i'm is a new initiative from Windows Live (TM) Messenger. Every time you start a conversation using i'm, Microsoft shares a portion of the program's advertising revenue with some of the world's most effective organizations dedicated to social causes. While there is no set cap on the amount each cause can receive, Microsoft will make a minimum $100,000 guaranteed donation to each of the nine organizations during the first year of the program. The more i'm (TM) conversations that happen, the more donations that happen. The sky's the limit.

So any time you have an i'm conversation using Windows Live Messenger, you help address the issues you feel most passionate about, including poverty, child protection, disease, and environmental degradation. All you have to do is join and start an instant messaging conversation. Microsoft handles the donation.

Visit http://im.live.com to join and get more information.

I am really happy to see our product in the public media... Yes! This is a show off! :D

最近和猪有缘了，发个猪的小专题吧。。。

1. Pig of shame

在俺们组里，做坏事是要受惩罚滴，所以这次作为Break DOA的责任人之一，拿了小猪，特此拍照留念作为教训以儆后来。。。

拍完才发现，这张还有点艺术照的那种光晕感觉哪，看俺们的小猪迷人不？

 

2. 猪音响

在engadget上看到了这个好玩的咚咚，发现老外还真能琢磨啊。以下引文：

不过，顾客永远是对的，有需求，就会有响应，先前想必有人已经在 E 站主战上看过这些可爱的喇叭，牺牲了听觉上的效果，但却造就了让人意想不到的娱乐笑果。看看这头 Stereo Squealer 推出的粉红猪，随然小小一只，仅 1.6 瓦的输出功率，没法让人听到动人的音乐，不过，四颗 AA 电池驱动，利用mini-jack连结，几乎可以和市面上所有的随身听兼容的便利性，其实还算不赖啦！而他最特殊的地方，在于音量控制的方法，只要摇摇猪尾巴，大声小声就随你调啰！售价 14.95 欧元（约人民币 150 元），不过中国可能没卖吧。

Just did a Quiz about major, seems I am right on track...You scored as Mathematics.
You should be a Math major! Like Pythagoras, you are analytical, rational, and when are always ready to tackle the problem head-on!
Mathematics 83% Engineering 83% Biology 75% Art 75% English 67% Dance 67% Sociology 50% Chemistry 50% Psychology 50% Philosophy 50% Theater 50% Linguistics 42% Journalism 33% Anthropology 33% http://quizfarm.com/test.php?q_id=119158

Recently I suddenly found that I am in love with the feeling of writing even if I don't have something special to write. So this shit is just releasing my writing addiction. :-)

 

Today is another normal day among the thousands of days in my life, nothing specially good to say, nothing specially bad to say either. Smoke is broken due to their improvement to the system - definately not a smooth improvement, so I am seating here to put some shit on my blog just in order to kill time...

 

However I am really feeling good during these 3 weeks, except for missing someone in Beijing ;-) First of all I met my US colleagues here and found they are all nice guys, I am increasing my effeciency with thanks to the direct communications with them. Secondly I synced up with several old friends here, it is good to know their recent news. What more, I knew some new friend in Redmond, and once again I have to say, the world is round! The last but not the least, we are enjoying the beautiful scenery and great food in Seattle, really amazing...

 

Ok, so much for today, got go back to real life.

Today I was coming back early than usual, that's why I saw some guys playing on the court near our condo.

 

Sunset, rap music beside the court, black guys playing ball, so that is what the US street ball looks like in my imagination, and that was just the same on the play ground today. I was eager to join in the game, so although feeling uncertain, I still made my way to the court.

 

Surprisingly, the guys are friendly enough to count me in, not showing a little bit weird to see an Asian guy on the court. Then we started a 3-on-3 game soon. I had to say, these niggas are really strong and fast - the muscles, the speed they dribbling, and the presure I felt when struggling for advantage space in the paint - now I know how hard Yao is fighting in the NBA game court!

 

But a funny thing on the court is, the best player, undoubtly, is a caucasian. He is about 1.87 meters height, not too strong but actually powerful, with astonishing jump speed and height. This guy is leading our team, he made a lot of incredible moves during the game, including a 360 degree spin layup (360度空中转体上篮 - I don't know if this is the correct term in english -_-).

 

My 1-on-1 counterpart is a *GAINT* black guy, he is about 195 meters height, his arm is as strong as my calf. When I said "You are so strong!" during our wrestling, he replied "Hey, I don't even begin to use my muscle..." But this guy is not so swift, he often lose ball when his teamates made a quick pass. After I grabbed a rebound using my speed and positioning, he said "So you can see muscle is not everything." :-)

 

It is an interesting experience to play street ball in US, and it is my luck that I met some friendly niggas today. After the game, they hit hands (击掌致意) with each others. Some of them even came to me and told me they are glad to play with me - no matter what they really thought - and this made me so happy.

 

Ok, I didn't take picture today, here is one from web: similar environment, but no audience :)

 

-----------------------------------------------------------------

* Below explaination for Nigga is from wikipedia:

Nigga is a term used in African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) that began as an eye dialect form of the word nigger.

The term is used in AAVE to replace words such as pal, friend, chum, people, person, boy, etc. For example, when speaking AAVE, one might say, "European niggas can ball" which can be translated into English as, "European guys can ball." Another example would be, "(That) Nigga stole my bike." The English translation would be, "That loser stole my bike."

As of 2006, the word nigga is used, without intentional prejudice, among all races of people in the USA, including African-Americans, Asian-Americans, and more recently by some Caucasians. This may be due to the overwhelming popularity of rap music in modern American culture...

Many, however, continue to see the word as pejorative, and its use outside African-American communities remains controversial. Many African-Americans express offence when referred to as a nigga by Caucasian people, but not if they are called the same by other African-Americans. In this case, the term may be seen as a symbol of fraternity and its use outside a defined social group an unwelcome cultural appropriation. Critics have derided this as a double standard.

It is an exciting day that I attended the Trust Worth Computation & Engineer Excellence Forum today and met a couple of Mr. Bigs there. Twc&EE forum is an annual event in Microsoft, a series of speechs will be given in this forum, mainly by the winners of the TWC and EE award.

 

The talk about development innovation this morning is somewhat valuable, it reminds me that we should keep our mindset ready for innovation, even if a lot of daily stuff are draining our time. He also commented that Google's successful technical innovation benefits much from the pipeline through which any valuable ideas of its employees can be fastly transferred to the management level within 2 weeks. This is a what we should be doing better to make ourselves greater.

 

During the lunch break, while I was seating and having lunch on the sidewalk of the corridor, I suddenly found Hongjiang and another gentleman came and seat next to me. I said hello to them, and Hongjiang asked me if I know who is that gentleman. He is an indian with an apperance of wisdom. I made a mistake at that time, - what a shame! - I thought he is the new manager of MTC so I said that I was feeling so pity that I didn't join the dinner he hosted last time. Oh man, after I know who he is, I was constanly feeling embarrassed even for now! He is one of the technical fellowship of Microsoft! (Technical fellowship is the most outstanding individual contributors in Microsoft, throughout the whole company there are only 12 of them)

 

In the keynote after lunch, the customer from Cyber division of FBI - Yes, Federal Bureau of Investigation - gave us a speech about their effort against digital intrusion, criminal. In my imagination the guys in FBI should be as cool as MIBs, however he is really a man with sense of humor.

 

Finally comes the Mr. Biggest - Bill Gates! He is one of the most extrodinary characters I have been expected to see for so long time. BillG gave a 1 hour speech mainly about software innovations within next decade. Generally speaking it is a good speech, while it made me feeling a bit awkward that he said China ranks 1st in many markets - wide bandwidth, mobile phone, personal computer, and PIRATING -_-b.

 

This is a great day for me, and this is why I am still up now: FIX BUG, FIX BUG, FIX BUG....

一直以来都在打算写一篇从个人的角度描述Exchange的文章，恰逢Exchange VP David Thompson到ATC进行了一次谈话，给我机会从更高的着眼点审视我们的产品，于是趁热打铁写下一些体会。——当然这些只是从个人角度，甚至也许有一些偏差和不当，所以不代表任何公司观点：）

 

首先解释一下Exchange到底是什么，因为说实话Exchange在公众面前做的宣传并不是很多，所以可能有很多人并不了解。Exchange Server是Microsoft的邮件服务器产品，用来提供企业级的通讯和协作，包括电子邮件、日程安排、共享目录、自动恢复等等功能。从Exchange最新版本2003开始，又与自Windows 2000开始采用的Active Directory目录集进行了集成，从而提供了更强的可管理性，并减低了维护成本。

 

Exchange与Outlook搭配使用，就形成了一套企业级的基于电子邮件的业务通讯系统。但Exchange Server支持的访问方式不仅仅如此，它还可以支持Web方式的邮箱访问，IMAP\POP3客户端，以及从移动设备的访问。所有这些feature，使信息工作者几乎能够在需要时随时随地进行重要的业务通信。就是这样，特别是有了支持Mobile Device的ActiveSync，几乎可以7*24小时进行业务通信了。（汗一个，恐怕很少有人会7*24工作吧，但是确实对于出差或者在家办公的情况是很有用处）

 

Exchange 2003现在占据了企业级电子邮件服务器产品的很大份额，主要的竞争对手是IBM的Lotus Notes。和Notes追求全面功能相比较，Exchange更关注于用户管理和使用上的方便，以及减少客户的总拥有成本。在功能的设计上，则更多的是从客户的需要出发考虑设计产品。David今天在回答问题时提到的"We provide what the customers really want"，大概就是这种考虑的一种体现吧。

 

在下一个版本中，Exchange更是整合了更多、更激动人心的特性和功能。期待着自己参与的这个新产品的早日完成与发布！

Gates and Buffett—friends who just happen to be the two richest men in the world, worth $51 billion and $40 billion, respectively—had a conversation with Fortune. Here is what they answer the question about the best books they ever read.

 

FORTUNE: A few quick hits. First: best book you've read lately.
BUFFETT: Katharine Graham's Personal History is sensational. I think everybody ought to read that.
GATES: There's one called The Bottomless Well, about energy, that I love. There's one about computer science, Ray Kurzweil's book—I have a preprint, so I'm not sure when it's coming out—called Singularity Is Near, about artificial intelligence. The Tom Friedman book [The World Is Flat] is supergood. Jeffrey Sachs wrote a book called The End of Poverty, the Jack Welch book Winning came out this year, and don't forget [Jared Diamond's] Collapse, which is the follow-on to one of the best books of all time [Guns, Germs, and Steel].

 

Today the writer Tom Friedman came to Sigma to give us a talk. This is a really charming talker, I think it will be worth to get one copy of his book.

青岛真的是个好地方，真的……

 

像传说中的那样，出了火车站走几步就能看到大海。下火车匆匆找好住处，我们就迫不及待的奔向了海边。火车站旁的那片海不敢恭维了，人实在太多，沙滩脏乎乎的也不太可爱，只能脱了鞋沿着沙滩走走，就当是热身了。

 

真正的海滩出现在第一海水浴场，那是我们沿着海岸一路向西经过鲁迅公园，再漫步经过充满欧式风味别墅建筑的八大关景区之后，霍然进入眼帘的。金灿灿的阳光下是金灿灿的沙滩，浪花一朵朵的涌上来，给金色沙滩留下了一串串白色的花边，这样的景象，不能不让我这个没见过几次海的内地土人激动。于是很快在浴场边的小木屋里换好衣服，狂奔着就冲向了大海——我是真的喜欢大海，好像小时候看过一本儿童读物叫《海的故事》，从那时候就一直在向往海边。炎热七月的中午，海水却还是沁人心脾的凉，差点让我们有来无回。浴场边的海水居然还是很清，在半米深的地方，可以看到水下的沙地，可惜就是那天的视距太差，有些雾蒙蒙的，看不到太远处的景色。但我也很享受这样的海边了，游上一圈之后，懒洋洋的躺在沙滩上，全身沾满了粉末一样的细沙，我觉得自己像一头吃饱了正在泥水滩里happy的猪，这样的闲暇感觉不知道一辈子能享受到几次：）

 

到了青岛，就不能不去崂山，可惜实在是太懒，第一天晚上从小吃街饱餐而归之后元气大伤，以至于早上到了十点钟才晃晃悠悠走出旅馆，貌似已经没有公交车过去了。于是搭寄居旅馆的车，抄近路赶上了一辆已经出发快一个小时的崂山旅游大巴，跟着他们一起团游崂山——其实现在跟团确实不比自助游贵，很多方面还要方便许多，唯一失去的只是自在，这个就看个人的喜好了。崂山号称海上第一名山，从山上眺望海岸、天边的感觉确实不错，山里郁郁葱葱的景色也是炎炎夏日里的清凉享受。同样，也熙熙攘攘的跟着大流走了一遭华严寺，却发现各个地方的名山宝刹到了现今只能深深的闻到一股铜臭味道，忽然想起多年前游少林寺的时候看到的看《参考消息》的僧人，我不知道是自己对空门的期望与现实出现了偏差，还是什么原因，总觉得心理落差很大，估计这辈子和佛门是无缘了。

 

最后一定要说一下青岛的美食，谁让咱就是这样的俗人呢？到了青岛不能不吃海鲜，我们发现大街小巷的餐馆门前，几乎都摆着一水的盆子，虾，螃蟹，蛤蜊，蛏子……保证让你目不暇接。海鲜只要是新鲜，随随便便做出来就好吃，第一天在一个小吃店里吃到的活虾和辣炒蛤蜊绝对是美味，陪着1块2一斤的青岛本地扎啤（吃的时候就看到本地人来打酒，打上一斤两斤的都用塑料袋装走，非常诡异），不知不觉就吃得微醺了。后来到据说是青岛美食街上一家叫海岛渔村的大店里吃了两次（为什么是两次？因为这家店确实很好，我们也就乐得做了一次回头客），18块钱一只的特价大螃蟹，一只足有半斤，真正把海鲜吃了个过瘾。唉，当时就想，回到北京可怎么办啊……

 

写了这么半天，回头看一遍，发现这样的旅游实在不像是旅游，四天的行程松松垮垮，除了上崂山还有点旅游的样子，其他几天就像是本地人的休闲生活，在青岛市里乱转。不过也没办法，自己玩的高兴就好了，爱咋咋的，^_^