if you are a msdn or technet subscriber, you now have access to the release candidate (rc) of windows 7. i suspect the download will be overloaded, but i know we are anticipating the huge demand.
if you do not subscribe, you can get your hands on win 7 on may 5.
i know that netbooks are all the buzz lately, but i still don’t get it. i had played with one for a day thinking that this might be an inexpensive was to travel lightly. i guess i am just not into small and underpowered (i almost made a reference to a certain comment often used on the office).
the machine could handle basic tasks, but i was not into waiting for those tasks to complete. it is smaller and lighter than most, but my voodoo envy is small, light, and able to run visual studio at a decent pace (not to mention it is dead sexy). it almost reminds me of when i was carrying around my little oqo (which i also hear is not doing that well). yes, it is small and light, but the tradeoffs are too much.
so for me, i still think the ultraportable is the better way to go. easier to type on and a screen big enough to actually get some real work done. i like the price range of netbooks, but i think i am willing to pay double for a machine that is more usable for more tasks.
i just took this pic from my condo in chicago. i was looking outside and after chatting it up with a good friend while i was at the office who was feeling a little down, i decided to share some happiness that comes with a beautiful day in the windy city.
i have to drag out one of my monkey suits for the chicago citylights awards gala this thursday. as much as i dread getting all dressed up, it should be a great night of networking. go register if you want to be part of what is going to be an amazing night.
if you have not already checked out deepzoompix.com, go check it out now. by now, most of you know about the coolness that is deep zoom built into silverlight (some of my favorite examples are hard rock and the playboy archive (it is playboy, so beware). but deepzoompix demonstrates the power of an open source .net library called jellyfish deep zoom developed by a japanaese partner, 2ndfactory (the site is in japanese) running on windows azure.
i am definitely going to be playing around with this sweet library. watch the mix video (and check out using sketchflow for “mooncake” at around 56:00… you’ll see what i mean) and then go get it off of codeplex.
i have had these books for months and they are still my favorite for just raw web design inspiration. i have been paging through the video sites one tonight and still amazed by what i did not know was out there.
sitting on my deck at my house in north royalton (suburb of cleveland, oh). there is nothing more peaceful than listening to the water from the creek on a beautiful morning.
now someone buy my friggin’ house!
after a long conversation with a bff on online direction, business, and life in general, i spent some time thinking about my blog and how it was all over the place. being an architect for microsoft in dpe (developer & platform evangelism), i tended to launch some posts that were heavy coding like my mesh video player, but i never really enjoyed doing that all the time (since i much rather be in front of an audience showing them in person). i then would sometimes swing to a more personal post like learning from the army where i talked about the discipline i learned that i have used my entire life. still no happy medium.
so now i am back with a vengeance (remember my post on how i hate blogging?). and with coming back brings with it a new bog engine, look and feel, and a whole new me. however, with the move, i purposely changed some things with my feed knowing i would need to alert all those feed readers that my feed changed… and it did. make sure you update your feed by clicking here or the link at the bottom or the link on the right sidebar.
this change in my content also happens to coincide with planning for our new fiscal year right around the corner (current one ends june 30). i have been planning how to bring social media to microsoft’s doorstep and yours in a way that makes sense (which will hopefully be revealed in a few weeks once i get done building, producing, designing, and developing my new online venture).
keep coming back to check up on how i am doing and give me a shout if you like the new format. ‘cuz i promise. it will be more me and less cowbell.
i just completed making a couple finishing touches to the blog. successfully moved over from graffiti to wordpress (although without a few minor hiccups). i spent some time fixing some character issues in the resulting blogml xml file export (thanks curt) and wordpress finally took it. yes!
i then chose a suitably decorative theme, modified it a little (ahhh… those good ol’ php days), found some clever plugins, made some dns changes, and was back in business in no time at all. you have to love modern technology.
now, with a whole new look comes a whole new me. stay tuned.
this weekend briangorbett.com may or nay not be available. i am preparing to move my blog engine over to wordpress from graffiti. since i have had a few questions on why i would be doing this, i figured i would give you my top 3 here (before my blog possibly gets smoked from the move).
now i am not abandoning graffiti entirely. one of my other projects is still running graffiti (which i will reveal soon) and i just finished up a simple theme for it.
the only challenge i have right now is that graffiti does not have an export feature. it has the ability to import, but not export. so i am modifying some code that curt put together to export from my sql server database to blogml. we will see how that goes.
next week when you return to briangorbett.com it will either have a new look and feel and all the same delicious content, or just a new look and feel with no content at all. i am hoping for the former of the two.
