Digest about software

Manifesto for Agile Software Development

mailtokos@gmail.com — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 07:07:00 +0300

What about Agile Methodologies? Is Agile (SCRUM) still popular in big software projects? Do we still have to implement bicycle with new name for software development process? I think nope, because we are uncovering better ways of developing

software by doing it and helping others do it Through this work we have come to value: Individuals and interactions over processes and tools Working software over comprehensive documentation Customer collaboration over contract negotiation Responding to change over following a plan That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more.

We follow these principles:

Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer
through early and continuous delivery
of valuable software.

Welcome changing requirements, even late in
development. Agile processes harness change for
the customer's competitive advantage.

Deliver working software frequently, from a
couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a
preference to the shorter timescale.

Business people and developers must work
together daily throughout the project.

Build projects around motivated individuals.
Give them the environment and support they need,
and trust them to get the job done.

The most efficient and effective method of
conveying information to and within a development
team is face-to-face conversation.

Working software is the primary measure of progress.

Agile processes promote sustainable development.
The sponsors, developers, and users should be able
to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.

Continuous attention to technical excellence
and good design enhances agility.

Simplicity--the art of maximizing the amount
of work not done--is essential.

The best architectures, requirements, and designs
emerge from self-organizing teams.

At regular intervals, the team reflects on how
to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts
its behavior accordingly.

Summary:

The Agile Manifesto was written in February of 2001, at a summit of seventeen independent-minded practitioners of several programming methodologies. The participants didn't agree about much, but they found consensus around four main values. Supplementing the Manifesto, the Twelve Principlesfurther explicate what it is to be Agile.

The_Agile_Manifesto_SDMagazine.pdf (80.69 kb)

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools

Working software over comprehensive documentation

Customer collaboration over contract negotiation

Responding to change over following a plan

More productive with Visual Studio Toolbox. All in one code framework.

mailtokos@gmail.com — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 06:45:00 +0300

Code samples, code framework, how to find them with Visual Studio and bring them to the product. Senior Project manager Mei Liang show how to use code framework and what customer can do with it. Free centralized, customer driven library. Online support services provide typical samples available for developers to help them resolve typical tasks. Frequently questions analyzed and provided as free code samples. You also can ask for code sample from Microsoft. Over 600 samples can be found in 2 places: code-plex and MSDN. Just download visual studio extension from Tools menu Search Code sample inside Visual Studio. Just highlight code and right click then search code sample and it will give you highlighted API examples. The Microsoft All-In-One Code Framework is a free, centralized code sample library driven by developers' needs. Our goal is to provide typical code samples for all Microsoft development technologies, and reduce developers' efforts in solving typical programming tasks.

Microsoft All-In-One Code Framework, a code sample library provided by the Microsoft Community team. The Microsoft Community team monitors the MSDN forums, as well as other developer hangouts, and then creates code samples that address the issues developers run into. In this video, Mei shows us how to search for samples using the All-In-One Code Framework Sample Browser, which runs as a Visual Studio extension. She then shows us that the Sample Browser runs stand-alone! Good news for our viewers who are using Visual Studio Express.You can choose what version Visual Studio are you using 2008 or 2010 and download code sample. Almost all examples are available on Visual Basic, C++ and C#.

[youtube:tmU4JXANm8I]

Code snippets are existing pieces of code. All you have to do is type the snippets shortcut and Visual Studio writes the code for you. Watch as we first use a couple of snippets that ship with Visual Studio. Then, see how to use the Snippet Designer extension and create your own snippets. With this extension, you can highlight code, right-click, and Export as Snippet.

References:

Code project from codeplex can be found: http://1code.codeplex.com/documentation

MSDN samples gallery also has all samples: http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/

All-In-One Code Framework Sample Features
All-In-One Code Framework Sample Catalog
All-In-One Code Framework Sample Browser
All-In-One Code Framework Coding Standards

Code Samples
- Download all code samples (growing by six samples per week)
- Browser all code samples
- Read code sample KB articles
- Download the C++, C#, VB.NET coding guildline
- Read the special features of the provided code samples

Search Install Sample Browser

Install Sample Browser Visual Studio Extension

Services Request code sample

Feedback

Fill out a customer polling survey - September Survey Result

Summary

Download address: http://1code.codeplex.com/releases/view/68596. Summary A new release of Microsoft All-In-One Code Framework is available on June 19th. We expect that its 14 new code samples would reduce developers’ efforts in solving the following ypical programming tasks. Alternatively, you can download the code samples using Sample Browser or Sample Browser Visual Studio extension. They give you the flexibility to search samples, download samples on demand, manage the downloaded samples in a centralized place, and automatically b e notified about sample updates. If it is the first time that you hear about Microsoft All-In-One Code Framework, please watch the introduction video on Microsoft Showcase, and read the introduction on our homepage http://1code.codeplex.com/. Great sources for fashion news and fashion articles.

Debugger canvas

mailtokos@gmail.com — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 04:05:00 +0300

Debugger Canvas is a new user experience for the debugger in Visual Studio Ultimate. It pulls together the code you’re exploring onto a single pan-and-zoom display. As you hit breakpoints or step into code, Debugger Canvas shows just the methods that you’re debugging, with call lines and local variables, to help you see the bigger picture. Code debugging with code bubble is easy now! :) If object change state we can see updates easily. The Debugger Canvas is built on technologies that only ship with Visual Studio Ultimate, such as IntelliTrace and the code analysis features in the Architecture tools.

[youtube:3p9XUwIlhJg]

Canvas Debugger pulls together all the code along a call path into a single display for browsing and even editing. Instead of having to keep all the code in your head while you look at one file tab at a time, now you can see the entire path on the canvas, enabling you to more easily track the flow of control and data through your application.

We can save xps file and share how we fix bug to other team members. Below, you can see an example where we have stepped into the execution of the Add Item function of a website shopping cart. The functionality requires the coordination of several methods, and the canvas lets you see them side by side so that you can more easily find and fix bugs.

Debugger Canvas is the result of collaboration with Brown University and Microsoft Research, incorporating innovative ideas from Brown’s Code Bubbles and Microsoft Research’s Code Canvas. Cutting edge research is being done at Brown and at other universities around the world to help improve development team productivity and software quality.

Debugger Canvas also highlights the potential of several of the technologies we introduced in Visual Studio 2010 Pro and Ultimate. It takes advantage of the flexibility of the new code editor to show fragments of files as bubbles on the canvas with a fully functioning editor in each. Debugger Canvas on top of Visual Studio Ultimate so that we could also use the underlying technology for the Dependency Diagrams to identify and display the right fragments on the canvas. This let us support both C# and VB in this release and will help us support other languages in the future. Building on VS Ultimate also allowed us to provide a new user experience for IntelliTrace, enabling some interesting scenarios, such as “show me what code ran when I clicked here”.

Debugger Canvas is the result of a collaboration between Brown University and Microsoft, integrating ideas from Brown University’s Code Bubbles project into Visual Studio. This is what you can do in this version of Debugger Canvas:

Step into methods on a canvas using the debugger
Use the normal debugger features in the canvas
Share a canvas as an XPS image
Take snapshots of local variables so you can make comparisons as you step through code multiple times
Add related methods to the canvas using Go to Definition and Find All References

It also has some more features that are under development and which you can turn on if you’d like to try them: Edit code directly on the canvas (including edit and continue if available) by enabling the option in the options dialog and Visualize IntelliTrace logs as fragments on the canvas, or step through IntelliTrace logs using the canvas. Power tool is trying out these use interface features to see how they work in real life development situations. And depending on your feedback, some of this may very well make it into a future version of Visual Studio! Code navigation and editing are switched off by default when Debugger Canvas is installed. To switch on these features, use the menu item Debug / Debugger Canvas / Options... and check the second and third checkboxes:

References

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/devlabs/debuggercanvas

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/somasegar/archive/2011/06/13/debugger-canvas-on-devlabs.aspx The first alpha release will be available in early June 2011. Check back here for a download link and also keep an eye on http://blogs.msdn.com/kaelr and http://twitter.com/andrewbragdon for news as well.

DebuggerCanvas .png (160.46 kb)

Summary

Visual Studio 2010 ultimate rocks!!! But Debugger canvas is still has perfomance problems, it is really eat a lot of memory from your machine. I will be waiting for updates on this feature, because now it takes a while to create all this fancy diagrams :( What do you think about this Intellitrace feature - Debugger Canvas?

vNext - Microsoft Visual Studio 2011 IDE features

mailtokos@gmail.com — Sat, 28 May 2011 10:03:00 +0300

vNext – is new version of Visual Studio 2011. First article about features was created by Weston Hutchins - Program Manager, Visual Studio IDE Platform Microsoft Corporation 19 May 2011. I am going to discuss new features presented by VS2011 IDE vNext presentation in this article. What is cool about brand new 2011 Visual Studio? It is more organized, clean, nice look and feel. If you with VS 2011 it can save a lot of time, it is busy a lot of toolbars and buttons, especially in debugging. You can do each thing in different ways. For example search and replace changed from Find and Replace -> Find symbols -> Navigate to, few examples how to do same thing in new VS 2011 in demo from channel 9 below. Challenge for vNext release is simpler (reducing amount of buttons, setting UI to concentrate on your code) + faster (overall responsiveness, long running operations, memory utilization and better feedback / telemetry) = more productive. Project is fully supported between 2011 and 2010 solution projects.

Simpler + Faster = More Productive

Pretty cool new Search IDE feature. New Project, Add Class dialog in few seconds with quick access. Multiple monitors improvements, preview tabs for debugging and editing files, solution explorer improvements. Toolbox, team explorer, IDE search, error list and solution explorer search and filtering capabilities, new reference dialog and lot more features. Also very fast build feature on parallel multiple processes, memory usage is very small and performance improvements should be very supporting for all projects. Overall perfomance improvements: Responsiveness/Long Running Operations, Background build (VB, C#, C++), Parallel Multi-proc build, Memory Utilization, Out-of-proc (C#, C++), Reduction in virtual memory usage throughout the product, Better Feedback/Telemetry.

Be great if you could have a popup search window for the search box for any commands. that way you can press say shift-~ and immediately focus where the mouse is then enter command and press enter to move on rather than focus up top right corner. Code Experience/Understanding: Improved Solution Explorer, Search, Smart Rename, Collapse All, Multiple Instances, Integration of Class View/Object Browser/Find References, View types and members in a file (C#/VB/C++), Explore code relationships (calls, called by, used by, base/derived types), VB Call Hierarchy, Streamlined toolbars, Floating Tab Wells, Aero-peak taskbar preview support, Minimize to taskbar, Preview Tab, Single-click preview in Solution Explorer, Find in Files, Find Symbol Results, and more. Also very nice features: Pinned Tabs, Simplified Navigate Back/Forward, Streamlined Quick Find/Replace, Search in Solution Explorer, Toolbox, Error List, Team Explorer. Reusable search control, Scope Error List to “Open Documents”, “Current Project”, or “Current Document”, IDE Search (searches menus, open documents, options). New Add Reference Dialog.

References

Visual Studio Team Blog
Visual Studio Gallery

Productivity Power Tools

Color Theme Editor

Visual Studio PerfWatson

http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudio

http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudio/en-us/lightswitch

http://www.microsoft.com/expression/
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/somasegar/
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/bharry/
http://www.microsoft.com/sqlserver/en/us/default.aspx
http://www.facebook.com/visualstudio

Presentation from atlanta from Weston Hutchins - Program Manager, Visual Studio IDE Platform Microsoft Corporation 19 May 201: DEV326.pptx (3.73 mb) Be one of the first to get a sneak peek at the new IDE features planned for the next version of Visual Studio! At this session, see how we’ve improved the Visual Studio developer experience -- streamlining the common tasks, simplifying the environment and allowing you to focus on the code that matters. vNext looks pretty good, some nice improvements there, what do you think?

What is Build Verification Testing (BVT) ?

mailtokos@gmail.com — Tue, 17 May 2011 06:08:00 +0300

Build Verification Test is a set of tests run on every new build to verify that build is testable before it is released to test team for further testing. These test cases are core functionality test cases that ensure application is stable and can be tested thoroughly. Typically BVT process is automated. If BVT fails that build is again get assigned to developer for fix. In software testing, a Build Verification Test (BVT), also known as

Build Acceptance Test, is a set of tests run on each new build of a product to verify that the build is testable before the build is released into the hands of the test team. The build acceptance test is generally a short set of tests, which exercises the mainstream functionality of the application software. Any build that fails the build verification test is rejected, and testing continues on the previous build (provided there has been at least one build that has passed the acceptance test).

Here’s the definition we use: “A build acceptance test (sometimes also called build verification test a.k.a. BVT, smoke test, quick check, or the like) is a set of tests run on each new build of a product to verify that the build is testable before the build is released into the hands of the test team. The build acceptance test is generally a short set of tests, which exercises the mainstream functionality of the application. Any build that fails the build verification test is rejected, and testing continues on the previous build (provided there has been at least one build that has passed the acceptance test). So build acceptance tests are a type of regression testing that is done every time a new build is taken. Build acceptance tests are important because they let developers know right away if there is a serious problem with the build, and they save the test team wasted time and frustration.”

SMOKE TESTING:
1) Smoke testing originated in the hardware testing practice of turning on a new piece of hardware for the first time and considering it a success if it does not catch fire and smoke. In software industry, smoke testing is a shallow and wide approach whereby all areas of the application without getting into too deep, is tested.
2) A smoke test is scripted–either using a written set of tests or an automated test
3) A Smoke test is designed to touch every part of the application in a cursory way. It’s is shallow and wide.
4) Smoke testing will be conducted to ensure whether the most crucial functions of a program work, but not bothering with finer details. (Such as build verification).
5) Smoke testing is normal health check up to a build of an application before taking it to testing in depth.When a build is received, a smoke test is run to ascertain if the build is stable and it can be considered for further testing.

Smoke testing can be done for testing the stability of any interim build. Smoke testing can be executed for platform qualification tests.

SANITY TESTING:
Once a new build is obtained with minor revisions, instead of doing a through regression, a sanity is performed so as to ascertain the build has indeed rectified the issues and no further issue has been introduced by the fixes. Its generally a subset of regression testing and a group of test cases are executed that are related with the changes made to the app. Generally, when multiple cycles of testing are executed, sanity testing may be done during the later cycles after through regression cycles.

Some BVT basics:

It is a subset of tests that verify main functionalities.
The BVT’s are typically run on daily builds and if the BVT fails the build is rejected and a new build is released after the fixes are done.
The advantage of BVT is it saves the efforts of a test team to setup and test a build when major functionality is broken.
Design BVTs carefully enough to cover basic functionality.
Typically BVT should not run more than 30 minutes.
BVT is a type of regression testing, done on each and every new build.

Tips for BVT success:
1) Spend considerable time writing BVT test cases scripts.
2) Log as much detailed info as possible to diagnose the BVT pass or fail result. This will help developer team to debug and quickly know the failure cause.
3) Select stable test cases to include in BVT. For new features if new critical test case passes consistently on different configuration then promote this test case in your BVT suite. This will reduce the probability of frequent build failure due to new unstable modules and test cases.
4) Automate BVT process as much as possible. Right from build release process to BVT result – automate everything.
5) Have some penalties for breaking the build Some chocolates or team coffee party from developer who breaks the build will do.

Developers migh be doing the unit and intregration testing and not necessarily the BVT. BVT is most of the times done by test engineer. Once the build team deploys the test build on the test environments its the job of test engineer to perform BVT (sniff, sanity smoke and other testing) If you are able to test the applicaiton and are executing the test cases, its natural that the BVT has been passed. Else you wouldn’t have been able to test the applciation… It dosent mattter if the testing is done manually or is automated using any tool. If the build has got a new feature how can you automate it?

Following is the process that you might follow: Developer initiates a mail to build team (also marked to test team with the description of what to be tested in the new build) to make the build >> Build team makes the build and deploys it on test machines and replies all asking the test team to continue testing, else if build fails he replies so in the mail >> If the BVT fails tester replies to mail stating that the BVT failed along with the logs whatever are available, else continues testing.

Conclusion:

In real life investigating all the test case failures requires huge amount of discipline and noticeable amount of intellectual effort. Imagine thousands of test cases running on n different editions of your product. Every failure needs to be properly investigated and if applicable then bugs opened. Every single one of them. BVT is nothing but a set of regression test cases that are executed each time for new build. This is also called as smoke test. Build is not assigned to test team unless and until the BVT passes. BVT can be run by developer or tester and BVT result is communicated throughout the team and immediate action is taken to fix the bug if BVT fails. BVT process is typically automated by writing scripts for test cases. Only critical test cases are included in BVT. These test cases should ensure application test coverage. BVT is very effective for daily as well as long term builds. This saves significant time, cost, resources and after all no frustration of test team for incomplete build. Different teams have different practices across the Microsoft and even outside the Microsoft you should not try to adjust some specific methodology/process to your needs and blindly follow the process. You should think how every team member can win from BVT in your project. Let me know what testing process and build verification testing you have?

Skype and Microsoft together

mailtokos@gmail.com — Thu, 12 May 2011 08:07:00 +0300

Skype - is my favourite program in a last few years and now it is a new product and new business division of Microsoft. I like Skype and I use Skype that is why it is really nice purchase.

With 170 million connected users and over 207 billion minutes of voice and video conversations in 2010, Skype has been a pioneer in creating rich, meaningful connections among friends, families and business colleagues globally. Microsoft has a long-standing focus and investment in real-time communications across its various platforms, including Lync (which saw 30 percent revenue growth in Q3), Outlook, Messenger, Hotmail and Xbox LIVE.

Skype is a software application that allows users to make voice calls and chats over the Internet. Calls to other users within the Skype service are free, while calls to both traditional landline telephones and mobile phones can be made for a fee using a debit-based user account system. Skype has also become popular for its additional features which include instant messaging, file transfer, and video conferencing. Skype has 663 million registered users as of 2010. The network is operated by Microsoft Skype Division, which has its headquarters in Luxembourg.

http://youtu.be/QFkTGLNfh6c

Analysts say Microsoft's $8.5 billion purchase of Skype is a defensive move against Google and Apple, as well as an offensive move to further expand Microsoft's reach beyond personal computers.

Yesterday on 10 May 2011, Microsoft announced it had agreed to acquire Skype for $8.5 billion. This marked a 300% increase in value for the company in the three years since the eBay write-down in October 2007. It will be Microsoft's largest acquisition ever. Skype will be a division within Microsoft, with Skype's former CEO Tony Bates—now its president—reporting to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer.The price Microsoft agreed to pay for the company is 32 times Skype's operating profits. According to the Financial Times this raises fears of a new tech bubble.Ars Technica and the BBC have questioned the value for Microsoft in the purchase.

The Skype software was invented and developed by Estonian developers Ahti Heinla, Priit Kasesalu and Jaan Tallinn, the same individuals who together with the Swedish entrepreneur Niklas Zennström and Dane Janus Friis were also originally behind the peer-to-peer file sharing software Kazaa. Skype as a company was founded in 2003 by Zennström and Friis. In April 2003, Skype.com and Skype.net domain names were registered. In August 2003, the first public beta version was released.

Skype uses a proprietary Internet telephony (VoIP) network called the Skype protocol. The protocol has not been made publicly available by Skype and official applications using the protocol are closed-source. Part of the Skype technology relies on the Global Index P2P protocol belonging to the Joltid Ltd. corporation. The main difference between Skype and standard VoIP clients is that Skype operates on a peer-to-peer model (originally based on the Kazaa software rather than the more usual client–server model (note that the very popular SIP model of VoIP is also peer to peer, but implementation generally requires registration with a server, as does Skype).

http://www.microsoft.com/Presspass/press/2011/may11/05-10CorpNewsPR.mspx

STEVE BALLMER: I just want to wrap with a couple of words about Microsoft. “Skype is a phenomenal service that is loved by millions of people around the world,” said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. “Together we will create the future of real-time communications so people can easily stay connected to family, friends, clients and colleagues anywhere in the world.”

I've been at Microsoft a long time at this stage, 31 years, the company is about 36 years old, and a couple of things I would highlight. No. 1, we're a super-ambitious company. We are irrepressible in moving forward, and pursuing new things. We've been consistently focused on empowering consumers and businesses to do more with technology. This Skype acquisition is entirely consistent with our ambitious forward-looking, irrepressible nature.

Sometimes we build things ourselves, as we've done with Bing and Kinect, or we'll partner and form an alliance to seize the moment, and at other times we'll make an acquisition, as we're announcing today, one that placed our strengths, and is much more than the sum of its parts.

Skype will become a new business division within Microsoft, and Skype CEO Tony Bates will assume the title of president of the Microsoft Skype Division, reporting directly to Ballmer.

"Microsoft and Skype share the vision of bringing software innovation and products to our customers,” said Tony Bates. “Together, we will be able to accelerate Skype's plans to extend our global community and introduce new ways for everyone to communicate and collaborate,” Bates said.

“Tony Bates has a great track record as a leader and will strengthen the Microsoft management team. I’m looking forward to Skype’s talented global workforce bringing its insights, ideas and experience to Microsoft,” Ballmer said.

Microsoft's $8.5 billion acquisition of Skype is the biggest technology deal so far this year, and the transaction would rank among the 12 biggest high-tech deals since 2000.

Related Article: http://nyti.ms/lJ2B54
Please visit http://nyti.ms/j64HPe to embed this video.
Watch more videos at http://nytimes.com/video.

About skype future by Tony Bates: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFkTGLNfh6c and about future of Microsoft skype division from New York times: http://youtu.be/7RdPBd9CgO4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Skype_Division “Together, we will be able to accelerate Skype’s plans to extend our global community and introduce new ways for everyone to communicate and collaborate.” What do you think about this purchace?

First month at Microsoft with thoughts on pros and cons

mailtokos@gmail.com — Wed, 11 May 2011 08:18:00 +0300

Hey everybody, this is Agafonov Slava and I have a good news for you. I changed my job and now I am working as software engineer in the Microsoft. I don’t think I’ll forget my first day at Microsoft, because to be perfectly honest, I don’t remember most of it. I spent about 6 weeks here in Redmond campus in Seattle area. It is not just work that you need to do every day and it is more then that. The best thing about this company which I have noticed it is people. It has been a very learning and inspiring experience till now. I have met people with years and years of experience. For example: average expirience here is about 8-10 years. Main office of MS located in Redmond, Washington state. Approximate size of Microsoft is 89,000+ employees and it has $62B+ revenue. From gamers to governments, moms to mega-corporations, Microsoft helps customers all over the globe to realize their potential. I am really excited to work in such huge company with empolyees and customers in all parts of the world. Below you can see the video about how people from Soviet Union celebrating some good event in they life.

Many aspects of the bureaucracy actually work the way they should, and many things are set up for online self-service, which expedites the process. I've already gotten my ORCA bus pass, it is working for local buses, subway, etc. Also it is very good choice of free drinks that you consume each day like juice, Sprite, different types of Cokes and Pepsi. My first project in Microsoft was connected to data migration from old servers to Windows Azure servers for Microsoft Dynamics Online project and ILC (Internet Lead Capture) division. It was tool for data validation and testing.

After this I changed Microsoft Dynamics Online project to Customer Assistance Portal project. My current team called APE (Architecture and Perfomance Engineering) and my role is software developer in test. I will write more about CAP and support Fix It team later in another post.

But now I just moved into Fix It office (building 22) from Advanta, configured my laptop and onebox (virtual machine), had a lovely lunch with other MSR CAP team at a thai spot not far from our office building, and gotten a chance to take 2 books (Windows Azure and Test Automation) from Microsoft library. I found old, but interesting video about Microsoft life, check this out:

Actually it is the other side of the coin. So it turns out that I'm part of the Dash Trash, a second class citizen on the Microsoft Campus. In other words, a mere vendor. So since I have an Orange badge and not a Blue Badge, I am not eligble of discounts at the Microsoft Store. This store happens to be in Building 92. It took me a while to find that out. If you Google Microsoft Company Store, you will not find an answer. So that's one of those fascinating things. It is, perhaps, a purposeful Googlewhack. Sure my badge will get me in the store, but not a discount on the stuff I really want. Also it is a difference between working place environments for FTE (Full Time Employeers) and vendors. It is very depends on project that you are working on. But sometimes it is huge difference. For example: FTE has own room with 2-4 monitors and door, yes he has door to close and concentrate on work, but vendor can be placed near elevator or kitchen with own laptop and without any room or even 1 additional monitor. I am optimistic person and small problems are not make me crazy, but sometimes it is really make impact on your perfomance and overall impression about company.

Many people think Microsoft = software. My first month at Microsoft shows that Yes, we do software—but we also do hardware, services, research, and more. We work on PC operating systems and applications—like Windows and Windows Live. Products for IT professionals and developers—like Windows Server, Azure and Visual Studio. Online services such as Bing and MSN. Business solutions like ForeFront, Office and Exchange. And devices like Xbox, Zune, Kinect, Windows Mobile, and more. We’re passionate about what we do.

This means opportunity for Microsoft employees — to do things that impact the lives of millions, if not billions. I think you’ll find that amazing things do happen here.

[youtube:q8HBFB1JQUo] Final thoughts, short summary of pros and cons and overall overview from my point of view after first month at Microsoft. "Pros" are the primary positive aspects of an idea, process, or thing; "Cons" are the primary negative aspects: Microsoft company cons: work can be stressful, as there is always something new to learn and keep up with. Lots of processes and methodologies, not common across teams. Company is too big with bureaucratic organization. Each team is like a small company with its own budget, which makes it very hard to get a higher position, be better trained.

Microsoft company pros: laid back but highly productive atmosphere. Great co-workers. Work hard--play harder! Unlike most places, the company actually cares about employees. Work and tasks are very challenging. High expectations of productivity - yet no one is breathing down your neck / peeking over your shoulder. Lots of projects in so many different areas, so one can switch teams if one gets bored. Smart and friendly people and opportunity to make a big impact in changes of technology world.

Microsoft has about Ninety Thousand employees, a huge percentage them very determined to change the world, and often suceeding. And millions of customers with the same idea. Basically, Microsoft is in the world-changing business.

If you not like this post write your comments and I provide some updates. I am going to write several more posts about life in Microsoft campus and about company.

Orleans - software framework for cloud applications

mailtokos@gmail.com — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 06:32:00 +0300

Orleans - is a Microsoft Research project and managed (.NET) software framework for building client + cloud applications. As outlined in the recently released paper on the topic: Orleans defines an actor-like model of isolated grains that communicate through asynchronous messages and manage asynchronous computations with promises. The isolated state and constrained execution model of grains allows the Orleans runtime to persist, migrate, replicate, and reconcile grain state without programmer intervention. Orleans also provides lightweight, optimistic, distributed transactions that provide predictable consistency and failure handling for distributed operations across multiple grains. Orleans is a library written in C# that runs on the Microsoft .NET Framework 4.

Orleans defines an actor-like model of isolated grains that communicate through asynchronous messages and manage asynchronous computations with promises. The isolated state and constrained execution model of grains allows the Orleans runtime to persist, migrate, replicate, and reconcile grain state without programmer intervention. Orleans also provides lightweight, optimistic, distributed transactions that provide predictable consistency and failure handling for distributed operations across multiple grains.

AsyncValue<int> getPromise = setPromise.ContinueWith( } <= () return grain.GetAxB(); ;({ // schedule action when GetAxB returns actual result AsyncCompletion resultPromise = getPromise.ContinueWith((int x) => { Console.WriteLine("Result: " + x.ToString()); ,{ (Exception exc) => { Console.WriteLine("Error: " + exc.Message); throw exc; // re-throw the exception ;({ // wait for operation to complete try { resultPromise.Wait(); } catch(Exception exc) { // error at any stage will throw exception Console.WriteLine("Error: " + exc.Message); {

CreateGrain immediately returns a reference to the grain, allowing pipelining of asynchronous requests to the grain, such as SetA and SetB, even before the grain is fully created. The client
invokes GetAxB on the reference before SetA and SetB fulfill their promises. The invocation is queued on the grain and executes after SetA and SetB execute. When the getPromise is resolved, a
success or an error function delegate is invoked. Because every asynchronous operation, such as a call to a grain method, a call to ContinueWith() on a promise, or a call to Join(), returns a promise, and because promises propagate errors through continuations, error handling can be implemented in a simple manner. A client can build an entire dataflow graph of interconnected asynchronous continuations and defer error handling until a later point. In the example above, an error at any stage of the program (CreateGrain(), SetA(), SetB(), GetAxB(), x.ToString(), etc.) will eventually break resultPromise and cause resultPromise.Wait() to throw an exception with information about the error to the one error handling statement (try/catch) as the top level. All possible errors bubble up to that point in the program, even though pieces of the computation may run concurrently on different threads.

Orleans supports the development of cloud application software. It targets a specific category of software, embodying best practices for building scalable cloud applications. This section provides an overview of Orleans, elaborated in later sections, and explains the rationale for the design choices.

Motivation

Client + cloud computing is a disruptive, new computing platform, combining diverse client devices – PCs, smartphones, sensors, and single-function and embedded devices – with the unlimited, on-demand computation and data storage offered by cloud computing services such as Amazon’s AWS or Microsoft’s Windows Azure. Advances in semiconductors again are driving a radical change, reducing the cost of computing and communications and enabling inexpensive, compact, personal, and mobile devices with powerful processors, wireless connectivity with good bandwidth and reach, and low power consumption. In the data center, low-cost, efficient, virtualized servers created a new business of selling inexpensive computation on demand. Together these advances make possible the vision of ubiquitous computing articulated by Mark Weiser two decades ago, where data and computation are no longer tied to a physical location or computing device, but instead become the fabric of our environment and part of all devices we interact with.

As with every advance in computing, programming is a fundamental challenge. Client + cloud computing combines many of the most difficult aspects of programming. These systems are inherently parallel and distributed, running computations across a large number of servers in multiple data centers and diverse clients. Individual computers and communication links are commodity components, with non-negligible failure rates and complex failure modes. Cloud computing runs as a service, offering economies of scale and efficiency by concurrently processing requests from many clients, but also facing challenging demands in handling varying and unpredictable loads and offering a highly available and reliable service in the face of hardware and software failures and evolution. These problems, of course, come in addition to the familiar challenges of constructing secure, reliable, and efficient software.

Orleans provides a well-designed and engineered environment with abstractions that support the development of scalable, reliable distributed systems, reducing the difficulty and cost of building new software infrastructure on unreliable hardware needed for the client + cloud computing. Orleans has three main components: (1) programming model, (2) programming language and tools, and (3) runtime system.

AsyncValue<int> intPromise = GetA();
//anonymous method runs when promise is resolved
intPromise.ContinueWith((int a) => {
   // success block
   Console.WriteLine("Result: " + a.ToString());
,{
(Exception exc) => {
   // exception block
Console.WriteLine("Error: " + exc.Message);
}).Ignore();

Asyncronous continuation

References

Guide About Orleans

Orleans: A Framework for Cloud Computing

Summary

Orleans defines an actor-like model of isolated grains that communicate through asynchronous messages and manage asynchronous computations with promises. The isolated state and constrained execution model of grains allows the Orleans runtime to persist, migrate, replicate, and reconcile grain state without programmer intervention. Orleans also provides lightweight, optimistic,distributed transactions that provide predictable consistency and failure handling for distributed operations across multiple grains. We believe that this framework will significantly simplify the development of complex cloud applications, by incorporating fundamental distributed computing functionality and abstractions into the system and by promoting the use of design patterns that promote scalability and reliabilit. One of Microsoft’s biggest selling points for its cloud platform is that developers can use .Net, Visual Studio and other programming tools they already know to write Azure applications.

Silverlight versus other applications inside web browser

mailtokos@gmail.com — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 16:15:00 +0300

With this new releases of Silverlight, the border between web applications and desktop applications is becoming much thinner. Code Name WPF/E. You might have heard the name Windows Presentation Foundation Everywhere, or WPF/E. This was the code name under which Microsoft developed Silverlight, in reference to Windows Presentation Foundation, the rich desktop programming framework included in .NET 3.0 and later. Very soon, however, this name was abandoned in favor of the catchier Silverlight. Silverlight is here to stay, and Microsoft is betting a lot on this technology. In these three years, it went from “Flash contender” to major user interface technology. A convergence is occurring between Silverlight and WPF. More and more features are shared. The movement is toward compatibility, with Silverlight becoming a complete subset of WPF. Not just compatibility of interfaces, but also binary compatibility. We will probably see this happening in the next few years.

Silverlight is a powerful development platform for creating engaging, interactive applications for many screens across the Web, desktop, and mobile devices. Silverlight 5 introduces more than 40 new features, including support for running Silverlight applications with desktop features in the browser, dramatic video quality and performance improvements, and features that improve developer productivity.

Alternatives to Silverlight

Adobe Flash - this is the obvious contender, the one technology that is most often mentioned when Silverlight is compared to other frameworks. Adobe Flash is installed on a huge number of computers and various operating systems. It is also a well-known environment, and many companies develop applications in Flash for the Web. As mentioned when Silverlight 2 was released, Flash is not going to be killed by Silverlight, and in fact this was never Microsoft’s intention. Rather, Silverlight provides a welcomed alternative to firms who do not want to invest in two very different technologies for the desktop and the Web. Silverlight and Flash are coexisting on the Web, sometimes even in the same web pages. Thankfully, this is easy to realize, and there is even a possibility to let these mixed applications communicate together through JavaScript. This allows a gradual modification of existing websites from Flash to Silverlight, without breaking the functionalities or forcing the users to adapt to large-scale changes. We actually saw some striking examples of this at Microsoft itself, with existing Flash applications being gradually converted to Silverlight without disruptions.

Java Applets - Java as a plug-in is quite widespread and allows small applications known as applets to run in the web browser. Java was revolutionary in that way when it was released, but it suffers from a lot of issues: . Java is notoriously slow. It’s slow to install on a new computer, and especially slow to start. Java applets have a bad reputation when it comes to security. This claim might not be as true in newer versions as it used to be, but Java’s adoption in the corporate world has suffered a lot from this concern.

Microsoft ActiveX - silverlight differs significantly from ActiveX, and converting existing applications to this new technology is not the easiest task a developer can dream of. With this step, however, you will offer a newer, richer, and much friendlier interface to your users, and make a big step toward the future of software development.

Adobe AIR - For users, AIR applications are known to be heavy in memory consumption, and require an additional framework that must be installed the first time you run an AIR application(even if you have Flash already installed). This can be a problem on corporate networks, where IT departments are often reluctant to install new components on users’ PCs. Silverlight, on the other hand, is installed once and gets the out-of-the-browser capabilities immediately.

HTML5 - this new revision of HTML intends to provide a wide range of rich functionality, allowing developers to reduce the use of third-party plug-ins. In this matter, it positions itself as a concurrent of Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight.
Although it is true that plug-ins cause problems, they also solve some. One big issue with HTML is that different web browsers have different implementations of the standard. This is a well-known issue: Testing a web page for all major web browsers on all major operating systems can be a real hassle. On the other hand, Silverlight as a plug-in is guaranteed to run the same in every supported web browser. The major issue that HTML5 faces is that a wide adoption will take a lot of time. Also, if we learned anything from the past, it is that each browser is likely to offer a slightly different feature set. Some features will simply be missing from some browsers; other features will be implemented in a different manner. Compatibility will take a lot of time, if it is ever achieved. In the meantime, and until we know whether HTML5 really delivers what it promises, Silverlight offers a real alternative.

One important thing to keep in mind is that Silverlight is not a replacement for HTML web pages, and will absolutely not kill HTML. Silverlight is here to enhance your web pages with richer content, and with the out-of-the-browser feature, to create lightweight applications that can function online or offline. Learning Silverlight does not mean that you should avoid writing HTML code, or that you should stop investing in technologies such as ASP.NET. But it means that you can now realize applications that were impossible (or very difficult) to do in HTML/CSS/JavaScript, and that you can use the same languages (and in some cases reuse code) on the server and on the client.

From a security point of view, Silverlight also scores better because you don't really have to worry about common issues such as XSS, CSRF and other vulnerabilities that are common in web-development.

Silverlight can give you animation online, deliver RIAs, stream movies etc (all that Flash and HTML 5 can do), but Silverlight has a lot more to offer. The architecture behind Silverlight I feel is spot on. It mixes both the worlds of Desktop and Web seamlessly, effectively delivering desktop applications (with all their power) via the internet for installation, communication and maintenance. This is very different to HTML 5. Because of this, developers will use Silverlight for business applications, for RIAs that need to do more (integrate, carry out complex functions etc) and all without the reliance on the browser or server doing processing jobs. This reduces testing and ensures a single code base (and that’s how it should be). In addition, you get frequent updates, and full support from Microsoft, which again are good things for real developers.

References

http://sobees.com/web - Many people, however, do not use the social websites but prefer to use a rich aggregator instead. Sobees offer such applications for multiple platforms, including one built in Silverlight 4 or 5 and running either in the browser or installed out-of-the-browser. The Sobees application can be used to visualize entries from Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn within one single window. It is also possible to perform multiple searches on Twitter.

Deep Zooming the Matterhorn - Deep Zoom application was developed by Microsoft Switzerland to celebrate their 20th anniversary in Switzerland. When the image is loaded in the DeepZoom viewer (powered by Silverlight), the user can zoom in or out (for example using the mouse wheel or, if he has a supported multitouch screen, with a “pinch” gesture).

Another great way to get involved in the Silverlight community, you can find more information about the Silverlight community at http://silverlight.net/community
Microsoft Silverlight team are on Twitter. You will find their usernames at http://www.galasoft.ch/sl4-twittermvp and http://www.galasoft.ch/sl4-twittermsft

http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/

Silverlight Training Course on Channel 9

Silverlight Forums on the Silverlight community site

You can gain more insight by reading the post about Silverlight on these blogs:

Summary

Note the following restrictions:

The Opera web browser is not officially supported at the time of this writing.
PowerPC-based Apple computers support only Silverlight 1.0.
Cross-Browser and Cross-Platform Compatibility

If you were still hesitating to invest in Silverlight, now is a great time to start.

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Silverlight versus other applications inside web browser

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