Hat-tip to Scott Hanselman for pointing out CarlosAg's Ajax-style snippet translator.

Give it a try!

MSDN subscription customers can download from the MSDN subscriber download site

Jeff Beehler posted these instructions to upgrade from Beta3/Refresh:

1. Backup your server and copy the data to a safe location
2. Download the Team Foundation Server RC
3. Download the Upgrade Utility
4. Uninstall Team Foundation Server Beta 3 Refresh
5. Follow the upgrade instructions, which are included with the Upgrade Utility
6. Install Team Foundation Server RC
7. Complete the post install upgrade instructions, which are included with the Upgrade Utility

For a reference to the major changes since Beta3 refresh, please see Jeff's posting.

Here is the link to the support site for my Team System book. It contains comments and corrections.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/905038

Also, I just found an error today, thanks to a reader:

"In your book on page 179 you put a reference to a figure 8-1 as the Team Model comparison, but the figure shows the Process Model comparison.
Have you ever seen this error ? Do you have the right figure ?"

This should refer to figure 8-4

A student pointed this out in class today. The free editions of Visual Studio 2005 Express won't be free forever - only until November 7th, 2006, which is one year from the launch. After that, it's assumed that the Express editions will be $49 each. You can find this information on the FAQ under pricing.

SQL Server 2005 Express edition, however, will remain free, as was promised during the launch events.

Why am I telling you this? So that you'll go download your free copies today!

Check out this article on CNNMoney. It lists the top 5 jobs in having the biggest demand for employees. .NET Developers made the list!

Here's an excerpt:

Developers who are expert users of Microsoft's software programming language .NET can make between $75,000 and $85,000 a year in major cities when they're starting out. If they pursue a job at a company that seeks someone with a background in a given field (say, a firm looking for a .NET developer experienced in using software related to derivatives) they might snag a salary hike of 15 percent or more when they switch jobs.

Microsoft just announced this a few minutes ago, literally. It appears they are on track for a Calendar Q1 release of TFS!

What:   Tech-Ed 2006
Where:  Boston, MA
When:   June 11-16, 2006
Why:     Dude, it's Tech-Ed!!!

Be sure to visit the site and get registered!

And, if you can make it, be sure to attend an awesome pre-conference seminar on customizing Team System.

"Bend to Evil" is an anagram of Google's "Don't be Evil" byline.  I generally hold Google in high regard for its strong vision of an interconnected world where information is free, open and shared.  But I also understand their need to make money.  Still, I'm disheartened by their decision to actively censor search results on their newly installed Chinese servers.  The Chinese government believes concepts like freedom and democracy are not in the best interests of their subjects, and like any good nanny state, is trying to protect their people from these dangerous thoughts.  Enter Google.  Google, who proudly proclaimed that it did not censor search results, has decided that to best serve the Chinese market, they'll take direction from the Chinese government as to what people should be able to see.  Now, i believe Google has good motives; you can read their defense here.  However, I'm still dismayed for a few reasons:

1. Google has officially removed their Official Censorship statement.  In their FAQ, they had a heading titled "Does Google censor search results?" The very first sentence was "Google does not censor results for any search term."  The entire FAQ heading has now been removed.  They didn't try to explain their position, or justify why they've decided to censor.  Instead, the FAQ term just disappeared.  My question, if this was a common Frequently Asked Question before, do they really think it ISN'T now?  (Read more: here)
2. When a company decides to forgo one of their key foundation principles in pursuit of some other goal (profit, or new markets, or to benefit the Chinese people...), they are stepping down a slippery slope.  Sure, maybe censoring for China isn't a big deal (and at least Google, unlike MSN or Yahoo! put a notice on the search results saying the results were censored), but once a concession has been made for China, how long before one is made for Saudi Arabia, Cuba, Canada, the United States?

Of course, there are lot's of folks poking fun, and I'd be remiss not to share a couple of those...  Michelle Malkin is running a competition for new Google logos. You can find the first two batches here and here.  I'll post just a couple...

One of the main sticking points with many people is the lack of integration between Visual Studio Team System (VSTS) and Microsoft Project Server.  Sure, you can indirectly connect the two through a MS Project file, and there's some light integration there.  But most people want to use VSTS as part of a complete lifecycle management too... and that means tracking resources across multiple projects, and many across several organizational stovepipes.  That's where MS Project Server comes in. 

In the future, Microsoft will likely do a great deal of integration between the two, but for right now you'll need to download the Project Server Visual Studio Team System Connector.  I haven't used it yet, but am planning on taking a look at it once it's been upgraded to support either TFS RC or TFS RTM.  I'll let you know!

Some changes this year from Microsoft. It seems that they are merging the usually separate and distinct Tech-Ed Europe (traditional audience of 50% devs/50% IT pros) and Microsoft IT Forum (100% IT pros) into just "Tech Ed Europe". They will be run in two consecutive weeks in November:

• Tech Ed: Developers (week November 6th, CCIB Barcelona, Spain)
• Tech Ed: IT Forum (week November 13th, CCIB Barcelona, Spain)

For more information, check out the Tech-Ed Europe site.