On the series finale of this Memorial Day Trilogy, I will reveal the final phases of our process. (Find a diagram of the entire process and details on first three phases here and details on phases 4-6 here.)
The results of the beta exam are analyzed to determine which items should be included in the live item pool. I had a four part series on how we make these decisions. To learn more, see:
Item Selection Part 1
Item Selection Part 2
Item Selection Part 2.5
Item Selection Part 3
Phase 8: Standard (Cut-Score) Setting
Once the final item pool has been established, the cut score is set using industry recognized methodologies. Regardless of the method used, the cut score is always based on SME input of some kind—cut scores for MCP exams are never set in an arbitrary manner.
After the item selection and standard setting meeting, the final item pool and cut score information are used to assemble forms, or instances, of the exam. If an exam has multiple forms, these forms are designed to be psychometrically equivalent in terms of difficulty, meaning that one form is not harder than another.
This phase is self explanatory. Prometric publishes the exam, and it becomes available for candidates to take.
Localization is handled by an external vendor. Our exams are typically translated into French, German, and Japanese; additional languages are added based on market research, reach, and/or other strategic initiatives.
This is technically not a phase of exam development. Rather, it’s a phase of the exam lifecycle that is critical to maintaining the quality of the exam, which is why I like to include it as part of our process.
Exams are psychometrically analyzed at least annually. We also review the results of our candidate satisfaction survey (the survey you are invited to complete via email after you take an exam—your feedback drives change, so take a minute to complete it the next time you take an exam) and other sources of candidate feedback to identify ways to improve our exams.
So, that’s the long and short of our exam development process. Each of these phases will be described in more detail in a future blog if they haven’t been already.
What else do you want to know? I’m partial to trilogy blogs… will work for blog ideas.
A mere 15 years ago (indeed time flies) I worked at McGraw-Hill publishing. Our best selling ‘computing book’ at the time was ‘The Internet Golden Directory’.
Hard to believe today but we printed books that were basically big stacks of Yellow Pages featuring URLs and descriptions, just so you could find stuff on the internet. It was a solid best seller for a number of years, you should have seen our warehouse whenever the new edition was published. The line extended: ‘The Internet Golden Directory for doctors, for athletes etc. etc.’
Then there was search.
And next week there will be Bing.
Take a look here, especially at the videos; Discover Bing.
So… you may have noticed that a new thingy appeared on the left sidebar. Yes, it’s the Born To Learn Podcast!
The certification series now have three episodes that consist conversations among Microsoft Certified Professionals, Microsoft Certified Trainers and hiring managers. The topics cover the certification experience, value of certifications, and tips & “tricks” for passing exams. You can listen to it on your PC or on your Zune. The iPod subscription is coming soon.
Subscribe to it and tell us what you think of them, and what other topics you want, we are working to develop more podcasts that will be of interest to you. :)
We posted on the debut of the new MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-433): Microsoft SQL Server 2008—Database Development book last Thursday. And a week later it already tops the list of Amazon’s bestselling SQL Server titles. Congratulations to authors Tobias Thernstrom, Ann Weber, and Mike Hotek!
That’s the 70-433 Training Kit at #1 in the list below, giving Microsoft Press five out of seven of the hottest selling SQL Server titles on Amazon, at least for today.
…on Twitter: http://twitter.com/MicrosoftPress
In late March, the last time we checked in on Amazon reviews of Inside the Microsoft Build Engine: Using MSBuild and Team Foundation Build (Microsoft Press, 2009; ISBN: 9780735626287), Sayed Ibrahim Hashimi and William Bartholomew were four for four: all the reviews were 5 stars. Yep, their streak has continued.
Check out the titles of the eight 5-star reviews:
And here’s a snippet from one of the recent reviews:
This book made a huge difference in helping me achieve a clean and efficient implementation. I was able to have any number of Team Builds all using a single (master) TFSBuild.proj file with calls to reusable code for all the builds. I was able to add and configure a new team build in minutes without creating any redundant code. I have yet to plumb all the depths of this book and look forward to it with great expectations!
Congratulations, guys!
Remember Tom Cruise in The Minority Report, using that touch / hologram screen interface and flicking through applications on his sci-fi computer?
Seems we’re not too far away from that becoming a reality, more Windows 7 coolness is on its way to us: check this story about the Windows Touch Pack for Windows 7! Working on a dream indeed :-) Or check this video to see what work could look like soon.
If you agree Windows 7 is hot and want to get trained: look here!
I have been teasing everyone this year with the idea of digital version of the wallet card – now referred to as Virtual Business Cards (VBC). The goals of this project all revolve around employability & identity of MCP’s. Built on Silverlight, fully modifiable, and include direct access to your MCP transcript with a single click. Do you remember Purple Eyes?? Thank gosh – that project is in full swing for a launch coming very soon!
A great mention to this project is you will have control of what art you can choose (your own or one from a provide list by moi) to put on your VBC & Experience site. You don’t all have to be Purple Eyes. Below are examples of the first set of art work that could be used on a VBC / Experience Site that would be provided*.
This is draft one and I am looking for your opinion. I have my opinion & will share later. I don’t want to sway anyone. With that being said, does it speak to your inner geek? Your inner dev / IT pro? What do you think when you viewed the avatars? Would you use any of the avatars I provided above on your VBC?
As always, I heart your opinions.
I’m an MCP
Sarah
*Remember you can always upload your own avatar, photo, so forth – and oh, yea, I will also have a kill switch so no – ah - ‘funny’ stuff. Also, the above images are already owned by MSFT. I feel like LCA right now. :-)
Hi, all. Today we’re happy to share some excerpts from the recently published Programming for Unified Communications with Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 (Microsoft Press, 2009; ISBN: 9780735626232; 416 pages), which comes directly from the Microsoft Office Communications Server product team. This post includes the book’s About the Authors, Contents at a Glance, Introduction, as well as a stretch of text from Chapter 2, “Microsoft Unified Communications APIs Foundation.” I’ll keep this intro text short because much follows.
About the Authors
Rui Maximo is a senior technical writer in the Office Communications Group. He has worked on different aspects of the Microsoft Office Communications Server product suite (management, migration, topology, VoIP, Communicator Web Access) and shipped Microsoft Live Communications Server 2003, Live Communications Server 2005 (the original version and the SP1), and Office Communications Server 2007 as a lead program manager and program manager. With 13 years of experience at Microsoft, Rui has been fortunate to work in diverse roles (program management, software engineering, and technical writer) and various products (including Microsoft Windows, Windows Mobile, and Microsoft Office), primarily focusing on security. Prior to Microsoft, Rui worked at IBM as a software tester and at Brigham Young University as a UNIX administrator. Rui holds a master’s degree in mathematics, specializing in abstract algebra and cryptography. You can reach him at [email protected]. Please send your comments!
Kurt De Ding is a senior programming writer in the Office Communications Group. As the pioneering member of the SDK documentation team, he was instrumental in the initial design, authoring, and delivery of the SDK documentation for the Microsoft Unified Communications APIs, including Microsoft Office Communicator Automation API, Unified Communications Client API, Unified Communications Managed API v 1.0, and Unified Communications AJAX API, as well as Live Meeting Service API. Before joining the Office Communications Group, Kurt had worked on various Microsoft technologies, including Windows CE SDK, Windows Platform SDK, and Microsoft SQL Server SDK.
Vishwa Ranjan is a program manager in the Unified Communications Group. Most recently, Vishwa has worked on the Unified Communications Platform API Workflow Activities, which is available as part of Office Communications Server 2007 R2. Previously, he worked on Microsoft Speech Server 2004 and Office Communications Server 2007 Speech Server. He has more than 7 years of experience as a software design engineer in test, a technical lead, and a program manager.
Chris Mayo is a technical evangelist in the Developer and Platform Evangelism group. Chris focuses on the Unified Communications products (Office Communications Server 2007 R2, Office Communicator 2007 R2, and Microsoft Exchange Server 2007) and platform software development kits (SDKs), working with the Office Communications Group since the early betas of Office Communications Server 2007. Chris has been with Microsoft for 8 years as an evangelist working with the developer and independent software vendor communities. Chris has experience as both a writer for developer publications and a public speaker at professional events, such as the Professional Developers Conference and TechEd. Prior to joining Microsoft, Chris served as a developer and architect in the IT departments of Fortune 500 companies in the retail and finance industries. Keep up with Chris at his Unified Communications Development blog at http://blogs.msdn.com/cmayo/.
Oscar Newkerk is a Unified Communications Architect at Unify Square Inc. working in the area of Unified Communications, with an emphasis on integrating and enhancing business processes with collaboration technologies. With 14 years of experience at Microsoft, Oscar worked in various roles and groups within the company. Most recently, he was a technical evangelist in the Unified Communications Group, helping the developer community to plan, design, develop, and deploy solutions that integrate with Office Communications Server. Prior to Microsoft, Oscar worked for Digital Equipment Corporation as a software specialist and in software engineering in the areas of systems and network management. Oscar holds a bachelor of science degree in physics from Guilford College and holds patents in the areas of systems management and speech recognition.
Albert Kooiman is a member of the Unified Communications Marketing team and has been responsible for product management of the Unified Communications Developer Platform since the group was created in 2006. He works on both Exchange Server and Office Communications Server. With 14 years of experience in the telecommunications and speech technology industry, Albert has been involved in a wide range of projects encompassing the broad spectrum of Unified Communications solutions currently in the market. Albert holds a master’s degree of the Medical Faculty of the University of Amsterdam, specializing in medical informatics.
Mark Parker is a programming writer in the Office Communications Group. Most recently, Mark was responsible for the Unified Communications Managed API 2.0 Core SDK documentation and part of the Unified Communications Managed API 1.0 SDK documentation. Before joining the Office Communications Group, Mark worked as a writer on the Speech Server 2007 documentation team and was a lead programming writer on the Windows Device Driver Kit documentation team. Prior to Microsoft, Mark taught mathematics and a number of programming languages at Shoreline Community College. Mark holds a master of science degree in mathematics.
Introduction
Why We Wrote This Book
Microsoft Office Communications Server is a relatively new product. Although it has its origins in the Enterprise Instant Messaging products, such as Exchange Instant Messaging, Live Communications Server 2003, and Live Communications Server 2005, it has evolved to become a comprehensive platform for all real-time communications. The current release, Office Communications Server 2007 R2, not only supports enterprise instant messaging (IM) and rich presence, but also offers a powerful Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP)–based telephony system, multiparty audio conferencing, Web conferencing, and application sharing.
This server offers tangible benefits in direct cost savings (for example, by eliminating costly audio conferencing services provided by telecom carriers) and improves productivity by providing more efficient ways for people to contact each other. Office Communications Server is one of the fastest-growing server products in Microsoft history, with tens of millions of licenses sold.
Office Communications Server is a software-based solution that runs on standard computing and networking hardware. This server offers a rich, open API platform, making it an open and extensible part of the Microsoft Unified Communications (UC) platform. There are many opportunities for developers to build new applications on this platform. We know that developers are looking for resources to help them develop applications using the UC APIs, and this book is the only one on the market today that addresses this need. Written by experts from the product group, Programming for Unified Communications with Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 offers an easy-to-read exploration of the APIs. We hope it serves you well.
What This Book Is About
This book is organized into five parts.
Part I, “Understanding Unified Communications,” introduces the UC platform and provides an overview of the APIs.
Part II, “Office Communicator Automation API,” explains the Office Communicator Automation API in depth and provides a detailed walkthrough of an example.
Part III, “Unified Communications Managed API Workflow,” explains the UCMA Workflow API in detail and walks through an example of a business process communication.
Part IV, “Unified Communications Managed API,” covers the Unified Communications Managed API architecture and shows how to extend the Office Communications Server Enhanced Presence model by using this API.
Part V, “Debugging, Tuning, and Deploying Unified Communications Applications,” explains how to debug, tune, and deploy UC applications.
Who This Book Is For
This book is intended for developers who want to create enterprise applications that include communications functionality built on the UC platform. Familiarity and experience with Microsoft Windows COM, Microsoft .NET Framework, and Windows Workflow Foundation development is recommended. This book is written on the assumption that the reader has this knowledge. Code examples in this book are written in C# unless otherwise noted. For clarity and to better illustrate how to use the APIs, the code samples are not written with defensive coding practices in mind. Please apply defensive code practices when reusing the samples in your own production applications.
For an in-depth resource on the internals of Office Communications Server 2007 R2, see the Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 Resource Kit (Microsoft Press, 2009), which you can purchase in a bookstore or order from http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/ Books/13113.aspx. That book also covers the Office Communications Server Software Development Kit (SDK), which is intended for administering and controlling compliance of the conversations (for example, ethical walls and custom disclaimers) with Office Communications Server, and therefore is outside the scope of this book.
We sincerely hope that you find the technical information within this book useful and lucrative to your work.
Companion Content
This book features a companion Web site that makes available to you all of the code used in the book. This code is organized by chapter, and you can download it from the companion site at http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/programmingocs.
Hardware and Software Requirements
You need the following hardware and software to work with the companion content that is included with this book:
Servers
Hardware Use only a 64-bit computer that is running a 64-bit edition of Windows Server (see more about the operating system below). Other technical specifications include the following:
Operating System Use only the 64-bit edition of Windows Server 2003 SP2, Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2, or Windows Server 2008. Supported editions include Standard, Enterprise, and Data Center versions of Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008.
Client Computers
Hardware Use any 32-bit or 64-bit computer that is running Windows Vista SP1. Other technical specifications include the following:
Operating System The 32-bit or 64-bit edition of Windows Vista SP1 or later. Windows Vista Home Premium Edition, Windows Vista Business Edition, or Windows Vista Ultimate Edition.
Database Requirements
Use the 32-bit version of Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express Edition SP2, which is included with Office Communications Server 2007 R2.
Office Communications Server 2007 R2
Deploy Office Communications Server 2007 R2 Standard Edition on a private network.
More Info For more information about deployment for the UC test environment, see the “Deploying Office Communications Server Standard Edition” section in Chapter 9, “Preparing the UC Development Environment.”
Administrative Tools
Install the Office Communications Server Administrative Tools. The administrative tools can be installed independent of the Office Communications Server deployment on a computer that is running the 32-bit or 64-bit edition of Windows Server 2003 SP2, Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2, Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista Business, or Windows Vista Enterprise with SP1.
Development Tools
The software development environment and tools required to build UC applications include the following:
Visual Studio 2008 SP1–supported software includes Visual Studio 2008 Standard Edition, Visual Studio 2008 Enterprise Edition, Visual C# 2008 Express Edition, and Microsoft Visual Web Developer 2008 Express Edition.
More Info For more information about configuring the UC software development environment, see the “Configuring Application Development Components” section in Chapter 9.
Sample Test Topology
To build and test the samples included in this book, a typical test topology includes the following clients and servers:
Chapter 2 Microsoft Unified Communications APIs Foundation
This chapter will help you to:
This chapter provides a technical overview of the Microsoft Unified Communications (UC) APIs so that you can understand them, how they relate to each other, and what purpose they serve.
The intent of this chapter is to provide you with sufficient information to help you decide which UC APIs best fulfill your needs. If you already know which APIs meet your needs, you can look only at the sections that cover the APIs of interest to you, or skip this chapter altogether if you wish.
Unified Communications Managed API 2.0
The Unified Communications Managed API (UCMA) is a code platform managed by Microsoft .NET Framework, which provides access to presence, instant messaging (IM), telephony, and audio/video (A/V). UCMA is a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)–based platform. SIP is a signaling protocol that is used for setting up and tearing down multimedia communication sessions. This API abstracts the details of the communication protocols used by Microsoft Office Communications Server.
Scenarios
UCMA is used to build scalable middle-tier applications that work with Office Communications Server 2007 R2, provide large-scale message throughput, and represent multiple endpoints. You can use this API to build the following types of applications:
More advanced applications include the following:
Considerations
UCMA 2.0 is considered a middle-tier API written completely in C#. Therefore, it runs only in environments where the .NET Framework is supported. It provides the following characteristics:
UCMA 2.0 supports two types of SIP endpoints that are designed for distinct application scenarios: the ApplicationEndpoint class and the UserEndpoint class. You use the ApplicationEndpoint class in applications that represent automated applications, such as bots that interact with users. You use the UserEndpoint class in applications that connect to Office Communications Server on behalf of users and perform operations on behalf of those users.
To configure Office Communications Server to trust connections from UCMA applications that use the ApplicationEndpoint and UserEndpoint classes, the application provisioning process must define a Globally Routable User Agent URI (GRUU). For more information about GRUUs, see Chapter 9, “Preparing the UC Development Environment.” This is all that is necessary if the application creates only UserEndpoints. After the application has authenticated the user, it does not need to supply those credentials to Office Communications Server for authentication. For applications that create ApplicationEndpoints, the provisioning process also must create a Contact object that defines the application’s SIP URI. You also have the option to create a display name and a TEL URI. The ApplicationEndpoint uses this Contact object to register with Office Communications Server.
Examples of applications that use the ApplicationEndpoint class are Automatic Call Distributor (ACD), interactive IM or voice bots, and conference bridges. For more information about these applications, see the “UCMA 2.0 Workflow API” section later in this chapter. These applications use a Contact object to identify the application in Active Directory Domain Services. The Contact object specifies the application’s SIP URI and phone number. Examples of applications that use the UserEndpoint class are those that publish additional presence information. Examples of additional presence information include showing a Global Positioning System (GPS) location on behalf of a user or acting as a proxy when the user is not available and routing incoming IM messages through a Short Message Service (SMS) gateway.
API Architecture
UCMA is composed of the following two interfaces:
This architecture can be represented as shown in Figure 2-1.
Well, just a little.
After much thought, and then some more, along with discussions with the community, the product groups for Visual Studio and .NET 4, our own internal folks and anyone else who wanted to chime in, we have finally decided on most of the new developer certification plan.
Here are the 99% definite exams;
MCTS Web Developer
MCTS Windows Developer
MCTS Connecting to Data (ADO.NET)
MCTS WCF
MCPD Web Developer
MCPD Windows Developer
Here are the 50% definite exams;
MCTS Workflow
MCPD Enterprise
So, what are the changes I alluded to?
1) The Windows exam will cover both Windows Forms and WPF. Percentages to be determined by your peers during the design sessions. This will also help to address the feedback over the Windows vs WPF requirements for MCPD Enterprise on .NET 3.5. NO, I don’t mean we are changing the 3.5 certs, I mean the new plan will not have seperate Forms/WPF issues.
2) Web to cover some Silverlight. Why? Silverlight is akin to nailing Jell-o to a wall. The dev cycles are shorter than our exam dev cycle. ouch!
3) Workflow has some great changes and is an awesome technology but, we need to decide based on other factors.
4) MCPD Enterprise in my opinion is still a non-defined audience. I don’t feel we are positioning this exam correctly and we need more market research into what an “Enterprise Professional Developer” really is. Thoughts and comments are welcome of course.
There will be Windows Mobile exams created, with one for 6.5 getting underway in June and the next version on the horizon. Embedded is coming up as are Microsoft Office SharePoint Server dev exams, Expression Blend and perhaps Web. We are still trying to nail down a Software Tester style cert as well.
All fun here in Redmond for sure.
I could post more, but I don’t want to. Actually, I can’t because we still need to lock firmly on what we have committed to.
As always, comments and suggestions are welcome.
Gerry
Previously on Lost… I mean “The Story of Exam Development,” we talked about the first three phases of exam development. In today’s installment, let me enlighten you on the next three phases of our exam development process.
Phase 4: Item Development The number of items to be written for each objective is based on the results of the blueprint survey. Items are written by external SMEs; internal Microsoft employees cannot act as item writers except in rare circumstances. Once written, the lead item writer reviews and revises all items to ensure that they are:
Items that meet these criteria are included in the initial item pool.
Phase 5: Alpha Review
The technical (or alpha) review ensures that the items are technically accurate, relevant to the real world, consistent with the experience level of the target audience, and map to the intended objective. The alpha review meeting includes the lead item writer, editor, and external SMEs. These experts become the primary arbitrators of any issues or concerns that are exposed. To minimize conflicts of interest, only the lead item writer can attend the alpha review; none of the other SMEs who participate at this phase have seen exam content prior to this meeting.
The reviewed and edited items are collected into a beta exam item pool; the beta exam is built and administered to an invitation-only audience in most cases. During the beta exam, each participant has the opportunity to answer and comment on the items in the pool.
Coming tomorrow on the final installment of this trilogy…the final steps of our exam development process. Find out what the mysterious final step is that doesn’t appear on graphic that was included in my initial post…
As always, let me know what your thoughts and any questions that you have.
Thinking about your next career step and how to get there?
Looking for a discount on your next exam?
You may have developed the same reflex as I have: search the net for anything!
But why not ask your Microsoft Certified Trainer? Your trainer keeps track of us and our special offers. Your trainer knows when we offer special content. At most times there will be some special offers out there that may help you.
Your MCT can also advice you on your next steps in training in certification. Share your career plans with your MCT. There may be more options than you think.
Just my 0.02 USD, odds are this post turns out to be worth a lot more though :-)
Even though we always see it coming, this is still an insanely busy time for my team (and for most Microsoft employees, I’d wager).
Fresh off the bus and home from TechEd, we plunged immediately into planning for our next fiscal year (we run our business on a calendar that starts on July 1 and ends on June 30). Our budgets, our individual and team commitments, and sometimes even our roles and responsibilities are re-examined and reset. We are in the middle of our rapidly closing window of time to define and get approval and resources for all that we plan to do over the next year.
And we plan to do a lot.
Here’s what my day was like yesterday:
5:00am Wake up—not an easy feat after only 3 hours of sleep (and I’m not alone—had e-mail conversations with team at 1:00am) 6:00am Drive to work. 7:00am Conference call with our international field marketing managers to ensure our plan will work globally. 8:00am Coffee. First of several. 8:30am 1:1 with Sarah. Signed off on a very cool initiative for MCPs; Project PurpleEyes will be announced in the next couple of weeks, and launched very soon after. 10:00am Met with my peers and manager to put our high-level marketing message together for next year. Really like the direction we’re heading.
5:00am Wake up—not an easy feat after only 3 hours of sleep (and I’m not alone—had e-mail conversations with team at 1:00am)
6:00am Drive to work.
7:00am Conference call with our international field marketing managers to ensure our plan will work globally.
8:00am Coffee. First of several.
8:30am 1:1 with Sarah. Signed off on a very cool initiative for MCPs; Project PurpleEyes will be announced in the next couple of weeks, and launched very soon after.
10:00am Met with my peers and manager to put our high-level marketing message together for next year. Really like the direction we’re heading.
11:00am 1:1 with Tjeerd. Big focus for Tjeerd next year on recruiting academic instructors and teachers—into MCT? or does he have something else up his sleeve?
12:00pm Lunch 12:30pm Met with my colleagues in the U.S. marketing team to discuss plans to provide significantly greater opportunities for MCTs in Microsoft events and programs next year.
12:00pm Lunch
12:30pm Met with my colleagues in the U.S. marketing team to discuss plans to provide significantly greater opportunities for MCTs in Microsoft events and programs next year.
1:00pm Explore the new MCT Awards site. Love the Career Advisor tools and resources! Can’t wait until we start expanding this program for MVPs, user group leaders, and other influential audiences.
1:30pm Call Melissa with Springboard team and discuss plans for “Get on the Bus: Season 2” this fall. We agree that U.S. residents will need to sit this one out. (BTW, love the pics from the great Springboard party at TechEd… if you were there, check ‘em out.)
2:00pm Catch up on e-mail: Looks like we’ve got a new certification forum starting soon for hiring managers—cool.
2:30pm 1:1 with Bill. Love the new MCT Virtual Summit site—a 48-hour, non-stop, multi-language live virtual event for instructors? And you don’t even need to be an MCT to attend? June 18th can’t get here soon enough!
3:30pm Catch up on Born to Learn—even for me, this is the best way to keep up with what my colleagues are doing!
4:00pm Met with Marty, our Digital Marketing team lead, to sync on our social networks plans for next year. We did a lot of startup experimentation this year, now it’s time to get busy.
4:30pm Finally, focus time: two hours of work before heading home (and two hours of work after). Love, love, love Windows 7 Direct Access. Makes working from home a no-brainer—faster access to internal resources than in the office, without ever needing to RAS again!
Whew—long day! And a lot more still to come…
When I was in university, one of my professors was a former banana salesman. During his first lecture, he told us about how he won a prestigious bid and became the preferred supplier to one of the wealthiest corporations in (I think it was) Dubai.
He went to a lot of trouble to deliver his first order in mint condition. Bananas, I learned that day, need to be transported at 13.3C or 56F. So you get them on a plane that is cooled and that can maintain a constant temperature. And you cannot ship them with other fruit as bananas produce a kind of gas that spoils other fruit.
When the bananas arrived, they went on the back of a truck and were transported, it was boiling hot and the bananas did not arrive in mint condition…
So my professor went on, about how he stepped in and had another shipment done, this time in cooled containers to make absolutely sure the bananas were at the right temperature along their way to the customer. He would lose money on the deal but he wanted to be a great salesman and meet the customer’s expectations.
The bananas arrived and… the cook smiled and put them straight in the blender!
The lesson was that in communications you cannot assume, you need to ask questions and listen.
What a great teacher this former banana salesman was. We did not touch a book that morning, he told us this lesson 20 years ago and I still think of it often, most of all he inspired me into choosing a line of work.
-> Here’s my tip of the week: when next you attend Instructor Led training, make sure you get more out of it than just the plain theory. Make sure you talk to your ‘classmates’ and hear about their real life experiences. Make sure you ask your MCT for his/her anecdotes. The ‘informal learning’ component of any technical training class is sometimes underrated, but there are valuable lessons to be learned that may serve a lifetime! And it makes learning so much more fun! Enjoy your class!!!
For those of you who have followed us from our old blog, this series will seem familiar. Because this series didn’t get transferred here (operator error, I’m sure), I’m reposting. Think of it like those TV clip shows that catch you up on what you’ve been missing (think of that hour long show before the actual season finale of Lost only with a little less intrigue and confusion--at least I hope).
Here is our complete exam development process to whet your appetite. Below it are descriptions of the first three phases of our twelve phase process. Yes, I know that there are only nine phases in the picture. All will be revealed in good time, my friends.
Phase 1: Determining the Need for an Exam
Exam development starts with a need for an exam. Our internal business partner, BPS, performs market research to determine the need and value of a certification in the marketplace. Input from market surveys, hiring managers, and MS product groups are considered when identifying which exams should be created.
Once a need has been established, BPS communicates this need to my organization, ACE.
Phase 2: Defining the Content Domain At Microsoft, we call the area that an exam will cover the “Objective Domain (OD).” To create the OD, we work with external subject matter experts (SMEs) who help us define the important functions and tasks that users of the product must be able to perform to be considered competent. A good OD meets the following criteria:
Krista recently blogged in more detail about this process.
Phase 3: Blueprint The blueprint ensures that the content of the exam reflects the relative importance of the tasks specified in the OD. During the blueprinting process, SMEs rate the importance and frequency of each objective and functional group in the OD. We will use this blog as a forum to recruit blueprinting SMEs for future exams. Yes, you can play a role in exam development!
Krista recently blogged in more detail about this process, too.
Well, that’s all I have room for today. If you have any questions about these phases or those to come, let me know. I’ll incorporate the answers into the next parts of this trilogy (aren’t stories better as trilogies?).
Coming tomorrow on “The Story of Exam Development: A Post Memorial Day Trilogy,” the next 3 phases of exam development. Stay tuned!
I was excited ever since I saw the demos of Office 2010 at the company meeting last year. It was very elegant, beautiful and efficient for everyday use. So when the opportunity came for employees to get the internal technical preview, I jumped on it. I have been using it for the couple of weeks, and I am loving it. :D
Since it’s not released yet, I can’t really say much beyond what has been shown publicly. The technical preview for public is coming in 34 days, and I want to encourage you to check out the Office 2010 movie (yes the movie…) and sign up for the technical preview. You can also join the discussion here, or visit the Office 2010 blog. :)
I will post more stuff in 34 days!
Are you interested in EBS? Here’s the book you’ve been waiting for: Windows Essential Business Server 2008 Administrator’s Companion by JC Mackin and Charlie Russel (ISBN: 978-0-7356-25259).
The authors and surrounding team have put great effort into providing an in-depth Administrator’s Companion that will answer your questions about this enterprise-class server solution that is designed for the needs of the midsize business. JC Mackin and Charlie Russel bring a wealth of experience and knowledge to this topic and the Microsoft MVPs and the EBS product team were generous with their support. Here’s a glimpse at the Table of Contents and a sample of a sidebar. Enjoy!
The Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Management Console is built entirely on Windows PowerShell. Everything that can be done in the console can also be done from the Exchange Management Shell (the name for the Microsoft Exchange PowerShell window.) While most tasks are easily accomplished from the Exchange Management Console, and are certainly more discoverable from there, doing repetitive tasks from any graphical console can be a pain, and is also far more prone to errors. Using the Windows PowerShell command line that the Exchange Management Shell provides gives you the ability to automate routine tasks or apply changes uniformly across multiple mail-enabled objects.
Microsoft Exchange makes it easy to learn the basic Exchange-related commands and options even if you’re a Windows PowerShell neophyte. When you use one of the Exchange Management Console wizards, you have an option on the last page to copy the command (and some related stuff you don’t actually care about) to the clipboard by pressing Ctrl+C. You can then paste this into a file and edit it with the ASCII editor of your choice. What’s pasted in is the actual command that was shown on the Completion page of the wizard—giving you a great starting point for building your own scripts to perform similar tasks. A useful resource is the Exchange Team Blog at http://msexchangeteam.com/.
Another good resource is Windows PowerShell itself. Windows PowerShell is an extremely self-discoverable language. You can start by getting a list of all the Exchange-specific Windows PowerShell commands:
Get-Excommand > ExchangeCommands.txt
This will create a file that has a list of all the Exchange-specific Windows PowerShell commands. If you see a command that looks like it might do what you want, say creating a new distribution list, get some help with that command:
Help New-DistributionGroup
You can get additional help, including examples of using the command, by adding the –detailed switch to the Help command:
Help New-DistributionGroup –detailed
To get some more general help with Windows PowerShell, try the following:
Help about*
This will give you a list of available general Help topics and is a great way to start your Windows PowerShell Discovery Tour.
Laurence Moroney, a Senior Technology Evangelist at Microsoft focusing on Silverlight and the user experience, has completed the third edition of his Silverlight book, now titled Introducing Microsoft Silverlight 3 (Microsoft Press, 2009; ISBN: 9780735625730)!
Laurence’s first edition (Introducing Microsoft Silverlight 1.0) was 256 pages, and his second (Introducing Microsoft Silverlight 2) was 352 pages. The new edition has grown to 384 pages, it will available after June 17, and you can pre-order it here and here. We’ll post lengthy book excerpts in June.
Congratulations again, Laurence!
One our our free e-books available this month, in celebration of Microsoft Press’s 25th year of publishing, is The Practical Guide to Defect Prevention, by Marc McDonald, Robert Musson, and Ross Smith (along with Marc McDonald, Dan Bean, David Catlett, Lori Ada Kilty, and Joshua Williams). To coincide with that offering, Ross Smith (a Director of Test at Microsoft) has sent us some thoughts on the increasing importance of defect prevention in our development efforts:
Iron rusts from disuse; stagnant water loses its purity and in cold weather becomes frozen; even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind. —Leonardo da Vinci Ross here. As the world hopefully begins its recovery from the economic crisis, here are a few reasons why now might be a good time to focus on employing defect prevention techniques. And please note that The Practical Guide to Defect Prevention is available as a free e-book download for another day or two! :-) http://csna01.libredigital.com/?urrs4gt63d As things have slowed over the last 6–9 months across a variety of industries, businesses have fewer customers, fewer employees, and face a more competitive landscape. The need for innovation, the need for higher quality, and lower costs rise dramatically as customer purse strings tighten. Chapter 3 of The Practical Guide to Defect Prevention (www.defectprevention.org) is titled "The Economics of Defect Prevention" and illustrates how an investment in defect prevention techniques can lead to cost savings. In particular, during the economic downturn, a business may have fewer customers, which would imply that the opportunity to optimize business processes would be higher, because the risk of customer dissatisfaction goes down with fewer customers. That said, it also implies that it s more critical than ever to get things right because what few customers one has might disappear. April 2009 figures from the National Bureau of Labor Statistics show the unemployment rate at 8.9% http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.toc.htm. Company layoffs have impacted almost every segment of the business world. Typically, companies have fewer employees today than they did a year ago. This fact alone emphasizes the need for process efficiency improvements. Investing in defect prevention techniques reduces the need for re-work, thereby reducing costs and allowing firms to do more with less. The need for innovation and quality improvements also rises during hard times. Companies need to compete on more rigorous terms, and differentiation is a key strategy. As we describe in Chapter 3: "Defect prevention changes the cost of capital requirements, allowing an organization to accept a different mix of projects. By using defect prevention techniques, an organization can invest in a different technology mix, including disruptive technologies that might otherwise be valued at below the cost of capital. Therefore, defect prevention not only saves money in the short term, it allows for long-term innovation and enables a company to invest in disruptive technologies." While we like to think that any time is a good time to focus on defect prevention, there are many characteristics evident in today s economic conditions that point to an opportunity to experiment and refine new techniques that will lead to greater long term profitability. Some of this may be driven out of necessity, as investments in R&D or cash-hungry experiments are less likely in this climate, but as Plato taught us, "Necessity is the mother of invention."
Iron rusts from disuse; stagnant water loses its purity and in cold weather becomes frozen; even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind. —Leonardo da Vinci
Ross here. As the world hopefully begins its recovery from the economic crisis, here are a few reasons why now might be a good time to focus on employing defect prevention techniques. And please note that The Practical Guide to Defect Prevention is available as a free e-book download for another day or two! :-) http://csna01.libredigital.com/?urrs4gt63d
As things have slowed over the last 6–9 months across a variety of industries, businesses have fewer customers, fewer employees, and face a more competitive landscape. The need for innovation, the need for higher quality, and lower costs rise dramatically as customer purse strings tighten.
Chapter 3 of The Practical Guide to Defect Prevention (www.defectprevention.org) is titled "The Economics of Defect Prevention" and illustrates how an investment in defect prevention techniques can lead to cost savings. In particular, during the economic downturn, a business may have fewer customers, which would imply that the opportunity to optimize business processes would be higher, because the risk of customer dissatisfaction goes down with fewer customers. That said, it also implies that it s more critical than ever to get things right because what few customers one has might disappear.
April 2009 figures from the National Bureau of Labor Statistics show the unemployment rate at 8.9% http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.toc.htm. Company layoffs have impacted almost every segment of the business world. Typically, companies have fewer employees today than they did a year ago. This fact alone emphasizes the need for process efficiency improvements. Investing in defect prevention techniques reduces the need for re-work, thereby reducing costs and allowing firms to do more with less.
The need for innovation and quality improvements also rises during hard times. Companies need to compete on more rigorous terms, and differentiation is a key strategy. As we describe in Chapter 3:
"Defect prevention changes the cost of capital requirements, allowing an organization to accept a different mix of projects. By using defect prevention techniques, an organization can invest in a different technology mix, including disruptive technologies that might otherwise be valued at below the cost of capital. Therefore, defect prevention not only saves money in the short term, it allows for long-term innovation and enables a company to invest in disruptive technologies."
While we like to think that any time is a good time to focus on defect prevention, there are many characteristics evident in today s economic conditions that point to an opportunity to experiment and refine new techniques that will lead to greater long term profitability. Some of this may be driven out of necessity, as investments in R&D or cash-hungry experiments are less likely in this climate, but as Plato taught us, "Necessity is the mother of invention."
Ross says he’ll be sending us more blog posts soon on efforts such as this: http://www.42projects.org/. We look forward to more, Ross! Thanks!
While we were traveling across the US on the "Get on the Bus" tour, I made a habit of asking people what technologies are hot right now. Across the board, the most common response I got was SharePoint Server and Dynamics CRM. According to trainers, CPLS managers, consultants and ITPros across America, the demand for these products is high and rising.
For those with an eye to the future, they re bulding skills on Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2. People I met said these products together make a great upgrade argument and would come right at the time businesses will be ready to start investing in IT again.
What are you hearing? What are you seeing? I ll send a free Windows Sharepoint Services 3.0 eBook to the first 10 people who share what s hot in their market and tell us where they re building their skills for the future.
Microsoft Press is a part of the Microsoft Learning team. In addition to books, we develop certification exams, instructor-led training courses, e-learning training, and other learning products. Our MSL News posts feature information about these learning products. Hopefully we have the right one to fit your needs and your style of learning.
This is our first official MSL News post and it’s for those of you seeking training for Microsoft’s Small Business Server 2008 or Essential Business Server 2008. We’re happy to announce the availability of two new courses:
Implementing and Administering Windows® Small Business Server 2008 (course number 6445): This five-day instructor-led course provides you with the knowledge and skills to plan, implement, and manage Windows Small Business Server 2008. The course helps prepare you for the MCTS: Small Business Server 2008 Configuration (exam 70-653) certification.
Implementing and Administering Windows® Essential Business Server 2008 (course number 6446): This five-day instructor-led course provides you with the knowledge and skills to implement and administer Windows Essential Business Server 2008. The course helps prepare you for the MCTS: Essential Business Server 2008 Configuration (exam 70-654) certification.
If you’re an MCT or CPLS and interested in giving these courses, you can find them for now on Microsoft Learning’s Courseware Library. If you’re not currently registered to access Courseware Library, the User’s Guide is a great place to start.
Shop Barnes & Noble Booksellers or shop online at bn.com through June 2, 2009 to save 30% off select Microsoft Press books.
Following in the tradition of covering poets, novelists (and now songwriters...if you missed it, check Ken Jones’s great post last Friday covering some lyrics by Loudon Wainwright III), this week I’m revisiting an old Emily Dickinson favorite.
We’ve been talking about trends and changes in publishing a lot lately, and we keep coming back to questions of accessibility and around reaching the every computer users – no matter their level of experience. I’ve been thinking back to some of the earliest poetry I ever learned. Bear with me…there is a connection coming. I was pretty young when I discovered Emily Dickinson and years later I marveled at the depth of her message that I’d been able to connect to at both a beginner, and then as an English major, a more “advanced” level. The hope is that we can find continue to find ways to ensure there is a title or series that meets that individual user wherever he or she stands in the spectrum of computer use. Here is one from Ms. Dickinson.
There is no frigate like a book To take us lands away, Nor any coursers like a page Of prancing poetry. This traverse may the poorest take Without oppress of toll; How frugal is the chariot That bears a human soul!
Prank (noun): a trick of an amusing, playful, or sometimes malicious nature. (Thanks, Dictionary.com!)
Here at Microsoft, when an employee is away from the office for an extended period of time, his or her colleagues may welcome him/her back in a unique way, usually involving the tampering with items in his/her office. This is a risk we all take when leaving the office for vacation or business trips, and it s a time-honored tradition here.
So when Joanne was out getting on the bus and presenting at Tech-Ed, I took the opportunity to impart some of this tradition on her office. Here are the results (and yes, they re all full of water):