Jackie Goldstein's Weblog : Data Access

Microsoft Sync Framework 2.0 Released

Jackie Goldstein — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 13:44:13 GMT

While the release of Beta 2 of Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4 is getting all of the attention this week, version 2.0 of the Microsoft Sync Framework was also released this week and can be downloaded from here ....(read more)

MSDN Screencast Library

Jackie Goldstein — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 22:03:19 GMT

The MSDN team over in the UK has put together a huge collection (279 at the time of this post) of short screencasts for .NET developers. Each video is only about 10-15 minutes long, but packs a lot of useful information. Here is the full List...(read more)

Entity Framework - Some of our Experience and Code

Jackie Goldstein — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 11:56:00 GMT

Kim has a new post that summarizes some of our experience using the Entity Framework in a real client project.

He also includes some code and concepts for a repository interface that we used to make it more managable and extendable.

Read the post for all of the details, but our bottom line is

"To summarize, I am basically a happy camper with the Entity Framework. It has a some rough edges, but nothing we haven’t been able to work around."

ADO.NET Entity Framework Essential Resources

Jackie Goldstein — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 19:56:00 GMT

In order to make it easier for developers to familiarize themselves with the Entity Framework, we have put together a list of some of the available resources that we found to be most useful in getting up to speed with the new tools and technologies. You can download it from our web site at

http://www.renaissance.co.il/downloads/Entity%20Framework%20Essential%20Resources.pdf

Great Tool for Learning LINQ to Entities

Jackie Goldstein — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 17:55:00 GMT

As part of my research and preparations for my presentation on the new Entity Framework at the VSLive New York conference, I came across a great tool (thanks to Kim) for learning and playing with LINQ to Entities queries. The application (C# source code) can be downloaded from http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/EFQuerySamples

As you can see from the screen shot on the download page, this app organizes it large set of sample queries into differnent categories and often offers both the standard LINQ and the method form of the queries. In addition to the queries, you can see the results of their execution against different versions of SQL Server and SQL CE.

A great learning tool...

Getting Ready for VSlive! New York

Jackie Goldstein — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 20:53:00 GMT

In two weeks is the VSLive! Conference in New York City, where I'll be giving two presentations. This promises to be another great conference, and especially fun for me to be back in my home town. You can still sign up to attend - see the details at http://vslive.com/2008/newyork/
If you make it over, please let me know so we can get together.

Here the abstracts for my sessions:

The ADO.NET Entity Framework and Entity Data Model
Monday, September 8, 11:15 a.m.
Come learn about Microsoft's newly released Object Relational Mapping (ORM) offering - the ADO.NET Entity Framework and the Entity Data Model. See how they simplify and raise the level of abstraction available for data programming. The Entity Framework is an evolution of ADO.NET that you already know and love and is built upon the standard ADO.NET Provider model which allows access to third party databases. Designers for Visual Studio are also available to make your development even more productive.

Using SQL Server 2005 Compact Edition
Tuesday, September 9, 1:45 p.m.
SQL Server Compact Edition is no longer limited to mobile devices you can use it to develop desktop applications as well ! This session will introduce you to SQL Server Compact Edition and show you how you can build today both standalone and occasionally connected applications with this lightweight database engine. We will discuss the various options and tradeoffs for deploying, developing, and synchronizing with a central database server. We will also show how SQL Server Compact Edition is a cornerstone of Synchronization Services for ADO.NET and will demo the tools in Visual Studio 2008 for configuring this synchronization between SQL Server and SQL Server Compact Edition.

Observations from VSLive! San Francisco 2008

Jackie Goldstein — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 02:13:00 GMT

I recently (OK, 10 days ago) returned from my annual pilgrimage to San Francisco, to speak at the main VSLive conference. My presentations this year are described here.

I'd like to share with you two observations / surprises from this conference:

(1) It is well known that I am a pretty big fan of DataSets - but I realize that it is not necessarily the most popular position to take. At VSLive, I gave 2 sessions on DataSets (Intermediate and Advanced). Image my surprise (if not shock and horror) when I realized that there were at least 2 or 3 other sessions covering much of the same content on DataSets. Could DataSets be making a comeback...?

(2) In one of my DataSet sessions, I asked the audience how many of them were developing with VB vs. C#. While one would expect a high percentage of VB developers in a data-centric session, I was still surprised that the audience was easily at least 80% VB developers. Could VB be making a comeback...?

VSLive San Francisco in Less Than 3 weeks

Jackie Goldstein — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 22:50:00 GMT

Yes, it is that time of year again (and I say that most happily!) to go out to San Francisco to speak at the VSLive Conference. This year I am focussing on real-world use of DataSets, both with VS 2005 and VS 2008. But don't attend just for that - there are many other great sessions and speakers that you will really enjoy and learn from.

In order to make it easier (i.e cheaper) for you to attend, you can receive a $695 discount on the Gold Passport if you register using priority code SPGOL. More at www.vslive.com/sf - be sure to ping me if you are going to be there!

Here are the descriptions for the sessions I am doing:

Using and Extending the Typed DataSet and TableAdapter
Are you using the VS 2005 DataSet designer to design your data access code usign Typed DataSets and Table Adapters? You should be - because doing so allows you to build better data access code much faster. This session will be mainly demos that cover both the basic uses of these tools and objects, as well as techniques to extend the standard classes to meet your own specific needs. We will also take a look at some of the improvements in Visual Studio 2008.

VS Tools and Techniques for Distributed Data Access in VS 2008
This session will discuss several challenges facing developers developing distributed data access applications. These issues include hierarchical updates, use of VS tools/wizards to generate truly N-tier applications, and separation of data entity and data access objects. We will demonstrate what tools and techniques can be used and take a look at what new solutions are offered in Visual Studio 2008.

Off to TechEd EMEA in Barcelona

Jackie Goldstein — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 09:41:00 GMT

I'm completing final preparations for my trip to Barcelona next week for the annual Microsoft TechEd (EMEA) event. I'll be there from Sunday through Thursday and am giving the following presentation

Mashups and Windows Live - Not Just for Browsers (WIN203)
6 November 2007 Start: 15:15 Finish: 16:30

Although there is a lot of "Internet" in a "Mashup" application, that does not mean that it must be a browser-based application! Find out what a mashup really is and how to use some of the common tools, techniques, and resources to built a rich client mashup application. These applications will use services and data from Windows Live as well as other sources and show you how easy it is to build smart client (as well as browser) mashups that combine heterogeneous data and services.

If you are at the conference let me know - or just stop by and to say hi!

Check out The Region

Jackie Goldstein — Fri, 24 Aug 2007 19:53:00 GMT

Although it has been around since this past TechEd US, The Region has now moved to ists permanent home at http://www.theregion.com/

The Region is basically the public global center for the 140 Microsoft Regional Directors around the world. It is a single view into the blogs of all of these technical and community leaders, along with a calendar of upcoming events.

Check it out and post your thoughts and comments here.

Microsoft Developer Academy (Israel) - A great event !

Jackie Goldstein — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 05:36:00 GMT

Yesterday's major developer event for Microsoft developers, Microsoft Developer Academy, was a great success. Over 2,000 developers attended the event, which offered a choice of 25 different breakout sessions, plus another 6 panel discussions. I sat in on several sessions, and was very impressed (I would have attended more, but had to leave early since I was exhausted from lack of sleep and jet-lag, since I had just returned from a 2-week trip to Seattle and Neew York). The feedback on got from people I spoke to was that they also enjoyed and learned alot from the sessions.

I also led the Developer Panel Discussion, which had a good showing of panel expert and attendees. We helped them solve, or at least think about, solving, some very interesting real-world issues.

If you were at this event yesterday, I'd love to get your feedback ...

SQL Server Compact Edition is Back!

Jackie Goldstein — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 15:02:00 GMT

No new software, but a new/old name... The recently renamed SQL Server Everywhere (the successor to SQL Mobile and SQL CE) has been renamed back SQL Server Compact Edition - see the details here.

I have spent alot of time over the past few months speaking about SQL Server Everywhere and how it fits into the MS SQL Server family. The name change will probably add to the confusion for a while, but I think that in the long run it is a good choice. At least the .NET namespace name now makes sense...

If you haven't checked it out yet, you really should check out this page, which gives you a brief overview and links to the June CTP and additional docs (although look for both an RC and then RTM version in the next 1-2 months).

Feel free to ping me with any thoughts or questions...

Sessions I'll be Giving at VSLive in Boston

Jackie Goldstein — Sun, 22 Oct 2006 16:55:00 GMT

VSLive! is coming to Boston this week and I'm scheduled to give 2 presentations:

(1) SQL Server 2005 Everywhere

(2) .NET Worst Practices - What's Wrong With This Code ?!

According to an email I received a few weeks ago, the latter session is rated one of the top 5 sessions in the Smart Client track.

If you're at the conference, please track me down and say "Hi!"

ADO.NET v3 CTP now available !

Jackie Goldstein — Thu, 17 Aug 2006 14:42:00 GMT

If you want to get your hands on the first bits of ADO.NET 3.0, you can download the CTP from here. Pablo Castro announced it over here - here is what you get to play with:

The ADO.NET Entity Framework, which includes:
- The Entity Data Model (EDM), which allows developers to model data at a higher level of abstraction
- A powerful client-views/mapping engine to map to and from store schemas
- Full query support over EDM schemas using Entity SQL and LINQ
- An object services layer that allows you to choose to present query results as rows and columns or as objects. When using .NET objects, the system will transparently do identity resolution, change tracking and update processing for you.
- An open provider model that allows other stores to plug into the ADO.NET Entity Framework
Language-Integrated Query (LINQ) integration in ADO.NET for this CTP includes:
- LINQ to Entities: formulate queries using LINQ against your EDM schemas
- LINQ to DataSet: the DataSet finally gets full query capabilities! You can formulate LINQ queries that go against one or more DataTable objects. The LINQ to DataSet implementation will even optimize certain query patterns for better execution performance.
Tools
- We're working hard to include a rich set of tools that integrate naturally with the runtime components to provide a great end-to-end experience. Some early tools are included in this CTP, and more will come soon!

Let the games begin !!

ADO.NET Best Practices Podcast - One of the best on Dr. Dobbs

Jackie Goldstein — Sun, 09 Jul 2006 19:34:00 GMT

I recently received the following email message regarding a Podcast interview I did about 6 months ago:

Hi Jackie,
Hope all is well! We did an interview with you on VB6 to VB.NET migration back in the early part of this year for .NET Cast. I wanted to give you a short update - the Feb 14th episode "XML and ADO.NET Best Practices" is currently the top download on DDJ and has been for the past month, and is the #2 all-time download overall. Over 8,000 downloads of that single episode and still climbing. I was told that some companies are passing links to the episode around as a way to share the insight you offered in the episode. Certainly good news.

Here is the link to that show in case you want to check it out - http://www.ddj.com/documents/s=9887/ddj060214dnc/ddj060214dnc.mp3