When I was at the Worldwide Partner Conference in Houston, I overlooked a great video from Chris Almida on SBS 2008 migration.
Chris is really sharp – and although it’s a long video – it’s well worth watching. You can download SBS 2008 (current candidate) and learn more about Small Business Server 2008 and Essential Business Server 2008 at http://www.multiplyyourpower.com
We installed SBS 2008 RC1 yesterday for our TAP client – The Bellingham/Whatcom Chamber of Commerce. Easy upgrade from RC0. We have watched them go from an old and horribly unreliable Novell network to a network that has never crashed with SBS2008. We’ve been running SBS2008 in production there since last December, and the productivity for the Chamber has skyrocketed – they now have reliable and secure Mobility (Windows Mobile 5/6), Sharepoint with a heavily used Wiki (WSS 3.0), great WSUS patching, and a solid and stable (and FAST!) operating system. SBS 2008 is impressive software, and EBS 2008 is starting to intrigue me more and more, because SBS 2008 is just so darned good.
Here’s a fun video from Sean Daniels (on the SBS team) showing Kevin Kean (his boss) getting some pie in celebration of RC1 shipping… Thanks to Arlin for pointing me at this post.
Sean’s got a great blog over at http://sbs.seandaniel.com/
If you use/sell/install SBS, you should be reading it regularly…
I see over on CNET News that Microsoft is working on a "Mojave" Experiment to show real people about Microsoft’s secret new operating system.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-9998336-56.html?tag=nefd.lede
Update – Here’s the link for the campaign: http://www.mojaveexperiment.com
Microsoft met with a bunch of XP lovers/Vista haters in San Francisco last week and captured video of them playing with this new "Mojave" operating system. "Oh, WOW!" one of them said… But "Mojave" isn’t Windows 7 or SP2 of Vista – it’s Vista right now. Apple has done such a great job with their "I’m a Mac" campaign, and planted so much FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt), that users really believe that Vista is terrible. I’m excited that Microsoft is finally going to fight back, and not with lame campaigns like the one aimed at a special phone number for business upgraders. Vista is a great incremental upgrade from XP. The way that search is integrated (and includes application names, not just files and email) is fantastic. Security is improved, though I wish that UAC was password driven like it is on OS X. It’s solid and stable, and yes it requires modern hardware – shocker! With modern hardware and a modern amount of RAM it’s smoking fast and I really like it. I find that typical users who upgrade to a new machine don’t even notice the change except for the addition of Search in the Windows Menu. So, go Microsoft! Bring on a response to Apple and to the critics. This concept of showing real Vista haters impressed with Vista is brilliant, and don’t stop there. Be AGGRESSIVE!
Second interesting thing that is happening right now is Apple is having serious problems with MobileMe. MobileMe is "Exchange for the rest of us" – according to Apple. Well… I love Apple hardware/software (typing this on a 24" iMac running Vista Ultimate) but Apple isn’t perfect. And Microsoft has just a few more years doing Exchange and especially Synching mobile devices than Apple. In a business environment where mobility and seamless integration is business critical, Windows Mobile just works. Mobile Me is new and appears to have significant problems. I think it’s good for Apple to stumble once in awhile, and if I was the WM team at MS, I’d leap on this opportunity and do some WM/iPhone commercials oriented around the Power of Exchange… (and I’d partner with the Exchange Team for those commercials) It’s bad enough that Walt Mossberg, who champions all Apple products over at the Wall Street Journal, uncharacteristically says that "Apple’s MobileMe is far too flawed to be reliable". Here he is on video talking about MobileMe.
http://ptech.allthingsd.com/20080723/apples-mobileme-is-far-too-flawed-to-be-reliable/
Note – Walt is getting personal handholding from Apple, and still can’t make it work. In the real world, believe me, users are floundering around and are frustrated and aren’t getting that level of support.
*Full disclosure – I’ve been an Apple user (ex FanBoy) since 1986. I worked at and then managed an Apple Specialist retail storefront from 1996 to 2000. I am currently an Apple Consultant Network member and a Microsoft Small Business Specialist and Certified Partner. (I hold certs on both platforms) My business has 10 Macs (iMacs, MacMini, MacBook Pro). I run both operating systems every day and consider each OS to be great blades in the swiss army knife of technology.
Arlin and I spoke with Digital Forum TV about the HTG Peer Groups. Note that this is playing with SilverLight – so if you don’t have it installed you’ll have to install it first to see the video. (Ouch – Digital Forum TV appears to only works in IE on Windows right now)
The HTG Peer Groups are a great opportunity for Microsoft Partners – check them out at: http://www.htgmembers.com (both in person groups and the online groups). I’m in HTG3 and it has revolutionized my business. Also – Arlin has a great blog at: http://peerpower.blogspot.com
I’d like to comment a bit on http://www.digitalforumtv.com as well. This is a really interesting project from Microsoft for Partners to display solutions aimed at other partners or at clients. It’s free and the video quality is outstanding. It’s a great place to host a video if you’re a Microsoft Partner and your clients use IE. It’s also a great showcase for SilverLight – the new Flash competitor from Microsoft. Note that all the other videos I’ve uploaded are playing back using Flash – YouTube (biggest user of flash video on the web), Vimeo (wonderful quality), and even Microsoft Soapbox! (Doh!). SilverLight video will have a place in the marketplace, and Digital Forum TV definitely makes it look very attractive… The big downside is that currently DigitalForumTV only appears to work in IE on Windows. I tried Safari and Firefox 3 on both Mac and Windows and can’t get it to play the video.
Cindy Bates and Robert Deshaies – Microsoft US Partner Group on VARvid.com
Cindy is the VP of US Partner Strategy, Marketing & Programs and
Robert is the VP of the US Partner Group. The two of them drive the
decisions that lead to opportunities for US Partners. They gave us an
exclusive interview speaking to the US Partner Program and how
Microsoft is really investing in the program this year. Specifically in
talking about the Small Business Specialist Program, they spoke about
how they are pleased with the numbers that the program has grown to,
but this upcoming year (remember – to Microsoft the "Year" is July 1st
to June 30th) the focus is on growing Partner’s business with Microsoft
rather than increasing the numbers of participants. This was really
clear to me when they proudly told us about the 52% of SBSers that are
Certified or Gold. If you work with Microsoft and want to be part of
this investment – you can learn more about the Small Business
Specialist program at: partner.microsoft.com/40021525
Eric Ligman is the Microsoft US Senior Manager for Small Business Community Engagement (and many other things). Eric spoke with Pat and listed his roles, but his impact on the partner community is far deeper and wider than that list makes clear – we closely follow his blog, and highly recommend keeping up with the Small Business Channel Community at: http://www.mssmallbiz.com
Also – Eric does amazing webcasts on Licensing – I know that many of you reading this have already seen Eric speak on Licensing but if you haven’t, watch one through the 5W50 series! http://www.mssmallbiz.com/sbstraining/
Like most things SBS, I originally learned about Eric and the many resources he’s responsible for via the SBS Diva – http://www.sbsdiva.com
Harry spoke to us about a new curriculum that SMB Nation has developed
for school districts (180 day curriculum for the classroom) so that
schools can teach high school students and/or adult learners about SBS
and how to get certified in SBS. He is working with the Houston School
District right now and is excited about the opportunity to work in education again.
Bjorn Levidow from the EBS team on varvid.com
We spoke with Bjorn Levidow, a program manager for Essential Business Server. Bjorn is really proud of the product and clearly has been working really hard to bring it to fruition! He feels that Small Business Specialists could really use EBS to grow their practices up to include midsized businesses by using the similar technologies they learned with SBS in more complex environments (with EBS). You can learn more about EBS at the Windows Server Blog. I also found some nice posts on EBS over at the D’Technology Weblog.
Mark Crall from Charlotte Tech Care Team on varvid.com
Mark spoke to us as WPC wrapped up about Community. Mark heads up the Charlotte Tech Care Team (a SBSC and Certified Partner) as well as acting as one of the eighteen worldwide Microsoft PAL’s (Partner Area Leader) – acting as a liason between Microsoft and their SBSC Partners. You can learn more about Mark and what’s going on with the PAL’s at Mark’s Blog: http://sbsc.techcareteam.com/
Bob Tenczar from Microsoft IP and Licensing on varvid.com
Bob Tenczar, Director of Intellectual Property and Licensing, spoke with Pat about opportunities for Partners in IP. http://www.microsoft.com/iplicensing/
