Xbox 360 with 3 Quarter Red Ring of Death + Best Buy PRP + Geek Squad = New Xbox 360 with No Data Loss

Last week, after a year and a half of almost constant Call of Duty and Halo gameplay, my Xbox 360 finally bit the dust. For a few weeks leading up to the 3 RRoD incident, when I would go to start a new Call of Duty: World at War Nazi Zombies match, it would [...]

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MCPD: Web Developer

Last month I completed the final exam in the .NET Framework 2.0 Web Developer series to achieve the MCPD. Check my About page to see a list of my current certifications.

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MCTS: .NET Framework 2.0 Web Applications

This week I completed the second of two exams to achieve the MCTS: .NET Framework 2.0 Web Applications certification. This is just one step toward the MCPD: EA certification. Check my About page to see a list of my current certifications.

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SharePoint Guidance: Released

Microsoft patterns & practices SharePoint Guidance has been released to MSDN!
http://www.microsoft.com/spg
Updated: SharePoint Guidance 1.0 – Nov 2008
Here are a few of the topics you will find inside:

Architectural decisions about patterns, feature factoring, and packaging
Design tradeoffs for decisions many developers encounter, such as whether to use SharePoint lists or a database to store information
Implementation examples that [...]

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Service Level Dashboard for System Center Operations Manager 2007

Earlier this year I worked on a project with the Microsoft Solution Accelerator Team to develop what was released as the Service Level Dashboard for System Center Operations Manager 2007.
The dashboard is a report that is installed into Operations Manager 2007 and is used to display availability and performance metrics related to SLA thresholds set [...]

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MCTS: WSS 3.0 – Application Development

Last Saturday I was able to pass the 70-541 exam to earn the MCTS: Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0: Application Development certification. Not only will I be working on my MCPD certification this year, but also the WSS/MOSS certifications. Check my About page to see a list of my current certifications.

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New Xbox Live Gamertag

I updated my Xbox Live gamertag tonight from “alex00110101″ to “NewGuid”, something a little more… globally… unique…
Appending binary to my name didn’t really gel with all of those non-technical folks out there. Hmmm… I guess they won’t be very familiar with the whole Guid concept either… oh well… at least it’s easier to tell people.

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SharePoint Guidance: Second Release

The second release of SharePoint Guidance from the Microsoft Patterns & Practices SharePoint Guidance team is now published on Codeplex at http://www.codeplex.com/spg.
Updates included in this release:

Refactor code to leverage MVP pattern where applicable.
Refactor SPList-related SharePoint code with the Repository Pattern.
Unit tests for manager and presenter classes using TypeMock.
And much more…

Disclaimer: This will evolve (and change) significantly. At [...]

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SharePoint Guidance: First Release

The first release of SharePoint Guidance from the Microsoft Patterns & Practices SharePoint Guidance team is now published on Codeplex at http://www.codeplex.com/spg.
Disclaimer: This will evolve (and change) significantly. At this stage the RI provides a basic set of WSS features with accompanying guidance. This is not a CTP or a BETA.
Stay tuned for new releases about every [...]

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SharePoint Guidance: Intro

Recently I started a new project with one of the teams in the Microsoft Patterns & Practices group in Redmond, Wa. For this project our team will provide guidance materials and a reference implementation. We are aiming to help SharePoint developers overcome some of the more difficult aspects of SharePoint development as well as help new developers with [...]

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