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Do you feel the need to tweet? Are your Facebook and Linkedin profiles up to date? Do you consider yourself a social media expert or do you have no idea what “At Reply” means? No matter your experience level, social media provides an unprecedented way to be heard. Social media serves as a great resource for setting up online profiles for individuals to connect with friends and family and network with new people. Social media can also be used as a great resource to be heard and get problems resolved. Businesses use social media to answer questions from consumers where they pop up online and also provide exclusive access to content and news. Social media is quickly becoming the main line of communication between companies and fans. Twitter provides a great place to talk with companies once thought untouchable through a quick message. YouTube gives users the ability to share exclusive content, while subscribing to a Facebook page gives you up to date news and information. You can find Microsoft Online Services in several social media channels (see list below) so that you get the latest news, exclusive insights and your questions answered. So no matter if you’re an expert or a novice, use social media to interact with us online. We want to hear from you. Post something on our Facebook Wall , send us an “At Reply” or message on Twitter , comment on a new video on our YouTube Page and share some thoughts below this blog post. Don’t just sign up for an account on a social media channel, go and be a part of the conversation. Hope to hear from you soon! Get answers in our forums – https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/category/microsoftonlineservices Read our blog – https://blogs.technet.com/msonline/default.aspx . You can subscribe via RSS too. Follow us on Twitter – @msonline – https://www.twitter.com/msonline Become a fan in Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/MicrosoftOnlineServices Subscribe to our YouTube channel – https://www.youtube.com/user/msonlineservices Join our LinkedIn group – Microsoft Online Services Find a local users group in MeetUp – https://www.meetup.com/Microsoft-Online-Services Remember to follow Office 365 on their channels: Read the Office 365 Blog Check out the Office 365 Community – https://community.office365.com/ Follow @Office365 on Twitter – https://twitter.com/office365 Become a fan in Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/office365 Watch the latest Office 365 Videos Join the Office 365 LinkedIn group

Following the recent release of the December 2010 Cumulative Updates for Project, Project Server and SharePoint 2010 , I have decided to update my demo VM. Please find below a quick step by step procedure to install this CU and others yourself and ensure you are using the latest and greatest version of our favorite products (as usual plenty more content, recommendations, recorded webcast on TechNet on applying software updates: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-US/projectserver/gg176680.aspx ). Create a snapshot in Hyper-V before applying any updates Download the hotfix package: Project Server https://support.microsoft.com/kb/2459258 & Project Professional: https://support.microsoft.com/kb/2466263 Execute the server package ( office2010-kb2459258-fullfile-x64-glb ), will take a few minutes, then run the SharePoint Configuration wizard. After you run the wizard once you might get errors in the upgrade logs saying something like this (lets ignore these for now): OWSTIMER SPContentDatabaseSequence INFO 1/25/2011 3:29:28 PM: SPContentDatabase Name=PWA_WSS_content_80 OWSTIMER SPContentDatabaseSequence ERROR 1/25/2011 3:29:28 PM: Found a missing feature Id = 367b94a9-4a15-42ba-b4a2-32420363e018, Name = Report Server Integration Feature, Description = Enables rich reporting using Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services., Install Location = ReportServer OWSTIMER SPContentDatabaseSequence INFO 1/25/2011 3:29:28 PM: SPContentDatabase Name=PWA_WSS_content_80 OWSTIMER SPContentDatabaseSequence ERROR 1/25/2011 3:29:28 PM: The feature with Id 367b94a9-4a15-42ba-b4a2-32420363e018 is referenced in the database PWA_WSS_content_80, but is not installed on the current farm. The missing feature may cause upgrade to fail. Please install any solution which contains the feature and restart upgrade if necessary. OWSTIMER SPContentDatabaseSequence INFO 1/25/2011 3:29:28 PM: SPContentDatabase Name=PWA_WSS_content_80 OWSTIMER SPContentDatabaseSequence WARNING 1/25/2011 3:29:28 PM: WebPart class 8d6034c4-a416-e535-281a-6b714894e1aa is referenced 15 times in the database PWA_WSS_content_80, but is not installed on the current farm. Please install any feature/solution which contains this web part. (…) Re-run the Wizard, and it should be successful the second time;

Some of you are asking how and who builds the Solution Starters. The Solution Starter specifications were done by the same group of people who design new components of Microsoft Project – the Program Managers inside of Microsoft. The specifications (“specs”) were then handed off to external company who coded, tested and released them into the MSDN Code Gallery. The company is called Internet Commerce Corporation (ICC) ICC is one of the first companies that started working with Microsoft Project Server 2010 as part of Microsoft’s TAP program and continues to gain experience being involved in the development of a number of solution starters for Project Server 2010. Since then, ICC has built strong expertise in building EPM solutions based on the Microsoft Project Server 2010 Platform. Major focus areas in Enterprise Project Management for ICC are: EPM Solution Implementation Project Server 2010 deployment and configuration Project Server 2010 customization and custom report development If you plan to do a coding project for Project 2010 and you need great developers with vast experience , feel free to consider them too! Jan

The Microsoft Office 2010 Developer Map is now available for download. You can view it on a big monitor, or print it full-size on a 3-foot x 2-foot page. It shows the full stack of Office desktop and server applications, technologies, and tools – including mobile and cloud apps. For Office 2007, see the Microsoft Office 2007 interactive Developer Map . The Silverlight-based interactive map for Office 2010 is not yet available.

Yes – it’s here for few weeks now – https://code.msdn.microsoft.com/P2010Scrum . Details are here . Thanks for all the comments, keep them coming!

Looking for tools and way to easily get started building customizations by reusing and modifying code from an existing? Then make sure to look at https://code.msdn.microsoft.com/P2010SolutionStarter . There’s plenty of related resources, including deep dive webcasts. If you have any questions – please check the related discussion . Jan

When:
Thursday, February 10, 2011 at 9:30 AM - Friday, February 11, 2011 at 5:00 PM (GMT)

Where:
Technology House
Shottery Brook Office Park
Timothy's Bridge Road
CV37 9NR Stratford Upon Avon
United Kingdom

For more details, course content and to register for this event please go to:
https://taipsadmin2010100211-rss.

We had a support case this week relating to the use of the samples from the SDK on a Spanish version of Project Server 2010.

This probably isn’t a very common scenario – but you may run in to it.

This week in BPOS news is a recurring segment on the Microsoft Online Services Team Blog that covers news from all sectors of Cloud Computing and the Microsoft Online Services business suite known as the Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS). You can read all past This Week in BPOS News segments here. For this week in BPOS news we take a look at the new Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 announcement, and we get a 99.9 percent guarantee from BPOS. 1. Microsoft’s Dynamics CRM 2011 hits the cloud In our first BPOS News story we announce a new cloud offering from Microsoft, Microsoft’s Dynamics CRM 2011. CNET covers the launch story here . The announcement comes with a price drop of the service from 44 dollars to 33 dollars per user. There is also a “Cloud CRM for Less” program which CNET explains as Microsoft “ offering cash rebates on a per-user basis for companies that switch over from competing Salesforce or Oracle CRM tools.” Dynamics General Manager Brad Wilson told CNET why he was excited about this announcement. “What’s kind of cool about this right now is that this kind of price point and this type of technology lets smaller business take advantage of technology that was before only available to larger organizations,” Wilson said. “So to be able to offer it up as an on-demand service at a very affordable price really expands the access of the technology to smaller companies, and I think that’s very exciting.” What do you think of the new Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 announcement? We want to hear from you! Leave your thoughts below in the comments section. 2. Microsoft: BPOS components average 99.9-plus percent uptime In our final BPOS News story for this week , we look into the average up time for Microsoft BPOS over the past year. Microsoft offers a 99.9 percent uptime guarantee as their service level agreement or SLA. SLA’s are taken very seriously and if the 99.9% SLA cannot be met, Microsoft offers cash reimbursements. In this NetworkWorld article it claims that Microsoft has held a 99.9 uptime SLA over the past year. What do you think of the service level agreement from Microsoft BPOS? Leave your thoughts below. What are your thoughts about the stories we shared with you this week? Did you see a story you want to share with us? Let us know what other topics you’d like to see. You can comment on this blog post or send an email to our community mailbox . Follow us on Twitter and like our Facebook page.