Back to Blog index.
The Developer.com portal has published my latest web application development article titled "Avoiding Annoying Mistakes in Your ASP.NET Web Applications".
The article talks about subtle, yet common, web application design mistakes, and how to avoid them in your ASP.NET/C# applications.
Enjoy!
For the past several years, many of those .NET applications I've built have included at least some kind of basic user interface for maintaining or displaying database data from ADO.NET data sources. Now that Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) is quickly coming the best alternative to Windows Forms (WinForms), I've noticed that developers (including myself) would need better tools/components to build GUIs for database data faster.
For example, in WinForms you could drag and drop database fields onto your forms and have the fields automatically generated for you. I'm missing this functionality in WPF applications. So, drag-and-drop support would be necessary, but it would also be great to have some kind of navigation control as well. That said, something like BindingNavigator for WPF would be just what I'd be looking for in many applications.
So far, doing embedded development with Microsoft products has been somewhat expensive since you would need Windows Embedded or Windows Mobile, the hardware, and the development tools. Now Microsoft has announced a new initiative, named "SPARK Your Imagination" which "offers [an affordable] kit that combines Windows Embedded CE 6.0 R2, Visual Studio 2005 Professional, and an embedded device."
However, SPARK is for non-business use, which makes it especially interesting for hobbyist and other startup developers. If you are interested in embedded development, this might be just what you were looking for.
On the IIS.NET web site, I found a newish beta release of the URLScan 3.0 tool for IIS 7.0. URLScan is an utility to protect an IIS web server from malicious requests and hacking attempts via invalid URLs. The 32 bit version of the beta can be downloaded directly from here.
The registration site for Microsoft's premier developer event, PDC (Professional Developers Conference) is now open. This year, PDC is being held on October 26th to 30th in Los Angeles Convention Center.
I've been using KeyTronic (Key Tronic) keyboards from KeyTronicEMS for ages, and still after the years I prefer them to those bundled, cheap keyboards that come with many PCs. However, all my current KeyTronic KT-2001 (aka KT2000, KT-2000) keyboards are with the legacy PS/2 connector, so I lately decided to check what an USB connected version would cost.
Previously, it was easy to find these keyboards in Finland, but now it suddenly seemed hard. First, I noticed that no IT distributor sells these keyboards anymore here, so my second option was to contact the manufacturer EMS directly. I got a kind reply from their sales and marketing saying that the won't sell their keyboards anymore to the European Union, because of new strict electronic waste laws.
Of course, my next question was to check whether Finnish/Swedish keyboard layouts would be available for purchase from EMS. Unfortunately, they won't sell those, but there's a custom company called DataCal (AZ, USA) that would do that. DataCal takes a generic KeyTronic keyboard, and then converts it to the local 104 key keyboard that I use daily.
So the next step would be contact DataCal, and check to see what would it cost to purchase and deliver few of these gems to Finland.
I today had a change to play around just a little bit with SQL Server 2008, and of course I wanted to test the new geography related data types. To do so, I created a simple table like this:
CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Customers](
[ID] [int] IDENTITY(1,1) NOT NULL,
[Name] [nvarchar](50) NOT NULL,
[Phone] [nvarchar](50) NULL,
[Location] [geography] NULL
)
This is how it looks like in the SQL Server Management Studio:
Note that if you want to use this data type from your C# applications, you need to make sure you add a reference to the assembly Microsoft.SqlServer.Types. Otherwise, you cannot access the field in your SQL queries with for example the SqlCommand or SqlDataReader classes.
On Tuesday (10th) we had a meeting with our local ITpro.fi software development expert group in Helsinki. It was really nice to meet the guys and exchange views about current, hot .NET development topics and general news about Microsoft. Also, we had a knowledge sharing session about .NET 3.5 SP1, and I'm waiting for my copy of the DVDs to get to my door.
Next time, we'll probably meet after the summer holiday season. In the mean time, check our our group's Finnish blog.
Microsoft has just recently release the first release candidate version (RC) of the forth-coming SQL Server 2008 product. The release is named RC0 for Release Candidate 0. The release is available from Microsoft's Download Center.
A list of SQL Server 2008's new features can be found from the product’s overview page. This page would also answer your question about "What's new in SQL Server 2008?".
Microsoft has already for a while had an web-based assessment site, where developers and their managers can go and fill in a questionnaire (survey), and get results that show where their software development process currently is and how it could be improved.
Now, Microsoft has updated it's offering, and the new Application Platform Capability Assessment site is available online. For example, the Application Life-Cycle Management provides "a quick snap-shot of an organization's development capabilities across the entire Application Life-Cycle".
If you already haven't done so, I suggest that you fill in the questionnaire and participate in the assessment. It is naturally free. The two other assessments available on the site are titled Business Intelligence and SOA and Business Process.
News from TechEd through the web news: the next version of Visual Studio Team System (VSTS) codenamed Rosario will include tools to "visually model the architecture of an application and validate it against application code".
This new feature would be called Architecture Explorer, and it would allow "developers to create new architecture and new constraints", according to the article, citing Norman Guadagno, a Microsoft director of product marketing.
Currently, Rosario is in the making, and present estimate is that the new version would be available later this year.
I started my car few days ago normally, when the onboard diagnostics mentioned the problem "Oelstand Motor" (ölstand motor). According to the operation manual, this is severity level 1 problem, and driving should be stopped immediately. Of course, engine oil level or pressure is something to be not taken lightly, so I became a little worried. I checked the oil level, and it appeared to be plenty to me, around one third left.
I browsed the error message on the Internet, and found a German web site that talked about the problem. In many BMW E34 model cars, the oil level indicator is quite sensitive, so I decided I'd just add more fresh oil. I didn't need to add it no more than 1 dl, and the problem went away. Lesson learned: the message "Oelstand Motor" just means that the engine oil level is low. Nothing more serious.
I noticed two interesting error messages on a Windows XP box here closeby. During normal shutdown, the machine caused two error messages to be shown on the screen, which I don't remember seeing previously. These are:
--------------------------- Windows Internet Explorer --------------------------- This window is busy.Closing this window may cause some problems.Do you want to close it anyway? --------------------------- OK Cancel ---------------------------
And:
--------------------------- Deleting... --------------------------- Windows is currently working with a file.Either wait for Windows to finish, or close it before you quit Windows. --------------------------- OK ---------------------------
Because of the erroneous spelling (no spaced between sentences), I actually think these error messages are not created by Internet Explorer (IE) or Windows itself, but rather are messages created by some add-on applications. I cannot help it, but Adobe Reader comes instantly on my mind. It causes problems on my own Windows XP machines as well.
› Blog Archive