Rob Mensching's Blog - page 13

On New Year's Eve I left Microsoft. This year I begin a new adventure. A couple people asked, "Where are you headed?" I am off to create a new company. A company that focuses on setup, deployment and the WiX toolset. I have a few ideas that I want to share with you since I'm curious what you think.

Badass. Next New Year's Eve this is how I'm opening a bottle of champagne.

Today was my last day at Microsoft. After 13.5 years I decided it was time to strike out on my own. I'm starting a new company that builds on my setup expertise to take the WiX Toolset to the next level. I'll talk more about the future tomorrow. On this New Year's Eve, I want to look back and reflect on my tenure at the largest software company in the world.

Happy Holidays! It is my pleasure to announce that the WiX toolset v3.7 is now officially declared Production/Stable. The final build number is v3.7.1224.0. You can download it from here.

Phil Haack wrote a post about responding to feedback on your Open Source project yesterday. If you run a project you will either benefit by taking his words to heart or you already have (or you are probably very sad <smile/>). Even if you don't run a project, I encourage you to read his blog post then come back here for one follow up item.

The next major version of the WiX Toolset is now a couple weeks underway. WiX Toolset v4.0 is shaping up to be the most exciting version since WiX v2.0 was released as Open Source in 2004. In WiX v4.0 we expand beyond the confines of the Windows Installer and XML. There are a lot of changes ahead of us, the following are highlights of what's in WiX v4.0 right now.

Today we released WiX v3.7 RC. When I introduced WiX v3.7 I noted that WiX v3.7 would be a short release. If you have not pulled down a WiX v3.7 drop, I highly recommend it to let us know if there are any showstoppers. At this point in time I expect the release to wrap up before the end of the year. Wondering what is in this shortest release in the WiX toolset's history?

A couple weeks after I started Microsoft, 13+ years ago now, my dev manager at the time invited me to lunch with him. Over lunch he asked me a question that would define my career: "Did I see myself becoming a manager or a technical individual contributor at Microsoft?" I said I was interested in pursuing the individual contributor track and he explained how career advancement was more challenging via that route. I accepted the challenge that day and today I reached my goal.