08 April 2007
Patterns & Practices - Enterprise Library 3.0 released
Hot off the press from the P&P team key points for me are;
The Enterprise Library application blocks help address the common problems that developers face from one project to the next. They are designed to encapsulate the Microsoft recommended best practices for .NET applications. In addition, they can be added to .NET applications quickly and easily. For example, the Data Access Application Block provides access to the most frequently used features of ADO.NET 2.0 in simple-to-use classes, thus boosting developer productivity. It also addresses scenarios not directly supported by the underlying class libraries.
This release of Enterprise Library includes two new application blocks (the Validation Application Block and the Policy Injection Application Block), two guidance packages, and a configuration editor that is integrated with Visual Studio. There are also additions in functionality to the Data Access Application Block and to the Logging Application Block. The highlights of the new release include:
- Validation Application Block. Allows you to centrally define validation rules using configuration or attributes, and easily validate data from anywhere in your application, including deep integration with Windows Forms, ASP.NET and WCF.
- Policy Injection Application Block. Provides an approach for separating cross-cutting concerns from business logic using declarative policies that are attached at runtime to methods on your objects. The block includes handlers that can call other Enterprise Library application blocks from policies, implementing functionality such as validation, authorization, exception handling, logging and caching.
- Application Block Software Factory. Dramatically simplifies the process of building application blocks and providers through the magic of guidance automation.
- Visual Studio-integrated Configuration Editor. Edit Enterprise Library configuration files directly within Visual Studio.
- Environmental Overrides. Use the configuration tool to specify configuration settings that are common or different across multiple deployment environments, and merge this information into configuration files to be deployed with your applications.
- WCF Integration. Easily integrate the Logging, Exception Handling and Validation Application Blocks into service interfaces built using Windows Communication Foundation.
- Pre-compiled, strong-named binaries. No need to compile and strong name the code unless you want to manage and evolve the code yourself.
Roadmap
No new releases of Enterprise Library are planned for 2007. The patterns & practices team will consider opportunities to update Enterprise Library in the future based on customer feedback and new platform and product releases. Architects and developers who would like to provide feedback to improve future releases of Enterprise Library should participate in Enterprise Library Community site on CodePlex.
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