Home of Microsoft Updates and News

We initial proposed blogging about a tumble 2008 updates to Hotmail in September. Since then, we’ve posted a great series of blog entries about how we’re responding to your feedback. Here’s a list of all of a posts which embody tips as well as tricks if you’re carrying problems with a Hotmail update.

·         September 26: Hotmail refurbish entrance soon: An general outlook of a changes to Hotmail for tumble 2008

·         October 1: Thanks for a feedback upon a ultimate Hotmail release. Here’s a scoop… : Tips as well as tricks to assistance have Hotmail work improved for you, together with how to residence messages to people in your contacts

·         October 15: Hotmail is fast, fast, fast!: More item about what Hotmail did to have a knowledge faster

·         November 7: Update upon a brand new Hotmail: Responses to usual user feedback upon Hotmail changes similar to scrolling problems, how to send messages to people in your contacts, themes, as well as a spell checker

·         November 10: A note about Hotmail: If you’re carrying difficulty accessing your Hotmail account, here have been a couple of pick ways to get during your Hotmail messages.

·         November 25: Continuing a Hotmail updates: The Hotmail group has bound a little of a issues reported, as well as in mid-December will shift Hotmail so which it scrolls similar to Classic Hotmail. This will give some-more space to review messages.

Stay tuned! More blog updates have been entrance soon, as well as we’ll be adding them to a list here.

You can correlate with a group regulating these links:

1.                  Report bugs as well as send feedback which gets review by genuine people upon a Hotmail team

2.                  Read a support team’s blog, as well as if which doesn’t repair your problem, contact await to get assistance with your account

Do you share photos upon Facebook? What about pity pity videos upon YouTube? Well interjection to Will Duff, the single of the developer interns this past summer, there have been right away the integrate of code brand brand brand brand brand new tell plug-ins for Facebook as well as YouTube accessible for download.  Both plug-ins capacitate you to simply share your photos or videos with only the couple of clicks!

LiveUpload to Facebook is the plug-in for Windows Live Photo Gallery Beta which creates it easy for any the single to upload their photos to Facebook. The plug-in takes value of the brand brand brand brand brand new people tagging in Photo Gallery, too!  This equates to which when you tab your friends in Photo Gallery, if you’re additionally Facebook friends with those people, those tags will automatically crop up upon the published photos upon Facebook. Pretty cool, huh? 

Some of the LiveUpload to Facebook plug-in features:

• Add mixed Facebook accounts.
• Quickly as well as simply upload your photos to Facebook, together with any people tags combined in Windows Live Photo Gallery Beta.
• Upload your cinema to an existent manuscript or emanate the brand brand brand brand brand new one.

LiveUpload to YouTube is the plug-in for Windows Live Photo Gallery Beta and Windows Live Movie Maker Beta which creates it easy for any the single to upload their videos true to YouTube.  For example, once you’ve fast combined which sparkling brand brand brand brand brand new video regulating Movie Maker, simply click the Publish symbol as well as select LiveUpload to YouTube to share it!

(Note for developers out there… The people tags, along with alternative metadata, have been unprotected as partial of the brand brand brand brand brand new Publish API. Please see the SDK for some-more information. Plus, Will was additionally super kind sufficient to share his proceed with the village by posting the source to both of these plug-ins upon CodePlex.)

Finally, don’t dont think about to let us know if you’ve built your own Photo Gallery or Movie Maker plug-in which you wish to share. We’re gripping the list of plug-ins which you know about upon the plug-ins download page.

Michael Palermiti, Program Manager

There has been a lot of fad as well as questions about a Live Framework given it was voiced during a Professional Developers Conference. To assistance assimilate it as well as share tips, believe as well as code, a Live Framework group has proposed a new group blog. Subscribe to a feed as well as have certain to check out their initial post “Hello from a Live Framework Team” to sense what their skeleton have been as well as to take partial in a flourishing community.

The Live Framework group has additionally done a little brand new downloads available:

A whitepaper upon a Live Framework Resource Scripts: A ResourceScript is a “declarative module clarification which allows a programmer to indication a AtomPub/FeedSync interactions opposite a Live Operating Environment. The ResourceScript module abbreviation includes constructs for declaratively displaying carry out flow, interpretation flow, AtomPub as well as FeedSync interactions between alternative things.”

Live Services & Mesh Backgrounds: Ori Amiga, a Principal Group Program Manager for a Live Framework, has put together a little good seeking Live Services as well as Mesh backgrounds we can download.

Ori has additionally proposed a personal blog where we can find info about a Live Framework. Want to make use of IronPython with LiveFX? Ori tells we how to get started. And if you’ve seen a Channel 9 video upon Ori’s unconventional MeshMobile, right away we can get a detailed outline of a cold hardware which went in to it.

We have been gratified to make known which a Live Search group usually expelled a chronicle 2.0 beta of a Live Search API with multiform brand brand brand brand new features. According to this Live Search blog post:

• We right away suggest entrance by brand brand brand brand new interfaces: JSON, as well as XML over HTTP. Of course, we can still make make use of of a SOAP interface. But right away we have options.
• You pronounced we were spinning cycles parsing out non-web formula which had been shoehorned in to a one-size-fits-all reply structure, as well as we listened you. The brand brand brand brand new API is strongly typed as well as offers entrance to 7 opposite sorts of formula (web, news, images, phonebook, spell-checker, associated queries, as well as Encarta present answer).
• We’ve non-stop up a Terms of Use, expelling a pre-set make use of quota. We do need which we make make use of of this API for user-facing applications only. But that’s reasonable, right?
• We’ve defended a renouned capacity to collection as most SourceTypes as we wish in to a singular ask with a singular question string.

There is additionally a commander module we can pointer up for which allows we “to soak up advertisements seamlessly in to your formula pages,” as well as a brand brand brand brand new “100% OpenSearch agreeable RSS format.”

For some-more information, take a demeanour during a Live Search blog, as well as check out a redesigned Live Search pages here upon Live Services.

Hi everyone, George Moore as well as Neelamadhaba Mahaptro here from a Live Services team. For a past multiform months a Live Framework as well as Windows Live ID teams have been operative together to capacitate warden formation of Windows Azure with Windows Live ID, Active Directory as well as OpenID. This work shipped as a partial of a CTP releases during PDC2008. The formation is done probable by a multiple of a Azure Services Developer Portal, Microsoft Federation Gateway, as well as a Microsoft Services Connector.

This formation enables a following temperament scenarios “out of a box” with Windows Azure:

• Easily soak up Live services in to Windows Azure applications
• Data portability: entrance interpretation from Windows Azure that belongs to Live users (contacts, Mesh data, etc)
• Accept hundreds of millions of Windows Live IDs in to Windows Azure apps – users do not need a brand brand brand brand brand brand new ID
• Accept federated commercial operation users in to Windows Azure applications:
  • Microsoft has a warden resolution for Active Directory-based businesses
  • Non-Active Directory businesses can combine with a small additional work
• Accept federated identities around OpenID providers

In addition, a Windows Live Tools as well as a Cloud Computing Tools for Visual Studio were written to yield seamless formation in to this altogether process, together with a auto-provisioning of a compulsory temperament bindings in to a ASP.NET controls.

This blog post visually walks by a altogether developer lifecycle knowledge in adding Windows Live ID or Active Directory authentication in to a Windows Azure application, followed by a end-user knowledge in immoderate such an application. For a finish demo for how to set up a Federation Gateway as well as a Services Connector, greatfully watch a Connecting Active Directory to Microsoft Services display from a PDC.

Developer Life Cycle Experience

Step 1: Developer visits a Azure Services Developer Portal to emanate their brand brand brand brand brand brand new Azure project.

Developer presses “New Project” in a top left, as well as afterwards selects “Hosted Services for Windows Azure”:

Step 2: Developer selects a tab for their project, along with an discretionary description, as well as presses “Next”:

Step 3: Developer selects a self-centredness DNS name of their brand brand brand brand brand brand new use that will crop up inside of a cloudapp.net domain for Windows Azure:

Step 4: The portal right away automatically creates an dull hosting project, registers a brand brand brand brand brand brand new domain name with LiveDNS, as well as creates a compulsory temperament bindings for after connectivity to Windows Live ID. These bindings embody a Application ID, Secret Key as well as Return URL.

The developer was not compulsory to manually come in these temperament bindings – they were combined as well as purebred automatically by a portal in to a Windows Live ID service, as well as have been right away ready for after use:

Step 5: Now a developer contingency writer as well as sustenance their application. They launch Visual Studio as well as name File: New Project: Blank Cloud Service:

Step 6: Add a brand brand brand brand brand brand new Web Role to a project:

Step 7: Choose Windows Live for a brand brand brand brand brand brand new template:

Step 8: The developer is afterwards since a vacant engineer page inside of Visual Studio. The Windows Live use controls for ASP.NET crop up upon a left (MessengerChat, IDLoginView, IDLoginStatus, Contacts, Silverlight Streaming as well as Virtual Earth).

These have all been mutated to work with a Windows Azure certitude model:

Step 9: Developer drags as well as drops a IDLoginStatus ASP.NET carry out for Windows Live ID web authentication onto their web page. Note a Visual Studio intelligent tab charge industrialisation object entitled “Configure Application ID”:

Step 10: When a developer selects a “Configure Application ID” menu object for this ASP.NET control, we automatically begin a Trident browser window inside of VS that points to a Azure Services Developer Portal.

This requires a developer login to collect a temperament bindings that were automatically combined in Step 4.

Step 11: The portal, regulating inside of a Trident window inside of Visual Studio, presents a made easy list of all formerly combined Azure projects. Windows Azure projects have been shown with a Hosting Service icon, whilst Live Services projects have been shown with a Live icon.

When a developer selects a scold plan as well as presses “Ok”, a portal transmits a compulsory Application ID as well as a Secret Key to Visual Studio. This creates a treble contracting in between a ASP.NET control, a Windows Azure DNS name, as well as a Microsoft Federation Gateway:

Step 12: The developer afterwards compiles a plan in Visual Studio (via a Windows Azure SDK) as well as uploads it to Windows Azure (via a portal).

Once a focus has been promoted to Production by a developer, a focus is afterwards regulating underneath a domain name purebred for a temperament bindings as well as will be means to entirely experience in any of a Windows Live ID temperament services:

End User Authentication Experience regulating Active Directory

Step 1: The finish user visits a website hosted by Windows Azure configured in a stairs above. The finish user presses a “Sign In” couple to substantiate this site opposite their corporate Active Directory credentials:

Step 2(a): When a “Sign In” symbol is pressed, a user is taken to a customary Windows Live ID sign-in page.

In this Step 2(a) example, Mary has never prior to sealed in to this site regulating her Active Directory credentials. Because a “fabrikam2.com” domain has been formerly purebred as well as administered by a Microsoft Services Connector, Mary is since a event to name “Partner ID” in a Windows Live ID menu, sort her email address, as well as afterwards press a “Go there” button. Windows Live ID knows a place of a Fabrikam AD authentication page around MSC:

Step 2(b): In pick Step 2(b), Mary had formerly real to a Fabrikam site, as well as so Windows Live ID remembers her ID. When she presses her name, she is rught away taken to a Fabrikam corporate site for authentication:

Step 3: Redirection occurs to Fabrikam’s Active Directory authentication page upon their corporate network.

Mary sorts her AD credentials:

Step 4: Once a Fabrikam site has scrupulously certified Mary’s credentials, a redirection happens behind to a strange Windows Azure-hosted site with a singular user ID provided. This site can right away without delay implement Fabrikam corporate resources around Mary’s certification regulating a Federation Gateway:

Questions? Comments?

If we have any questions or comments, stick on us in a Windows Azure forum.

Thanks for temperament with us during a ultimate Hotmail upgrade. We swallow ones pride for any inconveniences which we have been experiencing with a brand new version. We’ve posted some-more headlines about what we’re you do with your feedback upon a Windows Live Wire blog.

You can correlate with a group regulating these links:

1.                  Report bugs as well as send feedback, which gets review by genuine people upon a Hotmail group

2.                  Read a support team’s blog, as well as if which doesn’t repair your problem, contact await to get assistance with your account

One of a tip underline requests after final year’s recover of Windows Live Photo Gallery was for a capability to modify photographs to black as great as white. We listened, as great as have been happy to deliver this underline to you!

We comprehend there have been a little photos which only merit a additional attention. Those photos, such as those prisoner upon your graduation or marriage day, have their own special content, mood, as great as colors. We longed for to support to these differences, as great as to illustrate built 6 black as great as white goods from which to name from.

Black & white filters make use of a colors in your strange sketch to establish shades (from black by gray to white) in your black & white photograph.  By adding a colored filter to your sketch when converting it to black as great as white, we can emanate a little thespian as great as overwhelming black as great as white images.

Try out a yellow as great as orange filters for your mural as great as landscape images. The yellow filter, which darkens sadness as great as greens slightly, functions great upon landscapes by adding pointed contrariety in in between a sky as great as a white clouds as great as in in between a immature tones in foliage. The orange filter, which creates stronger goods than a yellow filter, darkens sadness as great as greens whilst lightening a yellow, orange as great as red in an image. This filter provides larger clarification to excellent details. For example, it differentiates flowering plants from surrounding leaflet as great as additionally creates a some-more distinguished sky by creation a blue sky darker as great as enhancing a white clouds. To supplement a thespian hold to your outside images as great as emanate clever contrariety effects, give a red filter a go. This filter, which significantly darkens sadness as great as greens, causes blue skies to be shown as roughly black whilst creation a white clouds pop. This filter is additionally a great preference to constraint excellent sum in still-life photography. 

Additionally, assorted goods can be completed by coloring your B&W picture with sure tints. Give your images an very old or elderly demeanour with a Sepia tone, or an inventive hold with a Cyan tone.

<a href="http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?vid=9d9e4e8a-8352-4b6f-85fd-6d16b934cd11" title="Black as great as White Effects">Video: Black as great as White Effects</a>

[Direct link]

First name an picture as great as click upon a Fix symbol in a authority club during a top. This will move up a picture to revise with a Fix mirror to a side. To entrance this feature, click upon a Black as great as white goods button. Converting your picture to black as great as white is elementary – only name any of a 6 goods which have been available. Experiment as great as fool around around with a opposite settings supposing to find a a single which we similar to best!

Enjoy!

Arwa Tyebkhan, Program Manager

Releases