Microsoft to showcase social bookmarking at TechEd

One of the new technologies that Microsoft is planning to showcase at its upcoming TechEd U.S. conference is its social-bookmarking tool.

John Martin, Lead Evangelist for Server & Tools Online -- as he describes it, "the group that manages the global MSDN, TechNet, Codeplex, and Expression websites" -- blogged on May 23 about his unit's plans:

"Next week (the week of May 26), we will release a preview version of Social Bookmarks for both MSDN and TechNet and showcase it at TechEd North America the following week."

Microsoft launched the initial beta of its social book-marking technology, codenamed "TagSpace," in 2006. At that time, company officials described TagSpace this way:

"This is the stand-alone service piece, along the lines of del.icio.us or other third-party social bookmarking sites." Ultimately, it will act as "a means for Microsoft.com to begin to aggregate a 'folksonomy' of terms that can be used to enrich and enliven Microsoft-related sites and community properties on the Web."

For the first time this year, Microsoft will follow suit with its European TechEd scheduling, turning the annual U.S. TechEd show into a two-week affair. The first week, which commences the week of June 1, is aimed at developers; the second week is tailored to IT professionals.

One thing that won't debut at TechEd is Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2. Previously, Microsoft officials had said that Beta 2 of that technology would be available "this summer." In a blog post last week (thanks, ActiveWin, for the link), Microsoft Senior Technical Account Manager Nick Machechnie said to expect IE 8 Beta 2 some time in the third calendar quarter of 2008.

Microsoft officials still have not said when the final IE 8 release will hit, but given that Firefox 3.0 is due imminently, I'd bet Microsoft is trying to push out the newest release of its browser sooner rather than later.