Back from the ICWE 2006 [1] conference, finally I found some minutes to re-think about all the talks seen there and papers read in the proceedings. Actually I found out that there are many approaches to model systems. Finally, there are a few questions I think about when I hear the term model:

1. How easy is it to create and change the model. Do I need tool support or can I do it using pen and paper? 
   
2. Is the model machine-readable? Can I process the model in any way? What is the benefit of the model?
   
3. Do I create the model and the the artefcats depicted in the model or do I create the model with respect to the artefacts i have found? What happens if these artefacts change?
   
4. In school I learned in chemistry about models. For this our teacher showed us a Matchbox car [2].

[1] http://www.icwe2006.org/
[2] http://www.matchbox.com/home.aspx

Windows Principles [1].

[1] http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/newsroom/winxp/windowsprinciples.mspx

"What's wrong with you?"

Johannes Meinecke, San Francisco, 2006

"I know what to do, and how to solve the problem, but I do not know the bloody API." - I just met the guys implementing the Krugle [1] search engine over here at ICWE 2006. And it does work quite well.

[1] http://www.krugle.com

Microsoft's community development portal [1] and the Shared Source portal [2].

[1] http://www.codeplex.com/ 
[2] http://www.microsoft.com/resources/sharedsource/default.mspx

I just received my ACM Professional Membership certificate these days with some links about ACM to remember.

Homepage: http://www.acm.org
Professional Development Centre: http://pd.acm.org
Caree Resource Centre: http://www.acm.org/crc
Digital Library: http://www.acm.org/dl
Online Guide: http://www.acm.org/guide

How to do can be found in [1].

[1] http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q102712/

Several times I got the question waht the vshost.exe is in Visual Studio Express Editions [1]. If you are familiar with Visual Studio the answer is easy: It is called hosting process . And is decribed in [2]:

"The hosting process is a feature in Visual Studio 2005 that improves debugging performance, enables partial trust debugging, and enables design time expression evaluation. The hosting process files contain vshost in the file name and are placed in the output folder of your project."

[1] http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/
[2] http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms185331.aspx

Having trouble to create a A1 poster out of a PowerPoint Slide? Is the bottom of the poster messed up? Mirko [1] got the solution: Actually it does not matter what page size you choose for the PowerPoint slide. Print first a A4 (or maybe Letter) PDF. This usually works quiet fine. Then open the A4 PDF and re-print it to A1. In many cases this shall help.

[1] http://www.ipvs.uni-stuttgart.de/abteilungen/ks/abteilung/mitarbeiter/mirko.knoll/en

End Users Shaping Effective Software [1].

[1] http://eusesconsortium.org/index.php/