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Mitchell Ashley
Productivity Hazards of Windows Updates
Written on Mon, 11/30/09 - 10:22am
Patch Tuesday. Windows updates. Microsoft Office updates. It's a necessary evil, making sure your Windows computers are up to date with the latest vulnerability patches. Patch "whatever day" for Microsoft, Oracle, Apple and others are now simply part of our normal IT process. Next to anti-malware and...
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Just How Much Is Riding on Windows 7 For Microsoft?
Written on Fri, 10/23/09 - 9:09am
In a word, Windows 7 means "everything" for Microsoft's future. We can all talk about the insane number of SharePoint licenses sold, how well Windows Server 2008 has been put together, Bing's surprising rise in the search market, and exciting moves by Microsoft into Online Services for hosted Microsoft...
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Podcast: Essential Steps For Securing Hyper-V
Written on Mon, 08/17/09 - 1:31pm
During this week's Converging on Microsoft podcast interview with Mike Schutz, Director of Product Management for the Microsoft Windows Server Division, we discuss the relevant steps necessary to secure servers running Hyper-V.
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SharePoint Grabs Attention of The New York Times
Written on Wed, 08/12/09 - 12:02am
You know something's hot when non-tech publications talk about a product technology like Microsoft SharePoint. Ashlee Vance of the New York Times has an article talking about SharePoint's success even with our downed economy. It's not popular these days to be positive about a market dominator like Microsoft,...
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Microsoft GPL Linux Drivers First Legit Open Source Contribution
Written on Mon, 07/20/09 - 3:47pm
While Microsoft has made some prior moves to be more friendly towards open source (albeit slightly more friendly), Microsoft's GPLv2 contribution of Linux drivers will be seen as the first legitimate Microsoft move by the Linux open source and user communities. Microsoft's cozy relationship with Novell...
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Apple's Window To Gain PC Market Share Is Narrowing
Written on Wed, 06/17/09 - 4:14am
My recent blog post about the new Apple OS X Snow Leopard release not being enough to “beat” Windows 7 sparked quite a response from many Apple users. I understand that, when users are passionate about a product, brand and/or a company, as so many Apple users are. Apple’s always been successful...
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Is Free SharePoint In Your Future? Surprise! It's Already Here
Written on Tue, 06/02/09 - 3:35pm
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Windows 7 RC1 and Vista SP2 – Two Drastically Different Release Paradigms
Written on Thu, 04/30/09 - 3:03am
I’ve been really struck over the past few days by the difference in approaches between the Windows 7 RC1 and Vista SP2 releases. Windows 7 beta and RC1 have been handled much like the new Obama administration, emphasizing transparency and quickly addressing issues. We received plenty of notice there...
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Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 Bring Us DNSSEC. Will We Use It?
Written on Tue, 04/28/09 - 3:21am
Network security always seems to be driven by the latest "thing", whether that be a virus or a bot like conficker, or a technology like NAC (Network Access Control) that was in vogue was for several years. Security is hot technology and hot ulnerability/attack driven, at least that seems to...
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Microsoft and Apple: A Tale Of Two Cities
Written on Fri, 04/24/09 - 11:44am
This week's earnings reports by Microsoft and Apple couldn't be more different. Apple is soaring ahead on the success of the iPhone despite the slowing sales of PC units across the board, while Microsoft has posted its first year-over-year quarterly loss in history with worse-than-expected revenue....
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Muglia Promotion Secures Windows Azure Future
Written on Tue, 01/06/09 - 4:14am
We all think of the Windows desktop OS and Office apps when we think of the power houses at Microsoft, but there's a new sheriff in town ready to paint the place Windows Azure blue. Bob Muglia received the Microsoft exec equivalent of an at-a-boy, being promoted to president of the servers and tools...
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Podcast: BizTalk Server 2009 Wins Over Oslo
Written on Mon, 09/15/08 - 1:35am
My podcast this week is about BizTalk and Microsoft's announcement that the long awaited BizTalk Server 2006 R3 will be released in early 2009 as BizTalk Server 2009. Microsoft's adding RFID features and also refreshing BizTalk to work with other currently available Microsoft products like Windows...
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4 Reasons Microsoft Will Crush VMware
Written on Thu, 09/11/08 - 9:05am
Microsoft's momentum in virtualization is growing quickly, as evidenced by September 8th's "Get Virtual Now" virtualization extravaganza showcase. Microsoft announced Hyper-V Server 2008 will be free to download along with System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 and Microsoft...
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Live Mesh & Virtualization Saves Gas
Written on Mon, 07/07/08 - 12:52pm
I came across an interesting blog post by Brian Loesgen over the weekend about his experiences with Live Mesh. What caught my eye was his own use case of Live Mesh for software development. Besides sharing personal files, Brian uses Live Mesh to share his software development files between home computers...
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A Weekend With Hyper-V
Written on Mon, 06/30/08 - 1:12pm
This weekend I spent a good bit of time working with Microsoft's Hyper-V in the Converging Network Labs, following my daughter's baby shower on Saturday (which went swimmingly well thanks to all hard work my wife put into the event.) I installed the release version of Hyper-V on an Intel...
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Limitations Won't Dampen Hyper-V
Written on Fri, 06/27/08 - 7:33am
Thursday was Hyper-V "hyperventilate day" as everyone reported about Hyper-V's release. I'm sure Windows Server 2008 machines all over the world will be downloading Hyper-V via Windows Update come the 2nd week in July. You can manually download Hyper-V until then. I'm excited...
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Windows Server 2008 Ease Of Installation
Written on Mon, 06/16/08 - 2:10am
Over the weekend I installed the released version of Windows Server 2008 (after having worked with the release candidate previously), and the experience reminded how impressed I am by Win2008's ease of installation. I have a Intel quad-CPU set up, along with some 7200rpm drives because I do a lot...
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Windows 7 Sneak Peek This Week
Written on Tue, 05/27/08 - 4:10am
Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates are taking the stage at this week's Wall Street Journal D: All Things Digital (#6) conference. Rumor is Windows 7 will also be making its first public debut at the conference. I haven't been able to confirm if Windows 7 really will be shown at the conference or not,...
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Microsoft & Citrix Accidently Create Virtualization Battleground
Written on Wed, 05/21/08 - 2:01am
Introducing the Citrix Branch Repeater from Microsoft and Citrix. Next... the brouter and the Ethernet vampire tap. I thought I'd slipped into a Star Trek time wrap when I read the news Microsoft and Citrix introduced their Branch Repeater Tuesday... star date, circa 1988? I wonder how much money...
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Major Windows Version Every 2-3 Years - How?
Written on Thu, 05/15/08 - 2:53am
"...there will be constant change. I see Windows, a major new version of Windows every two to three years." Those were Bill Gates' words last week during his speech at the Digital Lifestyle Consortium in Tokyo, according to a transcript released by Microsoft. Those words have to put fear...
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About Converging on Microsoft
Mitchell Ashley has a diverse background in software development, network engineering, information security, mobility, collaborative technologies, and IT management and operations. An early adopter of social media in business, he began blogging about security and information technologies in 2006 at theconvergingnetwork.com. Mitchell is VP of Information Technology at CableLabs in Louisville, CO, and previously held positions as CIO, CTO and VP Engineering at prior companies.
 

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