In her excellent blog post today, Anne Thomas Manes from the Burton Group declares the “official” passing away of the term SOA on January 1st, 2009.
Once praised as the solution to all IT problems, SOA did not result in measurable benefits for most, but a few, companies. I really recommend reading the article that discusses the failures and opportunities the recently deceased SOA paradigm left behind.
It is not a secret, I am NOT a fan of buzz words. I believe that buzzwords in the Software Industry are too often misused, misunderstood, and rarely keep their promise, especially if they are propagated as solutions to all the worlds problems. Nevertheless, I believe that paradigm shifts are necessary to improve on the status-quo (and in the IT field there is still lots of room for improvement ;-)). These paradigm shifts are based on the innovation curve. That means a new paradigm, if it catches on, gets first over hyped, then we get over pessimistic before we find the productivity plateau for the paradigm, which in turn triggers the adoption of new paradigms that improves on the experiences of the previous paradigms.
In the graph below I tried to capture this. The SOA hype started around 2002 and actually held up for a long time until the term Cloud Computing took over the headlines of the IT magazines.
I think this reflects very much what we see today. Cloud Computing as new paradigm includes many other current notions we use such as SaaS and Web 2.0. The interesting point to make is that we are still in the very early stages of defining the notion of cloud computing. If we ask 10 people in the industry for a definition of the term cloud computing today, then I am sure it would result in 12 different explanations. This is very similar to what we saw with the term SOA in the early stages. Let’s hope that we are not falling into the trap of equalizing the architectural paradigm with certain technology implementations (as we did too often with SOA and web services).
From the Microsoft perspective, the notion of S+S fits very nicely into the new paradigm of Cloud Computing as a natural evolution form SaaS and SOA. The S+S vision reflects the reality that we will have very diverse requirements for software systems. These requirements include the “old fashioned” but very powerful client applications, rich web applications, as well as reusable services hosted either in the cloud or on premise. Exciting times are ahead, despite (or because of) the death of SOA ;-)……
Just read a great post from Doug Ware on how to use Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) on Amazon EC2.
This is a very compelling and cost effective solution.
Once SharePoint Services are publically available in the Windows Azure Platform, I’m guessing Doug will consider a move.
Awesome how-to Doug!
Here’s the link to Doug’s original post: Windows SharePoint Services on Amazon EC2
Windows SharePoint Services on Amazon EC2 - eLumenotion Blog
Thanks for checking out this post!
Description
Are you excited about the WPF but concerned about the learning curve? Have you seen Silverlight but don’t know where to get started? Or are you curious about how tools like Visual Studio and Expression Blend help designers and developers work together to deliver great user experiences? If so, join us at XamlFest!
XamlFest is a two day interactive event where you’ll learn about the platforms the tools and processes used to deliver differentiated user experiences. It’s a chance for you to mingle with UX minded Microsoft folks as well as industry leading design integrators. It’s also an opportunity to pick up a free copy of Visual Studio 2008 and Expression Studio 2 for you attendance.
Each XamlFest day will start with interactive sessions by Microsoft and our design partners, followed by a free lunch and a chance to network, have some fun and win prizes. Each afternoon will be geared toward assisted development with instructor-led walkthroughs, or, better yet, come with your own project in mind and we’ll help kick start your very own proof of concept!
Please note that each attendee will need a laptop to take part in the assisted development sessions.
Agenda
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Date |
Time |
Topic |
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Wednesday, January 14th |
9:00 AM - 10:30 AM |
Introduction to WPF, Xaml, Expression Blend |
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10:30 AM – 10:45 AM |
Break |
|
|
10:45 AM – 12:00 PM |
Building Visually Rich Applications: The role of the Integrator in building designable applications |
|
|
12:00 PM – 1:00 PM |
Lunch, Mingle, Prizes |
|
|
1:00 PM – 3:00 PM |
Instructor-led WPF walkthrough and assisted development |
|
|
3:00 PM – 5:00 PM |
Assisted development |
|
Thursday, January 15th |
9:00 AM - 10:30 AM |
Introduction to Silverlight, Data Binding, LINQ |
|
|
10:30 AM – 10:45 AM |
Break |
|
|
10:45 AM – 12:00 PM |
Platform Centric Design Best Practices:
Creating WPF and Silverlight XAML for Web and Local Client Solutions |
|
|
12:00 PM – 1:00 PM |
Lunch, Mingle, Prizes |
|
|
1:00 PM – 3:00 PM |
Instructor-led Silverlight walkthrough and assisted development |
|
|
3:00 PM – 5:00 PM |
Assisted development |
Frequently Asked Questions
Q. What if I don’t have Visual Studio?
A. No problem, every attendee leaves with Visual Studio 2008 Pro!
Q. What if I don’t have Expression Blend?
A. Again, no problem! Everyone leaves with Expression Studio 2.
Q. What if I don’t have an idea for a starter project?
A. We’d like you to leave with something personal, but if nothing comes to mind that’s OK too. It’s the main reason we’re planning a few guided sessions where you can fallow along with us. These sessions should take no more than two hours, so if something sparks your interest you’ll still have time left for assisted development.
Q. What if I don’t have a laptop?
A. You can still participate in the training in the mornings and lunch, but assisted development in the afternoon is a harder problem to solve. We have no problem with people pairing up, so you might want to check with friends or co-workers to see if they’re interested.
Q. Can I just come for the training and skip assisted development?
A. XamlFest is about empowering designers and developers to deliver great user experiences and we believe a key component is hands-on assisted development. If you are unable to participate in the afternoon sessions please wait until the day before the event to register. This will give others the opportunity to sign up first, and if there’s still space available you’re welcome to join us.
XamlFest -- Come as you are, leave Xamlized.
Dates
Wednesday & Thursday January 14th and 15th
Attendees
We’re only allowing 50 attendees to this event. First come, first served.
Venue
Microsoft Technology Center: Irvine
3 Park Plaza, Suite 1600
Irvine, CA, 92614
(949) 263-3000
Registration
We’re asking that each company send no more than 3 people to this event so that we accommodate as many as possible. We’re allowing only 50 attendees to ensure we deliver a good experience during the assisted development sessions.
To register, please send an e-mail with the names and e-mail addresses of your attendees to xamlfest-socal@live.com.
Ever felt like it would be cool to upload photos straight from Photo Gallery?
Well I definitely have. I almost downloaded Google's Picasa 3 just to be able to do this. The upload tool that's provided on Facebook.com always fails on me, so creating albums in Facebook was just too much of a pain to mess with.
Fortunately Will Duff, a developer intern this past summer at Microsoft created plug-ins for both Photo Gallery and Movie Maker. Awesome news!!!
Here's the info:
Do you share photos on Facebook? What about sharing sharing videos on YouTube? Well thanks to Will Duff, one of our developer interns this past summer, there are now a couple of brand new publish plug-ins for Facebook and YouTube available for download. Both plug-ins enable you to easily share your photos or videos with just a few clicks!
LiveUpload to Facebook is a plug-in for Windows Live Photo Gallery Beta that makes it easy for anyone to upload their photos to Facebook. The plug-in takes advantage of the new people tagging in Photo Gallery, too! This means that when you tag your friends in Photo Gallery, if you’re also Facebook friends with those people, those tags will automatically appear on the published photos on Facebook. Pretty cool, huh?
Some of the LiveUpload to Facebook plug-in features:
- Add multiple Facebook accounts.
- Quickly and easily upload your photos to Facebook, including any people tags added in Windows Live Photo Gallery Beta.
- Upload your pictures to an existing album or create a new one.
LiveUpload to YouTube is a plug-in for Windows Live Photo Gallery Beta and Windows Live Movie Maker Beta that makes it easy for anyone to upload their videos straight to YouTube. For example, once you’ve quickly created that exciting new video using Movie Maker, simply click the Publish button and choose LiveUpload to YouTube to share it!
(Note for developers out there… The people tags, along with other metadata, are exposed as part of the new Publish API. Please see the SDK for more information. Plus, Will was also super kind enough to share his approach with the community by posting the source to both of these plug-ins on CodePlex.)
You can check out other plug-ins at the plug-ins download page.
Thanks to Michael Palermiti, Program Manager for his original post (http://blogs.msdn.com/pix/archive/2008/11/17/new-publish-plug-ins-available-for-photo-gallery-and-movie-maker.aspx)
Thanks for checking out this post!
I just found out from Todd Fine that Wintellect has released three SharePoint courses. Nice work guys!
I know the guys at Wintellect have been working hard on these.
Here are the details:
The Great SharePoint Adventure
An intense exploration of developing with all aspects of Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) including Forms, Services, and Report Center.
Developing Solutions with SharePoint Server 2007
Learn the development opportunities with Microsoft’s most recent release of SharePoint Products and Technologies covering both Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (WSS) and Microsoft Office SharePoint Services (MOSS).
Inside Windows SharePoint Services 3.0
Explores design and development techniques used when building business solutions with Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (WSS).
Good deep developer class, only focuses on WSS, not MOSS
The instructor is Marc Gusmano. His bio is posted on the site here http://www.wintellect.com/TechnicalBioDetail.aspx?Tech=31 .
Thanks for checking out this post!
Enterprise-class applications being built by ISVs require secure delivery of line-of-business (LOB) information across network boundaries. They are often provided over the Internet and require a role-based user interface and data trimming applied for the business context.
Silverlight and .NET Framework 3.5 supplies excellent capabilities for building such scalable and secure LOB applications. The lightweight Silverlight runtime running inside a sandbox provides framework libraries for integration with back-office data services. In order to build robust applications with Silverlight, architects and developers need to understand the Silverlight programming model and its framework features in the context of a real-world application.
Hanu Kommalapati has put together an article in MSDN Magazine entitled Build Line-Of-Business Enterprise Apps With Silverlight, In the article he builds an application from the ground up. He describes screen pop notification, the asynchronous programming model, Silverlight dialog boxes, and cross-domain TCP policy server implementation.
In short, he provides a blueprint to your real-life Silverlight application from the ground up. It's worth the read.
One of the hottest topic for ISVs is identity. The ability to identify a user and provide the correct details for that user is a challenge all ISVs face. ISVs need a federated identity, an identity that you can get from your customers. You need to be able to use that identity regardless of whether it comes from Active Directory or some other provider.
A project Microsoft Code Name "Geneva" is an claims-based access model identity platform’s foundation is the claims-based access model. It is built on Security Token Service (STS) technology that we've been developing over the past few years as part of its industry effort to create a single identity system based on standard protocols.
Geneva" helps simplify user access for developers by externalizing access logic from applications via claims, and reducing development effort with pre-built security logic and integrated .NET tools.
Geneva is made up of several main parts:
- Geneva Server, formerly called Active Directory Federation Services 2.0.
- Geneva CardSpace Client, a smaller and faster version of the identity client now available with Vista.
- Geneva Framework, which was formerly code-named Zermatt.
In addition, we provide:
- .Net Access Control Service, which are designed to create a sort of identity backbone and connection to the cloud.
- Microsoft Service Connector
- Microsoft Federation Gateway,
The .NET Access Control Service is a significant part of .NET Services that is included in the Azure Services Platform.
To learn more about Geneva, see the Microsoft Code Name "Geneva". For architecture details, see Introducing Geneva whitepaper by David Chappell.
It's important to point out here that although the technologies work together, you can use them separately. For example, Geneva Server does not require CardSpace Client.
Geneva family of identity software and services is expected out by the second half of 2009.
Geneva Server
Geneva Server is an STS that augments Active Directory and installs on a domain controller or a server on the network. It implements an security token service (STS) in response to WS-Trust requests. It supports broswers and other clients, such as Windows Communications Foundation (WCF). Although it supports the XML--based Security Access Markup Language (SAML) 2.0 protocol, you can use create your own tokens for your application.
For more information about the business problems addressed by “Geneva” Server and its features, see “Geneva” Server overview. To learn how to configure “Geneva” Server in an end-to-end scenario, see Step-By-Step Guide. To see specific steps and explanations for various procedures within “Geneva” Server, see Getting Started with “Geneva” Server. You can download community previews for both x86 and x64 from Microsoft Code Name "Geveva".
Geneva CardSpace Client
Windows CardSpace Geneva for helping users navigate access decisions. It can be used with Web browsers, with Windows clients, or WCF. While a user doesn't have to have Geneva CardSpace to access the data, the user can use Geneva CardSpace as a consistent way of selecting what identity is shared.
Geneva Framework
The Geneva Framework is an extension to the .Net Framework 3.5 that helps developers more easily build applications that incorporate a claims-based identity model for authentication/authorization. Your applications could plug into the bus in order to authenticate users and provide access control.
Your authorization code can be as easy as one line of code, similar to that of Windows identity in .NET Framework.
Geneva Framework uses standard protocols such as WS-Federation, WS-Trust, and Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML). Data contained in the claims can come from Active Directory, LDAPv3-based directories, application-specific databases, and new user-centric identity models such as Windows Live ID, OpenID and InfoCard systems including CardSpace and Novell's Digital Me.
Learn more about it in the “Geneva” Framework Whitepaper for Developers. You can download it at: x86 setup package or x64 setup package.
.NET Services Access Control Service
.Net Access Control (NAC), is a service on the Azure Services Platform. NAC is an STS that takes in authentication claims and outputs authorization claims based on a set of rules that can be defined via a management portal. The service lets users create and maintain rules and integrates with the Federation Gateway.
The Microsoft .NET Access Control Service helps you avoid the complicated programming that is normally required to secure applications that extend beyond organizational boundaries. With its support for a simple declarative model of rules and claims, Access Control Service rules can easily and flexibly be configured to cover a variety of security needs and different identity-management infrastructures.
Microsoft Federation Gateway
The Microsoft Federation Gateway (MFG) is an identity backbone that runs as part of Azure Services Platform. Geneva Server or third-party STS gateways could connect to MFG that provides identity services to cloud applications such as Exchange, SharePoint and SQL Server. Developer services also would be securely accessed via MFG.
The gateway acts as a hub for all the connections the organization wants to make, whether to a developer application built on Windows® Azure™ or to a Microsoft application running in the cloud.
For more information, see Quick Start for the Microsoft Federation Gateway.
Microsoft Service Connector
The Microsoft Service Connector (MSC), a fixed- function gateway that lets users connect Active Directory with the Microsoft Federation Gateway. MSC, which will be a free download, is a lightweight version of the Geneva Server. MSC is in a community technology preview (CTP) now with a beta and final release slated for the first half of next year. For more information, see Microsoft Service Connector.
Don Syme has announced that F# would ship as part of Visual Studio 2010 in his blog entry, F# to ship as part of Visual Studio 2010. F# combines the succinct, expressive, and compositional style of functional programming with the runtime, libraries, interoperability, and object model of .NET.
F# gives you:
The development in the first Visual Studio 2010 community technology preview focused on F# for exploratory programming with F# Interactive, programming with data and implementing parallel and asynchronous components.
S. Somasegar who leads Developer Division at Microsoft had announced a year ago that F# was to become one of Microsoft’s supported languages on the .NET platform. He wrote, "Language features such as lambda expressions in C# and generics in .NET 2.0 have roots in functional languages, and LINQ is directly based on functional programming techniques. Through LINQ and Parallel FX, ideas from functional languages are helping us address some of the biggest challenges facing the industry today, from the impedance mismatch between data and objects to the challenges of the multi-core and parallel computing space."
Luca Bolognese has released a .NET library that provides the full set of financial functions from Excel. You can download the library from Excel Financial functions for .NET.
Check out Visual Studio 2010.
Clint Edmonson has published a set of coding standards that you can customize and share with friends. Check out his latest posting on notsotrivial.net, called Holiday Goodie Bag: Free C# and VB Coding Standards Reference Documents.
Edmonson point out the biggest lesson is "It doesn't matter what the standards are, as long as you have them and everyone agrees to adhere to them!"
A new design gallery for ASP.NET MVC hosts free HTML design templates that you can download and easily use with your ASP.NET MVC applications. The site is part of asp.net. Included with each design template is a Site.master file, a CSS stylesheet, and optionally a set of images, partials, and helper methods that support them.
Scott Guthrie, Vice President of the .NET Developer Platform, says on his blog entry ASP.NET MVC Design Gallery and Upcoming View Improvements with the ASP.NET MVC Release Candidate that you can preview each of the designs online, as well as download a .zip version of them that you can extract and integrate into your site.
In addition, the release candidate of ASP.NET MVC would ship shortly. The new features include:
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Views without Code-Behind Files
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Top-Level Model Property on Views
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HTML/AJAX Helpers Now Enable Expression Syntax
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Scaffolding Support
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MSBuild Task for Compiling Views
For more information, see ASP.NET MVC Design Gallery and Upcoming View Improvements with the ASP.NET MVC Release Candidate.
Have you wanted to build a product around technology that's in Microsoft Flight Simulator? Perhaps you have an idea for a game or simulation.
Microsoft ESP is a visual simulation platform that brings immersive games-based technology to training and learning, decision support, and research and development modeling for government and commercial organizations. As a full platform, it is an all-in-one set of simulation engine, tools, and content, enabling developers to affordably create compelling simulation solutions for their customers.
Microsoft ESP is available to all MSDN subscribers. You can learn more, get FAQ, and Getting Started information at Microsoft ESP on MSDN.
You develop the Microsoft ESP-based simulations using the ESP SDK and your customers can purchase Microsoft ESP client licenses for each Microsoft ESP desktop. Note that the licensing is “per computer,” not “per solution,” making ESP’s licensing terms attractive for many organizations. See Purchase ESP | Overview for more details.
Check out Microsoft ESP. Reviewers have said that it's the coolest technology.
Office Communications Server 2007 R2 has been released to manufacturing (RTM). Customers will see the software at a virtual launch event in Feburary. OCS 2007 R2 incorporates new tools that developers can use to embed communication features into business applications.
New application programmer interfaces and Visual Studio integration improves the efficiency of everyday business processes by enabling businesses to build communications-enabled applications and embed communications into business applications.
The release improves mobile device support. Your customers will see more PBX-like features that to improve productivity and cutting the cost burden of legacy PBX infrastructure.
SIP trunking, new in R2, and also an important part of Microsoft's ResponsePoint small business VoIP offering, enables companies to move to a standards-based infrastructure so your customers can connect OCS 2007 directly to the carrier network, reducing infrastructure costs at the gateway. SIP trunking could help spur OCS adoption in the midmarket and SMB segments.
OCS 2007 R2 will mark the general availability of OCS 2007 R2 on February 3 in a virtual launch event. At that time, Microsoft's volume licensing customers will be able to download the software.
Those interested can register to participate in the launch at http://www.microsoft.com/communicationsserver
Through deep integration with Microsoft Office, Microsoft Exchange Server and Office SharePoint Server, Office Communications Server delivers organizations the power of one: one infrastructure for enterprise communications and one cohesive user experience. Customers do not need to deploy and adopt dozens of different applications to make unified communications a reality. ISVs are adding features to applications, which integrate communications deep-ly to their applications.
We had a very successful event. Thank you Startup Teams (invited 5 teams out of 50+ teams), Advisors (total 6), Judging Panel (total 6), MTC Reston Team and Snippies (our professional video crew). All teams could convert their dream ideas into a tangible solution using Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform. Two of the teams used SilverLight to sizzle their UX experience. See below for daily live updates.
Sanjay’s Daily Blog Coverage:
· Day5: Microsoft Dynamics CRM Incubation Week
· Day4: Microsoft Dynamics CRM Incubation Week
· Day3: Microsoft Dynamics CRM Incubation Week
· Day2: Microsoft Dynamics CRM Incubation Week
· Day1: Microsoft Dynamics CRM Incubation Week
· Day0: Microsoft Dynamics CRM Incubation Week
Sanjay Jain
ISV Architect Evangelist
Microsoft Corporation
http://blogs.msdn.com/SanjayJain