Patrick Hynds

Unless this is the first thing on technology you are reading in the last six months you will know that we are seeing a new server being launched by Microsoft. After the ups and downs of Vista (many love it and many hate it) I expect that Windows Server 2008 will be something we c... (more)

Developers are increasingly working on systems that abstract the underlying mechanisms they depend upon. SharePoint was the catalyst for this observation as I increasingly see development implementations that just don't seem to work out as hoped, with misunderstandings or in some... (more)

Another version of Visual Studio is here and while there are many cool features, we can conclude a lot from the fact that it isn't a staggering release. The first Visual Studio that wore the .NET moniker was a paradigm shift and threw in many features such as Web services, which ... (more)

When .NET first came on the scene, there was fighting over whether it was a platform or not. As I have said here in the past, those debates are over as .NET has proven itself a very useful and valuable platform, expanding into areas that people assumed it wouldn't and even couldn... (more)

I feel as if there is a calm on the .NET waters at the moment and it's a rare and somewhat uneasy sensation. Most of the developers I know are playing with Blend and Silverlight and all the cool WPF stuff, even if their specialty is back-end database work. We all know there is an... (more)

I feel as if there is a calm on the .NET waters at the moment and it’s a rare and somewhat uneasy sensation. Most of the developers I know are playing with Blend and Silverlight and all the cool WPF stuff, even if their specialty is back-end database work. We all know there... (more)

This month, I want to talk about Windows Workflow and what it means for the state of .NET development (in my experience and, of course, in my opinion). Before the release of Window Workflow (WF for short because WWF means something else entirely already), there were several avenu... (more)

With the Microsoft MIX conference just ending last week and product announcements happening with greater and greater regularity, it's sometimes discouraging when you think of how much work it will be to just keep up with it all. Technology is moving faster and faster and we as p... (more)

When Microsoft announced the technology that is now known as WCF, there was a lot of expectation and some skepticism. Expectation because it sounded great and would help us solve so many problems and realize so many things that were then very hard to make happen. Skepticism becau... (more)

Usually in this space I like to summarize the contents of the issue and point out anything bearing in particular on our theme, but if you will indulge me, I would like to talk more long term and big picture this month. I am thinking specifically about security. Not a big surprise ... (more)

A lot is changing in .NET this year, but it all feels like progress. Now that Vista is released, we get to stop using Community Technical Previews (mostly) of things like WPF, WF, and WCF. The ASP.NET group has been busy bringing us AJAX tools that take a wild technology and pret... (more)

(SYS-CON Media) – I am often struck by how good some ideas are and often wonder whether they are happened upon by accident (dumb luck), like the discovery of Teflon and penicillin, or whether there was just a really good idea that made it happen. I think what we are seeing ... (more)

In a cross-platform world where software giants nevertheless continue to vie with each other for developer mindshare, it is significant that only one major company has managed to synch up its release numbers with the Web 2.0 phenomenon. Microsoft is not resting on its laurels tho... (more)

Storage is still one of the most costly and fastest-growing aspects of everyone's network and is likely to remain so for some time. Every network user is a storage user. We're all part of a community that shares the costs and the benefits of this expensive resource. Storage manag... (more)

Information Storage & Security Journal Co-Editor-in-Chief Patrick Hynds writes: The U.S. deparment of Homeland Security is performing a readiness test this month called Cyber Storm, after rescheduling. The Cyber Storm exercise is about ensuring and testing against a computer base... (more)

Okay, summer's over. Let's get back to work... But first, let's look at what's new. Microsoft has taken WinFS, its new file system, out of the first release of its next operating system. The story is that WinFS will follow soon after the OS releases. For most of us, this is some... (more)

Storage always seems to come first in technical discussions and security seems to be the perennial afterthought. This can be considered reasonable given how we shop for things in general, namely finding the thing that meets our expectations and then ensure it has all the bells an... (more)

PATRICK HYNDS BLOG LIVE FROM TH E PDC OPENING KEYNOTE I am writing this from Bill Gates' opening keynote at PDC in Los Angeles. "User experience" is definitely the message of the day. "Windows Vista" is a clear indication of the Microsoft belief that if you build a better interf... (more)

Last month we skipped the introduction to summarize some of the things we hope to bring to you in the coming year. This month we are circling back to our backgrounds in the hopes that this will help explain why we might be suited to fulfill the agenda hinted at last month. Bruce ... (more)

We (Patrick and Bruce) are new to ISSJ. In a future article, you'll learn more about who we are and why we are here. In this issue, we thought we would take a minute to frame some of the discussions that will go on throughout the year. As you probably all know from first-hand ex... (more)