PSfD: Team Blog

After a recent conversation with a few folks on the AppFabric (AF) team and them saying to me “ What? You’re not using AF? Really? Well what are you waiting for ?” I figured it was about time. ... read more

If you’ve been doing software development and haven’t heard of Scrum than shame on you because Agile methodologies have a lot to offer. ... read more

Every day, developers scour the Internet to make short work of typical programming tasks, only to find questionable, if not unreliable, sample code. ... read more

The Windows Phone 7 platform contains great out of the box integration with SharePoint under the Office Hub. But what if you want to create your own custom applications on the phone that leverage SharePoint 2010 data and services? ... read more

Lately I’ve been spending a of time within Team Foundation Server (TFS), specifically around deployment and release management so when I got an email from Brian Blackman (Principal Consultant here at Microsoft) that said that the Rangers created...

Architecting even the simplest of systems nowadays can be a significant and complex undertaking and therefore a review of the current/proposed architecture is generally warranted. I’ve often been asked “ What does a review of this type consist...

A quick post to mention that the Office Sustained Engineering and Release team has released the first service pack (SP) for Office and SharePoint 2010. ... read more

Today a colleague of mine asked me for some help with a problem revolving around Team Foundation Server (TFS) so of course I said “sure, no problem.” I figured it’d be a no-brainer but as anyone will tell you, life often has other plans...

If you ever have the pleasure of working here at Microsoft you’ll find that there is certainly no shortage of passionate people who have great ideas and want to share them with you. I was recently introduced to such a team that was comprised of...

This version of the quick reference guide QRG is a PDF file with a total of 241 articles (51 of these are either new or updated from version 3.5) that are all meant to provide quick information about various aspects of performance testing with Visual...

Putting aside the debate on whether or not developers should use Silverlight or HTML5 with regards to Windows “8”, if you’re currently using Visual Studio and are trying to implement some HTML5 features then you’ve probably noticed...

Successful software projects manifest themselves when teams work together. When a team has good communication and transparency, it tends to find problems sooner. Teams want to come to work and are excited about what they’re building when things...

If you’re coding with the Visual Studio 2010 Integrated Development Environment (IDE) for hours and hours on a daily basis then you should definitely download and install this free extension. There’s quite a lot of functionality that’s...

Our friends at TechNet Edge captured some great conversations on the ground at TechEd North America 2011. Check out Jason Zander talking with Richard Campbell about Visual Studio vNext, specifically the upcoming ALM features. ... read more

If you haven’t used the reporting capabilities of Team Foundation Server (TFS) then you’ve certainly been missing a big piece of the product. There are standard reports but more importantly you have the ability to customize and extend those...

Ahhh, I remember it just like yesterday; my first Professional Developers Conference (PDC). It was a week of geeky tech talk, gallons of soda and lots of great information to be had. Who could ask for more? ... read more

Even though most people dread hearing the words “a new version of Windows is soon to be released,” I on the other hand think of all the possibilities that a new operating system (OS) brings with it. ... read more

Our friends “across the pond” seem to have the right idea as they’re conducting numerous in-person and Live Meeting seminars on all aspects of software development using Visual Studio (VS). ... read more

Ever wonder how Microsoft configures and deploys SharePoint? Well, Microsoft IT recently completed its migration to SharePoint 2010. When sensible, the team automated its process to improve efficiency. Scripting is shared, including remote installs using...

Now that all of the major browsers support most of the HTML5 specification, it’s time to start exploring what all the fuss is about. At MIX11, HTML5 was one of the hottest topics whether about development, IE9, IE10 or Mango’s native browser...

Recently at TechEd , Ted Kummert, Senior Vice President BPD, announced a partnership with SAP that showcased tighter integration for application development and cloud deployments. This announcement describes SAP and Microsoft’s plans to focus on...

Creating installation packages is not something any developer likes to see on their task list because of the complexities that present iteself but it is a necessary evil to get software installed on an end users machine. There are some very good third...

The more time I spend using Team Foundation Server (TFS), the more I believe it’s an integral component of the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Framework. Now while most organizations employ some sort of source control and change management...

So you don’t use Visual Studio as your main IDE and instead use Eclipse with Team Explorer Everywhere but want to tailor TFS to suite your (and/or your teams) needs. Not a problem as with this new SDK it’s now possible to fully customize,...

A quick post to mention that the SharePoint team has been hard at work putting together the first service pack (SP) for SharePoint 2010. ... read more