.Net Framework 3.5 Enhancements Training Kit

 

If you haven’t subscribed to Microsoft’s Download Notifications and aren’t aware of .Net 3.5 Enhancements Training Kit then check it out here – http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=8741672

 

The .Net Framework 3.5 Enhancements Training K it features presentations, hands-on labs, demos, this content is designed to demonstrate how to use the 3.5 enhancements like ASP.Net MVC, ASP.Net Dynamic Data, ASP.Net AJAX History, Silverlight, ADO.Net Data Services and ADO.Net Entity Framework.

 

Also, if you want to keep on top of new downloads I suggest you subscribe here – http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=8741740

Windows Mobile 6.1 on HTC Apache??

Thanks to PPC geeks, I just managed to install Windows Mobile 6.1 on the old HTC Apache.

 

It’s relatively a simple process – download the ROM Kit onto your PC from the PPC Kitchen’s site (http://ppckitchen.org/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=44:ppckitchen-released-apache&catid=1:latest-news) , get the updates, open up the default project file for your device, pick and choose the OEMs that you want on your mobile including the skins, wallpapers etc, connect your PPC to your PC, compile and run the project.

 

The amazing part is I neither had to do any registry hacks to connect it up to the exchange nor install the certificate to the root manually. Also, I realised that the device is much faster and stable.

Dynamic Data Preview for ASP.Net now available for download!!!

ASP.NET Dynamic Data is a powerful new feature that provides two significant usability improvements to working with data controls in ASP.NET Web sites and Web applications.

The first improvement is for existing applications that use DetailsView, FormView, GridView, or ListView controls. The DetailsView and GridView controls have been extended to display fields by using templates instead of by using hard-coded rules that are programmed in the controls. These templates are part of the project, and you can customize them to change their appearance or to specify what controls they use for rendering. This makes it very easy to make a change in one place that specifies how to present dates for editing, as one example. FormView and ListView controls can implement similar behavior by using a DynamicControl control in their templates and by specifying which field in the row to display. Dynamic Data will then automatically build the UI for these controls based on the templates that you specify.

The second improvement is that the controls look at the metadata for a LINQ to SQL or Entity Framework data model and provide automatic validation based on the model. For example, if a column in the database is limited to 50 characters, and if a column is marked as not nullable, a RequiredFieldValidator control is automatically enabled for the column. (The controls also automatically support data-model-level validation.) You can apply other metadata to take further control over display and validation.

You can find more details here – http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/dynamicdata, and Scott Gu has a good post with an example here (http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2008/04/10/asp-net-dynamic-data-preview-available.aspx) plus links to other useful posts about this topic.

Creating and Using Silverlight and WPF User Controls by Scott Guthrie

Not sure how many of you follow Scott Gu’s weblog but there are some cool Silverlight demos and colleteral that he’s been reggularly posting so if your work lingers around Microsoft’s product set, I suggest you subscribe to his weblog – http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/default.aspx

his most recent one is about creating and using Silverlight and WPF User Controls – of course, the demo requires expression blend, but, you can always trial it!

 

Repository Factory for VS 2008

I have seen many people wanting to know the future state of the Repository Factory (formerly known as Data Access Guidance Package) – the news from Microsoft is that it will be retired and there won’t be any further releases. 

As you probably know the current version available on CodePlex isn’t VS 2008 compatible – so if you have moved on to using VS 2008 and are looking to use the repository factory further then write to me (leave a comment), I will flick you a copy. The version I have was tweaked and compiled for VS2008 and it uses Partial Classes etc so it is indeed better than the previous release!!!

Note:
There’s one issue with this version of the Repository Factory that I would like to highlight -
If you encounter an exception of type ’System.Configuration.ConfigurationErrorsException’ it is because the code generated web.config entry for the repository interface will look like the following:

<add interfaceType=”CustomerMgmt.DataAccessLayer.ICustomerRepository, DataAccessLayer” repositoryType=”CustomerMgmt.DataAccessLayer.BusinessLayer.CustomerRepositoryArtifacts.CustomerRepository, DataAccessLayer”/>

instead, this is how it should have been:

<add interfaceType=”CustomerMgmt.DataAccessLayer.Interfaces.ICustomerRepository, DataAccessLayer” repositoryType=”CustomerMgmt.DataAccessLayer.BusinessLayer.CustomerRepositoryArtifacts.CustomerRepository, DataAccessLayer”/>

I will correct and repackage the project but for now modify the web.config mannually.

Note: This issue is now resolved in the new version of the package that I created.

Microsoft released the new Software Factory refresh for VS 2008

The Web Service Software Factory: Modelling Edition (also known as the Service Factory) is an integrated collection of resources designed to help developers quickly and consistently build Web services that adhere to well-known architecture and design patterns.

A refresh for VS 2008 was released a few days ago to address the following feedback that the team had received:
- The tool should remember the information provided so it does not have to be provided each time the source code is generated.
- The next version should focus less on the data access and business logic tiers and more on the service interface.
- Help those who want to modify the Service Factory source code; doing this is not a straightforward process.
- Wizards are okay some of the time, but a visualization of the services is a better experience.
- Services should be designed in a technology-independent manner.

More information can be found here: http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-nz/library/bb931187(en-us).aspx