31 de janeiro de 2006

Microsoft junta equipas de Exchange e RTC

A Microsoft anunciou ontem num comunicado que as equipas de Exchange e de Real-Time Collaboration (RTC) serão fundidas, dando lugar ao Unified Communications Group (UCG).
Segundo o gigante informático, esta fusão não terá qualquer impacto nos produtos presentemente em desenvolvimento, nomeadamente o Exchange "12".
Links relacionados:

27 de janeiro de 2006

Leitura de fim-de-semana

Mais uma semana, mais um exame feito (o 70-298, que me conferiu a especialização MCSE:Security), mais uma lista:

Os 12 prevaricadores de 2005

Os Estados Unidos voltam a liderar a lista dos países responsáveis pelo envio da maior quantidade de correio não solicitado, apesar de terem baixado significativamente a sua quota (no ano passado era cerca de 42%). Eis a lista completa da "dirty dozen", segundo um relatório da SOPHOS:

  1. United States
  2. China (incl Hong Kong)
  3. South Korea
  4. France
  5. Canada
  6. Brazil
  7. Spain
  8. Austria
  9. Taiwan
  10. Poland
  11. Japan
  12. Germany

24,5% 22,3% 9,7%
5,0%
3,0%
2,6%
2,5%
2,4%
2,1%
2,0%
2,0%
1,8%
Others 20,3%

20 de janeiro de 2006

Leitura de fim-de-semana

Nota pessoal: realizei hoje o exame da Microsoft 70-299 e passei :-)
E agora, a lista, desta vez a tempo e horas:

Webcasts de messaging em Fevereiro

Aqui vos deixo um re-post da informação recolhida no blog da Eileen Brown:

TechNet Webcast: Planning a Migration from Lotus Domino to the Microsoft Collaboration Platform (Level 300)
Thursday, February 16, 2006 - 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM Pacific Time
Edward Wu, Product Manager, Microsoft Corporation
This webcast presents a technical strategy for planning a migration from the IBM Lotus Domino application to the Microsoft collaboration platform. We present the latest information and demonstrate the new Microsoft Application Analyzer 2006 for Lotus Domino. Join us to get new guidance, including information about application categorization, migration and coexistence options, and pre-migration steps that can help your migration go more smoothly.

TechNet Webcast: Exchange 2003 Disaster Recovery Processes: Strategies and Considerations (Level 200)
Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - 9:30 AM - 10:30 AM Pacific Time
Brett Johnson, Technical Specialist, Messaging, Microsoft Corporation
What would happen if a hardware failure destroyed all of your vital data? Is your current recovery plan and knowledge of disaster recovery processes strong enough to recover the lost data? To make sure you are ready, join this webcast to review or establish a disaster recovery strategy for your Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 organization. Learn about ideal server configuration and best management practices. We also take a close look at disaster recovery for Microsoft Active Directory.

TechNet Webcast: Using InfoPath with Lotus Notes and Lotus Domino (Level 200)
Thursday, February 23, 2006 - 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM Pacific Time
Gary Devendorf, Technical Evangelist, Microsoft Corporation
Using Microsoft Office InfoPath, information workers can collect, present, edit, and publish data. XML is at the heart of InfoPath and gives it versatility. What you may not know is that many of the features of InfoPath enable it to work with IBM Lotus Notes and IBM Lotus Domino interfaces. Some methods for getting InfoPath to work with these Lotus products require no code, while others require a little. Join this webcast to learn how InfoPath works with Lotus Notes and Lotus Domino.

MSDN Webcast: Get Started with Visual Studio 2005 for the Lotus Notes Developer (Level 200)
Thursday, February 02, 2006 - 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM Pacific Time
Gary Devendorf, Technical Evangelist, Microsoft Corporation
Join this webcast to learn how to perform basic tasks in Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2005, the newest version of the Microsoft .NET development system. Like IBM Lotus Domino Designer, Visual Studio .NET 2005 is a development system for IBM Lotus Notes and IBM Lotus Domino. We will compare how to perform basic tasks in each product. If you have ever written LotusScript, then you will be ready to write Microsoft Visual Basic .NET by the end of this webcast.

MSDN Webcast: Using ADO.NET with Your Lotus Notes Applications (Level 400)
Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM Pacific Time
Gary Devendorf, Technical Evangelist, Microsoft Corporation
ADO.NET is the standard method for Microsoft Visual Studio .NET applications to interact with data sources such as Microsoft SQL Server, the IBM DB2 Universal Database, and Oracle. Did you know that you can use the same standard method to access IBM Lotus Notes data? By separating the data interface from the data, you can change your data source without rewriting your client applications. In this webcast, we demonstrate this technique using a code example of ADO.NET and Lotus Notes.

Momentum Webcast: Secure Messaging: Defense in Depth (Level 100)
Thursday, February 16, 2006 – 11:00 AM-12:00 PM Pacific Time
Forrest Hobbs, Director of Sales & Market Development, Microsoft Corporation
Join this webcast to learn about the new Microsoft multilayered strategy for secure e-mail. The recent acquisition of both Sybari and FrontBridge demonstrate the Microsoft commitment to bringing greater security to your e-mail environment and ensuring that you have a choice in how these solutions are delivered. By using the managed services of FrontBridge with Sybari and Microsoft Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server, you can have multilayered, secure e-mail, protecting inboxes from spam and viruses. This webcast covers three main topics: network edge protection, firewall protection, and internal antivirus protection against both external and internal threats.

Momentum Webcast: Information Management Features in Office Professional 2003 (Level 100)
Monday, February 20, 2006 – 9:00:00 AM-10:00:00 AM Pacific Time
Matt Berg, solutions specialist, Microsoft Corporation
Companies often collect a huge amount of potentially useful data, but without effective tools and processes, it can be tough to capitalize on the information buried deep within documents and databases. In this webcast, we explore the information management tools built into Microsoft Office 2003, including Microsoft Office InfoPath, XML, and information rights management (IRM). Tune in to find out how these tools and technologies can help improve the way your organization gathers, organizes, re-uses and protects its critical business information.

17 de janeiro de 2006

Push email com o SP2? Ainda não...

Com o lançamento recente do Service Pack 2 para o Exchange Server 2003, foi anunciado com toda a pompa e circunstância a nova funcionalidade de push email, ou seja, a sincronização automática dos dispositivos móveis com o servidor de correio electrónico. Na realidade o Exchange Server 2003 já disponibilizava esta funcionalidade, através do mecanismo Always-Up-To-Date (AUTD). Só que esta tecnologia tem alguns problemas e funciona através de um esquema complexo que utiliza mensagens SMS.
A Blackberry desde há algum tempo que já disponibiliza aos seus clientes um esquema eficiente de envio de mail para dispositivos móveis. Terá sido inclusivamente esta uma das razões para a Microsoft incluir o direct push email no SP2 e anunciá-lo tão efusivamente.
Só que para funcionar completamente, falta ainda uma peça do puzzle: o Messaging & Security Feature Pack. Resumindo, os requisitos são:

  • Exchange Server 2003 SP2
  • Dispositivos com o Windows Mobile 5.0
  • Dispositivos com o Messaging & Security Feature Pack

O problema é que este Feature Pack não se encontra ainda disponível e só será distribuído exclusivamente pelos fabricantes de telemóveis e PDA's. Chegará, com certeza, muito em breve às nossas mãos, mas por enquanto o direct push email da Microsoft é ainda uma miragem (mas acreditem que quando chegar, vai valer bem a pena).

Links relacionados:

Ferramentas de migração de Lotus/Domino

No seguimento da estratégia para ganhar clientes ao seu arqui-inimigo IBM, a Microsoft anunciou hoje um pacote de novas ferramentas de migração do ambiente aplicacional Lotus Notes/Domino para a plataforma colaborativa da Microsoft. Neste conjunto de ferramentas que estará disponível para download, incluem-se as seguintes:

  • Microsoft Application Analyzer 2006 for Lotus Domino
  • Microsoft Data Migrator 2006 for Lotus Domino
  • Novos Templates de Windows SharePoint Services
  • Actualizações de Ferramentas de Messaging e Coexistência
Links relacionados:

12 de janeiro de 2006

System Center Capacity Planner 2006 já disponível


System Center Capacity Planner 2006 é uma ferramenta muito útil que ajuda a planear uma arquitectura de Exchange Server 2003 ou MOM 2005 e está finalmente disponível através das subscrições TechNet.

"System Center Capacity Planner 2006 employs state of the art modeling technology to bring unprecedented functionality and flexibility to the process of performance analysis and planning of Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 and Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 deployments."

Num artigo recentemente publicado no site MSExchange.org, eu mencionei esta ferramenta:

11 de janeiro de 2006

Nova Beta do Exchange 12 em Março

De acordo com uma notícia avançada no blog do Harold Wong, uma nova versão Beta do Exchange 12 deverá vir incluída na subscrição de Março do TechNet Plus. Ainda de acordo com a mesma fonte, esta versão não será disponibilizada ao público em geral.

10 de janeiro de 2006

"Monad" Shell Beta 3

A Microsoft disponibilizou hoje a versão Beta 3 do Microsoft Shell, também conhecido por Monad ou MSH, que pretende ser a próxima geração de command-line e scripting do mundo Microsoft.
Esta versão está disponível para os ambientes x86 e x64 e tem como requisito a instalação do Microsoft .NET Framework Version 2.0 (x86, x64).
A versão definitiva deverá acompanhar o lançamento da próxima versão do Exchange, nome de código Exchange 12, o que deverá acontecer lá para o final deste ano ou início do próximo.
Aqui ficam alguns links sobre o tema:

Actualizações de segurança para Exchange e Outlook

A Microsoft disponibilizou hoje vários updates de segurança, entre os quais alguns para Exchange (5.0, 5.5 e 2000) e Outlook (2000, 2002 e 2003).
Estes patches pretendem corrigir uma vulnerabilidade descrita no buletim de segurança MS06-003: Vulnerability in TNEF Decoding in Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Exchange Could Allow Remote Code Execution (902412). Aqui ficam os links para os downloads:

6 de janeiro de 2006

Leitura de fim-de-semana

Vamos lá então à primeira lista de leitura do ano. Espero que todos tenham recuperado bem dos excessos inerentes às festividades.

[off-topic] Concurso Imagine Cup 2006


O Imagine Cup é o concurso internacional de tecnologia mais desafiante para Estudantes do ensino superior!
Sob o tema central ‘Imagine a world where technology enables us to live healthier lives!’ o Imagine Cup 2006 dá-lhe a oportunidade de contribuir activamente numa missão global para promover a saúde em todo o Mundo!
Tem 6 categorias distintas (Software Design, Algorithm, IT, Short Film, Visual Game, Interface Designer), com propostas diferenciadas e aliciantes e prémios fantásticos! … a todos os finalistas nacionais, todas as despesas serão pagas para participação na final mundial em Agosto 2006, Nova Deli, Índia … $25.000 para o vencedor mundial da categoria Software Design … $8.000 para os vencedores das restantes categorias.
Faça aqui o seu registo!

Spam: o crime não compensa

De acordo com uma notícia publicada no site Techworld, um homem da Florida foi multado em 11 mil milhões de dólares, após ter sido considerado culpado de envio massivo de correio comercial não solicitado (spam).
Ainda segundo a mesma notícia ficou provado em tribunal que o spammer enviou nada mais, nada menos do que 280 milhões de mensagens de spam.
É uma vitória para todos os utilizadores de correio electrónico e uma prova que, às vezes, o crime não compensa.

4 de janeiro de 2006

Live Mail Beta - o convite

Conforme noticei num post anterior, começou há uns meses os testes Beta do Windows Live Mail, a próxima evolução do serviço Hotmail.
Finalmente recebi o convite para participar nos testes e, até agora, o balanço é positivo. O novo look & feel é muito similar ao Outlook 2003, pelo que os utilizadores deste cliente de mail da Microsoft não vão ter quaisquer problemas de adaptação.
Resta a dúvida: o software servidor que suporta o serviço, será Exchange Server?

2 de janeiro de 2006

Webcasts de messaging em Janeiro

Lista de webcasts de messaging e colaboração em Janeiro, cortesia de Eileen Brown.

Microsoft Webcast: Empower People to Work Better Together with Microsoft Collaboration Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 9:30 AM - 10:30 AM Pacific Time
Jason Bunge, Senior Product Manager, Microsoft Corporation
Empowering individuals to work better together is critical to your organization’s success in today’s more connected, globally integrated world. Microsoft technologies help information workers communicate and collaborate across applications and devices by combining servers, services, and end user software. Join this webcast to learn how Microsoft technologies deliver business benefits such as presence awareness, collaborative workspaces, enterprise search, application integration, and more.

Microsoft Webcast: Cost-Effective and Flexible Team Collaboration Solutions
Tuesday, January 24, 2006 - 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM Pacific Time
Jason Bunge, Senior Product Manager, Microsoft Corporation
Effective teamwork is critical to the success of your business in areas like product development, human resources, and customer relationship management (CRM). However, keeping team members on the same page across time and distance can be a costly challenge. Team collaboration technologies like Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services and Microsoft Groove Virtual Office meet that challenge by providing a range of flexible, cost-effective solutions. For example, individuals in your organization can work better together with team workspaces and document-based collaboration. Join this webcast to hear the success stories that illustrate how the team collaboration technologies from Microsoft can benefit your business.

TechNet Webcast: Exchange 2003 Performance Tuning Tips and Techniques (Level 300)
Wednesday, January 18, 2006 - 9:30 AM - 11:00 AM Pacific Time
Michael J. Murphy, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation
Are you getting the best performance you can from Microsoft Exchange Server 2003? In this webcast, learn helpful performance tuning tips and techniques for Exchange Server 2003. We begin with a look at the tools available for monitoring Exchange performance. We then provide best practices, registry tweaks, and performance monitoring techniques based on extensive, real-world experiences with Exchange 2003.

TechNet Webcast: Using Third-Party Tools to Migrate Notes Databases to the Microsoft Collaboration Platform (Level 200)
Thursday, January 19, 2006 - 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM Pacific Time
Gary Devendorf, Technical Evangelist, Microsoft Corporation
Learn how you can migrate your Lotus Notes databases to the Microsoft collaboration platform, based on Microsoft SharePoint products and technologies, quickly and easily. This webcast introduces and demonstrates several tools offered by third-party providers that facilitate the migration from Lotus Notes to the collaboration platform from Microsoft.

TechNet Webcast: Exchange Best Practice Analyzer (ExBPA) (Level 200)
Friday, January 20, 2006 - 9:30 AM - 11:00 AM Pacific Time
Matt Hester, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation
The Microsoft Exchange Server Best Practices Analyzer Tool (ExBPA) is an automated health check and troubleshooting tool. ExBPA collects configuration settings and performs network and protocol tests in an Exchange topology. Join this webcast to learn about the new version of the tool that was released in March, 2005. We discuss enhancements such as scheduling and baseline support. See how to use ExBPA with Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) 2005. At the end of the presentation, we talk about future enhancements to the ExBPA tool.

MSDN Webcast: How to Write Microsoft ASP.NET Pages That Use IBM Lotus Domino (Level 400)
Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM Pacific Time
Gary Devendorf, Technical Evangelist, Microsoft Corporation
Many developers think that Microsoft ASP.NET pages and the Web capabilities of IBM Lotus Domino are competing technologies. However, by writing ASP.NET pages that use Lotus Domino functionality, you can create a better user experience. This webcast walks you through the steps of writing an ASP page that acts as an interface for Lotus Domino functionality. We will use Microsoft Visual Basic .NET and LotusScript. You can also run the demonstrations yourself if you have Microsoft Visual Studio .NET. The only prerequisite for this webcast is a basic understanding of code.

TechNet Webcast: Defense in Depth: Sybari Antigen Solutions for E-Mail Hygiene (Level 200)
Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 9:00 AM - 10:30 AM Pacific Time
Peter Eicher, Sr. Product Manager, Enterprise Access and Security Products, Microsoft Corporation
Now that 50% of all e-mail is spam and 85% of viruses use e-mail to propagate, comprehensive e-mail protection is critical for overall network integrity. This webcast presents defense-in-depth to strengthen e-mail—and thereby overall network—security. We describe the protection that Sybari Antigen Solutions offers from viruses, worms, and spam. We also discuss content protection technologies that you can combine to eliminate single points of failure and reduce the window of vulnerability for emerging threats. We also cover perimeter defense; layered elimination of unsolicited traffic; multi-engine, server-level threat detection, and incident containment. Learn how you can apply a defense-in-depth strategy to reduce infection rates and maximize performance in e-mail environments.

TechNet Webcast: Implementing Exchange Server 2003 Security (Part 1 of 2): Securing Services and Messaging Protocols (Level 200)
Monday, January 16, 2006 - 11:00 AM - 12:30 PM Pacific Time
Kevin Remde, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation
Securing communication over networks is essential to securing your organization from intrusions, overloads, and interruptions of many types. In this first webcast of a two-part series on Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 security, we describe how to deploy a more secure Exchange 2003 infrastructure and how to secure its server services and messaging protocols.

TechNet Webcast: How Microsoft IT Implements Exchange 2003 Anti-Spam Technologies (Level 300)
Tuesday, January 17, 2006 - 9:00 AM - 10:00 AM Pacific Time
Konstantin Ryvkin, Microsoft IT Group Manager, Microsoft Corporation Alexander Nikolayev, Microsoft Program Manager, Microsoft Corporation
Wouldn’t we all like to improve how we manage spam? This webcast presents how Microsoft does just that, providing an overview of anti-spam technology in Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 with Service Pack 2 (SP2) and how the Microsoft Information Technology (IT) department uses these technologies to help control spam. The webcast also provides a complete overview of the anti-spam technologies available in SP2 and explains how the department implements them. Join us to learn best practices, tips, and other useful information for getting the most from the anti-spam technologies in SP2. We conclude with a question and answer session.

TechNet Webcast: Implementing Exchange Server 2003 Security (Part 2 of 2): Protecting Against Unwanted E-Mail (Level 200)
Monday, January 23, 2006 - 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM Pacific Time
Kevin Remde, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation
This second webcast in a two-part series on Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 security describes how to increase the security of e-mail that flows through an organization's Exchange servers. We also introduce you to Exchange 2003 features such as Real Time Block List support and Intelligent Message Filtering, tools that make it easier to reduce the amount of unwanted e-mail before it spreads through your organization.

TechNet Webcast: Antivirus and Antispam Managed Services: When and How to Outsource E-mail Hygiene (Level 200)
Thursday, January 26, 2006 - 11:00 AM - 12:30 PM Pacific Time
Forrest Hobbs, Senior Technology Specialist, Microsoft Corporation
Touted by many as a key component for the future of e-mail security, outsourced messaging protection has become the solution of choice for a number of informed information technology (IT) administrators and service providers. This webcast presents how outsourced e-mail security services provide enterprise antispam and antivirus protection and detail the benefits of such services in terms of cost, efficiency, security, policy enablement, and archiving. We also provide a checklist of considerations that you can use to decide when and how to outsource e-mail hygiene in a wide range of different business scenarios.

TechNet Webcast: Implementing Messaging Security for Exchange Clients (Level 200)
Monday, January 30, 2006 - 9:00 AM - 10:30 AM Pacific Time
Harold Wong, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation
To ensure that e-mail messages can be read only by the intended recipients, it is as important to provide security for the clients of Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 as it is to secure the server itself. This webcast describes solutions such as using Microsoft Exchange Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Service Extensions (S/MIME) and information rights management to protect e-mail content. We also discuss using remote procedure call (RPC) over Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) to help secure client connections to Exchange Server 2003 over the Internet. We conclude with a look at controlling access to e-mail attachments and show how to manage and secure Microsoft Outlook Web Access.

TechNet Webcast: Enabling Secure Remote Access to Exchange Server 2003 (Level 200)
Tuesday, January 31, 2006 - 9:00 AM - 10:30 AM Pacific Time
Tom Bartlett, ISA Solution Specialist, Microsoft Corporation
As operations become increasingly decentralized and working practices evolve to better suit market demographics, the need for efficient remote access has become increasingly prevalent. In this webcast, we outline best practices for securing Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 to ensure that network management, policy, and security are not compromised by remote e-mail access. The discussion covers a wide range of topics, such as faster Exchange publishing, more secure remote access, e-mail hygiene considerations, efficient bandwidth management, and enhanced Microsoft Outlook Web Access security. This webcast offers the knowledge you need to provide remote users with efficient, secure, and well-managed access to Exchange.

TechNet Webcast: Connecting Windows Workflow Foundations to Lotus Notes/Lotus Domino (Level 400)
Thursday, January 12, 2006 - 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM Pacific Time
Marc Mercuri, Architect Evangelist, Microsoft CorporationGary Devendorf, Technical Evangelist, Microsoft Corporation
Microsoft Windows Workflow Foundations is an exciting new technology from Microsoft. IBM Lotus Notes/IBM Lotus Domino has been building on the concept of workflow for a long time. Luckily, both systems have standard interfaces that allow them to interoperate. This webcast shows you how to connect a Windows Workflow Foundation workflow with a Lotus Notes/Lotus Domino workflow, including a look at the code that makes the connection.

TechNet Webcast: Integrating Microsoft Products with Web Services in Lotus Domino 7 (Level 300)
Tuesday, January 17, 2006 - 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM Pacific Time
Gary Devendorf, Technical Evangelist, Microsoft Corporation
IBM Lotus Domino 7 now includes Web services that provide a native way to create and host a Web service on a Domino server. This webcast explains how you can write a LotusScript Web service and call it from Microsoft Visual Studio .NET by using a few lines of code that you wrote in Microsoft Visual Basic .NET. If you are interested in simple steps that you can take to make your IBM Lotus Notes applications more powerful, join this webcast.

TechNet Webcast: Exchange Server 2003 Tips, Tricks, and Shortcuts (Level 200)
Wednesday, January 25, 2006 - 9:30 AM - 11:00 AM Pacific Time
Harold Wong, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation
Your organization is running Microsoft Exchange Server 2003, and it is stable. What can you do to improve your Exchange operations, customize them, and optimize them to better meet the requirements of your organization? This webcast provides tips on how to customize system messages, address lists, and Microsoft Office Outlook Web Access. We also explain how to control which versions of Microsoft Outlook are allowed to connect to the Exchange server, how to use Mailbox Manager, and how to create catch-all mailboxes.

TechNet Webcast: Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 for Exchange Deployments (Level 200)
Friday, January 27, 2006 - 9:30 AM - 11:00 AM Pacific Time
Keith Combs, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation
In this webcast, we explore the Microsoft Exchange 2003 Management Pack for Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) 2005 and show how it can help your organization proactively identify problems. We discuss the monitoring capabilities provided by this management pack and demonstrate how they can help you to identify problems and quickly solve them. We also examine the reporting capabilities provided by this management pack and explain how they can help you avoid problems.

Microsoft Office System Webcast: Tips and Tricks for More Secure Communication with Outlook 2003 (Level 100)
Thursday, January 12, 2006 – 9:00 AM-10:00 AM Pacific Time
Andrew Reed, Senior Training Specialist, Pacific Technical Consulting (PTC)
Learn the fundamentals of security, auditing, privacy, and protection with Microsoft Office Outlook 2003. Find out how to choose more secure passwords, create profiles, limit viruses and junk e-mail exposure, create more secure attachments, and incorporate encryption and digital signatures into your e-mail. This webcast shows how you can reduce vulnerabilities and enhance reliable communication within and outside your organization by implementing Outlook 2003 in combination with Microsoft Exchange Server. This webcast illustrates these techniques through demonstrations that represent typical interactions between employees and their team.