Head in the Clouds

As a software architect, my head is often in the clouds, dreaming of the future. And the future is increasingly in the cloud...

CloudStorageAccount.Parse is your friend

When I started writing my first Azure app, one of the first issues I ran into was dealing with Azure...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 02/01/2011

Re-launch of my blog

This will be, in restaurant parlance, a "soft opening": no fanfare, we'll see if anyone notices. If...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 02/01/2011

The reports of VBA's demise have been greatly exaggerated.

There have been spurious reports in the media saying that VBA is dead. Caused quite a firestorm...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 01/17/2008

VSTO Architecture Demo from TechEd and MSDN WebCast

Good news here -- for me especially :). The demo code from my VSTO Architecture talk at TechEd and...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 11/30/2007

Back Into the Light

And out of the dark... I've been dark for a while now, time to come out and let you know what's been...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 06/14/2007

VSTA and Generics

VSTA has been officially released now, in InfoPath in the 2007 Office System, and for use by third...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 12/05/2006

Outlook 2007 Form Region Sample – Second Edition

Office 2007 is official today, so it is time to update my Form Region Sample. The big difference is...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 12/01/2006

Outlook 2007 Form Region Sample

I've finally finished my Form Region Sample for Outlook 2007 that was promised. I've been working on...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 10/30/2006

Back in Redmond

It's good to be home. But we had a great time in Europe and learned a ton. The best thing I learned...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 10/10/2006

On the road in Europe

It has been almost two weeks now since I arrived in Europe. As noted, I had hoped to blog more, but...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 10/01/2006

Catching up: Cypress (VSTO 2005 SE), Frontline and more...

Wow, I can't beleive that it has been more than two months since I posted, but the numbers don't...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 09/20/2006

Using Windows Presentation Foundation in VSTO -- with "Cross-bow"

I've been working on this on and off since TechEd. I had a customer ask if it was possible to use...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 07/11/2006

TechEd 06: Chalk-talk today, MAF 101

I'm doing a "chalk-talk" today at TechEd -- at 3:45 in DEV (Blue area) Theatre 1 in the TLC. The...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 06/14/2006

TechEd 06: VSTO 'v3' talk this afternoon

Mike Hernandez and I are speaking today (3:15 in room 153) about VSTO 'v3' and what we are doing...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 06/12/2006

VSTO 'v3' June CTP can run VSTO 2005 customizations

One of the biggest complaints we had on the February CTP of VSTO v3 was that you couldn't run your...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 06/06/2006

VSTO 'v3' June CTP and WinFX Beta 2

So many of you have noticed that we got a little surprised by WinFX Beta2. The June Customer...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 06/06/2006

TechEd is Coming

TechEd in Boston is only a couple weeks away now. Unfortunately, if you haven't already registered,...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 05/26/2006

Categories

Those of you who have been following my blog will note that I have retroactively added some...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 05/26/2006

Adapters

Geez, did I make you wait long enough!?! I have been remiss, hopefully I will have time to do this...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 05/17/2006

Jobs on the VSTO and VSTA Teams at Microsoft

We are hiring! Would you like to help realize the vision of Office as a development platform? Do you...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 03/07/2006

VSTA CTP Released

Just a quick note to reinforce the announcement of the VSTA SDK Community Technical Preview. This...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 02/10/2006

Proxies

I'm sure that everyone's reaction to the contract concept is that it is very strict, that it can get...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 01/16/2006

I'm back

I just noticed my last post was from October. How time flies once we get to the Holiday season. I...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 01/16/2006

Are Arrays OK in Contracts?

I know its been a while, but I've been busy coding lately. That code will become public fairly soon,...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 10/28/2005

Reference vs. Value: Types, Passing and Marshalling

The .NET Programming Model makes a clean distinction between Reference and Value on three different...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 10/06/2005

Contracts and IContract

In my post What is an Addin? I said that a "contract" is just that: "a previously decided upon...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 09/22/2005

MAF vs. COM

OK, I know I said my next post would be an in depth treatment of IContract, but I remembered I...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 09/15/2005

What is MAF?

As I noted we also unveiled yesterday the Managed Addin Framework (MAF). MAF is necessary...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 09/15/2005

PDC 05: Visual Studio Tools for Applications Announced

Today we announced Visual Studio Tools for Applications (VSTA). As Eric Rudder said, think of VSTA...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 09/14/2005

PDC05: Addins in .NET

I noted in an earlier post that I was involved in a committee to establish an Addin Model for...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 09/13/2005

What is an Addin?

Now that we know how to spell it, let’s define our terms. The definition of the word “Addin” it...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 09/13/2005

Hello World

Hello out there. I am, as you can see by my profile, as Software Architect at Microsoft. That title...

Author: Thomas Quinn [MSFT] Date: 08/24/2005