Hidden Microsoft

Tyson Kopczynski

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I use Windows Live Mesh, what do you use?

By tyson.kopczynski on Fri, 01/09/09 - 8:17pm.

. What's this?

Sometimes Microsoft surprises me... For some time now, they have been trying to find ways to outmaneuver Google in the "Cloud" and everything Web related. Hence Microsoft has been pushing hard with their "Live" branded set of products and other such endeavors.

The only problem is that Live often seemed to be just a rebroadcast of something that already exists, or kinda just empty and without much soul. In other words, Live just hasn't been very compelling, or possibly not marketed correctly.

So... why this posting... Well, my laptop's hard drive was acting up over the New Years. Being that I was technically on holiday and didn't bring a USB drive big enough to back up my data, I started looking at online ways to save some of my less sensitive data within the cloud. If anyone remembers from a past post, this was the type of solution I was looking for a couple of months ago. But, after searching around a bit, I concluded that the currently available options lacked what I needed.

Not wanting to spend any money on a paid storage solution, nor head down to the nearest denki-ya-san. I decided to again search around for a "free" cloud based storage platform (yes, I like being cheap). Being that I use Google Apps, I decided to first see if Google was offering what I needed. Nope... Google still only allows certain content to be uploaded, limits the size of the content, and it doesn't let me just sync content straight from a folder (however, there are add-ons to do this).

Kinda sad, in my opinion, after all Google has always been a leader in breaking limits. Err... like Gmail which busted the limited mailbox model (so I was kinda hoping Google would do the same with stored content). Anyhow, I next decided to see what was going on with Microsoft. I first took a look at SkyDrive, and quickly concluded that was not going to work. Then I started down the usual path of searching around until a little light went on within my brain. Being part of part of several Microsoft TAPs, I remembered a component of the Azura services platform call Live Mesh. I also remember that it went beta sometime ago and was exactly what I needed, but just hadn't taken it seriously enough to use it for real data.

For those not familiar with Mesh, it allows you to create and manage synchronization relationships between data and devices. As part of that synchronization relationship, is a cloud storage component that allows you to store up to 5GB of data online. Both the cloud data and data on currently active devices can be accessed anywhere using the Live Desktop or Live Mesh Application. On top of that, you can also access a remote device using the Live Mesh Remote Desktop.

In other words, Live Mesh is a data sharing beast, and based on other things I've seen, this is just but the first of many really cool things this particular component and the Mesh Operating Environment (MOE) will be used for. Expect the pipes to become interesting...

If you like this, check out some other posts from Tyson:

Fun with PowerShell 2.0 Eventing!
Creating a custom 404 page to handle link redirection for ASP.NET web applications
Microsoft Discontinues Support for Windows 3.X (as an embedded system)
Kyoto Temple Night View - Powered By Google!
My quest for SSH within PowerShell revisited!
How to read Certificates and CRLs using PowerShell

Or if you want, you can also check out some of Tyson's latest publications:

Windows PowerShell Unleashed (2nd Edition)
Windows Server 2008 Unleashed (Yes, I did help on this book)

Lastly, visit the Microsoft Subnet for more news, blogs, and opinions from around the Internet. Or, sign up for the bi-weekly Microsoft newsletter. (Click on News/Microsoft News Alert)

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About Hidden Microsoft

With more than ten years of experience in IT, Tyson Kopczynski has become a specialist in Active Directory, Information Assurance, Windows automation, PKI, and IT security practices. Tyson is also the founding author of the Windows PowerShell Unleashed series and has been a contributing author for such books as Microsoft Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server 2006 Unleashed and Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Unleashed. He has also written many detailed technical papers and guides covering various technologies. As a consultant at Convergent Computing, Tyson works with and provides feedback for next generation Microsoft technologies since their inception and has also played a key role in expanding the automation and security practices at CCO. Tyson also holds such certifications as the Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP), the SANS Security Essentials Certification (GSEC) and SANS Certified Incident Handler (GCIH), and the MCTS (Application Platform, Active Directory, and Network Infrastructure).

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