June, 2006

Blog vacation alert?! What are you talking about? It's only been about a month since you started blogging?! For those of you whom I haven't met, or didn't know, my second child was born in March of this year. For the month of July, I'm taking some...

From the IE blog , IE7 Beta 3 has been released . I popped it on my machine last night. So far, so good. I've been running beta 2 bits successfully since late March with hardly any issues. Looks like they snuck a couple of minor new features into this...

Those agile hip-hopping p&p guys are at it again… ‘dropping’ new software every few weeks! They’ve just dropped a new build of their Web Service Software Factory for July. Want to see the Enterprise Library application blocks in action in a...

Thanks to everyone who attended the Philly Code Camp today! This was the "third" or "application server" edition of the second code camp in the Microsoft office in Malvern, Pa . It was great to meet so many folks in the community today. I want to give...

Tom Hollander from the Microsoft patterns & practices team just announced that they are in the planning phases for a version 3 of the Enterprise Library . The p&p team has always worked closely with the community in the past via their GotDotNet...

Interesting commentary from Slate on those new Mac commercials. Basically sums up how it's all about the "cool" kid vs. the "nerdy" guy. It's fashion vs. functionality. And as Apple has taught all of us, fashion can trump all. I think our marketing department...

Last month, I wrote a post about migrating .NET 1.1 applications to .NET 2.0 . My colleague Doug Turnure put a handy little slide deck together based on the information in that post. I've updated the original post with a link to the slide deck. It should...

I think most developers out there can empathize with me on this one. It’s 1:30 in the morning. You’ve been cranking code all night, the midnight oil is burning, Conan is wrapping up on the TV in the background, the Dunkin’ Donuts * coffee is wearing off...

The third of 3 philly Code Camp events is scheduled for June 24 at the Microsoft office in Malvern, Pa . There will be 15 sessions in 3 tracks. There are still a limited number of seats available, so register soon to make sure you get in!!! Lunch is included...

During the development cycle, the scenario often occurs where Developer A is working on a component that depends on a component worked on by Developer B. Of course, B’s component isn’t ready yet. ‘A’ feels hopelessly stuck and ends up twiddling her thumbs...

As this blog evolves, I’ve been debating what type of blog it should be. One of my primary goals is to help support the developer community here in the north east. To that end, I’ll be posting about local user group meetings, code camps, Microsoft events...

Mark Seemann , an MCS guy from Copenhagen , Denmark just published a new article in MSDN Magazine on how to build a custom application block using the Enterprise Library 2.0 . I’m a big fan of the EntLib . In this article, Mark shows how to take advantage...

As noted by all two of my readers, I missed some of the user groups from the area in my previous post announcing all of the June meetings. While I’ve visited quite a few of the user groups in the past eight months since I started as a DE, I haven’t been...

The NJ MS Developers group already met on June 1 st to see Keith Pijanowski’s session on Windows Communication Foundation . But the month of June isn’t over yet! Many Microsoft developers are attending TechEd in Boston this week, but there’s still some...

From Thom Robbins ... If you can't make it to TechEd, check out Virtual TechEd . Thom is the only guy on my team who'll be attending TechEd this year. It's right there in his neck of the woods up in Boston. If you see him, say hello for me.

I've always assumed "WinFx" was just a codename for the new developer technologies coming in the Windows Vista release. Now that has been confirmed. WinFx will now officially be known as the .NET Framework 3.0 . You can read more about it at Somasegar...

Want to build really cool mash-ups using Virtual Earth ? Want to trick out your Windows Live homepage and Vista desktop with some crazy gadgets? How about adding Search capability into your application? Or maybe you want to take advantage of Windows Live...

The folks at MSDN have some incredible webcasts to bring you during the month of June. Not only is there a great line-up of topics, there are also some incredible speakers that are presenting. Topics range from Vista-related technologies such as, Windows...

There's been lots of talk about Windows Vista out there in the blogosphere lately. Have you been dying to get your hands on it and see what it's all about? Well, now you can! Vista Beta 2 has been opened up to the public via the Windows Vista Customer...

Check out Skyscrapr . It’s a new site for architects. You can't build a stable system without a good plan. And you can't develop a good plan without a strong model that fits the needs of the organization. A coherent vision of how all of a system...

T he Visual Studio Team System team recently announced the availability of a brand new product in the Team System family. First there were Architect, Developer, and Tester editions, now Database Professionals have their own flavor of VSTS! Visual...

Last Saturday was the second NJ Code Camp in the Microsoft office in Iselin , NJ . It was great to see and meet so many folks in the community attending! Despite a few technical glitches in the morning, the sessions mostly went off without a hitch! One...

Don't have an extra machine handy to try that new beta product? IE7 on XP? Vista? Office 2007? Load it up in a Virtual PC! I've used Virtual PC for a long time now. I found it most useful in my Microsoft Consulting days as it made it easy for me to simulate...

The Microsoft patterns & practices team has released the first Community Technical Preview (CTP) for the Mobile Client Software Factory. The factory will help architects and developers design and build mobile LOB solutions. The Mobile Client Software...