Just a reminder that the IEEE Networking Forum is coming up on Thursday 30th July 2009.

In this economy, you want to give yourself the maximum exposure to recruiting companies as possible. The IEEE Networking Forum gives you a chance to talk to future employers and also get valuable information.

Students from all four major universities in Perth will be attending.

Head to http://www.ieeenetworkingforum.org for more info.

Something useful to all students…  $10,000.

Microsoft is running a treasure hunt, where you download IE8, look out for clues on Twitter to find $10,000 on the Net.

Applications have opened again for Microsoft Internships for the engineering roles SDE and SDET.

As posted often on WA MSP, Microsoft Internships are an awesome way to get a headstart in your career, while learning a bunch and having heaps of fun.

A Real World Experience like No Other.  As an intern at Microsoft, you’ll have real responsibility, real work, and real opportunities to jumpstart your career. (You’ll get paid, too!) It’s an experience you’ll never find in a classroom. You’ll be given manageable assignments that you can complete while you’re here, and your efforts will likely take shape in Microsoft products—or be used by Microsoft teams—long after you return to school. And imagine millions of customers, not to mention your classmates, seeing your work! Some interns even parlay their experience into a job offer.

An Opportunity to Shine. Our interns make a real difference. Not by filing paperwork or running errands, but by developing real products. Here, you’ll run your own projects and put your skills to work. This is why our internship program is one of the most successful in the industry. You’ll learn more in 12 weeks than you would in a whole school year. It’s the kind of work that gets noticed by millions of people all over the world. Kind of redefines the whole concept of internships, don’t you think?

More information and full details can be downloaded at AU Internship 2009

If interested, please send your resume by July 22 to: ausrec@microsoft.com

For a heads up on the Internship process you may also like to read my earlier post at http://www.wamsp.com.au/2008/09/how-to-get-a-microsoft-winter-internship-for-australian-students/

A little good news to brighten your exam-study filled days (’cause everyone is studying for exams now, right? right?) – Windows 7 will be released to manufacturing (i.e. the RTM version) during the second half of July and should hit general availability (i.e. the consumer market) on October 22 of this year!

Check out the Press Release and stay tuned for information on a Windows 7 countdown timer…

It’s rare to have a serious new entry into the search market that makes people sit and up and pay attention. Lately the only one that comes to mind is Wolfram Alpha, although they claim to be aiming at a niche search market rather than directly competing with the likes of Google.

Enter Bing – the new search engine from Microsoft which has now replaced live.com as the default for searching. Sporting not only a new interface and a catchy name (which Microsoft are hoping will become a verb) Bing will help you search the web smarter – allowing you to drill down to the information that you need as quickly as possible. Even though it’s only been around for a number of days it’s already garnered interesting support from the press – and surprisingly positive support from the likes of Steve Wozniak (Apple co-founder).

Can the good roll continue? We can only hope so!

We have posted often about Microsoft’s It’s Not Piracy offer for students, allowing us to get a completely full, legit copy of Office 2007 Ultimate for $75.00.

Making it an even better deal, when you purchase Office for $75 you go into the draw to win $5,000!

The competition ends June 30th, 2009 so get your copy of Office now to go into the draw!

Luke
Aussie MSP Lead
The University of Western Australia

Following on from the success of last year’s Imagine ‘08 event, the UWA MSPs will be running a similar session this semester.  We will be covering a host of topics, from Microsoft Internship opportunities (how to apply, how to succeed, and what the internship is like) to creating Mashups with MS Popfly, to examining the new Win7 Release Candidate (with plenty of installation DVDs to save you the download). The event will be held at:

4-5 pm Thursday May 14th

Weatherburn Lecture Theatre, UWA

Reservations are not required, we have plenty of seats for everybody. Be sure to come along, the event only goes for an hour, but could see you on your way to Seattle at the end of 2009, or in Egypt for the Imagine Cup Finals; the possibilities really are endless. We will also have prizes and drinks, for you lovers of free stuff.

See you there!

Question: Do you know what IDE stands for?
Question: Do you know what languages Visual Studio can use?
Question: Do you like free pizza?

If you answered yes to the last question, then this event is for you!

The Curtin MSP’s will be demoing off Visual Studio – showcasing its ability as an IDE and why it has become industry standard.

So, even if you think you already know everything there is to know about Visual Studio and IDE’s, come along anyway – there will be heaps of giveaways and FREE PIZZA.

For more information, either click the poster (left) or visit http://curtinvs.eventbrite.com/

- Daniel
Curtin MSP

Great summary of a bunch of awesome student programs.

The Power of Students to Change the World

Posted by Anthony Salcito
General Manager, U.S. Education

This week I traveled to Cambridge, Mass. for the U.S. finals of the Imagine Cup, a student competition sponsored by Microsoft that encourages students to apply  technology in creative ways to tackle real-world problems. This year’s competition specifically challenged students to use technology to achieve the U.N.’s Millennium Development Goals, which include fighting hunger and poverty, eradicating AIDS, improving education and advancing environmental sustainability.

Read the rest of this entry »

In case you’ve been living under a rock for the last few months, or your still reeling from the fact that Tesltra has killed off its home ISDN plans (don’t laugh – I was still using ISDN until the beginning of this year), you probably would have noticed that Microsoft has been busy at work preparing the next generation of client, server and development software that they are so famous for.

As a quick recap, these are the betas\CTP’s that are making news:

• Windows 7 RC
• Server 2008 R2 RC (<- Site is up, and linked to form the Server 2008 home page, but no download likely until tomorrow)
• Exchange 2010 Beta
• Visual Studio 2010\.NET 4 CTP
• Windows Azure
• Live Mesh Beta
• Office 2010 (No beta\CTP available yet…)

So, the question you probably asking is "Why should I care? Why should I spend my time looking at this stuff when it isn’t even finished yet?". The answer to that is simple…

Consider: most of the people reading this blog are students interested in technology and, most likely, Microsoft technology. Most of the betas above are likely to be ready, deployed and industry standard by mid to late 2010. By which time you should have either graduated or be close to it. This means that you’re going to be looking for a job that involves the final versions of there products (on that note, open Microsoft Students to Business in a new tab and register after reading the rest of this blog). At the point where you are in the interview where your potential employer asks "How much do you know about Program X Version Y" how much better will it appear when you can honestly say that you have not only been using "Program X" but you have been running "Program X Version Y Beta" for the last few years and helped submit a number of bugs which were then fixed. Not only does it show that you have a few years experience with the program, but also the fact that you participated in a beta program indicates that you enjoy learning and experimenting and that you aren’t afraid to do some testing and go the extra mile.

Other than that, there is nothing more enjoyable then playing with (and breaking) pre-release software…

- Daniel
Curtin MSP

Fallen behind on your Windows 7 news? Or wondering where to go to hear the latest from key Windows Engineers and IT Professionals on their opinions and insights into the next version of Windows? Perhaps you have something to say to the guys building Windows 7?

Either way, take some time to check out http://talkingaboutwindows.com/ – here you’ll find videos portraying all aspects of the Windows 7 development and the Industry’s response to it. Not only this, but below each video is a comment section where, unlike watching the same video on YouTube, you are likely to get a response from Microsoft.

(As a side note, its also a pretty cool demonstration of the power of Silverlight)

- Daniel
Curtin MSP

Following on from Luke’s previous post here’s another update that will get your inbox up and running super fast, even before Office 2007 SP2 is released.

Got a large inbox? Lots of emails clogging up the system? Grab the February Cumulative Update which includes massive speed improvements for people with large PSTs. You can either grab it today via the link below or wait for Office 2007 SP2  (which should be coming next week, April 28th):

The Update
FAQ About the Update from the Outlook Team

Something I found useful during my time at Microsoft was the Microsoft Outlook Thread Compressor which is basically like conversation view for Outlook. It was only internal when I was there, but has now been released to the web!

Channel10 is reporting:

An internally used tool at Microsoft called the Microsoft Outlook Thread Compressor has by finally made available to the general public by its creator, Ewan Dalton. The Thread Compressor (or “TC” for short) is an add-in for Outlook 2000/XP/2003/2007 which removes unnecessary emails from your inbox. The tool basically looks at the body of your email and removes those that have redundant data. This is most useful when you’re dealing with a long chain of emails and replies – such as those found in discussion lists. You see, in those cases, the person replying often leaves the body of the email to which they’re replying intact. Since each new email on the thread includes the entire conversation history, there’s no need to have every individual email saved. And by deleting the ones you don’t need, you can save a ton of space in your inbox and archives.

Since the tool was originally built back in 1999, it may look a little…uhhh…retro by modern standards, but don’t let the appearance fool you – this may easily be the most useful Outlook plugin you’ve installed in a long time.

Of course, anyone choosing to use the tool must do so at their own risk because – be warned! – it does delete email. That’s its purpose. For that reason alone, the legal department at Microsoft was hesitant about it being released to the public.

Note that Microsoft does not support the tool nor can they be held responsible for what it does.

That said, you can get the Microsoft Outlook Thread Compressor for free from here: http://threadcompressor.co.uk/default.aspx. You’ll find installation instructions and more information on that site, too.

Luke
Aussie MSP Lead
The University of Western Australia

If you are interested in a career in IT, then make sure you check out this free Live Meeting.

[ Are you graduating soon? And don’t know what to expect from your IT career? ]

We can help! 

The Microsoft Students to Business program together with Excom Education

Bring you the opportunity to clarify this and many questions you might have

Just join our Live Meeting session, this Thursday 23th of April at

12 pm Singapore, Malaysia and Philippines

11 am Indonesia

2 pm (EST) Australia

4 pm (NZST) New Zealand

To join just click on the link bellow

Join the meeting

AUDIO INFORMATION

Computer Audio

To use computer audio, you need speakers and a microphone, or a headset.

Telephone Conferencing

Choose one of the following:

· Start the Office Live Meeting client, and then in the Voice & Video pane, click Join Conference.  The conferencing service will call you at the number you specify. (Recommended)

· Dial the conferencing service directly, and enter the participant code shown below:
Australia: 1800202713

Malaysia: +12034808000

New Zealand: 0800448997

Philippines: +6328608611

Singapore +6568888008

Indonesia: +8134574
Participant Code:                        2758513

FIRST-TIME USERS

To save time before the meeting, check your system to make sure it is ready to use Office Live Meeting.

TROUBLESHOOTING

Unable to join the meeting?  Follow these steps:

            1.         Copy this address and paste into your web browser:

https://www112.livemeeting.com/cc/_XML/microsoft/join

            2.         Copy and paste the required information:

                        Meeting ID: 29JJ8P

                        Entry Code: S~[x38<&F

                        Location: https://www112.livemeeting.com/cc/_XML/microsoft

If you still cannot enter the meeting, contact support.

NOTICE

Office Live Meeting can be used to record meetings. By participating in this meeting, you agree that your communications may be monitored or recorded at any time during the meeting.

By attending to this conference you will qualify for a chance to receive a complimentary copy of Microsoft Office Professional 2007. (1 participant will be randomly selected*)

Want to know more about S2B? register today!

Any questions please contact s2bapac@microsoft.com

One of the benefits of being a Microsoft Student Partner is that we get access to free Microsoft Certification Exam Vouchers for ourselves and to give away. Additionally Microsoft announced recently free technical exam vouchers for students through the DreamSpark program.

I thought I might as well work on my MCPD as .NET is one of my primary tools I use to write software.

I got myself a copy of Microsoft .NET Framework – Application Developer Foundation which is part of the self-paced training kit for the MCTS Exam 70-536.

At 794 pages this book is pretty huge. I was kind of overwhelmed at first. However when I started self-studying I found each chapter is broken down into bite-sized lessons. Each lesson is generally specified for about 40 mins, but I found I could read the lesson, and do the included exercise in about half that time. This was great for me, where often I’d only have 20-30 mins here and there to spend on this, and I could easily start a lesson knowing I could finish it off in the time I had free between other stuff I was doing.

The book itself has 16 chapters (listed below) on the fundamentals of the Microsoft .NET Framework. Although it says it expects the reader to have some experience, I found it explained well enough for even newer developers to understand.

Every lesson is followed by both a summary and a small multi-choice lesson review, which is great as we know the key to learning is repetition. Additionally each chapter also gives a summary and a review, along with case scenarios and suggested practices.

Like most Microsoft Press books, this book also comes with a companion CD. This includes practice tests and exam questions from each chapter. One thing I found on the CD was an included PDF of the entire book! This was great for downloading to my phone and notebook and being able to read a lesson when I had a spare 10 mins.

A couple of things I found useful were:

• The small lesson sizes
• “Real World” examples and best practices
• The integration of lessons and exam objectives
• Mini labs

Microsoft also provides resources for universities to teach Microsoft Certification through the IT Academy program. This would allow you to learn through some structured program at your university.

For the rest of us, the self-study training kits are a more cost-effective approach than a third party institution, which for me as a student is not really a feasible choice. But the book provided everything I need to pass the exam.

You can get a copy of this book at www.mspress.com.au.

I also have a copy of Microsoft .NET Framework – Application Developer Foundation to give away to a UWA Student, along with a second-shot exam voucher. To enter, please leave any comment below, and I will randomly draw a winner within the next week. Please use your @student.uwa.edu.au E-mail address in the comment.

Luke
Aussie MSP Lead
The University of Western Australia