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1 hour ago, blowdart wrote

Even with Lync2010 I got background notifications, but Lync routes to the last active, open instance. So if you left it running on the desktop that's where it will go.

Hmmm, I knew that, and thought we had made sure that my Phone was the last one to be active.  But I will try again to see if it works.

Update: I talked to my system admin and it seems that Lync 2010 is just a stop on the upgrade path to Lync 2013. 

Hopefully Microsoft has created a better WP8 client for Lync 2013 than they did for Lync 2010...

these credits are intended for dev & test use of Azure... not for production.

Yeah, I did not make it clear that I understood that, but I do.

But we have quite a few servers that are Dev and Test servers.  And they all run using our Expensive SAN (same type of SAN as our prod stuff).  So if we could free up the use of that (and prevent the need to buy more for a while) that could be a huge cost saver.

However, we are a VMWare shop, so the the path to get to using Azure VMs will be hard (both politically and in implementation). 

Hence the question about the time frame of this offer....

Around where I live there are a lot of flashy Cable TV ads that tout extremely low prices for fantastic TV packages.

Then at the end of the ad, a voice comes on and in a low voice, quickly states that after six months the prices return to "normal" levels.

I am trying to decide is Microsoft is doing that to me.  I have an Ultimate MSDN subscription and the Azure develop pricing reduction plus the free $150 of Azure credit per month looks really good.

But I am wondering if I will go to the work of getting my company to accept Azure and then the effort of moving our servers to Azure, only to find out in 2 years that it as a "Limited Time Offer".  And now that Azure is more accepted, the price for Develop stuff is the same as Prod stuff.

Don't get me wrong, I am very excited about the new pricing and benefits, and I don't want to "look a gift horse in the mouth", but I have been bit by stuff like this in the past, so I feel I must ask what everyone thinks.

<FYI, this is a rant.. I am a bit frustrated with Microsoft...>

So my company just upgraded to Lync 2010 from Office Communicator.  (I guess Lync 2013 is too new to be proven enough...)

I was excited to get corporate instant messaging support on my Windows Phone 8.  (We did not have it for Office Communicator.)

Me and my co-workers were experimenting with the client and I noticed that one of them had access to his corporate calendar via the iPhone Lync client.

We also discovered that messages could be send to the phone, even if the app was not running in the foreground, using the Android Lync client.

I was excited for both these features, and was sure that Microsoft would have all that and more on their very own platform.

Imagine my surprise when I found that Microsoft has less support for their Lync product on their own Windows Phone platform than they do for their competitors.  (Neither of these features are present for Windows Phone 8!)

Is Microsoft trying to tell me that I should go to Android or iPhone if I want a more rich Lync experience?  I get that WP 8 is new-ish, but the Lync client has been around for longer that WP8 (It was release during the 7.5 days.)

Plain and simple, they put more time and effort into the other platforms than they did their own.

Why are they creating better apps for their competitor's platforms than for their own?

How can they beg and plead for big developers to give Windows Phone 8 "First Tier" apps and games when they are not even doing it.

Grrrr... makes me consider moving my sim card back to my iPhone...

</rant>

Banning online portions of second hand games seems to have some merit. I paid for Call of Duty, so I support the servers that allow online play. There is an expected decay rate of online players. (I got bored with the game.) But resale resets the decay with no money given to support the online maintenance.

I get where they were going with the "Xbox One" name.  (It is the only device you need.)

But people are used to a version number after the name. 

It is going to be confusing for a while:

"Mom, I want an Xbox One for Christmas"...  Mom goes and looks for Xbox V1.   

Xbox is big enough that people will get it eventually.  But I think that right at the first it will be confusing.

I can't get any of the links listed here to work on my Windows Phone 8....

Xbox.com (and everything under it) says UNAVAILABLE

The other link posted just goes to a blank screen.

GRRRRRRRRRR.....

I tried them on my computer too and it does not work.  (Though my company blocks Xbox.com.)

@Duncanma - Thanks for the response.

I love enterprise mobile stuff.  My whole last project was in that.  Unfortunately I have yet to see an "Enterprise" device that can run Windows 8 or Windows RT.

Most of them still run Windows Mobile.

The only mobile devices for Windows 8 and Windows RT are for consumer oriented stuff (like MS Surface).  Sure they run office and can download data for dashboard apps.  (Great for Executives, but not for rank and file workers who need to use it to accomplish a job.)

As for what I am looking for when I come to Channel 9, well, my current project uses OData, WCF and WPF. 

But, I guess I am just hoping to find presentations on something I don't know that could possibly be useful in my job.

Maybe something on how to use Lightswitch HTML for business apps.  (I know that it does not seem to have a data-grid, and that makes it hard to use for many enterprise scenarios.  Still I can see some business uses for it even without the data-grid.)

OData has some newer stuff out that would be great to see a presentation on.  (Instance annotations think they are called.)  I would love see a presentation on what they are for or how they are used.

Basically I would love to see anything that can be used by enterprise developers.  (A "Classic Enterprise" company (to me) is one who recently got everyone upgraded to Windows 7 and whose System Admins laugh at you when you mention Windows 8 (there are a lot of us out there).

But heck, I would like to even see more about how to do enterprise stuff on Windows 8.  I watched "The Edge" show about it and was left wanting details and explanations.  (Details on how you can do it and Explanations on why MS thinks we should pay to install apps (sideload) when it was free for every version prior (both mobile and desktop).

@kettch - I was referring to going to the conference. I still plan to look at the on line sessions.