windowscoding.com;

Tips & Tricks: Manually uninstalling CodeSmith.

Blake Niemyjski — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 08:39:00 GMT

I've come across a few issues, where a CodeSmith install might become corrupt when going from a beta to RTM. The following guide will show you how to successfully remove CodeSmith from your computer. Please allow 10 to 15 minutes of your time to complete this guide. Please note: This guide could be used to uninstall other .net applications.

You will need to download the Windows Installer CleanUp Utility. After you have installed this application you will need to launch the following executable: C:\Program Files\Windows Installer Clean Up\msicuu.exe. After the application is launched you will want to Select CodeSmith from the list and click remove. This will remove CodeSmith from the Installer Database. The installer database holds a record of each application you install on your computer.
Next we will need to remove all the CodeSmith assemblies that are located in the GAC. Open up Windows Explorer and browse to: C:\Windows\assembly.
Now you will need to right click all the CodeSmith.* assemblies and select uninstall.
Next we will remove the configuration and program directories. The following directories will need to be deleted, please note the below paths are working paths for Windows Vista.
- C:\ProgramData\CodeSmith
- C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Local\CodeSmith
- C:\Users\<user>\Documents\CodeSmith (If you want to remove your templates).
- C:\Program Files\CodeSmith
- C:\Program Files (x86)\CodeSmith (if you’re running 64bit)
- C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\CodeSmith Professional 5.0
- C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\CodeSmith Standard 5.0
You can now install a fresh copy of CodeSmith!

CodeSmith 5.0 RTM available now

Blake Niemyjski — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 17:37:00 GMT

Over the past year the CodeSmith team has been hard at work on CodeSmith 5.0. This release contains many fixes, performance enhancements and other enhancements over the previous versions. Below is a list of some of the major changes between CodeSmith 5.0 and CodeSmith 4.0. I have highlighted some of my favorites below.

5.0.0 Final

* Added a tab for editing variables in the CodeSmith Project settings dialog.
* Made it so that any .csp variables are automatically used when there is a string matching the variable value in the property values.
* Made it so that variables are automatically created for connection strings stored in .csp files so that the connection string isn't repeated.
* If you choose to remove all settings during uninstall, it will automatically try to deactivate your license.
* Added more info about the current license to the about dialog.
* Made schema explorer designers load their data sources async so that the UI would not lock.
* Fixed bug where wrong data source was selected when the designer was opened.
* Fixed error when adding references to Visual Studio project.

Beta 2

* Changed all SchemaExplorer designers to display in Object (Owner) format so that you can type the first couple letters to jump to the object you are looking for.
* Added ability to override plural/singular forms of words to the StringUtil.ToPlural and StringUtil.ToSingular methods.
* Added ability to specify Filter="SomeTableSchemaProperty" on ColumnSchema directives which will filter the list of columns in the designer based on the table selected in the specified property.
* Added new RegisterReference method to CodeTemplate to indicate which assemblies your generated code relies on so that they can be automatically added in Visual Studio.
* Performance improvements in adding files to the project system in Visual Studio.
* Added a menu item for managing data sources to the Visual Studio CodeSmith menu.
* Added step to the uninstall process to remove all samples and config files. It will also automatically deactivate your license so you can use it on another machine.
* Added syntax highlighting for the VB keyword "Infer".
* Various improvements to the OracleSchemaProvider including full extended property support.
* Made deleting items in the csmap editor more intuitive.
* Changed ColumnSchema designer to use a treeview so that all columns for all tables aren't loaded at once.
* Fixed issue with duplicate CSP item templates in the C# project system and missing in VB project system.
* Fixed error with editing empty CSP files.
* Fixed issue with beta license that was causing the application to freeze on startup when behind a firewall.
* Fixed a bug with email addresses in the bug report form.

Beta 1

* Added ability to deep load all schema information at once which results in huge performance improvements. This is used by setting the DeepLoad attribute on any SchemaExplorer property in your template. This would typically be used when you know you are going to use all of the schema information from a database.
* Ability to use .net 3.5 features in templates including LINQ. This is accomplished by setting the CompilerVersion attribute on CodeTemplate to "v3.5".
* CodeSmith Projects now have a single file output mode to generate all template outputs into a single file.
* Added Ability to generate individual project outputs.
* Changed Manage Outputs dialog to make it easier to manage outputs and added an options dialog for changing project settings.
* Made it so that files being generated from a CodeSmith Project are checked out of source control before being edited.
* Improved the custom tool upgrade process so that it works 100% in all scenarios without having to make manual changes afterward.
* CodeSmith Projects can now add files to Visual Studio as code behind files to other generated files.
* CodeSmith Projects can now set a generated files build action.
* Added ability to resolve assemblies located in paths relative to the template now using Path attribute. Looks in template folder and \bin folder by default.
* Optimized template caching algorithm allows for much improved performance.
* Templates use partial classes now so you can have partial class code behinds and have access to template properties from the code behind file.
* Added template metadata caching.
* Added GetPropertyAttribute and SetPropertyAttribute to CodeTemplate.
* Property attribute values are added for any non-recognized attributes on Property, XmlProperty and CodeTemplate directives.
* Made all SchemaExplorer objects serializable.
* Fixed bug with refreshing SchemaExplorer objects where it would not show all extended properties of the object after refresh.
* Re-organized all sample templates and projects into a more logical folder structure.
* Added new NHibernate templates in both C# and Visual Basic.
* Made various improvements to the Plinqo templates.
* .netTiers updated to the 2.3 Beta version of the templates.
* Added VB versions of many sample templates and projects.
* Added a couple new maps and ActiveSnippets.
* Included the latest version of the NuSoft framework templates.

Download Links Available Below:

Professional: http://www.codesmithtools.com/download/codesmithprofessional-50.msi
Standard: http://www.codesmithtools.com/download/codesmithstandard-50.msi
Zip: http://www.codesmithtools.com/download/codesmith-50.zip

Visual Studio 2008 SP1 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 RTM

Blake Niemyjski — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 13:24:00 GMT

I was so happy to see that Microsoft has finally release Visual Studio 2008 SP1 and the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1. It contains so many improvements and bug fixes; you can view the full list of the enhancements at Scott Guthrie's blog.

"Unlike other Service Packs from Microsoft, the SP1 of.Net Framework 3.5 and Visual Studio 2008 not only contains bug fixes and improvements, it also contains new technologies such as ADO.Net Entity Framework v1, ADO.Net Data Services v1, ASP.Net Dynamic Data and the framework and tools support for working with SQL Server 2008 that was RTM'ed last week.

Here are some useful download links:

VS 2008 Service Pack Preparation Tool
.NET Framework 3.5 Service pack 1
Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1 (exe)
Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1 (iso)
Visual Studio 2008 Express Editions with SP1 (Web Install)
Visual Studio 2008 Shell (isolated mode) with Service Pack 1 Redistributable
Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1 Remote Debugger
Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1 Stand-Alone Profiler
Visual Studio 2008 Team Foundation Server SP1
Visual C++ 2008 SP1 Redistributable Package (x86, x64, ia64)
Visual C++ 2008 SP1 Sample Library
Microsoft Report Viewer Redistributable 2008 SP1 Language Pack
.NET Framework 3.5 Client Profile Language Pack

While downloading and installing the SP1 of.Net Framework 3.5 and Visual Studio 2008 you can take your time to read the posts I've written during the beta time frame:

Overview of the Service Pack 1

ADO.Net Entity Framework

ADO.Net Data Services

A Simple ADO.Net Data Service Walkthrough (updated for SP1)
Querying an ADO.Net Data Service via .Net Client (updated for SP1)

ADO.Net Sync Services

Sync Services for ADO.Net now use SQL Server 2008 Change Tracking

SQL Server 2008 and Data Access Technologies

Speaking at the Madison .NET User Group

Blake Niemyjski — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 15:24:00 GMT

Date:     Wednesday, July 30, doors open at 5pm

Topic:     Code Generation

Speaker:     Blake Niemyjski

Location:     Herzing College, East Madison Campus, 5218 East Terrace Drive, 53718

Description:

Blake Niemyjski is a full time student studying Computer Science and Mathematics. His previous studies included RSA Encryption and Number Theory. This coming year he will be attending UW-Madison to continue his education. Since the late 90's Blake has had a curiosity in developing software with the goal of making software that helps the masses accomplish tasks. As a hobbyist developer turned student and professional developer, Blake has had a passion to continue his knowledge into the unknown and creating technologies of the future.

Some of Blake's past and current work includes the development on various Windows featured communities: bink.nu, windowscoding.com, hypervoria.com, open source communities: (e.g. nettiers.com, communityserverlive.com), charities (e.g. wearemicrosoft.com) and other commercial entities including, globalgrind.com, CodeSmith Tools LLC and more.

Blake will be covering Code Generation using CodeSmith's upcoming release CodeSmith 5.0. The presentation will cover the following:

How-to create templates that use Data Sources, XML, SQL, etc...
Tips and Tricks used by senior fellow CodeSmith users
Demos on Data Access Generation using nHiberate and .netTiers
How templates can make your life easier and save you money
CodeSmith 5.0 specific features
An overview of what happens under the hood, CodeDOM, etc.

Meeting Agenda:

5:00pm, Networking with sponsors and members
5:30pm, Free pizza and soda
6:00pm, Introduction and start main presentation
7:45pm, Break off into Special Interest Groups
9:00pm, Give away prizes and Wrap up meeting

Microsoft StyleCop: Source Code Analyzer for C#

Blake Niemyjski — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 07:15:00 GMT

Here is a cool internal tool used by Microsoft that is now seeing daylight .

"We are very excited to announce the release of a new developer tool from Microsoft, Source Analysis for C#. This tool is known internally within Microsoft as StyleCop, and has been used for many years now to help teams enforce a common set of best practices for layout, readability, maintainability, and documentation of C# source code.

StyleCop is similar in many ways to Microsoft Code Analysis (specifically FxCop), but there are some important distinctions. FxCop performs its analysis on compiled binaries, while StyleCop analyzes the source code directly. For this reason, FxCop focuses more on the design of the code, while StyleCop focuses on layout, readability and documentation. Most of that information is stripped away during the compilation process, and thus cannot be analyzed by FxCop.

The ultimate goal of StyleCop is to allow you to produce elegant, consistent code that your team members and others who view your code will find highly readable. In order to accomplish this, StyleCop does not allow its rules to be very configurable. StyleCop takes a one-size-fits-all approach to code style, layout, and readability rules. It is highly likely that you will not agree with all of the rules and may even find some of the rules annoying at first! However, the majority of teams using this tool within Microsoft have found that after a short adjustment period, they came to appreciate the rules enforced by StyleCop, and even began to find it difficult to read code not written in this style.

StyleCop comes with a set of default rules analyzers covering approximately 200 best practice rules. These rules are fully compatible with the default layout settings in Visual Studio 2005 and Visual Studio 2008.

Specifically, these rules cover the following, in no particular order:

Layout of elements, statements, expressions, and query clauses
Placement of curly brackets, parenthesis, square brackets, etc
Spacing around keywords and operator symbols
Line spacing
Placement of method parameters within method declarations or method calls
Standard ordering of elements within a class
Formatting of documentation within element headers and file headers
Naming of elements, fields and variables
Use of the built-in types
Use of access modifiers
Allowed contents of files
Debugging text

After installation, StyleCop can be run from within the Visual Studio IDE, and can also be integrated into MSBuild-based command line builds" (Microsoft StyleCop).

Download ( Microsoft StyleCop )

How-to: Run Windows Live software on 64bit Windows

Blake Niemyjski — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 23:57:00 GMT

I'm guessing that many of you have attempted to download the latest version of Windows Live Messenger or other Windows Live Software but have been prompted with the following error:

"Sorry, Windows Live programs cannot be installed on Windows Server, Windows XP Professional x64 Edition, or Windows operating systems earlier than Windows XP Service Pack 2."

You're not alone, as I have received the same error when trying to install the latest version on Windows Server 2008 64bit.

The folks at Microsoft included support in the installer for all operating systems during the Windows Live beta(s). However when Messenger 8.5 went RTM, they removed support for all of the operating systems mentioned above. Many are outraged that Microsoft took this stance because they supported it while it was in beta, and then launch and say we don't support it and won't ever support it.

"A special note for those of you running Messenger 8.5 Beta on Windows XP 64-bit or Windows 2003 Server: the final version of Messenger 8.5 will not install or run on your OS. We don’t want you to get stuck out in the cold so you will not receive the mandatory upgrade to the final version. However, these operating systems won’t be supported by future Messenger versions. You may stay on your current beta version, or to get to a more stable final version we recommend that you uninstall Messenger 8.5 and go back to Messenger 8.1." ( Windows Live Messenger Blog ).

Many are wishing Microsoft would remove this limitation from the Windows Live installer. For more information visit the messengergeek blog.

Luckily there is an easy work around to installing Windows Live on Windows 64bit operating systems and Windows Server operating systems if you have a 32bit windows operating system available. Just follow the steps below and you will be up and running in a few minutes with the latest version of Windows Live Messenger, Windows Live Writer and various other Windows Live programs.

Download the installer on your 32bit Windows machine from http://get.live.com. Note: I used Windows XP Service pack 3.
Run the Installer (WLinstaller.exe). Note: It will download and install the latest version of Windows Live onto your machine.
Go to the following folder(C:\Program Files\Common Files\WindowsLiveInstaller\MsiSources or C:\Windows\System32\config\systemprofile\AppData\Local\WindowsLiveInstaller\MsiSources\).
Copy or email the executables of the various Windows Live programs installers to your Windows 64bit or Windows Server operating system. Below is a list of applications names that correspond to the filename (diTii.com ).

Windows Live Writer
Install_{9176251A-4CC1-4DDB-B343-B487195EB397}.msi
Windows Live Messenger
Install_{508CE775-4BA4-4748-82DF-FE28DA9F03B0}.msi
Windows Live Sign-In Assistant
Install_{AFA4E5FD-ED70-4D92-99D0-162FD56DC986}.msi
Windows Live Mail
Install_{EDB619FD-4E71-403C-8E99-DFC9CF9DD345}.msi
Windows Live Toolbar
Install_{C6876FE6-A314-4628-B0D7-F3EE5E35C4B4}.msi
Windows Live Photo Gallery
Install_{AA436FBD-2595-479B-8DDE-E9C36F50D99D}.msi

Finally install the above msi's onto your machine. You should now be on the latest and greatest version of your favorite software.

.netTiers 2.3.0 Beta 1

Blake Niemyjski — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 19:20:00 GMT

The .netTiers team released .netTiers 2.3.0 Beta 1 the other day. .netTiers 2.3.0 is a maintenance release containing many bug fixes and patches. We have also added various requested features like Enterprise Library version 4 as well as support for Visual Studio 2008.

You can download the 2.3.0 Beta 1 templates at the following locations. You can download it the following locations: SVN, Google code, or www.nettiers.com. Please submit all bug reports to http://code.google.com/p/nettiers/issues/list.

Tips & Tricks: Resetting the CodeSmith Sample Templates

Blake Niemyjski — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:11:00 GMT

A tip that not a lot of people know is that the samples are not reset during every new release of CodeSmith. New versions of templates are added to the CodeSmith template directory for the Major and Minor versions. However that is not the case for regular builds (identified via the assembly build number) for example: 4.1.x. Please note that this will also work if you want to reset your templates for the fun of it.

You might be asking yourself, well why doesn’t CodeSmith automatically update my templates for me. Well there is a pretty good reason behind this. There is no way to know if you modified the current set of templates on your machine. If we were to just overwrite the files with the new templates that contain bug fixes, you could lose a lot of unsaved work.

So if you are experiencing a template related bug and you didn’t cleanly install CodeSmith for the very first time on your machine. The chances are your templates are out of date and need to be saved manually and updated following the steps below.

The following steps below will reset your samples to the version that of CodeSmith that you updated to, or installed to. If the samples still do not show up in CodeSmith Explorer. Then you can find the sample templates located in two zip files: samples.zip and maps.zip, located in Program Files\CodeSmith folder, and you can extract these to the correct folder inside of you’re my documents folder (Documents\CodeSmith\Samples\v4.1\Templates).

PLEASE CREATE A BACKUP OF ALL YOUR TEMPLATES BEFORE PROCEEDING!!!

First you will need to exit all CodeSmith related applications (CodeSmith Studio, Visual Studio) and follow the steps below.

Open the Windows Run dialog box by hitting the Windows Key and R. or by going to the Start menu and clicking on run. or start -> run) dialog box and type “cmd” and click the “OK” key.
Next type “cs /resetsamples” into the Command Prompt window and hit enter.
Finally type “y” to confirm that you want to reset your templates and hit enter.

Congratulations your CodeSmith templates have been reset.

How-to: Delete dangling files from a Community Server database

Blake Niemyjski — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 18:13:00 GMT

The other day I came across a bug when upgrading my site to Community Server 2008. The Community Server 2008 upgrade tool would throw an exception when trying to move my files into CFS. The exception was result of the upgrade tool trying to pull down post attachments where the Section or Post didn't exist.

This might not seem like such a bad thing, but it is for two reasons:

You have a file that is taking up database space that isn’t accessible within Community Server.
Community Server appends the SectionID to file name. Since the SectionID is null an exception will be thrown when creating the file name.

I created the following SQL statement that will delete all cs_PostAttachments where the SectionID and ApplicationType is NULL and the section doesn't exist in the cs_sections table.

DELETE
    cs_PostAttachments
FROM
    cs_PostAttachments
LEFT JOIN
    cs_Sections
ON
    cs_Sections.SectionID = cs_PostAttachments.SectionID
WHERE
    cs_PostAttachments.Content NOT LIKE 0x AND
    cs_Sections.SectionID IS NULL AND
    cs_Sections.ApplicationType IS NULL

-Blake Niemyjski

How-to: Reset a CodeSmith license.

Blake Niemyjski — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 14:26:00 GMT

Every once in a while you might run into a licensing problem when using CodeSmith. This can be when the Visual Studio add-in becomes corrupted, or you encounter some kind of licensing problem and you have problems activating. You can fix these related problems by resetting the license file and reactivating your copy of CodeSmith.

First you will need to exit all CodeSmith related applications (CodeSmith Studio, Visual Studio) and follow the steps below.

1)    Open the windows run (windows key + r or start -> run) dialog box and type “cmd”

2)    And type “cs /resetlicense” hit enter and type “y” and hit enter again. This will remove any CodeSmith license files from your computer.
Your command prompt window should look something like this.

C:\Users\Administrator>cs /resetlicense
CodeSmith Console v4.1.3.3349
Copyright (c) 2002-2008 CodeSmith Tools, LLC. All rights reserved.
WARNING: This will reset your license files and you will need to re-register and activate your license. It will not extend your trial period.
Press Y to confirm that you would like to reset your license: y
Reset license complete.

3)    Next launch CodeSmith studio and try to register your key. You should now see the activation prompt.

Microsoft's 2008 Lang.NET Symposium Videos

Blake Niemyjski — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 04:32:00 GMT

Check out the screen casts / videos of the Microsoft 2008 Lang.NET Symposium event. They have some pretty interesting videos available for everyone, granted you have Silverlight installed.

View ( 2008 Lang.NET Symposium Videos )

Microsoft’s DreamSpark Program for Students

Blake Niemyjski — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 18:42:00 GMT

"Welcome to Microsoft DreamSpark Professional Developer and Designer tools for students at no charge" ( Microsoft ).

I think this is really a great thing that Microsoft did for the students of the present and future. It allows students to get enriched in a great platform and at the same time use the leading tools of today to create their dreams. I am hoping that they open this program up to more students.

"Microsoft launch DreamSpark - a program to give students all over the world access to Microsoft developer and designer tools at no charge. It's available through channel 8, our student community and can be found at http://channel8.msdn.com. The idea behind this is really straight forward - provide professional tools to students and empower them to make incredible breakthroughs and get a head start on a cool career in technology.
This program is currently being rolled out to 10 countries around the world including United States, the United Kingdom, China, Germany, France, Finland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Belgium.
Students will be able to download any of the following software products via Channel 8 (channel8.msdn.com) and will have to go through a quick online third party-driven authentication process to validate their student status. Once this is done, they will be able to download the software of their choice- one title or all.
Microsoft developer tools.
Visual Studio 2005 Professional Edition
Visual Studio 2008 Professional Edition
XNA Game Studio 2.0 ( 12 months free membership in the XNA Creators Club )
Microsoft designer tools.
Expression Studio, including:
Expression Web
Expression Blend
Expression Design
Expression Media
Microsoft platform resources.
SQL Server 2005 Developer Edition
Windows Server, Standard Edition" ( FREE Developer & Designer Tools for Students )

Visit ( DreamSpark )

Silverlight 2.0 is almost here!

Blake Niemyjski — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 20:18:00 GMT

Over the past week there has been some talk on Scott Guthrie and Shawn Burke blog about Silverlight 2.0. Please check out Scott’s blog for included freatures and eight walk throughs pertaining to Silverlight 2.0, and Shawn’s for more information on what we can expect while developing Silverlight 2.0 enabled applications.

Continue reading Scott Guthrie’s blog ( First Look at Silverlight 2 )
Continue reading Shawn Burke’s blog ( Getting to know Silverlight 2.0 Beta 1 )

Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2008 Database Edition Power Tools

Blake Niemyjski — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 20:09:00 GMT

"This release updates the Power Tools for the Database Edition to work with Visual Studio 2008 and provides several new features. The new features include two custom unit test conditions, a new Data Generation Wizard, and new MSBuild tasks to support running TSQL Static Code Analysis from the command line. The updated features include 5 refactoring types, a dependency viewer, additional data generators and editors, 2 MSBuild tasks for Schema and Data Compare and the TSQL Static Code Analysis feature
New Test Conditions for Database Unit Tests
• ChecksumCondition – You can use this test condition to verify that the checksum of the data set returned by a database unit test matches the checksum of an expected data set.
• ExpectedSchemaTestCondition – You can use this test condition to verify that the column names and data types of the returned data set match expected values.

Data Generator Improvements
• New Data Generator Wizard – This new wizard creates a data generation plan that is configured to copy data from a source database. You can use this wizard when you need to copy most of your data from a live source, but need to make small changes to ensure privacy.

MSBuild Task Improvements
• SqlAnalysis Task – You can use this build task to run T-SQL Static Code Analysis from MSBuild.
TSQL Static Code Analysis
• Static Code Analysis - A precursor to the functionality that will be in future versions of VSTS that will allow you to perform Static Code Analysis on T-SQL code.

Refactoring
• “Move Schema” Refactoring - Allows a user to right click on an object and move it to a different but existing schema
• SP Rename Generation - Generate a new script that will contain sp_renames for all rename refactored objects that the user can then execute.
• Wildcard Expansion - Automatically expand the wildcard in a select to the appropriate columns.
• Fully-Qualified Name Support - Automatically inject fully-qualified names when absent in a script
• Refactoring extended to Dataset - Refactor into strongly typed dataset definitions

MSBuild Tasks
• Data / Schema Compare Build Tasks - MSBuild tasks that can generate scripts as if the user had run the Data / Schema compare UI

Schema View
• API Access to Schema View - Insert / Update / Delete to schema View and list schema objects and their associated files

Dependency Tool Window
• Dependency Tree - Show the dependencies ( incoming / outgoing ) for selected schema objects in a new tool window

Miscellaneous Tools
• Script Preprocessor - Expand SQLCMD variables and include files and command line version (sqlspp.exe) & an MSBuild version ( wraps the command line version )" ( Microsoft ) .

Download at Source ( Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2008 Database Edition Power Tools )

Microsoft SQL Server 2008 February CTP

Blake Niemyjski — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 19:55:00 GMT

The February CTP of SQL Server 2008 has been released on Microsoft Download Cetner. From what I understand this CTP of SQL Server 2008 is feature complete. Please also check out the following article "Breaking API changes in the February '08 CTP". The download link to the CTP can be found below.

"Overview
Microsoft SQL Server 2008, the next release of Microsoft SQL Server, provides a comprehensive data platform that is more secure, reliable, manageable and scalable for your mission critical applications, while enabling developers to create new applications that can store and consume any type of data on any device, and enabling all your users to make informed decisions with relevant insights."
System Requirements
Supported Operating Systems: Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2; Windows Server 2008; Windows Vista; Windows XP Service Pack 2
For all download types
32-bit systems: Computer with Intel or compatible Pentium III 600 MHz or faster processor (1 GHz or faster is recommended)
64-bit systems: 1 GHz or higher processor
Minimum of 512 MB of RAM (1 GB or more is recommended)
675 MB of available hard disk space" ( Microsoft ).

Download ( 32Bit | 64Bit )

XSLT Profiler Addin for VS 2008

Blake Niemyjski — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 12:00:00 GMT

"XML Tools team has released the XSLT Profiler Addin for VS 2008 - a quick and reliable performance analysis profiler tool that assists in the development and debugging of XSLT documents. The XSLT Profiler Addin for VS 2008 allows developers to measure, evaluate, and target performance-related problems in XSLT code by creating detailed XSLT performance reports. The XSLT Profiler includes a wealth of useful hints for XSL and XSLT style sheet optimizations, which are essential for XSLT-based applications that demand maximum performance.

If you need to develop reliable and robust software, the XSLT Profiler is capable of detecting the performance errors and defects in coding so that they are corrected at an early stage in the development. This is essential in reducing the overall cost of developing software applications." Announcing the XSLT Profiler Addin for VS 2008

Download ( XSLT Profiler Addin )

Visual Studio Themes

Blake Niemyjski — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 23:20:00 GMT

Scott Hanselman has created a nice Visual Studio Programmer Themes Gallery that allows you to quickly pick a color scheme for your Visual Studio 2005/2008 IDE. I personally like a black theme, what about you?

View ( Visual Studio Programmer Themes Gallery )

Use Windows Server 2008 as a workstation.

Blake Niemyjski — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 23:03:00 GMT

Windows Server 2008 is the fastest OS I have ever used. It’s truly amazing at how fast it performs every task I throw at it. With this said, below is a guide on how you can customize it to look just like vista. Making it a great looking development machine!!!

"1. Enable Hardware Virtualization
My workstation is a x64 machine with hardware virtualization capabilities. This means I can run Hyper-V on my machine. Even if your machine's hardware supports virtualization it is most likely not going to be enabled by default. You have to enable it via your BIOS setup.
2. Install the latest Graphics and Audio drivers
Being a server OS Windows 2008 carries with it basic graphics and audio drivers. To utilize the full strength of your hardware ensure you install the latest drivers for both graphics and audio hardware. Only with the proper graphics drivers will you be able to enable the "Aero" experience on Windows 2008.
3. Desktop Experience Feature
The Desktop Experience Feature enables a bunch of stuff that is by default present on a desktop OS. Most importantly it includes Themes, Windows Media player and the Aero related features. You will have to enable it form the Server Manager. The "Turn Windows features on or off" / "Add remove windows components" has all been rolled into the Server Manager now.
Server Manager > Features > Desktop Experience
Installing the Desktop Experience feature does not enable them. You have to manually set them up.
4. Themes
To enable Themes you will basically have to enable the Themes Service. Again being a server OS it is not enabled by default.
Services.MSC > Themes
Set the start up type to Automatic
Enabling the Aero Theme.
For this go to Control Panel > Personalization >Theme and select Windows Aero
5. Search
Search is also disabled by default on Windows 2008. Searching is important for me as I use it a lot to find my emails. To enable search you will have to add the File Services Role via Server Manager.
Server Manager > Roles > File Services > Windows Search
Outlook relies on this search service.
6. Disable Shutdown Event Tracker
Since I am using it as a workstation I do not want to keep a track of all the Shutdowns. The Shutdown Event Tracker is the pop up that you get asking you for a shutdown reason. To disable it
Open mmc.msc
Add the Group Policy snap-in
Under Administrative Templates expand System
Set Display Shutdown Event Tracer to Disabled
7. Audio
For audio you need to enable the Windows Audio service. You do this by setting the startup type to Automatic.
Services.msc > Windows Audio
Ensure you have proper drivers for your audio hardware... for me the default driver was not enabling the headphones ... it started working fine after I got the proper driver.
8. SuperFetch
As a workstation, enabling SupertFetch will give you that additional bit of responsiveness. The SuperFetch services is disabled by default and when you try to enable it you will most likely get an error message "The operating system is not presently configured to run this application"
You will have to make two registry changes to enable this service. I basically copied them over from my Vista machine.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management\PrefetchParameters
EnablePrefetcher DWORD 3
EnableSuperfetch DWORD 3
9. Get a codec pack.
For media hungry buffs download a codec pack. This will ensure you can play all media files.
10. Enable Hyper-V
With Hyper-V you can run virtual machines on your workstation. This is useful if you want to run your tests on older OS versions. Enabling Hyper-V is easy
Server Manager > Roles > Hyper-V
Remember you need a Hyper-V enabled Windows 2008 licence and also your hardware has to support virtualization.
Also If you are using an existing VHD it may ask you to re-Activate Windows as it detected hardware changes.
One good thing about Windows Server 2008 is that it no longer asks for the i386 folder like Windows 2003 while you enable features.
11. Processor Scheduling

As pointed out in a comment on my previous post; On Windows Server 2008 background services are given preference over interactive programs. You can change this behavior by

Control Panel > System and Maintenance > System > Advanced System Settings > Advanced > Performance > Settings > Advanced > Processor Scheduling

Setting this to Programs will make foreground programs more responsive.

12. Visual Effects

One thing you will notice on Windows Server 2008 is that by default you will not see Preview Thumbnails in your Documents / Music / Video folders. This has to be enabled explicitly.

Control Panel > System and Maintenance > System > Advanced System Settings > Advanced > Performance > Settings > Visual Effects

Based on your preference you can tweak these settings.

13. Power Options

Do your bit for a Green World! The Balanced (default) power plan on Windows Server 2008 does not turn off hard disks by default. On Vista hard disks are turned off after 20 mins. You can change this by

Control Panel > Hardware and Sound > Power Options > Change plan settings

It does take a bit to kick start the hard disks when you resume work but that's a sacrifice worth making for a greener world."

Source ( Using Windows Server 2008 as a SUPER workstation OS )

Top Three Reasons I cannot wait for Microsoft SQL Server 2008.

Blake Niemyjski — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 22:50:00 GMT

There are many new features that are being shipped with Microsoft SQL Server 2008. But there were only a couple on that list that really stood out as a reason for me to upgrade to SQL Server 2008. What features are you most excited about in the Microsoft SQL Server 2008 release?

Data Compression: Enable data to be stored more effectively and reduce the storage requirements for your data. Data Compression also provides significant performance improvements for large I/O bound workloads like data warehousing.
Backup Compression: Keeping disk-based backups online is expensive and time consuming. With SQL Server 2008 backup compression, less storage is required to keep backups online and backups run significantly faster since less disk I/O is required.
T-SQL Intellisense: It is about time that SQL Management Studio gets Intellisense. Source ( Is SQL2K8 Really a dot Release )

For a list of more features that will be included in Microsoft SQL Server 2008, please visit the source.

Source ( What's New in SQL Server 2008? )

Got Posters?

Blake Niemyjski — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 18:26:00 GMT

Chris Bowen’s did a search last month for all posters available on Microsoft Downloads. This is what he found:

.NET 3.5 Namespaces Poster
The .NET Framework 3.5 Common Namespaces and Types Poster
Visual Basic 2008 Keybinding Poster
Printable wall poster containing list of useful keyboard shortcuts for Visual Basic 2008 developers
Visual C++ 2008 Keybinding Poster
List of keybindings for Visual C++ language within Visual Studio and Visual C++ Express 2008
Visual C# 2008 Poster
Wall chart showing useful keyboard shortcuts for Visual C# programming language
2007 Office System: Developer Posters
Download these posters to learn more about the new features and enhancement to the 2007 Microsoft Office System.
Windows Server 2008 Component Posters
Windows Server 2008 Component Posters, originally printed in the July 2007 issue of TechNet Magazine.
Microsoft Silverlight 1.1 (Ed: Make that 2.0) Developer Reference Poster
Microsoft Silverlight Developer Reference Poster
PnP Overview Poster
Patterns & Practices Overview Poster
Smart Client Poster
Patterns & Practices Smart Client Poster
Visual C# 2005 Keyboard Shortcut Reference Poster
This poster contains the default keybindings for Visual C# 2005, and is available as a PDF download in either color or grayscale for you to print.
Visual Basic 2005 Keyboard Shortcut Reference Poster
This poster contains the default key bindings for Visual Basic 2005, and is available as a PDF download in either color or grayscale for you to print.
Visual C++ 2005 Keyboard Shortcut Reference Poster
This poster contains the default keybindings for Visual C++ 2005, and is available as a PDF download in either color or grayscale for you to print.

Source ( Got Tech Posters? )

I also just did a search for myself and only came up with four results.

Microsoft Device Emulator 3.0

Blake Niemyjski — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 05:17:00 GMT

Overview

Microsoft Device Emulator 3.0 is the third publicly released version of the Device Emulator for ARM-based devices. This emulator will also release with Visual Studio 2008. Device Emulator 3.0 will replace the executables and DLLs from previous releases (1.0 and 2.0). The main addition with Device Emulator 3.0 is the new automation API for the device emulator manager, which allows developers programmatic access to perform the same operations on installed emulator images that can be performed interactively on the Device Emulator Manager drop-down and context menus.

Download ( Microsoft Device Emulator 3.0 )

Windows SideShow Device SDK for .Net Micro Framework 1.4

Blake Niemyjski — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 05:11:00 GMT

Overview

Windows SideShow is a feature of Windows Vista that enables users to access information from their PCs on auxiliary displays. The Microsoft .NET Micro Framework 2.0 SP1 is the efficient runtime that powers today’s most popular SideShow-compatible devices.

The Windows SideShow Device SDK enables developers to build SideShow-compatible devices using the .NET Micro Framework 2.0 SP1. It includes sample code; portrait and landscape SideShow UI for QVGA displays (320x240); USB and Bluetooth connectivity; and the SideShow device simulator, which allows developers to test their firmware without physical hardware.

Download ( Windows SideShow Device SDK )

.NET Framework Library Source Code now available

Blake Niemyjski — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 12:09:00 GMT

I've been waiting for this day for a very long time. Starting today you can view or debug the source code to the following .NET Framework libraries:

.NET Base Class Libraries (including System, System.CodeDom, System.Collections, System.ComponentModel, System.Diagnostics, System.Drawing, System.Globalization, System.IO, System.Net, System.Reflection, System.Runtime, System.Security, System.Text, System.Threading, etc).

ASP.NET (System.Web, System.Web.Extensions)

Windows Forms (System.Windows.Forms)

Windows Presentation Foundation (System.Windows)

ADO.NET and XML (System.Data and System.Xml)

Shawn burke has a great blog post on how to configure your Visual Studio 2008 install to allow you to view the source code. Please continue at source for all the details on how to implement this feature.

Source ( Configuring Visual Studio to Debug .NET Framework Source Code )

ReSharper 3.1 Released

Blake Niemyjski — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 18:49:00 GMT

Jet Brains has finally released ReSharper 3.1. This is the first and much needed update to ReSharper since Visual Studio 2008 was released to manufactures. ReSharper 3.1 also contains new functionality like Solution Analysis (The ability to check an entire solution for errors/code improvements) and many bug fixes.

Download ( ReSharper 3.1 )

Release Notes ( ReSharper 3.1 )

Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX Templates for Visual Studio 2008

Blake Niemyjski — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 21:30:00 GMT

"This release contains project templates for using Visual Studio 2008 or Visual Web Developer 2008 to create new web sites and web applications with ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX Extensions 1.0 features. The project templates contain specific references to assemblies in .NET Framework 2.0 and ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX Extensions 1.0" (Microsoft).

Download ( Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX Templates for Visual Studio 2008 )