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April 2009 - Posts

Thursday, April 30, 2009 10:53 PM

Autofocus: Discussion Groups

Here are the Autofocus discussion groups that I'm currently aware of: http://www.markforster.net/forum http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/AutoFocusTM/ http://autofocusgld.ning.com/ Do you know of any others? If so, please let me know in the comments
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Tuesday, April 28, 2009 5:28 PM

In 60 Seconds... Silverlight 3 Beta: What is Silverlight?

Microsoft Silverlight is a cross-browser, cross-platform implementation of the .NET Framework for building and delivering the next generation of media experiences and rich interactive applications (RIA) for the Web. Silverlight offers the following features:
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Tuesday, April 28, 2009 5:24 PM

Autofocus: How to Decide on Which Task to Work on Next

The Autofocus directions state that you must not try to prioritize items mentally. "Instead," Mark Forster writes, "wait for a feeling of release about an item. It’s hard to describe but easy to recognize. You just feel that the item is ready to be done.
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Tuesday, April 28, 2009 12:41 AM

In 45 Seconds... Visual Studio Tools for Office, Version 3.0: Customizing the Ribbon

The 2007 Microsoft Office system introduced a user interface (UI) element that is named the Ribbon. The Ribbon is a way to organize related commands so that they are easier to find. Commands appear as controls on the Ribbon. Controls are organized into
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Tuesday, April 28, 2009 12:39 AM

Autofocus: Dissecting the Instructions #7 - Dismissing Actions

In this series of blog posts, I'm going through each step of the Autofocus instructions... "If you go to a page and no item stands out for you on your first pass through it, then all the outstanding items on that page are dismissed without re-entering
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Tuesday, April 28, 2009 12:34 AM

Kanban: More Kanban Resources

More kanban resources: Kanban Systems : http://jamesshore.com/Blog/Kanban-Systems.html . "Typical Agile projects use time-boxed iterations. At the beginning of the iteration, the team meets and chooses stories from their backlog that can be done by the
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Friday, April 24, 2009 5:50 PM

Kanban: Some Kanban Resources

Some kanban resources: Kanban vs. Scrum : http://www.crisp.se/henrik.kniberg/Kanban-vs-Scrum.pdf . For the basics, read the “Kanban in a nutshell” section on page 3 and the “Summary of Scrum vs Kanban” section on page 25. Kanban software development resources
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Friday, April 24, 2009 5:32 PM

In 60 Seconds... ASP.NET 3.5: What is MVC?

The Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern is an architectural design principle that separates the components of a Web application. This separation gives you more control over the individual parts of the application, which lets you more easily develop, modify,
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Friday, April 24, 2009 5:30 PM

Autofocus: Dissecting the Instructions #6 - Moving on to the Next Page

In this series of blog posts, I'm going through each step of the Autofocus instructions... "Move onto the next page and repeat the process...." When you've finished all of the tasks on a given page, write an "X" in the page's upper corner. Draw a circle
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Thursday, April 23, 2009 11:16 PM

Kanban: What Is It?

A kanban system is a mechanism for controlling work for a project. The origin of kanban is the Toyota Production System. Very simply, there is a queue of work items, which go through a number of stages of work until it's done. When work is completed in
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Thursday, April 23, 2009 10:43 PM

In 20 Seconds... .NET Framework 3.5: What is Windows Workflow Foundation?

Windows Workflow Foundation is a framework that enables users to create system or human workflows in their applications written for Windows Vista, Windows XP, and the Windows Server 2003 operating systems. Scenarios that Windows Workflow Foundation addresses
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Thursday, April 23, 2009 10:40 PM

Autofocus: Dissecting the Instructions #5 - Complete the Current Page First

In this series of blog posts, I'm going through each step of the Autofocus instructions... "Continue going round the same page in the same way. Don’t move onto the next page until you complete a pass of the page without any item standing out...." Each
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Wednesday, April 22, 2009 6:52 PM

MSDN Developer Center Resources

All MSDN Developer Centers: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/aa937802.aspx Some featured MSDN Developer Centers: .NET Framework: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/netframework ASP.NET: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/asp.net Office: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/office
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
Wednesday, April 22, 2009 6:44 PM

Autofocus: Dissecting the Instructions #4 - Re-Entering Actions

In this series of blog posts, I'm going through each step of the Autofocus instructions... "Cross the item off the list, and re-enter it at the end of the list if you haven’t finished it...." Get used to re-entering actions. All of your partially-done,
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Tuesday, April 21, 2009 10:42 PM

.NET Framework 4.0: Windows Workflow 4

In this 24-minute video, you'll learn about Windows Workflow 4. You might have heard that the .NET Framework 4.0 includes an all new Workflow engine. In this video, you will learn how you can not only use Workflow but also do test first style development
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Tuesday, April 21, 2009 9:52 PM

Autofocus: Dissecting the Instructions #3 - Work an Action for a While

In this series of blog posts, I'm going through each step of the Autofocus instructions... "Work on that item for as long as you feel like doing so...." When you pick a task to work on, keep at it without getting distracted. When you feel like you've
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Monday, April 20, 2009 11:19 PM

Visual Studio 2010: Model-First Development

In this 20-minute video, you'll learn about model-first development. This feature allows you to use Visual Studio 2010 to create your entity data model (EDM) from scratch and then generate a database from it. See http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/10-4/10-4-Episode-15-Model-First-Development-with-the-Entity-Framework-40/
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 2 Comments
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Monday, April 20, 2009 10:52 PM

Autofocus: Dissecting the Instructions #2 - A Stand-Out Action

In this series of blog posts, I'm going through each step of the Autofocus instructions... "Go through the page more slowly looking at the items in order until one stands out for you...." Don't begin mentally prioritizing the list of undone items. Instead,
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Wednesday, April 15, 2009 8:02 PM

Autofocus: Dissecting the Instructions #1 - Don't Take Action Yet

In this series of blog posts, I'm going through each step of the Autofocus instructions... "Read quickly through all the items on the page without taking action on any of them...." Doing this helps me to begin recognizing which tasks are undone. It also
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Tuesday, April 14, 2009 8:49 PM

Autofocus: My Outlook Tasks Implementation

In attempting to keep with a relatively "pure" Autofocus implementation, here's how I'm currently using my Outlook Tasks list: I have a simple list view with the following columns: Categories , Priority , Subject , Due Date , and Complete . Completed
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Monday, April 13, 2009 8:54 PM

Autofocus: Print-Friendly Instructions

For a print-friendly set of instructions for Autofocus, see http://www.markforster.net/blog/2009/1/6/autofocus-system-instructions.html?printerFriendly=true .
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Monday, April 13, 2009 8:49 PM

Visual Studio Team System 2010: Dynamic Reporting

In this 11-minute video, you'll learn how to more easily generate dynamic reports that can give you quick insights into how your project is running. You can also publish your reports to a SharePoint web site for easy access by the rest of the team (although
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 2 Comments
Friday, April 10, 2009 8:20 PM

Do It Tomorrow: A Diagnostic Procedure

I'm reading through the Do It Tomorrow book by Mark Forster ... From Chapter 12, "Completing the Day's Work"... My own rule is that if I have not caught up completely within three days at most, I will initiate a diagnostic procedure....there can only
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Friday, April 10, 2009 7:53 PM

Autofocus: How-to Video

Here's a 9-minute video of Mark Forster, creator of Autofocus , demonstrating how he uses his system to remain productive: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qF1ngJAyD_s Contents: 0:41 - Autofocus in summary. 1:33 - How to choose what to do next. 3:15 - The
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Friday, April 10, 2009 7:31 PM

C# 4.0: Named and Optional Parameters

In this 9-minute video, you'll learn how to use named and optional parameters in C# 4.0 (which, if you know anything about Visual Basic, you should be familiar with this already!). See http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/10-4/10-4-Episode-12-Simplifying-Your-Code-With-C-40/
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Tuesday, April 07, 2009 5:57 PM

Autofocus: Simplifying E-Mail Even More

I'm now pursuing a much more "pure" form of Autofocus (AF) by removing my _Today and _Tomorrow inbox subfolders in Outlook (see my previous post on this). Now, as I process my e-mail at start, middle, and end of day (at least that’s my goal!), I put each
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Tuesday, April 07, 2009 5:43 PM

ASP.NET 4.0: WebForms Routing

In this 20-minute video, you'll learn how to use ASP.NET 4.0 WebForms to provide bi-directional routing functionality; use the common route engine that allows you to customize the URLs that your application exposes; and learn how new expression builders
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Monday, April 06, 2009 10:07 PM

Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0: Sentient Domain Specific Languages

Happy belated April Fool's Day! :-) See http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/10-4/10-4-Episode-14-Sentient-DSLs/ 02:10 Use Notepad with a Visual Studio 2010 plug-in to write applications in plain text. First example, making a text-based video game. 06:00 Do
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 0 Comments
Monday, April 06, 2009 8:35 PM

Do It Tomorrow: Sequencing Tasks, False Emergencies

I'm reading through the book Do It Tomorrow book by Mark Forster ... From Chapter 6, "Emergency, What Emergency?"... Now how does Mick impose order on the random sequence of [tasks]? He does it by creating some distance between himself and the [tasks].
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 0 Comments
Monday, April 06, 2009 7:00 PM

Autofocus: Some Implementations on Flickr

You can look at some Autofocus implementations on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/groups/autofocustimesystem/pool . Featured implementation include those using Moleskine notebooks, Circa notebooks, Microsoft OneNote, and even a few mindmaps.
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Friday, April 03, 2009 7:18 PM

Autofocus: Simplifying E-Mail, Doing It Tomorrow, and Workflow Checklist

I feel I’m much more productive and getting more of a sense of satisfaction by leaving all of my non-emergency tasks until tomorrow. It has freed up time for me to dig into some big projects and gives me a good time buffer in case an unscheduled emergency
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 1 Comments
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Friday, April 03, 2009 7:13 PM

Do It Tomorrow: Problems with Traditional Time Management

I'm reading through the book Do It Tomorrow by Mark Forster ... From Chapter 4, "The Problem with Time Management"... To reduce our work, we need to reduce our commitments....The right place for prioritizing is at the level of goals and commitments. Since
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Thursday, April 02, 2009 11:31 PM

Autofocus: Moving to Just One List

Now that I've read through several chapters of the book Do It Tomorrow by Mark Forster , I'm adjusting my approach to Autofocus (AF) just a tiny bit. I now have just one AF list both for work tasks and non-work tasks. If a multi-task project pops up,
Posted by Paul Cornell [MSFT] | 0 Comments
Thursday, April 02, 2009 11:24 PM

Do It Tomorrow: The Principles

I'm reading through the book Do It Tomorrow by Mark Forster ... From Chapter 2, "The Principles"... One thing at a time... I am so much more successful at doing one thing at a time instead of pseudo-multi-tasking. ( Multi-tasking is a myth , by the way.
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