Darren Straight’s Blog

The UK Launch of Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008 is now underway at the International Convention Centre (ICC) in Birmingham.

I Loved the Drumers that started just before Jonathan Pereras (General Manager of Application Platform Marketing for Microsoft) Keynote started, adds more excitement to the event.

In the keynote we are expected to see some demos from Julius Davies, Mark Quirk and Keith Burns.

Update 12:00: As expected in the keynote we saw some interesting demos demostrating Windows Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008. Affter this I decided to stay in Hall 1 for the Core Infrastructure Improvements in Windows Server 2008 presentation with Matt Mcspirit and Jane Lewis. I’m now sitting down in Hall 3 by the Xbox Gaming Area having lunch. The ICC is pretty big, lots of halls and areas to visit, so thinking of checking out the place.

But for those of you not here, if you havent already may I suggest you check out the Microsoft Virtual Launch page:

http://www.microsoft.com/virtualevents/uk/vle.aspx

This week I’m on Holiday with an exciting week ahead of me.

Yesterday I started working on my new blog theme.

Today I visited Thorpe Park with my new Merlin Annual Pass. While right now I’m staying at the Arc Apartments within the Arcadian Centre in Birmingham which I must say are great value for money considering their location in the heart of Birmingham.

Tomorrow I will be at the UK Launch of Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008 at the International Convention Centre here in Birmingham then after that I will be heading home for a bowling event with work.

And this weekend I will be travelling to Alton Towers for two days of fun with mates from work!

So yeah a great week ahead of me. If anyones going to the launch tomorrow - see you there!

Britons are risking losing valuable images and data forever with almost one in five who own a portable device losing phone numbers and contact details on mislaid items and 40% admitting to not backing up photos on portable devices, according to research commissioned by Network Appliance (NetApp), a leading provider of storage and data management solutions.

The YouGov survey of 2,035 online adults, reveals that whilst 58% of those that own a portable device store up to 500 photos, only 6% are very worried about losing them. It also indicates that 60% who had lost a device with phone numbers on had to source the contact details from scratch.

Surprisingly, only 44% said this had made them think twice about backing up information in future. Not surprisingly, however, 25 to 34 year olds (33%) have mislaid more portable devices with phone numbers and contact details than any other age group, with over 55s (8%) losing the least.

Mark Stevens, UK Area Director at NetApp said: “Data backup and protection is not just a concern for businesses. Today’s ‘Digital Generation’ load an increasing amount of information onto phones, iPods and laptops everyday, and with this comes risk.

“People need to be aware that saving images and numbers without backing them up means they could be lost forever.”

The research findings also highlight a gender gap in attitudes towards data loss among those storing photos on portable devices, with three times as many women saying they were very worried about losing images than men. Men who have lost devices with contact details are less likely to change their behaviour than women with 54% saying they would not backup or change the way they store information, compared to 43% of women.

Mark Stevens, UK Area Director at NetApp said: “Clearly there is a level of education needed to help consumers protect their information.

“Protecting your data doesn’t have to be complex. The right solution will speed and optimise backup and recovery processes, heighten data availability and you can keep in contact with friends and family, as well as retrieve lost images.”

Other findings from the study include different attitudes towards data protection across Britain:

• People from the South of England are least likely to have photos backedup on their portable devices than in any other region (32%)
• Those from Scotland are the most careful with 48% having images backedup.
• Londoners are most likely to lose a portable device containing contact details (26%), compared to 15% of people in the South and 15% in the Midlands and Wales
• 47% of Northerners would change the way they store information following the loss of a device with Southerners least likely to change their attitudes (35%).

Microsoft Research has just launched a new Web site called InkBlot, which shows, a series of Rorschach Inkblots and helps users create a secure, personal password that is easy to remember. The user is presented with a sequence of random inkblots. Each should remind the user of a word, a butterfly or a pumpkin, for example. For each image, the user then types the first and last letters of the word that come to mind, such as ‘by’ for butterfly or ‘pn’ for pumpkin. InkblotPassword.com currently has 1,000 inkblots in its database.

Passwords almost always suffer from one or more serious problems. Users have a difficult time remembering strong (high-entropy, hard to guess) passwords. Users handle this difficulty by recording their password somewhere insecure, by selecting a weak but memorable password, or by using the same password at multiple sites. You can also learn more about the principles behind inkblot passwords in this Microsoft Research technical Report MSR-TR-2004-85.

Via: ActiveWin

Microsoft is apparently looking for beta test takers for the SCCM 2007 exam. (This is the product that replaces SMS 2003.)

The following code below will allow you to take the exam once free of charge. If you pass you will receive credit toward the new Microsoft certifications MCTS and MCITP. If you fail, you can re-take the exam once the exam goes live but you will have to pay the testing fee. (In the US it’s $125.) Since this is a beta exam, it will take a month or more for you to receive the results of the exam. (To see if you passed or not.)

To take the Exam register at https://www.register.prometric.com and enter the following test number and promotion code:

Test #: 071-401
Code #: B401

If you are interested register NOW. Once Microsoft feels they have had enough beta test takers the offer will be discontented. There is no “Second Chance” on beta exams.

New research into the habits of 1,626 UK PC owners has revealed that a staggering two-thirds (65%) have lost precious data or files that were stored on their PC’s hard drive.

The research, conducted by Tickbox.net on behalf of online backup provider Carbonite (www.carbonite.co.uk), also found that despite this high rate of data loss experienced, almost a quarter (24%) of respondents never back up their PC data at all.  This is surprising given that almost seven out of ten (68%) stated that their data, which includes digital photographs, music, videos, personal files and work-related documents, is ‘extremely’ or ‘quite’ important to them.

So Why Don’t We Backup?

55% of respondents said they don’t backup because they don’t know how to do it.  Of those that don’t know how, 65% were from the younger age bracket of 16-24 year olds.  ‘Can’t be bothered’ (25%) and ‘too complicated’ (11%) were also reasons cited for not backing up.

63% said they were not aware of automatic online backup services, such as Carbonite; however, 56% of these respondents said that they would use one if it existed.  Only 8% currently use online backup services, showing there is significant growth potential for the future of backing up automatically over the Internet.

But If I Backup I’m Safe Right?…Wrong!

Of those who do back up, roughly 4 in 10 burn their files to CDs or DVDs.  External hard drives are the second most popular backup choice, with almost a third (28%) opting to use them. However, as 59% of respondents keep their backup disks and external hard drives in the same room as their PC, it is highly likely that should there be a fire or burglary their backups would be gone.  Just 5% keep their backup in a separate building. 

Frequency of backup is also a concern, with 37% backing up only once a month.  73% of respondents forget to back up, and the younger tech-savvy generation are the worst for this: 88% of 16-24 year olds have forgotten to back up compared to 69% of 35-44 year olds.  As home contents insurance doesn’t cover information stored on a hard drive, even if the PC itself is insured, a hard drive meltdown could result in consumers being out of pocket, both financially and personally.

Reasons for Data Loss

Of the 65% of respondents who suffered data loss, over half (55%) blamed a faulty hard drive or other hardware failure.  38% was attributed to human error in the form of accidental deletions.

Who’s Most at Risk of Losing Data?

The younger generation were found to be most at risk of losing data. Almost two-thirds (64%) of 16–24 year olds lost data due to hardware failures, compared to 53% of over 55’s, and 38% of 16–24 year olds lost data due to a virus compared to just 25% of over 55’s.

“A marked increase in Internet take-up, higher broadband speeds and the presence of one or more PCs in most homes has resulted in people keeping increasingly valuable contents on their hard drives,” comments Floyd Bradley, Executive Vice President of International at Carbonite.  “The most surprising result from this survey is how many people do not back up at all.  Anyone with a PC should regularly back up their files, including costly music and digital photos.”

“The number of people who simply do not know how to back up is concerning.  It is often the unsophisticated computer users who are most at risk from data loss, as they are more likely to open an email containing a virus or click through to a site that downloads spyware, malicious programs or other malware.  Online backup services that require minimal input, are continually running in the background and are easy to use, represent the future for PC security and peace of mind.  Consumers need to ensure that data loss becomes a thing of the past,” Bradley added.

Well it’s been a busy and crazy week but I’ve finally got some time to tell you all about my 3 Days in London attending The mashup* demo event and of course the awesome Future of Web Apps Conference and Expo which included the Live Filming of Episode 118 of Diggnation and the Carsonified Relaunch Party!

Unfortunately I didn’t have a laptop to do any Live Blog coverage like I would have liked to so instead I took what notes I could on paper and took plenty of photos along with a couple of videos.

Mashup* Demo Event - Day Before FOWA

First up let me tell you about the Mashup* Demo event, In running order the following companies demoed, yes they only had 5 minutes to demo, this made sure they got to the point of why we should try out their site/service/product etc and why investors should invest in them:

3.30pm - Serena Software
3.35pm - Mobestar
3.40pm - 15 Second TV
3.45pm - BabelTV
3.50pm - WeLoveLocal.com
3.55pm - Rummble
4.00pm - Magpie
4.05pm - Inspire
4.10pm - Bondaii
4.15pm - Meecard
4.20pm - Serena Software
4.25pm - Rollsense
4.30pm - Fav.or.it
4.35pm - Kwiqq
4.40pm - Tipped
4.45pm - testcard.tv

I have yet to test fully every site/service/product on this list; however I hope to do very soon. The venue it’s self was great and I had some interesting talks with people such as James Dyer (TestCard.Tv) and Dominik Grolimund, Co-Founder and CEO of Caleido who has created Wuala, which is a new way of storing, sharing, and publishing files on the internet.

I would however like to make some suggestions for improvements, mainly on the after party hosted by Blognation, as part of their UK Launch of Blognation. Me and a few others agreed that some music would have been nice to go along with that disco ball they Club had, along with some food/nibbles as it was dinner time by then…

Other than that it was pretty good, I’ll be sure to be checking out each and every site/service/product in more detail. By the way Richard Brooks (Managing Director of The 100 Year Website) where were you - someone said they talked to you but we couldn’t find you again - hope you had a good time and that my invite for you to come was worthwhile!

The Future of Web Apps Conference and Expo (FOWA) - Day 1

Ok now let me tell you a little lot about The FOWA Conference and Expo.

Welcome from Brian Oberkirch & Simon Willison, the FOWA Conference Chairs
We were first welcomed by Brian Oberkirch & Simon Willison, the FOWA Conference Chairs, along with Ryan Carson, co-founder of Carsonified (Carson Systems), they gave us a quick talk on what we could expect over the next 2 to 3 days at FOWA.

What is the Future of Web Apps? We Discuss! - Om Malik, (GigaOM) & Michael Arrington (TechCrunch)
After this brief welcome to FOWA there was a discussion between Ryan Carson, Om Malik, founder of Giga Omni Media, Inc and Michael Arrington, serial entrepreneur and operator of TechCrunch. In this talk they talked a about how web apps are changing the web and how we can benefit from them.

10 Real-world Apps That Represent The Future of Web Apps - Ben Forsaith (Adobe)
10 Real-world Apps That Represent The Future of Web Apps was a fast pace session presented by Ben Forsaith (Andrew Shorten), product specialist with Adobe UK, in which he demoed 10 Web Apps that were using Adobe technology such as Adobe AIR (Adobe Integrated Runtime)

High Performance Websites - Steve Souders (Yahoo!)
High Performance Websites was the first developer track session of the day, and was presented by Steve Souders, who works at Yahoo! as the Chief Performance Yahoo!, where he has developed a set of best practices for making web sites faster.

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• Examples of High Performance Websites (Comparisons)
• Importance of the backend
• Memory Cache
• iFrames
• YSlow

The Future of Search - Tony Conrad (Sphere)
The Future of Search was the second business/entrepreneur session of the day, and was presented by Tony Conrad, who is a Venture capitalist turned entrepreneur who co-founded Sphere (previously Yodel Search).

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• Sphere past/present/future
• Sphere Widgets (as seen on popular sites like the New York Times, Pop Sugar, TechCrunch, Cool Hunting, All Things D, TIME, AOL News, GigaOM, Wall Street Journal, Access Hollywood, Captains Quarters, ZDNet, O’Reilly Radar and many more)
• BlogBurst

The Art of Attractive Yet Useable Sites - Robin Christopherson (AbilityNet)
The Art of Attractive Yet Useable Sites was the second business/entrepreneur session of the day, and was presented by Robin Christopherson, who despite being blind, uses a computer very effectively by relying on speech output to access the full range of mainstream software including email and the internet. So he has a first-hand appreciation of the importance of good web design practice to accessibility, which is great for AbilityNet’s Web Consultancy services which he manages.

In his talk he talked about how over 90% of sites are still illegal because they do not meet the required accessibility standards and how sites which are accessibility friendly are really easy to use for people who are vision impaired.

*Lunch Break*
It’s Lunch Time, so I took a walk around the ExCeL Building and the FOWA Expo Hall.

How User Feedback can Influences Design - Daniel Burka (digg / Pownce)
How User Feedback can Influences Design was the third developer session of the day, and was presented by Daniel Burka, who is the creative director at Digg and is one of the cofounders of Pownce.

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• Gathering User Feedback
• Reacting to Feedback
• Are the changes worth it?
• Creating user feedback communities.
• Anticipating areas of friction.
• Digg Images “Digg Images: A dedicated images section (with thumbnails). Still on track to launch in late October. - Kevin Rose “

The Architecture Behind WordPress.com - Matt Mullenweg (WordPress)
The Architecture Behind WordPress.com was the fourth developer session of the day, and was presented by Matt Mullenweg, who is best known as the founding developer of WordPress, the blogging software tool.

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• Wordpress
• Wordpress MU
• Wordpress.com VIP Hosting
• Wordcamp
• Equalities to look for when hiring people (e.g. Personalities, Ability to learn, Taste, Passion for space, Familiarity with Technologies etc)

Building a Community (Creating and Running Communites) - Matthew Haughey (MetaFilter)
Building a Community was the fifth developer session of the day, and was presented by Matthew Haughey, who is best known as the founder of the community weblog MetaFilter, where he is known as mathowie.

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• Building a community
• Community growth
• Build for yourself first / Eat your own dogfood
• Use Guidelines not Rules in communities
• Tailor to community norms
• Every community suffers a revolute eventually
• Ways to avoid community disasters (e.g. Be transparent, honest, responsive. Have a dedicated place to talk about the site/product etc. Explain why you made changes.)
• Always acknowledge your mistakes
• And last of all remember to find out what’s illegal and where?

Taking Your Application Mobile - Heidi Pollock (BluePulse)
Taking Your Application Mobile was the sixth developer session of the day, and was presented by Heidi Pollock, who having left Yahoo! Mobile, started to work as a contractor for Twitter and then more recently started work for the Australian start-up, Bluepulse, fulltime.

In her talk, she talked about some of the following points:

• Bluepulse
• Firefox Extensions
• Developing Mobile Web Sites for Mobile Phones.
• Optimising Web Sites for Mobile Phones.
• Mobile Acid Test (http://jwtmp.com/a)

The Future of Firefox and JavaScript - John Resig (Mozilla Corporation)
The Future of Firefox and JavaScript was the seventh developer session of the day, and was presented by John Resig, who is a programmer working for the Mozilla Corporation. As well as being a programmer for Mozilla, he is also the creator and lead developer of the jQuery JavaScript library. He is also the author of the book ‘Pro Javascript Techniques.’ And is currently located in Cambridge, MA.

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• The Future of Mozilla Fireox
• SVG/Canvas 3D
• OpenGL in Browsers
• <video></video> and <audio></audio> Tags etc..

7 Things You Probably Don’t Know About That You Can Use in Your Future Web Apps - Mark Quirk & Jon Harris (Microsoft)
This session was presented by Mark Quirk who joined Microsoft UK in 1992 as a senior support engineer for Microsoft development tools and is now the product manager responsible for Visual Studio and web development at Microsoft UK.  And also by Jon Harris who used to work for Macromedia but is now a Microsoft User Experience Evangelist.

• In their talk, they talked about some of the following points:
• Microsoft Visual Earth (Interactive SDK)
• PopFly
• Microsoft Codename Astoria (http://astoria.mslivelabs.com/ and http://astoria.sandbox.live.com/)
• Microsoft Live Labs Seadragon (http://labs.live.com/Seadragon.aspx)
• Windows Live and Silverlight

Lessons Learned From Launching Digg & Pownce - Kevin Rose (digg / Pownce)
Kevin Rose was up next for this last session of the day
In his talk he talked about some of the following points:

• Saving Money
• Making Money
• Digg 1.0
• Digg past, present and future.
• Scaling
• Chilling Effects
• Hosting

Live Filming of Diggnation @ FOWA London
What can I say about it - The Live Filming of Diggnation with Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht was more than awesome! The place was packed out with people wanting to watch the show - The Crowd went wild - And I had a front row side seat!

Watch Diggnation Episode 118 London Here.

Carsonified Relaunch Party @ FOX@ExCeL
Yet more fun, a big thanks goes to both Kevin and Alex for allowing people to take photos with them!

Me and Kevin Rose!

Me, Kevin Bing (uni student) and Alex Albrecht

The Future of Web Apps Conference and Expo (FOWA) - Day 2

The Future of Web Apps (FOWA) continues on Day 2…

Developer Stage: Welcome from Brian Oberkirch & Simon Willison, the FOWA conference chairs

The Future of Web Startups  - Paul Graham (Y Combinator)
The Future of Web Startups was presented by Paul Graham, who is the author of On Lisp (1993), ANSI Common Lisp (1995), and Hackers & Painters (2004).

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• About Startups
• Let the market design the product
• However many acquisitions Google does Microsoft should do x10.
• Do we still need Silicon Valley?
• Do Startup Founders Need Degrees?
• Will Colleges and Universities change?

Predicting The Future of Web Apps - Edwin Aoki (AOL)
Predicting The Future of Web Apps was presented by Edwin Aoki, Chief Architect AOL.
In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• Edwin’s Near Term Industry Predictions:
  • A new industry group to develop standards for building web apps and content for low-cost, reduced capability devices
  • Aol to announce a major push for html and javascript apps on the desktop
  • new mobile computing device with a modem os and open deve platform.
• All of the above came true 10 years ago:
  • The Network Computer Reference Platform - 1996 Sun, IBM, Apple Replace Network with Mobile
  • Netscape Crossware 0 1997 apps build on javea javascript & html
  • AT&T/EO Communicator - 1994 - touch screen, handwriting recognition, live object embed, 33.6 kbps fax and data modem
• Technology evolves, impetus the same
• Build on Solid, Tested Foundations:
  • Storage - AOL Xdrive, Amazon S3
  • Message & Data Exchange - XMPP, JSON & REST based APIs to Open AIM
  • Publishing & Commenting - Atom
  • Idenity - Open ID, Open Auth
• Web apps of the future need to run everywhere.
• Learning from our past:
  • Small & beautiful beats large and clunky
  • Sweat the details, but don’t sweat infrastructure
  • Let the service provides do the heavy lifting for you
  • Standards and openness are important
  • But employ with an eye towards security and trust
  • Technology moves faster than society
  • It’s up to us to use it responsibly
• We won’t need a Future of Web Apps (FOWA) Anymore, instead we will have a Future of Web Stuff (FOWS) or just Future of Stuff (FOS) - 5/10 years from now!

Web app do’s and don’ts - Practical lessons we learned - Leah Culver (Pownce)
Web app do’s and don’ts - Practical lessons we learned Predicting was the first developer session of the day, and was presented by Leah Culver who is currently best known for founding Pownce with her friends Kevin Rose and Daniel Burka as a way of sending messages, links, files and events to each other.

In her talk, she talked about some of the following points:

•  Thinking about technology choices
• We could pick anything - made from scratch
• Social as well as technological reasons factored into our decisions
• Took risks to work with newer technologies
• Why Django?
  • Django is a Python web framework
  • Yah! Web frameworks!
  • Documentation and readability
  • Auto-generated admin
• Why S3?
  • Amazon’s Simple Storage Service
  • Pownce files are stored on S3
  • Less maintenance for Pownce
  • Inexpensive
• Why Air?
  • Adobe Integrated Runtime
  • Works on both PC and Mac
  • Easy to develop
  • Encourages good UI
• Do a lot with a little
  • Pownce has a tiny team
  • One website developer
  • Self-funded
  • Short deadline
• Small Teams - we wear many shoes
  • Multiple roles
  • Learn quickly - I have had to learn a lot about everything
  • Dedicated
•  Open Source Tools
  • Plenty of web application help
  • Someone has solved this problem before
  • … and they’re probably smarter than me
  • Lots of tools available
• Use your Resources
  • Get some help
  • Documentation websites
  • IRC
  • Network and learn from friends
  • Exchange knowledge with other sites
• Be kind to your database
  • Pownce’s databse is its main bottleneck
  • One MySql database - a bit embarrassed about, not a dba
  • REsponding quickly to slow querie
• Caching - I’ve already done that
  • Memcached
  • Caching at page and object/list level
  • Cached our static pages since launch
• Queuing - I’ll do that later
  • Taking a shorter note of a longer process to do later
  • We send notes via a job queue
  • Need to improve our queuing system
• Limits and Pagination - I don’t need to do all of that
  • Notes list, friends list, recipicient list
  • Good user interface as well
• Index - I’ll mark that
  • How would I search, set up database
• Avoid Complexity: I won’t make the db do that
  • Some queries are just to complicated for a new web app
  • Consider if they’re actually needed
  • Usually good to avoid abstract or conceptual data display
• Expect Anything
  • Young sites can run into many problems
  • Need to respond quickly
  • Can’t prepare for everything - stuff with come out of hte blue
  • Every web app is different
• Keep Backups - because stuff happens
  • Use version control
  • Have a system to revert to code changes
  • Tract dependencies and updates made
  • If developing locally, backup personal
• Duly Noted - Keep lots of data
  • Stats to monitor
  • Quantitative data
• Community - Keep in touch with your community
  • Let users know what you are doing
  • Respond to bug reports
  • Inform users of bug fixes and new features
• Friendships Matter - Social sites are all about friends
  • Strive to make it easy to establish, maintain or break relationships
  • Accurately represent user relationships
• Prepare to Scale UP - It’s a good problem to have
  • Don’t prematurely optimize
  • … unless you work with Kevin Rose
  • Design for success
  • Accept that your code will change 

Thanks goes to Jenifer Hanen for the gap filling - check out her post here!

The Story Behind The Facebook Platform - Dave Morin (Facebook)
The Story Behind The Facebook Platform was the second developer session of the day, and was presented by Dave Morin who is the Senior Platform Manager at Facebook where he leads platform strategy and community

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• Amount of active users on Facebook (43 Million)
• Amount page views on Facebook (60 Billion)
• Amount of people who have added an application - 80% of users
• The Social Graph
• Facebook Photos (Built in a week)
• Facebook Events (Built in a night)
• Developing for Facebook
• Generating Revenue

Preparing for Enterprise Adoption (The Future Of Blogging) - Suw Charman (suw.org.uk)
Preparing for Enterprise Adoption was the third business/entrepreneur session of the day, and was presented by who Suw Charman, a social software consultant and writer who specialises in the use of blogs and wikis behind the firewall. Suw is also founder and board member of the Open Rights Group, a digital rights advocacy group which aims to raise awareness of digital rights issues, to campaign against bad legislation in Britain and the EU, and to support grass roots activism.

In her talk, she talked about some of the following points:

• Getting products out
• Getting your products bought
• Finding out what business want from your products and services.
• Supporting your products and services.

*Lunch Break*
It’s Lunch Time on Day 2, so I thought id go outside down by the water to take some photos.

On the ExCeL Victoria Dock Bridge I witnessed the filming of a film/movie/soap/drama/documentary… ehhh… no idea what it was but we were not aloud to cross the bridge until they were finished and as we were approaching we were told to be quite! I heard one of the actors say “Dial 999″ quite loud….

Click on this photo and Zoom in and you’ll notice they are still up there

Putting Users First - Thomas Vander Wal (InfoCloud Solutions)
Putting Users First was the fourth business/entrepreneur session of the day, and was presented by Thomas Vander Wal, who is the The Principal and Senior Consultant at InfoCloud Solutions, Vander Wal is an information architect best known for coining the term “folksonomy.” He’s also known for initiating the term “infocloud”. His works has been with the Web and with information design and structure.

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• Focusing on real people
• Tagging
• Folksonomy
• Magnolia
• Stikkit

Next Generation Visualisations - Eric Rodenbeck (Stamen Design)
Next Generation Visualisations was the fith business/entrepreneur session of the day, and was presented by Eric Rodenbeck, Stamen’s founder and creative director. He is a 10-year veteran of the interactive design field, and has spent this time working to extend the boundaries of online media and live information visualization.

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• Visualization
• Visualising Data
• Visualisation is a media
• http://cabspotting.org/
• http://oakland.crimespotting.org/
• Modest Maps
• Digg Labs (Arc, BigSpy, Stack, Swarm)
• Twitter Blocks
• Stamen.com

Comet: Making the Web a 2-Way Medium - Joe Walker (DWR)
Comet: Making the Web a 2-Way Medium was the sixth developer session of the day, and was presented by Joe Walker, a developer and consultant working on advanced web development techniques like AJAX. He recently developed Direct Web Remoting, (DWR) which has become one of the most popular Ajax toolkits for Java by making browser/server interaction intuitive for web developers. See www.drectwebremoting.com. He currently works through his consultancy, Getahead (http://getahead.org/), which is supplying a growing number of customers with AJAX and advanced web solutions.

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• Comet and Examples using it
• SessionRater (http://www.webtide.com/sessionRater/)
• Polar Rose

An Insight to FireEagle - Tom Coates (Yahoo!)
An Insight to FireEagle was the seventh developer session of the day, and was presented by Tom Coates, who works for Yahoo Brickhouse where he develops new concepts in social software, future media and the web of data. He focuses on the shape of the web to come and how to make things that thrive as part of it. He’s worked for many of the UK’s most prominent web companies including Time Out, UpMyStreet and the BBC where he ran a small near-term R&D team for the BBC exploring media navigation, annotation and distribution. A regular speaker at conferences including ETech, XTech, IASummit and The Future of Web Apps, Tom also writes extensively at plasticbag.org as well as running the experimental online community barbelith.com.

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• FireEagle (won’t be called this when released out of Beta)
• Applications that could use FireEagle
• Twitter Maps

Air - Next Generation Development - Ben Forsaith (Adobe)
Air - Next Generation Development was the eighth developer session of the day, and was presented by Ben Forsaith, product specialist with Adobe UK.

In his talk, he talked about some of the following points:

• What is Adobe AIR (Adobe Integrated Runtime)
• Building your first Adobe AIR Application
• Aptana IDE
• Adobe Flex
• Adobe Labs (http://labs.adobe.com)
• onAIR (http://onair.adobe.com/)

Best Tips & Screw Ups - Panel of FOWA speakers
This last session of the day was a discussion talk between Ryan Carson, Kevin Lawver, Lane Becker, Rashmi , Dick , Ted Rheingold, Simon Willison and Brian Oberkirch.

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Follwing my recent post about removing or disabling the Ease of Access Icon, located in the lower left hand corner of the Windows Vista login screen. I just found an article titled “Windows Vista - Backdoor Logon” which exlains to you a method which you can use to exploit the ‘Ease of Access’ menu at the bottom of a regular Windows Vista Logon.

Normally, if you click the Icon then you get a choice of help from Narrator, Magnifier and High Contrast.  The trick is to replace the file called Magnify.exe, with a file which is really cmd.exe.

Once you make the change, then when you select Magnifier from the Ease of Access dialog box, you enter the operating system at the command prompt.  The result is you can logon as the System account, without the need of a password.  However one of the limitations that exsist is that your shell program is cmd.exe rather than explorer.  Though a more serious limitation is that in order to enter via this backdoor, you would need to install a Trojan horse program.  Another possibility is that you have logged on previously, and manually made the changes as described below.

Preliminary Step - Deal with Permissions

Problem: You cannot rename or delete the original Magnify.exe in Windows \system32.  Even though you are an administrator, even though UAC is enabled, all you get is this message:

‘You need permission to perform this action’

Solution: Take ownership of the file Magnify.exe, then change the permission for the Administrator’s group to Full control.  Then rename Maginify.exe to MagnifyOld.exe.

Main Step - Create the Impostor Magnify.exe

1. Create a new folder called Ease
2. Copy CMD.exe —> \Ease \cmd.exe
3. Rename \Ease \cmd.exe —> Magnify.exe
4. Copy \Ease \Magnify.exe —> Windows \system32\Magnify.exe

What you have achieved is that the old, relatively harmless, ‘Magnify’ becomes the more versatile cmd.exe.

Test Your ‘Ease of access’ Backdoor Method

1. At the Vista Logon screen, click on Ease of access
2. Check the box next to: Make Items on the screen Larger (Magnifier)
3. Click ‘OK’
4. You should now find yourself at the Command Prompt
5. Try whoami
6. Try regedit
7. Feel the power!

It looks like quite a few people out there (here, here and here) would like to know how to go about removing or disabling the Ease of Access Icon which is located in the lower left hand corner of the Windows Vista login screen as you first boot up to Windows Vista or when you lock the screen.

Well it looks like a guy named James Wilcox who I found via a thread on the Shell: revealed forums has developed a solution, which he calls the “Ease of Access disabler”

A small program that disables that annoying Ease of Access button in the bottom left hand side of your Vista logon screen.

Ease of Access disabler is a small but clever program that disables the Ease of Access button in the bottom left hand corner of the screen and show a message similar to the above when clicked.

If you work in a location where people often meddle with your PC, i.e a school, and when you come back someone has switched the narrator on, the magnifier on , and onscreen is turned on and the color scheme has changed to black and white. Annoying.

There is really no point in this button, unless of course you are disabled, so why not disable it with this neat little program. You can also re-enable it if you find out that you do want it.

Simply click the disable button to disable it and the enable button to re-enable it. This application must be run with Administrative priviliges. Right click, and select run as Administrator.

It can be very annoying because somebody can still fiddle with your PC even while its locked!!?

Doesn’t make sense to me! But I have fixed the problem. Just run this small application, click disable and the button no longer opens the Ease of Access window.

When you come back to your PC it will be the way it was when you left it, not with narrator, magnifier the onscreen keyboard and the black and white color scheme running.

The Ease of Access disabler can be downloaded from here or here.

Microsoft has licensed Netcraft’s Phishing Site Feed for use in its Microsoft Phishing Filter Service, providing users of Internet Explorer 7 protection against the latest phishing attacks reported by the Netcraft Toolbar Community.

Microsoft’s inclusion of Netcraft data in the Microsoft Phishing Filter was announced by Microsoft chairman Bill Gates during his keynote speech today at the RSA Conference in San Francisco, which introduced new security intiatives by Microsoft.

The Netcraft Toolbar Community is a giant neighborhood watch scheme for the Internet, empowering the most alert and security-aware members to defend the rest of the community against phishing frauds, which to date has blocked over 650,000 distinct phishing urls aimed at customers of over 900 institutions. In independent reviews by ZDNet, CNet and academic researchers, the free Netcraft Antiphishing Toolbar has been found to be more effective than antiphishing tools in IE7, Firefox 2 and other toolbars.