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I was going to put this on twitter but it’s a bit longer to tweet.

Last week I shared some videos on Google Reader and twitter from Microsoft’s MSDN Chopsticks video website. If you don’t know it, it’s a VERY nice videos website with much content on very interesting topics and very recent products as well as different experience levels of content.

http://www.microsoft.com/belux/msdn/nl/chopsticks/

Today, some other friends on twitter noticed the Chopsticks site and were wondering why it doesn’t allow downloading the videos (you can only view them online).

Well, there is a work around to download the videos though:

1. Go to the video web page (you need to have Silverlight installed, and a .NET passport login, like Hotmail account).
   I’m using a sample here: “Using ASP.NET MVC Model Binder” http://www.microsoft.com/belux/msdn/nl/chopsticks/default.aspx?id=798
   
2. [Update: Skip this is step. Go to Step 3>1]
   If you hover on the video player, you find some icons/buttons that were not showing.
   1. Click the 2nd icon/button from the left, which has the tip “EMBDE”.
       
   2. When you click it, it shows like this:
      
   3. Extract the URL in the text following “Embed this video”
      In this example the text is:

      <iframe src="http://www.microsoft.com/belux/msdn/nl/chopsticks/player.aspx?id=798&e=1" frameborder="0" width="493px" height="385px" scrolling="no" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" ></iframe>

      so the URL is: http://www.microsoft.com/belux/msdn/nl/chopsticks/player.aspx?id=798&e=1
3. Go to the URL, when the page displays
   1. [Update: the next steps should work in the video page itself not having to get EMBED URL (skip previous STEP 2).
      If the video URL is not found yet, try STEP 2]
      show the source code of that page.
      In Firefox you do this by right clicking near the end of the page and choose “View Page Source” (if you right click up, it’ll show “Silverlight” instead)
      
   2. In the source look for a line that starts with:

      <script type='text/javascript'>Silverlight.InstallAndCreateSilverlight("1.0",document.getElementById("

      In this example the code is: (found near the end of the </form> tag)

      <script type='text/javascript'>Silverlight.InstallAndCreateSilverlight("1.0",document.getElementById("SilverlightInstallPromptHost"),createPlayerSilverlight("http://mediadl.microsoft.com/MediaDL/WWW/B/belux/msdn/chopsticks/community/maartenballiauw-mvc-model-binder.wmv", "http://www.microsoft.com/belux/msdn/nl/chopsticks/default.aspx?id=798", true, true, 1, 538953 ));</script>

      This way you can extract the video URL as the value in between createPlayerSilverlight(" and it’s closing "), you should find (based on this example) the URL: http://mediadl.microsoft.com/MediaDL/WWW/B/belux/msdn/chopsticks/community/maartenballiauw-mvc-model-binder.wmv
      This is the video URL. Go put it ion your favorite download manager, and enjoy watching the video anytime.

I hope this is useful for somebody!

1. Go to https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/10434 ( Update: This is the only official provider made by Microsoft itself)
   This is the URL I originally posted (from which the below screenshots come): https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/12205 - Of course you are recommended to go to the official URL above.
   
2. Check “Let me install this experimental add-on” and click “Add to FireFox”
   
   Now the add-in is there.
3. In the search bar, click the little triangle at the left and choose Bing.
   
4. In your browser it may not the first item nor bold as in the pic here. Click “Manage Search Engines…”.
    
5. Click “Move Up” to have it the first item
   
6. If you have Google Toolbar, you need to check more settings:
1. Go to Google Settings. In the “Layout” tab, make sure to choose “Classic Toolbar Layout”. Save that.
   
2. In Firefox address bar, type:
   about:config
   without “http://” or anything, and click the button that appears then.
   
3. In the “Filter” field type: “browser.search.defaultenginename”
   
4. Double click the only result that will show, you get a message box where you should  enter text. Replace the existing text “Google” with “Bing” instead, and click OK.
   
5. Close the window. Your default provider is set.

Have fun :-)

If you are not on Twitter, let me spread this by @bing:

Ladies and Gentlemen, www.bing.com is live. :) (rollouts will continue however to partners and other mkts, more to come) ^betsy

Bing, if you don’t know, is Microsoft’s new search engine, also known as “Decision Engine” since it has features that help answer what you are wondering about rather than just display links.

For those wondering about Live Search. I think I read somewhere that both search engines will remain there for a while, then Live will be brought out to Bing. Nothing to confirm yet though. In Bing homepage you read “Live Search is Evolving. Welcome to Bing”.

For quick video of what Bing can give to you, check this.

For an official introduction about what Bing is, check this.