Ken Levy's Blog

I just updated my blog’s RSS feed to use FeedBurner. So if you’ve already subscribed to my blog here, please delete the existing reader subscription and re-subscribe using an RSS feed at http://feeds.feedburner.com/mashupx/klevy.

Update: The URL above goes to a FeedBurner page with various types of methods to subscribe. You can subscribe directly to RSS XML at http://feeds.feedburner.com/mashupx/klevy?format=xml.

Update: I’ve you’ve encountered any RSS XML errors from my blog here, it is due to some WordPress blog bug summarized in the WordPress forum post RSS Doesn’t Work – XML Parsing Error. It has to do with some WordPress plug-in files with extra spaces outside of the PHP code block definition. It appears I was able to fix it after making recommended in that forum thread.

Update: Thanks to a tip from Steven Black, I was able to auto-update the blog default RSS feed to auto redirect to the FeedBurner URL. This means there is no need to unsubscribe and re-subscribe as I indicated above. The information on how to do this with WordPress was at the blog post The right way to redirect a WordPress 2.0 feed through FeedBurner.

Update: I think this will be the final update on this, finally. I did have to install one more WordPress plug-in to get the auto RSS feed redirect working, the FeedSmith Plugin. The trick to get the blog source RSS feed to always work properly was to remove one blank line from the Yahoo plug-in for WordPress called Customizable Permalinks. it took several hours to track down this tiny bug, but in the process I learned a lot about the folder/file structure and architecture of the open source WordPress application.

Video posted on Channel 9: Toby Richards: Community and MVP Program Roadmap (40 minutes).

In this video interview I did a few weeks ago (a few days before my last day at Microsoft), I talk to Toby Richards, General Manager for Community Support Services and the MVP Program at Microsoft. The interview includes discussions around the current state of the Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professionals) community and the roadmap for the MVP program and the next MVP summit.

Toby took over this role in early 2008, and he is responsible for programs that identify, award and enable community influencers around the world, creating deeper relationships and richer feedback opportunities that improve Microsoft products and services. Also discussed in the interview is online support strategies and how MVPs help users and developers who are not MVPs.

This video is a kind of part 2 to the video interview I did last year with Sean O’Driscoll in the video Channel 9: Sean O’Driscoll, a General Manager for Community Support and the MVP Program. Sean, who will be leaving Microsoft later this year, was in the role Toby has now taken over. In that interview with Sean, we discussed  the history, current state, and future of Microsoft MVPs and the MVP Program. So the video interview with Sean is a good prequel to the Toby video sequel.

I was an MVP for much of the 1990s before joining Microsoft, and I was an MVP product group lead for both Visual FoxPro and Windows Live Developer groups, followed by mostly MVPs who made up the VSX Insider group. I’ve been involved with the MVP program and summits in some form since the mid 1990s, starting about a year or so after the MVP program started at Microsoft.I will be working with a variety of current MVPs in my new company (MashupX, LLC) ventures.

Thanks to Dan Fernandez for posting this video interview on Channel 9. For more information about the MVP Program, refer to http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/.

Disneyland recently opened a new interactive experience called the Innovations Dream Home, located in the Tomorrowland area of the park near Space Mountain. The major sponsors were HP, Microsoft, and LifeWare (a home automation company). Based on a full page article with photos in E-Gear magazine, here are some details.

• The kitchen has a voice-activated digital recipe guide via a display on the kitchen counter, using an HP TouchSmart PC.
  When someone stands in front of the magic mirror in a bedroom superimposes a digital wardrobe paper-doll style including jewelry and hair styles).
• Another bedroom projects storyboard images on the wall when reading a book out loud.
• Microsoft’s Surface technology is used for the dining room table to display pictures, videos, or a digital light show.
• A projector and screen are used in the living room play music and movies via a media library from an HP Media Center PC.
• There are about 150 digital picture frames around the house that change images whenever guests enter, based on an RFID chip they wear on their cloths to identify the person.
• LCD touchpanels by LifeWare are all over the house to allow control of most every system including lights, media, temperature, and access to news and weather.

The official home builder of the Dream House at Disneyland is Taylor Morrison, the company my brother works for in the Phoenix area selling new homes. He was invited with a group of co-workers to visit Disneyland for a day just after the opening.

I haven’t been to Disneyland or Disneyworld in over 20 years. Anyone who is about my age or older probably remembers when they charged per ride and various rides had their own type of ticket from A to E, with E tickets being the most expensive for the good rides like Pirates and the Haunted House – thus the cliche’ that still exists today an E-ticket ride.

About 75% of what is on display in the Dream Home is actually available to consumers today. What I (and probably most people) would be most interested is in the 25% category of not available to the public, which is a consumer version of the Surface table.

I started computer programming in 1981, when I got a TRS-80 Pocket Computer 1 (made by Sharp) which was also the same here I started 10th grade in high school and took a class in BASIC programming using the TRS-80 Model 1. We had a model II at home and I ended up doing part-time programming work for extra allowance. I taught myself Z-80 assembly language a year later, and ended up programming on many other TRS-80 (aka Trash-80) models over the following years.I also built many electronic based projects during my high school years based on parts from Radio Shack (my favorite store during that time).

Below is a Radio Shack and TRS-80 history timeline that I copied a while back, not sure of the source but it appears accurate:

• 1921: - Radio Shack begins as a one-store retail and mail-order company catering to ham operators and electronics buffs.
• 1963: - Charles Tandy buys the chain of stores, and within two years turned a $4 million dollar loss into a $20 million dollar profit.
• 1977: August - Radio Shack announces the TRS-80 Model I microcomputer for US$600.
• 1977: September - One month after launching the TRS-80, 10,000 are sold.
• 1979: May - Tandy/Radio Shack announces the TRS-80 Model II.
• 1979: October - Radio Shack begins shipping the TRS-80 Model II to users.
• 1980: July - Radio Shack introduces the TRS-80 Model III, priced from US$700 to US$2500.
• 1980: July - Radio Shack introduces the TRS-80 Color Computer, and sells for US$400.
• 1980: July - Radio Shack introduces the TRS-80 Pocket Computer. Price is US$230.
• 1981: January - Radio Shack ceases production of the TRS-80 Model I, and recalls units from the US market, due to failure to meet new FCC radio-frequency interference regulations.
• 1982: January - Radio Shack introduces the TRS-80 Model 16, with 8-inch floppy drives, and optional 8-MB hard drive.
• 1982: January - Radio Shack introduces the TRS-80 Pocket Computer, Model PC-2, for US$280.
• 1983: March - Radio Shack announces its TRS-80 Model 100 portable computer. Price is US$799 for 8KB version, to US$1134 for the 32KB version.
• 1983: May - Radio Shack introduces the TRS-80 Model 4, for US$2000.
• 1983: June - Radio Shack introduces the TRS-80 PC-3, for US$99.95.
• 1983: October - Tandy/Radio Shack announces the "transportable" TRS-80 Model 4P, for US$1800.
• 1983: Radio Shack introduces the TRS-80 Pocket Computer, Model PC-4, replacing the PC-1, for US$70.
• 1983: Tandy releases the TRS-80 Model 2000, which uses the Intel 80186 microprocessor.
• 1983: Radio Shack unveils the TRS-80 Model 12 at the CP/M ’83 Show. Price is US$3200.
• 1985: March - Radio Shack introduces the Tandy 6000 multiuser system. It features Z80A and 68000 processors, 512 KB RAM, 80×24 text, graphics, 1.2-MB 8-inch disk, optional 15 MB hard drive, TRS-DOS, or XENIX 3.0. It supports up to 9 users.

In today’s InternetNews.com article Rough Launch for iPhone 3G, I was interviewed by Andy Patrizio just after lunch. The focus is on my experiences this morning in trying upgrade the firmware of my iPhone (original 1.0 version which I bought on iPhone launch day last year) to the new version 2.0.

I have two mobile phones, a Blackjack II Windows Mobile phone as my primary phone, and the original iPhone as my additional phone line. I’ll post more about the iPhone 2.0 firmware upgrade and new features soon, as well as some tips I’ve been archiving to post about using Windows Mobile based phones.

For my first blog post here, I’ll just link to the About page with my bio.

For a reference to the blog I posted to from 2004 to 2008 while working at Microsoft, refer to http://blogs.msdn.com/klevy.