The Architecture Journal devotes the latest issue (Journal 16, July 2008) to Identity and Access, a topic near and dear to my heart. You can read the issue online, download it as a zipped PDF, or view it and all issues offline in the Architecture Journal Reader. This issue has a lot to offer, so dig right in.

I want to call out two personal highlights. First is an article on federated identity patterns by fellow Connected Systems MVP Jesus Rodriguez and his colleague Joe Klug. Jesus and Joe are Chief Architect and CTO, respectively, at Tellago.

Second is an article on claims and identity for on-premise and cloud solutions by Vittorio Bertocci. Vittorio's article serves as a nice background for Zermatt, which is the project codename for a Microsoft .NET framework for writing claims-aware applications that Vittorio announced in July.

On the lighter side, the issue includes a profile of Kim Cameron, Identity Architect in Microsoft's Connected Systems Division. Kim is the author of the Laws of Identity which can be found on his blog, identityblog.com.

This issue also introduces Diego Dagum as the new editor of The Architecture Journal, who takes the baton from Simon Guest (the only person at Microsoft who can logon as 'guest').

Diego is calling for papers on Green Computing for a future Journal issue, abstracts due by 10 September 2009. If you've got something to contribute, let him know.

Just in case you missed these three notable releases so far this month...

SQL Server 2008 has Released To Manufacturing (RTM) and is available for download by MSDN and TechNet subscribers. There's also a free 180-day Full Trial and Express Edition which are available for download by everyone.

Following that up is a pair of complementary releases: .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1 and Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1.  The .NET 3.5 SP1 includes performance improvements, ADO.NET Entity Framework and Data Services, and a version of the .NET runtime optimized for clients which weighs in at under 28 MB. On the VS2008 SP1 side of the house, there are both new and improved designers, improved VSTS features, and new controls. Plus both service packs provide support for SQL Server 2008. And a bunch more.

Scott Hanselman blogged a nice guide to the combined service packs.

Microsoft announced their Oslo Initiative last October at the Microsoft SOA and Business Process Conference 2007. You can read what they said then. I am sure the audience and the timing were right. But since then not a whole lot has been said publicly about Oslo.

The wraps started coming off in June, at the TechEd 2008 Developers Conference. Bill Gates painted some broad strokes in his keynote address. He spoke briefly about rich modeling and how Oslo is about much more than a repository for that modeling data. He announced the next milestone is producing a Community Technology Preview (CTP) for Oslo in the PDC2008 timeframe this October. (I bet that pressure is on to actually deliver bits at the PDC.)

Also at TechEd 2008, David Chappell gave a talk titled "Introducing Oslo". Interestingly, the talk was listed in the conference guide as "Road to Oslo" but by the time the conference the product team decided to unveil some of the key concepts to the developer community. That talk is on the TechEd 2008 DVDs, but I couldn't find it available online.

However, David also was interviewed by Ron Jacobs about Olso, and he hits the highlights. That interview and two related ones are available on the TechEd TechTalks site. The best method for locating these videos is to browse to the Microsoft TechEd Online Developers Library and enter "oslo" into the library search. (I wish there were better URLs for these individual TechTalks. Hint, hint.) From there you can choose from a number of video formats. Here are the three sessions you should get from the search.

• "The Road to Oslo: The Microsoft Services and Modeling Platform" with David Chappell and Ron Jacobs.
• "The Future of Modeling" with Steven Martin and Ron Bagby.
• "Framework and Microsoft BizTalk Best Practices with an Eye Toward Oslo" with Jon Flanders and Ron Jacobs.

Now there is news from my fellow MVP, Brian Loesgen, that he will be the second person (after David Chappell) speaking publicly about Oslo. He is presenting "A Preview of Oslo" at the First Annual International SOA Symposium in Amsterdam on October 7–8, 2008. It looks like a great conference, with keynote addresses from Thomas Erl and the other David Chappell (VP and chief technologist for SOA at Oracle). A perfect excuse to visit Holland this fall. But if Holland isn't on your dance card, Brian is looking forward to giving many other talks on Oslo.

And look for much more news at the PDC2008, October 27–30, 2008 in Los Angeles, California. To whet your appetite, the conference website recently doubled the number of published sessions.

My Tech·Ed 2008 North America DVD set arrived in my mailbox this morning! I am like a kid in a candy shop. Because I got busy during the conference with co-chairing Birds-of-a-Feather sessions, side meetings, and some quality time in the architecture lounge with the Ask The Experts, I didn't get to all of the breakout sessions I had scheduled. And I was only at the Developers week: there were some IT Professionals sessions that sounded pretty interesting. Now I can explore 650 sessions from both Tech·Ed weeks from the comfort of my laptop. I am jazzed.

Handy tip: the Developers sessions are on discs 1 through 5, the IT Pro sessions are on discs 6 through 9. The labeling or insert could have made that clear. But don't worry, it's all there.

If you didn't attend Tech·Ed 2008 North America, you can will be able to purchase the DVD set from the Microsoft Event DVD Store. (Yeah, I just learned that such a thing existed. Nice to know.) The Tech·Ed 2008 set is listed as "coming soon." Since I just received my set in the mail, I assume that means really soon now.

There is also a good deal of content available at TechEd Online including the conference keynotes and Tech·Talks.

Next year Tech·Ed moves to Los Angeles, California, and it moves up a month: May 12-15, 2009 for Developers, and May 19-22, 2009 for IT Professionals.