Microsoft Office

Microsoft SharePoint Designer 2007 is now a free product!

Why?

Customers are telling Microsoft that they see a significant part of SharePoint Designer’s capabilities as an extension of what SharePoint Products and Technologies already do, and they want to be able to create increasingly dynamic Web sites on SharePoint.

In response to this feedback, Microsoft is implementing a number of changes to promote and facilitate even more customization efforts on top of the SharePoint platform.

When?

Starting April 2, 2009, SharePoint Designer 2007 is available as a free download.

Where?

Start at the SharePoint Designer home page and follow the download links from there: www.microsoft.com/spd

Where can I learn more about the announcement?

Read the Letter to SharePoint Designer Customers.
Watch the interview with SharePoint Director Tom Rizzo (below).

What about licensing issues?

To learn more about licensing issues, for example, what to do if you recently purchased SharePoint Designer, see the Q&A on Licensing Changes.

Where can I learn more about SharePoint Designer?

Start with these:
Introducing Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007 (article)
Introduction to building SharePoint applications (article)
A six-part video series on getting the most out of SharePoint Designer (videos)
Get SharePoint Designer training on your desktop (videos)
Can I restrict access to SharePoint Designer in my organization?

Yes! See Locking Down SharePoint Designer (blog on MSDN).

SharePoint Designerfor free interview with Tom Rizzo

From Sharepoint Designer weblog: We hope you’re as excited as we are about this announcement. Enjoy using SharePoint Designer and check back often for blog posts on using SharePoint Designer!

From Microsoft Inside Office Online: Theyhave created a new Office Online Career Center and partnered with Monster.com to make the entire job hunting process - from planning your strategy to polishing your resume and submitting it for a position - as painless as possible.

Check out the video, where they walk Seattle’s Alycia Delmore through the process and help her get ready for her next job. Download a resume template and update your own. Look for a job in your area, and post your resume. They’ve even linked to career advice from Monster’s career experts. It’s all there on the page, and broken down in even greater detail in this article.

They didn’t forget those employers who might have openings, because as difficult as it is to find the right job, they know it’s also challenging to find the right candidate for an open position.

Finally, they know their resume templates are among the most popular templates on our site. Our hope is that this new Career Center helps you do more and we wish you luck in your search for a job.

Here’s Microsoft’s Office Online Career Center:

Four Steps to Online Job Search:

1. Start with a strategy
You can avoid anxiety about your job search by starting with a strategy — and we can put you on the fast track with a strategy that’s ready for you now. Monster.com and Office Online are teaming up to make the whole job search process faster and easier.

2. Search for available jobs
What are you looking for?

On Monster.com, you can find information on what employers are looking for in your field, such as finance career tips or information for technology jobs. Go to the Advice home page, scroll down to the View Information by Category section, and click the industry you want to know more about.

If you need to brush up on some of your Office skills, you can find free, self-paced training courses on Office Online.

3. Write your resume
Now that you’ve found a job you want to apply for — or you’ve learned more about the industry where you want to work — it’s time to dust off and brush up your resume.

You want your resume to look professional and to stand out. And you want it to be returned in Search results — right in front of anyone looking for the perfect candidate (that’s you).

Submit!
You’re ready to start your search officially.

If you created your resume using a Word 2007, template, take a moment to save a copy of your resume in .doc format. That’s the copy that you’ll submit to Monster.

Click the Submit button to submit your resume to Monster.com. You can submit it specifically to that job you saw earlier, and you can submit it generally for employers to find in their searches.

Follow up
You can use the Job search log template or the Interview/Resume Follow-Up Log template on Office Online to keep track of where you’ve sent resumes and follow-up letters, and where you’ve interviewed, as well as tracking the thank you letters you send after those interviews.

For more details, click the blue link above to access Microsoft’s Career Planning site.

From Microsoft Home Office, these 101 freebies will make your home office work smoothly.

Click the blue link above for the full list and descriptions.

Whether you’re partial to online services or to downloadable software, we have the Web’s best free stuff and it’ll keep you productive, secure and entertained.

Free. It’s the magic word for an ever-expanding wealth of downloadable software and online services. Free doesn’t necessarily mean good, however, and hunting for freebies can mean sifting through a lot of junk.

That’s where we come in. We surfed, clicked and installed to find sparkling free gems capable of planning your time, keeping you in touch and tuning and securing your PC, not to mention glitzing up your desktop, helping you stay productive and entertaining you with music, videos, photos and games. We paid special attention to programs and services you may not have heard of before.
We also singled out two free offerings — one download and one online service — as the best of the bunch.

What they cover:

In This Article:
File Sharing and Storage
Security
Video and Photo
System Utilities and Backup
Maps and Directions
Communications
Time Management
Music
Desktop Customization
News Readers
Games
Best Download and Web App

I’m always on the lookout for the newest, latest scanners in adware, malware, virus and spamware, and there appears to be quite a few in this annual batch. Microsoft has two entries. Their Microsoft Office Live Workspace and Microsoft Office Live Small Business, both of which I have, my business site Lione Services.

From the Microsoft Office Blog Archive: After you open and run an infected program or attachment on your computer, you might not realize that you’ve introduced a virus until you notice something isn’t quite right.

Here are a few primary indicators that your computer might be infected:

• Your computer runs more slowly than normal

• Your computer stops responding or locks up often

• Your computer crashes and restarts every few minutes

• Your computer restarts on its own and then fails to run normally

• Applications on your computer don’t work correctly

• Disks or disk drives are inaccessible

• You can’t print correctly

• You see unusual error messages

• You see distorted menus and dialog boxes

These are common signs of infection—but they might also indicate hardware or software problems that have nothing to do with a virus. Unless you run the Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool and install industry-standard, up-to-date antivirus software on your computer, there is no way to be certain if your computer is infected with a virus or not. If you don’t have current antivirus software installed, try Microsoft’s tools or go to Download.com. There are some amazing and free virus removal software tools out there.

On my tablet, I have AVG Free virus scanner, A-Squared Free, Zone Alarm, Advanced System Care Free and CCleaner. There are about as many virus, ad-and spy-ware scanners as there are computers in the world. Do your research to see which one fits your needs.

Set up an automatic scanning, or set aside time each day to run your programs to scan. I set mine at night or during slow times (funny, I know).

Slow down, freeze, crash, and security threats are over. Advanced SystemCare Free is a comprehensive PC care utility that takes a one-click approach to help protect, repair, and optimize your computer. It provides an all-in-one and super convenient solution for PC maintenance and protection. All work will be done with 1 click and 1 minute. Compared with its nearest competitor, Advanced SystemCare Free provides the more essential and practical formula for Windows: Removing Spyware and Adware, Preventing Security Threats, Privacy Protection, Fixing Registry Errors, Temporary Files Cleanup, Startup Cleanup, Repairing Windows, Speeding up System and 1-click Mechanism.

Version 3.1.2 may include unspecified updates, enhancements, or bug fixes.

This utility offers a one-stop-shop for cleaning and maintaining your computer for better overall system performance. The interface is very simple, featuring only a few buttons, which makes it easy to get down to cleaning immediately (in fact, it automatically runs on start-up) and doesn’t confuse you with multiple steps.

The Maintain Windows section focuses on four areas of maintenance: spyware removal, Registry cleaning, a privacy sweep, and deletion of junk files. The Diagnose System button provides system optimization tools, detects spyware, defragments your disk, and scans for hijacked Windows settings. In our tests the scan and clean for each of these areas took less than 10 minutes to complete. In many of these scans, it is difficult to tell what exactly is being accomplished by some of the tools, but we were able to test against other trusted apps, which confirmed Advanced SystemCare’s efficacy in those areas.

Under the utilities section you are given several tools, which are similar to plug-ins, for other areas of optimization and diagnostic tests. Overall, Advanced SystemCare Free is a good way to maintain your system’s speed and clear out junk files, but you’ll need to remember to run it regularly because scheduling of scans is only available in the paid Pro version.

Tell a great visual story about a memorable event or trip

What a memorable family holiday! What a special visit from your daughter and your new grandchild! Cool soccer party! Great vacation! Don’t you wish everyone could experience the most meaningful events in your life the way you did? Visual images can conjure up great experiences that you can share with others or revisit by yourself. This article shows you how to capture great photos that will help you to tell your story best.

That’s right, your family holiday, team party, or vacation is a story; each memorable experience has a beginning, middle, and an end. Taking photos in a way that tells the story is the first step in capturing the significant events in your life and sharing it with others.

Digital photography has dramatically changed the way you can share your experiences with others. It provides many new options for telling stories with images. For example:

• You can create a digital scrapbook or slide show to share with others.

• You might burn images to a CD and ship them to your parents or send them via e-mail to family and friends around the world.

• By combining Microsoft Pro Photo software Capture One and Expression Media, you can add stunning professional effects to your photos, and then easily publish, distribute, and archive them.

• With a program like Windows Movie Maker, you can even create a movie of your still images, complete with music, movement, and narration.

• Windows DVD Maker, available in Windows Vista Home Premium and Windows Vista Ultimate, enables you to create professional-looking video DVDs of your home movies and photos and then view them on your DVD players, regardless of geographical region codes.

• The new software AutoCollage enables you to create beautiful collages of your favorite pictures with a few mouse clicks. You can download AutoCollage and start creating your own collages within minutes, then share them with friends and the wider community.

• With the new program Photosynth, you can combine photos on a digital canvas and reconstruct a scene or object to achieve the cinematic quality of a movie and the detail of the real world. The program makes it easy to share your unique creations with others on the Web.

Holly Thomas, of Inside Office Online, posted about a great creativity test, the Epstein Creativity Competencies Inventory for Individuals (ECCI-i).

It’s a short survey, about 25 or so questions, that scores you in four ares, Preserves New Ideas, Seeks Challenges, Broadens Skills and Knowledge, Changes Physical and Social Environment. Then after you submit the questionnaire, you are given scores in each area and a cumulative score. Mine was 63%. Apparantly I need to seek more challenges and change my environment more. It’s a great venue to get yourself thinking of your environment and life; how you interact with it.

This past year, I’ve relocated across the country from Nebraska to Washington State, moved from Tacoma to Seattle. That’s changing my physical environment. Had to furnish my apt, talked to new and interesting people. Maybe I need to get out more?

It’d be interesting to see how other people score and react to the test and their scores. What would you do differently in your creative life for home, work or around town? How do you interact with others? Have you done anything outside your ‘comfort zone’? I really haven’t. Unless you consider being out at night when the criminals and addicts are panhandling.

Create your own Mini-Me Smiley

Microsoft is offering a free program to make create a smiley in your own image!

The program is easy to understand, install and use. You choose from an array of options, from head, eyes, mouth, color for skin, eyes, hair, glasses, hats; most any combination you could ever want. I was looking for a quill and ink, being a writer, but can’t have everything, I guess.

The finished product can be loaded onto your Live Messenger program (add me bricko at lioneservices dot com), spaces, facebook or other social network site. The finished smiley is pretty good, with all the options they have to offer.

Create your own Mini-Me then add your friends to show off your handiwork.

If you use Calendar Templetes to create your own Calendars, look no further than Michael Oldenburg’s site, Nota Bene .

There looks to be quite a few available via a OneNote templete, for which Michael posts a video ‘how-to’. If you’ve created your own templetes, be sure to share and let Michael and your fellow MO-ON’s (MicrOsoft OneNoters) know.

Personally, I use my Nokia 9500’s PIM (personal information management) calendar, which is pretty basic, but suits my needs. I can sync it with my Outlook calendar, if I so choose, but I carry it with me everywhere anway.

The Calendar templetes on Michael’s site look impressive and the video shows detailed how-to’s.

On the download page, there are eight downloads available for your OneNote program. There is the January 2009, Feburary 2009, March 2009, April 2009, May 2009, June 2009, 2009 calendar with room for notes, and the 2009 monthly calendar.

There is also available daily, weekly, appointment and note calendars to download. And remember, you aren’t tied to that particular style, font, color, etc on any one calendar templete. Feel free to change any area. You can also add your own pictures, use clipart, basically any image, gif or jpg you feel is appropriate for your needs.

Making a calendar for your office? How about creating your own uplifting sayings with pictures alongside and showoff your work here. Just post a link so everyone can see and download your calendar templetes. Who knows, you may be the next that is in-demand.

bThis is the first community prototype from Office Labs. Community prototypes are projects Microsoft employees work on in their spare time. Speed Launch’s goal is to let you get to the stuff you use faster and with less frustration.

Why do I need Speed Launch?
Work faster and with less frustration. Speed Launch gives you lightning quick access to all the documents, files, and websites you use often. In the past when you used something a lot you might have created a desktop shortcut, added it to your IE favorites, or placed it on your quick launch bar. Speed Launch allows you to create centralized shortcuts to all the stuff you need and allows you to access them effortlessly.

What is Speed Launch?
Speed Launch is an application launcher that extends the functionality and usability of Microsoft Windows. With Speed Launch, users can select their own words to open frequently used websites, documents, and applications. The most compelling feature of Speed launch is the use of a drag and drop interaction model to make this advanced functionality more intuitive to novice computer users.

How is it used? How does it work with Windows?
Speed Launch is a downloadable program available at www.officelabs.com. After you’ve download Speed Launch, simply drag the file, document, or website url onto the Speed Launch bull’s-eye to create a Speed Launch shortcut. From then on, any time you need to access that file, document, or website, just hit “Windows+C”, type the shortcut name, and what you need will immediately appear.

Is there a shortcut key to open the launcher?
Yes. Use “Windows+C”.

How do I use Speed Launch to open multiple things?
Drag the first item on to the bull’s-eye and give it a name. Next, drag the second item on to the bull’s-eye and give it the same name. When you do this, Speed Launch will give you the option to replace or merge the two items, choose merge. Now, hit “Windows+C” and type the name. Speed Launch will open both items.

Is there a limit to how many items a single Speed Launch shortcut can open?
Not that we know of

I notice that Speed Launch comes with some shortcuts that allow me to search websites. How do I use them?
Speed Launch comes preloaded with a few useful fucntions. For example, to search Wikipedia just type “Wikipedia Search” and hit enter. Next, type what you want to search for in the new window and hit enter. Speed Launch will open the related Wikipedia page.

Cool! Can I create my own “functions”?
Yes… but it’s a little tricky. You can watch the video below for a walk through (and some good music). In short, go to the results page (e.g., search for the information you are looking for) and, if the search term appears in the URL, you can drag it on to the bullseye to create a function. Name it with a period (e.g., “MySearch.”) which tells Speed Launch you want a function, and follow the prompts. We will make this easier in the future, but our current focus is in making the basics as easy as possible.