Microsoft LifeCams and Windows Live Messenger: The Perfect Holiday Side Dishes
With holiday-related travel costs already up 25 percent over last year,1 people are looking for alternative ways to connect with distant loved ones this holiday season. When it’s not possible to attend that family gathering in person, Microsoft LifeCams offer an easy, fun and affordable way for people to connect with friends and family all over the world — with high-quality video, crystal-clear audio and versatile designs. When users pair a LifeCam with the latest version of Windows Live Messenger, they can now experience a higher-quality video call with full-screen VGA video for clearer, sharper video.
LifeCams and Windows Live Messenger: The Price Is Right
An online survey from Zoomerang found that many people are cutting back their travel this year — in fact, almost half say the weakened U.S. economy will have an impact on their holiday travel plans.2 Now connecting across the miles with video calling is better than ever when LifeCams are paired with the new Windows Live Messenger. Users will experience true VGA video (640×480) at up to four times better resolution than the current solution in Windows Live Messenger when they switch to full screen, as well as faster connection time to initiate a video call and a new attractive user interface. Users will need a Microsoft LifeCam, the latest version of Windows Live Messenger, and a PC with a dual core processor and broadband Internet connection to experience a true VGA video call.
Microsoft Corp. offers a full line of webcams that deliver high-quality video calls at varying price points to fit consumers’ budgets, including the two newest Microsoft webcams to hit the market, LifeCam Show and LifeCam VX-5500.
Source- Microsoft Press Release
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Sun Microsystems to Distribute Microsoft Live Search-Powered Toolbar as Part of Java Runtime Environment
Microsoft Corp. today announced a search distribution deal with Sun Microsystems Inc. to offer the MSN Toolbar, powered by Microsoft Live Search, to U.S.-based Internet Explorer users when they download the Java™ Runtime Environment (JRE™), effective as of today.
Through this agreement, Internet Explorer users downloading Sun’s JRE will have the option to download the MSN Toolbar and have one-click access to Live Search features, as well as news, entertainment, sports and more from the MSN network and direct access to Windows Live Hotmail and Windows Live Messenger.
“This agreement with Sun Microsystems is another important milestone in our strategy to secure broad-scale distribution for our search offering, enabling millions more people to experience the benefits of Live Search,” said Yusuf Mehdi, senior vice president of the Online Audience Business at Microsoft. “With the vast array of Java software-based Web applications that are downloaded every month, this deal will expose Live Search to millions more Internet users and drive increased volume for our search advertisers.”
With more than 6.5 million Java software developers around the globe, Java is one of the most widely available and popular software platforms. It is already present on 91 percent of Internet-connected PCs worldwide. The Java Runtime Environment is one of the highest-volume consumer downloads on the Web, with tens of millions of downloads each month from http://java.com.
“With over 800 million Java desktop users around the world, our goal is to provide Java users with compelling and immersive business and consumer solutions powered by Java technology and value-added solutions from world-class software partners,” said Rich Green, executive vice president of Software at Sun Microsystems. “Our customers expect top-quality products when they choose to download technology from Sun, and we are confident that they will find great value in both Microsoft’s MSN toolbar and Live Search.”
Source- Microsoft Press Release
Windows Live Messenger release date confirmed
According to an email sent out tonight to users of MSN Direct Spot watches, which will not support the new Wave 3 version, Windows Live Messenger is set to be released on February 10, “2008” (sic). The email gives the correct start date for the beta (Sept 17, 2008). Of course it remains to be seen whether or not the release schedule is met, but this gives us some indication of the timetable for Wave 3 final releases.
Source- Liveside
Media Center Gadgets for Windows SideShow Release Candidate announced!
Just got the mail from the Windows Sideshow team that have released the RC version of Media Center gadgets for Windows Sideshow has been released.
Here is what the mail reads-
Download the Release Candidate build of the Windows Media Center Gadgets for Windows SideShow here:
(download links removed, you would be only able to download only if you were approved earlier to test the product)
Please install this build and provide feedback. The final release will be posted to the Windows Live Gallery in the near future.
While you are there, check out some of the great new gadgets that have been uploaded including Remotebook (for Facebook), AccuWeather, Twitter, System Health and Windows Live Messenger (all available in 9 languages)!
Support for Media Center Extenders:
Extenders are now supported if you are using a SideShow device that can pre-enable the gadgets. The Ricavision Vave100 remote control is an example of a device that pre-enables the Media Center gadgets.
Try this with your Xbox 360 or other extender device and provide us with any feedback. Additional instructions have been added to the Installation Instructions page about using the gadgets with an extender.
Connect Site Links:
Installation Instructions
Gadget general information and known issues
Send Feedback
Want to write your own Gadget in Managed Code? It’s easy!
You can download and install our easy to use SDK, which includes templates for a gadget that integrate with Visual Studio (2005/2008 including express editions). You can build and run the template Gadget right out of the box giving you an easy place to start to tailor your own gadget. Download this today from Microsoft Download Center:
Windows SideShow Managed API 1.0 SDK
Have a Windows Mobile 5 or 6 phone?
Download and install Windows SideShow for Windows Mobile Developer Preview
Your feedback has greatly increased the quality of this release! Thank you so very much from our entire team for taking part in the Windows Media Center Gadgets for Windows SideShow Beta.
Thank you!
The Windows SideShow team
Translation powered by….Microsoft Translator!
Our team is celebrating a major milestone today - last week we successfully transitioned all of our translation services to technology developed right here in Microsoft Research!
As some of you may have noticed, up until last week, some of our languages were still supported by a third party technology for general domain requests. Here’s the summary of what this release means:
- Translation now fully powered by the Microsoft Translator technology is available through Live Search, as well as IE8, the Windows Live Toolbar, and Windows Live Messenger.
- All translation pairs on the site (11 English-X, 12 X-English) are powered by Microsoft Research-developed systems.
- Two transliteration pairs (chs<->cht), courtesy of the Windows International team.
- For several languages, better language quality.
- And finally, the release of TBot, a translation bot for Windows Live Messenger.
This release is the combination of all the effort that the team has put into machine translation, not only over the past months, but literally over the past years.
Source- MSDN Blog
Windows Live Messenger translation bot now available!
The Microsoft Translator team is excited to announce the new translation bot for Windows Live Messenger! This Messenger bot does translations for you. Just add mtbot@hotmail.com to your contacts and start chatting. You can have one-on-one conversations with the bot, or you can invite a friend and chat in different languages with the bot translating for you. As usual, remember that machine translation isn’t perfect – slang especially will give the engine trouble.
You can also access Windows Live Messenger on your smartphone to use the bot to translate simple sentences while you’re traveling to other countries!
The translator bot is localized into all of the languages for which we have translation support on www.windowslivetranslator.com:
- English to/from:
- Arabic
- Chinese Simplified
- Chinese Traditional
- Dutch
- French
- German
- Italian
- Japanese
- Korean
- Portuguese
- Russian (RUS->ENU only)
- Spanish
- Chinese Simplified <-> Chinese Traditional
Source- MSDN Blog
Windows Live Messenger 9 Build 14.0.3921.717 leaked
The new version of Windows Live Messenger 9 beta has been leaked and available on net for download.
Those who are eager to download the leaked version and test it just search and you would find many links.
Windows Live Wave 3 is coming
The Windows Live Wave 3 is coming and with it comes the new versions of Microsoft’s Live products along with some of the new product releases.According to the sources the Windows Live Wave 3 is expected to be released by the end of summer means somewhere around September.
As we have already reported the Windows Live product page and the search page both have been changed.
Let us discuss on some of the new things added in Windows Live Wave 3
New unified header
The new header would be added to the online services of Windows Live.One thing to note is that they have removed the ORB from the header,and the search box has also been made smaller and also according to the information available the users would be able to customize the header images.
Here is the one image of header that I found while searching-
The header seems interesting isn’t it.The header image did give ‘wow’ feeling.
Windows Live Messenger
As we know that the Windows Live messenger 9 is already currently in testing stage.Though the Windows Live Messenger M1 has already been leaked and most of the people would be using it still their is some more goodies to come for all the messenger lovers.According to the sources they are going to change the design of the Windows Live messenger 9.Still the new features expected in Windows Live Messenger 9 are editing,polygamy and ofcourse multiple logins.
Windows Live Photo Gallery
The coming version of Windows Live Photogallery would be surely awesome with some good features coming in it.One of the confirmed feature is the face reorganization.Here is the image that we were able to find on the net-
(image courtesy manicho )
In the new Windows Live Photogallery we could add tags to the faces, really interesting indeed!!
Windows Live Frameit
With FrameIt, you can set up photo collections to stream into your digital photo frame or any of your RSS enabled devices.We have already blogged about it earlier and the beta version of Windows Live Frameit has already been released.If you haven’t seen it yet, give it a try at http://frameit.live.com.
Windows Live Hotmail
The information about Windows Live Hotmail is very less though we could expect an integration with Windows Live SkyDrive (service virtual disk with a capacity of 5GB that, who knows, may also be increased, although the chances of it happen to be low) and would also bring a new feature, called People, although the information about this release is very less.
We are also expecting integration of Windows Live Calender in Windows Live mail though the information about it is very less.
To sum up the Windows Live Wave 3 would be really awesome with many surprises in it.We would be keeping you updated about anything we find about Windows Live Wave 3.
