QUEENSLAND software developer Technology One has moved to acquire content management firm Avand in a $10 million deal.

There's a tremendous amount of goodness (the "new" goodness?) that's circulating around the 'sphere. Martin Fowler chimed in with his take on it and I'm glad we're all generally singing from the same song sheet.

Jeremy Miller Jeffrey Palermo brought up mention of how the original Code Camp spread like wildfire as the format and idea was easy to implement. As time goes on, I think this is true for the AltNetConf idea. Jeff summed the idea of the AltNetConf best with this quote:

AltNetConf's are open spaces conferences where DotNetters get together to discuss how to build better .Net software.

Short and sweet. Just the right amount of description.

Given this the idea of new conferences springing up and spreading the new goodness is a great idea. What does it take to start up your own AltNetConf? The passion and desire to do so. So why not? There's nothing stopping you.

On the heels of the first one in Austin there are a few good ideas that you could use when you're building your own AltNetConf:

• Keep the size manageable. I think the 100 person limit was great for the Austin one. This also helps you locate a place for it.
• Self-organizing agenda. Rather than pre-canned agenda of topics, the first day/night of the conference is the time to collaborate and drill out what people are passionate about. What bugs people, what do they want to talk about. This is an agenda driven by both speaker and speakee (as I would consider everyone a speaker for each session, with someone keeping the conversation on topic rather than coffee-talk, much like a Scrum Master does during the daily standups)
• Nothing but .NET. This isn't Alt.JAVA so the conversations follow building on Microsoft platforms using the most appropriate tool, technology, and technique that makes sense for the problem at hand.
• Don't turn it into a vendor fest. While it may be Microsoft related, I think the last thing an AltNetConf needs is "Brought to you by [insert .NET vendor product here]". True, it should be free and things cost these days, but there are too many ideas that spiral out of control and become product showcases rather than guys and girls talking about software development.
• Follow the OpenSpace approach to organization and flow. Just resonates on the ideas above.

I'm at a disadvantage as I didn't directly attend the conference in Austin so I'm looking for those that were there to maybe bring out a AltNetConf retrospec. What worked well? What didn't work. What can we do better?

So spread the news, pick a location, and start doing it. For me, I'm looking to see if we can get an AltNetConfCalgary or AltNetConfEdmonton (or AltNetConfAlberta for that matter) going so ping me if you're interested. Let's keep the momentum going!

Hopefully lessons learned and ideas here would be applied to future conferences like this (which we all hope to see soon everywhere as we don't all need to coalesce to one single place once a year).

Jason Meridth just posted this on the alt.NET list and I thought this shoudl be of general interest:

"The 4 best blogs that I read to continually try to grok BDD:

Joe Ocampo
http://blog.agilejoe.com
Scott Bellware
http://www.codebetter.com/blogs/scott.bellware
Jimmy Bogard
http://grabbagoft.blogspot.com/
Dan North
http://www.dannorth.net
and specifically for him:
http://dannorth.net/introducing-bdd

"

 

I find that BDD still means many things to many people, even more so than TDD since it can mean quite a fine line from what many call TDD. When I've gathered my thoughts more on this, I'll post what I think the various meanings are.

This article discusses how to create an HTML Editor server control for use within an ASP.NET AJAX 1.0 environment.

Christophe Lauer has an interesting post (en français) that emphasizes how well-positioned .NET developers are to take on all sorts of platforms. For example, Silverlight job offers are just starting to show up on the radar in the Indeed.com Job Trends where Adobe Flex remains the leader. As Christophe says, you can learn ActionScript and start working as a Flex developer but what can you switch to with that language under your belt? On the other hand, if you know the basic .NET Framework libraries...(read more)

This article discusses and demonstrates to what extent the .NET Framework and Visual Studio .NET support Arabic, including information about the features and limitations of Arabic support.

This article presents code that augments any INPUT box with an auto-suggest feature, AJAX-capable

I have done this a few times in the past as well. Typing Ctrl + C instead of Ctrl + V on a blank line and losing the data on the clipboard. I am sure this post will save me some time and frustration the next time I do it.

Nice one Sara.

 

Thanks. 

 

The Real Development Reloaded Tour will be in Montreal on October 18.

I had the chance to review the content of this event, lots of good tips and tricks will be shown, and I am sure you will learn something new, even if like me you do ASP.NET since you are born (almost!).
This tour focus on today's technologies, the ones you use on your day to day job as a web developer. So don't miss this chance to consolidate your knowledge, feel more confident on ASP.NET, AJAX, and learn about the best tools for your browser!

 

realDEVELOPMENT_07 tour is coming to a Canadian city near you. This half-day event is your chance to get a closer look at the technologies you use to create real web applications.

In the sessions, you’ll learn how to use:

• Visual Studio® development system to debug and trace your web application
• Third party tools and utilities such as the Internet Explorer® internet browser Readiness Toolkit, Developer Toolbar, and Fiddler
• the Enterprise Library to implement best practices
• ASP.NET AJAX to create more immersive and interactive experiences

Link for Montreal registration:
MONTREAL - OCT 18, 2007 (8:30 AM - 12 NOON)

For other dates and cities, read this post.

If you are still using HTML <table> elements to create page layouts, Chris Pels shows you why you should start using Cascading Style Sheets and <div> elements. We then learn how to create a custom membership provider and a custom profile provider for your ASP.NET application.

I don't know why but I randomly decided to see how well my SinglyLinkedListCollection<T> fared against the LinkedList<T> collection in System.Collections.Generic.

First off, my implementation supports pretty much everything that the MS LinkedList<T> does, that includes full LINQ support and so on.

Anyway, I added 5000 items to each to see what that would do - I actually expected the BCL data structure to be superior to mine.  I had done no real magic in my implementation, I had simply coded the thing after working out the various algorithms on paper.

Memory allocation:  both data structures are allocated 48 bytes total per instance, however I can only assume that the node used internally by the BCL collection has maybe another pointer i.e. it has a next and prev pointer, giving the ability to use it as a DoublyLinkedList? (I've not looked at it yet).  This is where my implementation kind of wins, although I'm pretty sure at this moment that the BCL node supports doubly linked list style structures - in any case as my node is smaller than that of the BCL one my implementation after 5000 instances are created totals 160,000 bytes, the BCL one on the other hand stands at 240,000 bytes so quite a reduction there.

FYI: my node size is 32 bytes, the BCL one is 48 bytes.

Out of curiosity I also benchmarked my DoublyLinkedListCollection<T> against the LinkedList<T> of the BCL and my node size is still smaller, this time only by 8 bytes per instance but it still add's up.  Same scenario, 5000 items added my implementation has been allocated 200,000 bytes where as the BCL one has been allocated 240,000 bytes - still a considerable saving, all be it slightly less.

Again, the actual data structures were allocated 48 bytes.

If you want to rip my implementations to bits then you can go ahead and download it from here: DSA 0.2.2 (you shouldn't notice any difference between these implementations and the BCL ones - both in terms of API and design time debugging experiences).

How to integrate TortoiseSVN – a Subversion Source Control system with Visual Studio.NET

Register now for ASP.NET Connections and Visual Studio & .NET Connections on November 5 - 8 at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. Learn all about the new features in Visual Studio 2008 from Microsoft and industry experts.

[Cross posted from Telerik Watch blog]

One of the fun little activities that took place at the recent DevReach conference in Bulgaria was a panel discussion on the current state of WPF. The panel featured Tim Huckaby, Brian Noyes, and yours truly (and the famous .NET Rocks hosts, of course) discussing the merits of WPF, dispelling some of the myths, and clarifying some of the misconceptions about designer tools available for WPF. Tim brought to the table excellent first hand experience using WPF to deliver solutions; Brian brought an incredible depth of technical WPF knowledge; I brought a unique perspective that needs a little introduction.

Ever since joining the "programming world" about 6 years ago, I have been reluctant to mention my "hidden" past as a graphic designer. Yes, that's right. I'm the artist in the room of engineers. For years I did freelance logo design, brand development, and designs for all variety of print projects. I cut my proverbial computer teeth on Corel Draw, Adobe Illustrator/Photoshop, and the Macromedia design products. In fact, in my early hunt for colleges RISD (Rhode Island School of Design or "riz-dee" for the initiated) and similar topped my list of interests.

"What in the world are you doing in programming?!" say you. Glad you asked. I may be an "artist" but I am also thoroughly pragmatic. I had no intention of becoming a "starving artist". With entrepreneurship in my blood, Texas A&M's highly ranked business school replaced my desire to go hang with hippie artists and involvement in the school's Student Council lead me to programming. An ugly (and I mean ugly) ASP application was dropped in my lap one day and I didn't run away. Quite the opposite. The web suddenly became my playground for building things and it gave me a venue to continue to flex my graphic designer muscles.

The rest (as everybody says) is history. I spent much of my own time learning as much as I could about building things for the web- ASP Classic, ASP.NET 1.x, ASP.NET 2, and now about 5,000 different Microsoft platforms. I never left my designer roots, though, so when Microsoft starts touting tools that "designers will love" my ears perk up.

I'll let you uncover my opinions on that marketing message in the .NET Rocks episode. Either way, that's my true background and the source of my unique perspective on this panel. Hopefully you'll enjoy the new point of view.

Que has released a new book covering ASP.NET 3.5. I think this is the first ever book on ASP.NET 3.5

Microsoft Expression Web Developer's Guide to ASP.NET 3.5, The: Learn to create ASP.NET applications using Visual Web Developer 2008

http://www.packtpub.com/community-server/book

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1847190871

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/1847190871/

Environment Variables Manager (EnvMan) is a tool written in C# .Net intended to handle the administration of Windows Shell Environment Variables. It is designed to replace Control Panel System Environment Manager and easily manage long variable values.