Developer's Shelf By Rupak Ganguly

The Mohave Experiment: our pre-conceived ideas gets the worst out in us...

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 18:54:00 +0000

http://www.mojaveexperiment.com/ - let the first video play and watch it. It is just 1 minute video. It sums it all up. Very nice.

Technorati Tags: Vista

Silverlight 2 Tools Beta 2 For Visual Studio 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 21:13:00 +0000

Microsoft just recently released Silverlight 2 Beta 2 today. They also released the Expression 2 Suite of tools and the Expression Blend 2.5 June 2008 Preview that works with Silverlight 2 Beta 2 release. These are truly exciting technologies that help us to create stunning RIA web applications.

As I had mentioned in my earlier post when Silverlight 2 Beta 1 was released, the setup process has been simplified a lot. Just download one file and it takes care of all. So if you are interested, go ahead and download the Microsoft Silverlight Tools Beta 2 for Visual Studio 2008. NOTE: However as mentioned at the top of the download page, it is important to manually uninstall KB949325 (installed as part of Silverlight Tools Beta 1) before installing Silverlight Tools Beta 2. The VS 2008 Tools for Silverlight download works with both VS 2008 and the recent VS 2008 SP1 Beta release.

The installation actually takes care of everything that is required and installs the following:

Silverlight 2 Beta 2
Silverlight 2 SDK Beta 2
KB950630 for Visual Studio 2008 RTM or KB950632 for Visual Studio 2008 SP1 Beta
Silverlight Tools Beta 2 for Visual Studio 2008

Silverlight Tools Beta 2 for Visual Studio 2008 includes:

Visual Basic and C# Project templates
Intellisense and code generators for XAML
Debugging of Silverlight applications
Web reference support
WCF Templates
Team Build and command line build support
Integration with Expression Blend
Enhanced Setup with upgrade support

To get details about the new features and improvements check out the excellent blog post by Scott Guthrie.

Technorati Tags: Visual Studio 2008,Silverlight,Silverlight 2,Expression Studio,Expression Blend,Microsoft,RIA

Problem loading IIS7 hosted WAP projects in VS 2005 after installing Vista SP1

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Thu, 01 May 2008 21:18:00 +0000

After Vista SP1 got released, I was excited as it was very promising and wrote about it that every Vista user should get it. Now before I start with the problem it is important to understand my environment prior to installing Vista SP1:

Vista Enterprise RTM
IIS 7
Visual Studio 2005
Visual Studio 2008

It is also important to note that I work with WAP projects which are configured to be hosted on IIS7 and NOT the ASP.NET Development server.

Now, I installed Vista SP1 and it went without any hitch despite a lot of pain that people have expressed on the forums.

Next, I opened my WAP project in VS 2005 and the project would not load. It showed the dreadful 'Unavailable' status. I right-clicked on the project file and chose to edit the project file. I went down the file and changed the highlighted property to False.

<ProjectExtensions>
    <VisualStudio>
      <FlavorProperties GUID="{349c5851-65df-11da-9384-00065b846f21}">
        <WebProjectProperties>
          <UseIIS>True</UseIIS> ---> Changed to False
          <AutoAssignPort>True</AutoAssignPort>
          <DevelopmentServerPort>60528</DevelopmentServerPort>
          <DevelopmentServerVPath>/</DevelopmentServerVPath>
          <IISUrl>http://localhost/Cronus</IISUrl>
          <NTLMAuthentication>False</NTLMAuthentication>
        </WebProjectProperties>
      </FlavorProperties>
    </VisualStudio>
</ProjectExtensions

Well that made me load my project in VS, but now it was not hosted in IIS 7. That is where the whole problem started.

If I tried to change the project to be hosted on IIS 7 via the project properties in VS, I would get the following error:

I tried a lot of stuff and googled a lot but could not find anything relevant. So, I shamelessly emailed Scott Guthrie, who has helped me in the past. He sent me a reply the next day (that is pretty quick for a guy so high in ranks in Microsoft):

Can you check out the steps in this article to see if they help: http://learn.iis.net/page.aspx/431/using-visual-studio-2005-with-iis-70/

Well, I read the article and in gist the article suggested to install the “IIS Metabase and IIS 6 configuration compatibility” component. The following screenshot from the above article describes what should be in place:

Now, I had a lead to follow. I checked on the “IIS Metabase and IIS 6 configuration compatibility” checkbox and Windows installed stuff or atleast it seemed so... But. alas, after a minute or two it errored out with the following message:

After I clicked OK, Windows still wanted me to Restart and I did. It showed messages that it was configuring updates and the machine came back. I went back to the Windows features window, and the “IIS Metabase and IIS 6 configuration compatibility” checkbox was now "unchecked". I thought I will try again but I got the same result. Now, I was stuck again. I replied to Scott's email with the above explanations. He forwarded the message to some of his colleagues at MS looking for a resolution. Greatly appreciate the effort, Scott.

While I waited, I searched again, and now for the failed “IIS Metabase and IIS 6 configuration compatibility” component. As luck would have it, I found an article by "bluemanifold" at http://forums.iis.net/p/1148581/1866381.aspx#1866381 (see the last post) that solved my problem. Here is the clear instructions from the article:

Hurrah! After goodness know how many fruitless hours, I have managed to enable IIS6 compatibility. For anyone else who happens to become trapped in this mess, here is the solution:

Enable the built-in Administrator account:

From Start menu, run cmd as administrator.

At prompt, type net user administrator /active:yes

Exit, log off and log in using the now-visible Administrator account.

Open Explorer and make sure that hidden files/directories are visible.

Navigate to C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Crypto\RSA\MachineKeys.

Set the permissions on the directory as follows:

Right-click on MachineKeys directory, select Properties and then select the Security tab.

Click Advanced, select the Permissions tab and click Edit.

Click Add and add the following object names: Administrators and SYSTEM. Give then full permission and make sure the 'Include inheritable permissions' is not selected.

I also did the same for the files in the directory (just in case).

From the Start menu run cmd as administrator and type the following at the prompt:

start /w pkgmgr /uu:IIS-WebServerRole;WAS-WindowsActivationService

Now open Control Panel and select Programs, Programs and Features, Turn Windows features on or off.

Select Windows Process Activation Service (at the bottom of the tree) and select all components. Hit OK.

Repeat step 6 and select Internet Information Services. Now select the appropriate options, click OK and it should just work!!

I performed the last steps in stages so that I could be sure that everything worked. This whole process sucks - I cannot believe that something as simple as setting up compatibility should require such contortions.

I thing to note is that after I did the above steps, all the components in Windows Features under IIS->Web Management Tools and World Wide Web Services were unchecked. So, I check the relevant ones as shown below.

All is well now. I can open my WAP projects in VS 2005 and host them on IIS 7. Thanks to Scott Guthrie for all the help and "bluemanifold" for the article. Hope this helps someone else.

Technorati Tags: Vista SP1,VS 2005,WAP,IIS 7

.NET 3.5 Framework Enhancements Training Kit released

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 15:20:00 +0000

The .NET 3.5 Framework Enhancements Training Kit includes ~~presentations~~, hands-on-labs ~~and demos~~. It helps in learning the new concepts and features including:

ASP.NET MVC
ASP.NET Dynamic Data
ASP.NET AJAX History
ASP.NET Silverlight controls
ADO.NET Data Services
ADO.NET Entity Framework

The supported operating systems are Windows Vista and Windows XP. The pre-requisites to run the training kit application are:

Microsoft Visual Studio 2008
Microsoft SQL Server 2005 (Express recommended)
Windows PowerShell 1.0 RTM
ASP.NET 3.5 Extensions Preview
ADO.NET Entity Framework Tools CTP (for all data labs)
Silverlight 2 Beta 1 Runtime (for Silverlight labs)
Silverlight Tools Beta 1 for Visual Studio 2008 (for Silverlight labs)

The installation was pretty standard and easy. The web page that describes the kit, states it as April Content Preview. It also mentions the fact that it only includes hands-on labs. The presentations, demos and screencasts will be added in a future release of the training kit. Each lab has an overview page which lists the pre-requisites for the lab in details.

The following are the excerpts from the kit's details page:

ASP.NET MVC

Developing ASP.NET MVC Applications

This lab shows the fundamentals of creating and ASP.NET MVC applications, their core concepts, how they work and how to use them. You will also learn what is needed and how to perform unit testing while creating the application and how to extend the ASP.NET framework to use an IoC container.

ASP.NET Dynamic Data

Introduction to ASP.NET Dynamic Data

In this lab, you will learn how to quickly create and customize a data-driven Web application without the need to write a great amount of code. The application created uses the ASP.NET Dynamic Data features to offers viewing, editing, filtering and sorting operations over the data model of the underlying database.

ASP.NET AJAX History

Introduction to ASP.NET AJAX History

One problem faced by a typical AJAX application is that the browser’s Back button does not move back one AJAX step, but moves back one entire document, which is unlikely to be what the user expects. In this lab, you will learn how to use the ASP.NET AJAX History features to insert history points using server controls or client-side code, so that the user may click the browser’s Back and Forward buttons to move between AJAX states.

ASP.NET Silverlight Controls

Introduction to ASP.NET Silverlight Controls

In this lab, you will learn how to use the ASP.NET controls for Silverlight to add rich media capabilities to your Web application. From one side, you will learn about the ASP.NET MediaPlayer control which lets you integrate audio and video into a Web site. On the other side, you will learn about the ASP.NET Silverlight generic control to integrate XAML into your Web site.

ADO.NET Data Services

Introduction to ADO.NET Data Services

This lab highlights the creation of a data service using the Entity Framework as its data source, and shows how to consume the service using both the .NET client APIs and the ASP.NET AJAX APIs. Additionally, you will use Service Interceptors to add validation support and Service Operations to perform custom queries.

ADO.NET Entity Framework

Introduction to ADO.NET Entity Framework

In this lab, you will learn how to create an Entity Data Model using the ADO.NET Entity Framework Tools and how to consume it using the Entity Framework APIs.

I recommend downloading the .NET 3.5 Framework Enhancements Training Kit to get familiar with the new concepts.

Let me know your thoughts by putting comments about the usefulness of the training kit.

Technorati Tags: Visual Studio 2008,.NET,.NET 3.5,.NET Framework,training,ASP.NET,AJAX,Silverlight,Entity Framework

Vista SP1 is released

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 20:38:00 +0000

All Vista users, you should install Vista SP1 and here is why…

Technorati Tags: Vista,service pack

All that "Googles" is not gold...

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 21:30:00 +0000

Well, agreed that most of the stuff that Google has put their hands on has been gold, but not App Engine. I think it is too early to judge but why just limit it to Python. People compared it to Amazon's EC2 - my take it is not even close. Amazon is a totally different beast altogether. Well, 10,000 invites to try the program was gobbled up fast, but only time will tell what happens. Another theory could be to compete with Facebook who have opened up and allowed developers to write code against their API and host their apps on Facebook.

Or it could just be another thing that Google can afford to do with the kind of money they have.

Technorati Tags: Google,Google App Engine,Facebook,Amazon,EC2,cloud computing

Silverlight 2 Tools Beta 1 For Visual Studio 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 15:44:00 +0000

Microsoft just recently released Silverlight 2 Beta 1 at MIX08. They had also released the Expression 2 Betas and the Expression Blend 2.5 March 2008 Preview. These are truly exciting technologies that help us to create stunning RIA web applications.

Usually it is a bit of challenge for me to setup newer versions as they are released but I had come to believe that is a small price to pay for living on the edge. But, this time when Microsoft released Silverlight 2 Beta 1 and its additional SDKs/components to support Visual Studio 2008, they made the installation easy and in one package. So if you are interested, go ahead and download the Microsoft Silverlight Tools Beta 1 for Visual Studio 2008. The installation actually takes care of everything that is required and installs the following:

Silverlight 2 Beta 1
Silverlight 2 SDK Beta 1
KB949325 for VS2008
Silverlight Tools Beta 1 for VS2008

And it includes:

Visual Basic and C# Project templates
Intellisense and code generators for XAML
Debugging of Silverlight applications
Web reference support
Integration with Expression Blend

Just make sure you uninstall any previous installations of Silverlight versions or any Silverlight SDK components, otherwise the installer will throw an error. For other scenarios, errors and gotchas read the excellent post from Bradley Bartz, which covers the installation process in detail.

Technorati Tags: Visual Studio 2008,Silverlight,Silverlight 2,Expression Studio,Expression Blend,Microsoft,RIA

Amazon starts new Amazon TextBuyIt service

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 16:08:00 +0000

Continuing on its innovation trail, Amazon has again done it. It released a new service TextBuyIt, which allows anyone with a SMS capable phone to send a message to Amazon to get pricing details of a product and then choose to buy it.

Very easy, just SMS the item name or author, artist ISBN/UPC code or any keyword to 'AMAZON' (262966). Amazon sends back a text message with the details and with instructions to buy the product by replying with 1 or 2 to buy an item. If the person chooses to buy, the person has to sign-in with an email address and zip code. Then an automated call is received by the buyer for order confirmation. Also, the first time one uses the service, a separate help text message is sent with all commands applicable to the service.

Truly remarkable. If you have any experience with the service (good or bad), please share it in the comments.

Technorati Tags: Amazon,TextBuyIt,service

Visual Studio 2008 Tip of the day - Vista Sidebar Gadget

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 15:36:00 +0000

I found the Visual Studio 2008 Tip of the day Vista Sidebar gadget and I love it. I am surprised to find a lot of things that I did not know about VS 2008.

Technorati Tags: Visual Studio,Visual Studio 2008,Vista Sidebar,Vista,gadget

My new found love for HD-DVD movies

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 17:42:00 +0000

While I was reading and following the format war between HD-DVD and Blu-Ray Hi-Def formats, I was still a little hesitant in buying a HD-DVD and Blu-Ray player, as the prices were still high. But, things changed overnight, when the unfortunate step was taken and HD-DVD format lost the battle. Toshiba stated that it will not develop, manufacture or market HD DVD players and recorders. Microsoft followed suit with withdrawing its future support for HD DVD and support for its HD DVD add-on for XBox 360. Others like Netflix, BestBuy, Walmart have since announced their abandonment of the format.

But, for me that was a cloud with a silver lining. I bought the HD-DVD player for XBox for a low price of $49.99. It came with the King Kong movie. I watched it that night. I was blown away.

That started a uncontrollable spiral to get the slowly vanishing HD-DVD movies off the shelves. So far, I have collected the following titles:

They are one of the best titles in HD DVD format. Click on the titles to read the reviews from High-Def Digest.

Technorati Tags: HD-DVD,hd dvd,media,movies,xbox

Roundup of April's Fool Day 2008 Bluffs

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 16:48:00 +0000

Well, here is an assortment of April's Fool Day 2008 news story headlines:

My best pick: XBox.com First look for long time gamers - I actually wanted to believe it!

InfoWorld: Microsoft, Yahoo agree on buyout price

Redmond nabs Yahoo's data centers, Web properties, and ad platform for $47.2 billion.

Google: gDay with MATE

Search tomorrow’s web, today! Google Australia has introduced a new feature, enabling you to search content on the internet before it is created.

Google: Announcing Project Virgle

Virgle's goal is simple: the establishment of a permanent human settlement on Mars.

Google: Gmail Custom Time

Introducing Gmail Custom Time. Be on time. Every time.

Telegraph: Flying penguins found by BBC programme

The BBC will today screen remarkable footage of penguins flying as part of its new natural history series, Miracles of Evolution.

The Independent: Ramsay vows to forswear bad language after he gets the brush-off from Australia

His name has long been synonymous with abuse, asterisks and four-letter words, but Gordon Ramsay has had a dramatic change of heart on swearing. In a move that will have diners choking on their oven-roasted Bresse pigeon, he plans to ban foul language in all his restaurants, whether in the kitchens or the dining areas.

Daily Mail: Mile-high tower: Saudi prince promises £5bn desert spire TWICE as tall as nearest rival being built

Plans for a mile-high tower in the Saudi Arabian desert have been unveiled by the billionaire owner of London's Savoy Hotel.

Inhabitat: MICROCHIPS THAT RUN ON BODYHEAT

Today’s microchips, while tiny, still use a fair amount of power. This means that batteries have to be large and don’t usually last very long. But what if microchips were just a little bit more efficient? That’s what a team of engineers at MIT was thinking when they set out to redesign the microchip to make it even more efficient. The result is a microchip with a power consumption that is so low it can be recharged by your very own body heat.

And, last but not the least, a link to a website that has a collection of April's Fools Day 2008 links on the web. Enjoy!

Comment with your own stories and experiences.

Technorati Tags: April Fools Day,aprilfools,april-fools,april fools day,humor,jokes,funny

Web Services Standards Overview poster

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 17:20:00 +0000

innoQ released an excellent Web Services Standards Overview poster in both jpg and pdf formats.

Visual Studio 2008 Product Comparison Guide released

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 03:44:00 +0000

Rob Caron worked on this very elaborate comparison of Visual Studio 2008 product line. Various downloadable versions in .docx, .xps and .pdf are available here. It compares the following products except Team Foundation Server or Test Load Agent:

Visual Web Developer 2008 Express Edition
Visual Basic 2008 Express Edition
Visual C# 2008 Express Edition
Visual C++ 2008 Express Edition
Visual Studio 2008 Standard Edition
Visual Studio 2008 Professional Edition
Visual Studio Team System 2008 Architecture Edition
Visual Studio Team System 2008 Database Edition
Visual Studio Team System 2008 Development Edition
Visual Studio Team System 2008 Test Edition
Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Suite

Great informative work.

HD-DVD or Blu-ray players for XBox?

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 16:50:00 +0000

Well, don't just run out and buy the now $49.99 HD-DVD player add-on for XBox 360, as Microsoft has no plans to support either HD-DVD or the Blu-ray player yet. Aaron Greenberg, group product manager for Xbox 360, commented

Xbox is not currently in talks with Sony or the Blu-ray Association to integrate Blu-ray into the Xbox experience

Microsoft has stopped making the HD-DVD add-on player for XBox 360 and would continue to invest in the XBox Live online medium. Microsoft has recently started renting HD quality movies on Xbox Live.

So it has to be seen what Microsoft does in future. I guess they have to develop a Blu-ray player add-on.

How to: Convert HD DVDs to Blu-Ray

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 16:12:00 +0000

Well, now that it is evident that HD DVD format may actually lose out the battle against Blu Ray, Wired has an excellent step-by-step article describing how to convert HD DVDs to Blu Ray. The basic process is ripping, transcoding/authoring and finally burning. Well, I am not sure I want to spend the money on burn software, Blu-Ray disk burner and Blu-Ray blank media to try it out myself. But, if you have already invested in most of the stuff or want to invest to try it out, please post your findings in the comments section.

Technorati Tags: blu-ray,hd dvd,how-to,media

IEeee - An IE Add-in for capturing bug details

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 18:49:00 +0000

The UK VSTS team has released a tool named IEeee, that is an add-in to Internet Explorer and allows the user to submit a bug about the page that is being currently rendered. It captures a significant amount of details about the environment and integrates well with TFS's workitem tracking system. A Bug can be directly created by this add-in and all captured information about the defect is attached with it. The information captured includes the following:

A Screen Shot of the page

The source HTML of the page

Any script files being used by the page

Any CSS pages that are referenced in the page

Details about the client browser configuration (e.g. screen resolution, browser version, ...)

Assign default values for any field in the defect report (e.g. Area, Iteration, Assigned To, ...)

Why the funny name? Here is what the team has to say:

So why the silly name - its supposed to be based on the noise you make when you find a bug - well it would be if you were in a Batman cartoon!

Download the IEeee v 1.5 add-in. And then checkout the detailed user guide.

Additionally, if you are TFS buff, the UK VSTS team has also released a custom set of Work Item Controls that can be installed to enhance the work item user interface in TFS. They also have a Web Test Plug In that lets the user create scriptable parameters to new or existing web tests.

That is so cool. Kudos to the UK VSTS team. Keep up the good work.

Visual C# 2008 Cheatsheet

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 18:30:00 +0000

Download the very handy wall chart PDF listing all the useful keyboard shortcuts for Visual Studio C# 2008. It works for the Visual Studio C# 2008 Express Edition as well.

Amazon Kindle : a revolutionary portable reader

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 02:23:00 +0000

Amazon.com released a one of kind, portable reader - Amazon Kindle. It can wirelessly download books, blogs, magazines, newspapers and other content. The display is crisp and can be used even in bright sunlight. It is unlike our regular LCD or computer monitor which gives a glare, but it is a high-resolution electronic paper display that looks and reads like paper. All content can be bought and downloaded from the Kindle Store. Currently it offers New York Times Best Sellers and New Releases for $9.99. Kindle is available at http://www.amazon.com/kindle. Read more about the features in Introducing Amazon Kindle.

All the photos from Amazon.com Checkout the videos that showoff the product.

Buy Amazon Kindle or its accessories.

Visual Studio 2008 RTM version released

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 17:59:00 +0000

Kudos to Microsoft for releasing VS 2008 earlier than promised.

If you are a MSDN subscriber, you can get hold of the VS2008 RTM version from the MSDN subscriber download page.

If you are NOT an MSDN subscriber, you can either get the VS 2008 Express Editions or download the 90-day VS 2008 trial version.

Update: Scott Guthrie has a nice post about uninstalling VS 2008 Beta 2 before installing VS 2008 RTM release. Other great posts include Answers to a few VS 2008 Trial Edition, TFS 2008, and SourceSafe Questions, VS 2008 Compatibility with Older VS 2005 Add-in Packages.

In the spirit of the release of VS 2008 RTM version, a VS2008 Training Kit has been released as well. It is a nice collection (self-extracting, 120MB) of presentations, labs, demos and it installs nicely at one place. It is very intuitive to use with a supporting set of web pages that takes the user through all the available resources. Download it.

You can also enjoy the relevant screencasts on Channel 9:

VS2008 Training Kit: Lap around Visual Studio 2008 & .NET Framework 3.5

VS2008 Training Kit: What's new in C# 3.0?

VS2008 Training Kit: .NET Language Integrated Query (LINQ)

VS2008 Training Kit: ADO Synchronization Services

VS2008 Training Kit: .NET Framework 3.5 Enhancements

VS2008 Training Kit: Using LINQ with Relational Data

Post from WLW on Blogger

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 15:40:00 +0000

Let us try to post an entry from WLW on Blogger. I had an issue with this as described in an earlier post. The themes recognition has been fixed. I wanted to try if the images in the post gets uploaded to Blogger.

Yahoo Messenger 9.0 beta released

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 15:30:00 +0000

Yahoo! released its new Yahoo Messenger 9.0 Beta today. It has a funky bold look. It is fun. Yahoo has added contact pictures or avatars on the side and the status message under the contact name/address. Hover over a contact and you will get a context menu to quickly IM, Call or SMS your friend. Or you can see the full contact info by clicking on the left arrow key on the left side of the context menu. A new group Address Book is added automatically. Additionally, you can search for a contact by name or phone number from the search bar at the top.

Sharing photos is a breeze and fun with Flickr integrated. Sharing videos is even easier: just pasting a link of a video in the IM window, shows the video in a video player which can be played instantly. Similarly, if you paste a link to a photo, it shows up instantly rather than a boring link.

If you are offline, you can also have your IM messages forwarded to a mobile phone as text messages. You can have your incoming Yahoo calls to be forwarded to another telephone number as well.

While new themes add surprise, new emoticons spruces up the chatting experience and makes it more expressive.

You can watch a video preview to decide for yourself and you can download it. Alternatively, you can always choose to use the Yahoo Messenger for Web.

Earlier in Jan 2007, Yahoo announced that it is working on Yahoo Messenger on Windows Vista using the new WPF technologies. The current news is that it is not done yet.

Halo 3 launches - the game begins

noreply@blogger.com (Rupak Ganguly) — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 02:04:00 +0000

With a lot of fanfare the biggest hit of all games Halo 3 was launched today. Halo 3 as described at Xbox site:

A HERO MUST RISE. BELIEVE.
The epic saga continues with Halo® 3, the third chapter in the highly successful and critically acclaimed Halo franchise. Master Chief returns to finish the fight, bringing the epic conflict between the Covenant, the Flood, and the entire human race to a dramatic, pulse-pounding climax.
Halo 3 represents the third chapter in the Halo trilogy—an international award-winning action series that grew into a global entertainment phenomenon, selling more than 14.5 million units worldwide, logging more than 650 million hours of multiplayer action on Xbox LIVE®, and spawning action figures, books, a graphic novel, apparel, an upcoming film adaptation, and more.

Halo 3 is being released in three different editions:
Legendary Edition: $129.99, Standard Edition: $59.99 and Limited Edition: $69.99.

Check out the extremely well done Halo 3 Game Guide site. Microsoft has also released a special edition Halo Zune , a Xbox 360 Halo 3 Special Edition console, Xbox 360 Limited Edition Halo 3 Wireless Headset , Xbox 360 Limited Edition Halo 3 Wireless Controller Brute and Xbox 360 Limited Edition Halo 3 Wireless Controller Spartan.

Check out the Halo 3 60 second trailer and let the games begin...

Buy Halo 3, Halo 3 Limited Edition, Halo 3 Legendary Edition, Zune Halo 3 Collector Edition (30 Gb), Xbox 360 Wireless Spartan Controller, Xbox 360 Wireless Halo 3 Headset, HALO 3 The Official Strategy Guide and many more accessories.

Funny news about MIT students turn famed Harvard statue into 'Halo' chief via Crave.