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Whilst I have been on holiday Black Marble have announced some new events and this time they are not just in the UK, we have a couple in our new Dublin office location. The programme up to new year is: 17 Nov 2011 (Holiday Inn Leeds/Bradford) Am - [Delivering High Impact WebSites with SharePoint](http://www.blackmarble.com/events.aspx?event=Delivering High Impact WebSites with SharePoint) SharePoint 2010 creates a dynamic and striking internet experience for your users. Pm - [A Guide to Successfully Adopting the Cloud for IT Managers](http://www.blackmarble.com/events.aspx?event=A Guide to Successfully Adopting the Cloud for IT Managers) This session will be exploring the business value of cloud computing with Microsoft Windows Azure. 30 Nov 2011 (Black Marble office Cleckheaton) Am- [TFS for the small team – hosted in the cloud](http://www.blackmarble.com/events.aspx?event=TFS for the small team – hosted in the cloud) I’m doing this one and I will be talking about the hosted version of TFS, its UI, the new features it exposed from TFS vNext. 6 Dec 2011 (Dublin) Am - [The Right Tools for your Application Lifecycle](http://www.blackmarble.com/events.aspx?event=The Right Tools for your Application Lifecycle) This session will discuss how this Application Lifecycle Management process can be managed, and what are the right tools to do that – Visual Studio Team Foundation Server. Pm - [An Afternoon of Windows 8](http://www.blackmarble.com/events.aspx?event=An Afternoon of Windows 8) Following the fanfare, what is there in Windows 8 for developers and the IT professional? 8 Dec 2011 (Holiday Inn Leeds/Bradford) All day - [Architecture Forum in the North 4](http://www.blackmarble.com/events.aspx?event=Architecture Forum in the North 4) The top Microsoft Architecture Forum in the UK returns for its fourth year. 26 Jan 2012 (Holiday Inn Leeds/Bradford) Am - [Black Marbles Annual Technical Update for Microsoft Technologies – 2012](http://www.blackmarble.com/events.aspx?event=Black Marbles Annual Technical Update for Microsoft Technologies - 2012) Return of our roadmap for all things Microsoft! Pm - [Implementing the Secure Development Lifecycle in your ALM Process](http://www.blackmarble.com/events.aspx?event=Implementing the Secure Development Lifecycle in your ALM Process) A look at how implementing Microsoft’s Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) into your development process can improve quality, reliability and long-term maintainability. Hope to see you at some of these events, I won’t be at all of them due to client commitments, shame I enjoy doing these. ...

[Update: Also so More experiences upgrading my Media Center to receive Freeview HD] I have used a Windows Media Center as my only means to watch TV for about 5 years; upgrading over the years from XP to Vista and onto Windows 7.  I am a completely hooked on the ease of use, especially if you just want a means to watch and record Freeview (the UK free to air terrestrial service). Far easier UI than any Freeview PVR I have seen, and I personally think easier than Sky+ box (satellite) or Virgin’s Tivo (cable) though I don’t have much experience of these device (and they do look a bit of a pain to integrate with Media Center, but they are not really designed for that) ...

When using VMPrep to setup a VM for use in a Lab Management system I got the error cross at the bottom of the dialog Not too much help, usually there is a link to the log file or a message. If you look in the log file in c:user[name]AppdataRoamingLMInstaller.txt you see that the path to the Patches folder is invalid. This is fixed by editing the VMPrepToolVMPrepToolLibraryApplications.XML file and correcting the path (which I had made a typo in) ...

I will be speaking at a [Black Marble event on the 30th November on the new TFS vNext announcements for TFS on Azure](http://www.blackmarble.com/events.aspx?event=TFS for the small team – hosted in the cloud). Though this event is target as hosted TFS, I will be doing demos of the new web based UI for agile project management in TFS that is common across all VNext versions. Hope to see you there

At one of our recent events I was asked if I had any experience using Nuget within a TFS 2010 build. At the time I had not, but I thought it worth a look. For those of you who don’t know Nuget is a package manager that provides a developer with a way to manage assembly references in a project for assemblies that are not within their solution. It is most commonly used to manage external commonly used assemblies such a nHibernate or JQuery but you can also use it manage your own internal shared libraries. ...

Registration is still open for tomorrow’s event so if your weekend has just become free why not come along?

I have just published documentation for the PowerShell activity in the TFS Community Build extensions. This opens up a whole range of possibilities for your build process. Off to look at using it for SharePoint deployment now…..

I have been following the process in the ALM Rangers build guide and in the Community Build Extensions to edit a build process workflow. Now I am sure this process was working until recently on my PC (but we all say that don’t we!), but of late I have found that when the .XAML workflow is loaded into Visual Studio I see loads of warning icons. If I check the list of imported namespaces many of them also have warning icons which if the icons are clicked they say the assembly cannot be found. ...

A common work item type (WIT) edit in TFS is to limit the list of names shown in a combo to the users assigned to the project i.e. the members of the Team Projects Contributors and Project Administrators groups. This is done by editing the WIT either via your favourite XML editor or the Process Template Editor (part of the power tools). You edit the Allowedvalues for the field you wish to limit such as the Assigned To as shown below, ...

I am back on the should I buy a Kindle train of thought. Todays announcements are certainly interesting, I am not talking so much about the new Kindle Fire, but the new entry level version and the Touch. For me the tempting feature is still the E-Ink and battery life. The point is I have got used to reading on my phone, a Kindle might be easier on the eye, but it is more kit to carry, and I just don’t think I want to carry any more things. ...