Comments

Thanks for your comments, guys. I think you raise fair points - not all employers invest in their teams, which means that many people have to train themselves. What we're trying to do with the new certs is to get them out at release wherever possible, and sometimes even earlier. As you say, @aL3891 - if you want to be ahead of the curve then beta is a great time to be doing skills development; but if at the very time that companies are looking for those skills you can demonstrate that you have passed a rigorous exam focusing on that area, you're going to have an edge in the jobs market.

Similarly, if you have the skills, you should be able to pass the exam already - you don't need to go on a formal training course. If you're a great ASP.NET developer, you should pass the new exam with flying colors; on the other hand, if you have a poor understanding of the technology and rely on MSDN as a crutch rather than a reference, you're going to have a hard time.

Imagine hiring a web developer today - everyone and their dog has HTML5 on their resume. Sure you can quickly sift through the dross when you get to an in-person interview, but if one of your candidates had passed an exam worthy of the name, you'd know ahead of time that they had the technical skills - which ought to ensure that they got an interview at least.

That's what we're going for - certs that measure real on-the-job skills, that have a good enough reputation in the market that employers look for candidates with that level of accreditation.

Hi Crazyboy10, no changes for the existing developer exams at this time - you'll be pleased to know that we don't instantly retire the current exams. Later this year, you'll see us launch the new MCSD certifications that will support Windows 8, probably starting with the HTML5 exam that we mention in the video. Thanks for the question!

I was very worried you'd start revealing all my secrets. Between the two of you, you have enough dirt on me and the rest of the team that my blood pressure rose when I saw you were posting a behind the scenes expose. Remember: the content should be the only thing to not stay in Vegas...

Hi stevo_! There are actually lots of other developer events going on around the world to coincide with the launch of Windows 7 - I don't know them all but if you go to your local MSDN site I'm pretty sure you'll find something. (Failing that, let me know.) We can't afford to have the full team deliver this training in every country - it was hard enough to assemble such a star lineup somewhere just two hours away from Redmond - but we are indeed recording this bootcamp for online distribution - stay tuned for later details. Still - if you can get to LA, you'll get the full experience: while it's good to watch a ballgame on TV, nothing beats the live experience

 

Thanks for your post, Tim

robski wrote:

Brandon, thanks for saying you will post the sample code when SP1 ships. For now, even a very simple but complete (.sln to .ps) "hello pixel shaders in WPF" sample would be very helpful.

Hey robski, I think you might well like Greg Schechter's blog series that goes into this in some detail:
http://blogs.msdn.com/greg_schechter/archive/2008/05/12/a-series-on-gpu-based-effects-for-wpf.aspx

Tim

Ion Todirel wrote:

...ensure the WPF meets customers requirements, what customers? How do they decide what features to add/improve in WPF?

Great question. There are lots of different ways we gather feedback: the Connect site, forum and newsgroup posts, support requests, blog comments, requests received via MVPs etc. We also run invite-only labs here in Redmond for some of the very largest customers and partners: we gather lots of feedback at those events also. Occasionally we have customers who are on campus come and deliver short presentations to the team where they demonstrate their own application and talk about some of the best and worst experiences they had in developing the product.

At the same time, we're constantly looking at the broad-scale research we collect about platform adoption - for example, at what point does the size of a runtime have a material effect on its adoption rate? How many people are still using Windows 2000? And so on.

Plus of course, almost all of us here actively use WPF as developers, whether for amazing demos like David produces, for writing technical articles or in building test harnesses to ensure the platform works consistently.

We're always keen to hear real-world experiences with the platform: it's immensely useful to get your feedback. Ian mentions a few ways you can provide that feedback above. If it's actionable feedback and not simply a request for technical support, and you're struggling to be heard through more traditional routes, you're always welcome to drop me an email at tims at microsoft.com and I'll ensure it gets routed in the right direction.

We know that we're only delivering if you are able to deliver on top of us - our success is measured by your success!

Tim

Different Kevin this time - Kevin Gjerstad, not Kevin Moore!

We'll figure a way to get the KevinButton in there for another time, certainly.

(For those of you who don't know what Al is talking about, check out the following video: http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=222817#222817)

Tim

Hey - is that my couch?

I'm going to have to charge you guys a rental fee

Tim

CahillNet wrote:

Note to Channel 9: find a quieter place to record.  I found the background conversation really distracting.

CahillNet, sorry about that - we recorded this at the MIX conference Las Vegas, and this was actually the quietest place around (we took over one of the press briefing rooms). Maybe we can find a better directional microphone next time. Hope it didn't ruin the video completely.

Thanks for the interesting comment, dot_tom.

I'm interested to hear a little about how you learnt PowerShell. Did you force yourself to go "cold turkey" on cmd.exe? Did you use the book above or the reference card that comes with PowerShell? What's the first time you really found yourself saving time through the use of PowerShell? Was it easier or harder than you expected to make the transition? I'd love to hear your thoughts on these and other areas of the learning curve...