Sean McBreen's WebLog
Structured (and more likely) unstructured thoughts on software development and the New Zealand software market.
Its a Road Trip Audio Summary of .NET/VS2005 and SQL2005
The UK DPE team have done another great thing with the release of their ‘Road Trip’ content. It’s a...
Author: smcbreen Date: 07/08/2005
NZ VSTS Developer Competition - $100K in prizes
We are giving away lots of software to people who enter our VSTS competition – around $100K of it in...
Author: smcbreen Date: 06/09/2005
First Major Corporate Account - Gen-i send 150 to NZ TechEd
Gen-i have committed to sending 120 attendees to TechEd this year. There is a brief article in...
Author: smcbreen Date: 06/08/2005
NZ .NET User Group Videos
I love this – the guys over at our community site www.dot.net.nz have started to host the video’s...
Author: smcbreen Date: 05/30/2005
VSTS Webcasts
These are probably already all over the net but well worth watching if you are interested in VSTS....
Author: smcbreen Date: 05/28/2005
Is Visual Studio Team System for Me?
I’ve been asked this many times over the last few weeks and I though I would put a little flesh...
Author: smcbreen Date: 05/25/2005
Class Designer Updates
There are some cool updates to the class designer in Beta2. Auto layout of elements:...
Author: smcbreen Date: 05/20/2005
The Team Grows – Wellington Based IT Professional Evangelist – Nathan Mercer
Nathan Mercer has joint my team as the IT Professional Evangelist (I’m sure he will call himself...
Author: smcbreen Date: 05/14/2005
The Team Grows – Wellington Based Developer Evangelist – Darryl Burling
Just to show we are gearing up for Longhorn and other exciting technologies coming out soon (watch...
Author: smcbreen Date: 05/14/2005
Getting Started - ASP .NET 2.0 Quickstarts
I was asked the other day where I would look for sample code for ASP .NET 2.0. The obvious answer is...
Author: smcbreen Date: 05/14/2005
Get VSTS, VS2005 and SQL 2005 Beta on DVD
Simple – go here: https://www.microsoft.com/nz/evaluate/products/vs2005.aspx Fill in the form and we...
Author: smcbreen Date: 05/11/2005
TechEd NZ Earlybird Registration goes Live
Go get your earlybird… click here. Let me start by saying that TechEd US sold out 9 weeks before...
Author: smcbreen Date: 05/06/2005
I’m back – well sort of
Sorry for the lack of posting over the last few weeks – I’ve been flat out but also on holiday. I’m...
Author: smcbreen Date: 05/06/2005
Visual Studio 2005 Beta 2 – How to get it in NZ
The great thing about Beta 2 is that we allow customers to go live using it – a great local example...
Author: smcbreen Date: 04/18/2005
VS 2005 Product Line-up :: A Picture Says 1,000 Words
We are getting a lot of questions on the Visual Studio 2005 product line-up and I though I would...
Author: smcbreen Date: 04/05/2005
The Register on Windows 2003 SP1 - Get it...
So we have released Windows 2003 SP1 and if you have a server running Windows 2003 then you should...
Author: smcbreen Date: 04/04/2005
Lukas, Connect, HDD Failure and VS2005/VSTS
I’ve been out of contact for a few days (estimation will continue soon) and there are a few items I...
Author: smcbreen Date: 03/31/2005
Clinic 2806: Microsoft Security Guidance Training for Developers
Michael Howard used to work for MSNZ and he has a good post on his Blog about some new security...
Author: smcbreen Date: 03/29/2005
Nigel Parker Joins Team
Nigel Parker has joint my team (Developer and Platform Strategy) as the Auckland based Developer...
Author: smcbreen Date: 03/29/2005
Estimation: Historical evidence of the teams performance
So what if the individual doing the estimate is a star and thinks everyone else is as well – they...
Author: smcbreen Date: 03/21/2005
Estimation: Experience of the person doing the estimate
This is the single most important factor – but also the hardest bit to gain. It’s a classic Catch...
Author: smcbreen Date: 03/20/2005
Software Estimation – Getting it right
Software estimation is hard – and it’s not likely to change in complexity overnight. I’ve seen a...
Author: smcbreen Date: 03/18/2005
Effective Application Delivery - It's easy
At the highest level I feel that delivering applications that are maintainable, reflect user needs...
Author: smcbreen Date: 03/18/2005
FREE - Technical Training – MS Connect Registration Open
The registration tool for our Microsoft Connect event is now live. See this post for details on the...
Author: smcbreen Date: 03/15/2005
Developer and IT Pro Content overview for MS Connection (April) event
We’re almost ready to start registration for this event and I thought I might give some early...
Author: smcbreen Date: 03/01/2005
More on MapPoint Web Service
Over the last week I’ve had a couple of additional enquiries on the MapPoint Web Service. This is a...
Author: smcbreen Date: 03/01/2005
Demo: Visual Studio Web Developer
Once again about 15 minutes to do a demo. ASP .NET 2.0 is such a great product that showing it off...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/25/2005
Demo: SQL Server Reporting Services – If you work with SQL you need to use this.
So many people don’t seam to be aware of the great [SQL Server Reporting Services] functionality...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/24/2005
Artificial Eyes on the way - 2010
I'm not a big one for just linking to articles but over on the Register there is an interesting...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/24/2005
Demo: Visual Studio 2005 IDE
So given that I had about 15 minutes I tried to touch on a number of areas. Point I wanted to make...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/23/2005
Object Relational Mapping Tools for .NET
With ObjectSpaces being delayed I still get many customers asking about where to get ORM tools for...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/23/2005
NZ MapPoint WebService – goes LIVE
New Zealand is now included in the MapPoint WebService – with 100% map coverage. More on the...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/19/2005
Virtual PC – get it, it rocks!
I simply could not even start to get ready for the demo’s on Monday without the help of Virtual PC...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/19/2005
Can I make the products work?
On Monday I’m doing a set of presentations (across two hours) to a customer on several of our...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/19/2005
Hey Sean where’d you go?
It’s been a busy past few weeks. I was in Australia at the start of the week for a Microsoft ANZ...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/19/2005
Starting with .NET: What about beginners – Starting off
If you like to learn though looking on-line at web-sites then I would suggest these as a few great...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/11/2005
Just starting out with .NET – ‘What about beginners’
A customer sent me this mail recently: Hey Sean It's great getting the MSDN Flash every couple of...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/10/2005
Want to be work at Microsoft NZ’s – I’m hiring
I though I might follow my Australian college’s lead and advertise here in my blog… Within the...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/09/2005
The Age of Spiritual Machines
I’ve just finished reading the bulk of Ray Kurzwell’s book and it’s been pretty interesting. The...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/08/2005
Software that’s Free… And helps you learn
I've been asked recently about where to find some good sample apps. Their are a whole host of great...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/07/2005
Our next major NZ Technical Event – Save the dates
We are in the final stages of planning our next NZ technical event covering content for Architect,...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/04/2005
So what was it that the Developer and Platform Strategy team did again?
Simply put the team is interested in three core things: Helping customers to adopt our technology...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/03/2005
MSDN Flash
I've just finished the MSDN Flash that will be sent out to (4,500+) developers in NZ today. Covered...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/03/2005
Who am I/what do I do?
I work for Microsoft New Zealand as the Developer and Platform Evangelism lead. I also have a cross...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/03/2005
The first post...
Well I’ve toyed with the idea of starting a blog for some time now. A couple of people in my team...
Author: smcbreen Date: 02/03/2005