Tales from a Trading Desk

PDC is nearly here

So its almost time for the PDC.  Looks like Orcas (Integrated Query Framework) will be one of the topics during PDC week, together with C# 3.0, and even FoxPro.  These are the sessions I'd start with:

• The High Performance Computing session is probably worth checking out
• Indigo - too many to choose from :(, but one of them would be Workflow + Messaging + Services: Developing Distributed Applications with Workflows and Windows Communications Foundation ("Indigo"): Writing Reliable and Transacted Distributed Applications
• WinFS - given that its recently beta'd.  Maybe the "WinFS" Future Directions: Building Data Centric Applications Using Windows Presentation Foundation ("Avalon") and Windows Forms session.
• Windows Vista & "Longhorn" Server: Under the Hood of the Operating System
• CLR: Garbage Collection Inside Out
• Tips & Tricks: 10 Things to Avoid If You Want Your Managed App to Work on Future CLR Versions
• Tips & Tricks: Writing Performant Managed Code
• Tips & Tricks: Common Memory Management Pitfalls and Profiling for Managed Applications
• Advances in Agile Development
• Looking Ahead to the Future of the CLR
• Future Directions for Windows Internals
• .NET Language Integrated Query End-to-End
• C++: Future Directions in Language Innovation
• CLR: Leveraging Dynamic Language Features
• CLR: Writing a Dynamic Language Compiler in One Hour

With 200+ sessions available it's going to be a hard choice of what to see in real time - Channel 9 coverage, downloadable presentations etc should however help.

Mono'less PDC

Appear Miguel got another NO from the PDC this year again. As Stephen says, the fact that Microsoft published the CLR and C# specifications through ECMA/ISO doesn't mean a lot in reality.  If Microsoft offered the CLR on Linux etc as Mono does, then you could possibly understand the NO, but since they don't, one has to assume they are scared of the damage Mono could inflict on their own product.

Surf's up again next week

Ken Schwaber (aka The Scrum Master)

Feature request for Visual C++ Orcas

g++ has a cool feature that shows you the files that were traversed when an error occurs:

In file included from /cygdrive/c/opt/omniORB-4.0.3/include/omniORB4/CORBA.h:444,
                 from someheaderfile.h:10,
                 from sourcefile.cpp:3:
/cygdrive/c/opt/omniORB-4.0.3/include/omniORB4/dynAny.h:160: error: `CORBA::LongDoubleSeq' has not been declared

Unfortunately Visual C++ gives this style of output:

C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\Vc7\PlatformSDK\Include\WinNT.h(764) : error C2628: 'BYTE' followed by 'short' is illegal (did you forget a ';'?)

Which doesn't help you track down who is including WinNT.h

APM

I finally got round to looking at Jim Highsmith's book, Agile Project Management (APM).  Basically APM consists of five phases:

• Envision; determine the product vision and project scope, the project community, and how the team will work together
• Speculate; develop a feature-based release, milestone, and iterative plan to deliver on the vision
• Explore; deliver tested features in a short timeframe, constantly seeking to reduce the risk and uncertainty of the project
• Adapt; review the delivered results, the current situation, and the teams performance, and adapt as necessary
• Close; conclude the project, pass along key learning’s, and celebrate

If you know Scrum then the book does really have any ground breaking new ideas.  However I would say the book is a worthwhile read, and does have some sensible suggestions about risk management, and I particularly liked the project data sheet (from a consultant's viewpoint).

Other interesting facts in the blogsphere this week or so:

• VS 2005 has over 43million lines code code.
• Layer Court
• F# 1.1
• SDTimes article on Agile

BOX again

Surf's up, C++ debugging

I'm off to Bude this weekend for a bit of surfing.  Hope the weather give me some decent waves.

Anyway, back to the day job.  I'm in the middle of some debugging.  I have a Win32 EXE that does a CreateProcess and starts another EXE - don't ask why.  I was expecting to be able to attach to the new process and debug that as well, but when I attach, I don't seem to see the 2nd process in Visual Studio's module window, or have any of my breakpoints hit.  Anyone got a view on what I am missing?

Useless piece of information of the day - hard break points can be inserted into C++ code using:

__asm int 3;

HPC

10Mbps Broadband

Microsoft's Source Server