Will Windows 8 be the Right Tool for all Jobs?

Word is spreading that Microsoft is likely to be passing out Samsung tablets running a pre-release version of Windows 8 to all BUILD conference attendees next week. (Let me note that as a journalist covering the event, I will -- yet again -- be ineligible for any of the booty. No, I'm not bitter. Why do you ask?)

Posted by Keith Ward on 09/09/20113 comments

Dave Mendlen Q & A

Microsoft's Dave Mendlen just announced he's leaving. Mike Desmond, who up until five weeks ago ran this magazine, asked him some questions about his time in Redmond. His revealing interview follows.

During his 15 years at Microsoft, Dave Mendlen has become something of a fixture in the development tools business at Microsoft. At one time a speechwriter for Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer, Mendlen first got his start in Redmond as a product manager for Visual Basic. He most recently served as senior director of the Visual Studio business at Microsoft, where he helped shepherd the launch of Visual Studio 2010.

Posted by Keith Ward on 09/07/20110 comments

Q&A With the F# Team

I recently had the pleasure of emailing with Don Syme, creator of F#, and his team of collaborators. I asked the group a number of questions about the language, which I feel is still under-utilized and under-publicized. A number of the responses have come out in different formats, but the full Q&A has yet to be published. It's fascinating, so I wanted you to have it.

Q: Why was F# created? What need does it serve?

Posted by Keith Ward on 09/06/20110 comments

Windows 8? Big Yawn

Have you seen all the upcoming changes in Windows Explorer for Windows 8? Most all the world's techies have by now. Microsoft's blogging about it on its informative new site. There's a lot of cool new stuff in it; new functionality that'll certainly improve the Windows experience.

And you know what? I don't care.

Posted by Keith Ward on 08/31/20111 comments

Stuck in the PC Era

I ordered a new desktop PC over the weekend. This may shock some. And that shock is an interesting thing indeed.

If Steve Jobs is to be believed, we've arrived in the "Post-PC Era", that time when we work from whever we are, no longer tethered to some archaic metal box on a desk. We're free from the ball and chain of desktop OSes, too -- similarly bulky software that doesn't understand the needs of the modern worker. We've shed our poundage, and are finally light and agile. No one wants or needs PCs anymore. They're as dead as a vinyl record left out to melt in the sun.

Posted by Keith Ward on 08/29/20112 comments

Microsoft One-Ups Apple in Mobile Development

Like many other media outlets, we reported yesterday that Microsoft is now accepting and certifying "Mango" apps ("Mango", if you came into the movie after the opening credits, is Microsoft's first major update to Windows Phone 7 platform).

One bit of news that's flown under the radar in the Mango mania is the release, within the Windows Phone SDK 7.1, of the Marketplace Test Kit. I think that's unfortunate because it's way, way cool, and further demonstrates how serious Microsoft is about taking on Apple and Google in the smartphone wars.

Posted by Keith Ward on 08/24/20117 comments

Silverlight for Windows Phone Toolkit Released

Today Microsoft released a Silverlight for Windows Phone Toolkit, the first since last February. The toolkit features extra controls and builds on the Windows Phone 7.1 SDK, according to the Windows Phone Developer Blog.

Some of the new components include:

Posted by Keith Ward on 08/17/20111 comments

New Windows 8 Blog Launches

Windows 8 is primed to be the most radical OS out of Redmond -- ever. Yeah, I know, the switch from Windows 95/98 to Windows 2000 was huge. Going from Windows XP to Vista (sorry, not Windows 7 -- they're more alike under the hood than Microsoft wants to admit) was big, too.

But they will have nothing on Windows 8. It's the first OS that will need to span multiple paradigms: It will need to be a full-featured, rich environment for all the desktop/laptop needs of businesses. On the other hand, it also needs to work on tablets, smartphones, and the emerging mobile world. At least those are the hints Microsoft is throwing out -- it needs to be all things to all people.

Posted by Keith Ward on 08/16/20110 comments

Microsoft to Release Fix for Entity Framework Bug

Microsoft is releasing an update to Entity Framework next week to squash a bug that's causing errors for some users.

The bug, according to a blog posting from EF Program Manager Rowan Miller, "...affects third party EF providers using a generic class for their provider factory implementation, things such as WrappingProviderFactory<TProvider>." This could result in Visual Studio blowing you a raspberry in the form of a message about invalid assembly names or codebases.

Posted by Keith Ward on 08/12/20110 comments

John Papa Joins Visual Studio Magazine

It's not often you get to sign a star to your roster. When you get the chance, you do it. The Vikings, a few years ago, signed Brett Favre. The Packers, years before that, signed Reggie White, and he helped them win a Super Bowl. Many think the Eagles' signing this offseason of Nnamdi Asomugha will propel them to a championship. The Heat signed LeBron James, and ... nevermind; bad example.

I'm delighted to announce that we've landed a star, too. Microsoft's John Papa is officially the newest Visual Studio Magazine columnist. John will be writing a monthly print column called "Papa's Perspective", where he'll be doling out wisdom on his specialty, Web application development. In addition, he'll be writing for this Web site regularly -- look for his articles several times per month.

Posted by Keith Ward on 08/10/20110 comments

Microsoft's BUILD Conference: A Riddle Wrapped in an Enigma

So Microsoft's BUILD conference is just about a month away. Incredibly, it's been sold out for many weeks now. Fortunately, I have a press pass, so I didn't have to suffer the disappointment many of you undoubtedly did.

I can understand why it's sold out, too. BUILD is, at least for 2011, replacing the Professional Developers Conference and Hardware Engineering Conference. That's two big shows crammed into one. It's also the unveiling of Microsoft's Windows 8 strategy going forward. Big questions need to be answered, like: How much of a hybrid (traditional desktop/laptop and mobile) will it be? Is HTML5/JavaScript the Web platform developers should be learning now? What about Silverlight, for Pete's sake? What about .NET?

Posted by Keith Ward on 08/09/20110 comments

Agile Gaining Steam

A well-known prediction by Gartner stated that by next year, agile techniques will be used in 80 percent of all sofware development projects. Statistics like that are growing proof that if you're not on board the Agile Train by now, you'd better hurry or risk being left at the station.

It's a sentiment that Ezi Boteach, VP Products for developer testing-tool maker Coverity, shares wholeheartedly. "The problem is that software complexity's growing, and that has a direct impact on things like time-to-market, brand name, customer satisfaction, and overall cost of sofware development," Boteach said in a recent interview.

Posted by Keith Ward on 08/08/20111 comments