Herding Code 48: Dustin Campbell on Visual Studio 2010

This week on Herding Code, the guys speak with Dustin Campbell about Visual Studio 2010 Beta’s "super exciting" programming, debugging and extensibility features and the F# May CTP.

  • The show kicks off with Jon commenting about the evolution of Visual Studio. Dustin then takes us down memory lane sharing how Visual Studio has been torn down and stitched back together over the years – this time with a new WPF-based IDE and an impressive extensibility model.
  • K Scott notes that F# is now being shipped with Visual Studio 2010 and teases Dustin about working on Project Euler problems in F# with his wife. (There’s a hot dating tip for you.) Dustin squirms a little and then talks in more detail about the latest F# release and the many language refactorings.
  • Scott K asks if dynamic languages like IronRuby and IronPython are scheduled to be shipped with later versions of Visual Studio and Dustin suggests that those languages may not find benefit in doing so.
  • Scott K asks if Microsoft is trying to kill off the competition by introducing IDE features already provided by CodeRush and ReSharper?  Dustin shares that the new extensibility model within VS2010 actually promotes third-party development and refers to the DevExpresses, JetBrains and Whole Tomatoes of the world as “partners” rather than competition.
  • Scott K asks if rewriting the VS2010 editor in WPF will elevate WPF’s exposure inside and outside of Microsoft and effectively force the framework to continually improve. Scott K also asks if componentizing Visual Studio (think Perspectives in Eclipse) is something we might see in future bits.
  • Jon asks about team size and what it takes to build a product like Visual Studio at Microsoft.
  • Scott K calls out Parallel Programming, a highlighted new feature in VS2010, and Dustin drills into IDE support for parallel programming with parallel debugging windows and profiling views.
  • Kevin and Dustin talk about improved TDD support with features like "Generate From Usage."
  • The show wraps up with the guys beating Dustin up a bit with talk about Visual Studio issues such as the Add Reference Dialogue slowness and the "Visual Studio is busy" dialogue.

Show Links:

Download / Listen:

Herding Code 48: Dustin Campbell on Visual Studio 2010

[audio://herdingcode.com/wp-content/uploads/HerdingCode-0048-Dustin-Campbell-on-Visual-Studio-2010.mp3]

Show notes compiled by Ben Griswold. Thanks!

Herding Code 47: Joe Brinkman on Webforms vs ASP.NET MVC

This week on Herding Code, the guys speak with Joe Brinkman, Co-founder and Technical Fellow at DotNetNuke Corporation, about the ASP.NET MVC vs. Webforms debate, open source development, recent advancements in DotNetNuke and how to improve our industry and the community as a whole.

  • Joe explains that the Webforms vs. MVC debate boils down to a component based vs. object-oriented based approach to web development. Joe also shares that one shouldn’t only think about Webforms when doing the comparison. After all, let’s not forget web services, HTTPHandlers and HTTPModules are also part of the ASP.NET stack.
  • Joe speaks about the lack of a reusability model in ASP.NET MVC and Scott K offers solutions that go beyond mere copy and paste operations. Joe and Kevin explore how the absence of the component model in ASP.NET MVC is rescued by rich functionality packaged within the Javascript frameworks.
  • K Scott and Joe talk about core issues with Webform development. That is, ClientId management, .ASPX in URLs and maintainability concerns around Webform’s event model in the code behind and forcing statefulness in a stateless web environment. K Scott notes that .NET 4.0 will offer URL routing and greater control over ClientId generation so key areas of concern may soon be addressed, but it will take further framework improvement to provide greater control over the Webform abstraction layer.
  • Everyone agrees that Microsoft, vendors and community will provide components to pave the way to richer, easier to implement, ASP.NET MVC applications. Additionally, advancements will continue in the Webforms space.  Most notably, the guys assume there is bound to be a push towards a better Webforms testability story.
  • Kevin gives historical context to Webforms and why the abstraction model was revolutionary and arguably necessary. Knowing full well that hate mail is to come, Jon talks about using the “right” tool for the job and how he plans to continue to use Webforms where appropriate.
  • Jon and Joe summarize four big reasons why EVERY developer should learn MVC and Scott K asks what can be done with senior web developers who just don’t want to learn the new framework?  This leads into a conversation about honing one’s craft, mentorship, leading by example, and following through with supervision and code reviews.  
  • Now that ASP.NET MVC is in the picture, the group wrestles with what to call ASP.NET Webforms.  Classic ASP.NET is kind of catchy (and a little confusing.)
  • Jon and Joe talk about changes in Open Source – inside and outside of the Microsoft community – over the past six years. 
  • Scott K talks about the “promise” of being able to contribute to an open source project and asks about the managing patches – specifically on large open source projects.
  • The guys also dive into open source definition, licenses, legal considerations, protections around intellectual properties and implicit copyright on code.
  • The episode wraps up with a Joe providing a nice overview of DotNetNuke’s past, present and future.

Show Links:

Download / Listen:

Herding Code 47: Joe Brinkman on Webforms vs ASP.NET MVC 

[audio://herdingcode.com/wp-content/uploads/HerdingCode-0047-Joe-Brinkman-on-Webforms-vs-ASPNET-MVC.mp3]

Show notes compiled by Ben Griswold. Thanks!

Herding Code 46: Mistakes and News Recap

Everybody makes mistakes. The trick is to learn from your own or, better yet, the mistakes of others!  This week, the guys amuse and educate by graciously sharing some of their past developer mistakes. 

  • Hear tales of recursive website spidering, rogue mass emailers, and hardware snafus which end in puffs of smoke
  • Learn from Jon that simulating nuclear fission on a Cray supercomputer can get wildly out of control
  • Find out why you should think twice before optimizing a relative’s computer on New Years’ Day
  • What’s the quickest way to realize the benefits of a Transaction Server?  Why listening to K Scott’s ATM story, of course.
  • Discover why you might want to rethink flying Kevin out to your company to perform any hardware magic (but if you need to reconstruct a FAT table, he’s your guy.)
  • And get the most sage advice ever offered by K Scott on Herding Code.

As a bonus, the Extended Lightning Round!

Show Links:

Download / Listen:

Herding Code 46: Mistakes and News Recap 

[audio://herdingcode.com/wp-content/uploads/HerdingCode-0046-Mistakes-and-News-Recap.mp3]

Show notes compiled by Ben Griswold. Thanks!