Northwest Cadence Further Distinguishes Itself by Earning a Microsoft Competency in Custom Development Solutions and Learning Solutions

Kirkland, WA, USA – 9 January, 2009

Northwest Cadence, www.nwcadence.com, today announced it has attained Gold Certified Partner status in the Microsoft Partner Program with a competency in Custom Development Solutions and Learning Solutions, recognizing Northwest Cadence’s expertise and impact in the technology marketplace. As a Gold Certified Partner, Northwest Cadence has demonstrated expertise with Microsoft technologies and a proven ability to meet customers’ needs. Microsoft Gold Certified Partners receive a rich set of benefits, including access, training and support, giving them a competitive advantage in the channel.

Northwest Cadence provides consulting, coaching, and training on Visual Studio Team System and Application Lifecycle Management. With careful attention to both the present and the future, Northwest Cadence provides sound solutions that can be implemented, metrics that can be measured, and knowledge-transfer to ensure sustainable success. “This Gold designation helps tell the story of who we are. We are extremely pleased to be recognized as a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner. Although this Microsoft designation is quite an achievement, we are especially proud because it represents who we strive to be, every day” said Lori Borg, President of Northwest Cadence. “At Northwest Cadence, our mission as a team is to listen and be responsive to our customers and attaining this Gold status will enable us to continue to better serve our VSTS community.”

“Customers are looking for partner companies that can bridge the gap between their business demands and technology capabilities,” said Allison Watson, corporate vice president of the Worldwide Partner Group at Microsoft Corp. “They need to trust in a company that can act as an expert adviser for their long-term strategic technology plans. Microsoft Gold Certified Partners, which have certified expertise and direct training and support from Microsoft, can build a positive customer experience with our technologies. Today, Microsoft recognizes Northwest Cadence as a new Gold Certified Partner for demonstrating its expertise in providing customer satisfaction using Microsoft products and technology.”

As one of the requirements for attaining Gold Certified Partner status, Northwest Cadence had to declare a Microsoft Competency. Microsoft Competencies are designed to help differentiate a partner’s capabilities with specific Microsoft technologies to customers looking for a particular type of solution. Each Competency has a unique set of requirements and benefits, formulated to accurately represent the specific skills and services that partners bring to the technology industry. Within select Competencies, there are Specializations that focus on specific solution areas that recognize deeper expertise within that Competency. Serving as a specialized path to earning those Competencies, Specializations give direct access to the tools and resources that support that specific area of focus.

The Custom Development Solutions Competency is designed for technology partners providing custom-built solutions for clients that require value-added capabilities to optimize business opportunities.

“Our developer partners enable us to deliver high-quality solutions and applications to our customers,” said Nick Abbott, group manager in the .NET Developer Product Marketing Group at Microsoft Corp. “As the demand for applications built on the Microsoft platform continues to grow, there are more opportunities for providers of custom-developed applications than ever. The Custom Development Solutions Competency provides partners with a way to showcase their expertise delivering custom-built solutions to customers, to enhance partners’ revenue opportunities and positioning them for growth.”

Microsoft partners with the Learning Solutions Competency specialize in delivering high-quality training and full-service learning solutions to help customers maximize their investment in Microsoft technologies. Earning this competency identifies partner members of Microsoft’s premier commercial training and delivery channel, making it easier for partners to expand their scope of services and market potential. Microsoft Gold Certified Partners with the Learning Solutions Competency deliver a comprehensive range of information technology and developer training services, including skills assessment, technical training, student mentoring, and Microsoft Certified Professional exam preparation.

The Microsoft Partner Program was launched in October 2003 and represents Microsoft’s ongoing commitment to the success of partners worldwide. The program offers a single, integrated partnering framework that recognizes partner expertise, rewards the total impact that partners have in the technology marketplace, and delivers more value to help partners’ businesses be successful.

Northwest Cadence specializes in Visual Studio Team System and Application Lifecycle Management. Deeply committed to the VSTS and ALM space, Northwest Cadence is committed to ensuring its clients have an exclusive advantage based on the company’s product expertise and ability to bring it all together. Northwest Cadence is involved in the current and future Microsoft product development of VSTS and employs a team of consultants and trainers who are designated as Microsoft VSTS MVP’s, VSTS Advisory Council Members, and Certified Trainers. Northwest Cadence is proud to be a part of Microsoft’s respected VSTS Inner Circle program.

The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

For more information, press only:

Lori Borg, Northwest Cadence, (206) 947-0967, Lori.Borg@nwcadence.com

Compelling TFS Features to Upgrade from 2005 to 2008

The 2008 release of Team System provided several compelling features and upgrades over the 2005 release.  Most of these were in the Visual Studio client editions.  In fact, many people feel that Team Foundation Server itself did not see substantial improvements.  I disagree.

I’d like to take just a few minutes to bullet point a few of the many improvements at the Team Foundation Server tier of the 2008 release.  Some of these come from the October Power Tools release, which I consider a “must have” download!

·        Team Build

o   Multi-threaded builds

o   Built in continuous integration and scheduled builds

o   Dramatically simplified build creation

o   “Toaster” notifications

·        Version control improvements

o   Windows Shell integration – perform version control operations directly from Windows Explorer!

o   Destroy – permanently destroy version controlled files

o   Drag and Drop from the Windows Explorer to the Source Control Explorer

o   Search for specific files in version control

o   Annotate – this shows who authored every line of code in a file, plus the date the line was added or modified and a direct link to the changeset containing the modification

o   Merge improvements – big improvements in usability plus some long awaited improvements in baseless merge support (i.e., identical files no longer trigger a “merge”)

o   Single click navigation between Version Control Explorer and Windows Explorer

·        SharePoint 2007 support, including easily using an enterprise SharePoint portal implementation.

·        Alert subscription UI to simplify the creation of advanced email alerts

·        Work Item Web Access – a web based interface to TFS work items allowing people without Client Access Licenses (CALs) for TFS to create, track and update work items.

·        Team Member view – information about the development team at a glance from within the Team Explorer.  Find out who has what checked out, and what team members are working on.

·        Instant Messenger integration – rapidly communicate with members of your team

·        Team Foundation Server Manager – an improved tool for managing Team Foundation Server

·        SQL Server 2008 support – rebuild indexes online, improved Reporting Services and Analysis Services, and a whole slew of relational database improvements

·        Plus much, much more, including offline experience improvements, performance and scalability improvements, and Power Shell integration

If you haven’t upgraded to Team Foundation Server 2008, I encourage you to strongly consider it!  If the above list doesn’t convince you, remember that you’ll need to upgrade to TFS 2008 to get to TFS 2010, even if only for a few minutes.  So do it now, and get the benefits now.

To read more of this newsletter visit:

http://www.enewsbuilder.net/nwcadence/index000331069.cfm

 

Steve Borg knows, for now – the 5th year in a row, Steve has been awarded this prestigious award from Microsoft. This award is given annually to outstanding members of Microsoft’s technical community and it is based on contributions made during the previous year. In order to receive this award, the nominee undergoes a rigorous review process. A panel that includes MVP team members and product group teams, evaluates each nominee’s technical expertise, community contributions, and commitment to the MVP code of conduct. This panel considers the quality, quantity, and level of impact of the MVP’s contributions and presents the award based on their findings. Not only has Steve undergone this rigorous review for the past five years, but did you know – he was in the very first group of MVP’s for VSTS announced the day VSTS was released!

Steve is part of this amazing group of individuals who are considered exceptional technical leaders in the community. And indeed, this is an elite group for there are only 3,500 MVP’s worldwide. Northwest Cadence is very fortunate to have Steve as part of our team. Congratulations!

Please stay in touch with us as we can be of service: service@nwcadence.com

Visit our schedule of upcoming events:  http://blog.nwcadence.com/category/event/

And, we always love new blog visitors! http://blog.nwcadence.com  

 THe Northwest Cadence Team

They stay afloat by accessing an abundance of resources.  At Northwest Cadence, we regularly check the MSDN Flash Newsletter as a portal for the latest news, web resources, and most importantly training offerings.   Change, it is not optional, but how we adapt to change is and knowledge is the key.  Stay atop the wave of change and save this link as your favorite.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/flash/default.aspx.    

Steven Borg of Northwest Cadence (Microsoft Team System MVP) took a road trip to Portland to speak to a very interested audience about the new features of Team Build 2008, an inherent and powerful part of Visual Studio Team System 2008. 

There were a total of 68 students from 35 different companies in the Portland area.  Feedback from the attendees on what they believe was most valuable:

• “How build automation with Team Build can replace or enhance our current in-house development   system”
• “Step by step demo of MS Build and overview of ways VSTS can help my organization”
• “Using Team Build for automated deployment”
• “Learning what Build can do for us”
• “Tasks that check in to TFS can be traced in the build.  This really simplifies debugging”
• “High level oversight so as to better see the big picture”
• “References to best practices when using TFS”
• “The integration of work items and code check ins.  Setting up continuous integration”
• “Customizing the Team Build project file”
• “Implementing database scripts in build reporting”

At the end of the presentation, there were several prizes up for grabs; however, two attendees were especially lucky as the recipients of Vista Ultimate and a Microsoft Zune Digital Player.  But I think it is safe to say, all attendees were winners as they were energized by the dynamic speakers and enlightened as to the abundance of Team Build’s bells and whistles.