The online extravaganza of the year… You wouldn't want to miss!
Stars from the worlds of Cricket, Bollywood, Design and Enterprise take centre-stage, as Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer heralds “the next Web now”. Be sure to join us online to watch the entire event live from Mumbai!

Dont miss host Mandira Bedi as she anchors the online show and engages you in contests. Win thousands of really cool prizes!

Click here to register for the LIVE webcast.

Webcasts

Watch Live Webcasts 5 times a week by Microsoft experts. Participate in the contest during the Webcast and take your chance to win a Microsoft Press book.

• SQL 2005 for Developers: This session will cover enhancements with SQL 2005 for Developers.
  Presenter: Ramakrishnan | Date: Nov 2, 2006
• Managing and Administering SQL Server: This session concentrates on Dynamic Management Views , Performance tuning , Availability and Scalability features.
  Presenter: Ramakrishnan | Date: Nov 3, 2006
• Performance/Capacity: The session will give an overview of the performance related challenges when considering systems from an architectural perspective. In addition, the session will introduce some of the techniques that are used by performance engineers. We will also discuss techniques available to the architect for managing performance and capacity issues.
  Presenter: Vivek Bhatnagar | Date: Nov 3, 2006
• Security: This session will establish a common architectural view of Information Technology Security; explain several prevailing definitions for security that may differ in scope and approach; elaborate several paradigms for Information Technology Security and current industry practices and initiatives in Information Technology Security. The session will also explain impact of security related decision on functional, operational and non functional aspect of Information Technology Security.
  Presenter: Vivek Bhatnagar | Date: Nov 7, 2006

On-Demand Webcasts

Missed a webcast? Catch them here

• SQL 2005 Overview: An overview of SQL 2005 as a Data platform. This will provide all the features and enhancement over the last Release.
• Building Blocks of Business Intelligence. Integration Services and Analysis Services: An overview of the ETL Tool SSIS and Multidimensional Cubes with Analysis services
• Viability and Architectural assessment: Key considerations in determining the viability of architecture and also understand how to develop the Viability Assessment work product.
• Availability: An understanding on the concept of high availability, its terminology, principles and design tools.

Specials

Call for Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) Award Nominations

MVP Award is the premier award for technologists who are engaged with the community and have consolidated their position as community leaders. The award considers the contribution by the individual to communities like user groups, forums, newsgroups, blogs etc. The nominations are accepted year round and awards are announced every quarter. More details on the MVP Program and nomination form are available at www.microsoft.com/india/mvp

Announcing APAC Influencer Award

APAC Influencer Award is the award for recognizing community volunteers who have participated in the community either public or internal to their organizations. The awardees are recognized for an ongoing willingness to share the experience within technical communities. The nominations for the award are accepted year round and the awardees are announced every quarter. More details on the program and nomination form are available at www.microsoft.com/india/ai

• Bharat Petroleum Corporation Refinery uses complex applications such as SAP R/3 and Manufacturing Execution System (MES) from Aspen Tech. These solutions offer standardized functionality. To add reports or applications relevant to the Refinery, the IT team used a number of development platforms. When .NET was introduced as a development platform in early 2003, it was realized that the component architecture and flexibility helped reduce the development cycle significantly.
• Larsen & Toubro Limited has a world-class heavy engineering facility at Hazira, one of the largest of its kind in South Asia. The unit is engaged in design and manufacturing of high-tech fabricated equipment for core sectors such as oil and gas, refineries, petrochemicals, fertilizers, nuclear, and aerospace. Implementing a Microsoft Windows CE .NET version 4.2-based solution has enabled an efficient workflow management system at the Hazira Works manufacturing facility.

Answer these questions and four lucky winners with the right answers get a chance to win an MS Press book.

1. Which is the fastest location to store and access Session data?

(a) in a private object                      (b) in ASP.Net process
(c) in State server                           (d) in SQL Server

2. Which of the following is not a Web Services related standard?

(a) SOAP     (b) WSDL    (c) WAIT     (d) DISCO

3. Which of the following is not a component of ADO.NET?

(a) DataTable     (b) DataRow     (c) DataColumn     (d) DataCell

Please send your responses via email to techtriv@microsoft.com with the subject line “MSDN Flash Vol 4. No. 5 Quiz” in the format 1-C, 2-B (where C indicates the right answer for Question 1; B indicates the right answer for Question 2).

No correct entries were received for MSDN Flash Vol 2, Quiz 2. We're running this again for you. Come on guys, let's see if you can answer this quiz correctly.

• Using Cascading Style Sheets in Expression Web Designer: View a demonstration on creating basic site designs using fully standards-compliant XHTML and CSS in Expression Web.
• Integrating Excel and Word with ASP.NET 2.0 Web Sites: Read about how one MVP integrates Word 2003 and Excel 2003 with ASP.NET 2.0 Web sites to generate form letters in Word and graphical reports in Excel.
• Migrating a Shared Add-in to a Visual Studio Tools for Office Add-In: Learn about issues you might have with existing shared add-ins. Learn how to migrate your add-ins and how to convert command-bar code to support the new Ribbon.
• Developing Add-ins (XLLs) in Excel 2007: Learn about Excel 2007 features that affect XLL add-ins and enable new XLL functionality, as well as changes to the XLL C API itself.
• Business Contact Manager for Outlook Developer Guide - Now Online: Learn how the Outlook 2007 with Business Contact Manager combines the familiar appearance of Outlook with customer information management to help small business owners track customers and sales opportunities more effectively.

• 2007 Microsoft Office system Beta 2 Technical Refresh: Download an update to the Beta 2 version of a 2007 Microsoft Office system product. Beta 2 Technical Refresh updates are compatible with the Microsoft Windows Vista Release Candidate 1 pre-release product.
• Unleash Your Creativity With Expression Web: Expression Web has all the professional tools you need to design, develop, and maintain standard-based Web sites. Download the free beta 1 now.
• 2007 Office System Document: Lists of Control IDs (Beta 2 TR): Download updated files that list the control IDs for built-in controls in all applications that use the Ribbon.

ASP.NET Framework

• How to implement remote debugging in Visual Studio 2005
• You receive an error message when you use the ASP.NET compilation tool to compile an ASP.NET Web application
• You may experience unexpected results when you open a Web page that is in an ASP.NET 2.0-based application in Mozilla Firefox and the DefaultButton property is assigned to a LinkButton control or an ImageButton control
• Log Parser 2.2 and ASP.NET

SQL Server

• FIX: Error message when you run an application against SQL Server 2005 that uses many unique user logins or performs many user login impersonations: "insufficient system memory to run this query"
• FIX: An empty string is replicated as a NULL value when you synchronize a table to a SQL Mobile subscriber
• FIX: Error message when you use a label after a Transact-SQL query in SQL Server 2005: "Incorrect syntax near 'X'"
• FIX: Error message when you schedule some SQL Server 2005 Integration Services packages to run as jobs: "Package <PackageName> has been cancelled"
• FIX: Error message when you call the SQLTables function against an instance of SQL Server 2005: "Invalid cursor state (0)"
• FIX: System performance may be slow when an application submits many queries against a SQL Server 2005 database that uses simple parameterization

Visual Studio 2005

• BUG: A ComboBox control does not display any items in the .NET Framework 2.0
• FIX: Error message when you add a Web reference to a project in Visual Studio 2005: "The custom tool 'MSDiscoCodeGenerator' failed"
• FIX: The form may not be displayed when you try to switch to Design view for a complex form in Visual Studio 2005