Developer & IT Pro Days 2007

The Microsoft Web Story:
ASP.NET 2.0, ASP.NET AJAX, and WPF/E

27 March 2007 - 10:00 - 11:15

Speaker: Jeff Prosise

If you build Web apps for Microsoft platforms, times are changing--and fast. First there's ASP.NET 2.0, which is arguably the richest server platform available for building scalable, high-performance Web apps. Then there's ASP.NET AJAX, which extends ASP.NET 2.0 with a rich AJAX framework. Finally, there's WPF/E, which extends browsers to support incredibly rich and interactive content. This session surveys these technologies, overviews their features and capabilities, and sets the stage for the drill-downs in subsequent sessions.

The ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX Extensions

27 March 2007 - 11:45 - 13:00

Speaker: Jeff Prosise

The ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX Extensions are the half of ASP.NET AJAX that run on the server. They include a suite of server-side controls that make AJAX programming as simple as dragging controls onto a form, and a set of ASMX extensions that enable Web services to serve as endpoints for asynchronous XML-HTTP requests from JavaScript clients. This session drills down into the ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX Extensions and provides critical information not only about they're used, but how they work.

The Microsoft AJAX Library

27 March 2007 - 14:00 - 15:15

Speaker: Jeff Prosise

The heart of ASP.NET AJAX is the Microsoft AJAX Library, which is a JavaScript framework that runs on the client and is not only browser-agnostic, but server-agnostic as well. This session takes a deep dive into the client-side framework and demonstrates how developers can leverage it and extend it to build cutting-edge Web apps. Among other things, you'll learn how the Microsoft AJAX Library adds OOP to JavaScript and how to use this knowledge to implement features that aren't possible from the server side.

Introducing WPF/E

27 March 2007 - 15:45 - 17:00

Speaker: Jeff Prosise

WPF/E, which is short for "Windows Presentation Foundation Everywhere", is a subset of WPF that combines XAML and JavaScript to create incredibly rich browser-based content, and it's the perfect medicine for boring, plain-vanilla Web pages. This session introduces developers to the wonderful world of WPF/E and provides a glimpse at the future of Web programming on Microsoft platforms.

Microsoft Virtualization: Today and Tomorrow

27 March 2007 - 10:00 - 11:15

Speaker: Ronald Beekelaar

Virtual PC and Virtual Server have gained significant adoption in development and test environments, and are an important stepping stone to realizing Microsoft's vision of self-managing dynamic systems. Virtualization technology is gaining a foothold in the data center, enabling more efficient utilization of hardware and helping IT react more quickly to changing demands. This session introduces the Microsoft Virtual Server technology, its capabilities, how its being deployed today and the benefits and challenges customers are seeing. We look at how Microsoft will evolve the technology with the introduction of Hypervisor in codename Longhorn Server. We’ll look at the steps Microsoft is taking to help customers and partners use Virtual Server effectively in heterogeneous environments. Finally, we’ll predict how vitalization will change IT, from the data center to the branch, servers to the desktop.

Managing a Mixed Virtual/Physical Environment: Tools and Techniques

27 March 2007 - 11:45 - 13:00

Speaker: Ronald Beekelaar

Microsoft believes the management of physical and virtual machines should be largely transparent. The same tools and techniques should be used to deploy, monitor, maintain, and backup physical and virtual machines. For this to happen, tools need to understand the difference between physical and virtual, and automatically adjust the actions they undertake to accomplish the same task for physical and virtual. This session looks at System Center Virtual Machine Manager (VMM), Microsoft's first product which bridges the gap between physical and virtual. We’ll look at the complete lifecycle, from provisioning, to backup, migration (physical to virtual and back) to monitoring, and how this fits into the management of the rest of the server infrastructure.

Microsoft Virtualization Deep Dive

27 March 2007 - 14:00 - 15:15

Speaker: Ronald Beekelaar

What is the Architecture of Virtual Server, and how will this change with the introduction of Hypervisor? How does host clustering work, what are enlightenments? This session starts with a look at the components which make up Virtual Server, covers the changes introduced with Windows Virtualization (Hypervisor), and takes a detailed look how the virtualization stack works. We cover the High Availability capabilities inherent in Virtual Server, investigate the benefits of AMD-V and Intel VT hardware virtualization for non-Windows guests and cover some of the standards work Microsoft is pushing to improve the performance of disk and network for the virtualization industry.

Notes from the field: Practical advice on adoption, deployment and migration

27 March 2007 - 15:45 - 17:00

Speaker: Ronald Beekelaar

If you believe the hype, you could be forgiven for thinking Virtualization can solve most IT problems. In this session, we will share the experience gained by customers that deployed and managed Virtual Server. We’ll look at typical workloads, why they’ve been virtualizes, the challenges they needed to overcome to gain business benefits. And, of course what the business benefits were. Things like backup and recovery, load balancing and capacity management are all covered. In effect, the good, the bad and the ugly.