My good buddy makes the Kyle following comment on my last post:

I have a suspicion that TechEd might just be a massive re-education project, sponsored by Gates, attempting to grow an army for the violent overthrow of the domestic government.

Now that you’ve spoken the truth, you must be punished. You are hereby forced to use Windows ME for the rest of your life!

Sorry, nothing that insidious is happening here. Ballmer’s keynote focused on Microsoft’s mission for IT which is to help IT “Do More With Less”. Sadly, IT is already doing more with less. Less people. Less resources. Less moral. More hours.

For me, the most interesting announcement made was about Visual Studio.NET Team edition which will attempt to improve the software development lifecycle. This product integrates unit testing, deployment configuration (via Whitehorse), collaboration and workflow management, improved source control with the IDE. Yes, they are improving sourcesafe.

As for overthrowing the government, Ballmer did mention that Oracle is now a VSIP (Visual Studio Integration Partner). Larry Ellison partnering with Microsoft on any level? Either they’ve tied Larry up and locked him away, or there’s something brewing here…