March 2004 - Posts
You probably have already heard about Feedster, but in just in case you haven't here's a little story for you.
The best tool I use for following topics discussed in blogs is Feedster, the Google for blogs.
When Microsoft XNA was announced, I thought I'd like to "listen" to the ensuing discussion and watch for links to information on XNA. I searched for XNA on Feedster and then subscribed to the search. Now I get a custom aggregated RSS feed of blogs, forums and news sites discussing my topic of choice.
That's pretty powerful stuff, and one of the best uses of RSS aggregation to date.
Now you may be familiar with other sites that are similiar like PubSub. Why Feedster over others? There are no subscriptions, no email collecting, nothing strongly organized; just an open, easy search.
Another reason I like Feedster, they run a blog and they sign their names to each entry. It appears that most of them have ther own blogs up and running too. And I can look them up in Orkut and see their little faces on my computer screen. What value does that add? Accountability, transperancy and they're in the blogging community.
Go Feedster!
Microsoft unveiled its new XNA game development platform yesterday. The platform and tools act as a common programming environment for PC and XBOX games.
Hopefully by paying attention to what's going on here, I'll find some idea of the direction of DirectX. I haven't found much public word on DirectX and how much 3D functionality will be made available in Avalon. I'm guessing they are still trying to figure out what features if any can be done by the initial ship date.
Make sure to check out the demo videos on the XNA site and imagine half of the programming work done for you by Microsoft.
I've seen all of the talk today about VS2005 now available on MSDN, but I am wondering how well this will work with Longhorn and the Longhorn SDK?
Should I go to the trouble of uninstalling the Longhorn SDK and then installing the VS2005 bits?
At this point I am thinking, probably not. I doubt there is much to gain there for Longhorn development. Am I right?
I went to the Microsoft Security Summit site today due to prompting by the MSDN Flash newsletter.
- Ok, its free, that's awesome
- There's one in Chicago, that's good
- Let me take a look at the Developer Track...
Well that looks oddly familiar...“cross-site scripting, SQL injection” and “modeling threats”. The topics look very similiar to Dev Days, so that makes me wonder if it would be worth it for a Dev Days veteran developer to go. The IT Professional Track seems pretty stacked, but it might be slim for the Developer. There might be some Code Access Security talk, but I don't know if that's enough to attend.
Anybody have the scoop on how or if the Security Summit will build upon what we learned at Dev Days?
Minh (enderMinh on GotDotNet), has set up a site to aggregate .NET Developer blogs. Similiar to the Main Feed of ActiveHead, but its Non-Microsoft developers only. Its the anti-blogs.msdn.com, when you want information from those outside the “Big House“.
Well, I've gotten the information now and have officially signed up as a judge for local Imagine Cup Round 1 event, at Michigan State University.
The contest is global contest sponsored by Microsoft, for high school to college students. The requirements for the Software Design Invitational are listed below.
Work in teams of up to four to design a smart software system/application that improves the quality of everyday life. We're looking for great .NET applications that:
- contain a mobile device
- contain some smart component
- create and use at least one Web service
It should be very interesting to see what type of applications they come up with. Its a great opportunity for the students and I'm happy to help out.
If you're a .NET Professional and you're interested in helping out, tell them about it. Sign up here.
Wow, how cool is that?
So I quickly referred back to the definitive post by Alex Lowe on MVPs, to see if I “qualified”. I think the MVP program is a good idea, most of the people I talk too are MVPs so I've learned a lot about it.
The MVP program is definitley a smart move for Microsoft. People get excited about their work and they get great feedback and community support from dedicated professionals.
Either way MVPs rock, and if I could contribute to the group effort, that'd be awesome.
A neat synchronicity, is that today Mark Cliggett commented on the same post talking about plans on opening up the whole process behind the scenes. He mentioned “who is working on which bug, read the specs, etc.” This all sounds very cool, can't wait to see it!
Thanks again Don (and Kent who seconded the motion)!
Dev Days was a nice one-day conference. The best part about conferences is that you actually take a break from the grind and spend some time focusing on learning. Here's a breakdown of my Takeaways:
- InfoPath - Why am I not using this right now? After seeing it actually do stuff in person, rather than reading about it on blogs, I have realized the potential of InfoPath. Internal CRUD database application can be whipped in seconds. Kind of like Access Forms, but much cooler.
- SQL Reporting Services - Ok, here's another one. Very awesome, and know that I've seen it in action I'm hooked. I left the conference saying “I'm going to install that tomorrow (today)!” and I would have too if our server was not being rebuilt. I think reports may not be the dreaded finale of application development anymore. Kind of like Crystal Reports, but much cooler.
- Web Security - This is something I have spent time learning before, but it was nice to see the Threat Modeling Process explained. Something I would like to incorporate into our development process, but right now it falls in with Unit Testing. Something we'd like to start doing, someday...soon.
- Smart Clients - Very nice, I love it. I love the whole idea. An area we are definitley exploring/developing in. Got a preview of how sweet this will work with ClickOnce, very anxious for this technology. Now I just need to make sure that all of our clients can run .NET on their machines.
And then there was the post Dev Days get together at RockBottom with Jeff Key, Erik Porter, Matt Hawley, Brian Bussing, and Ryan Rinaldi. I sure enjoy the new community-oriented Microsoft culture. Thank you forums and blogs.
(And Kent, in case you are reading this and you click the RockBottom link; Yes, they do have “Great Beer”)
Yesterday I received some promotional materials for the upcoming Dev Days from Microsoft. I received the package because I am the leader of the .NET Users of Fort Wayne (NUFW) User Group and I can use the handouts to give to NUFW members and encourage them to go to Dev Days.
This in itself is a good thing. I love getting swag from Microsoft and passing it along. But the problem was the timing. The closest Dev Days are in
- Detroit, MI - March 3rd
- Chicago, IL - March 10th
- Cleveland, OH - March 10th
- Columbus, OH - March 17th
- Swag received - March 3rd
So the problem is I have the swag, but I don't believe I will be able to use it effectively. Detroit show is already over. Contacting the members, members deciding they want to go and getting apporval to go in 7 days to make it to Chicago or Cleveland seems like a stretch. Maybe they can make Columbus :-p
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