Developing For .NET

Have you ever had a problem you couldn’t complain about?  Me too.  I have been so busy I haven’t had much time to post.  Between working like mad on a new project at work, learning several new technologies, traveling to Nashville for my first DevLink 2009, and a super-secret side project I’ve just been too swamped to post.

And I can’t complain: being this busy is a good thing, especially in this economy.

Rants

nHibernate – first crack

I was finally given the impetus to learn nHibernate, which I had heard about but never tried.  I’ve always assumed that cool kid tools like these are not for me since I am currently married to the AS/400 as a database.  I found at this past weekend, though, that I can in fact connect to the AS/400 using nHibernate, so I could finally have a decent OR/M tool for our database.  Getting rid of straight ADO.NET would be a dream come true!

Back at work this week, one of the first things I wanted to dive into was of course nHibernate, so I downloaded the code and began following the example touted on the nForge site.  The article is long and seemingly thorough, but it suffers from some serious organizational flaws. As I worked through it, my experience was decidedly different than the article suggested, although I was able to get it working with the help of the comments thread and a lot of Binging.

My biggest issue was the apparently recent requirement for adding a “proxyfactory.factory_class” xml element in the hibernate.cfg.xml file.  After doing so, you’ll find that you require a reference to NHibernate.ByteCode.LinFu.dll, which was not included in the SharedLibs list in the article.  After that, you’ll discover that you also require a reference to LinFu.DynamicProxy.dll, also not included in the SharedLibs list.  You can find both of these in the nHibernate subdirectory Required_For_LazyLoading/LinFu. (This can be altered to use Castle or Spring, both of which are included in the download).

I know I’m picking on one article, but if it is your go to “Hello World” demo, I expect it to be more refined.  Not to mention, it shows a lot but explains little.  I think it is especially difficult for someone with very little Unit Testing experience. There is going to be a lot of work ahead to grok the application, but so far it seems worthwhile.  Now I just need to get it hooked into my AS/400 and see if I can do some real work.

Raves

DevLink 2009

My list of “must-attend” Community Events is growing at a rapid pace, a little too rapid based on how busy I am, but what’s a geek to do?

This event was a little different than usual: my community buddy Kevin Griffin and I took our wives along to Nashville.  We had a great time, usually the two of us at conference and the two of them out sight-seeing.  I did get to go to the Gibson Showcase, where they make all the Gibson Mandolins, and the Country Music Hall of Fame.  My trip ended on a bit of a sour note: our family van of 10 years passed away and we had to get a rental for the ride home.

But the event was great!  As always, Open Spaces rocked, and I also saw some great presentations, which leads me to my next rave…

Shawn Wildermuth

Today is a first for Rants and Raves: I am raving about an individual person.

If you are remotely interested in Silverlight you’ve probably heard of Shawn Wildermuth.  C# MVP, INETA Speaker, Silverlight Insider, author, speaker, teacher, and much more: Shawn is a Tour de Force when it comes to Silverlight.

Fortunately for me, he was not only present at DevLink, but he sat in on my Open Space session about Silverlight.  I really appreciated the chance to discuss Silverlight up close and personal, and he gave me some great ideas for moving forward with my project. 

I then got to see his presentation called “Silverlight + MVVM = Easy”.  Meeting Shawn and learning at the foot of the master was the highlight of the trip for me (followed closely by getting to play a $25,000 Gibson F-5 Distressed Master Model” mandolin!)

I really admire that he is so involved in the community and that he freely shares his knowledge and skills. Thanks Shawn!

Back in form this week with both Rants and Raves…

Rants

CodeRush

I wrote last week about how much I love ReSharper and what a benefit it has been.  I also said that I was installing DevExpress’s CodeRush and would report back.  Unfortunately, my report is not good.

My biggest beef is that I just plain didn’t like it.  I especially disliked how it had a tendency to prevent IntelliSense from doing what I wanted.  In particular, it removed my ability to hit Tab to insert the highlighted element.  And when I tried to hit Enter, it inserted non-selected text.  I just couldn’t intuitively get the hang of it.

In fact, I had installed the entire DevExpress DXperience suite of products.  If you think loading the ToolBox in Visual Studio is bad natively, try doing it with a ton of third party controls along for the ride.  And it seemed my overall VS experience was significantly slowed down.  That plus my dislike of CodeRush meant it was actually more of a hindrance than a help, so I uninstalled it.

Enter my next issue.  When I went to uninstall it, the DevExpress software was listed in my programs as three separate products.  This was fine, because I really only wanted to uninstall CodeRush at the time because I hadn’t had a chance to try out any of the WPF Controls.  When I uninstalled the CodeRush part, it uninstalled the entire DXperience family of apps.  Uninstall Fail.  I have not reinstalled any of the software, and I don’t know if I will.

I only tried it for a few days.  I’m sure an experienced user may know how to work around my issues, most likely via configuration.  Perhaps I’ve been spoiled by ReSharper, but for productivity tools, I don’t think I should have to make a lot of effort to be productive.  Maybe I’m being unfair, but this is a Rant so I’m entitled.

Ravesoptical communications

Windows Live Writer

If you blog and are still using your blog software editor to add and edit posts, please hold your hand in your front of your face, palm facing you, and slap yourself in the forehead.  That’s what I did once I finally used Windows Live Writer: it is definitely a “coulda had a V8” moment (or a Homeresque “D’Oh!”).

Live Writer is an excellent desktop application that allows you to write posts and pages and submit them to your blog.  The great thing about it is that it downloads your theme and executes it in the editor so you can actually see what your post will look like once published.  There is also a full preview tab so you can view the entire page, and of course you can modify the HTML directly.

Live Writer stores drafts and posts locally, so you can also work on them whether or not you are connected to the Internet.  It also supports plug-ins such as Twitter Notify, which will automatically send a tweet when you publish something new.

Naturally, the editor is complete with all the WYSIWYG goodies, text editing tools, hyperlink and image inserters, spell checker and more.  And you can connect to multiple blogs.  This one is going in my list of “can’t do without” software.

It is very difficult for me to come to terms with this, but I have nothing to Rant about.  I don’t know, maybe I’m sick or something, but nothing has really gotten under my skin this week.  Don’t worry, I’m sure I’ll be feeling better next time.  For now, I hope you enjoy this Rant-free entry.

Raves

More Pomodoro: GMail Tasks and an online Timer

I raved last week about Pomodoro, and I’m still raving.  This is quickly becoming a mainstay of my development, and so far with great results.  This week’s rave is about some of the tools I’m using to help me along.

I’m not sure when it happened, but sometime recently a new item showed up in my GMail: “Tasks”.  Now, obviously the idea of a task list is hardly revolutionary, but given my recent adventures with Pomodoro it was a very well timed discovery.

A Pomodoro purist would insist on Pencil and Paper to manage one’s daily tasks, but my desk has a tendency to get piled up with papers, among other things, and I’ve learned to essentially ignore the mess until I have no choice.  All arguments for a clean desk aside, this means that any system relying on me to regularly update anything on paper is destined for failure.

While I plan to tackle this shortcoming eventually, for now the GMail Task pane is my answer.  I can undock it and run it standalone, so I have it separated from my browser: this allows me to see it constantly.  For simple things like a daily task list, the service couldn’t be any easier, just add a task and check it off when complete.

The service supports more features, such as setting due dates and annotations.  For now, I plan to add a lot of specific tasks to my list: this seems best in keeping with the Pomodoro spirit.

My official Tomato Timer is on order ($5.99 + free shipping!), but thanks to reader Stephen Wrighton I have been using e.ggtimer.com/25minutes with some success.  It is a simple site that counts down from the number of minutes in the URL (you can change it as needed).  There is an audible beep when the timer is complete, and a popup message.  I have missed it a couple of times while busy with other tasks, but for the most part it has served me well.  Best of all it is free and easy to use: I just hit ‘Refresh’ at the beginning of each new Pomodoro.

I mentioned Pomodoro in our weekly Scrum (a topic for another time) and everyone thought it was cute – until I showed them what I was able to accomplish last week because of it.  My productivity is currently off the charts, so far a good justification for continuing the experiment.

ReSharper

I’ve certainly heard of productivity tools like ReSharper, but I’ve never really understood what the big deal was, until a couple of things happened recently to make me want to give it a go.  First, at the Charlottesville .NET User Group, Justin Etheredge gave a presentation and I got to see it in action for the first time.  I was very impressed by what I saw.  Then at CodeStock, Mike Wood had a great Open Spaces session, and one of the things said was that if you weren’t using a tool like this then you were shooting yourself in the foot.

Well, I certainly don’t want my foot shot, so I installed ReSharper and immediately began reaping the benefits.  I expected some kind of learning curve, but honestly it is all so intuitive that it just sort of happens.  My favorite feature so far is where you can begin to define a class and it will move the new class to a new file for you.  It’s small things like that, a whole slew of them, that make all the difference.  Above all else, this software helps keep my hands on the keyboard.

Coincidentally, I won a copy of DevExpress DXperience Enterprise, which includes a productivity tool called CodeRush.  I just installed it and will be experimenting with it in the near future, so more to come on that.

Rants

Microsoft Certification Exam

I ranted in the last Rants and Raves about the Microsoft Certification exam, specifically about the format.  Well, this week I feel no better: I decided that since I was so close last time that I would push ahead and quickly retake the exam, so I scheduled the exam for 9 days after the initial fail.  After lots of studying, cramming, and practice tests, I was able to pass.  All the prep work is what really delivered in the end, and it was a good thing I had invested the time: this test was far more difficult than my first attempt.  It was an agonizing process.

My Rant is the same as last week: I just can’t believe the amount of memorization expected.  The exam does little to truly test your knowledge of .Net concepts: instead, it focuses on specific method signatures and return values.  But, I don’t want to just Rant and run, so I have a suggestion.

As this is an exam for coders, how about letting us code?  Split the exam into two parts: part 1 would be questions regarding general .Net concepts.  Part 2 would be a practical hands-on.  Develop the exam software to utilize or emulate Visual Studio.  Then have tasks to complete, where we write code to solve a particular problem.  The kicker is they could write Unit Tests to evaluate our “answers”.  Who cares about the specific implementation details?  If the Unit Test succeeds, you get credit for your solution.

I’m sure there are plenty of holes in this idea, and by all means I encourage you to point them out, but I’ve really been annoyed by this and would welcome almost any change.  I hope it’s not as bad when I go to take my next exam, 70-502 “Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5: Windows Presentation Foundation Applciation Development”.

Raves

Pomodoro

Pomodoro, short for The Pomodoro Technique, is a time-management method that has been picking up steam lately with the developer crowd.  I first heard of this a couple weeks ago at CodeStock 2009.  I initially dismissed it as gimicky, but out of curiosity I read up on it some more.  I was intrigued, so over the last week I’ve been testing the waters, and I must tell you: I’m officially hooked.

It’s an easy read, and the technique is very simple.  In a nutshell, you break all your work time into 25 minute increments, each followed by a 5 minute break.  This is called a “Pomodoro” (Italian for Tomato.)  After 4 consecutive Pomodoros you take an extended break.  At the beginning of the day you write down your priorities and tasks, and at the beginning of each Pomodoro you write down what you are going to work on.  Then, at the end of the Pomodoro you update your status on that task.

The most important rule is you never violate the Pomodoro.  Focus and work intensely on your task for those 25 minutes: not a minute more nor a minute less.  To keep you on track, you use a kitchen timer or other device.  When the bell goes off, no matter where you are in your task, you stop.

There is more, in fact there is a 40+ page PDF book on implementing the technique that answers all those questions I can hear you asking, like “what about interruptions”, “what about emergencies”, “what if I finish my task in ten minutes”, and so on.  Essentially, the whole thing comes down to prioritizing your work and focusing.

The results for me have been excellent.  I used the technique to carve out blocks of study time for my exam, time for practice tests, and managed to write a new application in only a few days. By focusing on one thing, intently, I’ve been surprised at how much I can get done in a short while.

I haven’t tried using an actual timer yet, but I soon will.  I find it too distracting to constantly check the time, and I frequently work too long when I don’t pay enough attention.  I’ll be working on perfecting my technique in the weeks to come.  Of course, managing distractions is another key, so things like Twitter are suffering, but I’ve been so productive that I can deal with that.

Silverlight 3 and Expression 3

This probably isn’t news, but today marks the official launch of Silverlight 3 and Expression Studio 3.  I’ve been using the Mix09 Preview of Blend 3 for a while now and I’m very happy with it.  I haven’t gotten my hands on SketchFlow yet, but I’ve seen it and I’m anxious to give it a whirl.  I’m downloading the RC with SketchFlow as I write this, so you can expect I’ll be writing about it soon.

Silverlight 3 is a superb upgrade to Silverlight 2 with tons of new features.  For the best news available, be sure to read Scott Guthrie’s announcement.

Wow, it’s been a busy few weeks since the last Rants and Raves: Silverlight Firestarter DC, CHODOTNET, RVNUG, and CodeStock (not to mention two Craft shows!)

Rants

Microsoft Certification Exam

Along the way I have also been studying for my very first Microsoft Certification Exam, 70-536 “Microsoft .NET Framework – Application Development Foundation”. I am pursuing my Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) and this is the core exam for all Microsoft Visual Studio and Microsoft .NET Framework technologies tracks.  If you want to prove to yourself just how little you know, try studying for this exam.  I realized a couple of weeks ago that I would be fortunate to pass, and I was right: unfortunately I was not so fortunate.

I realize that failing Cert exams is nothing new, and in all honesty I think my 669 was a respectable first go.  My Rant is not that I failed the test, but rather the nature of the tests and the focus of this particular one.  I am bound by NDA not to discuss the contents of the exam, but I will say that I was completely unprepared for how irrelevant and out of date the contents were: (hey MS, .NET 1.1 called and wants its questions back).

I will, however, discuss the format.  My biggest Rant is the amount of memorization.  MS has given us a fantastic IDE, Visual Studio, with an unparelled feature: Intellisense.  I’ve become so accustomed to it that I almost can’t code without it, and it’s all Microsoft’s fault.  That being said, why am I expected now to memorize available methods and signatures? Test my core knowledge, absolutely, but perhaps you could do so in more of a real world environment.

Speaking of not very real world, the Test center itself left something to be desired. While the environment wasn’t great, the worst part was the actual exam software.  I don’t think it has been updated in quite some time: the UI is classic “Developer Art”. This was aggravated by the fact that the monitor I had was so large that I had to move the mouse a half acre to click a button.  It was functional, but far from pleasant.  Then again, perhaps that’s the idea.  Mostly I’m just disappointed: the UI was as out of date as the questions.

So maybe I sound like the nerd in class who wants to argue his teacher up to a higher grade, but really I’m OK with my score if this is the kind of stuff being tested.  I’ll take it again (and maybe again), but I will pass and move on to something near and dear to my heart: Microsoft .NET Framewor 3.5, Windows Presentation Foundation Application Development.

I Hate My Cell Phone

I have a Verizon PN-820 flip phone.  My phone before was a Palm Treo 700W, which I loved.  I switched to this POS last time our plan expired because I wanted the Internet Tethering feature.  While I have used it a few times, I have not needed it nearly as much as I thought I would, so it hs largely been a waste of money.  I miss the QWERTY keyboard, the better Calendar and Contacts.  My friends are sick of hearing it, although it provides a certain level of entertainment when they see me tweeting on my flip phone.  All I can say is “7777-222-777-33-9 999-666-88” (with love, of course!)

While I am happy to provide laughter for all involved, I eagerly await the day I can get a new phone, hopefully in the next couple of months.  Now comes the dilemma: my company has Verizon, and the coverage is excellent, but I want an iPhone, which means switching to AT&T.  I’ve heard that Verizon is in talks with Apple to also have the iPhone, but I’m sure that will not happen before my time of choosing arrives.

Verizon has some interesting phone options, like the enV-3, Samsung Omnia (5MP Camera!), and Blackberries Storm, Curve, and Tour.  While I want an iPhone, I’m leaning towards a BlackBerry.  Not wishing to start a Holy War or anything, but I could use some feedback on this one, so leave your comments below.

Raves

CodeStock 2009

Over the last few years I have become a huge fan of our Developer Community, and I love going to events.  Last weekend I had the pleasure of attending CodeStock 2009.  This was a great 2 day event with almost 400 people registered.  The speakers and topics were excellent, as was the food and SWAG.  I want to commend the organizers for putting on a top notch event.

By far, my favorite part of these events has become Open Spaces.  In short, the attendees create the agenda and hold unprepared meetings about their chosen topic.  Discussions are open and vibrant, not to mention completely unpredictable.  Some people contribute, some just listen, but everyone learns, and they do so in an atmosphere of complete openness.  If you haven’t experienced this format yet, then I encourage you to search it out.  More and more Code Camps and larger events, like DevLink in August, are hosting Open Spaces.  As I told Alan Stevens, an Open Space champion and organizer, they have become my primary reason for attending such events.

Our .NET Community

If you are reading this and wondering what all this Community stuff is about, let me say this: it’s about YOU.  We are very fortunate to have such a passionate group of developers: all over the country there are User Groups, Code Camps, Developer Conferences, Geek Dinners, Roadshows, and much more.  Microsoft is certainly part of the community, but it wouldn’t exist without the volunteers who organize it and the developers who attend the events.  And the one trait I’ve found to be universal is a desire and willingness to share knowledge with others.

This is where you come in: if you have never gone to a User Group, or a Code Camp, or a Developer Conference, I challenge you to find one and attend.  Give it a chance: it could change the Developer you are into the Developer you could be.  Not to mention, it’s always a blast!

Until next time, Happy Coding!

I’m thinking of starting a regular feature called “Rants and Raves”.  If I do continue this down the road, then I can always look back fondly and call this the beginning.  If not, I’ll just forget it as a failed experiment.  In the meantime, maybe it will make me feel better.

Rants

Expression Design and Underlined Text

I’ve been raving over Expression for a while now, which makes sense since I’ve been spending about 65% of my time in Blend.  I’ve also been using Design some, as evidenced by my recent series, and I was explaining it to my boss the other day.  Well, he gave it a test run and was creating a form background and discovered something I had not yet run into: Expression Design does not support Underlined Text elements.  It’s still on the Design 3 wish list!

Why is it that Blend and Design appear to share so much, and yet simple things like this get lost?  Blend does it, heck every other MS app does it, not to mention all of Design’s competitor products.  I’m really surprised (and annoyed) that something so basic was left out when you can sub and super-script no problem.  And while I’m at it, I’ll mention that the Gradient Fill tool is much nicer in Blend: and I thought Design was supposed to be the graphic design tool of choice?

Visual Studio Magazine had only 2 articles

I’ve been a VSM reader for some time now, and I always get excited when a new one comes.  I can’t wait to find time to read it, but with my schedule it may sit on my desk for a while.  Well, apparently that won’t be much of an issue anymore.  I read the June 2009 issue in 5 minutes, and I’m a slow reader.  What’s the big deal?  I read it so fast because it had very little content.

I guess the first clue should have been no Table of Contents: the issue consisted of a half page Editor’s Note, a feature article, and one other article on Sharepoint (which I do not use and so did not read.)  The rest were ads, with the entire center section an insert containing a series of Sharepoint ads labeled “Sharepoint Development and Deployment Guide.”  And actually, the Editor’s note and the Sharepoint article were in this insert, so if you remove it the magazine was exactly 1 article.  A good one, true enough, but hardly worth the cost of the magazine.

I hate to say it, but I think it’s adios come renewal time.

Raves

Microsoft Media Encoder

I’ve thought for quite a while that I would like to post some video tutorials, but I was never sure how to go about it.  Well, someone on Twitter – sorry, I can’t remember who but Thanks! – posted 10 Free Screen Recording Softwares for Creating Attractive Screencasts (sic).  I decided it was finally time to get this train rolling, so I downloaded a few of them and tried them.

I’m not qualified to give reviews, but the easiest one I tried was Windows Media Encoder.  It only took a few minutes to download and install, and after a quick read through the online tutorial I was able to easily record a video with sound.  You can expect to see some Video Tutorials posted on the site in the coming weeks!

XAMLFest Online

This is a great concept. XAMLFest was a live tour of XAML/WPF training that I wished I could attend.  It was so popular, that the creators decided they would offer the same contents online, and the called it XAMLFest Online.  Where do they come up with this stuff?

Anyway, this is a series of 15 hour-long training videos.  The first 5 are pre-recorded and available now.  The other 10 are stretched out over next week, an hour in the morning and an hour in the afternoon.  The tracks are divided into Designer and Developer, so naturally I will be attending both!  I’ve seen a couple of the pre-recorded videos, and they are top notch.  If you have any interest in WPF and Silverlight Development, then I recommend that you check this out: you don’t get free training like this every day!

Silverlight FireStarter DC

Speaking of free training, next Saturday, June 6th, the Silverlight Firestarter DC will be held at the Microsoft offices in Reston, VA, hosted by Frank LaVigne and the CapArea.NET Silverlight SIG.  I will be there giving a talk on Blend, but what I am looking forward to is Pete Brown, Silverlight MVP extraordinaire, presenting on Silverlight 3.  This should be a great event, and is FREE, so if you are anywhere near Reston that weekend, register now and join the fun!

Feeling Better

Well, I’m glad to have gotten some of that off my chest!  Catch you on the flip side…