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Nevertheless, the Redmond-based company managed to keep its employees focused on their tasks at hand, so Monday, Windows Vista Service Pack 1, the apple of so many engineers’ eye, was released to manufacturing alongside Windows Server 2008.

The date for the release of SP 1 was not pinned, but it is said to come somewhere in March, while Windows Server 2008 will be available to new clients as of March the first, and Microsoft Volume Licensing customers that have an active Microsoft Software Assurance coverage, or an Enterprise Agreement, will be able to download it earlier. There will be an event to mark it, part of the joint Microsoft SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008 "Heroes Happen Here" launch.

The Windows Vista Service Pack 1 was expected for over one year, ever since the official launch of the Operating System. What was broadcasted at the time as the best Windows to come so far turned out to be a bitter disappointment to some, who saw numerous vulnerabilities shipped along with the OS. Patches and updates that came afterwards managed to smooth the transition from XP to Vista in reliability and performance, but they were never enough. The wave of complaints will finally come to en end in March… hopefully.

Tuesday was the first day of the Microsoft Office Visio conference 2008, where delegates got to take a peak at the features that are to come with the next release of Visio. Add to that a keynote addressing the company’s future vision for the product, delivered by Jeff Raikes, the President of the Microsoft Business Division, and you can see why 250 seats weren’t enough.

The middle of the week brought the best news for small businesses and their owners, as Microsoft decided to give the world a version of Microsoft Outlook 2007, complemented with Business Contact Manager on Wednesday. "Small-business owners need effective solutions for managing their customer base. […] Currently, many small and home-based businesses keep their contacts in several different places — some in Rolodexes, some in spreadsheets. We understand the importance of good customer management and are providing simple and affordable solutions to help small businesses centralize their customer information so that keeping track of customers is more effective and less time-consuming," said Takeshi Numoto, general manager of Microsoft Office 2007 at Microsoft.