DotNetKicks.com : Stories kicked by rafi

New ASP.NET Charting Control

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 16:31:03 GMT

From ScottGu's blog. Brand new, Free, ASP.NET 3.5 chart control. It looks very nice!

Back to Basics: Generics

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 15:01:12 GMT

Introduction There are language features that are nothing more than syntactical sugar. For example, C#'s coalesce operator (??) is a short-handed and specialized if-else. Object initializers make it easier to set properties on a newly created objects. Some features though go beyond mere convenience and add real value. I know it seems like we constantly have to learn new things, while at the same time actually produce code to pay our bills. It can be hard to pick and choose what to learn and what can wait. Let me be straight up though: if you haven't mastered generics yet, you're starting to fall dangerously behind.

4 Steps To Ensure You're The Worst Developer Ever!

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 21:46:05 GMT

There are lots of articles about improving your skills as a developer. Everyone likes to talk about how to strengthen their skills and produce really good software. But, what if you want to be the worst developer ever? Nobody seems to want to share those secrets.

jQuery Intellisense in VS 2008 - ScottGu's Blog

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 16:31:20 GMT

Last month I blogged about how Microsoft is extending support for jQuery. Over the last few weeks we've been working with the jQuery team to add great jQuery intellisense support within Visual Studio 2008 and Visual Web Developer 2008 Express (which is free). This is now available to download and use.

Pair Programming - Marketing FAIL

Wed, 26 Nov 2008 09:01:05 GMT

When people talk about lack of adoption of "XP" (aka Extreme Programming) practices, one of the chief problems people have with it is the idea of "Pair Programming"

What Gives? Microsofts Code Generation Tool

Wed, 19 Nov 2008 01:31:12 GMT

In a world of Microsoft and third party applications, out comes t4. t4 is a code generation tool that can compete with CodeSmith, but its FREE and built right into Visual Studio. It has been years since the first edition with very little publication of the actual application. t4 is a free code generation engine from Microsoft that underpins the Domain Specific Languages and Software Factory toolkits.

What if your contact form fails?

Mon, 17 Nov 2008 17:16:18 GMT

Did you ever think about it? Someone types the message, clicks on send and gets the error message like "Something went wrong. Sorry...". Ok, what now? How TF can I send you a message? Read in this article.

Data Access With The Entity Framework

Wed, 12 Nov 2008 21:09:15 GMT

A post that shows how we use the repository pattern with the Entity Framework

Use jQuery and quickSearch to interactively search any data

Tue, 11 Nov 2008 19:31:04 GMT

A complete example of how to implement progressive search in ASP.NET, using the jQuery plugin quickSearch. The source download includes a customized version of quickSearch for use with ASP.NET.

Building a Silverlight Line-Of-Business Application - Part 3

Wed, 19 Nov 2008 23:16:03 GMT

The third part of the great article Chris Anderson wrote about developing a framework for a Line-Of-Business application in Silverlight.

How to Compare / Test the Equality of two Queries in SQL Server

Wed, 12 Nov 2008 18:01:07 GMT

Compare / Test the Equality of two Queries in SQL Server using this short T-SQL

PagedList Sorted Edition

Fri, 07 Nov 2008 14:16:10 GMT

Sorted Edition of PagedList

Crazy Talk: Reducing ORM Friction

Sun, 16 Nov 2008 03:01:12 GMT

Let's get this out of the way: I know you're going to think I'm nuts as you read this. You may "pfft" to what you're about to read - know that I know you're "pfft"-ing me. All I ask is that you consider what I'm about to suggest...

C# Structs

Mon, 10 Nov 2008 17:16:02 GMT

What are the benefit of structs in C#? When can they improve performance and memory use? See examples and benchmarks as well as screens from CLRProfiler and the Visual Studio debugger. Is this is the best struct article in the world? Maybe!

Ian talks about L2S Being killed

Mon, 03 Nov 2008 17:16:13 GMT

great post from Ian on the choice of EF over L2S decision from Microsoft.

LINQ To SQL is Dead - Read Between the Lines

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 18:46:13 GMT

David Hayden with some great points on the Linq to SQL announcement and some ideas on how the project could be saved.

Microsoft kills Linq to SQL

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 09:01:13 GMT

Ayende (aka Oren) expresses disbelief at Microsoft's decision to effectively kill off LINQ to SQL.

LINQ To SQL Gets Kicked to the Curb... Needs A Good Home!

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 20:16:02 GMT

Great post on why L2S needs to be supported by the community and why a L2S targeted at the community is a good idea.

Delete entity or collection in Linq to SQL without getting them

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 17:16:15 GMT

In order to delete an entity or a collection of entity in Linq to SQL, you have to first get them and then delete them. This requires additional database roundtrip. Here's a strongly typed maintenance free way to delete entities directly using their primary key.

SVN-Monitor is finally out for free download!

Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:31:02 GMT

A full-featured .net application that integrates SubVersion, TortoiseSVN and all your checked-out folders and repositories. Use it to perform all your svn commands and monitor all your projects' activities in a single place. Access all commands from the tray menu or from the main window. This is a must-have tool for every windows+svn user!

Whats up with Stored Procedures these days?

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 11:46:19 GMT

When life throws you hard balls, you can either step back and take a swing or bunt the hell out of it. I just recently went to an information session on T-SQL, Stored Procedures and now LINQ. These folks discussed stored procedures and why they are so important in the world today.

ASP.NET MVC Pro's and Con's

Thu, 23 Oct 2008 16:16:06 GMT

Some of the main pro's and con's of the new style for building web applications (ASP.NET MVC).

ASP.net MVC goes Beta

Thu, 16 Oct 2008 03:31:05 GMT

Hot on the heels of Silverlight, MVC is out of preview and into Beta today.

Measure String Size In Pixels (C#)

Thu, 09 Oct 2008 19:16:03 GMT

Sometimes we need to know the width of a given string in pixels, do you know how to compute it? Before writing some long code, please notice that the .NET framework class library provides such a method...

$("Microsoft").append("excitement");

Tue, 30 Sep 2008 20:46:14 GMT

Right now is honestly the most excited that I have ever been about the .net platform. With IronRuby and ASP.NET MVC on the horizon and jQuery being integrated as part of the official Microsoft development platform, I think that Microsoft is finally "getting" web development.