Scott Wiltamuth's Visual Studio blog : PDC05

Taking money from Anders Hejslberg

scottwil — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 22:38:00 GMT

Alex Turner's story about how he took $202 from Anders Hejlsberg is very amusing. And true!

I remember that week before PDC 2005. There was a lot going on, including a last-minute name change. We had to change all of the PDC materials from "Clarity" to "LINQ". Sometimes a name change before an event isn't a big deal, but this one was since we had assembled a ton of different materials -- presentations, samples, walkthroughs, a CTP, and on and on.

I had fun reading some of the other material on the Microspotting site as well. Who knew that riding a Segway was so dangerous!

--Scott

Borland Plans to Support MS LINQ in Delphi Platform

scottwil — Wed, 28 Sep 2005 19:46:00 GMT

eWeek: Borland Plans to Support MS LINQ in Delphi Platform. "Microsoft announced its Language Integrated Query Project earlier this month, and already third parties are talking about extending their technology to support the software giant's heralded new technology. . . .In a Weblog post, Borland Software Corp.'s chief scientist Danny Thorpe talked about how Borland's Delphi programming environment can take advantage of LINQ (Language Integrated Query) to enable developers to more easily integrate and manipulate data in building Delphi-based applications."

We're excited to see this kind of interest from partners about LINQ!

--Scott

It's a small world after all

scottwil — Wed, 21 Sep 2005 00:42:00 GMT

I had two experiences this week that made me think "It's a small world after all."

The first was at PDC last week. We set up a meeting with regional directors (RD's) interested in C#. I arrived a little late, so I missed introductions. During the our discussion, I recommended Effective C# to one of the RD's, only to find out that I was recommending the book to the author himself, Bill Wagner. I was a little embarassed at the moment, but I take some solace in the fact that I said nice things about his book :-).

The second was in the KPL demo I blogged about earlier. As part of the demo, they showed some code that a parent in the KPL community had written and contributed. The demo'er said he didn't know who it was, where he/she lived, etc. As it turned out, the contributor was in the room :-). There were grins all around.

--Scott

Even more LINQ news items -- Peter Coffee and Slashdot

scottwil — Tue, 20 Sep 2005 00:15:00 GMT

Here are a few more recent ones:

eWeek has a Peter Coffee column: Access to Data No Longer the Weakest LINQ. "Offering PDC attendees more immediate gratification were Microsoft's rollouts of its data access integration technology, LINQ, for managed-code application writers and its Expression family of illustration and Web-design tools--which radically streamlines the interaction between those who determine the look and those who define the underlying behavior of a site. . . .All of these technology introductions that I've discussed here address the question of why developers should continue to favor the Microsoft platform as the place where they work and as the target for what they produce. By that definition, or for that matter by just about any definition, one would have to call this PDC a great success."
Slashdot. spongman writes "Channel9 has a video of Anders Hejlsberg demoing C# 3.0. The new language enhancements include implicitly typed locals, extension methods, strongly-typed lambda expressions, anonymous types, and LINQ - a builtin SQL-like syntax for data access. The spec, samples and a working compiler can be found on MSDN."

If I had thought ahead, I would have titled my news item digests better :-). Here are my earlier digest posts, from Wednesday 9/14 and Thursday 9/15 at PDC, when we were unveiling Language Integrated Query (LINQ).

--Scott

More LINQ news items

scottwil — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 22:07:00 GMT

I blogged earlier with some of the early news items and feedback on Language Integrated Query (LINQ). Here are some newer ones:

ComputerWorld: .Net creator sees developer future with Linq. "As the man credited with creating .Net, Anders Hejlsberg has been in charge of making it easier for developers to build increasingly complex applications for years...With a new technology called .Net Language Integrated Query, or Linq, introduced by Microsoft Corp. at its Professional Developers Conference (PDC) Tuesday, Hejlsberg said the software maker has taken another step forward toward solving a common problem for developers: how to integrate various sources of data into applications built with object-oriented programming models."
eWeek: Microsoft Previews Key Platform Technology. "The LINQ project, a tool set for the .Net Framework that enables developers to more easily access data, is a set of language extensions to C# and visual Basic. It presents a unified programming model for querying XML, objects, relational data and other data types, said Anders Hejlsberg, a Microsoft distinguished engineer who authored the technology."
InfoWorld: A Podcast with Bill Gates from PDC. "Q&A: Bill Gates spoke with Jon Udell at the Professional Developers Conference, and their discussion is posted as a podcast." I haven't had a chance to listen to this yet, but Anders tells me that there is a lengthy section where Bill talks about LINQ.
InternetNews.com: First Sliced Bread, Now Microsoft LINQ? "Amid the flood of details about Windows Vista, Office 12, Sparkle and Longhorn Server made at Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference this week, one small announcement could have a huge impact on developers."
theServerSide.net: Microsoft Announces LINQ at PDC 2005. "During PDC 2005’s opening keynote Microsoft announced the development of the LINQ project (.NET Language Integrated Query), a set of standard query operators for use in working with data regardless of the data source. This feature combined with an extension for querying XML data (XLinq) and SQL Databases (DLinq) allow data to be queried, manipulated, and persisted using language constructs instead of ADO.NET."

--Scott

VB and Language Integrated Query (LINQ)

scottwil — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 21:32:00 GMT

Paul Vick gave a good PDC talk this morning on VB language futures.

VB and C# are focused on enabling Language Integrated Query (LINQ) across objects, relational, and XML data, so there is significant overlap in the feature sets. Due to the differences in the languages -- customers, design philosophy, exist feature set, etc. -- there still are interesting language differences. For example, VB's existing support for late binding impacts type inference, which is one of the key features for adding query support to languages.

The VB team has posted a bunch of information, both at the VB futures area of the VB Dev Center and as part of the LINQ site. The Overview of Visual Basic 9.0 looks like a good place to start. Enjoy!

--Scott

Visual Studio Tools for Applications announcement

scottwil — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 03:34:00 GMT

I've worked at Microsoft long enough that some of the products I helped deliver are now a bit long in the tooth. As one of the people who helped deliver OLE Automation and Visual Basic for Applications (aka VBA), I was very happy to see today's announcement today of Visual Studio 2005 Tools for Applications. Over the years, VBA has delivered a ton of value for VBA hosts and their developers. It's great to see Microsofta building a strong successor technology in Visual Studio Tools for Applications.

Visual Studio for Applications follows a similar model to VBA, in which:

A host application integrates the Visual Studio for Applications development environment, and exposes an application object model or framework. For VBA, the application model was exposed via OLE Automation. For Visual Studio for Applications, the application model is exposed via the .NET Framework.
Developers, which might include third party ISV's, corporate developers, power users, etc., write code that adds value for them or their customers. Developers using Visual Studio for Applications can use either VB or C# for this purpose.

It is important to note that VBA is not going away. For many ISV's, moving forward the large installed base of VBA code is very important. Dropping VBA would be a huge compatibility break for them. For this reason, many VBA licensees will choose to continue to support VBA while adding support for more modern application customization via Visual Studio Tools for Applications.

As the manager of the C# team, I'm excited to see these advances. I expect that Visual Studio Tools for Applications will provide an interesting new set of opportunities for C# and VB developers, whether in a hosting or customization role.

--Scott

Language Integrated Query (LINQ) feedback

scottwil — Wed, 14 Sep 2005 23:49:00 GMT

We're getting strong feedback on Language Integrated Query (LINQ), both in-person at PDC and online. Here are some of the online sources I've been reading today:

Channel9: customer comments on the Anders Hejlsberg LINQ video.
CRN: Gates: Vista Workflow, LINQ Extensions To Benefit Partners. "Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates said the Community Technology Preview of Windows Vista and Technical Preview of its LINQ Project are aimed at ISVs and developers but that solution providers are fast becoming part of that world."
InfoWorld: .Net creator sees developer future with LINQ. "As the man credited with creating .Net, Anders Hejlsberg has been in charge of making it easier for developers to build increasingly complex applications for years. With a new technology called .Net Language Integrated Query, or LINQ, introduced by Microsoft at its Professional Developers Conference (PDC) Tuesday, he said the software giant has taken another step forward toward solving a common problem for developers: how to integrate various sources of data into applications built with object-oriented programming models."
Microsoft Watch: Microsoft Rolls Out the Missing LINQ. "Anders Hejlsberg, the father of the C# programming language, has been hinting for months that he was working on a way to be able to query simultaneously objects, databases, XML and other data stores. On Tuesday at the Professional Developers Conference, Hejlsberg unveiled the fruit of his labor: The Language Integrated Query (LINQ) Project. LINQ extends C# or Visual Basic with native language syntax. Microsoft is providing PDC attendees with early LINQ bits, company officials said."
PDCBloggers.net: LINQ blog posts from PDC bloggers.

--Scott

Language Integrated Query (LINQ) at PDC

scottwil — Wed, 14 Sep 2005 02:33:00 GMT

Today at PDC, we announced and demo'd Language Integrated Query (LINQ). LINQ consists of language extensions to C# and VB, and a unified programming model that extends the .NET Framework to offer integrated querying for objects, databases and XML.

While most of my team has been focused on delivering VS 2005 (aka, Whidbey, which includes C# 2.0), we've also been working in parallel on LINQ (which includes C# 3.0). We're excited to talk publicly about this technology in detail and get your feedback!

In sync with the announcement and keynote demo, we also released a slew of information on C#, VB and LINQ. The three quickest introductions are a Channel9 video featuring Anders Hejlsberg, a LINQ overview whitepaper, and a Q&A session with Anders Hejlsberg and Paul Vick. For those who want to dive deeper, there are Tech Previews for both C# and VB on the LINQ site that you can download. (These are compatible with VS 2005 Beta 2 only; they do not work with post-Beta 2 builds.)

Over the next few days, we will deliver a lot of LINQ presentations:

Wednesday 9/14
- TLN306: The .NET Language Integrated Query Framework: An Overview at 1:45 pm (Anders Hejlsberg)
- TLN307: C#: Future Directions in Language Innovation at 3:15 pm (Anders Hejlsberg)
Thursday 9/15
- TLN308: Visual Basic: Future Directions in Language Innovation at 10 am
- TLN306 (repeat): The .NET Language Integrated Query Framework: An Overview at 2:15 pm (Anders Hejlsberg)
Friday 9/16
- DAT323: Using the .NET Language Integrated Query Framework with Relational Data at 8:30 am (Luca Bolognese)
- DAT324: Using the .NET Language Integrated Query Framework with XML Data at 10:30 am (Dave Remy)
- PNL11: .NET Language Integrated Query End-to-End at 1 pm (Anders Hejlsberg, Dave Remy, Don Box, Erik Meijer, Luca Bolognese, and Paul Vick)

We also have Hands-On Labs in the Main Hall for the above areas. If you're at PDC, this is an easy way to use these technologies yourself. On the other hand, if you're not as PDC, you can get the same experience by getting the Tech Preview, which includes the same product bits and Hands-On Lab instructions as PDC attendees are using.

It's been fun talking to customers today and reading feedback in various places (e.g., comments on the Channel9 video I referenced earlier). I look forward to more of this in the next few days and weeks. Thanks!

--Scott