The Morning Brew

Very much looking forward to the Alt.Net UK Conference this weekend, hope to see a few of you there!

Software

• QueryUnit Proof-Of-Concept code released – Davide Mauri shares a proof of concept build of his tool to enable Database code such as queries and cubes to be tested by DBAs using NUnit without them needing to know any .NET code. This looks like a project to watch given some of the proposed features

Information

• Writing a Custom NHibernate Class Validator – Billy McCafferty – Devlicio.us – Billy McCafferty shows how you can use the NHibernate Validator to create validation at the class level, allowing you to validate things across multiple properties, such as this worked example where any one of two properties may be true, but not both.
• Reviewing NerdDinner – Ayende takes a look at the NerdDinner sample application, with a view to (at the urging of Scott Hanselman) creating an NHibernate based version now that Linq to NHibernate is feature complete. Ayende continues with Reviewing NerdDinner: The Select N+1 pitfall where he looks at a possible N+1 select problem which could be triggered from a view.
• CodeRush vs CodeRush Xpress? – Rory Becker highlights the differences (and the amount of stuff you get for free) between CodeRush and CodeRush Xpress. I’m a ReSharper man myself, however if you aren’t using a tool like this, CodeRush Xpress looks well worth a go
• What’s the difference, part one: Generics are not templates – Eric Lippert takes a look at one of the stranger (and more confusing) aspects of Generics, how the framework decides which method to call when the signitures could be the same
• Microsoft Demo Showcase Suite Release at WPC2009 – Lachlan Cash highlights the new Microsoft Demo Showcase Suite, launched recently to partners, andJoe Beernink talks about the processes, practices and principles that his consulting company used in the creation of it in a series of 8 parts thus far.
• August’s Toolbox Column Now Online – Scott Mitchell highlights a number of interesting projects and resources for the .NET Developer in his monthly column for MSDN Magazine
• Creating a Data Access layer using Unity – Martin Hinshelwood takes a look at using the Unity Dependency injection framework to create an easily configurable data access layer
• Business Apps Example for Silverlight 3 RTM and .NET RIA Services July Update: Part 15: ASP.NET MVC – Brad Abrams continues his series on Silverlight 3 and the RIA Services with a look at sharing application logic between ASP.NET MVC and Silverlight
• Excerpt from ASP.NET MVC Framework – Sams Publishing share the first chapter from Stephen Walther’s book on ASP.NET MVC on Code Project
• WebResource access in ASP.NET MVC – Rick Strahl talks about the parts of the ASP.NET web forms API which are available in ASP.NET MVC when using ASPX pages, and the problems in consuming them from non-ASPX pages, and issues a plea for Microsoft to open up some of the interfaces so the dependency can be broken

Community

• Alt.Net UK Conference – Due to some last minute cancelations there are a few places for this weekends Alt.Net UK Conference available (for the Sunday Conference), get in quick if you want to attend.
• LIDNUG: Silverlight Ready for Business and .NET RIA Services Presentation – Demo Posted – Brad Abrams shares the demo code and follows up ona few questions from his Linked In Dot Net User Group online presentation

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Software

• Babel Obfuscator: Babel 2.0.0.0 Has Been Released – Alberto Ferrazzoli highlights the release of Babel 2.0, the second major release of this Code Obfuscator which is a complete re-write removing the dependency on the Microsoft Phoenix Framework, and includes nice features to remove any unused code
• Out-of-band security bulletins – Ronan Geraghty highlights two major security fixes from Microsoft released yesterday and in KB971092 Fails to install – Guy Barrette talks about some problems he had installing Visual Studio update, and highlights a work around

Information

• Commenting your Code – Buck Woody shares his code commenting best practices. His examples are for SQL code, but the principles follow into most languages
• Every character has a story #32: U+1e9e (CAPITAL SHARP S, Microsoft edition – Part 1) – Michael Kaplan explores some of the interesting aspects of character sets, and non a-z characters. In part 1 he looks at the font representations of one such character, and in Part 2 looks at some of the issues surrounding input, sorting and case
• Ravings of a Developer TS : Hey Microsoft Coders! Free Stuff (Training, Books, Magazines) to Sharpen your skills! – Angela Binkowski highlights some great free resources for the Microsoft developer, including subscriptions to MSDN Magazine, free e-books and a huge range of free e-learning courses
• Migrating From Visual Basic 6 and earlier – Bruno Terkaly shares a collection of resources for anyone looking at migrating from VB6 or older, along with some tools for those still working in VB6. I also like the screenshot of VB3…that brings back some happy memories 🙂
• Macto, a module features spec sheet for authentication – Ayende starts the planning process for his Macto Prison Management System sample application with a look at how he structures his feature sheets with an example for the authentication system.
• Are You Using Multiserver Queries? – Ben Nevarez highlights a new feature introduced in SQL Server 2008 allowing you to run queries on a group of servers simultaneously – this looks very useful
• Dependency Injection with StructureMap – Following on from his exploration of the concepts behind SOLID, Sebastian at Coding Efficiency looks into Dependency injection using the StructureMap framework
• MEF: Making Extensibility Fun – Martin Rue takes a look at extensibility using the Microsoft Extensibility Framework, telling a story of how MEF can be applied to real problems

Community

• MSDN Flash Podcast – Mike Ormond highlights the UK MSDN Flash Podcast being produced by Eric Nelson, looking forward to listening to some of these on my next train journey

Comments Off on The Morning Brew #401

Another post milestone, the 400th edition of the Morning Brew! Now looking forward to the significant 500 post milestone 🙂

Software

• Announcing PostSharp 1.5 RTM and PostSharp 1.0 SP2 – The PostSharp team announce the release of PostSharp 1.5 RTM, with the RTM containing a couple of bugfixes over the RC. This alos signifies the end for PostSharp 1.0, with the release of SP2 this ends the V1.0 line.
• T4MVC 2.4 updates: settings file, sub view folders, ActionName support and more – David Ebbo unleashes version 2.4 of his ASP.NET MVC T4 Templates, which includes a number of new features, and some bugfixes over the previously publicised 2.2 release. Significant new features include separate settings file, support for Views in sub folders, support for moving the master T4MVC template outside the web root, and a whole bunch more
• Subtext Security Issue and Patch – Phil Haack shares the details of how to fix a security vulnerability in the SubText blog engine, along with a complete release which includes the fix.

Information

• Spark output caching – Louis DeJardin talks about the new caching features of the Spark View Engine, influenced by Phil Haack’s discussions of donut caching
• Code Contracts – Melitta Andersen talks about the .NET 4 Code Contracts feature giving a nice overview of the functionality in this article for the August edition of MSDN Magazine
• Sending List of Complex objects to Sql server 2005 and persisting it in the database – Aashish takes a look at sending complex objects to the database for persistence by using XML serialisation to convert the object to XML and using the SQL server XML functions to retrieve the data in the stored procedure. Sample code is provided
• DDD and Code ReUse – Jérémie Chassaing continues the discussion started by Udi Dahan on code reuse, with a look at the types of reuse, focusing heavily on application code reuse and talking about how a Service bus can help bring together bounded contexts
• My ideal IDE – Jimmy Bogard talks about his dream IDE looking at the types of features the IDE would have such as multi monitor support, full keyboard operation (no need for a mouse) and a lack of designers and wizards
• SQL Server 2005 – Fast Running Totals solution with ordered CTE update? – Mladen Prajdi? takes a look at how Common Table Expressions (CTE) can help with one of the oldest problems in SQL, running totals
• Business Apps Example for Silverlight 3 RTM and .NET RIA Services July Update: Part 13: The New Class Library Project – Brad Abrams continues his RIA/Silverlight 3 series with a look at bringing some separation of concerns to his project structure, breaking the various parts apart and looking at the new RIA class library project type
• Free eBook – Developer-Evangelism.com – Joe Stagner highlights a new e-Book by Chris Heilmann of Yahoo about the role of a Developer Evangelist, an interesting read if you fancy a career in this direction, or work for a company which produces technology for techies
• Writing iPhone Sites with ASP.NET MVC – Chris over at FlipBit shares some ASP.NET MVC filters which enable you to serve special views to iPhone users of your website
• Pay Attention to the Foreach Implicit Casting – A level 100 article on something which can possibly catch you out to do with the implicit casting which occurs when you spin through a collection using for each
• Incremental Delivery and Continuous Design – Jeremy D. Miller talks about, and provides some additional links on the subject of Incremental Delivery and Continuous Design, the topic for his MSDN Magazine article for August
• RIA Services With Silverlight 3 – Part 1 – Faisal Khan starts a new series of posts over at dotnetslackers on the Silverlight 3 and RIA Services

Community

• Webinar: Driving unit testing in the organization – Roy Osherove and Gil Zilberfeld of TypeMock are running free webinar on a introducing and improving Testing in your organisation, to be held at two time slots tomorrow, allowing attendees from most timezones to attend. UPDATE: This is actually today, I slipped a day 🙁

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