Visual Studio Data : VS DATA Whidbey

Four part paper on generics in VS 2005 (by yag)

YAG — Sun, 06 Nov 2005 16:49:00 GMT

Juval Lowy (who I'll be seeing tomorrow at the launch - did I mention we're launching Visual Studio 2005, SQL Server 2005 and Biztalk Server 2006) tomorrow? <g>) has a four part, 107 page paper on generics in C#, VB and MC++ that has been published on MSDN.

EBay starter kit (by yag)

YAG — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 06:52:00 GMT

Getting ready for the launch of Visual Studio 2005 and I run across the EBay Selling Starter Kit for VB - ready for Visual Studio 2005 already. Pretty awesome!

We're shipping and launch info (by yag)

YAG — Thu, 27 Oct 2005 21:05:00 GMT

As noted by soma and others, we've officially shipped Visual Studio 2005, .NET Framework 2.0 and SQL Server 2005. The bits are online for download by those with MSDN subscriptions (and the servers are somewhat, er, busy ).

The next step is the launch events. As I mentioned here, I'll be at the San Francisco launch. In particular, I'll be hanging out at the Ask The Experts area from 10:30 - 12:30, then at the Hands On Labs from 2:30 - 4:30. Hopefully, there'll be some time to get lunch and talk more with some of you in between.

That same week I'll be speaking at the Bay.NET User Group. You can find more information and register here.

It also looks like I'll be at the Tel Aviv launch on December 12th. Roy, you hear that? We'll finally get to meet in person.

Global launch events (by yag)

YAG — Fri, 14 Oct 2005 19:21:00 GMT

I'll be in San Francisco at the November 7th launch event for Visual Studio 2005, SQL Server 2005 and Biztalk 2006. If you are there, please stop by and say hello. I'll be hanging out at the Visual Studio area. If you can't make it, we'll be having global launch events over the next few months. You can find the list and register at www.microsoft.com/launchtour2005/.

I'm back - and an XML Editor tip (by yag)

YAG — Wed, 06 Jul 2005 20:40:00 GMT

It's been way too long since I've blogged. I was off on a family trip in Europe for 3 weeks, and wrapped that with customer meetings the week before and after. It's taken a while to get back into the swing of things - but here I am.

I thought I'd start off with a little XML Editor tip that came up the other day. We got a question based on Ken's Channel9 video on the XML tools that asked why the XML Editor would reformat a Word doc that had been saved as XML.

The answer is that Word documents insert an xml:space="preserve" on the root level XML element. That setting makes all whitespace (including the lack thereof) significant - a change to the whitespace could break the semantics of the document. Our editor sees that and doesn't make the change that is needed to do the reformat.

If you are willing to do it (at your own risk), you can delete the xml:space="preserve" attribute. This may change the doc in Word, however, but if you're doing this just to learn more about XML and the tools in VS2005 (which this person was doing), it should be fine. Just don't save it back. <g>

One other note - to fine the xml:space="preserve" more easily, you can turn on word wrapping if you want by going to Tool/Options/TextEditor/XML in VS2005.

Visual Studio Beta 2 hit the streets (by Mairead)

vsdata — Mon, 18 Apr 2005 19:14:00 GMT

In case you have not heard, Visual Studio 2005 Beta 2 hit the streets for you guys/gals to take a look at. It's truely a remarkable release with alot of hardwork put in by all teams across the Developer Division as well as the SQL Server devision. The VS Data feature-set are in very shape for you to play around with.

This release is also a broad "Go-Live" release check out the following Whidbey Beta 2 "Go Live" post by Mike McKay from the Visual Studio Release team

Check out the Visual Studio 2005 MSDN download site to get the latest bits :-)

Any feedback on the data related features would be gratefully appreciated, please send us mail via vsdblog@microsoft.com

More information on DDEX (by yag)

vsdata — Fri, 15 Apr 2005 19:28:00 GMT

One of the things that we've worked on for VS 2005 is something we call Data Designer EXtensibility (DDEX). It allows various database providers to hook into VS more cleanly. Jim Glass has a post on the topic on his blog - which was co-written by Milind and Stephen from my team.

For those who are interested, Milind has written a few other posts on the subject:

The documentation on this should be out with the VSIP docs for Beta 2.

New MSDN Forums for VS2005 (by yag)

vsdata — Fri, 08 Apr 2005 22:58:00 GMT

Those of you reading this blog for a while know that I'm very committed to improving our feedback loop here at Microsoft. In that spirit, I just wanted to give a congrats to the team that has just launched our new MSDN forums. Currently in use for VS2005, I hope that these get picked up by other teams over time (and yes, we're looking into it for Fox). The ease of a web interface, RSS feeds for tracking, IM or Email when your question gets answered, integration with the VS2005 shell, easy searching to lok for an answer to your question (something that I always found missing with newsgroups). I'm really excited by the possibilities...

Note - don't forget that if you find any bugs, you can report them as well. I was answering a question in the VB forum and had an issue with previewing and modifying my answer. As soon as this is posted, I'll be reporting that. <g>

Update: The one for Fox has been created!

XML Visualizer for VS2003 (by yag)

vsdata — Fri, 18 Mar 2005 21:52:00 GMT

One of my favorite features coming in VS2005 is debugger visualizers. They allow you to easily add a type-specific form based visualization while debugging. Beth points to the XML Visualizer on GotDotNet. It lets you look at your dataset in a number of ways - the data, the XML, the schema. Pretty cool.

I can't wait to see what comes when writing tools like these get even easier in VS2005.

VB Coding Guidelines (by yag)

vsdata — Fri, 18 Mar 2005 15:50:00 GMT

Cory has published some VB Coding Guidelines. Julia asks: "Why this is on his blog and not on the VB Developer Center, I'm not sure."

Well, I asked the same thing and got back this URL along with the following message:

...right now it identifies itself as guidelines for our sample effort, but this will be generalized as the guidelines for all Microsoft Visual Basic code. Note: MSDN formatting for the Beta 1 docs isn't optimal.

Looks like Cory's guidelines match the ones we're doing pretty well also, FWIW.

Finally, we're going to look at making the guidelines in the VS2005 docs more visible in the help system.

Thanks Cory and Julia!

Rob Copeland is blogging! (by yag)

vsdata — Fri, 11 Mar 2005 23:07:00 GMT

Rob Copeland, Product Unit Manager for RAD Tools (that's VB, .NET Client aka Winforms and VS Data) has joined the blogosphere. In his first post, he discusses the VB6 support policy and where he'd like to go with his blog.

Please go and make him feel welcome... <g>

Update: D'oh! I forgot to add the link to his entry. ;)

Update 2: Rob's blog is now open for business.

Database Projects in Visual Studio (by Krishna)

vsdata — Tue, 08 Mar 2005 20:17:00 GMT

Summary:

Database projects are simple file based projects that allow you to store and execute database scripts and queries. Within a Database Project you can edit, test and deploy your databases using scripts. You can either add your existing scripts to the project, or create new ones. Multiple scripts can be executed from these projects against a selected database.

As with any project in Visual Studio, your files are tightly and easily integrated into source control. All scripts, query files, database references and the solution by itself can be checked into source control from within Visual Studio.

A Database Project can be considered as a SQL language project, with a few added capabilities such as source control integration, UI designers, file templates, debugging, language support (coloring the SQL keywords, defining a SQL block/query) etc. Like other language projects, the Database Project is a directory/web-based project that contains files and folders. These files in a Database Project – SQL scripts and queries can be versioned.

FAQs to get started:

List some scenarios where DB projects feature can be leveraged?

App building: If an application involves developing front end and backend modules, one can create a solution and add a project that’s used in developing front end modules using any language of user’s choice (such as VC#, VB, etc) and add a DB project that would store related database objects to be created on the backend. All these can be bundled into a single solution and deployed.

Team development: Various team members working on developing various database objects for a database can add their developed db objects into a single database project which can be versioned using source control.

In above listed scenarios, how using a DB projects in VS can be different/better than just saving the files onto a common share.

Note that the Database Project is for managing SQL scripts in enterprise development projects. Databases per se are exposed in Data View (Server Explorer) where developers can code against them or design them using the Visual Database Tools. Scripts in the Database Project can be applied to / generated from databases in Data View. New scripts can be developed, executed (the language support provided in VS, will color code the SQL Syntax in the SQL Editors, invoke Query designer if you prefer to add SQL code using designer for choosing table names, columns name with appropriate joins etc.)

How do I create a new Database project?

In VS, under new projects window (File -> New - > Project), expand “Other projects” node and then choose “Database projects”. Follow the steps of entering name, location, add to existing solution or create new etc., details. Once you press OK, “add Database reference” dialog appears, and user either can choose an existing connection listed in there or click on “add new reference” button which will open a connection manager dialog to create a new connection. Using connection manager, user can create a connection to a SQL Server/Oracle/Access Database using various available providers on the box. I have pasted “New Project” dialog screen shot from Visual studio below for convenience.

What all I can store in a DB project and how do I add a new item?

Like all VS projects, from solution explorer, you can use Project / Add Item to add new files to a Database Project. Database Projects support adding:

- Table script

- View script

- Stored procedure script

- Trigger script

- Database query, and

- Generic SQL script

Once you click one of these template icons in the “add new item” dialog, a corresponding template will be add to SQL editor in VS. Note that Project / Add Item don’t add anything to a database (backend), just adds a script file to the project.

What kind of connections I can create from VS and use in database projects

One can create a new database (New Database Wizard) which will add a connection for this newly created database to Data View (Server explorer), which can be set as a the default connection for the Database Project; or

Pick an existing database from a list of connections in Data View (or create a new connection to the existing database) and set it as the default connection for the Database Project.

Were DB projects supported in VS 6.0 too?

In VS 6.0, DB projects were supported by Visual Interdev. Visual Studio .Net and Visual Studio 2005 (coming later this year), DB project template is included in New projects window, under “Other projects” node. Between VS 6 to Visual Studio .Net, more support for executing SQL scripts on databases and generating create scripts for databases has been included. Also the contrasting features in Visual Studio .Net against VS 6 are that the Visual Studio .Net Database Project is similar to the V6 Database Project in Visual Interdev, except that it does not include visible connections, and it supports executing SQL scripts on a connection (Run / Run On). Database Projects have a default connection property that can identify a connection from Data View.

Please let me know if this post was useful or not. Also any feedback on any other relevant information you may want to hear in regard to Database Project, please let us know and I will try to post them.

Thanks,

Krishna

Partially trusted applications (by yag)

vsdata — Thu, 03 Mar 2005 18:29:00 GMT

Jay is running a survey to get information on usage of partially trusted applications. I wanted to point to it to get it to additional folks... Here's a quote from Jay:

We're running a survey (only takes about 3 minutes) to get some feedback on partially-trusted applications. How many of you are building them? What do you think?

Here's your chance to let us know: http://host.ultimatesurvey.com/microsoft/surveys/takesurvey.aspx?surveyid=1030

Help us test VS2005 (by yag)

vsdata — Thu, 17 Feb 2005 22:16:00 GMT

Jay Roxe posts that he's looking for a library of applications that can be used to test compatibility between VS2003 and VS2005. We don't need the source, just the binaries. If you're interested, check out his post here. Here's hoping that Jay's inbox gets overwhelmed... <g>

Michel Fournier, VFP MVP, has entered an interesting contest....

vsdata — Wed, 16 Feb 2005 21:22:00 GMT

Yeah, let's vote for Mike! From the UniversalThread:

--------------------------------------------------------------------

You might know already that Michel Fournier does also some other quite different things besides UT. Last Monday, Michel registered into a contest for the radio station. It was for Valentine's Day in regards to bring out a date and go for the best date. The voting process is similar to the reality shows such as seen on TV. People can vote by e-mail, fax or phone.

Last Friday the radio selected Michel as one of two participants on that contest. This is in Bathurst, New Brunswick and the radio station is MAX 104.9. As selected, they were supposed to bring out a date for the Valentine's Day on Monday night and do something original. The contest was named Red Neck Romeo contest.

The next day, the radio station called Michel's lady so she had to explain how was the date and what she liked. This was taped and will be played back until Friday. Until Friday, you have the chance to vote for Michel.

So, in order to support Michel in this contest in a quest to go for the overall prize, if you have a free minute, you can send an email to maxfm@radioatl.ca and say in it that you would like to vote for Michel Fournier for the Red Neck Romeo Contest.

Let's help Michel win!

Nick Neklioudov
Universal Thread Consultant
Microsoft MVP - Visual FoxPro 2001-2003