.. ance<T>() where T : Foo, new() { : Visual Studio

Back from Microsoft PDC 2009

Matt Ortiz — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 20:10:23 GMT

So we’re back from Microsoft Professional Developer Conference (PDC09) which was held at the Los Angeles Convention Center this past week.

The focus of PDC is future and emerging Microsoft technologies, product roadmaps, and industry trends – making it the premier, developer-focused Microsoft event. It is not held every year. The workshops, keynotes, and sessions were excellent with few exceptions and, as expected, there were a number of important announcements.

Unlike last year we didn’t come back with multiple gigabytes of pre-release bits; none in fact. Truth be told, though, with the rapid and open pre-release cycles on the many key products and technologies soon to release, any bits would be stale quickly. So get out to MSDN Developer Centers, CodePlex, and the like and pull down the latest as needed.

Take a look at the swag attendees did walk away with though (below)…

Key Themes and Announcements

By no means is this comprehensive but a punch list of key themes and announcements we, as as professional developers and Microsoft technology consultants should keep an eye and provide feedback to the product teams on and share with our colleagues, customers, and the community.

“Three Screens and a Cloud”

Ray Ozzie, Microsoft Chief Architect, described Microsoft’s long-term cloud computing strategy as “three screens and a cloud”:

“A journey that started 4 years ago with our Software as a Service platform vision, now materializing. I believe that the world some number of years from now in terms of how we consume IT is really shifting from a machine-centric viewpoint to what we refer to as three screens and a cloud: the phone, the PC, and the TV ultimately, and how we deliver value to them.”

As a very satisfied iPhone user (a WinMo/HTC convert) and someone who has been less than blown away by the Xbox 360/Media Center story, there is work to be done here. As an architect and developer I’m impressed by the leaps made by Microsoft; providing the tools, platforms and technologies to deliver sophisticated, connected solutions. And as a consumer, I’m very excited and look forward to seeing the strategy play out to when “it all just works - seamlessly.”

Providing web-centric experiences, served by private clouds in data centers or by the world wide, public cloud and extended through applications on your desktop, smart phones, and televisions certainly summarizes the current software + services strategy. And Ozzie also let in that, along with the back-end – servers, tools, and cloud computing, and the experience at the top of the Microsoft stack – Windows, IE and Silverlight, Office, and SharePoint, that in Spring, at MIX 2010, Microsoft will make announcements about progress on the Windows Live Platform and about developing applications for the “next generation of the Windows phone.”

So given Microsoft’s commitment, and the tools now at hand, it is as much up to us as technologists to plan for and build solutions that leverage and deliver on the “n screens and a cloud” and “software + services” stories.

Cloud Computing: “Software + Services” 2.0

It was announced that Windows Azure will release in January, with billing starting in February 2010. The November release of the Windows Azure SDK, available now, includes updates to Windows Azure Tools for Microsoft Visual Studio, which extends VS 2008 (and included in VS2010 Beta 2) allowing us to easily model, develop and test, build, deploy, and run Web apps and services for Windows Azure.

The AppFabric: a Unified Development, Configuration Management, and Deployment Model

Today, application architecture, design, and tooling considerations are vastly different for on-premises versus cloud-based applications. Now using Visual Studio 2010 and leveraging the AppFabric, applications can be designed and built once, promoted across environments to either Windows Azure or on-premises infrastructure, and delivered securely to our customers; whatever deployment model, service level or scale they require.

In addition, Windows Azure capabilities such as VMs, along with AppFabric, provide us with flexible options for migrating existing on-premises .NET applications to public and private Windows Azure environments.

Windows Azure Platform AppFabric i

The Windows Azure platform AppFabric provides secure connectivity as a service to help developers bridge cloud, on-premises, and hosted deployments. You can use AppFabric Service Bus and AppFabric Access Control to build distributed and federated applications as well as services that work across network and organizational boundaries.

From simple eventing scenarios to complex protocol tunneling, AppFabric Service Bus gives developers the flexibility to choose how their applications communicate, and to address the challenges of configuration and management of firewalls, NATs and dynamic IP, and disparate identity systems.

AppFabric Access Control enables simple, secure authorization for RESTful web services that federate with a variety of identity providers.

Windows Server AppFabric ii

Windows Server AppFabric is a set of integrated technologies that make it easier to build, scale and manage Web and composite applications that run on IIS. Windows Server AppFabric has these core capabilities:

For Web applications, AppFabric provides caching capabilities to provide high-speed access, scale, and high availability to application data. This feature was previously codenamed "Velocity"
For composite applications, AppFabric makes it easier to build and manage services built using Windows Workflow Foundation and Windows Communication Foundation. This feature was previously codenamed "Dublin."

Project “Sydney”

Project Sydney was announced at PDC. Sydney provides a means to connect existing on-premise or services behind the firewall with those running in the cloud on Windows Azure. Underlying the technologies are IPSec, IPV6, and Microsoft’s federated-identity capabilities (formerly codename “Geneva”).

Sydney can be used for a variety of business cases, such as allowing fail over of on-premises servers to the cloud (or vise versa), to running applications targeting on-premises and cloud deployments, and to synchronize on-premise and Azure-hosted databases, as examples.

Sydney is slated to go to beta early next year and to release in 2010.

Codename “Dallas”

Ray Ozzie announced the public alpha release of Microsoft’s Data Services in the Cloud. Microsoft codename Dallas allows developers and information workers to discover, purchase and manage data subscriptions in the Windows Azure platform. The “data-as-a-service” offering is an information marketplace that will deliver data, imagery, and web services from commercial data providers as well as public data sources from a single location, under a unified provisioning and billing framework.

A Silverlight application was shown using the NASA Mars Exploration Rover Mission Images dataset during the Day 1 keynote where attendees put on a set of silly 3D glasses handed out at registration.

Dallas is available now and surfaced at Microsoft PinPoint here.

Visual Studio 2010 and .NET 4

Visual Studio 2010 Beta 2 was released on October 19^th, so attendees had nearly four weeks to preview prior to the borage of information provided during keynotes and in deep dive sessions at PDC.

Microsoft announced at PDC that Go Live licenses are available for Visual Studio 2010 and .NET 4. So if you’ve not gotten your hands on Visual Studio 2010, it’s time to dig in and socialize the value proposition of transitioning early with customers.

Visual Studio 2010 is a significant release and has been re-designed using WPF 4.0? Cameron Skinner described the dog-fooding process as painful at times but that (paraphrasing here): “there’s nothing like a dev. finding their own (or a colleagues) bug holding them up.” Noting (half jokingly) how quickly things get resolved.

A quote from the Day 1 keynote by Ray Ozzie sums up, for me, how the Windows, Office, and Visual Studio platform and tools continue to be at the heart of what is to come: "We at Microsoft have one simple strategy - that is to focus on leverage and seamlessness in everything we do.”

Of particular interest to me is the new architect tooling: UML Modeling projects (and strategy), MEF extensibility, and T4 goodness. T4 has been there since VS2K5 but seeing it in action in various open source frameworks, being baked in as an extensibility point (along with MEF) in Visual Studio for Entity Framework 4, and shown in various sessions really re-piqued my interest.

I spoke with Cameron Skinner and team, along with some other attendees, after his session “Code Visualization, UML, and DSLs” and as a practicing enterprise and solution architect (and agile practitioner) the direction being taken by the group is compelling; not only from a modeling perspective, but from a tooling and process automation perspective as significant improvements in TFS have been made.

Some of those Team Foundation Server innovations include:

Multi-project Collaboration (i.e. Team Project Collections)
Process automation improvements, including deep agile support and improved workflows
Truly innovative parallel development capabilities with branching and visualizations
Continuous integration ++
Project visibility and health
Deployment, provisioning, and management options

Be sure to take a look at these Visual Studio sessions.

Entity Framework 4

From what I saw in the whirlwind session “Evolving ADO.NET Entity Framework in .NET 4 and Beyond” by Shyam Pather and Chris Anderson there have been significant improvements . The room was packed so the interest was high. As an observation, session goers (including myself) were guarded going in and generally high-energy walking out. Though you see a combination of NHibernate, Castle Active Record, Unity, and Fluent NHibernate, you also see a lot of innovative new capabilities.

Some of those things we’ve been waiting for, and delivered, include model first (as well as round-trip) development, support for POCO and lazy loading, and improved separation of concerns allowing for, among other things, a better testing story.

I did fiddle a bit late night this week, and there seemed to be issues with inheritance, but will dig in deeper and share my experiences with those interested and in posts. As a steadfast NHibernate advocate, I look forward to the discussion here.

.NET 4 and C# Language Enhancements

.NET and C# 4 now includes the dynamic types, named and optional arguments, enhanced Office programmability, and variance. Some additional areas of interest include:

F# for functional programming
Application Compatibility and Deployment
Parallel Computing
Improved Security Model
Core New Features and Improvements
Networking
Web
Client
Data
Communications and Workflow

There were sessions that hit on each of the areas listed so search the PDC and other sites for content; this is our bread and butter.

Office and SharePoint Development Enhancements

Office 2010 is now available in public beta and there are considerable, exciting improvements in Visual Studio 2010 allowing developers to more easily deliver rich business applications using Office. In addition, with Office Web Access (currently Office Live) developers will have real options to deliver connected solutions targeting both on-premises and in the cloud.

Here are links to SharePoint and Office PDC sessions.

VS Product Line-up Changes

Team System branding – no more: it was confusing. Now there is simply Visual Studio and Visual Studio Team Foundation Server and the Visual Studio product line-up has been streamlined. Now there are just three flavors: Professional, Premium, and Ultimate which provide progressively more capabilities. The new line-up doesn’t erase the price tag reality on the higher end but it is easier to understand. And hell the alternative is point solution fun-and-games; on the high-end at ridiculous price tags.

One significant item of note here is that TFS is now included (no limitations, e.g. Workgroup Edition). If you own VS2010 and MSDN then you own a TFS client and can deploy TFS for team use of any size.

So there’s too much on Visual Studio to punch list but I’ll follow-up with multiple posts with a value focused perspective.

Silverlight 4

So I attended a number of Silverlight or UX-related sessions this year. Silverlight 3 was released only 4 months ago but general availability of Silverlight 4 public Beta was announced at PDC. Silverlight 4 provides improved connectivity to peripherals and improves the out-of-browser application options. Together with RIA Services and Prism, Silverlight 4 is a leap ahead for web deployed, core business applications.

Silverlight 4 is planned to release in the first half of 2010.

It was announced at PDC and RIA Services renamed WCF RIA Services. RIA Services simplifies building layered applications targeting Silverlight (and MVC), exposing WCF services and reducing the amount of work for service configuration, contract specification, data validation, and deployment; essentially UI domain services.

Here’s a link to Silverlight sessions and take a look at the Day 2 keynote by Scott Guthrie and team.

SQL Server 2008 R2

Another one of those hot off the presses technologies is SQL Server 2008 R2. Despite the naming it is a major release.

It was also announced that the tooling previously known as codename “Gemini” is now PowerPivot. This is something we need to take a look at along with the BI toolset that Microsoft has delivered along with the partner ecosystem. If you get a chance take a look the PDC workshop “Developing Microsoft BI Applications – the How and Why.” Andrew Brust did a great job of describing the BI landscape and provided pointed guidance on how to approach and transition your customers.

Here’s a link to SQL Server and BI sessions at PDC.

Window Technologies

In case you haven’t noticed, Windows 7 was recently released. In addition to Windows 7 there were announcements about the Release of Windows Identity Foundation, Windows Azure, and the AppFabric.

Take a look at the Windows technologies related sessions here.

Microsoft PinPoint

Microsoft PinPoint was announced. It is a one stop shop providing access to software solutions based on Microsoft technologies. PinPoint is a directory to discover applications, companies, and trusted technology partners through contextual searches; a sort of Apple App Store and Salesforce.com AppExchange rolled together.

“It’s All Data” – Oslo, SQL Server Modeling

So last but not least is something I focused on at last PDC – Oslo, and more generally modeling. It was announced at PDC that Oslo has been renamed SQL Server Modeling and the team (along with XML) have been brought together under Data.

The MSDN Data Developer Center has been redesigned to not only include current and emerging data technologies but also roadmap and way early (or “future”) technologies like Oslo, which includes “M” – the language, Quadrant – the tooling, and SQL Server Modeling Services.

Keep an eye on these technologies and view related PDC sessions here and here.

The Swag, PDC Edition

During the day 2 keynote, Windows and Windows Live Division President Steven Sinofsky announced that attendees would receive an exclusive “PDC Edition” Acer Aspire 1420P Tablet PC designed by the Windows team, for PDC. It was funny watching folks streaming out of the keynote about a half hour early to get theirs, only to be turned away till later in the day.

The tablet’s not yet available to consumers, which make it even cooler, and the stacked configuration (for the nearly netbook form-factor) will allow developers to leverage many of the Windows 7 (64-bit, Ultimate) capabilities, including multi-touch. Take a look at some photos of it here at the Windows Team Blog and the specs here.

Session Videos and Downloads

Session videos, and in many cases the decks, are available publicly at microsoftpdc.com. We encourage you to get out there, download the video and content, and dig into these new technologies. I’d start with the keynotes so you can get a feel for Microsoft technology strategic direction and areas of focus, and then deep dive into the session.

Happy viewing!

i Content was used from the Windows Azure Platform site here.
ii Content was used from the Windows Server Development Center here.

Visual Studio 2008 Edition Comparisons Posted

Matt Ortiz — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 06:15:00 GMT

Update [1/30/2008]: here is another hot of the press product comparison.

So I've had a number of folks ask about Visual Studio 2008 editions recently but quick searches for updated product comparisons, till now, have been fruitless. Yesterday, though, a colleague of mine at Statêra asked and I finally reached out to Heuer to get the scoop.

He came through with just what I needed and followed up today with a heads-up on the pages oficial. Thanks man! Here's what we got:

Visual Studio Team Edition comparison matrix
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vsts2008/products/bb991841.aspx

Pro vs. Standard comparison matrix
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vs2008/products/bb980920.aspx

These will be helpful when determining what your organization needs: or when playing Trivial Pursuit Nerd (I mean Web v.Next) Edition.

Technorati Tags: Visual Studio,Team Edition,.NET,Visual Studio 2008

PowerShell Inspired VS 2K8 Fonts and Colors

Matt Ortiz — Sun, 23 Dec 2007 23:24:12 GMT

So I always import my standard fonts and colors options for Visual Studio each time I build out a new environment. I find the defaults a bit straining for all day work. Today, though, I was installing some developer tools and noticed while wiring PowerShell to VSCmdShell that it used the default VS Command Window colors: stark - black on white. Of course that wasn't going to do - so I went ahead and made it the same as the PowerShell colors and fonts. Better...

Then, as I hadn't yet set my Text Editor settings I thought: I like the PowerShell "style", why don't I take a shot at that for my VS Text Editor as well. Of course, some of the Display Items' defaults wouldn't work as they were either to shocking in contrast or almost not visible but not too many changes were necessary.

I came up with this

Here's a a downloadable link to the VS Settings file with only the Options --> Environment --> Fonts and Settings exported. I'm calling it "PowerShell Distilled": feel free to use them if you'd like. I haven't yet checked out how all of the text editors look. In addition to C# did take a poke at XML files and, like I say, I took a poke at it. If you do use it and you make any changes - let me know. I might like to incorporate the changes back into my settings.

As a note: I also like to change my Command, Immediate, Find Results and Output Windows settings but I've not yet done that - so you won't get those settings. I'll post an update pointing at a separate consolidated VS settings file once I do for those interested.

Happy Holidays!

Technorati Tags: Tips and Tricks,Tools,Visual Studio,PowerShell,Windows Vista

MSDN Power Series - Software Plus Services (S+S) Distilled

Matt Ortiz — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 23:35:00 GMT

Next week (Thursday, December 20th) we'll be presenting the ArcReady: Software Plus Services (S+S) Distilled session at the MSDN Power Series Event in Phoenix.

Bennie and I will cover, in some detail, a multi-tenant software + services reference architecture. The two other sessions that are being presented around ours by Joe Shirey (MS DPE) are:

ArcReady: Windows Live Platform Overview
ArcReady: Office as a Platform.

I understand that the event location will hold around 200+ so join us and others for a "day of free, live learning."

Technorati Tags: .NET Framework,Foo Theory,Patterns & Practices,Statera,Tips and Tricks,Visual Studio,Windows Communication Foundation,WCF,Windows Workflow Foundation,WF

My ALT.NET Tools Aren't Really Alternatives Anymore

Matt Ortiz — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 08:24:00 GMT

It's nagged on me a bit how my last post mentioned only MS products and not those that I deal with after my base install: you know, those developer tools you just can't get along without (R#). It certainly isn't all that important to that post but it got me thinking of putting together and sharing my list of "other" developer tools.

Though it'd been a while, this time, I often rebuild my laptop as a result of new product releases (or pre-releases), conflicting client requirements, or just because I'm not patient enough to troubleshoot PC issues. So I was catching up tonight on some reading and came across altnetpedia's tools list. A solid chunk of the list are tools I use regularly and a number more are ones I use every day. One was missing - Beyond Compare: I've registered and will add it if someone else doesn't beat me to it. Here's my list.

So, as observation, the spirit behind the ALT.NET movement is healthy and a good one. A couple of the movement's doyen are among the bloggers I read regularly, in fact. I find myself cringing at times, though, when reading some of those same altdotneter's "rants". Pause - thinking... And it doesn't feel natural to me that an alternative movement needs to be declared. It feels sort of, umm, .NOTALT.

I find, in an industry that requires its high-end to change quicker than the market, that such broad declarations of the obvious, as described in this What is ALT.NET page, are, well, redundant. I mean - encouraging developers to keep their eyes open to (and fingers in) alternatives is smart. Critical thinking and pushing, not being pulled, (and getting involved) is something to encourage. However, we all, at work at least, need to get to value at some point (soon) and this should be a principle considered as well.

Anyway, the Tools list is a good one: though many are, by no means, alternatives anymore or new, for that matter.

So I've got to go to bed now and hug my tree, spoon my Mac, and dream up my next rage against the Mothership. Then maybe I too can be considered alternative or, perhaps, mainstream...

Technorati Tags: ALT.NET,Stream of Consciousness,Tech Watch,Tools

Visual Studio 2008 RTM Bit Me!

Matt Ortiz — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 20:59:00 GMT

So I went home Tuesday night with the downloaded RTM bits in hand prepped for a late night install. The download experience was excellent: it took all of about 10-15 minutes to pull it all down while in the office - couldn't wait. And I had it prior to the onslaught of VS bits on the wire that must have happened that night. Isn't everyone waiting with bated breath for this release?

Visual Studio Orcas (2008) Betas and CTPs have been of awesome quality and I've had excellent experiences with the uninstall/installs all along side-by-siding - until now.

Hell, it had been a while since I'd wiped the machine anyway - right. And what better time than for a VS release: one of my, if not the, primary tools.

Yeah - that's what it took. I should say: I'm not willing to jump through too many hoops to troubleshoot an install. Especially, on a machine that's undertaken such Beta torture since being re-upped on. As the pre-releases were so surprisingly smooth, and stable once up, I had no expectation this time that it would come to this. Truth be told - it was a hateful experience.

The Rundown

So first, while uninstalling Beta 2 the setup hung for about an hour. It was late, the mother-in-law was in town, but I did some reading and found some nuggets, again, on Rick Strahl's blog. He'd recommended to uninstall some components manually first. I killed it as it was futile and after a reboot I took the suggestion. This seemingly freed up the problem for the uninstall but it still took a really long time and, though few, confirmations were still needed. You know, can't just cut it off mid-stream...

Took two days away from the machine as Thanksgiving came and family beacons. Happy late turkey day - BTW!

When I got back at it I attempted an install of the RTM bits. What the *#@&! It's hung after a couple of hours - no errors, couldn't find anything on the web. The curse of early adoption - right. So I killed it and retried after doing some research (multiple times) - it never panned out. I figured I'd sleep on it and see what I could do Saturday morning before other duties turned up. Saturday's attempt faired the same - no real progress.

The backups start...

I like having a newly installed machine but not since Vista RTM'd have I re-upped so I was not looking forward to this. Multiple backups - just in case (OneCare and manual file drops). As backups are the most boring thing ever it took till Sunday morning for me to really get it done.

Sunday, after going to the airport, the Vista Ultimate install commenced. Vista installs really nice - YES, finally! IIS is configured and SQL Server's installed (multi-step SPs ya-da-ya-da). Office 2007 - well it took a bit but just grunt work - got it all up. As a heads-up: if you have an MSDN subscription, don't opt for the Pro install and then individuals like OneNote, Grove, Project Pro, Visio, etc. just pull Enterprise, your list of stragglers will be smaller.

Visual Studio 2005 - this was quite painless but, again, it took a while: remember SP1 and SP1 update for Vista...

Visual Studio 2008 - I was in the Statêra office Monday so I kicked it off there in the morning. I walked away as I had a conference call with a Microsoft Services colleague and came back. SKREECHING OF TIRES AND THEN A HUGE BLUNT CRASH sound rang in my ears. On the screen was a prompt for, and let me remind you this is an MSDN DVD ISO, disk #3 (attempting to install the .NET 3.5 framework). My shoulders scrunched and I moped away to get a Perrier with lemon flavored stuff.

So I came back found the file it was looking for in the ISO (mounted using Daemon Tools) and pointed it at that directory. It wouldn't take it... I'm turning red.

Redemption

I did a search for VS 2008 install issues and found this cryptic MSDN newsgroup post titled Visual Studio 2008 Fails to compile on Vista Ultimate. The title and subjects were vaguely (stretching) relevant and the post was a bit over my head as many of these types of troubleshooting posts are.

Remember I mentioned I don't like to troubleshoot installs: I was in a pickle though, and hell, how else could I post on my experiences with the tool (or the install for that matter) - so I tried it. The one from BFaassen about installing the files in the \WCU\dotNetFramework\dotNetMSP\x86 folder:

NetFX2.0-KB110806-v6000-x86.msu
NetFX3.0-KB929300-v6000-x86.msu

As a heads-up, I attempted the install of the others there, the RTM ones: they both ran successfully but reported that the KBs were not installed. And, oh yeah, they all require a reboot if successfully installed. WING'N IT - HUH...

I re-attempted the install after reboots and after a nail biter of a while (not too long) - the VS 2008 RTM install was successful!

WHEW! Now to test the issue Bennie's been having: he reported that the XAML editor was not working. I tested it by simply creating some buttons and sure enough it worked for me. I'll take it! NAH-NAH-NAH-NAH-NAH...

So there are a number of posts in the MSDN managed newsgroups and elsewhere showing issues with the install. I don't have a feel, at all, for volume of problems and it could certainly be light for all I know. I can report, though, that Bennie's up in arms over his experience too. I opted out of beers with him last night as I could feel the flames over IM.

Kidding of course - I wouldn't turn down a Stella: that's crazy talk.

Technorati Tags: .NET Framework,Beta Review,Tech Watch,Tips and Tricks,Visual Studio,Windows Vista

Visual Studio 2008 and Netfx 3.5 Released!

Matt Ortiz — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 21:54:00 GMT

So Rob Bagby sent over an email that stopped me in my tracks titled "VS2008 RTM today". Well, I intended to spend time with my mother-in-law while she's out this week but sorry Grammy (as the kids call her) - I'm going to be locked in the office. Oh heck, I can put it off for a few days.

Nah, who am I kidding: I'll be up all night as long as the download works out...

Let me formally request that every Microsoft developer stay off the internet while I download it today. Yeah right - huh!?

Technorati tags: .NET Framework, NetFX 3.5, RTM, Visual Studio

Microsoft SOA Announcements

Matt Ortiz — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 05:20:00 GMT

So, though I had to miss it, reports from Redmond are hitting the wire about the SOA and Business Process Conference.

First, SOA technology roadmaps and press releases for project code-named "Oslo" were announced. The Oslo technology/product roadmap, posted by Christian Weyer, outlines Microsoft's strategy for its next generation of messaging and workflow technologies through (and initially releasing in) 2009.

The story within the story is maturing support, from within the Microsoft server and tools stack, for end-to-end SOA application life-cycle and run-time governance. Further, the "model-driven and service-enabled principles" referred to in the press release re-ups on the Microsoft SOA technology framework, server and tools commitment and marks maturing messages on composite applications and the "software-plus-services" play.

Other conference news comes out of Microsoft Services and the patterns & practices groups. The Managed Services Engine (MSE) and the Web Service Software Factory v.Next (modeling edition) were announced and are now available on Codeplex.

MSE looks to start to address the lack of Microsoft SOA repository/registry, virtualization and run-time governance tools - though, admittedly, I need to crack it open and check it out: updates to come. My hope here is the project matures and gets widespread community support, as in the case of EntLib, and receives product group and further P&P engagement. Microsoft product PMs and VPs take note from the field: they've got some great feedback.

It'd seem that Oslo is still in flux so let's put on our lobbying hats and provide feedback. Is there such a thing as a lobbying hat? If so - It'd probably be blue and have an LA on the front. ;-)

The November 3rd Service Factory drop is the final (modeling edition) release for Visual Studio 2005: this release "helps developers build WCF and ASMX Web Services in C# using Visual Studio 2005." I can't say enough about the service factory - the December 2006 release was the first and best community software factory implementation out there.

Good stuff! I'll be digging in over the next week...

Technorati tags: .NET Framework, Enterprise Library, Oslo, SOA, Visual Studio, WCF, Windows Communication Foundation, WF, Windows Workflow Foundation

Wow! Microsoft is Releasing Source Code for the .NET Framework

Matt Ortiz — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 19:07:19 GMT

Tim posted something on Facebook recently (I think in the last couple of nights) hinting that some big news was possibly coming: I assumed it would be Microsoft related. So this morning I looked through my feeds and both Scott Guthrie and Heuer dropped "it" in public. The .NET Framework source code will be released under the Microsoft Reference License later this year.

Holy c%@#! Debugging without having to use Reflector is significant: yes, some of us have to do some spelunking from time-to-time. And - well Scott says it best towards the end of his announcement:

Having source code access and debugger integration of the .NET Framework libraries is going to be really valuable for .NET developers. Being able to step through and review the source should provide much better insight into how the .NET Framework libraries are implemented, and in turn enable developers to build better applications and make even better use of them.

Great job developer division!

Technorati tags: .NET Framework, Visual Studio

We'll be at Desert Code Camp This Weekend

Matt Ortiz — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 16:58:59 GMT

Should have gotten the word out sooner, of course, but better late than never - right. Bennie and I've been cramming a bit: it's been an exercise in designing an enterprise .NET 3.x reference architecture in about a week and a half while juggling the clients and family commitments. Well - truth be told the: I'll have to do something special for the wife and boys after this...

What Are You Talking About?

Bennie and I are presenting the Building an Enterprise App with .NET 3.x from the Application Design track at Desert Code Camp 2007 in Tempe Saturday morning. As a heads-up we don't know how Acropolis and Silverlight got on the description: we won't be covering those technologies as exciting as they are.

The track will, however, cover a vertical slice of a web based Events planning reference application. The intent is to highlight how to go about tackling an enterprise or mission critical requirement given the mix of new technologies and tools in .NET 3.x and Visual Studio 2008 and to discuss recommendations for designing, developing and maintaining such applications. We'll specifically discuss Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) used as a controller for the user interface as well as to control and represent the "long-running" sometimes complicated process, Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) which provides a message based services infrastructure that is easily extended, maintained and scaled, and the brand new .NET 3.5 feature Linq (Linq to SQL in particular) as the resource access layer within the service architecture.

This reference architecture will be the subject of subsequent posts on Foo Theory and we've discussed, perhaps, collaborating with the broader community once it matures.

Bennie will also be presenting (or teaching as they call it) two other tracks this weekend:

The new C# Features behind Linq - Saturday
Intermediate PowerShell - Sunday

Hope to see you at code camp. It looks like the tracks are close to capacity so if you don't make it stay tuned at Foo Theory for more news.

Technorati tags: .NET 3.0, .NET 3.5, AZ Groups, Desert Code Camp, Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Workflow Foundation, Windows Communication Foundation, Linq

Orcas Beta 2's Svcutil.exe Is Broken But There Is A Quick Fix

Matt Ortiz — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 21:42:31 GMT

So I went to generate a service proxy using Orcas Beta 2's svcutil.exe and received the following error.

After a quick web search it turns out that the this is a known Beta 2 svcutil.exe bug. The MSDN forum moderator (LorenzP) describes that the svcutil.exe is not signed correctly and provides a quick and easy work around (also included here).

Open the VS command prompt.
Browse to the bin directory of the windows SDK.
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v6.0A\bin" in my case.
Type: sn -Vr svcutil.exe

Good to go.

Technorati tags: .NET, Beta Review, Orcas, Visual Studio, WCF, Windows Communication Foundation

What Happened to the WCF Configuration Editor Context Menu in Orcas Beta 2?

Matt Ortiz — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 03:10:54 GMT

The WCF Configuration Editor doesn't show-up in the right-click menu for WCF Service Host app.config files when the project wasn't created using a WCF project template. You can, however, wire it up given a quick trick. From the Tools menu choose WCF SvcConfigEditor and immediately close the editor. Until you close the project the WCF Configuration Editor context menu will now be available when right-clicking the app.config.

Why? By design? Dunno...

Follow-up

By design? Yup. Why? VS startup performance. Found this Indigo Forum post after initially publishing.

Technorati tags: .NET Framework, Beta Review, Orcas, Tips and Tricks, Visual Studio, WCF, Windows Communication Foundation

Orcas Multi-targeting - Feature Complete

Matt Ortiz — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 05:15:00 GMT

I intended to post about this a couple of months ago and am finally getting around to it. Good news though - my un-posted solution was already in the pipeline, it seems, and multi-targeting is now feature complete.

Supported multi targeting in VS 2008 (Orcas) is no small thing: it's huge to customers with a mature or large codebase.

Some History

Jomo Fisher's post was out there as early as Widbey Beta 1. Though others provided additional insight over time we've been using a modified version of Jomo's targets file since Widbey Beta 2 at a long-term client to target the .NET Framework 1.1: yes - unsupported multi-targeting in Widbey. Since, we've leveraged the targets file at a number of other clients: in particular where Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 is used as callouts and workflow components (CRM business logic extensions) are required to be built to the .NET Framework 1.1. There were certainly gaps with the approach like ASP.NET yuck but for middle tier components it worked fine in most cases.

Widbey "multi-targeting" allowed this particular client to uptake VS 2K5 tools and the .NET Framework 2.0 early but to cross-compile down to the .NET 1.1 when needed. This was significant - we had a large development team: MCS consultants (including Statera resources), body shop contractors and FTEs. We implemented TFS in earnest (at Widbey Beta 2 as well) including continuous integration (product, unit test and package and deployment team builds). It allowed us to almost entirely eliminate VS 2003 projects from regular team builds as we had little or no need for 1.1 except for "thin" (ahem) callout and workflow components that ultimately called 2.0 services.

So Scott Guthrie answers the next question in a post from June (like it or not - it's reasonable):

What about .NET 1.0 and 1.1?

Unfortunately the VS 2008 multi-targeting support only works with .NET 2.0, .NET 3.0 and .NET 3.5 - and not against older versions of the framework. The reason for this is that there were significant CLR engine changes between .NET 1.x and 2.x that make debugging very difficult to support. In the end the costing of the work to support that was so large and impacted so many parts of Visual Studio that we weren't able to add 1.1 support in this release.
VS 2008 does run side-by-side, though, with VS 2005, VS 2003, and VS 2002. So it is definitely possible to continue targeting .NET 1.1 projects using VS 2003 on the same machine as VS 2008.

I'd add one other consideration here and it may be tough to swallow: VS 2003 is not supported (but has been reported to work) on Vista. Ouch! Bottom line - get your clients to move along.

Beta 2 - "Multi-targeting is Feature Complete"

So as I now have Beta 2 up and running I intended to follow-up on this post and get it out there. I, again, opened the Community Server 2007 SDK solution to see if there was any change (my unpublished draft is below for context). Hey - the conversion was different: it obviously upgraded the solution and project files but it didn't change the target framework as it did with Beta 1. I like it - this'll work!

Our clients will now be able to use the new toolset and features and be assured that existing projects won't incur unexpected test burden as a result. In addition, they'll be able to use the tool to upgrade their existing projects and target netfx3.x as they get approval, as needed and when they have bandwidth (phased not forced). Solid!

Below is my original draft (couple months old):

So to test multi-targeting I attempted to open the Community Server 2007 SDK solution (Beta 1).

I 'd assert that multi-targeting would be most often used when opening and maintaining existing solutions (created w/ VS 2K5). I mean if you're using Orcas to create new projects you're likely to target the latest .NET framework - right(?). I know - I know: this won't always be the case, but come on - 80-20 or 50-50 at least. As consultants we're almost always using new (even Beta) technologies and need all the help we can get to "grease the wheels" for adoption.

When the conversion wizard completed I had a considerable effort ahead to get things back to working - it not only upgraded the solution and projects but each of the projects target framework - hmm. Ultimately, I was forced to make a decision to either make it all work with a new netfx version or go into each project and re-target 2.0. The later approach requires changes to references and undoing the code changes (backups - you say). As this was an academic endeavor - fine. However, clients would, and certainly have, delayed uptake as a result of forced test burden on larger projects.

Proposed Solution

Simple - during the conversion wizard prompt the user to keep the same target or to upgrade.

Technorati tags: .NET Framework, Beta Review, Community Server, Tools, Visual Studio

Upgrading to Orcas Beta 2 on Vista with VS 2K5 Side-by-Side

Matt Ortiz — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 07:03:38 GMT

First, I want to welcome Shane Bishop the newest Foo Theory blogger! Shane is one of those band members that worked at ********* with us back in the day but I didn't actually meet him until he came on at Statera: you know - different clients - we get busy... He's a good guy, he knows his stuff and we look forward to his involvement. Take a look at his Foo Theory blog here.

So most of the people reading this blog are likely to have come across issues with prior Beta product upgrades. In particular, when upgrading previous Visual Studio betas you would seriously consider re-imaging your machine. In this post I'll share my experience of upgrading my Vista laptop which side-by-sides VS 2005 and Visual Studio Orcas Beta 1 to VS 2005 and VS Orcas (2008) Beta 2. I'll point out that I, like many other, have a considerable amount of VS 2K5 extensions installed that I still rely on. The Beta 1 readme indicated that you should be able to install later Beta versions but will require a repair to VS 2K5 after uninstalling Beta 1. This indicated to me that the DivDev folks expected for the upgrade to be a reasonable undertaking and that they had some confidence that it would work.

In general I'm less exposed than some as I didn't install a whole lot of add-ins like Orcas Silverlight tools and Orcas ASP.NET Futures. I'd think this pretty typical, though, as there's a lot to digest in the Orcas line-up already. I did, however, install (or configure) ReSharper (R#) for Orcas but I was familiar with the needs here as the JetBrains folks have been pretty helpful.

In this post I'll track my upgrade experience start to finish: good, bad and ugly. So let's get started:

An initial lay-of-the-land looks something like the following (Programs and Features sorted by date). Hmm - don't remember installing all that!

Ok, Ok - yes, it took me a week and a half to pull down and install it. Cut me some slack: I have a life too! .. So ..

1) Uninstall MSDN Library for Visual Studio Codename Orcas
2) Uninstall Microsoft Visual Studio Codename Orcas Team Suite - ENU

Take a look at the installation/Uninstall components below. Hey those look familiar.

Below are the result of step 2, again, showing Programs and Features.

Hold on: one thing stands out and it was installed on 5/12 the day I installed Orcas Beta 1 - Microsoft Visual Studio Web Authoring Component. As I don't remember installing any VS 2005 or Orcas components that day (a few months ago) I did a Google search. I found a post by Rick Strahl pointing out that he'd had a problem with the installation of Beta 2 as a result, ultimately, of not uninstalling this component. Thanks Rick for providing a heads-up on this...

3) Uninstall Microsoft Visual Studio Web Authoring Component

As a note: Scott Guthrie's (ScottGu) blog confirms the Orcas Beta 1 release notes: you should run a repair on VS 2005 after uninstalling Beta 1.

4) Repair the VS 2005 installation

The VS 2K5 repair ran without incident though it did take quite a long while to complete. Make sure you don't need your machine for a while when you kick it off. I'm one of those anal types that don't like to have a bunch of stuff running during critical installations. Admittedly, though, I had Outlook up at times.

Testing after the repair revealed that all of the VS 2005 extensions installed previously were working as expected including ASP.NET AJAX, Guidance Automation Extensions/Guidance Automation Toolkit, Enterprise Library and Service Factory. There were two exceptions but not a big deal as I can re-install them later: ReSharper (as mentioned above) and Regionerate. I'll provide an update if I find other issues after I publish this post.

5) Install Visual Studio Orcas Beta 2 (or 2008 Beta 2) - I chose to do a Full Install

During the installation Microsoft .NET Framework v3.5 required a restart of the machine. In addition, the following warning was generated.

After researching the above warning the only relevant information I could find was in the Orcas Beta 1 Readme where it mentions the following (at section 1.1.15): "Installing Orcas on Vista may prompt to close running applications such as Machine Debug Manager." The resolution in the readme is to select Ignore and continue with the installation. BTW: the Visual Studio 2008 Beta 2 readme does not mention this explicitly but does suggest killing all applications in the warning list. My suggestion: review them both and "choose wisely". So after killing 1088 and Ignoring MDM - I march on.

In the end the install was a long one but seemed shorter than the VS 2K5 repair: actually fell asleep during the repair last night. So the installation went as expected from here and resulted in a successful install. Almost there. Almost there. Stay on target ...

Oh @$%! - did I just nerd out in public? Pull it together - Matt. ... So ...

You'd be crazy to not install integrated MSDN documentation IMO. As there's a lot to uptake with Orcas, .NET 3.0 and 3.5 new designers, ya-da-ya-da: MSDN documentation will be a launching point.

6) Install Product Documentation - optional (MSDN)

Finally, there are some follow-up tasks. Scott Guthrie provides additional context on these steps in his VS 2008 Beta 2 post (in the section "Important Installation Notes - PLEASE READ!"):

7) If you have existing projects using ASP.NET AJAX 1.0 and built using VS 2K5 extract and install the script described in step 3 of the Beta 2 installation instructions. More information on the script can be found here. Note: the script must be run as administrator.
8) If you've installed previous version of VS Orcas/2008 (CTP/Beta 1) reset VS settings by executing "devenv /resetsettings" from the VS 2008 command prompt.

That's it: you're ready to roll!

So I've been using Orcas now for a few months almost exclusively for EDD and POC development. I'll be posting over the next bit on my experiences - good and bad. Heck - good and wish list. All-in-all it was a smooth beta upgrade that most should be able to live with: thanks VS team (DevDiv) for taking the time.

Have fun! And hope this helps...

Technorati tags: Beta Review, Orcas, Visual Studio, Windows Vista

I'm Dig'n Regionerate

Matt Ortiz — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 06:18:30 GMT

I'm one of those OCD-developers that has to have my source artifacts formatted and organized for readability. So when I got a glimpse of Regionerate I was thrilled to see that there are like-minded folks in the open source community helping those of us out.

This kick-$%@! simple open source add-in for Visual Studio (2K5 and Orcas) and #develop applies automatic layout rules to your C# code. The site has a set of tutorials that explain how to use the tool, how to start applying your own custom rules (code layouts) and how to integrate it with NAnt to run and apply your rules during automated builds. Note to self: getting it to run with Team Builds (WIX) would be cool. The site also provides a gallery where people can upload custom layouts.

The creator Omer Rauchwerger has done a great job with this one. A+++ recommendation here...

Technorati tags: Tech Watch, Tools, Visual Studio