Today Joe Belfiore announced on the Blogging Windows blog that the Windows Insider Program has reached the 1 million registrations milestone which equates to a lot of people using the Windows 10 Technical Preview. You can read more in the blog post – Checking in on the Windows Insider Program.

Microsoft’s Terry Myerson and Joe Belfiore this morning unveiled the next version of Windows which had until now been known by the internal code name “Threshold”.   

You can read more about the announcement today from this blog post written by Terry Myerson himself: Announcing Windows 10.

Windows 10 is a seriously exciting release for all of us at Microsoft and we’re really excited that you can join us along the journey as we refine the release over the coming months.  You can learn more about the Windows Insider Program from Joe Belfiore and be among the first to see Windows 10 and provide feedback on the release.

Over the coming weeks and months I’ll be blogging more about Windows 10 and along with the series of blog posts I’m writing a book about Windows 10 for developers, more on that soon.

Kevin Gallo today blogged about Universal Windows on Windows 10 and you can read more about that in his blog post Universal Windows apps get better with Windows 10.

Sign up for the Windows Insider Program and join me here over the coming weeks to learn more about Windows 10!

Do you have an idea so brilliant, it keeps you up at night? Developers & entrepreneurs, BizSpark can help.

The Microsoft® BizSpark® program is FREE and helps your app development ideas come to life. You will have access to over 11 terabytes of software development tools, technical support; be provided connections with key industry players, and gain marketing visibility. The program also includes access to Windows Azure, a powerful cloud platform for the creation of web applications and services. As a BizSpark member, you can also get developer accounts to the Windows Store, as well as the Windows Phone Marketplace, and more.

Find out more about BizSpark at https://www.microsoft.com/bizspark/about/. If you’d like to enroll, drop us a note at weststartups@microsoft.com and we can help make the signup process even easier. :)

Join us for this FREE, hands-on event and learn how to build a Windows 8.1 and/or Windows Phone game in record time. We'll cover everything you need to create, upload and publish an amazing game. Expert developers will outline different game frameworks and give you the tools you need to start building. They'll also explain how to add graphics, levels, and sound to base games, while sharing other cool ways to make the game your own.

In one jam-packed day of learning and coding, turn your idea into reality – by dinner time! How awesome is that?

• Where? Microsoft office near you.
• Who should come? Students, first-time developers, or seasoned pros. Everyone is welcome!
• What should I bring? Bring your own machine.
• How do I prepare? Instructions are included in your registration confirmation.

Times:

• Registration: 8:30 AM Local Standard Time
• Event: 9:00 AM-4:30 PM Local Standard Time

Dates and locations:

• 10/23 – Tempe, AZ
• 11/6 – Lehi, UT
• 11/12 – Irvine, CA
• 11/13 – Los Angeles, CA
• 12/3 – San Diego, CA
• 12/4 – San Francisco, CA
• 12/5 – Mountain View, CA
• 12/5 – Portland, OR
• 12/11 – Redmond, WA
• 12/12 – Denver, CO

Join a Microsoft Developer Camp and learn critical skills that all modern developers need to know.

Roll up your sleeves at this free, one-day, instructor-led workshop where you can learn the critical skills that all modern developers need to know. We will start with basic Microsoft Modern Platform principles and build up to more advanced topics. Instructor-led, hands-on labs will focus on:

• Updating an App to a Modern Architecture
• Modern Dev & Test Practices
• Configuring and Testing a Modern Application

Throughout the day, you’ll hear from local Windows Azure partner specialists and Microsoft product team members.
We’ll talk about the best way to take advantage of modern platforms and tools, as well as how to fix the worst sins of testing. Developers of all languages are welcome!

Be fully prepared for this hands-on day of coding by bringing your laptop and signing up for the free Windows Azure Trial.

Events are available across 30 cities in the U.S. Visit the event site for more details - https://www.microsoft.com/enterprise/events/make-it-happen.htm. Events local to western U.S. are:

• 9/26 - Portland, OR
• 10/2 - Los Angeles (Playa Vista), CA
• 10/8 - Phoenix (Tempe), AZ
• 10/24 - Bellevue, WA
• 10/29 - San Diego, CA
• 10/30 - Denver, CO
• 11/6 - Sunnyvale, CA
• 11/7 - San Francisco, CA
• 10/22 - San Francisco, CA
• 11/12 - Bellevue, WA
• 11/21 - Los Angeles (Playa Vista), CA

If you’re new to writing Windows Store apps you may also want to check out my book, Professional Windows 8 Programming: Application Development with C# and XAML.

Join the Big Nerd Ranch and Microsoft for this free, two-day training designed to jumpstart your Windows Store app development.
You will learn the ins-and-outs of the Windows platform from iOS developers who are now building Windows apps. Sessions will follow a low-key, interactive format where iOS terms and concepts will be mapped to Windows alternates. You will also get hands-on time to apply what you’ve learned.

Schedule

• Thursday Dec 13, 2012 - 9 to 5 PM
• Friday Dec 14, 2011 - 9 to 5 PM
• Evening Social Thurs Dec 13, 6 PM

Location

• Microsoft Silicon Valley Campus
• Galileo Room
  SVC Conference Center
  1065 La Avenida
• Mountain View, California 94043
  United States

What’s the agenda?

Times need to be finalized, but we’ll cover the following topics in sessions that are 30 to 60 minutes long:

Day 1

• Introduction to the platform and the Windows Store
• Design differences between iOS and Windows 8
• Tooling: Visual Studio and Blend
• C# for Objective-C developers
• Asynchronous programming
• Consuming web services
• Intro to building Windows Store apps with XAML (controls, layout and styling)
• Advanced UI development with XAML (data binding, templates, and collections)
• Contracts and extensions
• Ask the Experts panel
• InstallFest

Day 2

• Process Lifecycle Management and State Management
• Notifications and Live tiles
• Bing Maps, SkyDrive, and Microsoft Account integration
• C++ for Objective-C developers
• Reusing code with Windows Phone
• Hands-on-labs

How do I register?

To secure your seat in this event, please register at https://aka.ms/iostowindowscamp

Live Stream

If you can’t attend in person, watch the live stream of the event at https://channel9.msdn.com. You do not have to register for the live stream; just point your browser to Channel 9 or to our registration site on the day of the event.

Notes

Any iOS developer will benefit from this training, but we will focus more on those apps that are not games. For this event, there will be no deep game/graphics coverage (no OpenGL ES to DirectX deep-dives).

Questions

Email your questions to windevcamps@microsoft.com

Get ready to become immersed in the power of Visual Studio 2012. The .NET Rocks! Team of Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell are on the road bringing you presentations focused on building modern applications on the Windows platform for both client-side and server-side technology.
At each stop, they will also record a live .NET Rocks! Show with a guest star that will be flown in for the occasion. Plus, you’ll learn about an exciting initiative to develop a Humanitarian Disaster Response Toolkit.
Events are FREE, and include food, drink, and geeking out. Come join us!

Building in HTML5 and Javascript? C, C++ or C#? Come learn how to build fast, native Windows 8 apps. We'll have experts on hand, sample apps and ideas to get you started, and tech sessions on Friday evening to bring you up to speed on everything you need to know. There will be prizes for some of the best apps.

App builders can find more information, agenda and registration details on the event page.