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In my previous list of WP7 user requests, I piled all of my user hopes and dreams for my new WP7 phone (delivery date: who the hell knows) onto the universe as a way to make good things happen. And all that’s fine, but I’m not just a user; like most of my readers, I’m also a developer and have a need to control my phone with code. I have a long list of applications I want to write and an even longer list of applications I want other developers to write for me. Today at 1:30p is the first public
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My dear friend Craig Andera posted an implementation of a function that descends into a directory in a "lazy" manner, i.e. you get the first descendant back right away and not after all descendants have been calculated. His implementation was in Clojure, a Lisp variant that runs on the Java VM: (import [java.io File])
(defn dir-descendants [dir]
(let [children (.listFiles (File. dir))]
(lazy-cat
(map (memfn getPath) (filter (memfn isFile) children))
(mapcat dir-descendants
(map (memfn getPath) (filter (memfn isDirectory) children)))))) Craig was happy with this function because, even though it was a "mind-bender to write," it's easy to read and because C# "would almost certainly be at least somewhat more verbose." Taking this as a challenge, I rewrote...
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When I first moved from the combination of a dumb phone and a separate music player, I had modest requirements: phone calls, MP3 playback, calendar notifications, contact management, email, camera and solitaire. Even asking for only these seven things, my first smart phone was as life changing as my first laptop. I could do a great deal of my work while out and about, allowing me to have a much more productive work/personal life balance. When I was first married, the word “love” didn’t seem big enough for what I felt for my bride. These days, the word “phone” doesn’t seem nearly big enough...
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Here's how the Deep Fried guys describe episode 45: "At PDC 2009, 'Oslo' was renamed to SQL Modeling and it left a lot of developers scratching their heads. What better way to sort it all out than to talk with someone deep into the stack. We sat down with Lars Corneliussen to see how this is all going to turn out and it what it means for developers. Definitely an interesting show as it paints a different picture about where things are going with 'M', 'M' Grammar, SQL modeling, Entity Framework, Quadrant and so on." Check it out!
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An update of the SQL Server Modeling CTP (November 2009) that's compatible with Visual Studio 2010 RC has been released on the Microsoft Download Center. This release is strictly an updated version of the original November 2009 CTP release to support Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4 RC. It contains no other fixes outside of those required to work with the new RC. Enjoy!
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When I was but a wee lad, I learned that when it came to my computer, I was often going to be waiting on something, whether it was the CPU, the IO or the memory. Now that I'm all grown up and spending a great deal of time on handheld mobile devices, I've discovered a whole new thing I'm waiting on: charging the battery. In the bad old days of DOS, I spent a disturbing amount of time working on my autoexec.bat and config.sys files to optimize the loading of drivers and TSRs (DOS programs that run in the background for you whippersnappers). Now, instead of optimizing for memory usage on my PC, I spend my...
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We are currently preparing a release of the SQL Server Modeling November 2009 CTP that will install and operate with Visual Studio Release Candidate. We expect to make this release available the first week of March and will make an announcement here at that time. We are also planning for another release of the November CTP that matches the final Visual Studio product (RTM) when that product becomes generally available.
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I was swamped this morning, so didn't get to see the Windows Phone Series 7 stuff live. When I did finally get to poke my head out, Scott Stanfield and Damir Tomicic had the list of links all set for me to follow. Thanks, guys! Steve Ballmer’s Keynote this morning in Barcelona, Spain Channel 9 Hands On Main site with good micro-demos Gizmodo Gizmodo hands-on Now I just have to let my AT&T contract run out and find a buyer for my iPhone. Can't wait!
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 If you like Model-First design in Entity Framework, you're going to love the Entity Designer Database Generation Power Pack. The original Database Generation feature in the Entity Designer in VS 2010 is extensible via Windows Workflows and T4 Templates. This Power Pack builds on these extensibility mechanisms and introduces the following:
Basic Table-per-Hierarchy support. This is represented by the “Generate T-SQL via T4 (TPH)” workflow. The SSDL and MSL generation pieces can now be tweaked through T4 templates, both in TPH and TPT strategies through the “Generate T-SQL via T4 (TPT)” and “Generate T-SQL via T4 (TPH)” workflows. Direct deployment and data/schema migration are available through...
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I was building a little WPF app to explore a hierarchical space (OData, if you must know), so of course, I was using the TreeView. And since I'm a big fan of data binding, of course I've got a hierarchical data source (basically): abstract class Node {
public abstract string Name { get; }
public abstract IEnumerable<Node> { get; }
public XDocument Document { get { ... } }
public Uri Uri { get { ... } }
} I then bind to the data source (of course, you can do this in XAML, too): // set the data context of the grid containing the treeview and text boxes
grid.DataContext = new Node[] {...
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The Telerik LINQ to "M" implementation allows developers to use LINQ statements with blocks of "M" values, pure text or the results of a transformed DSL. With the new SQL Server Modeling November 2009 CTP there are some changes to the "M" specification, so Telerik has updated their core DLLs to accommodate these changes. Enjoy!
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"In the 43rd episode of Deep Fried Bytes, Keith and Woody sit down at PDC 2009 with Microsoft’s Douglas Purdy to discuss all things data. Do you remember Oslo from the previous PDC event? Well Oslo has been rebranded to SQL Server Modeling Services to help developers store and manage models for the enterprise. Modeling Services enables you to more productive when building and managing data-driven applications. The guys also get the low down from Douglas on a new web protocol for querying and updating data called OData."
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Rockford Lhotka has created a series of three videos showing how he has applied the SQL Server Modeling, specifically "M", to drive his well-known CSLA, a framework for building the business logic layer in your applications. He shows a custom domain-specific language (DSL) that lets you create a CSLA entity, along with the data serialization, business logic and a forms-based UI, resulting in a 95% coding savings (his words, not mine : ). Enjoy!
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Reading about Windows Azure Drive reminded me of a conversation I had when I was hanging out with my Microsoft brethren last week. We started by talking about how apps target a particular OS and how Microsoft's bread-and-butter is making sure that apps continue to work forever on Windows so that our customers can upgrade their OS and still get their work done. We then moved on to wondering whether Apple was gonna do the same thing when it came to letting iPhone/iPod Touch apps run on the new iPad. As it turns out, we heard from the iPad announcement that Apple is doing just that (although in a particularly strange single-tasking way). ...
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Soma has posted a lovely description of what's new in the Entity Framework for .NET 4.0, including: Foreign Key support so you can add a row without requiring you to download an object just to get the foreign key. Lazy Loading support so as you traverse a property that is a collection, the data is pulled on demand. Plain Old CLR Object support (POCO) so that you can build your own classes and have EF serialize those instead of generating new classes. T4-based Code Generation in case you do want classes generated but want to control the code. Data binding support for WPF and WinForms. WCF support with serialization attribute generation. Much better SQL generation so that you...
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I'm such a fan of LINQPad you don't even know. Recently Joe updated it to support Data Services and as of today, if you scroll down to the bottom of the LINQPad download page, it's been updated to support .NET 4.0 beta 2, which means that you can point it at Data Services constructed with .NET 4.0. This makes my heart sing. Also, if you haven't spent the $29 to get the auto-completion, it's totally worth it. Highly recommended. Thanks, Joe!
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This is a nice piece comparing NHibernate and EF4. Personally, I'm an EF4 fan, but I'm hardly unbiased and there are definitely features I want to see added to EF v.Next. Either way, it's clear that EF4 is garnering much more appreciation from the community than previous versions and that's because you let us know what you wanted and we added it. Keep those cards and letters coming!
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And here's one more from the paper file I'm putting into electronic format to reduce the pile of papers in my life: During the all-associate broadcast, Jerre Stead shared with the team a memo another associate had sent about defining a customer. Here are the highlights: Customers are individual companies with unique needs. Customers are struggling with their competitors for success. Customers are people with feelings and opinions, therefore relationships and experiences matter. Customers will judge us by our performance, not by our words. Customers are influenced by every contact with us, each and every day. Customer "Must Not's" We must not import our products or ideas on customers. We must not ask customers to deal with people...
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Fred Gleeck had this to say about what not to say to customers and what to say instead: There's a right way and a wrong way to talk to callers. Even about the simplest matters. And make no mistake: Talking the wrong way can turn a loyal customer into an annoyed ex-customer. I have a name for talking the right way: PosiTalk (tm). PosiTalk is an attitude. It shows you're concerned. Professional. Helpful. And, while it sometimes requires a few extra words, it can make a big difference. below you'll find some common negative phrases, and the PosiTalk alternatives. Post them. Use them. And speak the language that keeps customers calling. After all... they pay the bills! Negative: She/He is...
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When I was first in technical phone support for the software I was building, I found out that I wasn't exactly a... um... "natural" at putting customers at ease. I used the following information from an AT&T magazine (I was working for a AT&T VAR at the time) in the fall of 1992 to start my education: Don't react. Stay calm. When confronted with an irate caller, everyone has the urge to return fire. But don't fight back. And don't take it personally, or you'll become an emotional basket case. Keep relaxed by breathing deeply. And remind yourself that this discussion will not change the destiny of mankind. Let them vent. Remember, you simply cannot get customers to deal...
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Joe Albahari, the author of LINQPad, has added support for WCF Data Services to the 1.37.1 version beta of LINQPad. This means that you can point LINQPad at any Open Data (OData) endpoint and do queries interactively just like any other LINQ data source. He even supports HTTP security, in case the endpoint in question requires it. Further, if you have your own custom LINQ to Whatever and you'd like to plug a connection to it into LINQPad, Joe has already added the ability to create a custom data context provider. It is, as they say, a thing of beauty. Enjoy!
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If you weren't lucky enough to be able to attend this year's PDC, not only did you not get a killer laptop, but you didn't get to see the Data & Modeling talks live and in person. Fortunately, Doug has a nice list of them so you can watch them from the comfort of your own home. Enjoy!
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Doug Purdy shows off three features of "Quadrant" from the Nov '09 SQL Server Modeling CTP bits in two minutes: Access to SQL Azure databases Creating custom views (including master detail) by mashing views together See the "markup" of any view in Quadrant and steal it/change it (just like view source in a Web browser) Enjoy!
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 The boys and I were driving past a church with a holiday bizarre, so we stopped by. It was a mix of silent auction, bake sale and a $1 raffle for a turkey dinner with all the fixings. I made several comments about how they could skip the formality of the drawing and to make sure they could read my phone number on the back of my raffle ticket, because I was obviously going to win. They laughed.
When they called this morning to let me know that I had won, they told me that they remembered me and I laughed. Anyway, the Sells Brothers and I have already picked up all we need for our Thanksgiving...
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I couldn't wait for the PDC, so I posted a screen shot of my favorite new three features of "M" for defining domain-specific languages (DSLs) in the November 2009 CTP of "Oslo": Expressions on the right-hand side in language actions to calculate results. "M" supports a rich expression syntax for a variety of data types. Data conversion functions for output, one for each of the supported "M" data types. DSL debugging mode to let you step through your input data and debug your language. I can't wait for you to see it!
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