It’s the Microsoft MVP Summit 2009

By on March 1, 2009 in Windows Home Server

As the calendar ticks over from the wintry depths of February into March, it’s time once again to head overseas to Seattle for 2009’s MVP Summit. This year is a little different for Windows Home Server MVPs than last year – firstly, there’s quite a few more of us this time around, and I’m looking forward to meeting the guys who have heavily supported the WHS community over the last 12 months.

Turning the clock back 12 months, we were all pretty vexed about the data corruption bug, which led to a few honest words being exchanged from MVPs to the product team as I remember. This year, I’m sure once again there will be a positive exchange of views on the current product as well as a look forward to what’s coming down the line with Snoqualmie and Vail.

The Summit agenda involves registration plus a number of Keynotes tomorrow plus two full days with the Windows Home Server team on campus structured around specific elements of the platform – Backup, Storage, Remote Access, UX, Media Sharing etc. Wednesday then sees a final set of keynotes including seeing Steve Ballmer in action doing his thing on stage. I’m then off to Denver for a couple of days to check in with the MediaSmart Server team over at HP.

Should be a busy, but really fun week – unfortunately, a lot of the stuff that will be shared will be covered under NDA, but hopefully I’ll be able to share a couple of bits and pieces. We’ll see. Posting will probably be light this week, but follow me over on Twitter as I’ll be posting updates over there on where I am and what’s happening.

Given I have the opportunity to speak directly to both HP and Microsoft this week, I’m sure they’ll want tp know what’s going on in the community right now. What would you like me to share with them?


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About Terry Walsh

Terry Walsh is the founding editor and owner of We Got Served. Since February 2007, the site has provided detailed coverage and analysis of the emerging home server category, and has subsequently grown into a trusted outlet for digital home news and reviews.
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  • Josh

    What is happening with Shadow Coppies on MediaSmart?!

  • Simon

    I do have a few Q’s/points of interest.

    - Will we see support for Win7′s HomeGroup in the current WHS? (I may move my old desktops to Win7 but am certainly in no mood to upgrade my year old WHS to take advantage of HomeGroup.)

    - I think HP’s support for Time Machine is fantastic, feel free to pass that on to those guys. I went with a Tranquil PC instead and kind regretting the decision now. Do you think there’s any likelihood of Time Machine support from MS in the future?

    - Remote off-site back up. I really think this is essential as the amount of important data on the server builds up. I thought it was a real shame that HP’s out of the box solution got canned so early. Are we likely to see off-site back made available from MS in the future?

    Hope you keep up the good work Terry. Have really enjoyed reading the site over the last year. Thanks.

  • JohnCz

    - Please open up abit about Power Pack 2.

    - I modified my Vista PCs start menu to point My Documents to WHS user share, Pictures to WHS photo share and similarly with Music and Videos. The reason is that I want all documents stored on WHS by default. It wasn’t very straight forward to configure this along with Desktop Search 4.0. I’d like to see the WHS Connector provide some options to redirect some of these folders or provide some option for moving files. Also I’d like the start menu’s search to automatically search WHS shares I have access to. Again, I think WHS Connector can and should streamline this.

    - Do you see Windows Live services such as Live Photos, SkyDrive, Office Live Workspaces etc. as competitive offerings to WHS (not including backups)? Do you see opportunities to leverage WHS in those experiences?

    - Any prospects with making the PDC Live Mesh demo a WHS add-in?

    - Have you already started development on v2 WHS?

  • BuckDanny

    I would tell them that while WHS is a very, very nice solution for the digital home, there are still some issues to be ironed out. I hope MS will focus primarily on fixing those rather than adding another set of features that are 95% ready. These issues include improving the DE technology (WHS spends way too much CPU cycles on drive balancing now), improving shared folder access (I still get too many random “network permission errors” when browsing the content of my shares) and several imperfections in the backup & restore feature (as documented on this and other websites).

    Features that I really *would* want to see added to WHS, are a way to backup and restore the WHS OS itself, a built-in download manager that can handle redirection (see the Synology CS407 for some inspiration)
    and support for encryption of server backups (and possibly server content itself). Media Center integration isn’t essential for me, but would be very nice nonetheless.

    Finally, I would ask them to not make the mistake of limiting configuration possibilities even more. Yes, keep a very simple interface that appeals to the intended target audience (i.e. people who do *not* visit WeGotServed – sorry, Terry ;-) But allow us (semi-) enthousiasts to dig deeper in options menus to tweak WHS to our needs and wants, without forcing us to delve dangerously deep into Server 2003.

    Terry, have a safe and interesting trip, and thank you for keeping us informed !

  • Titus Britannicus

    More use of WOL, especially by WHS to wake-up networked PC’s, as an added option.
    Possibly a right click menu item on a networked PC’s WHS System tray icon, to WOL WHS. Much the same as AutoExit does. I keep my WHS hibernated and just WOL when I need it, both from internet and home network. Very PC and Green. Why run WHS 24/7 when you don’t have/want to.
    Have a good trip.

  • soundtweaker

    Windows Media Center on WHS

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