Ask Kathleen


Visual Studio Debug Tips (Part 3): Disabled DataForm

Kathleen Dollard closes up her guidance on debugging code in Visual Studio with some troubleshooting of a disabled DataForm.

Visual Studio Debug Tips and Strategies (Part 1 of 3)

Improvements in the latest Microsoft IDE and underused features in Visual Studio 2008 support common debugging strategies to help you write better code. (Part 1 of 3)

Visual Studio Debug Tips (Part 2): Beat the No Repro Problem

In the second installment of her series of tips and strategies for debugging code in Visual Studio, Kathleen Dollard looks into valuable resources like the TraceSource class.

Tap into the Power of Visual Studio

Daily coding is a lot easier when you know how to use Visual Studio effectively. To optimize your experience with the latest Microsoft IDE, try these practical tips and shortcuts. (Part 1 of 3)

Tap into the Power of Visual Studio

Daily coding is a lot easier when you know how to use Visual Studio effectively. To optimize your experience with the latest Microsoft IDE, try these practical tips and shortcuts. (Part 2 of 3)

Tap into the Power of Visual Studio

Daily coding is a lot easier when you know how to use Visual Studio effectively. To optimize your experience with the latest Microsoft IDE, try these practical tips and shortcuts. (Part 3 of 3)

Calling WCF Services in Silverlight 4

We explore the WCF service boundary after upgrading sample applications to Visual Studio 2010 and Silverlight 4.

How-To Q&A: I have set up my Web service for tracing, but I can’t find my trace logs.

A reader sets up a Web service for tracing, but can't find the trace logs, despite the lack of any error message.

How-To Q&A: How do I decide between an imported field or an importing constructor in MEF?

Kathleen Dollard explains the choices developers face when building applications in MEF.

How-To Q&A: Silverlight Startup and Moving Troubles

Kathleen Dollard tackles a pair of questions relating to cryptic errors produced by Silverlight.

How-to Q&A: Is There an Easy Way to Create Value Converters in Silverlight?

Value converters are extremely powerful and are valuable in minimizing the code required directly in the UI and in providing reuse of conversion logic.

How-to Q&A: Can I Store History Information Locally for a Sandboxed Silverlight App?

Learn how you can store history information for the user on the local client PC in a sandboxed Silverlight 3 application.

How-to Q&A: How Do I Work Around a Silverlight "Catastrophic Failure" Message?

How to work around some of Silverlight's subtle gotchas.

How-To Q&A: How do I Display Data of Complex Bound Criteria in Horizontal Lists in Silverlight?

Kathleen Dollard shows how to display a list of complex bound criteria, including data, child data and photos for each item, in Silverlight.

How-To Q&A: How Can I Automate Code Without Resorting to Heavy Code-Generation Techniques?

Kathleen Dollard shows how to improve development using T4 code generation and in-line DSL as a localized development tool.