This past week has seen the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) Being Held in Las Vegas. I have been monitoring the event closely through Engadget's coverage. I have been taking particular note of the flurry of Windows SideShow Devices that have been presented to market to be available with Microsoft Windows Vista.

Windows Vista SideShow is a technology which enables manufacturers to incorporate auxillary displays in their hardware. These auxillary displays can then be used to access data from the device without having to power it up. For example, laptop manufacturers can place an auxillary display on lid of the laptop, which enables the user to access calendar information, email or even their music collection without having to fully power up the laptop, therefore increasing battery life, convenience and usability. How many times have you gone to a meeting and then forgotten which room the meeting was in and had to fire up your laptop and outlook to check? Now you don't need to you can use a Windows Vista SideShow device.

Gadgets can be developed for SideShow along the lines of the current Windows Vista SideBar Gadgets and to see a few check out the gallery on Live.com.

For more information on developing for SideShow and some of the devices available check out Daniel Moth's Blog, Channel 9 and Channel 10 for their coverage of Windows Vista SideShow.

Devices already identified as possible users of SideShow are Laptops, keyboards, Remote Controls and Mobile Phones.

CES 2007 has seen a plethora of devices come to market and I have a few details about just three that have caught my eye.

ASUS W5Fe

This is a new laptop from ASUS, the original concept of which was see in a Channel 9 video back in May and it looked very cool then and now a production model has been showcased. The official from ASUS shows the W5fe boasts an impressive specification, and the auxillary display has 1GB of Flash Memory to store information for Windows Vista SideShow, be it music or video files, or calendar information etc. The guys at Engadget have had a hands on look at the W5Fe.

LG Z1

This is another laptop showcased at CES which has been released with a Windows Vista SideShow auxillary display. I have found very little information about the Z1 laptop apart from the information from Engadget at CES. It looks to be a very smart device, although I am unsure about the white keyboard. Plus I didn't have a clue that LG produces Laptops but I am now aware of this in their product portfolio, although it only appears they distribute in the far east as opposed to Europe and the US.

A use of SideShow which intrigues me is the use of an auxillary display on a Messenger Bag from Eleksen. This bag was unveiled at CES and allows the user to access their laptop from the outside of the bag using Windows Vista SideShow. This is potentially a very useful way to use the power of Windows Vista SideShow - what do you think?

Along with these great devices there were a number of SideShow enabled devices covered by Engadget at CES there were a large number of Remote Controls showcased and these will have massive use with Media Center. I expect to see a large number of SideShow enabled devices coming to market in the next six months as manufacturers take advantage of it's many possibilities.

Hi, back in December I posted the dates for the 2007 MSDN/TechNet Roadshow. As usual registration is filling up quickly and some events are already full and have a waiting list.

If you want to attend any of these events please register soon to avoid disappointment! I'll be attending the MSDN Roadshow in Harrogate, say hi if you see me there!

For the WebDD there is a Backnetwork setup. This is a social networking site and has been set up to accompany the WebDD Conference. More details can be found on the WebDD website. You can register yourself on the Backnetwork and create a profile and contact network. Also any posts you make on Blogs and images you put on flickr should be tagged WebDD so that the Backnetwork site can scan and link to them.

As previously posted on this blog, Phil Winstanley announced Web DD. This is a FREE event run on a Saturday at Microsoft in Reading. Sessions and speakers have been announced and some of the headline speakers include Scott Guthrie, Dave Verwer and Hristo Deshev.

The great news is that registration is now open, it is expected that this will fill up as quickly as the DDD events, so register quickly to secure your place at this much anticipated event! I'll be there so say hello!

Technorati Profile

There are only a few things in life that really get my back up but one that really does at this time of year is the shortening of Christmas to xmas! I'm not deeply religious, but I have been brought up as a Catholic, the correct term is Christmas! This is the one time of the year when Christians celebrate the nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ. As has been commented numerous times before by many, don't take the Christ out of Christmas!

Wishing you all a very Happy Christmas and a Joyful New Year!

Whilst waiting for Visual Studio 2005 to publish my updates to my Blog, I noticed a thread on Channel 9 about PDC and lo and behold on the PDC website the dates for next years conference. From what I've been told by people who have been to a PDC, it is well worth going to if you get the opportunity, and you will be amazed by the sheer scale of the event. For further information and to keep up to date with the announcements visit the site and subscribe to the PDC RSS Feed.

I welcome comments on my blog, and unfortunately they appear to have not been working up until now. Thanks to Guy for letting me know. I have also added a new link to comments at the bottom of each post and this also indicates how many comments have been placed against an individual post, click this link to go through to add comments on that particular post.

Great News! The next VBUG Meeting in the North East will be the VBUG EVO Launch event. This will be on a much smaller scale than the Microsoft Event being held in TVP on 19th & 20th January 2007. In approximately two hours, myself and Gary Rowntree, Leeds VBUG Regional Coordinator, will be giving all attendees an insight into the EVO products, primarily Vista, Office and .Net 3.0.

We'll try to cover as much as we can but obviously won't be able to cover everything, but hopefully it'll be a fun and informative evening for all. So for more information see the VBUG website for more information and details of how to register for the event. Currently the details of the Venue is to be confirmed. Keep an eye on the VBUG website and this blog as confirmed details will be posted as soon as they're confirmed!

I was talking to a colleague the other day and introduced him to Code Snippets. This is one of many features which are in Visual Studio 2005 and I'm sure that there are many other I don't know about but would find useful. My colleague was amazed at the simplicity but also the potential of this feature. I have developed my own snippets and they are very easy to do. To use code snippets, from within VS2005, go to Edit -> Intellisense -> Insert Snippet and this displays the snippet manager for you to select a snippet from. Snippets are great for removing the repetitiveness of entering the same structures many times, i.e. property constructs, if statements and try catch loops. Take a look at them and let me know what you think.

Also let me know your favourite tip/treat for Visual Studio 2005.