Writing managed (aka .NET) sinks for Exchange Server 2000 / 2003 SMTP events requires Primay Interop Assemblies to wrap Exchange's COM-based event sink interfaces. If you don't know what PIAs are, then I suggest you read Primary Interop Assemblies (PIAs) - MSDN. But chances are, if you weren't already at least aware of the existence of PIAs, then the rest of this post is probably not something that will interest you ;)

Now, there are no official binary PIAs for Exchange Server 2000 / 2003. However, Microsoft does provide such PIAs in "source" form (not really source code as such... but we'll get to that) that you can download and compile yourself. There is an MSDN article that explains how to use the Exchange Server PIA wrappers, however I strongly recommend you download the code and read the included "Writing Managed Sinks for SMTP and Transport Events.doc" file instead - it is far more up to date than the MSDN article in areas that are quite significant (such as the actual build process).

A couple of weeks ago, I upgraded my Windows XP machine to Windows 7. I used the Windows 7 Family Pack special, which includes three Windows 7 upgrade licenses in one pack for better value.

Now, the back of the Family Pack box says:

Which is completely fine with me, because I always do a fresh install anyway, for performance reasons. So, with all my important data backed up, I formated the disk and proceeded to install.

The initial stages of the installation were pleasantly slick - feeling much more refined than good old XP, but the pleasantries were put on hold when it came time to enter my product key, which was consistently rejected! :(

Since Google released Chrome last year, I've gotten used to regularly using two browsers on my PC: Google Chrome for all of my "simple" personal browsing such as webmail, and Firefox for more advanced browsing such as website development. This also tends to create a nice separation of personal (Chrome) versus work (Firefox) tasks.

However, one thing that has bothered me for some time is the (slightly) proprietary nature of Google Chrome... don't get me wrong, Chrome is built from the opensource Chromium project, so it's not all *that* proprietary, but still, something does not quite sit right with me.

So, finally we get to see the innovations of Google implemented in browser form. For those not "in the know", Google Chrome is a new browser recently "accidentally" announced by Google via this comic.

One thing I've been excited to try out is the new tabs system. I remember, back when I first got IE7, that I had a gripe with the tabs. I thought, "The tabs should be on top, so they don't get in my way." (Among other things).

Most people who know me will be somewhat surprised by the title of this post... but it's true. I do, indeed, enjoy the current iPhone craze - simply because I think some good is likely come of it :)

Specifically, there's two main positive things that I think may come from the current iPhone craze: