Jorge's Blog

Moved To MS Spaces

2008-02-17T22:17:00.001-05:00

I've moved my blog to MS Spaces.

http://matosjorge.spaces.live.com/default.aspx

ReSharper V3.0 and XML Comments

2007-07-12T10:41:00.000-04:00

If you are using ReSharper V3, you may notice that instead of seeing the little green box at the top right of the code window (which normally indicates that you have no errors or warnings in your code) you now have a yellow box that indicates that you have a warning in your code! That warning is most likely due to missing XML comments in your C# code. You can get ReSharper to ignore missing XML comments by going into your project's properties and entering the warning number 1591 into the "Suppress Warnings" text box.

Solution Item Tracking in VS.NET 2005

2007-07-12T10:39:00.001-04:00

One of my favorite features in VS.NET is the ability to click anywhere in an open class file and have the solution explorer automatically select that file in its window. This way I can see exactly which project the file resides in. You can turn this feature on in VS.NET by selecting Tools/Options/Projects & Solutions and click on the checkbox labeled "Track Active Item In Solution Explorer".

HP dv9000 Laptop, QuickPlay and Vista

2007-02-19T01:04:00.000-05:00

The HP QuickPlay application on my new HP dv9000t laptop just didn't work with Vista. I found a couple of solutions that worked:

1) Disable user account control
2) Set the HP QuickPlay executable (QP.EXE) to run as administrator

I chose option 2. If there's another way to get QuickPlay to work on Vista, please post a reply and let me know!

My son Alexander!

2007-02-03T19:54:00.000-05:00

He was born on Dec 27th, 7 lbs 3.2 ounces, 19 inches long

Notepad++

2006-08-26T23:39:00.000-04:00

Try Notepad++ its lightweight, better than Notepad2, and its free!

Its a Boy !!!

2006-07-24T22:15:00.000-04:00

The due date is December 29th.

Virtual PC is Free!

2006-07-18T22:27:00.000-04:00

Virtual PC is a cool product and I'm glad to see that Microsoft is giving it away for free. They're giving away the 2004 version but apparently they are going to give away the 2007 version (which supports windows vista) when it becomes available.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtualpc/default.mspx

NMock Constraints

2006-07-09T23:04:00.000-04:00

NMock constraints allow you to run a validation against a parameter that is passed to your NMock object's method during an NUnit test. I want to share a custom NMock constraint I've written. With this constraint you can write an expectation that compares an expected XML document and the actual XML document. The constraint is called IsEquivalentXml. The constraint class uses a class library written by Microsoft called XmlDiffPatch to do the actual xml comparison.

Some tests that use the new constraint are shown below:

   1:  [Test]

   2:  public void MyTest1()

   3:  {

   4:      string expectedXml = "<Order></Order>";

   5:      string actualXml = "<Order></Order>";

6:

   7:      DynamicMock mockObject = new DynamicMock(typeof(IOrderManager));

   8:      mockObject.Expect("SubmitOrder", new IsEquivalentXml(expectedXml));

   9:      ClassUnderTest classUnderTest =

  10:          new ClassUnderTest((IOrderManager)mockObject.MockInstance);

  11:      classUnderTest.DoSometing(actualXml);

  12:      mockObject.Verify();

  13:  }

   1:  [Test]

   2:  public void MyTest2()

   3:  {

   4:      string expectedXml = "<Order/>";

   5:      string actualXml = "<Order></Order>";

6:

   7:      DynamicMock mockObject = new DynamicMock(typeof(IOrderManager));

   8:      mockObject.Expect("SubmitOrder", new IsEquivalentXml(expectedXml));

   9:      ClassUnderTest classUnderTest =

  10:          new ClassUnderTest((IOrderManager)mockObject.MockInstance);

  11:      classUnderTest.DoSometing(actualXml);

  12:      mockObject.Verify();

  13:  }

   1:  [Test]

   2:  public void MyTest3()

   3:  {

   4:      string expectedXml = @"<Order id=""123""></Order>";

   5:      string actualXml = "<Order id='123'></Order>";

6:

   7:      DynamicMock mockObject = new DynamicMock(typeof(IOrderManager));

   8:      mockObject.Expect("SubmitOrder", new IsEquivalentXml(expectedXml));

   9:      ClassUnderTest classUnderTest =

  10:          new ClassUnderTest((IOrderManager)mockObject.MockInstance);

  11:      classUnderTest.DoSometing(actualXml);

  12:      mockObject.Verify();

  13:  }

   1:  [Test]

   2:  public void MyTest10()

   3:  {

   4:      string expectedXml = @"<Order>abc123</Order>";

   5:      string actualXml = "<Order>    abc123    </Order>";

6:

   7:      DynamicMock mockObject = new DynamicMock(typeof(IOrderManager));

   8:      mockObject.Expect("SubmitOrder",

   9:          new IsEquivalentXml(expectedXml, XmlDiffOptions.IgnoreWhitespace));

  10:      ClassUnderTest classUnderTest =

  11:          new ClassUnderTest((IOrderManager)mockObject.MockInstance);

  12:      classUnderTest.DoSometing(actualXml);

  13:      mockObject.Verify();

  14:  }

The ClassUnderTest code is shown below:

   1:  using System;

2:

   3:  namespace CustomNMockConstraintsClassLibrary

   4:  {

   5:      public class ClassUnderTest

   6:      {

   7:          IOrderManager _orderManager;

8:

   9:          public ClassUnderTest(IOrderManager orderManager)

  10:          {

  11:              this._orderManager = orderManager;

  12:          }

13:

  14:          public void DoSometing(string orderXml)

  15:          {

  16:              this._orderManager.SubmitOrder(orderXml);

  17:          }

  18:      }

  19:  }

The actual Constraint class is shown below. Notice that I inherit from the NMock BaseConstraint class instead of the IConstraint interface. BaseConstraint is an abstract class that already implements the IConstraint interface.

   1:  using System;

   2:  using System.IO;

   3:  using System.Xml;

4:

   5:  using NMock;

   6:  using NMock.Constraints;

7:

   8:  using Microsoft.XmlDiffPatch;

9:

  10:  namespace CustomNMockConstraintsClassLibrary

  11:  {

  12:      public class IsEquivalentXml : BaseConstraint

  13:      {

  14:          private string _expectedXml = string.Empty;

  15:          private XmlDiff _xmlDiff = new XmlDiff();

16:

  17:          public IsEquivalentXml(string xml) : this(xml, XmlDiffOptions.None)

  18:          {

  19:          }

20:

  21:          public IsEquivalentXml(string expectedXml, XmlDiffOptions options)

  22:          {

  23:              _expectedXml = expectedXml;

  24:              _xmlDiff.Options = options;

  25:          }

26:

  27:          public override bool Eval(object val)

  28:          {

  29:              string actualXml = (string)ExtractActualValue(val);

  30:              return AreEqual(_expectedXml, actualXml);

  31:          }

32:

  33:          public override string Message

  34:          {

  35:              get    { return "<" + _expectedXml + ">";    }

  36:          }

37:

  38:          private bool AreEqual(string expectedXml, string actualXml)

  39:          {

  40:              bool areEqual = false;

41:

  42:              try

  43:              {

  44:                  areEqual = _xmlDiff.Compare(

  45:                      new XmlTextReader(new StringReader(expectedXml)),

  46:                      new XmlTextReader(new StringReader(actualXml)));

  47:              }

  48:              catch(Exception e)

  49:              {

  50:                  _expectedXml += "\n" + e.ToString();

  51:              }

52:

  53:              return areEqual;

  54:          }

  55:      }

  56:  }

My First Soap Extension

2006-07-06T23:14:00.000-04:00

I've finally got a chance to write a Soap Extension. This one allows you to have caching for a web service method but the cache duration can be specified in the web.config file. The .NET "WebMethod" attribute supports caching but requires a constant value for the cache duration.

Here's the code for the extension:

   1:  using System;

   2:  using System.Configuration;

   3:  using System.Diagnostics;

   4:  using System.IO;

   5:  using System.Web;

   6:  using System.Web.Services.Protocols;

7:

   8:  namespace CacheExtensionProj

   9:  {

  10:      [AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Method)]

  11:      public class CacheExtensionAttribute : SoapExtensionAttribute

  12:      {

  13:          private string cacheDurationConfigKey;

  14:          private int priority;

15:

  16:          public override Type ExtensionType

  17:          {

  18:              get { return typeof(CacheExtension); }

  19:          }

20:

  21:          public override int Priority

  22:          {

  23:              get { return priority; }

  24:              set { priority = value; }

  25:          }

26:

  27:          public string CacheDurationConfigKey

  28:          {

  29:              get { return cacheDurationConfigKey;}

  30:              set { cacheDurationConfigKey = value;}

  31:          }

  32:      }

33:

  34:      public class CacheExtension : SoapExtension

  35:      {

  36:          Stream originalStream;

  37:          Stream newStream;

  38:          string cacheKey = null;

  39:          string cacheDurationConfigKey;

  40:          int cacheDuration = 0;

41:

  42:          public override object GetInitializer(LogicalMethodInfo methodInfo,

  43:              SoapExtensionAttribute attribute)

  44:          {

  45:              //Cast attribute and return attribute value

  46:              CacheExtensionAttribute cea = (CacheExtensionAttribute)attribute;

  47:              return cea.CacheDurationConfigKey;

  48:          }

49:

  50:          public override object GetInitializer(Type serviceType)

  51:          {

  52:              return null;

  53:          }

54:

  55:          public override void Initialize(object initializer)

  56:          {

  57:              cacheDurationConfigKey = (string)initializer;

  58:              if (cacheDurationConfigKey == null

  59:                   cacheDurationConfigKey == string.Empty)

  60:              {

  61:                  cacheDurationConfigKey = "DefaultCacheDuration";

  62:              }

63:

  64:              cacheDuration = GetCacheDuration(cacheDurationConfigKey);

  65:          }

66:

  67:          public override void ProcessMessage(SoapMessage message)

  68:          {

  69:              switch (message.Stage)

  70:              {

  71:                  case SoapMessageStage.BeforeSerialize:

  72:                      break;

73:

  74:                  case SoapMessageStage.AfterSerialize:

  75:                      newStream.Position = 0;  //need to reset stream

  76:                      CopyStream(newStream, originalStream);

77:

  78:                      SaveStreamToCache(cacheKey, newStream);

  79:                      break;

80:

  81:                  case SoapMessageStage.BeforeDeserialize:

  82:                      //Cache key is the entire request xml string

  83:                      cacheKey = GenerateCacheKeyFromStream(originalStream);

84:

  85:                      Stream stream = GetStreamFromCache(cacheKey);

  86:                      if (stream != null)

  87:                      {

  88:                          Trace.WriteLine("Returning Cached Version");

  89:                          HttpContext.Current.Response.ContentType =

  90:                                  "text/xml";

  91:                          CopyStream(stream,

  92:                              HttpContext.Current.Response.OutputStream);

  93:                          HttpContext.Current.Response.Flush();

  94:                          HttpContext.Current.Response.End();

  95:                      }

  96:                      else

  97:                      {

  98:                          CopyStream(originalStream, newStream);

  99:                          newStream.Position = 0;  //need to reset stream

 100:                      }

 101:                      break;

 102:

 103:                  case SoapMessageStage.AfterDeserialize:

 104:                      break;

 105:

 106:                  default:

 107:                      throw new Exception("invalid stage");

 108:              }

 109:          }

 110:

 111:          public override Stream ChainStream( Stream stream )

 112:          {

 113:              originalStream = stream;

 114:              newStream = new MemoryStream();

 115:              return newStream;

 116:          }

 117:

 118:          private void CopyStream(Stream from, Stream to)

 119:          {

 120:              TextReader reader = new StreamReader(from);

 121:              TextWriter writer = new StreamWriter(to);

 122:              writer.WriteLine(reader.ReadToEnd());

 123:              writer.Flush();

 124:          }

 125:

 126:          private string GenerateCacheKeyFromStream(Stream stream)

 127:          {

 128:              string cacheKey = new StreamReader(stream).ReadToEnd();

 129:              stream.Position = 0;  //need to reset stream

 130:              return cacheKey;

 131:          }

 132:

 133:          private void SaveStreamToCache(string cacheKey, Stream stream)

 134:          {

 135:              if (cacheDuration > 0)

 136:              {

 137:                  Trace.WriteLine("Saving result in Cache");

 138:                  Trace.WriteLine("cacheKey = " + cacheKey);

 139:

 140:                  MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream();

 141:                  stream.Position = 0;

 142:                  CopyStream(stream, ms);

 143:                  ms.Position = 0;

 144:

 145:                  HttpContext.Current.Cache.Insert(cacheKey, ms, null,

 146:                      DateTime.Now.AddHours((double)cacheDuration),

 147:                      TimeSpan.Zero);

 148:              }

 149:          }

 150:

 151:          private Stream GetStreamFromCache(string cacheKey)

 152:          {

 153:              Stream stream = HttpContext.Current.Cache[cacheKey] as Stream;

 154:              if (stream != null)

 155:              {

 156:                  stream.Position = 0;

 157:              }

 158:              return stream;

 159:          }

 160:

 161:          private int GetCacheDuration(string cacheDurationConfigKey)

 162:          {

 163:              int cacheDurationValue = -1;

 164:              string cacheDurationStringValue =

 165:                  ConfigurationSettings.AppSettings[cacheDurationConfigKey];

 166:              if (cacheDurationStringValue != null &&

 167:                  cacheDurationStringValue != string.Empty)

 168:              {

 169:                  try

 170:                  {

 171:                      cacheDurationValue = int.Parse(cacheDurationStringValue);

 172:                      if (cacheDurationValue <=0)

 173:                      {

 174:                          Trace.WriteLine("Caching disabled. " +

 175:                              cacheDurationConfigKey +

 176:                              " must be positive and greater than zero.");

 177:                      }

 178:                  }

 179:                  catch(Exception e)

 180:                  {

 181:                      Trace.WriteLine("Caching disabled. Unable to convert " +

 182:                          cacheDurationConfigKey +

 183:                  " value from configuration file into int type. \nException: "

 184:                          + e.ToString());

 185:                  }

 186:              }

 187:              else

 188:              {

 189:                  Trace.WriteLine("Caching disabled. " +

 190:                      cacheDurationConfigKey +

 191:                      " value is null or empty string.");

 192:              }

 193:

 194:              return cacheDurationValue;

 195:          }

 196:      }

 197:  }

You use the extension by adding the CacheExtension attribute to your
web service method:

   1:  [WebMethod]

   2:  [CacheExtension(CacheDurationConfigKey="GetDateTime.CacheDuration")]

   3:  public string GetDateTime(string name)

   4:  {

   5:    return "Hello " + name + " the time is " + DateTime.Now.ToString();

   6:  }

Your web.config file should look something like this:

   1:    <appSettings>

   2:      <add key="DefaultCacheDuration" value="8"/>

   3:      <add key="GetDateTime.CacheDuration" value="2"/>

   4:    </appSettings>

Some good links about Soap Extensions:

   1:  http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/issues/04/03/ASPColumn/

   2:  http://www.theserverside.net/tt/articles/showarticle.tss?id=SOAPExtensions

   3:  http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnaspnet/html/asp03222001.asp

   4:  http://www.codeguru.com/columns/experts/article.php/c5479/

   5:  http://www.mastercsharp.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=86&&TopicID=7

We're having a baby!

2006-07-04T00:14:00.000-04:00

The baby was putting on quite a show for us during the ultrasound, it was kicking and moving its arms around, it was amazing! Its' too early to know the baby's sex, so stay tuned!

Mexico Vacation April 2006

2006-07-03T23:36:00.000-04:00

New Position!

2006-01-08T20:03:00.000-05:00

I recently started a new position with Progressive Insurance as a software architect and I'm very happy about it. I've been a consultant for the last six years and it was about time for a change.

NMock Presentation

2005-12-18T03:45:00.000-05:00

I recently gave a presentation at the Cleveland .NET SIG. If you're interested in using mock objects, I suggest you check it out :)

How to replace MSN Toolbar default search

2005-12-17T15:29:00.000-05:00

Do you like using MSN Search Toolbar but you still want to use Google for your searches?

Then follow these simple steps:

1) Go into the toolbar options and click on General
2) Enter http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=$w ($w represents the search term you are looking for)

Favorite Resharper Keyboard Shortcuts

2005-12-16T17:17:00.000-05:00

VSS Tips

2005-12-16T10:10:00.000-05:00

Open VSS and select the project you want to work with.

On the Tools menu, click Options, click on the General tab.

• Set Use visual merge to Yes – this settings shows all the changes made during a merge.

• Set Folder for temporary files to C:\TEMP (or another directory on your hard drive) - Creating the temp folder locally, rather than on a server, may increase VSS performance.

Click on the Local Files tab.

• Set Compare files by to Contents – Compares the full contents of your local file to VSS’s copy. This ensures that you really get the latest version of the file when you click on Get Latest Version in the VS.NET IDE.

When retrieving the latest version of a project from VSS you only need to specify the recursive option. You do not need to select the Build tree option unless you do not want VSS to store the files in the working folder directory on your local drive.

NUnit VS2003 Template

2005-10-27T01:31:00.000-04:00

If you're using NUnit, then try this VS2003 template. It adds a test fixture class item to the "Add Items" dialog box.

After selecting the "Test" item you will see a class file like below:

Download msi installer or installer project

Enjoy!

Installing Vista on Virtual PC

2005-10-27T01:27:00.000-04:00

Make sure you have a good computer (3 GHz or higher & 2 GB of RAM or higher)
Download and install Virtual PC
Download Vista beta ISO image
Download and run Virtual CD Control Panel

Create a new virtual machine and specify "Other" for the operating system
Specify at least 1 GB of RAM for the virtual machine
Create a new Virtual Hard Disk
Run the virtual machine

When you run the virtual machine you should get the following message:

Reboot and Select proper Boot device or Insert Boot Media in selected Boot device

Run the Virtual CD Control Panel and mount the longhorn beta ISO to a drive letter
(I used Z: )

Select the CD->Capture ISO image menu option and select drive letter that is mapped to the vista beta ISO image (in this case Z:)

Issue a CTRL-ALT-DELETE from the Action menu option - this will cause the virtual mchine to reboot and

The Vista install will run and display an initial screen that has an "Install" option

Select to install but make sure you click SHIFT-F10 right afterward to invoke the command window, the Vista beta will not install on a RAW hard drive – so you’ll need to create a partition using the DiskPart utility which can be run from the command window.

Issue the following commands to create a partition on the vm hard drive

Select disk=0

Then

Create Partition Primary

Then type “Exit” to close the DiskPart, type “Exit” again to close the command window

Then click the “Install now” button to complete the install

After the Vista install is complete install the “Virtual Machine Additions” (from the Action menu) otherwise you will be stuck with a default resolution of 800x600

You may need a special version of "Virtual Machine Additions" which for the time being can be downloaded from here.

Hope that helps!

PDC 2005 Highlights

2005-09-18T16:18:00.000-04:00

Language Integrated Query (LINKQ)
Query any data source (relational, xml, memory) from within the C# or VB.NET language
http://channel9.msdn.com/Showpost.aspx?postid=114680

Atlas
Create ASP.NET applications that use AJAX without having to write a ton of Javascript
http://beta.asp.net/default.aspx?tabindex=7&tabid=47

Microsoft Office 12
New version of office that has a new UI that makes it easier to do the things you want to do
http://channel9.msdn.com/Showpost.aspx?postid=114720

Windows Workflow Foundation (WWF)
Create your own work flow applications in windows Vista
http://channel9.msdn.com/Showpost.aspx?postid=115366

Microsoft Expression Designer (codename "Sparkle")
Easily create web applications that developers and graphic designers can work on together
http://channel9.msdn.com/Showpost.aspx?postid=115387
http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2005/09/14/425216.aspx
MS Article

VS2005 DevCon

2005-06-13T15:02:00.000-04:00

On June 16th I'll be presenting at the Visual Studio 2005 developer's conference in Detroit. I'll be speaking about the new features in ASP.NET 2.0 - primarily MasterPages, Themes and Skins, and the new controls (Menu, TreeView, SiteMap, Login, etc...)

There's going to be 3 development tracks ASP.NET V2.0, Team System, and Smart Client. The registration web site is now open and the fee is a nominal $99 for this all day event. The format of the event is similar to last year's DevDays. There's going to be free stuff, free food and drinks, think of it as a mini PDC :)

The agenda is summarized below:

Opening Keynote – Tim Landgrave and Drew Robbins

ASP.NET v2.0
What’s New in ASP.NET 2.0 – Steven Smith
Building the Look and Feel with ASP.NET 2.0 – Jorge Matos
Leveraging Data in ASP.NET 2.0 – Bill Steele
Personalization and Membership – Darryl Hogan

Visual Studio Team System
Project Initiation: Implementing Process – Alex Lowe
Analysis and Design: Visually Designing Your Application – Martin Shoemaker
Development: Writing Quality Code – Dave Donaldson
Test: Validating the Project – Bill Maurer

Building Smart Clients with Visual Studio 2005
Building Databound WinForms Apps – Jim Wilt
Deploying Apps w/ ClickOnce – Bill Wagner
Building Office Apps with VSTO 2005 – Drew Robbins
.NET CF Tools and Platform Overview – Josh Holmes

Closing Keynote – David White

Hope to see you there!

VSTS Pricing Change

2005-05-18T04:14:00.000-04:00

Microsoft has changed its pricing plan for Visual Studio Team System.
Check it out:
http://www.theserverside.net/news/thread.tss?thread_id=33974

Rocky's Take on SOA

2005-04-27T17:17:00.000-04:00

Rocky has a good article on SOA, and he makes some interesting points about the issues concerning web service versioning, but he doesn't offer any solutions.

http://theserverside.net/articles/showarticle.tss?id=SOAVersioningCovenant

What I find most interesting is that he once said that "SOA was nothing but Cobol over the internet", it was obvious that his opinion on SOA at the time was not very flattering. My theory is that his previous books on "Business Objects" are probably not selling so well anymore and so he's decided to jump on the SOA bandwagon. Geez, I wonder if his next book will be called "Expert C# SOA" or "CSLA SOA"?

Cloning made easy

2005-04-22T13:11:00.000-04:00

Cloning an object is simple if you use serialization.


[Serializable]
public class Sheep : ICloneable
{
  private string _name;

  public Sheep()
  {
  }

  public string Name
  {
    get { return _name; }
    set { _name = value; }
  }

  public object Clone()
  {
    BinaryFormatter formatter = new BinaryFormatter();
    MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream();
    formatter.Serialize(ms, this);
    ms.Position = 0;
    return formatter.Deserialize(ms);
  }
}

MS Certifications

2005-03-31T12:20:00.000-05:00

The ServerSide.NET currently has a forum Ask TheServerSide: Does Microsoft Certification Matter?

I'm amazed at how some people can take the position that certifications are of no use. I've recently achieved MCSD status and I'm studying for my MCDBA and I doing it to increase my breath of knowledge and at the same time to differentiate myself from other developers who don't have certifications. The certification in and of itself does not mean that the person who has the cert is an expert but it does show that the person has a desire to learn new technology. Having a certification is not a substitute for real-world experience, but it does mean something.

Bottom line:
It can't hurt you to have certification, it can only help you.

Exception Handling

2005-03-28T12:57:00.000-05:00

Brad Abrams summarized a nice list of Exceptions that might be useful for anyone developing applications that need to handle exceptions.

He also lists a presentation he did on Exception Management best practices.

Coding Slave

2005-03-24T12:50:00.000-05:00

I've always intended to read Bob's book Coding Slave but never got around to buying it, but now its free and I have no excuse now!

VS2005 & SQL Server 2005

2005-03-24T12:32:00.000-05:00

Looks like the ship date has been delayed till later in the year.

Read the news.com article.

AvPad

2005-03-23T13:31:00.000-05:00

Chris Anderson has just come out with a new tool for learning Xaml. Check it out!

Visual Studio 2005 Pricing

2005-03-22T15:03:00.000-05:00

Alex Lowe presented at the Cleveland .NET SIG a few months back and he told us about how VS2005 was going to be split into 3 versions based on the role you are playing in your organization. The 3 roles are:

Software Architects
Software Developers
Software Testers

There is also a version of VS2005 that contains all 3 roles and you have to get the Team Foundation Server as a separate product if you want to use the collaboration features of Team System.

All existing MSDN subscribers will get a free upgrade to one role-based version of VS2005.

For more information:
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2005/mar05/03-21VS2005PR.asp
http://msdn.microsoft.com/howtobuy/vs2005/compare

Resharper

2005-03-21T14:50:00.000-05:00

I've been using a Visual Studio.Net add-in called Resharper for the last 2 months now and I have to say I really like the product, it makes developing so much easier, the ability to quickly search for classses by pressing CTRL-N and typing a few characters and the ability to find all usages of a method throughout the solution are two of my favorite features.

That being said, I do have a couple of issues with the product:

There is no feature to extract a pubic interface from a class
The product slows down the initial load time of a solution to perform caching

Overall, I think the benefits of Resharper far outweigh the issues I have with the product. I highly recommend that you check this out, there's a free 30 day eval download for it

VB6 Revolt

2005-03-10T22:33:00.000-05:00

Scott Hanselman sums it very nicely: Set VB6 = Nothing

SQL Server Broker (SSB)

2005-03-09T14:32:00.000-05:00

I just saw a presentation last night on SSB given by Brian Jackson (MCS) and I think Brian did a great job talking about this new feature of SQL Server 2005. I've seen more than one project treat the database as a "queue" and I think SSB will make it much easier to write distributed applications that involve the database.

The presentation slides and demo code will soon be made available here:

VB MVP Revolt

2005-03-09T12:24:00.000-05:00

I can understand why some people are upset about Microsoft's decision to stop supporting VB6 at the end of this month, but in my opinion I would have done the exact same thing. It's not easy to add new OO improvements and remain completely backward compatible. It would take so much longer for new language features to be added to VB6 if complete backward compatibility had to be maintained, and I think MS has given VB6 developers enough advanced notice to prepare for this. Bear in mind that this comment is from someone who'd rather shoot himself in the foot then write VB6 code.

The Blah Blah Blog
Robert Scoble
Dan Appleman
Alex Lowe

SQL Server @@Identity

2005-03-09T12:21:00.000-05:00

Most developers when writing an insert statement for a table that has an identity column will use the @@Identity function to return the value of the newly inserted column.

A better practice is to use the SCOPE_IDENTITY() function instead. The reason is that sometimes @@Identity may return back the wrong value. If you happen to have an INSERT trigger on the table that you are inserting data into that also happens inserts a row in a different table (auditing?) then @@Identity will return the identity value from the other table instead of the first table. SCOPE_IDENTITY() always returns the new identity value from the closest scoped operation.

Best Practices

2005-03-07T12:31:00.000-05:00

My job as a .NET consultant takes me to a lot of different companies and sometimes I'm asked to fix an existing performance problem. 99% of the time, the performance problem is related to a poorly written stored procedure, trigger or sql statement.

I'm amazed how often I see stored procedures and triggers that are > 1000 lines, which in and of itself is not the worst practice, but definitely a flag that maybe there's too much business logic in the stored procedure/trigger.

The other thing I see quite often are excessive use of cursors and temporary tables. I can understand this trend because it's really easy to create and use cursors and temporary tables in SQL Server.

Whenever I have to fix a problem at a client and I find it's related to poorly written SQL Server stored procs/triggers, I make it a priority to educate the developers who wrote the original code and show them alternative options.

For example, most cursors can be re-written with a while loop and temporary tables can (most of the time) be replaced with Table variables instead. Sometimes, its just a matter of re-writing the SQL statements to use a sub-select.

I don't understand why more developers don't know these basic best practices for SQL Server:

Bottom Line:
Avoid cursors when you can: they cause locking and server resources are consumed
Avoid temporary tables: they cause more locking and more stored procedure recompiles

Resources to help jump-start your .NET Development

2005-03-04T00:46:00.000-05:00

General .NET Resources

The .NET Home Page - The best “jump off” point for all things .NET
http://www.microsoft.com/net/default.asp
What is .NET? Here you will find a basic description of .NET services and functions
http://msdn.microsoft.com/theshow/EPISODE011/default.asp
Frequently Asked Questions about Microsoft® .NET Framework
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/techart/faq111700.htm
The GotDotNet Home Page - An excellent site to find more information about .NET with samples and real-world examples of .NET applications
http://www.gotdotnet.com/
An Introduction to the .NET Framework - A concise introduction to the .NET Framework
http://www.gotdotnet.com/team/framework/default.aspx
Microsoft® .NET Framework 1.1 Class Library Reference Volumes 1-4
http://www.microsoft.com/mspress/books/6075.asp
Best Practices for .Net Development
http://www.microsoft.com/seminar/shared/asp/view.asp?url=/Seminar/en/20020531devt1-47/manifest.xml
Exception Management
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnbda/html/exceptdotnet.asp
Visual Studio .Net Home Page
http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/default.asp
Inside Information for Developer Tools
http://www.microsoft.com/mspress/devtools/vstudio.net/
Microsoft VS.Net Technical Resources
http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/techinfo/default.asp
Visual Basic .Net books
http://www.microsoft.com/mspress/devtools/vstudio.net/vbasic.net/default.asp
C++ Books
http://www.microsoft.com/mspress/devtools/vstudio.net/visualc.net/default.asp
The Visual Basic .NET Upgrade Guide
http://msdn.microsoft.com/vbasic/techinfo/articles/upgrade/guide.asp

Agile Programming

2005-03-02T00:44:00.000-05:00

I've been involved in an Agile project for the last 6 weeks and this hits too close to home.

My First Blog Post

2005-02-28T01:23:00.000-05:00

This is my very first blog post. I've been putting off creating my own blog for a long time, but I now I'm part of the Blogsphere. If you're reading this I apologize for my lack of creativity, I can't think of anything interesting to write about! I did see a couple of movies this weekend, the first one was the new Keanu Reeves movie Constantine - it wasn't bad but its definitely a movie you should wait and see when it comes out on video, speaking of video, I just rented another movie called The Grudge it was very good. I enjoy horror movies, and this one reminded me of how scared I felt when I first saw "The Exorcist". The woman from the "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" tv show was in the movie (Sarah Michelle Gellar?) as well as Bill Pullman, but as far as I was concerned the real star of the movie was the story itself, check it out at a video store near you (if you dare).