REDMOND, Wash. — Oct . 14 , 201 3 — Johnson Controls, a global diversified technology and industrial leader in more than 150 countries, has secured Microsoft Office 365 for its employees, partners and suppliers around the world, enhancing knowledge sharing on a global scale and fostering innovation through greater employee interaction.

“Collaboration has been the hallmark of Johnson Controls’ success as a company,” said Colin Boyd, vice president, information technology and chief information officer, Johnson Controls. “We chose Office 365 because it will help us more effectively capitalize on our collaborative culture.”

The company evaluated multiple options and ultimately concluded that Microsoft’s cloud solutions offered the most reliable, cost-effective and scalable tools required by a global corporation. In addition, the platform’s capability to provide real-time translation in many languages effectively supports Johnson Controls’ focus on bolstering interactions among employees.

Boyd added: “At Johnson Controls, we will use Office 365 to enable the spontaneous, lateral communications that drive innovation and increase productivity, which are essential requirements in today’s global manufacturing environments.”

With Office 365, employees can engage in dynamic, evolving conversations that spark ideas and new ways of solving problems no matter where they are located. From the instant messaging, desktop sharing and Web conferencing capabilities in Lync to surfacing project-related email messages through Outlook, Office 365 gives the company the efficient and global communication tools it needs to be agile and responsive.

For example, the account teams within Johnson Controls’ automotive business consist of dedicated groups of people located in different countries working together to provide coordinated and consistent service to hundreds of customer locations. With Office 365, a shop supervisor with a car seat assembly question can use a smartphone to take a video of the assembly and upload it to a SharePoint site for the engineering team to immediately review and resolve.

“Avoiding any production issues that might impact our customers is a key issue for Johnson Controls,” Boyd said. “We’re using Office 365 to mitigate this risk, connecting our 300 production plants with engineering centers through real-time communications to drive quality and responsiveness for our customers.”

More information about how organizations are turning to Microsoft technology is available in the Microsoft Customer Spotlight newsroom.

About Johnson Controls

Johnson Controls is a global diversified technology and industrial leader serving customers in more than 150 countries. Our 168,000 employees create quality products, services and solutions to optimize energy and operational efficiencies of buildings; lead-acid automotive batteries and advanced batteries for hybrid and electric vehicles; and interior systems for automobiles. Our commitment to sustainability dates back to our roots in 1885, with the invention of the first electric room thermostat. Through our growth strategies and by increasing market share we are committed to delivering value to shareholders and making our customers successful. In 2013, Corporate Responsibility Magazine recognized Johnson Controls as the #14 company in its annual “100 Best Corporate Citizens” list. For additional information, please visit http://www.johnsoncontrols.com.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

Note to editors: For more information, news and perspectives from Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft News Center at http://www.microsoft.com/news. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but may have changed. For additional assistance, journalists and analysts may contact Microsoft’s Rapid Response Team or other appropriate contacts listed at http://www.microsoft.com/news/contactpr.mspx.

NAIROBI , Kenya — Oct. 1 4 , 2013 — Microsoft Corp. on Monday announced the expansion of the Microsoft Ventures partnership program into Africa. Microsoft Ventures was introduced in June as a coordinated global effort to offer tools, resources, expertise and routes to market for startups through partnerships with accelerators around the world.

The company has selected 88mph as its first African accelerator partner. 88mph was chosen for its proven model of helping launch and secure funding for innovative African startups. Together, Microsoft and 88mph will work to provide startups with mentorship, technology guidance, seed funding, joint selling opportunities and more.

Microsoft Ventures takes a holistic approach to helping startups get off the ground through a community evangelism program including Microsoft BizSpark, an accelerator program and a seed fund that works with startups worldwide. The expansion into Africa was conducted as part of the recently launched Microsoft 4Afrika Initiative and will therefore prioritize startups in key sectors including agriculture, education and healthcare.

“Through the 4Afrika Initiative, we are deeply committed to fostering African innovation and to fueling Africa’s economic growth and competitiveness, and we are very proud to see Microsoft Ventures extend its reach into the African continent,” said Amrote Abdella, director, 4Afrika Venture Capital and Startup Programs. “We strongly believe that with the right support, African startups hold tremendous potential to impact both their local economies and the world’s perception of African-led innovation and entrepreneurship.”

Startups will be selected based on the globally established criteria of Microsoft Ventures: Applying companies must have a full-time founding team, a bold vision for tackling a real problem, technologically driven solutions and less than $1 million raised. In Africa, Microsoft is also looking for solutions that can scale across and even outside the African continent.

“Microsoft is a company that deeply understands the value of the ecosystem, and we believe that by working together, 88mph and Microsoft can offer a world-class launch pad to African startups looking to achieve true scale,” said Nikolai Barnwell, Nairobi director, 88mph. “We share a deep commitment to the African startup community and look forward to showcasing more and more African innovators on the world stage.”

The graduating startups from 88mph’s most recent accelerator class will participate in a DemoDay on Dec. 5 in Nairobi where, with Microsoft’s help, the startups will present their businesses and opportunities to invited investors.

Through the BizSpark program, the company has already helped support 625 African startups to date by providing access to Microsoft tools and technologies, and this program will continue. And for the second consecutive year, the company is also a sponsor of DEMO Africa, a startup competition taking place Oct. 24–25 in Nairobi.

More information about Microsoft Ventures is at http://www.microsoftventures.com. More information about the 4Afrika Initiative is at http://www.microsoft.com/4afrika.

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

Note to editors: For more information, news and perspectives from Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft News Center at http://www.microsoft.com/news. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but may have changed. For additional assistance, journalists and analysts may contact Microsoft’s Rapid Response Team or other appropriate contacts listed at http://www.microsoft.com/news/contactpr.mspx.

A new E-Maj version, named 1.1.0, is now available from pgxn.org or github.

E-Maj is an Open Source extension for PostgreSQL. It contains functions to log updates performed on one or several sets of tables, and cancel ("rollback") these updates if needed, resetting a tables set to a predefined stable state. A dedicated plugin for phpPgAdmin also brings a nice GUI to these features.

The main improvement of this 1.1.0 version resides in the E-Maj rollback mechanism. It has been largely improved in order to get better performance and to allow administrator to monitor in progress operations. Functions that generate sql scripts from logged updates have been also enhanced.

The documentation and the CHANGES file supplied with the extension give all the details about the E-Maj features and usage and the latest improvements.

E-Maj 1.1.0 supports postgres version 8.3 to 9.3.

All E-Maj users working with previous versions are invited to upgrade (supplied migration scripts may help in performing this operation).

Have fun with E-Maj !

The PostgreSQL Global Development Group has released a bug-fix update to all current versions of the PostgreSQL database system, including versions 9.3.1, 9.2.5, 9.1.10, 9.0.14, and 8.4.18. This release fixes many minor issues reported by our community over the last six months. All users should update their PostgreSQL installations at the next regular maintenance window.

In this release are fixes for the recently-released version 9.3, including:

• Update hstore extension with JSON functionality
• Prevent memory leak when creating range indexes
• Fix libpq SSL deadlock bug

In addition to the above, there are a few dozen minor bug fixes for older versions. These patches were already included in 9.3.0 when released. Among them are:

• Guarantee transmission of all WAL files before replica failover
• Prevent downcasing of non-ASCII identifiers
• Fix several minor memory leaks
• Correct overcommit behavior when using more than 24GB of work memory
• Improve planner cost estimates for choosing generic plans
• Fix estimates of NULL rows in boolean columns
• Make UNION ALL and inheritance query plans recheck parameterized paths
• Correct pg_dump bugs for foreign tables, views, and extensions
• Prevent a parallel pg_restore failure on certain indexes
• Make REINDEX revalidate constraints
• Prevent two deadlock issues in SP-GIST and REINDEX CONCURRENTLY
• Prevent GiST index lookup crash
• Fix several regular expression failures
• Allow ALTER DEFAULT PRIVILEGES to work on all schemas
• Loosen restrictions on keywords
• Allow various spellings of infinity
• Expand ability to compare rows to records and arrays
• Prevent psql client crash on bad PSQLRC file
• Add spinlock support for ARM64

Note that users of the hstore extension on version 9.3 must take an additional, post upgrade step of running "ALTER EXTENSION hstore UPDATE" in each database after update.

As with other minor releases, users are not required to dump and reload their database or use pg_upgrade in order to apply this update release; you may simply shut down PostgreSQL and update its binaries. Users who have skipped multiple update releases may need to perform additional, post-update steps; see the Release Notes for details.

Links: * Download * Release Notes

REDMOND, Wash. — Oct. 9, 2013 — Microsoft Corp. on Tuesday announced it is hosting a series of midnight launch events at 10 Microsoft retail stores across the nation to celebrate the launch of Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2. Starting at 10 p.m. local time on Oct. 21, each participating store will host the Surface Challenge, offering contestants in each market a chance to go head-to-head in a series of fun, interactive and sometimes physical games for a chance to be whisked away to Orlando, Fla., the next morning for the Mall at Millenia store opening, where Pitbull will perform.

Attendees are encouraged to join the event in advance at the Microsoft Store Facebook page. At the event, they will have the chance to win dozens of other prizes as well as be among the first to check out both Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2 along with the latest accessories before they’re available to the public on Oct. 22. In addition to the 10 midnight launch events, the remainder of the more than 70 Microsoft retail stores will be holding events and giveaways to celebrate the new Surface later this month. Details will be posted at http://www.microsoftstore.com as they become available, or people can visit their local Microsoft retail store to find out more.

“We’ve worked hard to ensure that Microsoft retail stores will be the best place to experience and purchase the most productive tablet on the planet — Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2,” said David McAughan, chief operating officer of Microsoft Retail Stores. “Our stores are all about having fun with our customers and connecting with local communities. These Surface launch events are a great example of the type of experiences you can enjoy at our stores as we kick off the holiday season.”

Events will take place in the following locations:

• Bellevue Square Mall

• Westfield San Francisco Centre

• Scottsdale Fashion Square

• Dadeland Mall (Miami)

• Lennox Square Mall (Atlanta)

• The Shops at Prudential Center (Boston)

• The Westchester (White Plains, N.Y.)

• The Domain (Austin, Texas)

• The Fashion Centre at Pentagon City (Arlington, Va.)

• Oakbrook Center Mall (Oak Brook, Ill.)

Surface 2 includes significant new features — it’s thinner, faster and so much more than a tablet. A powerful laptop in a tablet package, Surface Pro 2 is a notable improvement, providing faster performance and significantly longer battery life. Both devices also feature a new lineup of Surface accessories.

Microsoft continues to expand its existing retail footprint in the U.S., offering an assortment of best-in-class products, including Windows PCs, Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2, Windows Phones, Kinect for Xbox 360, Office, and more. Microsoft aims to provide a premium retail experience that is entertaining, educational and as easy as possible with these new locations. More information can be found at http://www.microsoftstore.com.

Note to editors: For more information, news and perspective from Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft News Center at http://www.microsoft.com/news. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but may have changed. For additional assistance, journalists and analysts may contact Microsoft’s Rapid Response Team or other appropriate contacts listed at http://www.microsoft.com/news/contactpr.mspx.