The Future Computer the Future Computer

Anyone MICROSOFT TECHNOLOGY who knows DEPLOYMENT ISSUE 6 OCTOBER 2003

this much TECHNOLOGY about our software .NET: CHANGING THE FACE OF DEVELOPING is probably SQL SERVER: WAITING FOR YUKON TERMINAL SERVICES: certifiable. AT YOUR FINGERTIPS

The Affinity Homes Group chose Phoenix Software, a Microsoft Certified Partner, to migrate 250 users and their 20 servers to It takes a special company to be a Microsoft Gold Certified Open here Windows 2000, Microsoft Exchange 5.5 and Partner, one that’s demonstrated an exceptional level of You naturally want your IT service provider to have proven Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server. Richard Swift, specialist expertise in a particular Microsoft solution. And expertise across the full range of Microsoft products for the ultimate Head of Information Systems at Affinity you will reap the rewards for all their hard work, as you get commented: “We had been working with and solutions. Every Microsoft Certified Partner has met the assurance of the highest possible levels of service. Microsoft resource guide Phoenix for a number of years and they are a rigorous technical criteria set by Microsoft, so you can be THETHE FUTUREFUTURE Whatever challenges you’re facing, a Microsoft Gold Certified Microsoft Certified Partner, that gave us the confident that they can give you the high level of service Partner is perfectly qualified to make your IT systems for IT Professionals and added comfort of knowing that they had the you expect, together with trustworthy, independent advice. Developers right level of expertise that we were looking for”. workFor moreharder details, for you. visit Visit www.microsoft.com/uk/certified www.microsoft.com/uk/certified COMPUTERCOMPUTER PUSHINGPUSHING THETHE BOUNDARIESBOUNDARIES ATAT < ©Microsoft©Microsoft Corporation. Corporation. All rights All rights reserved. reserved. Microsoft Microsoft and and the the Certified Certified Partner Partner logo logo are are registered registered trademarks. MICROSOFTMICROSOFT RESEARCHRESEARCH LABSLABS SHORTCUTS TECHNOLOGY

THINKING MACHINES 6-8 “Machine learning has the potential to make human-computer interactions much more natural” CHRIS BISHOP, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR AT MICROSOFT RESEARCH IN CAMBRIDGE, REVEALS SOME OF THE RESEARCH GOING

ON BEHIND THE SCENES AT THE LABS AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR THE FUTURE OF COMPUTING.

IN-BOX 2-4 “What sort of information should I provide when I raise a case with developer support?” The Clinic responds to this and other questions.

THE BURNING QUESTION: A TOUGHER NUT TO CRACK? 5 “What is Microsoft doing to improve security in its IIS 6.0 server?” Julius Davies, principal systems engineer at Microsoft, responds to the above question.

SMALL BUSINESS SERVER: PLATFORM FOR SUCCESS 9 Microsoft is preparing to release the fourth generation of its Small Business Server. FYI Technology assesses the latest incarnation.

SQL SERVER: THE YEAR OF THE SEQUEL 10-11 “We have been working hard on different editions of SQL Server, recognising that people want different things from their database.” Cassandra Nuttall, SQL Server and solutions marketing manager at Microsoft UK, discusses the forthcoming release of “Yukon” – codename for the next version of Microsoft® SQL Server – and the improvements that are still being made to SQL Server 2000.

IMAGINE CUP: DEGREES OF DEVELOPMENT 12-14 “We’ve seen a sea change in the way Microsoft is working with academics over the last 18 months. Previously, we felt we were regarded as a revenue source.” Robert Miles, academic team leader at Hull University’s Department of Computer Science, discusses success in the Microsoft Imagine Cup, and how Microsoft is building closer links with academia.

To feedback your comments on FYI Technology or amend your sub- .NET FRAMEWORK: SUCCEEDING WITH .NET 15-17 scription details, please go to www.microsoft.com/uk/fyitechnology “.NET asks developers to embrace a new approach not merely to development, but to the underlying philosophy of systems design.” Editor: Gary Eastwood Creative director: Crispian Brown Art editor: Erroll Jones Picture editor: Rachel James Deputy picture editor: Rachel Curry Tim Sneath, principal systems engineer for Microsoft’s .NET developer group, on how .NET is changing Executive editor: Jo Russell Account director: Ingrid von Bibra Production director: the way developers work, and how it could even transform their role within their organisation. i Andrea St Hill Editorial director: Stuart Rock Publisher: Mike Bokaie

FYi is published for Microsoft Limited by Caspian Publishing Limited, Millbank Tower, Millbank, London SW1P 4QP. General enquiries: 020 7828 0706 WINDOWS TERMINAL: ONE SIZE FITS ALL 18-19 Editorial: 020 7828 0744 Fax 020 7828 0737 E-mail: [email protected] www.caspianpublishing.co.uk “There are many great remote administration tools, but sometimes you just want to be there. Terminal Server lets you essentially be at the keyboard of that machine doing that work.” The views expressed in this magazine are those of the contributors for which Caspian Publishing and Microsoft Limited accept no responsibility. Readers should Ivo Salmre, Microsoft UK product manager for .NET developer technology, discusses Windows Terminal. take appropriate professional advice before acting on any issue raised. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is strictly prohibited. Repro by Blaze Creative. Printed by TPL Printers (UK) SPAM E-MAIL: THE RANT 20 © 2003 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Microsoft, the Microsoft logo, Spam is a major problem for IT departments and users alike. Simon Attwell, security programme Windows, Active Directory, Windows NT, Outlook, Windows Server, SharePoint, Visual Studio, MapPoint, Visual Basic, Visual C++, Visual C#, ActiveX and Win32 are either manager at Microsoft, responds to the concerns of three different types of personnel. registered trademarks or of the Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other trademarks are held by their respective companies.

COVER PHOTOGRAPHY: WILL WEBSTER

October 2003 1 ➔ iN-BOX UPDATE IT FORUM This year’s Microsoft IT Forum 2003 will be held in Copenhagen, Denmark, 11-14 November. Focusing on “Integrated Innovation,” it QUESTIONS will help IT professionals to explore best practices for managing systems and strengthening security, and will provide guidance for TO THE CLINIC >>>> planning and implementing Microsoft technologies. Other topics include mobility, directory services, platform security, management tools and desktop systems. Register now at: www.microsoft.com/europe/msitforum

TECHNET ROADSHOW The TechNet Roadshow goes back on the road in October. This well ON DEVELOPER SUPPORT: established roadshow returns to provide IT professionals with a full day’s Q: WHAT SORT OF INFORMATION SHOULD I technical low-down on the new Office System and ideas on improving QPROVIDE WHEN I RAISE A CASE WITH their own productivity. Sessions include: an introduction to the new DEVELOPER SUPPORT? Office System; technical understanding of Exchange Server 2003; and RESPONSE: It depends on the type of case utilising mobile technologies and solutions using Windows® XP, Office, but as general guidelines: Smartphone and Pocket PC. For more information about TechNet events 1. For hangs and access violations, we turn to page 4. can help you best if we have a user mode dump – ideally created by the ADPlus. MSDN ROADSHOW You can get details of this at: The MSDN Roadshow provides software developers with a full day of http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?sci technical content covering key Microsoft technologies at regional d=kb;en-us;286350 locations, and is back on the road between 29 September and 17 2. For installation problems of the product November, 2003. The series will focus on “Building .NET Applications – itself, the installation logs are generally The ‘How’: A Developers’ Guide to Good Design Decisions.” These very useful to us. You can learn more about sessions will provide an insight into how to exploit the broad range of .NET installation solutions at: applications and how to choose an appropriate solution. For more http://support.microsoft.com/?id=319714 information about MSDN events turn to page 4. 3. For problems installing applications that you have produced, it is often helpful if we MICROSOFT OFFICE SYSTEM have information about registry access and Microsoft Office System is to be launched in October. Building on the file access. Many people find the FileMon familiar tools that IT professionals already know, the system includes and Regmon tools good for this purpose: servers, services, and desktop programs designed to work together to http://www.sysinternals.com help address a broad array of business problems. It provides the 4. For problems where the behaviour of a building blocks for creating solutions that will help: provide business class does not match with the behaviour users with better access to information; improve an organisation's that is expected or documented, a small agility; enable collaboration between teams and organisations; and sample that shows the problem is ideal. improve individual productivity. For more information on Microsoft The smaller the sample and the simpler Office System, visit: www.microsoft.com/uk/office the steps to failure, the sooner we will be able to get to the core of the problem. MIGRATING FROM NT4.0 5. For failures of server solutions, the event HP knows that NT migration is not a trivial exercise. It is critical to have all logs can be very helpful, especially the the facts before undertaking the exercise. That’s why they’ve packed so application event log. much useful information into a new document that looks at both the 6. For performance problems and memory benefits of migrating from Windows NT from a business perspective, and leaks, Perfmon logs are always helpful. provides a more technical overview. For more information, see the enclosed insert or order your copy from our subscription centre at: We are always interested in: www.microsoft.com/uk/fyitechnology •The platform – What OS is this happening on? Which service pack?

2 FYITECHNOLOGY >>>>>>>RUSSELL READ>>>>>>RICHARD MANNION>>>STEFAN HEDSTRÖM

•The version of the development tool, hop to another machine. This might be steps are to check you meet the minimum including service pack because your environment does not support requirements for Kerberos and then consult •How often this problem occurs Kerberos authentication. Second, there the following articles for configuration check- •Whether the problem has always might be a configuration issue that means lists and techniques to isolate the issue: occurred and if anything has changed your authentication request is being down- around the time of the failure graded to NTLM. This can be anything from 1. Building Secure ASP.NET Applications. •What you have done to troubleshoot this Kerberos not being enabled in the IIS Authentication, Authorization, and Secure issue yourself metabase, an incorrect setting in IE, a Communication •The EXACT error message. A lot of errors machine or user account not being enabled http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/using/ sound very similar for delegation, to a missing Service Principal building/web/default.aspx?pull=/library/ •Any special circumstances – for example, Name for SQL Server in Active Directory®. en-us/dnnetsec/html/SecNetch13.asp does the system have to go live by Friday? For a double-hop authentication to suc- 2. 317012 INFO: Process and Request ceed (that is, where credentials are passed Identity in ASP.NET Sadly, Dr Watson log files are not generally from the client to an IIS machine and then on http://support.microsoft.com/?id=317012 that useful to us since they lack symbolic to a SQL box), you must use Kerberos which 3. 810572 HOW TO: Setup an IIS/ASP.NET information. Armed with this information, authenticates the server and the client and Delegation Scenario we will be much more able to help you delegates the passing of credentials to SQL http://support.microsoft.com/?id=810572 resolve your problem. Server. The older Windows NT® Challenge/ 4. 326985 HOW TO: Troubleshoot Response (NTLM) mechanism authenticates Kerberos-Related Issues in IIS ON ASP.NET: the client only and is always used where http://support.microsoft.com/?id=326985 Q: WHY CAN’T I GET MY ASP.NET APPLICA- Kerberos cannot be negotiated. The mini- 5. 811889 HOW TO: Troubleshoot SSPI TION TO TALK TO MY SQL SERVER BOX WITH mum requirement for Kerberos is that you Context Errors “INTEGRATED SECURITY=SSPI”? I HAVE are running Windows 2000/IIS5 or a more http://support.microsoft.com/?id=811889 CONFIGURED IIS TO USE ONLY WINDOWS recent operating system on all the computers 6. 262177 HOW TO: Enable Kerberos AUTHENTICATION AND MY ASP.NET APPLICA- where you use Kerberos delegation. Event Logging TION TO IMPERSONATE THE LOGGED ON Additionally, you must put all the com- http://support.microsoft.com/?id=262177 USER (IN WEB.CONFIG). I CAN ACCESS puters in the same Active Directory forest. RESOURCES LOCALLY ON THE WEB SERVER Bear in mind also that only the Microsoft ON MICROSOFT EXCHANGE SERVER: WITH NO DIFFICULTY. I EVEN RETURN THE Internet Explorer 5.0 browser and later Q: WHEN I ATTEMPT TO CONNECT TO A CORRECT USERNAME OF THE LOGGED ON versions support Kerberos and you need to MICROSOFT EXCHANGE SERVER-BASED CLIENT USER IN C# CODE. HOWEVER, I KEEP ensure that it is configured for Windows COMPUTER AND I AM RUNNING OUTLOOK GETTING “LOGIN FAILED FOR USER NULL” authentication. As a quick test, if you switch ON A WINDOWS 2000 PROFESSIONAL-BASED WHEN I TRY TO CONNECT TO THE SQL BOX to basic authentication in IIS and your con- OR WINDOWS XP PROFESSIONAL-BASED FROM A CLIENT MACHINE. nection to the SQL server then works, it prob- COMPUTER, I GET THE FOLLOWING ERROR RESPONSE: There might be a number of ably means that you are not using Kerberos MESSAGE: “THE MICROSOFT EXCHANGE reasons for this. Your web.config might be to authenticate. The same thing applies if ADDRESS BOOK WAS UNABLE TO LOG ON configured correctly for impersonation but if you can get it to work when you browse the TO THE MICROSOFT EXCHANGE SERVER you aren’t using Kerberos to authenticate site actually on the web server but not when COMPUTER. CONTACT YOUR SYSTEM ADMIN-

PHOTOGRAPHY: ROB CLAYTON PHOTOGRAPHY: then you won’t be able to make the second you are browsing from a client machine. Next ISTRATOR IF THE PROBLEM PERSISTS.” ➔

October 2003 3 ➔ RESPONSE: You may also get the following 195795 OL2000: Troubleshooting Outlook TCP/IP, click Yes. Your computer restarts. error messages for the same problem: Configuration Problems “Your logon information is incorrect” or 258495 Troubleshooting Client Connectivity How to Reinstall TCP/IP: “Outlook could not logon.” There may be a Using Command Lines 1. Log on as the local administrator number of reasons for this: 167260 How to Use RPCPing to Test RPC 2. Right-click My Network Places on your 1. It occurs because the Transmission Communication desktop, and then click Properties. Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) 174701 XCLN: Troubleshooting RPC 3. Right-click Local Area Connection, and stack is initialised incorrectly. Problems for Exchange Clients then click Properties. 2. This can also be caused if the following 4. Click Install, and then click Protocols. registry key is corrupted or missing: How to Uninstall TCP/IP: 5. Click Add. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Micro 1. Log on as the local administrator. 6. Click TCP/IP and then click OK. soft\Rpc\ClientProtocols 2. Close all open programs, and then 7. Click Close in the Local Area Connection If it is caused by the first reason, you disable any anti-virus program. Properties dialog box, and restart computer. will need to uninstall and then reinstall 3. Right-click My Network Places on your 8. Log on to the network, and then verify TCP/IP from the Windows 2000-based desktop, and then click Properties. that Outlook® resolves the Exchange computer. [To uninstall and install TCP/IP, 4. Right-click LAN, and then click Properties. Server name and the mailbox name. see following section.] 5. Click Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), and then To resolve the problem if it is caused by click Uninstall. For answers to other technical questions, the second scenario, replace the registry 6. You receive the prompt to uninstall visit: http://support.microsoft.com key above, export the key from another computer, and then import it onto the affected The information contained in this section represents a selection of the useful exchanges found on the Microsoft web computer. For additional information about site, and originates from various sources. It is for general information purposes only. Microsoft Limited makes no how to troubleshoot before you remove warranties, representations or undertakings in relation to this information, including but not limited to its quality, TCP/IP, visit http://support.microsoft.com and accuracy, completeness or fitness for purpose. Microsoft accepts no responsibility for reliance placed on this look up the following articles: information. Always obtain appropriate professional advice on specific problems or matters.

MAKE SPACE IN YOUR DIARY FOR...

MSDN Roadshow 2003 TechNet Roadshow 2003 TechNet Spotlight Events TechNet Evenings Application Design Introducing the 10 October 2003 18 November 2003 Choices with .NET Office System Manchester Reading 29 September – Reading 1 October – Reading Migrating from NT4 to Troubleshooting: Windows 6 October – Leeds 7 October – Leeds Windows Server 2003 Desktop 8 October – Manchester 9 October – Manchester 15 October – Birmingham 16 October – Birmingham 17 October 2003 16 December 2003 22 October – London 23 October – London Birmingham Reading 4 November – Edinburgh 29 October – Reading Migrating from NT4 to Troubleshooting: Windows 6 November – Brighton 3 November – Edinburgh Windows Server 2003 Server 2003 11 November – Bristol 7 November – Brighton 17 November – Reading 12 November – Bristol 24 October 2003 London Migrating from NT4 to TECHNICAL EVENTS FROM MICROSOFT Windows Server 2003 Microsoft offers a wide range of events delivering technical “how to” information to IT professionals through 9-11 December 2003 Birmingham TechNet and to developers through MSDN. These include John Craddock on Active regular FREE events that focus on delivering in-depth Directory information on developing, deploying, using and optimising Microsoft technologies. For TechNet events, visit: www.microsoft.com/uk/technet/tcevents/itevents For MSDN events, visit: www.microsoft.com/uk/msdn/events/events.asp

4 FYITECHNOLOGY >>>>>>>RUSSELL READ>>>>>>RICHARD MANNION>>>STEFAN HEDSTRÖM

PHOTOGRAPHY: ROB CLAYTON PHOTOGRAPHY: then you won’t be able to make the second you are browsing from a client machine. Next ISTRATOR IF THE PROBLEM PERSISTS.” ➔

MAKE SPACE IN YOUR DIARY FOR...

4 FYITECHNOLOGY THE BURNING QUESTION A TOUGHER NUT TO CRACK?

The success of The trouble with being the world’s largest software designed security policies and Microsoft has eased the company is that your products become the target-of- task by supplying a rules-based wizard which walks Microsoft IIS web choice for hackers and crackers around the world. In administrators through the business of “disarming” IIS server has earned recognition, Microsoft last year ordered a temporary to expose required functions. The Microsoft Baseline it the unenviable moratorium on new product development, and devoted Security Analyzer, available as a free download from all of its resources to hardening the security and www.microsoft.com/security can then be used to audit status as the integrity of existing products. That initiative has seen the security of the finished configuration. world’s most security enhancements introduced across the To support this more strategic role for the product, Microsoft product range, but according to Julius Davies, as a true enterprise-class systems platform, many new hacker-targeted principal systems engineer with Microsoft, “probably no IIS 6.0 features are intended to bolster its scalability, internet platform. product has received more attention than IIS 6.0.” improve durability and ease its management. So what is The latest version of Internet Information Services To boost dependability, IIS 6.0’s new fault-tolerant (IIS) has not merely been patched and enhanced to process architecture magnifies web site integrity and Microsoft doing to correct known vulnerabilities, but “it has been com- availability, and the new concept of “application pool- improve the pletely rearchitected to deliver across the board ing” allows URLs to be grouped against worker process- improvements in performance, scalability, reliability es to isolate problems in one application from those server’s security? and security,” says Davies. The scale of this overhaul, affecting another. This should encourage more users to which includes the provision of a new fault-tolerant bring more applications to IIS. process architecture and numerous management Fewer IIS instances should also result in easier utilities, goes well beyond simply making IIS 6.0 a systems management, especially when users opt to use tougher-to-crack web server. It also reflects the growing the product’s new administration features. These include strategic importance that IIS will play as a general- the replacement of IIS’ old binary format store with an purpose application platform, supporting new systems XML plain-text file for storing configuration data, which delivered as web services. makes it easier to administer For most users, and a key and plug into third party moni- reason why IIS 6.0 is quickly gain- Key Enhancements toring and systems management ing market share is its toughened tools. A new Active Directory security profile. Unlike its prede- •Fault-tolerant process architecture Service Interface (ADSI) will cessors, IIS 6.0 is delivered with- •Application pooling make it easier to tune this in Windows Server™ 2003 in a •Automatic process recycling configuration data to the needs “secure by-default” configuration, •XML configuration data of specific applications. and is no longer automatically •Configuration versioning and rollback Altogether, Microsoft has deployed as a default feature of •Locked-down by default added 58 new features to IIS, the operating system. •Installation and upgrade many of them significant With Windows NT 4.0 and •Process isolation and recycling enhancements that extend the Windows 2000, says Davies, •New configuration wizard capabilities of the product, equip- the default deployment of IIS •Kerberos 5.0 authentication support ping it to play a more pivotal role spawned numerous instances of •ADIS interface in the overall delivery of enter- inappropriate or even unnoticed •IPv6 support prise applications within an deployments of what was essen- organisation. Industry analysts tially an unprotected web server. Gartner Group, for example, offer This greatly increased the vulnerability footprint of both the unprecedented advice that customers should install IIS itself, and associated systems. In Windows Server IIS 6.0, and not wait for the first Service Pack release. 2003, IIS must be deliberately deployed by users, and is It is good advice. With IIS 6.0, Microsoft’s key web delivered in a locked-down mode, which restricts it to server product appears to have shed its reputation as delivery of only static HTML pages in default mode. a point of vulnerability in the enterprise, and is becom- This “paradigm shift” means that most users will ing the platform for the web services-based applica- have to work harder to configure IIS to do the job they tions of the future. For more information on IIS 6.0,

require. But in turn that should lead to more thoughtfully visit www.microsoft.com/iis JONO ILLUSTRATION:

October 2003 5 Microsoft has over 600 experts worldwide working on research projects – 70 of them at the Microsoft Research (MSR) Labs in Cambridge. Their mission is to sharpen Microsoft’s cutting edge. Chris Bishop, assistant director at MSR Cambridge, believes that some of the work being performed could make computers easier to use and more intuitive.

THiNKiNG MACHiNES

WHAT DOES MICROSOFT RESEARCH CAMBRIDGE DO AND HOW DOES IT FIT INTO MICROSOFT’S STRATEGY AS A WHOLE? We’re part of Microsoft Research (MSR), which is itself part of Microsoft Corporation. Our mission is two-fold: the first is to advance the state of the art in our field and the second is to be useful to our funders, Microsoft Corporation. On the first objective, we aim to work at the cutting edge of science and contribute to the field through academic publications and participation in conferences. For the second goal, we aim to transfer some of our ideas and technologies into Microsoft products. It’s important to have both. If we didn’t have a strong programme of basic science we wouldn’t have anything interesting to transfer, but if we weren’t grounded in the desire to produce large scale, real-world applications we wouldn’t stretch ourselves. Real applications force you to address all sorts of difficulties and complexities that you might not otherwise have to address. We have an open, academic approach, including the freedom to publish and the freedom to follow our own interests. In many ways, we have more freedom than an academic because there’s no teaching or grant applications to worry about. And I don’t really have to worry about how to commercialise our research, since there are many product groups in Microsoft that are on the look out for new technologies. It’s the ideal research environment.

6 FYITECHNOLOGY WHAT IS MSR RESEARCHING AT THE MOMENT AND WHERE DOES INFERENCE AND LEARNING.” CAN YOU EXPLAIN WHAT THAT MEANS? YOUR WORK FIT INTO THE OVERALL PROGRAMME? Probability theory is the bedrock for everything we do in machine There are three main areas. The first is programming principles learning and perception. It’s actually quite important. The basic and tools. An example of this is research into “generics,” which idea is that, traditionally, we think of computers as deterministic are classes and methods that are designed to deal with data logical entities that slavishly follow a set of instructions that we types in a uniform way. give them. That’s fine if you have one computer in isolation. The The second area is systems and networking. One of the complexity comes when you have many computers interacting projects we’re interested in is quality of service in home networks. with one another and with the real world through sensors like These carry a great mix of traffic, for example e-mail and video cameras and microphones. This forces you to face much more streaming from one room to another or you may have instant complex situations with more variability, contradiction and messaging running with someone outside the house. You don’t ambiguity. The computer must make a decision on information want a lot of video data to interrupt a small but urgent instant that may be partial, incomplete and potentially contradictory. We messaging conversation. The third, which is my area of interest, is machine learning and perception. For example, gaze correction for video “Computers must conferencing, which uses two cameras to synthesise a view that you’d get if there was a camera inside the screen. Our application make decisions on works with any background and scene. information that WHAT RESEARCH PROJECTS ARE YOU PURSUING IN THE MACHINE LEARNING AND PERCEPTION GROUP? may be incomplete” There’s a big effort in handwriting recognition. At MSR we have a project that I think will run for several years. It asks: “To what extent can a computer understand what a user is writing?” need a mathematical framework for dealing with this and we use For example, can it understand pictures and diagrams or a Bayesian view of probability to do it. mathematical formulae? It’s much broader than just recognising We sometimes think of probabilities as the frequency of events, text. It’s a very hard, perhaps even an artificial intelligence like flipping a coin. But if the coin is slightly bent, it might land problem, but if we solve it or even partially solve it, it would have “heads” 60 per cent of the time, and “tails” the remaining 40 per lots of value. cent of the time. The Bayesian view of probabilities is much more Another general area we’re interested in is machine learning general. It deals with more than the frequency of events. It allows us in computer and video games. Here, one of the main motivations to quantify uncertainty in much broader situations, for example, the is to produce more human-like computer-controlled players. If probability that it will rain tomorrow, where it doesn’t make sense to you’re not playing online and just playing against a computer, repeat tomorrow a million times and see how often it rains. there need to be entities that are computer-controlled, either as opponents or helpers on your team, and it would be nice to have WHAT SORT OF PRACTICAL OUTCOMES OR SOLUTIONS DO YOU HOPE TO them behave in a less robotic way. FIND FROM YOUR RESEARCH? HOW IS YOUR WORK GOING TO CHANGE We have a general and long-term interest in information THINGS IN FIVE TO TEN YEARS’ TIME? retrieval, particularly text-based retrieval. This includes research We certainly hope that we will have an impact over that time on fundamental algorithms. Examples include searching your frame and that the research we have already done will have an hard disk all the way up to searching the entire web. We work impact on many different Microsoft products. But the real, deep closely with product groups in the US so that they can make use goal of the lab is to invent whole new technologies, not simply of these algorithms in particular products. refine and develop existing things. Then we have a pretty substantial portfolio of basic research, Let me give you an example from what we’ve already done. the output of which is expressed in terms of publications and talks Digital Image Pro, which is just shipping, features technology for at conferences. For example, we might research a new machine image editing. What’s qualitatively different is that it allows the learning algorithm and this might be applicable to computer user to do quite sophisticated things with the image quickly and

VER: MICHAEL CLEMENT vision and information retrieval. Often the research is not targeted without a lot of skill or attention and care. For example, you want CO at a specific application and often we don’t know what the to remove a lamp post in a picture. You’ve been able to do this outcome will be. Overall, it’s a roughly even split between basic for a number of years using brushes, borrowing little bits of the and applied research. existing image and pasting them in. The outcome of that can be very satisfactory but it can be time-consuming. Our technology ON YOUR WEB SITE YOU SAY “MY RESEARCH IS CONCERNED WITH THE allows people to achieve better results, quicker and with

PHOTOGRAPHY: ROB CLAYTON PHOTOGRAPHY: DEVELOPMENT AND APPLICATION OF PROBABILISTIC METHODS FOR virtually no skill. After simply selecting part of an image with a

October 2003 7 mouse, our system can remove the object in question and fill in across the full spectrum. I think one of the areas where I would the hole with a plausible background. It’s easy for like to see some significant impact and where there’s real the user but requires something much more sophisticated going on in the background. The software has to be more sophisticated to make BISHOP HISTORY the end-user experience simpler. One spin-off from our work on gaze Chris Bishop began his scientific career by gaining correction allows you to remove the undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in Physics from background around a face in a video Oxford and Edinburgh, respectively. He joined Microsoft conference and replace it with Research Labs in 1998. He retains strong ties with another. So, if you’re having a video academia, including a chair of computer science at conference with your boss from the Edinburgh and a fellowship of Darwin College, Cambridge. beach, you can replace the background with a picture of the In his spare time, he is a keen pilot flying everything from office in real time. old biplanes to more modern Mooney light aircraft. This interest lies behind his most recent paper: “Satellites, Wind WHAT DIFFERENCE WILL and Weather. A case study in the application of data mining YOUR WORK MAKE TO to meteorology.” DEVELOPERS, AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF Chris is an assistant director at Microsoft Research NEW PRODUCTS? Cambridge and is responsible for machine learning Our programming and perception. principles group is very interested in seeing how they can improve the experience of developers. It’s important for us to expose functionality to developers through APIs to allow access to these potential to change people’s lives, is in the area of human- technologies. Obviously, if we can achieve that goal the take up of computer interaction. I’m taking a broad view of computers – not a technology will be much greater. We sometimes get quite deeply just the box on your desktop, but computing devices of all kinds. involved in technology transfer to product groups. It is quite By making them easier to use, they’ll blend into the background and become much more useful. The kinds of technology that we’re looking at in machine learning have the potential to make “All the research those interactions much more natural. One thing that’s quite tantalising and inspirational for people we are doing has the in my field is that when I interact with a human it is easy and effortless. Another human can extract the information I want to potential to have a convey through my words, gestures and expressions. It should be possible for a computer to do the same, although it is immensely significant impact” difficult. The fact that we know it’s a soluble problem is a source of inspiration and we’re making steady progress in lots of these areas. common for a researcher to spend a couple of years doing very basic research and then spend a year or so working very closely Interview conducted by Matthew Stibbe, a freelance technology with a product group at Microsoft on the detail of how their and business journalist. technology should be used and implemented in software. When you’re involved in the next release of a product it’s a very different experience. People find it very rewarding. Often we hire researchers from an academic background and success for them WHERE NEXT? used to be a few hundred people reading their paper, but now they are contributing to a product that will be used by millions of people. For more information about Microsoft Research Labs, Cambridge, or on Chris Bishop, please visit: WHAT IMPACT DO YOU EXPECT YOUR RESEARCH TO HAVE ON http://research.microsoft.com/aboutmsr/labs/ MICROSOFT’S PRODUCT ROADMAP? cambridge Virtually all the areas that we’re researching have the potential to http://research.microsoft.com/~cmbishop have significant impact. I see technology transfer taking place

8 FYITECHNOLOGY Small Business Server

PLATFORM FOR SUCCESS

Microsoft is preparing to release the fourth generation of its Small Business Server, which will provide an easily deployed and managed server platform. FYI Technology assesses the latest incarnation.

BUSINESSES ARE LOOKING to become more agile and flexible, in provide remote access to a wider range of devices, including order to respond to rapidly changing market conditions in a jittery mobile phones, using Outlook Mobile. For a fuller service, using a economic climate. This means that employees may be working dial-up modem or broadband, secure virtual private networks can out of the office or from home, while still requiring access to e-mail be created using the Remote Access Wizard to simplify an and other services. Not to mention the requirement for portal- otherwise complex process. driven intranets and document routing. Windows 2003 Server is considered to be Microsoft’s most But while most small companies could benefit hugely from using stable platform to date. But there are always threats to the integri- technology to help run their business – and understand the benefits ty, or even the existence, of the data that underpins the enterprise. of remotely accessing e-mail, calendar and other services – many Here, Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSCS) has been added to cre- simply do not have the resources. Already ate point-in-time back-ups which means that all data can be copied stretched IT administrators are being asked and stored – including files that are open and in use at the time. What’s in the Box? to do more with less. With this in mind, When an accident occurs, such as a user deleting some vital files, Microsoft has ensured that the latest VSCS allows the user to restore the file without the need for access Standard Edition version of Small Business Server 2003 can to special backup programs or system-level access. Windows Server 2003 supply many of the functions required by But perhaps the most compelling feature in SBS 2003 is the Exchange Server 2003 small businesses in a package that makes inclusion of SharePoint™ Services. This brings a higher level of Windows SharePoint Services deployment and management as simple functionality to the suite by allowing users to create intranet por- Shared Fax Service and automated as possible. tals. Using the integral messaging services, workers can keep each Key to this enhanced sophistication, other informed of progress, seek advice or just discuss ideas. Premium Edition and ease of use, are the improvements SharePoint also provides document-routing capabilities. As above plus: made to the set-up procedures. Automation SBS 2003 takes the small business server into new realms. As ISA Server 2000 through Wizards and user group profiles well as the latest features, the addition of SharePoint could reveal the SQL Server 2000 means that a system can be up and run- possible evolution of the system to extend IT infrastructure service Office FrontPage 2003 ning in about a quarter of the time taken to provision into the realm of business infrastructure support. install SBS 2000. Some of these time-saving features are integral to Windows 2003 Server, which contains typical configurations for the different roles System Requirements that servers play, such as file, print, application or e-mail server. These Server Roles alone bring a significant time saving by relieving the Component Minimum Requirement (Recommended) installer from having to figure out the best configuration for each role. Processor: 300MHz (550MHz or higher) SBS 2003 offers two editions: Premium and Standard, the Memory: 256MB (384MB) latter being more suitable for those customers that do not require Hard disk: 4GB available space (4GB) the higher functionality of the Premium, which offers among other things SQL Server database and FrontPage web site designer. The Installation procedure two versions also differ in terms of provision for security, one of the Windows installation (40 minutes) main concerns for small businesses. The standard edition uses Windows configuration (30 minutes) RRAS – the Windows Server 2003 built-in network layer firewall – Server applications installation (90 minutes) which allows in-bound filtering based on port, protocol and IP Once installed SBS will reboot address, and is the equivalent of any SOHO hardware firewall on Follow a “to-do list” of tasks to complete the configuration the market today. The Premium edition, meanwhile, utilises ISA Connect the server to the internet (internet security and acceleration), which is a network and application layer firewall that has all the functionality of RRAS, as well as allowing restrictions on outbound access and the ability to add application layer filters. Prices are yet to be announced, but Microsoft WHERE NEXT? expects the Premium suite to sell for just under £1,000, while the For more details on Small Business Server, visit: Standard version should offer a significant saving at under £400. www.microsoft.com/sbserver Support for accessing Exchange Server 2003 information through web browsers has also been improved in SBS 2003 to

October 2003 9 SQL Server THE YEAR OF THE SEQUEL Microsoft is set to formally unveil “Yukon” – codename for the next release of SQL Server – its next generation database technology. Even so, SQL Server 2000 has seen many improvements over the last few years. Phil Jones reports.

What’s new in Yukon?

ENHANCED ENTERPRISE DEVELOPER PRODUCTIVITY BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE DATA MANAGEMENT •Deeper integration between SQL •Building on SQL Server 7.0 and SQL •Enhanced high availability tech- Server “Yukon,” .NET technologies, Server 2000, SQL Server “Yukon” nologies, additional backup and and Microsoft development tools. will deliver an end-to-end business restore capabilities, replication •One development tool for Transact- intelligence platform with integrated enhancements, and “secure by SQL, XML, and Multidimensional analytics including online analytical default” settings will help enter- Expression (MDX). processing (OLAP), data mining, prises to provide users with secure, •Robust enhancements to the extract, transformation, and load consistent access to enterprise Transact-SQL language. (ETL) tools, data warehousing; and applications. •Common language runtime (CLR) reporting functionality. •Interoperability advancements, embedded in the database engine. •Advancements to existing business support for open standards, and •CLR integration. intelligence features, such as OLAP native XML and web services •Native XML support, user-defined and data mining, and the introduc- capabilities. data types, and Xquery. tion of a new reporting server. •Enhanced online operations and •Support for both relational and XML •Scalability and availability enhance- high availability upgrades through data natively. ments will help ensure that users Windows will help to ensure that •Support for existing and emerging have uninterrupted access to extended enterprise systems open standards such as Hypertext business intelligence applications remain accessible. Transfer Protocol (HTTP), XML, and reports. •A new management tool, expanded Simple Object Access Protocol •Improved ETL tool. self-tuning capabilities, and a (SOAP), XQuery, and XML Schema powerful programming model. Definition (XSD). Enhancements to SQL Profiler and other tools.

FOR MANY CUSTOMERS THE LAUNCH OF YUKON, the codename for from their databases,” she says. the next release of SQL Server, will provide an early glimpse of Consequently, there are now four different editions of SQL the technology that is likely to form the basis of their data Server: the Standard edition, which still largely accounts for the management strategies of the future. It is expected to enter dominant 38 per cent share of the Windows DBMS market that commercial manufacture in approximately 12 months time. Microsoft holds; the Enterprise edition for larger installations; But while richer functionality is expected, Yukon’s arrival is Developer for application developers; and, most recently, the just the latest – if potentially most significant milestone – in its small footprint SQL Server CE, which places DBMS functionality ongoing effort to create the database management system for on handheld devices such as PDAs and phones. the 21st century. Indeed, according to Microsoft UK SQL Server These products and their allied tools and utilities generate and solutions marketing manager Cassandra Nuttall, although it Microsoft’s third largest revenue stream. “It [the SQL range] is a may not always have seemed obvious to customers, the last billion dollar business, and it’s absolutely of strategic three years have been a busy time for Microsoft’s SQL Server importance for Microsoft,” says Nuttall. And, when Yukon is product group. eventually released to manufacture as a commercial product, “it “There has been no new major release since SQL Server will have capabilities which our competition simply don’t have,” 2000 was released to manufacture, which has led some she promises. people to think that nothing much has been going on. The But some customers may still have to wait to judge that reality is that we have been working hard on different editions statement for themselves. Yukon was released to selected of SQL, recognising that different people want different things customers as a private beta in July, and will become publicly

10 FYITECHNOLOGY available in beta form early next year, but it will not be released to manufacture as a fully commercial product before the fourth quarter of 2004. Yukon’s improved management and operational efficiencies are expected to be of most benefit to IT professionals, although it will deliver faster performance and a wider variety of connectivity options, meaning that IT administrators will not have to figure out how to do this manually. SQL Server “Yukon” will be available in 32- and 64-bit editions. In the meantime, however, there is still much to offer those customers who would like to consolidate their enterprise software licensing strategy around one vendor. Although by its own admission Microsoft has had to come from behind in the DBMS space in the past few years, it has been catching up fast over the past two years. In particular, says Nuttall, the company has focused on filling out the business intelligence (BI) features supported by SQL Server, and on preparing it to be the platform of choice for web services and other internet-orientated applications people have found most useful,” says Nuttall. by ensuring the best possible support for XML. More recently SQL Server 2000 64-bit edition arrived in April, The “XML-isation” of SQL Server began with the first Service bringing with it the extra headroom that customers need to feel Pack release in February 2001, when managed classes and XML confident about using it as a high-end OLAP engine, supporting schema support were added to the standard offering. Since then, massive in-memory OLAP cubes. And there is more to come in the process has continued apace with a web services toolkit and later this year when Microsoft rolls out SQL Server 2000 support for Visual Studio .NET in February 2002. Then in March Reporting Services. of that year Microsoft joined forces with BI specialists Hyperion Originally developed as part of the Yukon project, SQL Server and SAS Institute to pioneer an independent standard for 2000 Reporting Services is a rare example of a software product XML for analysis. that has been readied for market ahead of schedule. More than that, Microsoft has been no less it is also intended to fill perhaps the final gap in SQL Server’s BI SQL Server Quick Facts diligent in its approach to grooming armoury – reporting. •100,000 customer sites partici- SQL Server to be a better platform When it arrives, in October or November according to Nuttall, pated in beta-testing for SQL for BI. Historically, the company has SQL Server 2000 Reporting Services will massively enhance SQL’s Server version 7.0. relied on its partnerships with third ability to perform as a reporting platform. It will allow users to •It took 300 person-years to build party application vendors to round manage, create and deliver reports in any format they wish (including SQL Server 7.0. out its BI portfolio, and it still has all Office documents formats, HTML and PDF, or as an Outlook e- •The SQL Server team eats an many such partnerships in place. mail), across any data comms structure, and as either push or pull. average of 5,400 take-out meals Increasingly though, says Nuttall, Together, these additions to the SQL Server portfolio such as during a development cycle. customers have asked the company Reporting Services, Accelerator for Business and 64-bit edition •SQL Server underwent 3.5m hours to fill the holes in its own BI offerings, have already done much to move Microsoft up the DBMS laggard of stress tests and around 16m and Microsoft has responded ladder, outside of the Windows market. Microsoft can now claim functional tests. with a series of point release at least par with rival products and presence in most key •The codename for the data min- enhancements to SQL Server 2000. markets, including the high-end. ing features in SQL Server 2000 The SQL Server Accelerator for Indeed, according to the result of a recent price-performance was “Aurum,” the Latin word for Business Intelligence, for example, comparison conducted by the CRN Test Centre, “Microsoft SQL “gold.” was released in May 2002 and Server Enterprise Edition ... achieved an overwhelming victory •Over 2,500 partners build instantly made it easier for users to over Oracle, IBM, Sybase and InterSystems.” solutions on top of SQL Server. build data marts, warehouses and With enterprise data management being one of three key •There are currently 83,572 cubes, and to use familiar tools pillars of Microsoft’s Yukon design goals, SQL Server looks set to Microsoft Certified Database such as Excel to create reports. go from strength to strength. Administrators for SQL Server. Accelerator for Business Intelli- •The codename for the upcoming gence was one of the first products Phil Jones is a freelance technology journalist. release of SQL Server is “Yukon.” of Microsoft’s BI best practice, and •Over one million customers are came supported by prescriptive expected to beta-test Yukon architecture guides that repres- WHERE NEXT? before its release. ented the team’s 30 years of For more information on SQL Server, visit: distilled BI market experience and www.microsoft.com/uk/servers/sql “which I can confidently say is what

October 2003 11 DEGREES OF DEVELOPMENT

A team of undergraduates from Hull University took joint third place in the Microsoft Imagine Cup student programming contest. Having beaten over 20,000 entries from around the world and learnt .NET in just eight weeks. The Cup represents just one of a number of initiatives that is helping Microsoft to build closer links with the academic world. Eric Doyle reports.

“Team Random” – Andrew Sterland, Phil Price, David Waby and Will Johnson – from the University of Hull, celebrate winning US$10,000 after coming joint third in the first annual Microsoft Imagine Cup, judged at Tech-Ed in Barcelona in July.

THE IMAGINE CUP was created to interest the Microsoft development environment, “Team Random,” as the students students in programming and to a team of four students from the dubbed themselves, are more used to introduce them to Microsoft tools and University of Hull developed a Pocket PC using Java, but found the .NET Framework technologies. It aims to familiarise application, Mercury Travel Assistant – easy to work with. The object orientation students with the Microsoft .NET which combines mapping, information with its similarity to Java eased their Framework and give them an opportunity web services and the global positioning switch between platforms. “When the to use it to create innovative applications. system (GPS) to provide a support service Imagine Cup came along we used the The theme of the first competition, for business travellers – and entered it finalists from the Hull heats of the judged at Tech-Ed in Barcelona in July, into the competition. Starting at the end competition. We teach Java in the first was the link between people, information, of April, the team took just eight weeks to year [of the course] and they were doing systems, and devices, using web services complete Mercury, following a selection okay, but wanted to spread their wings. and .NET as the springboard. process overseen by Robert Miles, The competition provided a good context Fired by the opportunity to academic team leader at Hull’s for them to learn the .NET language and supplement their knowledge of Java Department of Computer Science, and to create something worthwhile at the programming with practical experience of assisted by Microsoft UK. end,” explains Miles.

12 FYITECHNOLOGY The team – Andrew Sterland, Phil but a future feature will use GPS Price, David Waby and Will Johnson – were services to pinpoint the user. The Cup Winners also surprised by Visual Studio® .NET’s An on-screen menu lists locations, Integrated Development Environment such as restaurants, hotels and places of First Prize $25,000 (IDE). “The IDE was quite amazing, to be interest, and a web service is called to list Tu Nguyen, University of Nebraska, honest,” says Sterland, the team’s chief these local amenities – fuller details and USA – Ipods, a multi-language wire- architect. “We definitely wouldn’t be able reviews can be downloaded. The less PDA application allows a waiter to do the same sort of thing in Java. The MapPoint link allows two additional to take orders in one language and suite is very helpful when designing code features. One highlights the target on a transmit them in a language that – like the filling out of the functions and street map, while providing written the chef understands. methods for each object, and the name directions detailing how to get to the spelling. I think it’s one of the most venue from the user’s location. Second Prize $15,000 productive software environments I’ve The second feature is a translation University of Bombay, India – seen by far, especially compared with Java utility, which initially uses the Babelfish “Sanjeevani” integrates different environments like Sun Microsystems’ ONE web service to translate a phrase from one mobile devices to increase collabora- Studio and Forté.” language to another. The Pocket PC then tion between health organisations. Leading up to the Barcelona event, contacts a text to speech service provided end-of-year exams ended ten days before by Rhetorical so the phrase can be played Joint Third Prize $10,000 the university semester ended, and work back in a natural-sounding voice. Babelfish Nanyang Technological University became frantic to ensure the application does not support every language and this School of Computer Engineering, was 90 per cent complete, and that is where the image bank icon comes in Singapore – AutoShop is a wireless- debugging would be the sole concern useful. By downloading clip art images of enabled supermarket trolley that before the competition. taxis, restaurants and other required remotely accesses a shopping list Just before travelling to Barcelona, services, the Pocket PC can communicate and guides the shopper to each the team finalised the application, with at a rudimentary level in any language. product. It also displays product Mercury comprising of a screen with six Mercury also links to news services information and promotions. icons, each corresponding to its main that comply with the Remote Site functions: a mapping and location Summary (RSS) standard, such as CNN, University of Hull, UK – Mercury directory, a phrase translation facility, an Reuters and the BBC. Headlines or full turns a Pocket PC into a image gallery, a news service, a currency stories can then be downloaded. sophisticated travelling companion. converter and a messaging feature. The currency converter feature was The location directory uses the the starting point for the Mercury project. Microsoft MapPoint® Web Service to Sterland had written a PHP script, which developers and experts, and listening to on its own was considered too basic for the keynote addresses at Tech-Ed was the Imagine Cup. However, it is a service also a good experience, he adds. that travellers need and has been The response was exactly what incorporated into the application. Microsoft had hoped for when it created Messaging, meanwhile, offers more the Imagine Cup, which it believes will help than just a simple e-mail facility. Every it to regain some of the “mindshare” that user’s profile containing current location competing products, such as Linux, Unix is stored centrally and can be and Java, hold in the academic world. The interrogated to find local contacts. A 25,000 students who graduate each year traveller can use this to locate and in computing-related subjects enter their contact colleagues who are also in town working careers with a strong bias towards for a business meeting or convention. Linux, Unix and Java. But this does not At the competition each project was reflect the skills required in a business evaluated for innovation and creativity, environment and can result in a skills gap. implementation of the .NET technologies To that end, Microsoft will increasingly and web services, social responsibility, address the key influencers of the commercial value and overall academic world in an attempt to win Attendees at Tech-Ed get a chance to weigh presentation. The result saw Hull’s finest research initiatives and broaden the up the competition and share their experiences of using .NET and web services. walk away with an outsize cheque for curriculum. In turn, it hopes to provide US$10,000 (£6,200). students with a more balanced knowledge help navigate a user around any major But the team were not in it for the of the technologies they will require when city. The underlying feature is a user money. “As the project went on I really they enter the business world. profile that contains basic details such learnt how to work much more effectively The keystone for this initiative will be as name, e-mail address and location. as a team member,” says Price. Seeing the formation of faculty and student The location currently has to be typed in new technologies, mixing with other communities. “We’ve got to enable

NovemberFebruaryOctober 20032005 13 supplied with free Microsoft software for enhanced. “Employers will expect them to populating teaching and research labs. have an understanding of, and be able to Free software, in the form of copies of compare, these technologies and position certain applications, may also be given to them appropriately. We’re trying to give the researchers, faculty administrators and, students a much more rounded view of most importantly, the students. This will what’s used in the IT industry,” he says. not be restricted to use on campus, but These initiatives will be supported by will also be loaded onto students’ Microsoft’s Tech Tour, which mobilises a “Team Random” celebrate their success machines at home so that they can study development lab travelling the country Microsoft techniques of programming. and offering demonstrations, teaching Microsoft to get scale and reach out to the The new drive to extend MSDNAA modules and a walk-in clinic to help masses in the same way that Linux does,” started with the Imagine Cup and will be students and tutors through some of explains Stuart Nielsen-Marsh, Microsoft extended through other national their more perplexing problems. .NET academia manager. “So we’ve got to create and facilitate Microsoft and non- Microsoft online community portals, offline “We’ve seen a sea change in user groups and events. Historically, students have not had the same exposure the way Microsoft is to Microsoft technologies as they have to Unix, Linux and Java. But we are trying to working with academics change that and this initiative is about letting them use and experience Microsoft over the last 18 months” technologies to show them that it's just as cool and innovative as they perceive all these competitors to be.” competitions. One example is the With these initiatives, Microsoft The channel of communication will computer science faculty at Queen Mary, hopes to reach an audience of around 50 be the Microsoft Developer Network University of London, which is running a per cent or more of UK computer science Academic Alliance (MSDNAA), a sector of programming competition. The winner will students. The fruits of previous years’ the developer network formed to allow have their fees and maintenance grant initiatives have resulted in the University faculties to sign up to the network in the paid for their computer science degree of Hull offering a masters degree in .NET same way that individuals join MSDN. and a fast-track interview for a possible and the University of Leeds running a Under the scheme, the member faculty is year’s work placement at Microsoft. Trustworthy Computing course. There will also be more fun elements This growing academia focus of Testing Students such as “LAN Parties” and weekend Microsoft has not gone unnoticed in Hull at “techno-fests” supported by Microsoft. least. “We’ve seen a sea change in the way The Imagine Cup will be an annual Through the MSDNAA portal, students Microsoft is working with academics over event and 2004 will see some will be encouraged to form user groups the last 18 months,” says Miles. changes in the UK to make the quali- either within a geographical or technical “Previously, we felt we were regarded as a fying process even more rigorous. The area and to organise meetings, revenue source, but now they’ve realised first part of the competition will be an programming events and parties. that we do things of direct interest to them online IQ test of the student’s ability On the faculty side, there will also be and we’ve realised that their technology is to solve puzzles and problems. bursaries, technical help and teaching extremely interesting in computer science Qualifiers will be invited to enter the support offered under a Requests for terms. We’re going to get deeply involved second stage to test their abilities in Proposals (RFP) umbrella. Ideas with the next Imagine Cup and hopefully programming and design. The final submitted by MSDNAA members will be get our students into that as well. It was part of the qualifier will be a “Big evaluated by a board comprising really nice for me to see the students form Brother” knockout competition that Microsoft and academics who will judge a team out of nothing and then go ahead will not only test the computer skills each proposal on its educational and and do these great things.” of the students, but also their ability commercial merits. The aim of the board to collaborate as part of a team. The will be to ensure that the breadth and Eric Doyle is a freelance journalist challenges will not only be pure depth of the programme is maintained specialising in technology. coding, but will also include large- and does not become a mere extension scale problem solving and physical of Microsoft’s own product development challenges. The winners will then go research facility in Cambridge. WHERE NEXT? on to take part in the finals at Tech- Nielsen-Marsh points out that the aim For further information on Ed. Next year’s competition theme will of a university course is not just to teach the MSDNAA, visit the portal at: be revealed closer to the final. the principles of technology, but also to www.msdnaa.net ensure that students’ job prospects are

14 FYITECHNOLOGY .NET Framework SUCCEEDiNG WiTH .NET

The .NET Framework could revolutionise the way software developers work and even transform their role within the organisation – as long as they are prepared to embrace a new way of thinking. Phil Jones reports.

A YEAR AFTER THE FIRST RELEASE of the .NET Framework, and many customers have already reaped the benefit of using Microsoft’s latest development environment. Proponents describe it as the richest and most productive development environment that the Windows world has seen. In addition, with the arrival of .NET Server accelerating the uptake of Microsoft’s new component and service orientated programming paradigm, many are looking forward to enjoying unprecedented levels of productivity from their normally hard-pressed development teams. However, given the learning curve that any new programming requirements. Why should the developer community expect .NET environment inevitably presents, who can blame them if some to make any significant difference to their lives, and what do they Windows developers are eyeing the prospect of .NET with some have to do to realise these changes? caution and asking the question: “What’s in it for me?” On one level, says Tim Sneath, principal systems engineer The short answer to this question, if Microsoft’s .NET with Microsoft’s .NET developer group, there is nothing evangelists are to be believed, is that .NET will not only make the dramatically different about .NET from the developer perspective. lives of all Windows developers easier, in many cases it could also In the interests of easing its adoption, Microsoft has worked hard transform their role as developers. Indeed, thanks to the powerful to ensure .NET’s backward compatibility with existing component and web services-based architecture of .NET, development tools, and thanks to the common runtime language ambitious programmers are set to emerge from the shadows of (CLR), Visual Basic®, Visual C++®, Visual C#® and ASP the IT department and take centre stage within their developers will all be able to participate equally in the organisations as the architects of a .NET environment. revolutionary new generation of DEFINING THE BASIC ELEMENTS OF .NET For this reason, most developers web-based business-focused coming to .NET for the first time will applications. find little to make them wonder It is not the first time that how to get started with it. Then, developers have been as they discover labour Smart Clients urged to cast off their saving features and chains, and exploit a concepts, such as the powerful new technology automated garbage that could help them to collector and facade play a more strategic interfaces, they may role in the enterprise. A quickly find themselves decade ago, object Developer warming to their new Tools technology was expected environment. to turn programmers into However, says Sneath, it Servers business analysts, and then will not take long for most came the enterprise application developers to recognise that .NET is integration (EAI) trend, which was not simply a straight-forward evolution supposed to turn “humble” code-cutters of the conventional Windows development into systems architects. environment. “In two key respects,” he says, “.NET Well, that was what was supposed to happen. The asks developers to embrace a new approach not merely to reality today, of course, is that most developers are still toiling in development, but to the underlying philosophy of systems design. In the shadows, diligently crafting applications line by line, attending the first place there is a general shift away from a conventional to the unglamorous necessities of documentation and procedural object-oriented approach, to a stronger object-oriented,

maintenance, and straining to meet project deadlines against the component-based view. In the second place, there is a shift towards ILLUSTRATION:JACEY familiar background of tight budgets and ever changing user what people are calling a service-oriented environment.”

October 2003 15 Together, these two trends are what make .NET so powerful. They offer a final point of departure from the traditional hand- crafted, bespoke approach to software development, towards a component-led approach which is much closer to conventional engineering practices, and which embraces many more opportunities for automation and code-reuse. This will not just make developers more productive, says Sneath, “it will also free them to spend more time considering the bigger picture, and not just the mechanics of how every byte of code is manipulated. It is all about getting rid of the tedium [of programming] and giving developers the opportunity to concentrate on the more exciting code that really makes the difference.” Inevitably, providing developers with the opportunity to concentrate on “the bigger picture,” is also what will present many of them with their biggest .NET challenge. As Tom Welch, a consultant with programming analysts, the Cutter Group, points

out, “most programmers, especially the better ones, are good at JOHN MILLAR PHOTOGRAPHY: what they do because they enjoy working on the detail of writing .NET is transforming the role of the developer from “code cutter” to that of systems architect, designer and even business analyst code. To be a good .NET programmer, you don’t write hundreds and hundreds of lines of code, because most of the code is already there in the .NET Framework. [Instead] you are now assembling VB developer’s life further, “pretty much every object you utilise in actual applications into super-applications,” says Welch. the Base Class Library inherits.” For some developers this will certainly turn out to be a Without a clear understanding of inheritance, working with liberating experience, one which will encourage them to poke their the BCL quickly becomes a messy business, but in most cases head over the code-face and take a more proactive role in this will be “a big jump” for VB developers, says Sneath, and not business analysis and system design. one that all of them will relish. Certainly, for anyone still labouring But for others, the experience, at least to begin with, may be with VB 3.0 or VB 4.0, embracing inheritance will demand a altogether more uncomfortable. The extent to which working with complete change of mindset. .NET has an alienating effect on developers will depend largely on Whereas those developers who have had their first taste of their programming background. For Visual Basic developers, for inheritance using VB 6.0 might not want to repeat the experience. example, .NET will pose several challenges, says Sneath, of which The implementation of inheritance in that product was “so clunky the first and most important is likely to be mastering the .NET Base and horrible”, according to Sneath, that he doubts whether more Class Library (BCL) and the intricacies of true object inheritance. than 10 per cent of developers use it regularly. It’s also possible that The classes contained within the BCL are the heart of .NET, even with Visual Basic .NET, some users will find ways of working and learning them is a necessary part of being able to exploit key around inheritance and persisting with old ways of working. commands and opportunities for code reuse. It is not a trivial Those VB developers who do decide to ignore .NET will certainly task: the BCL documentation extends to eight volumes, be missing out though. Visual Basic .NET will make interaction with describing several thousand object classes, and to complicate the the operating system very much simpler, allowing direct access to event logs and performance counters, which VB developers have formerly had to utilise using undocumented APIs, and control and access to memory will also be much improved. Perhaps best of all, says Sneath, in the .NET world VB developers need no longer feel like the junior partner of their C++ counterparts, because with Visual Basic .NET, VB now has the power to participate in large-scale enterprise systems projects. “.NET lifts the ceiling on Visual Basic,” he says, “because in .NET there is nothing of any significance you can do in one language that can’t be done with any other.” Compared with the conceptual leap facing the VB developer moving to a .NET world, the migration path of the C++ programmer is a great deal less challenging, even if in some ways, at least in the short-term, it might seem less obviously rewarding. To be sure, in terms of technical expertise, the C++ developer Simplified model of the garbage collector has less to learn. All of .NET’s standard object technology constructs should already be familiar to the C++ programmer, and

16 FYITECHNOLOGY Patterns in .NET

although some will grumble at having to exchange home-grown Enterprise class business solutions are often extremely class libraries for the BCL, the application migration path from complex and must be highly available and scalable in C++ to .NET should hold few traumas. the face of unpredictable usage. They also need to be Even so, not all C++ programmers will necessarily find .NET malleable and predictable in order that organisations can entirely to their taste, particularly those who like to exert the respond rapidly to changing business requirements. tightest possible control on every detail of their code. To try and persist with this detailed approach to coding in the .NET world is The best solutions are those composed of a set of smaller, to miss the point of the new technology, and to enter a world of simple mechanisms that solve simple problems reliably and frustration. The garbage collector, for instance, which is designed effectively. During the process of building larger and more to be a measure of productivity advance for all programmers, may complex systems, these simple mechanisms combine to cause some C++ programmers to worry that they are giving up evolve the larger system. more control to the .NET compiler than they are used to. However, even if .NET inevitably imposes some constraints on A pattern describes a recurring problem that occurs in a programmers used to high flexibility of a language like C++, given context and, based on a set of guiding forces, recom- Sneath believes they will soon come to see that as a small mends a solution. The solution is usually a simple mecha- sacrifice compared to the advantages that .NET brings. “You are nism, a collaboration between two or more classes, objects, moving away from 100 per cent control of the bare metal, to an services, processes, threads, components, or nodes that work environment where you are still pretty close, but where you let the together to resolve the problem identified in the pattern. execution environment take over physical control of things like memory allocation,” he says. Patterns are useful because they: document simple mecha- This will feel alien at first, but ultimately it allows nisms that work; provide a common vocabulary and taxono- programmers to spend time, which otherwise would be spent on my for developers and architects; enable solutions to be relatively menial house-keeping tasks, exploring new ways of described concisely as combinations of patterns; enable designing systems and, ultimately, of participating in the new reuse of architecture, design, and implementation decisions. wave of application development that is centred on web service- For more information on enterprise solution patterns using oriented applications. .NET, please visit: For all programmers, even those who have already made the http://msdn.microsoft.com/practices/type/Patterns/Enterprise leap to the world of C# and Java, it is this latter trend that not only holds the greatest potential for cultural conflicts, but also the greatest opportunities for technical innovation and even for for developers as, in one sense, defining a service oriented career advancement. architecture is not very different from agreeing an application Again, the potential obstacles in the path of developers programming interface,” says Sneath. wishing to embrace the web services world owe less to matters of Seen in this light, he says, programmers will recognise that technical expertise and language knowledge, and more to matters working in the world of .NET need not be overly taxing, nor need it of mindset and habit. In the conventional world of tightly coupled necessarily involve an unwelcome degree of de-skilling. On the system architectures, programmers absolutely need to scrutinise contrary, although the future of programming under .NET may every aspect of their code, ensuring as far as possible that no line place less emphasis on the virtues of traditional programming techniques and coding expertise per se, it ultimately magnifies the role of individual programmers by magnifying the proportion “.NET will free of system functionality that is defined by the individual. For the ambitious developer with a real commitment to developers to spend creating great software, that can only be a good thing. more time considering the bigger picture” WHERE NEXT?

is surplus to requirements, and that each byte is tuned exactly For more information on technical resources to help you build and to its function. deploy web services, the foundation of a Microsoft .NET-connected By comparison, in the service oriented architecture world, environment, visit: www.microsoft.com/net/technical says Sneath, programmers “are forced to make a jump in their thinking. They are no longer there just to write code, they are there To visit the .NET Architecture Centre, go to: to define the structure of an application. This is an important http://msdn.microsoft.com/architecture/ concept that needs to be understood, but it should hold no fears

October 2003 17 Windows Terminal ONE SiZE FiTS ALL Terminal Services under Windows 2003 allows multiple users to access the same central applications. But you need to follow some basic implementation guidelines. Danny Bradbury reports.

CENTRALISING SOFTWARE APPLICATIONS on the server can be highly beneficial to corporate users. Aside from multi-user access, other advantages include easier application management and better security. Unfortunately, not all software is developed for web- based multi-user access, and neither is it designed for simultaneous access by multiple users. Multiple users, such as a field sales team, often need access to both single-user applications and to software that is not coded for web delivery, and this should be possible without extensive software modifications. Microsoft Terminal Services is designed to do just that. Terminal Services is designed primarily for carrying encrypted Windows Server 2003 has opened up a new set of options for keyboard and mouse data between a device, or client, and the Terminal Services users. For example, the Terminal Server software server. It minimises bandwidth requirements, while allowing access within the server operating system includes a number of new to remote graphical applications. But one feature within Terminal features. Remote Desktop for Administration makes it possible, for Server that will appeal most to business customers is virtual the first time, to connect to the console session of the server so that channels, according to Alex Balcanquall, a senior consultant at you can run privileged tasks without Microsoft. Virtual channels, which have been available since the physically being at the server. launch of Windows 2000, enable developers to pass different kinds What’s New? Terminal Server also uses more of of serial information between a client and a server. Windows Server’s management “Suppose you have a peripheral that takes input from, say, Remote Desktop for Administration capabilities, including Group Policy specialised barcode readers or swipe card readers for ATMs and Group Policy settings, so that you can set options banks,” says Balcanquall. “You could write a virtual channel to Remote Desktop Users for groups of servers and users. take the data and pass it to the server. So a virtual channel Remote Desktop Clients The addition of a Remote provides a new way of transferring data elements.” Desktop Users (RDU) group makes Virtual channels are made possible by the protocol that it possible to manage Terminal Services users more effectively. On underlies Terminal Services: the Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP). the client side, the Remote Desktop Client now automatically Based on the T.120 standard originally designed for multimedia reconnects in the event of a network failure and makes connection data conferencing, RDP is extensible, meaning that it can be used management easier. for multiple forms of communication. Terminal Services is evolving into a sophisticated remote Another benefit of Terminal Server is its protocol independence. connection system, with which users can connect either to a single application or to a complete Windows desktop on a remote device. This can be useful both for end users who want to access business “Terminal Services resources online, and for administrators who want to remotely configure a machine, according to Ivo Salmre, UK product manager is evolving into a for .NET and developer technologies at Microsoft. “There are many great remote administration tools, but sometimes you just want to sophisticated remote be there. Terminal Server lets you essentially be at the keyboard of that machine doing that work,” he says. connection system” Windows XP machines, for example, connect to current and previous versions of Terminal Server using Remote Desktop The architecture is based on the same sort of multi-level design as Connection (RDC) client software, which is also used for peer-to-peer the OSI stack, making it easy to separate out different technical management of desktop machines. Complementing this is the elements and replace them with others. Thus, RDP is independent Remote Desktop Web Connection ActiveX® control, which allows of the transport stack, meaning that it can run over any supported developers to serve applications using Win32® components over the networking protocol, as long as a transport driver has been web, minimising redevelopment time. Windows XP’s fast user developed. In addition, it makes it easier for developers to create switching feature also uses Terminal Services technology to let applications that work with Terminal Services. As long as they comply multiple users access a local machine without logging each other off. with RDP’s requirements, the networking takes care of itself.

18 FYITECHNOLOGY SYSTEMS.WINDOWS.FORMS Windows XP’s Remote Desktop Connection functions as the Terminal Services connection client (left). You can manage connections and change the bandwidth of your connection to Terminal Server from within the Remote Desktop Connection client (centre). Graphics options can be changed for Terminal Services connections, but be aware that your bandwidth might not be able to handle it (right).

Nevertheless, there are some guidelines that need to be adhered to in order to ensure that applications work efficiently “Terminal Server puts when served to clients over a Terminal Server connection. Application setup procedures, for example, have to acknowledge you at the keyboard the fact that multiple users will be accessing the software. Most of these users will require different features and have different of that machine access capabilities. Consequently, writing all user data to a single registry hive on the Terminal Server can cause problems. doing that work” Instead, user registry hives must be stored separately, and the same goes for user preference information and user data demanding of CPU power. Similarly, watch out for memory leaks. files. Kernel object namespaces are also used to help keep client A memory leak for a single user might not be a show-stopper, but sessions separate. Each client has a client namespace, to avoid replicating the same leak for multiple users could, over time, clashes with other clients accessing the same software. cause significant performance problems throughout the system. But separating user data is not the only challenge when Graphics are another important consideration for companies programming applications to run under Terminal Server. wanting to run applications as Terminal Services. Too many users Contention for server resources is another issue. CPU time, receiving graphical information or viewing animations over the memory and storage access are all critical as more users are network can impede bandwidth, so applications must be tailored added. Applications may need some modification as a result. You accordingly. Cutting down on splash screens and animations are an may have to tune them to avoid them running background tasks, important way to minimise bandwidth usage, while one way to or at least to make those background tasks run more efficiently. minimise the effect of a thin network pipe on screen-rendering is to Background tasks are low-priority tasks that run when a user change the way you write to video memory. Buffering output for is not accessing the machine for more important jobs. While it graphics-intensive applications off-screen and writing to the on- can be productive to carry out background tasks in a desktop screen video memory only when the buffered operations have been environment, it is not recommended on the server in a Terminal completed will help enhance your users’ experience. “Doom might Services environment because of the overhead incurred by multi- be possible over Terminal Services, but it’s probably not a practical user operation. Your background tasks will be competing with application,” quips Salmre. other users’ foreground tasks, thus reducing their performance. Terminal Services is not the best way to serve every application Microsoft’s developer network MSDN advises you to turn online. Graphics-intensive applications with real-time output will not them off or at least make sure they are efficient and not make the best use of the technology. Nevertheless, for more business-focused applications, such as text data entry and querying, using Terminal Server could help you make formerly single-user Terminal Services Add-ons software available to a wider user base in a relatively short time.

The tighter integration between Terminal Server and Danny Bradbury is a freelance technology and business journalist. Windows Server 2003’s management features is a welcome development. But third party tools can help to enhance manageability. For example, New Moon WHERE NEXT? (www.newmoon.com) sells the Canaveral iQ application A third-party company, Surgient, hosts Terminal Server sessions management system, designed to work with Terminal that allow developers to try out Visual Studio .NET 2003, without Server. It lets administrators monitor application usage for the need to install it on local machines. For more licence management purposes. DAT Group information visit: http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/tryit (www.pantherpowered.com) produces the Panther Server, For more information on Terminal Services, visit: which provides a mixture of client-side single sign-on and www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/ server-side administration capabilities. technologies/terminalservices

October 2003 19 Spam is the bane of all IT departments and left unchecked it can hinder a company’s ability to communicate. Simon Attwell, security THERANT programme manager for the Exchange product group at Microsoft, answers the concerns of different personnel.

KNOWLEDGE WORKER: support for Realtime Blackhole Lists, which are lists of e-mail “Why don’t my Outlook rules always stop spam getting through?” servers that are known to send spam e-mail. If a sender’s IP address is not registered on my IP address filter, Exchange 2003 Spammers are determined to make e-mail readable on any client. can perform an RBL look-up to see if the address is blacklisted, and They want you to read the e-mail and follow the link because they if it is, will block the e-mail. If for some reason my contact’s e-mail want the revenue that an e-mail referral generates. It’s a business for server ends up on an RBL list, I can still set their IP address to be

<<<<<<<< them. Outlook has a set of wizard rules to stop spam getting through, accepted. If Exchange 2003 does block a person’s e-mail, it but the problem is that with the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (which provides a customer error message notification explaining why the is how spammers submit their mail) it’s easy to spoof who the sender message was not delivered, so that if the sender feels that his IP of the mail is, so that it appears to be coming from a legitimate address has been unfairly blocked, he can contact the company to source. Spammers can also use different techniques within the con- get that rectified. tent, such as putting spaces inside key words that anti-spam soft- The following white paper includes more information about the ware rules try to recognise. As a result it becomes an end user security features in Exchange 2003, including the enhanced spam

SPAM E-MAIL SPAM nightmare to manage the different techniques. protection. It can be found at: This is why some Outlook rules aren’t successful – a spammer http://www.microsoft.com/exchange/evaluation/03SecEnh.doc can make an e-mail appear to be from an address that isn’t on the junk sender’s list. In Outlook 2003 Microsoft has taken the SECURITY OFFICER: <<<< smart filter anti-spamming technology that it uses in MSN 8 and “I’ve heard that some HTML e-mails use verification techniques to incorporated it into the client. It’s a Bayesian filter that looks at ensure that an address is ‘live.’ How is it done and how can I stop it?” various aspects of the mail and gives it a “score.” Depending on the end user’s settings, Outlook will move the message to the junk These are known as web beacons, or web bugs. There is a whole folder or leave it in the in-box, based on whether the sender is on ecosystem associated with spam. There are the people who send your trusted or junk sender’s list. it, the people who provide mailing lists and the people that provide If a colleague sends you an e-mail with content that has been bulk-mailing software. You can buy lists of e-mail addresses, but given a high spam rating, but that person isn’t on your trusted you have no idea of the number of addresses that are valid. So sender’s list, it may get moved to the junk mail list. Then, when you some list collectors will send you an HTML message that will have check the folder and see that it’s a valid mail, you can click a but- a reference to a GIF image. Outlook will then contact the web serv- ton and add that sender to your trusted sender’s list. After that, er specified in the mail to retrieve the image, which will often only even if they sent the same e-mail with the same high spam score be a single pixel, so that you don’t see it. The list gatherer will use it wouldn’t get moved to the junk mail folder. some identifier, such as a global unique identifier (GUID), in the There is more information about the junk mail filter at: image, and when the request is made for the GIF with the GUID it http://www.microsoft.com/office/ork/xp/beta/three/ch7/OutB07.htm reconciles the GUID with the original address that it was sent to. Now the address has commercial value. SYSTEMS ADMINISTRATOR: The ability of Outlook 2003 and Exchange Outlook Web Access “It’s all very well stopping spam at the client, but junk mail that 2003 to automatically download image content in HTML e-mails is reaches the desktop still hogs my network. What is Microsoft disabled by default. Instead, there is a bar at the top of the message doing to filter e-mails at the server end?” that you can click to download the images. This is useful when dealing with e-mails that you weren’t expecting, and it also has the With the sheer amount of e-mail that spammers send, there is a added benefit of avoiding offensive visual content by default. If you high cost in terms of CPU, disk and network resources. It gets to the are operating on an intranet and receive e-mails from people inside point where the in-box becomes devalued as a way of working. In your organisation, because the software knows that you are oper- Exchange 2003 we have introduced some features to attempt to ating within a network that you trust, we will go and download those address these issues. We use connection-based filtering by IP images for you to avoid disrupting your experience.

address, enabling the systems administrator to define ranges of IP You can find out more about the image download protection in JONO ILLUSTRATION: addresses that they wish to accept or deny email from. Outlook 2003 at: This connection-based filtering is there to complement our http://www.microsoft.com/office/ork/xp/beta/three/ch7/OutB07.htm

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