Stories
Tagged with Microsoft
A Look at ASP.NET 5: Part 4 - MVC 6
I had planned on finishing these a long time ago, but working on my Pluralsight course about ASP.NET 5 distracted me. Sorry about that.
If you’ve been doing web development in .NET, you probably have at least a passing experience with ASP.NET’s MVC framework. At it’s core, it’s a common way to build and architect web applications. The new stack is built on the same metaphors from the older versions. If you’ve been using MVC before, you won’t be lost and some of the additions are welcome.
I’ll explain what I’m doing in a series of blog posts and link them all here as I write them. The plan is to write posts about:
Part 3: Using Entity Framework 7
Part 4: ASP.NET MVC 6 (This Post)
Part 6: Web Tooling with VS2015 (coming soon)
Windows Phone, Surface, and Fanboydom
I admit it, I don’t know if that last word in the title is real, but anyway. I’ve used a Windows Phone since betas of Windows Phone 7. Like some of you I have the question of whether to believe the new Microsoft’s lukewarm support for the platform. Will Win10 be the savior of the platform or final coffin nail? I don’t have an answer to that.
I like to think that all that time has given me perspective, but I am not sure that’s true. I liken myself to a detached observer, but the reality is that I own a Windows Phone, a Windows Laptop, an Xbox One (and 360 before it), a Microsoft Band, and I even have a Spot Watch somewhere in a box. Does that make me a fanboy? I hope not, but certainly not a detached observer with a honest perspective.
Where does that leave me? That’s for my readers to judge. I am sure it’s somewhere in the middle but certainly leaning towards being a Microsoft fanboy.
Xbox One - First Impressions
My pre-order of the Xbox One arrived on Monday and I’ve had a little time to play with it. I mostly got the device for Forza which I love. So after a couple of days with it, here are my first impressions.
Let’s start with the Operating System. It’s gorgeous and fluid. The switching between apps is really impressive. While it’s missing some features from it’s 360 counterpart, I find it really satisfying.
Then there are the games. At launch like any platform the number of games is limited but so is my budget. Of course I started with Forza and I like it a lot. It’s missing some stuff I liked in previous versions but the game looks amazing. You can tell it’s next gen. While playing Forza, I wanted to start with the Game DVR feature. Xbox had to push out the Twitch support which would have been great, but you can record clips (up to five minutes) of your games and download them to the SkyDrive for sharing. This is an amazing feature. The Upload Studio app (free) let’s you do some simple edits and recording voice overs and even from the Kinect camera to go with the game videos. Here is a quick edit of five instances of my bad driving for example (in 720p):
My First Experience at the Microsoft Store
I wanted to get a Type Cover for my new Surface today so I headed to the Microsoft Store. I never go to malls so it wasn't a lot of fun just getting into the mall. But soon me and my girlfriend found the store. I was very surprised by the sheer number of customers. I didn't expect it to be empty on a Saturday afternoon but it was packed. As we walked in we were immediately approached and helped with where to find the Type Covers. Even with all those customers, the store was really well staffed. Was simple to find someone to help us get a Type Cover from the back and answer some pricing questions.
Unfortunately there was an issue with her Touch Pad. Whenever she closed her cover and re-opened it the keyboard didn't work until she unplugged it and re-plugged it in. So I thought while we were there, we'd ask them about replacing it.
Replacing it might have been difficult because the keyboard was from the Surface machine I received at Build 2012. No receipt, no box.
TypeScript (or the obligatory post about it)
Like many of you, I've been itching to see what Anders had up his sleeve and I wasn't disappointed yesterday when they announced TypeScript. After teaching all day, I took a quick look at TypeScript (and I do mean quick).
There was a lot of buzz yesterday and the response seemed to be in one of two camps (for the most part):
I think I am in the middle of this. TypeScript reminds me a lot of LESS. What I mean by that is that I think the smart thing they did was make all JavaScript valid TypeScript. In case that isn't clear, TypeScript is a superset of JavaScript. This means that they're adding some features to JavaScript to help with large, enterprise sized codebases including:
ASP.NET MVP
Today I was renewed as an MVP for the tenth time and could not be happier. Over the past year I've been looking last XAML into the web stack and Microsoft has graciously moved me from a Data MVP over to an ASP.NET MVP. This doesn't mean I won't be sharing on Silverlight, WPF or data technologies; it's just a reflection of what I am working with now.
I want to thank everyone in the community for following me and reading my blog over past year...you're the reason I've been renewed again and I sincerely appreciate it!
New Era for Microsoft?
A lot of people are writing about the possibility of a new era at Microsoft. As a cynical fanboy I am hoping that this turns out to be true. I think there are a lot of great things coming out of Redmond these days and they deserve credit for making real change.
If you’re not keeping up, let’s talk about some of the comments that are being talked about. First up, Woz:
Woz liking what is coming out with the Surface penlet (pen tablet) is very interesting. He’s already on record liking the Windows Phone quite a bit. I think he may be on to something.
Introducing MSDNLink.net
Recently, while working on my Windows Phone 7.5 book, I found the need to display a short URL to some specific documentation. I found that you could use msdn.com to do this but the results were not very satisfying. In fact, if you take a typical documentation ID (e.g. “ff402535”), you can simply do this:
This works but takes you to a simple page that reformats the topic instead of the full MSDN documentation. I didn’t like that solution so I registered http://msdnlink.net. With this new address you can do the same thing:
This is a simple redirect to the full documentation. Just take whatever MSDN documentation and look at the URL:
R.I.P. GooNews
I recently wrote about the release of my GooNews application for the Windows Phone 7 Marketplace. The Application has now been pulled from the marketplace and will not be resubmitted. There were a variety of issues that finally forced me to give up and just pull the application and give up on ever getting it out there as a successful application. Here's the story:
First and foremost I want to thank several people for trying to get this addressed including Jaime Rodriguez and Glen Gordon who both tried to get this resolved but I've spent way too much time trying to get it working before resorting to pulling the application and going public with the problems.
The Next Application Platform? All of them...
UPDATED: Added comments on backend story.
I've been knee deep in my book and a super secret project I can't talk about yet but that project and some conversations i've been having (on Twitter and with the Atlanta Pros User Group when we discussed HTML5). It started with the exaggerated death of Silverlight. I was asked at length to comment on what how HTML5 and Silvelright compete and other topics. But after looking at a lot of different things, I came up with a different idea...
A Week with WP7 from an Android User's Perspective
I spent most of the last week with my early demo Windows Phone 7 (e.g. WP7) phone as my primary phone. See I am a Verizon customer currently and therefore I couldn't use Verizon on the demo phone (as it takes SIM cards and Verizon can't spell SIM). So I took the opportunity while in Europe to get a pre-paid SIM card and use it as my main phone (since my Droid was useless there). You're probably wondering what my impressions were? Well, two caveats to start with...I have bet pretty heavily on the phone so I am not exactly a neutral party, but I'll try to be. Also, I've never owned an iPhone (AT&T is true evil incarnate) so take that for what its worth.
History with Android
Using Windows Mobile without Live Messenger?
Url: http://mobile.microsoft.com/live/en-us/mobile/d...
I am a dedicated Verizon phone user. Why? Because they have good coverage and their bills are never a surprise. When I was with AT&T, I had to spend an hour a month arguing over the bill. Anyway, I am with Verizon now.
Fun with Microsoft Tag
Url: http://www.microsoft.com/tag/
I've been playing with Microsoft Tag. Its pretty cool. I am pretty surprised how well it works with my phone. If you haven't played with it yet, go create your own. I want to start scanning everything I can so please create them and put them everywhere...
I am an MVP!
Url: https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile/Shawn...
I am proud to announce that Microsoft hasn't come to their senses yet and decided to renew my MVP status for another year. Being an MVP has been a great experience for me and I really appreciate the program. Five years into the program and I couldn't be happier.
Sara Ford's Blog
Url: http://blogs.msdn.com/saraford/archive/2008/06/...
I am surprised when I talk to developers these days and they don't know who Sara Ford is. She's responsible for CodePlex and many open source initiatives at Microsoft. In addition, her blog is an excellent source of information on Visual Studio tricks and features that most of us have never noticed. It is well worth a read. Just announced today, her blog is now available in Russian and Spanish so if English isn't your native tongue, you're in luck there too.
Wonder how I get someone to translate my blog into other languages ;)
Not Sure the Copy Bug in Gone in Vista SP1
I am copying a video file across my wireless network (though this particular machine is kinda flaky, so it might not be Vista's fault) but I thought this was funny:
New CTP's from Microsoft...
Over the past week there have been a flurry of new projects coming out of Microsoft, mostly in the form of CTP's. I've been downloading like crazy and will likely be discussing my experience with them in the coming week. In case you missed any of them:
I expect that with the release of the EF Beta 3 means Astoria is coming soon. I'll let you know when it drops! Time to start digging in.
Is Windows Vista the new Windows ME?
This blog post may seem to be a clever way of increasing my web traffic but the fact is that I am growing frustrated with the adoption of Vista and Microsoft's general under-delivering on Vista.
The big caveat is this: I use Vista and really like it. I don't have any real problems (no driver issues) and I find that gaming performance close enough to XP that I can't tell the difference. In addition, I like the new UX sheen of Vista...so why do I ask if its the new Windows ME?
Vista has a bad name in the community. Some is perception (bad press==bad experience), some of it is real (driver issues for machines not pre-installed are bad....often really bad), and the 64-bit story is just painful. UAC is similar to how Ubuntu implemented root protection, but bothers people more than most Linux distributions (with my limited experience).
Is Aero Killing Your Batteries?
Url: http://news.com.com/Vista%20draining%20laptop%2...
I wasn't surprised to see thsi story on CNet as I wondered whether this would be the case as far back as 2003:
http://wildermuth.com/2003/10/29/Been_a_busy_couple_of_days.aspx
Free T-Mobile Hotspot Subscription for Vista Users
Url: http://hotspot.t-mobile.com/vista
I am in between meetings near the Microsoft Campus today and wanted a coffee so I headed to a nearby Starbucks. I wanted to check my e-mail, ut I had given up my T-Mobile account (at $40/month) because there is so much free wireless in my neighborhood. I wrestled with spending $10 for a day pass just to check e-mail when I noticed that Vista users would get a free trial to T-Mobile hotspots.
I took the trial and I got a free month of access. No credit card required (so no nasty...trial, but we'll bill you if you forget to cancel nonsense). I did have to install an ActiveX component to check to see if IE7/Vista was in use. Voila...free e-mail checking...
Vista Still Has Some *OLD* Code
I was setting up my new laptop with Vista today and it looks like everything is finally installed, except my fonts. So I opened the Font folder and picked, "Add New Font". This is what I saw:
While it is certainly skinned with Vista, this is the same font dialog that i've been using since '95 or perhaps 3.1. I love the Drives dropdown and the Network button. I wonder how much ancient code is still in Vista? Anyone notice others?
Vista and NTFS Ownership
I thought I'd mention a problem I had with my new Vista installation.
I have a separate partion for my data, so when I upgrade to Vista I didn't do a clean format of the entire drive, but just did a clean install of Vista. Works great!
The only exception was that I did not have permission to access, modify or delete some files on my data drive. I am an administrator, what do you mean I don't have permission? After googling the problem, I discovered that the owner of these few wierd files was an unknown entity. To fix it, I used the Advanced button the security tab of the file/folder properties to change the owner to my admin account. Once I had the ownership, it was as simple as adding the appropriate permissions.
Realtime Taskbar Previews in Vista
I really like the realtime (or near real-time) preview of the windows on the Taskbar in Vista. Check it out: