Journey to the Source

Getting access to Microsoft source code is (not surprisingly) a long and arduous process. Actually, the tools for requesting access and tracking your pending approvals isn't bad at all. There's just a bit of red tape that your request has to go through. It's one thing if you're a Redmond employee working in a product group. It's another thing if your a field guy wanting to expose some source to the community. None the less, tonight I've proven it's not impossible.

It seems like almost the minute I managed to get the source downloaded from the repository David also sent it over to me in a zip file. Geez, if I'd just been more patient I could have bypassed all that trouble. Still, I don't want to be bugging David going forward and this was the more official way to get at the bits.

I've got a two hour flight from Houston to Tampa Sunday night. I hope to get the bits extracted and compiling by the end of the flight, but I realize that's probably a lofty goal.