For more information refer to the download page: https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=7d2f6ad7-656b-4313-a005-4e344e43997d

According to TechNet, the "Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 7 with SP1 is scheduled for release in Spring 2011".

For more information refer to the download page: https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=7d2f6ad7-656b-4313-a005-4e344e43997d

April 9, 2011 Update:  Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 7 SP1 have now been released!

PFEs tend to have a few specialities. Mine is SharePoint with .NET Development on the side.

It's been a long time since I've written a blog entry. I intend for this to be the first of regular updates.

The winner for me was this post from Joel Oleson. It's short, to the point, and answers the obvious questions.

The moral of the story... RTFM and install the DSL Tools before the Power Tool.

For the infrastructure people out there, this is probably nothing new. For devs like me, we probably don't spend enough time on TechNet to pick up nuggets such as this.

In the best tradition of consultants, my response to this question is that "it all depends". Personally I don't see any point in going through the certification process simply to get a few letters after your name. I've interviewed enough people over the years with the Microsoft alphabet stapled to their resume who couldn't answer basic real world questions. Instead, the real goal of certification is to learn something. Of course in order to learn something, you may actually have to look at the exam material over a period of time rather than cram it in the night before. Although both strategies may see you certified, it is usually pretty clear in an interview/work situation who has actually tried to improve their skills. So, if you're prepared to put in a bit of effort and learn something, I think certifications are worth it. However, if your goal is to be locked in a room for two hours to stare at a computer and eat lollies, you'd be better off staying at home and playing Age of Empires.

For anyone still reading, my main tip for successfully getting certified is to go ahead and book the exam/s. Having a deadline is a great motivator to get on with it.

Finally, for those that haven't looked for a while, the Microsoft Press training kits for the new MCPD and MCTS exams are now available from your favourite online bookstore.

This experience revealed to me how important getting to the bottom of a problem is (well at least in my mind). Many of the systems we build are used by large numbers of people. When they fail, these users have to live with the consequences. In the Windows world, we have this nasty habit of rebooting a server to "fix" a problem. A lot of the time this works and the phones stop ringing, but the chances are that the problem will come back. Some people write this off as "typical Windows". It's not! A .NET application running on Windows Server 2003 should be rock solid. If it isn't, something is definitely wrong and should be investigated.

I'm not about to start a masterclass on application diagnostics, but it's amazing what you can learn if you take the time to look. Windows itself can tell you a lot about an application through its various logs. That said, I still believe that adding some well considered instrumentation and exception management to an application is the best way to understand an application's runtime behaviour. If you put this in from day one, all the better.

Unfortunately we can't just add some instrumentation to produce Andrew 2.0 and find out why I needed jump-starting. But at least I'm looking.

Details can be found at AJAX : The Official Microsoft ASP.NET AJAX Site and Scott Guthrie's blog.