Brian H. Prince

Thrive for Developers is online

2009-07-07T10:45:00.001-04:00

A little while back I wrote about a site called Thrive for IT Pros. We have launched a similar site for developers called Thrive for Developers. Microsoft has always been good about giving the information and tools developers need to build great software. Thrive is a way for us to go beyond that. To help you learn the tools you need for your career, how to be a better developer, and do more with what you have already.

I was really excited to be asked to be a part of this launch. Many of you have seen the Soft Skillz talk that I have done over the past year. They have also brought together a lot of content from the community, as well as tools to help you find that next job.

That Soft Skillz talk originated out of a farewell talk I did as I left my team at Quick Solutions. It focused on retelling the lessons we had learned over my time there, so I could pass on some of our culture and tribal knowledge to the next generation of the team.

The talk evolved, and became very popular. When I heard about the new Thrive site, I pitched it to the team, to see if it could be part of the content. I was going to turn the talk into a screencast anyway, so why not have a place to host it? They accepted, and I started breaking the show down into 7 minute chunks. Way faster than an 8 minute show, and of course 6 minutes would too short, you wouldn’t even be able to get your heart rate going..

The first four episodes are up:

Driving Your Career - Soft Skills to Move You Forward

Sit shotgun with Brian Prince in “Driving Your Career” – a 32-week screencast series that explores the new skills developers need to thrive. Brian will tackle relevant topics including quick learning techniques, how to manage your career, how to build consensus, and the always-tricky task of talking to humans. Brian will share his expertise of being a manager, a consultant, and many other roles over his career, to help you succeed in yours.

Week 1 - It’s always darkest before the dawn | WMV MP3

Week 2 - How I learned that humans don’t care about technology | WMV MP3

Week 3 - Always have a mentor | WMV MP3

Week 4 - Body language doesn’t use CSS | WMV MP3

So please check them out, and even more importantly, forward the link to anyone you know that is struggling in their career, or in finding a job.

Windows 7 Release Date Announced!

2009-06-03T07:34:00.001-04:00

Steve Guggenheimer announced the release dates of Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 at Computex 2009 in Tapei. We will be RTM’ing Windows 7 in the second half of July, with general availability (that means it’s in stores, etc.) by October 22nd. Windows Server 2008 R2 will be available at the same time.

This is awesome news! Warm up your download tools, it’s not far away.

Everyone I know has been impressed with, and really likes Windows 7, even some of the most critical people I know. I think this is due to the changes in how the Windows team developed the OS, as well as how open they were to feedback, and their willingness to make changes. If you weren’t reading the Engineering Windows 7 blog, you should go there now, and read all of the posts. They are all quite fascinating.

I got to be part of the IQ team, which is a very small part, but it was still fun. I would be given weekly builds to install on my machines, and to test out. While the Beta was of a very high quality, for a beta, I could see the continuing improvements in quality and features in every build. I would get giddy every time I would get the email that a new build was available, then spend the next half day downloading it, and installing it on all of my machines.

I am looking forward to stabilizing on one consistent build for a while. That is of course until they start on Windows 8. :)

Martin Shoemaker and I discuss VS2010 & UML on Arcast.tv

2009-05-27T10:06:00.001-04:00

A while ago Martin and I sat down to discuss UML and how it is making a come back in VS2010 for architects. We had a great chat, and we learned how this isn’t your grandpa’s UML anymore. The way the VS team has implemented it is much more functional to everyone on the team besides the Big Up Front Planning Dinosaur. It will help you understand the lay of the land for that large system you inherited, allowing you to more easily see what is going on.

http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/ARCast.TV/ARCastTV-Martin-Shoemaker-discusses-UML-in-VSTS2010/

nPlus1.org hosts their third summit

2009-05-27T10:00:00.001-04:00

nPlus1.org is hosting it's third Architecture Summit on June 10th at the Microsoft office in Nashville, TN (Franklin). The topic of this summit will be Patterns and Principles.

Session One: Software Patterns

Patterns are an important tool to use as architects and developers. They provide a common vocabulary for us to design with, as well as a common approach to a common problem. Come learn about useful patterns, and how to use them in your everyday code.

Session Two: How I Learned To Love Dependency Injection

Dependency Injection is one of those scary topics that most developers avoid. It sounds all ‘high-falootin’ and complex. It’s not. Really. We wouldn’t lie. It’s a great way to manage complexity in your system, and a great way to make your system so much more testable. And isn’t that what we all want?

Each session will be followed by open discussions periods.

A catered lunch will be provided starting at noon when the welcome time begins.

Ian McDonald is coming to Columbus next week!

2009-05-20T09:55:00.001-04:00

Ian McDonald is the director and general manager of the Windows Server Group. He will be travelling through Ohio, and will be speaking at the Columbus Exchange & Windows User Group (CEWUG). The group meets at the Columbus Microsoft office. He will be talking about the experience of developing Windows.

Agenda

5:30 to 6:05: Welcome time; meet the MS steering committee, pizza and beverages
6:05 to 7:05: An inside perspective of managing the Windows code base.
5 minute break
7:10 to 8:15: Finish, the intricacies of the people, process and technology of creating Windows Server.

Where:

8800 Lyra Dr, Suite 400 Columbus, OH 43240

When:

Wednesday: May 27, 2009 5:30 to 8:15 PM

ArcReady is coming to Grand Rapids, MI

2009-04-13T11:32:00.001-04:00

So, you live in GR, and you want to go to ArcReady, but Detroit is just too far away? Then rest easy my friend. With some great help from Chris Woodruff, and the great folks at RCM Technologies, we are bringing ArcReady to Grand Rapids. The www.arcready.com site should be updated soon. The link to register is

http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032413886&Culture=en-US.

For information on what the sessions will be about, check out my post from last week.

nPlus1.org is giving away $250

2009-04-09T13:41:00.001-04:00

nPlus1.org is on a hunt for a new look. The site has really taken off over the past six months, and they are ready for a facelift.

Go design a new look, and submit it. First prize is $250 to Best Buy and a copy of Vista Ultimate. There are other prizes as well.

Their site is built on Graffiti CMS, and you will need to either provide a template, or other materials to easily upgrade the site.

Take a look at the official rules and requirements at http://nplus1.org/faceliftcontest/.

Upcoming events in the area

2009-04-08T11:16:00.000-04:00

Mike Wood and Jennifer Marsman put together this list of events in the area.

I often get asked how people know about the events. It actually becomes sort of all over the place. There is the MSDN Events page, communitymegaphone.com, the web pages of your local user groups, word of mouth, word of social networking site, word of twitter, etc. There isn’t one place to rule them all. While that seems unfortunate, I don’t that is achievable, or worthwhile. The goal should be to announce the events in as many channels as possible. You don’t seen an ad for a movie just at the movie theatre, do you?

Any way, on to the list:

Event	Event Date	Website
Cincinnati Silverlight Firestarter	3/28/2009	http://cinnug.org/
West Michigan .NET University	4/4/2009	http://dodn.org/WestMichiganDotNetU/
Central Ohio Day of .NET	4/18/2009	http://cinnug.org/cododn/
Lansing Give Camp	4/24/2009-4/26/2009	http://www.lansinggivecamp.org/
Kalamazoo X Conference	4/25/2009	http://www.kalamazoox.org/
Stir Trek	5/8/2009	http://www.stirtrek.com/
Lansing Tech Fest (Open Space)	5/30/2009	http://www.LansingTechFest.org (website not up yet)
Cincinnati ORM Firestarter	6/13/2009	No URL yet?
CodeStock	6/26/2009-6/27/2009	http://www.codestock.org/
Ann Arbor Give Camp	7/17/2009-7/19/2009	http://michigangivecamp.org/cms/AnnArbor/
Columbus Give Camp	7/17/2009-7/19/2009	No URL yet?
Lansing Day of .NET	8/1/2009	http://www.dayofdotnet.org (Lansing site not yet)
devLink	8/13/2009-8/15/2009	http://www.devlink.net/

Learn Lean Processes with LeanDog

2009-04-08T10:09:00.001-04:00

LeanDog is an interesting company. They are located in Cleveland, on a barge. Yes, a barge, on the water. They run an agile shop, and deliver software solutions for their customers.

The great thing is that they open up their space to a whole host of community events. I love it when companies ‘get’ why they should support and adopt the community. Jon, the founder, has an amazing amount of passion for agile practices, and experience helping teams adopt them.

TDD is an amazing practice. It has had a huge impact on how software is developed today. It has shifted how tech teams look at writing software, and has dramatically increased the initial quality of the software, and reduced the long term maintenance costs as well.

The trick with it is that it is very hard to learn, and takes at least six months if you are learning it by reading books and blogs. It is just one of those skills that you need to do with someone to fully get. You can reduce the learning time by doing this. If you are trying to learn TDD you need to find someone to work with, and spend some time with them

LeanDog will be offering some training later this month, "Test Driven Development & Refactoring in C#”. They will cover what TDD is, design and refactoring skills, as well as testing skills that you need.

My two good friends, Nate Hoellein and Corey Haines will be the instructors. The course does cost $1995 for the three days, but that is a small price to pay for being in a room with these two guys for three days. The training is on April 21,22 & 23rd. The cost includes parking, equipment, and food. Dancing bears are extra.

Check out www.leandog.com for all of the gory details.

Windows 7 Beta to RC Guidance

2009-04-08T10:05:00.000-04:00

THIS IS NOT AN ANNOUNCEMENT ABOUT WHEN THE RC WILL BE AVAILABLE!

Many people have been running the beta of Windows 7 for a while now, and we have gotten some great feedback. I have been running weekly internal builds since build 7000 went public, and it gets better every time. I, personally, have been loving my experience with Win7.

At some point in the future, we will be releasing a Release Candidate (RC) for Windows 7. Many of you with Windows 7 Beta installed will be sorely tempted to just upgrade to the RC. I can understand why, as I do build-to-build upgrades on my machines every week. It saves all that setting up, installing, and what not that you have to do to take a machine from bare metal to something that is productive for you.

PLEASE, use Windows Easy Transfer, save off your files, and then do a fresh install. We ask you do this mainly so we can test a real world scenario. You CAN do a build-to-build upgrade, but that is not a scenario we are trying to test, and the point of an RC is to get a broad sense of what is going on in the “REAL WORLD.(TM)”

Am I the only one that thinks ‘type mismatch’ from my old Apple IIe basic days when I see the trademark symbol?

When I do build-to-build, it takes a few hours as the files and settings are migrated, so an upgrade doesn’t save you all that much time from a fresh install. When I have been doing fresh installs (at least one of my machines per new build), I have been using Live mesh to do all of the heavy lifting. Here is what I do:

- Install OS
- Join Domain
- Install Office 2007 and VSTS 2008
- Install Live Mesh
- Let is sync for a while
- Install little tools (Live Essentials, ISO mounter, and FoxIt Reader are the first)
- Install twitter client. :)

Another great path we would like you to try is to upgrade from an existing Windows Vista machine. Please report issues via the connect.Microsoft.com site. This allows us to channel the feedback to the correct team, and allows you to see what other people are reporting.

Copy the contents of the ISO to a flash drive, and install off of that. It’s super fast.

A few notes that all of your should already know:

- Don’t run BETA software on any machine that is important to your productivity.
- Don’t do an upgrade on a machine before you have backed up the important data.

To get the scoop on this whole scenario, and the instructions for doing a build-to-build upgrade, check out http://blogs.msdn.com/e7/archive/2009/04/07/delivering-a-quality-upgrade-experience.aspx.

PS. The good news is that it will contain IE8RTM and be able to run the Azure SDK.

TechNet Unleashed – Windows Server 2008 R2

2009-04-07T16:39:00.001-04:00

Session 1: Windows Server 2008 R2 – Optimize your Time

Get a jump start on your peers with Windows Server 2008 R2 by joining us for this no nonsense technical session, where we will discuss the critical improvements in the next version of Windows Server. Some have argued that, given the impressive scope of new functionality in Windows Server 2008 R2, it should not be an “R2” release, but rather should be given a completely new name. They point to features such as Direct Access, Branch Caching, Live Migration, Powershell 2.0, and VDI that will help you cut down on the amount of time you spend doing mundane tasks, reduce end user frustration and support headaches, and give your mobile workforce a competitive edge through ubiquitous access to company data. There’s a good chance that by attending this session you’ll find a way to save time and money with Windows Server 2008 R2, and so you’ll get the time you spend with us back many times over.

Session 2: Windows 7 – Maximize Your Potential

In designing Windows 7, the engineering team had a clear focus on what we call ‘the fundamentals': performance, application compatibility, device compatibility, reliability, security and battery life. Early reviews of Windows 7 seem to indicate that the choice to focus on the fundamentals is resonating well with many users and professionals. And, IT professionals will further benefit from the enhancements to manageability and security. You’ll also learn how your investments in testing and evaluating Windows Vista will pay off in the transition to Windows 7. Come see firsthand what all the buzz is about in this demo-intensive session where we explore the UI improvements, performance gains, and manageability enhancements in the next client operating system from Microsoft.

Session 3: Internet Explorer 8 – Get Excited About the Browser Again

Internet Explorer is currently the most widely used browser in business, and while we’ve seen nice incremental improvements to IE in recent history, we haven’t seen as many truly earth shattering changes. Well, many agree that the next release of IE, Internet Explorer 8, provides the most compelling upgrade to IE in many years. In a typical day, users spend 2 hours or more per day in the browser, so significant improvements here can have tremendous impact on productivity and the way we work. The browser needs to be thought of in the same terms as an operating system—it has to be rich, robust, interoperable, easy to use and secure. Internet Explorer 8 is a browser that meets these needs and more for users, enterprises, IT professionals and developers alike. Come learn how the new improvements, too numerous to mention here, are driving many to get excited about the browser again.

WHO SHOULD ATTEND?

IT professionals interested in learning about the next generation of Microsoft platforms and tools.

WHERE ARE THE EVENTS?

Events are held in 16 cities across Central Region. To register for this event, please select a link below.

Location/Registration	Date	Time
Waukesha, WI	4/28/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Austin, TX	4/28/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Bloomington, MN	4/30/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Cleveland, OH	4/30/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Indianapolis, IN	5/4/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Chicago, IL	5/5/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Columbus, OH	5/12/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Houston, TX	5/12/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Mason, OH	5/14/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Overland Park, KS	5/14/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Dallas, TX	5/19/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Southfield, MI	5/20/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Downers Grove, IL	5/20/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
St. Louis, MO	5/21/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Nashville, TN	6/11/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm
Knoxville, TN	6/12/2009	3:10pm – 5:00pm

MSDN Unleashed – IE8 & Windows 7 for Developers

2009-04-07T16:37:00.001-04:00

Session 1: Internet Explorer 8 for Developers

The Windows Internet Explorer 8 browser makes it easier to explore and interact with the web. Did you know that there will be a new standards mode by default? While it can easily be turned off, knowing the potential to impact this may have on many sites that have been crafted around various features in past versions is a good idea. Attend this session to learn which current practices you need to change and how the new standards mode affects your development techniques and your existing sites. We review tools that are built into Internet Explorer 8 to help developers debug and create Web pages. We also discuss Web Slices, Accelerators, and Search Suggestion – all of which are key new features in this latest release.

In this session we’ll show you:

· Developer Tools

· Selectors API

· Use and create accelerators

· Use and create web slices

· Use and create search suggestions

· AJAX Navigation enhancements with Virtual Earth demo on history, AJAX Cross Domain Calls

· CSS improvements (printing, counters, new pseudo classes)

Session 2: Developing on Microsoft Windows 7

Building applications that are easy to use, visually appealing, and offer high performance is a challenge that developers face every day. Innovative applications can greatly improve the user experience, empowering companies to differentiate their services and solutions. However, developers are increasingly asked to do more in less time, while also optimizing the power and performance requirements of their applications. The Windows 7 platform makes it easy for developers to create engaging, user-friendly applications by providing familiar tools and rich development features that allow them to take advantage of the latest PC capabilities. In this session we will explore the new Taskbar and Jump Lists, the Scenic Ribbon, file management with Libraries, and Windows Web Services among many other enhancements to the new operating system.

In this session we’ll show you:

· New Features in Windows 7

· Use and create jump lists

· Scenic Ribbon API

· Use and create Libraries

· Windows Web Services API

· Additional enhancements that support development

WHO SHOULD ATTEND?

Developers interested in learning about the next generation of Microsoft platforms and tools.

WHERE ARE THE EVENTS?

Events are held in 16 cities across Central Region. To register for this event, please visit http://www.msdnevents.com/unleashed.

Location/Registration	Date	Time
Waukesha, WI	4/28/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Austin, TX	4/28/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Bloomington, MN	4/30/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Cleveland, OH	4/30/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Indianapolis, IN	5/4/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Chicago, IL	5/5/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Columbus, OH	5/12/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Houston, TX	5/12/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Mason, OH	5/14/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Overland Park, KS	5/14/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Dallas, TX	5/19/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Southfield, MI	5/20/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Downers Grove, IL	5/20/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
St. Louis, MO	5/21/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Nashville, TN	6/11/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm
Knoxville, TN	6/12/2009	1:00pm – 2:50pm

ArcReady – Architecting for the Client Tier

2009-04-07T16:36:00.001-04:00

Architecting for the Client Tier

The client (or presentation) tier of our applications is taking on an increasingly important role. Users are expecting more compelling user interfaces, but they also want more functionality from their applications. In this ArcReady we examine how to design and deliver well architected client applications that will be easy to maintain and extend.

Session 1: Trends and Patterns on the Client Tier

In our first session we will take a vendor and platform neutral look at some of the trends and emerging technologies that can be used on the client tier. We will look at techniques like Mashups, technologies like Natural User Interfaces (NUI) and the increasing importance of the mobile platform. We will also look at some common patterns that can be used in the architecture of the client tier.

Session 2: Applying Microsoft Technology on the Client Tier

In our second session we will take some look at how we can use Microsoft technologies to create well architected and compelling client applications. We will look at technologies like Silverlight and WPF that can be used to create compelling clients. We will also look at technologies that can be used to make your applications more extensible for future development. We will also examine some architectural guidance developed by the Microsoft Patterns and Practices group.

WHAT IS ARCREADY?

· A forum for aspiring and practicing architects to discuss industry trends

· An overview of Microsoft’s roadmap as it relates to software architecture

· A mechanism to solicit your feedback

· An opportunity to showcase the work you do!

WHO SHOULD ATTEND?

Architects and Senior Developers who are interested in becoming an architect.

WHERE ARE THE EVENTS?

Events are held in 16 cities across Central Region. To register for this event, please visit www.arcready.com.

Location/Registration	Date	Time
Waukesha, WI	4/28/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Austin, TX	4/28/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Bloomington, MN	4/30/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Cleveland, OH	4/30/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Indianapolis, IN	5/4/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Chicago, IL	5/5/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Columbus, OH	5/12/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Houston, TX	5/12/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Mason, OH	5/14/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Overland Park, KS	5/14/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Dallas, TX	5/19/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Southfield, MI	5/20/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Downers Grove, IL	5/20/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
St. Louis, MO	5/21/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Nashville, TN	6/11/2009	9:00am – 11:45am
Knoxville, TN	6/12/2009	9:00am – 11:45am

KalamXoo Conference is on April 25th, 2009

2009-04-04T16:28:00.000-04:00

While I am here at the great West Michigan .NET University event, I wanted to tell you about another Michigan event coming up. This one has a bit of a different flavor though. Instead of being all about hard skills, all of the talks will be about soft skills. I think this is a great change. While we have a very strong community in the area, our user groups spend too much of their time talking about hard skills, and not enough time about skills that make them better developers as a whole. The Kalamaxoo event team set out to change this. I will be speaking, as well as some other great people, so check it out.

From their site http://blindbackup.com/,

The Kalamazoo X Conference is a one-day software development conference hosted in beautiful Southwest Michigan. While there are many great technical conferences in the region, their focus tends toward new technologies and programming languages. The Kalamazoo X Conference intends to uniquely complement those conferences by enabling attendees to boost their process, design, and communication skills in the following areas:

Human interaction, including social, personal, and career development.

Interface and graphic design

Development processes and best practices

Requirements analysis, architecture, design, and modeling

This one day, one of a kind conference is being held April 25, 2009 from 8AM to 6PM in beautiful downtown Kalamazoo.

Register Now! Professionals $20, Students $10.

devLink has opened registration

2009-04-03T16:16:00.000-04:00

I could sit here and tell you about the great conference that devLink is, or how inexpensive (and cost effective it is), or say how awesome it was last year, or about the great speakers (and myself) that will be there. But I figured just pasting in their own well written announcement is enough. It’s call code reuse. I get to be a speaker again this year. While I doubt there will be a devLink bus this year (people still haven’t recovered from last year’s bus) but it would be cheap to get some buddies, and carpool down there. See you there!

     The devLink Technical Conference is pleased to announce it's fourth annual event - devLink 2009. This year devLink will take place August 13 - 15 in Nashville, TN. We have worked hard to bring you the best content possible at a price you can afford. This year promises to be the best devLink ever with nearly 100 sessions offered over three days. That's right, we have expanded devLink to a third day to allow even more content to be delivered to you. The tentative list of sessions is available now so click here for more information.

    We understand that economic hardships abound, so again devLink is brought to you at a price so reasonable that a ticket to devLink is less than two good technical books. Now don't you think you will get more out of three days worth of content delivered by experienced professionals than a couple of books? General admission tickets to devLink 2009 are $100, but if you buy your ticket before April 15 they are only $75. So what are you waiting for? Get your ticket NOW!

     Since 2006, the devLink conference has sold out tickets before the deadline. While we cannot control demand, we can control how many seats are available. This year we return to the excellent facilities offered by Lipscomb University and with that expand our seating capacity to 800 people. Space is limited and having a ticket to devLink 2009 is the only way you can assure admittance so get your ticket TODAY!

Three tips to help your career on Edge

2009-04-02T16:06:00.001-04:00

While I was on campus in Redmond during the MVP summit in March, Adam Carter asked me to swing by the TechNet Edge studio for a quick visit. We sat down, and talked about three things you can do to help you career. Check it out. There are some funny April Fool’s joke videos as well.

P&P Releases PRISM 2.0

2009-02-28T13:41:00.000-05:00

The Patterns & Practices group at Microsoft has released version 2.0 of the PRISM framework. PRISM is a framework you can use you easily build loosely coupled composed applications. This new version supports both WPF and Silverlight! That is totally awesome.

I believe that we should focus on only writing the code that only we can write, and to leverage frameworks and components to provide the infrastructure and cross cutting concerns for our systems. This is a key way to provide more value to your business, and to reduce costs and time. There are plenty of other ways, like TDD, agile, pairing, etc. But this post is about PRISM, and there are far more smarter people than I to learn about those other practices from.

PRISM helps you create modules in your application. For example, a screen might have a list of upcoming appointments, and a section highlighting some tasks the user has to accomplish before the selected appointment. Each of these pieces would be a component. But they aren’t directly tied together. The first instinct might be to refresh the view of the task list when the selected appointment is changed in the list. You might go off and write some glue code to do this. There are many applications that are created like this, and in some situations, this is ok.

But some applications need a greater degree of loose coupling. PRISM provides a sort of message bus within the application that allows the modules to communicate without being directly bound to each other. This is really useful when these components are accessing different systems, and presenting their information in a composed manner.

Another great reason to build a system in such a loosely coupled manner is when the modules are being developed in a disconnected way. Perhaps each component is coming from different teams, and they need a separate development process. Maybe the architect expects a great degree of enhancement by the business over several years, and they want an easy way to plug in new modules as the system grows. This could easily be used by an ISV in such a manner, when they often need to deploy customer specific customizations.

This componentization also benefits the testability of your codebase. When a system is well architected, and has the proper level of the component isolation, it becomes easier to test each component in a stand alone manner.

The great thing about PRISM is it will give you the most reuse of you code across both platforms.

If you are building line of business applications, especially in a services environment, you should take 20 minutes and check out PRISM. The kit comes with a full reference application called Stock Trader. It is built using the framework, and following the latest guidance on how to build composed applications.

Of course guidance is exactly that. As with all things architecture, it depends. You need to spend an hour reading about this, understand how it might fit into what you might be doing, and be prepared to bring out of your toolbox when an opportunity exists. The videos on Channel 9 make it really easy to understand how it can help you.

Channel 9 videos

http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/Continuum/Prismv2/

http://channel9.msdn.com/posts/akMSFT/

Because it is from P&P, and hosted on CodePlex, you get access to the source code. So if it is close to what you need, but you want to enhance it, or tweak it to suit your needs, by all means go ahead. To get the bits, and to read more about the framework, check out these sites:

http://www.microsoft.com/compositewpf

http://www.codeplex.com/prism

Azure ‘How do I’ videos

2009-02-27T10:59:00.000-05:00

Looking for something to do this weekend? How about a series of small, low calorie, bite sized videos on how to work with Azure? Check these out. These are great training videos.

Everyone is interested in Azure, and cloud computing, and everyone is looking for resources to get up to speed quickly. This is the next best thing to downloading the SDK and hacking out some code.

Overall Page	Visit here for the full summary of videos
Get Started Developing on Windows Azure?	If you’re a developer and you’re new to Windows Azure, start here! You’ll see what you need to download and install, and how to create a simple “Hello World” Windows Azure application.
Deploy a Windows Azure Application	You’ll see what it takes to move your application into the cloud – you’ll see how to request and register a token, how to upload your Windows Azure application and how to move it between staging and production in the cloud.
Store Blobs in Windows Azure Storage?	Learn how to leverage Windows Azure storage to store data as blobs. You’ll learn about blob storage, containers and the API that makes it easy to manage everything from managed code.
Leverage Queues in Windows Azure?	Learn how to use queues to facilitate communication between Web and Worker roles in Windows Azure.
Debugging Tips for Windows Azure Applications	The Windows Azure SDK includes a development fabric that provides a "cloud on your desktop." In this screencast, learn how to debug your Windows Azure applications in this environment.
Get Started with .NET Services?	.NET Services are a set of highly scalable building blocks for programming in the cloud. In this brief screencast, you'll learn about the registration process, the SDK and the built-in samples - everything you need to know in order to get started.
Harness the Microsoft .NET Service Bus?	The .NET Service Bus makes it easy to access your Web services no matter where they are. In this brief screencast, you'll see how to take a basic Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) service and expose it to the Internet with the .NET Service Bus.
Get Started with the Live Framework?	If you are looking to get started developing with the Live Framework, this is the place to start! In this screencast you'll learn how to get a Live Services token and what you need to download in order to start writing Live Framework applications.
Use the Microsoft Live Framework Resource Browser?	The Live Framework Resource Model is a simple, straightforward information model based on entities, collections and relationships. In this brief screencast you'll learn how to navigate the relationships between entities by using the Live Framework Resource Browser, which is a tool that ships with the Live Framework SDK.

Dave Giard publishes an interview with Brian H. Prince

2009-02-26T16:55:00.001-05:00

Dave was hanging around the awesome CodeMash event this January, when he asked to interview me for his blogged. So we snuck out to the entryway of the Kalahari, and chatted about my experience at being a new employee of Microsoft.

He had good timing in publishing the video, since this past Wednesday was my one year anniversary as a blue badge. Go check it out.

http://www.davidgiard.com/2009/02/23/BrianPrinceOnWorkingForMicrosoft.aspx

New User Group: Columbus Exchange & Windows User Group

2009-02-26T13:49:00.000-05:00

Some of my colleagues have worked with IT Pros in the community to start a new user group focused on Exchange and Windows. If you need to manage these systems, and want to learn how to really leverage them, this is the group for you.

CEWUG Registration Link

What: http://cewug.spaces.live.com/blog/

· Please join us for the first meeting of the Columbus Exchange & Windows User Group (CEWUG). The goal of CEWUG is to help businesses, public sector and home users to optimize their knowledge of Windows, Exchange, Office Collaboration Server, System Center, Dynamics and Virtualization.

· The goal of the CEWUG is to build relationships with peers, share expertise and involvement with the central Ohio IT community.

· We will meet the 4^th Wednesday of the month at the MS Columbus Office: 8800 Lyra Dr, Suite 400, Columbus, OH 43240

Agenda:

§ 5:30 to 6:05: Welcome time; meet the MS steering committee, pizza and beverages

§ 6:05 to 7:05: Windows 7 Overview

§ 5 minute break

§ 7:10 to 8:15: Finish Windows 7, Start Windows Server 2008 R2

Where:

· 8800 Lyra Dr, Suite 400 Columbus, OH 43240

When:

· Wednesday: February 25, 2009 5:30 to 8:15 PM

I will be with a bunch of KNOTheads

2009-02-25T14:40:00.000-05:00

During the upcoming ArcReady tour, I will be sitting in on a KNOThead meeting. The meeting is at EdFinancial, and is from 5:30-8:00pm on 3/10/2008. We will talk about cloud computing, and how this shift is affecting our organizations, especially during this time of grapefruit.

So come out for ArcReady, and hang around for the KNOThead meeting.

Location:

EdFinancial Services, 150 N Seven Oaks Dr, Knoxville, TN

Job security is a myth, and how IT Pros are Thriving

2009-02-24T18:35:00.001-05:00

No matter how you slice it, the economy is definitely in a state of concern. Some call it a recession, some a depression, others it is a crash. Since all of those words are overloaded, I will choose to use the word Grapefruit to represent the current situation. How concerned you are with grapefruit depends on who you are, and your personal situation. It is these times of grapefruit when there is the most opportunity. Crazy, I know. But now is the time to start that crazy idea, to outmaneuver an opponent, or get desperate enough to take risks you normally wouldn’t take (personally, or as a company) during up times.

All boats float in the high tide. Only great captains can navigate the low tide.

There is no such thing as job security. Surprise. There just isn’t, it is a complete myth. ‘Job Security’ might have made sense two generations ago, but it just doesn’t work now. You make your own security, during good times, and during grapefruits. Through keeping your skills sharp, through delivering real value to your company, planning for your own future, and through professional networking. The people that aren’t worried now are those that have been training at home, going to user groups, and networking both inside and outside the organization. They knew they needed to be ready when the grapefruit came.

A large part of our economy is based on technology, and if you are reading this blog, then you are likely in technology as well. Microsoft is in a position, and I think obligated, to help out IT Pros weather this storm.

We have launched a new program, called Thrive, that will help IT Pros with their careers. We have looked at how we can empower the IT Pro to really move the needle when it comes to helping your company not only survive through these times, but thrive.

The program is centered on three aspects:

Career Care
Technical Competency
Business and IT Alignment

Career Care We have worked out a program to help you guide your career. These come from career and IT experts. We want to help you learn and prove your skills with certifications and access to technical training and material. We are working with CareerBuilder.com to provide help in managing your career.

Technical Competency We are working to bring a series of programs to bear that will help you learn the skills you need to be fresh, and to use the technology you ALREADY HAVE. What? Yes, we want to help you get the most of what you have. No need to buy something that will fix this problem. Chances are you already have it, and have been to busy or distracted with luxurious trips to Hawaii to use it.

Our platforms have had the features for years that help you do more with less. Whether that is virtualization technology, or management tools that help only a few IT Pros to manage hundreds or thousands of desktops. There are plenty of other time and money saving goodness in Windows. It has taken this tough environment to get people to look into using them, when they really need the payback, and show how much value they are really delivering. Plus, chances are you used these features as a selling point to management to let you buy it, so you should probably use them.

Business and IT Alignment We want to help you align with the business, and help you communicate your value, long term, to the business. There are tools and training in place that can teach you how to align your IT goals with the business goals, and then market that throughout your organization. As techs, we really know technology, but sometimes we need help explaining that value to the rest of the world. “It’s just better” usually doesn’t cut it. That is like telling a child to drink grapefruit juice because it is good for them. You have to be able to articulate the value, and then follow through.

Once you are aligned, it is easy to show your value, and it is easy to be seen as a lever to help move the business, not just a cost center, that must be paid like the water bill. If you are a cost center, then the first thing companies look for is how to CUT COSTS. If you are a strategic advantage, they company looks on how to use you as a lever to survive and thrive in this grapefruit.

How are you positioning yourself, your team, and your organization for success during this economic grapefruit? Visit the Thrive site and learn how to enhance your skills, advance your career and elevate IT as the business leader. Go ahead - find out how YOU can Thrive!

Azure Tables are for Squares in the Cloud

2009-02-20T17:05:00.001-05:00

The third aspect of Azure storage is the table structure. BLOBs answer how to manage unstructured data in your cloud application, and tables answer how to manage your structured date.

Tables, like the rest of Azure, are designed to be super scalable. You can easily store billions of rows, and terabytes of data, and still get great performance. Because the tables are part of Azure, the table data is always available, and triple replicated for reliability.

Accessing tables is easy using ADO.NET Data Services, which should be familiar to most .NET developers. ADO.NET DS uses normal .NET classes and LINQ to access your data. If you don’t want to access sit with ADO.NET, you can easily use REST, so any platform can make queries and calls into the data.

Each account can have many tables of data. Each table contains entities, which are like rows in a traditional database. Each entity is indentified with a composite key. The first half is the partition key, which identities which partition the entity lives in. Partitions are how the table data structures scale so well. Which entities go into which partitions are left up to the application and the developer to decide, simply by assigning the key appropriately. You could have a partition in your customers table for each state, based on which state the customer lives in. Azure will move partitions around to balance performance and traffic to a specific data server. If two partitions are very active, one will be moved to a different server.

The second half of the primary key is the RowKey which is used to identify the entity within the partition, and is very similar to your trusty old unique row id.

Both PartitionKey and RowKey are strings, and must be less than 64KB in size.

Queries that reference a partition key in the constraints will be much faster, because the engine can constrain the table scan to the same partition.

Each entity can have up to 255 properties, including the partition key, and the row key. Azure does not enforce a schema. Schema enforcement is left to the application. This gives you the flexibility to vary the shape of the entity based on the scenario, instead of building more and more tables. This is very handy when you are deploying customizations for customers in a multi-tenant scenario.

It is easy to create and destroy tables. It is common to check for the table existence, and create it if it isn’t found on application startup. This makes it easy to deploy your application. No more struggling with complex setup SQL scripts. This code can also be moved into a separate tool for use in deploying your application. Each account has a table called Tables, that tracks which tables have been created.

To access a table with REST, you can easily use the URI:

POST .table.core.windows.net/http://<ACCOUNT NAME>.table.core.windows.net/<TABLE NAME>

Using a POST verb will save an object to the table. The object would be stored in the Atom envelope in the REST call. Querying, updating, and deleting records is just as simple. A sample query would look like:

GET .table.core.windows.net/?$filter">http://<ACCOUNT>.table.core.windows.net/<TABLE>?$filter= cost eq 45

TechNet Tour Unleashed details here!

2009-02-16T09:51:00.001-05:00

[TechNetUnleashed has two siblings, ArcReady, and MSDN Unleashed. For some reason we haven’t unleashed ArcReady yet.]

Windows Server 2008
In this session we will look at Windows Server 2008 and the improvements that have been made to Microsoft’s premier server operating system. Microsoft Windows Server 2008 is the most advanced Windows Server operating system yet, designed to power the next generation of networks, applications, and Web services. With Windows Server 2008 you can develop, deliver, and manage rich user experiences and applications, provide a highly secure network infrastructure, and increase technological efficiency and value within your organization.
Windows Server 2008 introduces several new capabilities including 64bit virtualization, a robust web and development platform, improvements in networking, security, high availability and disaster recovery. In addition, there is a new “Core” installation option that reduces the operating system overhead by removing the graphical user interface thus freeing resources and lowering the potential security attack surface. Come see demonstrations on many of the features in a technical deep dive you won’t want to miss!
After we discuss Windows Server 2008, we’ll briefly discuss the improvements coming in Windows Server 2008 R2 which is in development and now available for beta testing.

Prizes

Attendees are eligible to win a book or a copy of Windows Vista.

Event Schedule – TechNet Events Unleashed starts at 3:00 PM and end by 5:00 PM

St. Louis, MO – March 5, 2009 3:00 PM

Downers Grove, IL – March 9, 2009 3:00 PM

Austin, TX – March 10, 2009 3:00 PM

Indianapolis, IN – March 12, 2009 3:00 PM

Irving, TX – March 19, 2009 3:00 PM

Chicago, IL – March 23, 2009 3:00 PM

Houston, TX – March 24, 2009 3:00 PM

Detroit, MI – March 31, 2009 3:00 PM

MSDN Unleashed tour details announced.

2009-02-16T09:48:00.001-05:00

[MSDN Unleashed has two siblings, ArcReady, and TechNet Unleashed. For some reason we haven’t unleashed ArcReady yet.]

Enhance your coding capabilities with new tools, tips, and inside secrets from MSDN Events. You’ll see how developing for a Windows Mobile phone leverages your current coding skills and can make it simple to build, deploy and debug cool new devices. Additionally, we’ll be showing you how to take full advantage of the Visual Studio debugger. We’ll offer some great tips and tricks to help you debug faster and more efficiently, while applying fresh techniques to ramp up your problem solving abilities.

Session 1: Tips & Tricks for the Visual Studio 2008 Debugger

The Visual Studio debugger is a highly underutilized tool for many developers. In this session, you’ll learn how to use it like a pro, while picking up new techniques to fast-forward your problem solving and debugging abilities. We’ll show you how to use advanced breakpoints, advanced watch window / Expression evaluator tricks, modifiers, assertions on the fly, remote debugging, and more. Whether you’re writing C#, VB, WPF, ASP.NET, Windows Forms, or services, we’ll provide tips and tricks that will have you debugging faster and much more efficiently. The debugger is your primary tool for finding bugs, so join us and learn how to make the most of it.

Session 2: Developing for Windows Mobile Devices

Mobile development is growing fast, and Windows Mobile is at the forefront with over 18 million phones shipped last year and many more cutting-edge devices on the way. Visual Studio developers have tremendous opportunities in this space. Why? Developing for a Windows Mobile phone leverages your existing coding experience and takes it to new heights. In this session, we’ll look at some of the coolest new devices, you’ll learn how to set up Visual Studio with the latest SDK and device emulators, and you’ll see how to build, deploy and debug Windows Mobile applications. We’ll also explore how Internet Explorer Mobile 6 provides new AJAX capabilities that offer the richness of the desktop with pan and zoom features tuned for mobile devices.

Prizes

Attendees are eligible to win one of two books, a copy of Windows Vista or Visual Studio 2008 Professional.

Event Schedule

Cleveland, OH – February 24, 2009 1:00 PM – 5:00 PM

St. Louis, MO – March 5, 2009 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM

Downers Grove, IL – March 9, 2009 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM

Austin, TX – March 10, 2009 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM

Overland Park, KS – March 10, 2009 1:00 PM – 4:00 PM

Indianapolis, IN – March 12, 2009 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM

Irving, TX – March 19, 2009 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM

Columbus, OH – March 20, 2009 1:00 PM – 4:00 PM

Chicago, IL – March 23, 2009 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM

Houston, TX – March 24, 2009 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM

Mason, OH – March 27, 2009 1:00 PM – 4:00 PM

Detroit, MI – March 31, 2009 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM

Waukesha, WI – March 31, 2009 1:00 PM – 4:00 PM