Goodbye Yellow Brick Road – I’m Leaving Intergen

It’s true, I’m moving on from Intergen to Magnetism.  It hasn’t been a decision I have made lightly either.

After 8 years and 2 months I have decided it is time for change. Intergen has been an excellent company to grow my career and work on some amazing projects – and the people are great to work with to!

Some of my highlights at Intergen have included (but not limited to) the following:

• Selected by Microsoft within NZ as one of two only v-TSP for CRM
• Technical Lead for the rollout of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 to 475 users across Australia and New Zealand in a large company rollout. System went live in 2010
• CRM Lead Developer for the rollout of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 to 450+ end users at the end of 2009 to a large NZ organisation. System went live in 2009
• Developed the Microsoft Instructor Lead Training for Dynamics CRM 4.0 for Microsoft
• Developed the Microsoft Windows Azure Hands On Labs (HOL) for Microsoft
• Microsoft TechEd Hands On Lab (HOL) Proctor 2006 & 2009
• Microsoft Imagine Cup 2010 – Industry Mentor
• Presented at TechEd 2012 – DYN301 – What you need to Know to Upgrade from Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 to CRM 2011
• Passed CRM examinations
• Intergen – Numero Uno 2010 (Auckland Office Employee of the year)
• Intergen – Numero Uno 2009 (Auckland Office Employee of the year)
• Intergen – Project of the Year 2007 (WinScribe)
• Intergen – Newbie of the Year 2005

I have probably missed a few items of this list, but I think it gives you an idea of my achievements at Intergen over the past 8 years.  There are a few details and customer projects successes I can’t share due to confidentially as well.

My last day is with Intergen on 26th September 2012. After this date you will see me out and about with the team from Magnetism. I will still be evangelising the Microsoft product stack with the main focus still remaining on Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

Greg Olsen
YellowDuckGuy

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Nokia Lumia 800 – Configuring the Vodafone NZ APN

If you are having issues accessing the Marketplace or browsing sites with Internet Explorer on your Nokia Lumia 800 within NZ then you may have an issue with the settings on your handset and require an update to the APN settings or have an APN setting added. Note: This blog applies to New Zealand only.

Some error codes you may receive:

• C00cee3b
• C101a006

To setup the APN settings for your Nokia Lumia 800, then download the document from the link below and follow the instructions.

Configuring the NZ Vodafone APN on the Lumia.pdf (151.6KB)

Greg Olsen
Yellow Duck Guy

Twitter – How to set your background image or theme

Today I have updated my Twitter background to simply show my profile picture and remove the blue default background set by Twitter. This now looks like the image shown below. Next I thought I would blog how to update your Twitter account and share some tips when changing the background image or theme.

 

The first tip is the the maximum recommended allowed background size is 1600×1200 pixels. Next thing to know is that the file size of your background image should not exceed 800kb.

Next tip I would recommend is that your left hand column (where I have placed my full profile image) should not exceed 200 pixels in width. This will allow your Twitter page to support smaller monitor resolutions but allow for a tidy layout at the larger monitor resolutions.

Instructions to change your background image or theme:

1. Login to your twitter account
2. Click Settings
3. Click Design
4. Scroll to the bottom to you see “Change Background Image”
5. Click Change Background Image
6. Browse to your desired background image
7. Don’t check/select “tile background”
8. Click Save Changes

Now you should see your image on your Twitter page. I have also configured my Design Colours as well. To do this you will need to click on “Change Design Colors”.

I have set my background colour to white i.e. FFFFFF

And that’s basically it for my twitter page. All finished.

Some other settings I was looking at doing but did not apply were:

• Text color: 000000
• Link color: 121212
• Sidebar fill color: bfbfbf
• Sidebar border color: FFFFFF

Hope that helps!

Greg Olsen
Yellow Duck Guy

Yellow Duck Guy – Blog Hits and Statistics

Microsoft Windows Live tracks the number of hits, page views today and page views this week. Its great to see this blog so active worldwide, mainly as a online 24/7 reference for myself (I think of it as an online technical code library) but also serving up a number of articles and downloadable material for you every month. I try and post something every month.

 

Statistics wise, Microsoft Windows Live is reporting: Total page views: 23,685 !

 

Box.net has reported a LARGE number of downloads for the code postings from http://yellowduckguy.spaces.live.com  The most download file is http://www.box.net/shared/tmm25or137 – seems Windows 7 launch worldwide is MASSIVE!  This is great. I have been using the Release Candidate of Windows 7 since it was release and i’m really really pleased with it. The release of Windows 7 is going to be successful even during the worldwide economic downturn.

 

Till next time, keep watching this space! p.s. big thanks to you!

 

Greg Olsen
Yellow Duck Guy

Quick Media Converter – Works on Windows 7!

I have been wanting a free tool which can convert video with ease from my digital camera to different formats i.e. for the web or my mobile phone.

Couple of weeks ago I came across Quick Media Converter and really really like it. It’s simple to use and works a treat. I have also had it working fine on the latest Windows 7 Release Candidate (RC) operating system.

 

 

Some of the formats supported: Flash, WMV, MOV, DivX, XviD, DVD, VCD, mp4, 3gp, SWF etc. The full list is here: http://www.cocoonsoftware.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=72&Itemid=73

 

Do try it, it’s pretty simple to use!

 

Greg Olsen
Yellow Duck Guy 

VirusTotal – Scan that file via multiple virus checkers online

Virustotal is an online service that analyzes suspicious files and facilitates the quick detection of viruses, worms, trojans, and all kinds of malware detected by antivirus engines. It is a site I use frequently to check any files against viruses, worms, trojans and malware which I have received or any trial software versions I download from the Internet. 

To use: Simply head over to http://www.virustotal.com/ and upload your file and their service will provide an in-depth scan of the file against the latest leading virus scanners. To give you an idea of these, see the list below (list as at 11th October 2008):

AhnLab-V3
AntiVir 7.8.1.34
Authentium 5.1.0.4
Avast 4.8.1248.0
AVG 8.0.0.161
BitDefender 7.2
CAT-QuickHeal 9.50
ClamAV 0.93.1
DrWeb 4.44.0.09170
eSafe 7.0.17.0
eTrust-Vet 31.6.6141
Ewido 4.0
F-Prot 4.4.4.56
F-Secure 8.0.14332.0
Fortinet 3.113.0.0
GData 19
Ikarus T3.1.1.34.0
K7AntiVirus 7.10.490
Kaspersky 7.0.0.125
McAfee 5403
Microsoft 1.4005
NOD32 3513
Norman 5.80.02
Panda 9.0.0.4
PCTools 4.4.2.0
Prevx1 V2
Rising 20.65.42.00 
SecureWeb-Gateway 6.7.6
Sophos 4.34.0
Sunbelt 3.1.1715.1
Symantec 10
TheHacker 6.3.1.0.106
TrendMicro 8.700.0.1004
VBA32 3.12.8.6
ViRobot 2008.10.10.1416
VirusBuster 4.5.11.0

Enjoy!

Greg Olsen
Yellow Duck Guy

Vista Memory Usage Gadget

If you would like a simple memory gadget to place on your Vista OS desktop to monitor all that memory usage then you can get a hold of this cool little gadget called iStat Memory 1.0.

You can download a copy of this from here:
Vista Memory Usage Gadget Download

Enjoy!

Greg Olsen
Yellow Duck Guy

Merry Christmas

Its been another busy year in IT and for most of us we are now on a well deserved holiday.

 

Some of the IT highlights in 2007 (just to name a few)

• Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 was released (November 07).
• Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 was released (November 07).
• Microsoft CRM 4.0 was released (December 07).
• Microsoft Office 2007 was released (retail customers January 07).
• ActionThis was released. http://www.actionthis.com
• Microsoft Office 2007 SP1 was released.
• Microsoft Windows Vista Operating System was released (retail customers January 07).
• Greg Passed Exam: Microsoft CRM 3.0 Customisation !!

>>Microsoft Windows Server 2008 global release launch will be around February 27th 2008 – so look out for this!

Thanks for taking the time to read my blog posting(s) through the year, hope you have found it informative.  I will be looking at increasing the volume of postings in 2008.

 

Have a safe and happy Christmas.

 

Yellow Duck Guy
Greg Olsen.

ActionThis – Now Live!

ActionThis has just gone live this week.

What is ActionThis?

“ActionThis is a web-based team and project management tool with a difference. It focuses on ‘execution’, on getting things done. If you’ve ever had the experience that people agree to do things and don’t follow through, ActionThis can help. It remembers so you don’t have to, with a very cool web interface for anywhere access, plus Microsoft Outlook extensions so assigning and dealing with tasks is as simple as email”

How do I get it?

You can sign up for a 30 day free trial from the Web site here: http://www.actionthis.com/

There is also a ActionThis product datasheet for download for more info here: ActionThisDatasheet.pdf

So I encourage you to sign up now for the 30 day free, no obligation trial.

Yellow Duck Guy
Greg Olsen

Yellow Duck Guy Joins Plugoo

Well I thought it might be interesting to join Plugoo and give this blog the ability to send instant messages to my computer directly when i’m online or offline.

"Thanks to Plugoo, visitors on your webpage, friends or family, can easily chat with you while visiting your website! Plugoo enables you to chat directly from your Instant Messenger with any visitor of your blog, personal webpage or e-sales site. When you’re logged into your Instant Messenger (Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, AIM, GoogleTalk, Jabber or ICQ), you can receive in real time all the comments of your visitors or any question they might ask, and answer instantly! "

If you would like to use this service as well then simply go to http://www.plugoo.com/  and create your own Plugoo account, following the few very simple steps.

So you can now start messaging me directly by using the link below:

>Message me with Plugoo

Yellow Duck Guy
Greg Olsen