Knowledge Matters

Phil Wheat's Blog on all manner of items.

Posts Tagged Software/Tech

The revolution will be printed

Jan 25

Posted by PhilWheat in Coding Outside The Box, Software/Tech | No Comments

This past week, for me the big news in consumer electronics wasn’t what you probably thought.  The big names all were all talking mobility of one fashion or another, but one of the companies that can make a claim to bringing printers into the home is now applying that same talent to 3d Printers.  Yep, that’s right HP is now working with Stratasys to bring 3d printing to a much wider array of people.  This has huge potential for localsourcing manufacturing and changing how economics work in quite a number of markets.

http://www.shapeways.com/blog/archives/357-Stratasys-and-HP-join-forces-to-make-3D-printers.html

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Recruiting and skills

Jan 19

Posted by PhilWheat in Software/Tech | No Comments

Talking with so many people in the community, a subject that comes up often is that of “How do I find good people?”  I’ve actually been doing some education with those looking to staff up their projects or organizations (see my “I need a SharePoint Guy” slides on slideshare.

So it comes as no shock the post Catrina Fake (co-Founder of Flickr) just made about the challenges of finding the right people.  But her take is somewhat different than many of the staffers I’ve talked to.  Her view is that finding good engineers isn’t as hard as some might claim, but it’s the finding of the cross disciplined engineer that’s the difficult task.

So for those of you out there looking to make a move, check out the things that she mentioned and consider adding something besides that next level of recursive optimizations to your resume.  Check out a user group on a subject you’re not familiar with.  Try out a role you haven’t done before.  Take on a task that you have been avoiding because it’s just “not in my job description.”  It might just pay off – with both better job offers and a better understanding of the whole software/tech industry.

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Windows At Work

Jan 18

Posted by PhilWheat in Software/Tech | No Comments

I normally don’t post contest links, but this one is for a fully loaded HP TouchSmart TX2 (if you’ve seen me around, that’s the one I’m using) so I thought I’d better get the word out.  It’s a simple contest and one that can help out with your visibility or just give you an excuse to try something new, so again – I figured why not?

So what is it?  All you need to do is write up a article for Code Project targeted for a Windows 7 client project that you have done.  It’s that simple.  The details are at http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9702416 – but it’s a great chance to get your name out as someone who’s up on the platform, a credit for your articles list, and a chance to win a really great laptop.  And when you submit your article, leave a comment with a link to it, I’d love to see what everyone is doing!

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Zune Power User Tips

Jan 15

Posted by PhilWheat in Software/Tech | No Comments

This started out as a not for myself, but since it was so useful, I thought I’d pass it on.  I’ve been finding some really neat new features that slipped in on the Zune 4.0 or even the 3.0 update that I missed.

http://forums.zune.net/513727/ShowPost.aspx

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John Weston’s TechNet Radio program is on air again.

Jan 4

Posted by PhilWheat in Software/Tech | No Comments

John just let me know that he’s just re-launched his TechNet radio program today with an interview with Deborah Lovell – AITP president. 

You can find his relaunch show at http://edge.technet.com/Media/TechNet-Radio-Community-Corner-with-John-Weston-Episode-1/ and keep an eye out for follow up shows at http://blogs.technet.com/jweston/default.aspx

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Smart for Who? Connected Devices and You SxSW Interactive Session

Sep 2

Posted by PhilWheat in Architecture, Coding Outside The Box, Events | No Comments

In the spirit of completeness, I wanted to make a few comments about my other session I submitted for SxSWi- “Smart for Who?”  This session really came out of looking around my office and working spaces and really noting not only how connected all those “impulse electronics” and “entertainment devices” have become, but how little most people consider what their full capabilities and purposes are.  As we’ve seen in the history of PC’s the best capabilities have come with networking and larger connectivity between systems, but that increase has also been paced by an increase in vulnerability and exposure to those connections being done with malice.

So as we connect more and more devices that we use every day not only to each other, but to the internet at large, we need to be aware of what’s going on between those.  PVR’s often report back not just what shows you watched, but how many times you rewound that halftime commercial or act.  The old days of “tracing a call” have become a Hollywood gimmick – the number is available even before the connection is made, and the call itself can be real time transcribed to text.  Your printer is network connected, and most embed unique numbers in ever item printed, your security system knows when you’re home and when you’re gone.  And they’re all able to talk with each other.

This session will be about how much control we have over this – how much is black helicopters and how much is actual productivity enhancement and personal customization that I WANT to be done.  Do I want my bedside alarm clock to check my schedule and know that it doesn’t have to wake me quite so early tomorrow morning because my first meeting got cancelled overnight?  Do I want the world to know I’ve put my house on power save mode because I’m going to be in Chicago for a couple of days?  The Yin and Yang of connectivity is that Identity, Privacy, and Security are key – and we’re having to find new ways of making those concepts easy enough that you don’t have to read another 300 page manual just to use your new remote control or VOIP phone!

If this sounds like something you would be interesting in hearing about, either at SxSWi or in the community after SxSW – please “Thumbs Up” my session either above on the link or below!

Vote for my PanelPicker idea!

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Arch Reactor forms a Hacker Space in St Louis.

Aug 13

Posted by PhilWheat in Events, Software/Tech | No Comments

I can’t let St Louis get too far ahead of us!  Looks like I need to get more involved in the Austin Hacker Space movement!

http://archreactor.org/

Looks like their first meeting is next week.

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A nice, detailed analysis of the Office 2010 NDA coverage to date

Jul 27

Posted by PhilWheat in Software/Tech | No Comments

SharePoint Joel (http://www.sharepointjoel.com/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?List=0cd1a63d%2D183c%2D4fc2%2D8320%2Dba5369008acb&ID=243) has a very nice summary of the current state of Office 2010 and SharePoint discussion points that are covered by and released from the current NDA’s.  If you’re looking to blog or present on the new features – take a quick read through the post above.

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Real-time surround air traffic control

Jul 3

Posted by PhilWheat in Software/Tech | No Comments

I want!  http://nevver.tumblr.com/post/128929601/realtime-3d-airtraffic-fubiz  Of course I mean the display hardware mostly.  The controls seem like they could be refined a bit more.

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Private Cloud Architecture to be discussed at Worldwide Partner Conference in July

Jun 25

Posted by PhilWheat in Architecture, Coding Outside The Box, Events | No Comments

It’s been up a couple of days, but I just saw a tweet fly past about it.  If you check out session CI011 on the session track (https://www.mspartnerconference.com/public/sessionlist.aspx?keyword=CI011) you’ll see that there’s some great information about the Infrastructure strategy behind Microsoft’s cloud computing.  We expected to see a good bit about that, but there’s also a nice little spot in the end of the session description – “and the Dynamic Datacenter Toolkit for Enterprises (available Q4 CY 2009) that enables building the foundation for a Private cloud.”

Hmmm, I need to try a lot harder to get to the conference – it isn’t that far away!

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