Brownie Points: Microsoft Development

SQL Server 08 Get It While It's Hot

Thu, 07 Aug 2008 06:18:00 GMT

The final piece of the 2008 Launch, SQL Server 2008 (formerly known as Katmai), has finally gone Gold. For those with an MSDN subscription, you can download the bits now on subscriber downloads.

I'm not the person to ask for a full-blown tour of Katmai, but some of the features that have had my radar pinging include:

Spatial Data: With native support for geographic data, SQL 2008 provides a powerful platform for storing and retrieving your data based on location.
Separate Date and Time Data Types: If you're only concerned about a date, you no longer have to store it as August 6, 2008 12:00:00.00 AM. Likewise if you're only concerned about a given time (for instance if you want a recurring appointment to happen every day at 10:00 AM), you no longer are burdened with specifying a date in addition.
Table Value Parameters: Table value parameters allow you to pass a table of data into a stored procedure. While you could emulate the same effect using XML in SQL Server 2005, native support for passing in tabular data means your stored procedures do not have to deal with parsing XML or complicated XQuery.
HierarchyID: This is an interesting beast. It is a system defined SQL-CLR data type that can be used as a column type in your table. Basically the HierarchyID allows you to store a hierarchical relationship between rows in your table. (Look for an update to the Employees tables in the Northwind samples to demonstrate how to take advantage of this new feature).

There are a number of other new features in SQL Server 2008 and we haven't even left the realm of the database engine itself. Reporting Services (including a server that does not rely on IIS), Analysis Services, and Integration Services have all received significant upgrades.

I guess this gives me a nice toy to play with while waiting for the release of .NET 3.5/VS 2008 SP1.

MOSS Grows on the North Side

Sun, 17 Dec 2006 04:57:59 GMT

In case you didn't know, Charlie Calvert (former Borland developer community evangelist) has joined our family as the C# Community PM. For comparison sakes Charlie Calvert's impact in the world of Borland development is equivalent to that of Charles Petzold for Microsoft Development. Anyway, I was reading the transcript for the LINQ to SQL chat that Charlie coordinated this past Tuesday. I have been so preoccupied with WPF and the .Net 3.0 framework that I forgot all about the stuff coming down the road with .Net 3.5. Honestly I think 3.0 should have been called 2.5 and 3.5 called 3.0 but 3.0 (nee Winfx) does add SIGNIFICANTLY to the existing .net 2.0 framework.

But I digress...after reading a bit of the transcript and what we will be able to do with Orcas. I read some of Charlie's prior entries (The man blogs A LOT) and ran across a link to a blog entry discussing the duplication of effort in the Microsoft Open Source community. I wa going to write a comment, but like David, I felt that this merited discussion on my own blog.

I definitely have agreed with what David said a few times in regards to collision within the OSS community. If you look at O/RM alone you have several decisions to make including what persistence framework to use, what generation technology to use (myGeneration, Codus, etc.), and most importantly what style of crust you prefer, pan or thin?

Now if you consider how many people eat pizza on a daily basis...or for a more manageable number how many people engage in database programming daily. I'd assume it's more manageable because a WHOLE lot of people eat pizza, but not as many engage in database programming regularly...I'd guesstimate that 99.99% of the people who program against databases eat pizza...but would be surprised if even 20% of the people who eat pizza program against databases...however I guess we should stick with the pizza analogy because it fits well with what we're discussing...

Think of Pizza as Data Driven applications. Just like Data Driven Apps, pizzas have layers...not as many layers as onions, but layers none the less. Your crust is your database...some people like thin crusts like Access, or FoxPro. Others like buttery crusts like MySQL or Firebird. Others prefer a pan pizza Thick and Robust...practically a meal by themselves like SQL Server, DB2, or Oracle. On top of your crust is your pizza sauce. Okay you get the idea. There are a number of ways to develop an application, just as many (if not more) as there are ways to make a pizza). There are hundreds if not thousands of companies that specialize in making pizza, no one complains about redundancy or duplicated efforts when it comes to pizza. In the same vein, I think that multiple options are a good thing when it comes to development tools. Sometimes one is a better fit for a project than another.

As someone else mentioned in the comments, it could definitely be worse. Look how many web frameworks are available in the Java open source community.

More new stuff.

Sat, 16 Dec 2006 08:29:38 GMT

Somehow my entry regarding the Team Data RTM was just published yesterday...could have had something to do with me clicking save as draft instead of publish entry.

Anyway hot on the heels of Visual Studio Team Edition for Database Pros is its first Service Pack. Well actually the service pack is for VS 2005 in general but still it does technically upgrade some stuff in Team Data. If you were installing Team Data by itself that is....seeing that Team Data is a standalone SKU in the visual studio family. It's a big service pack, weighing in at almost half a gigabyte. One of the big fixes in SP1 (at least to me) is the inclusion of the "classic" web application projects. You could download a hotfix and installer that did the same thing...but it always seemed like web application projects were the unwanted step child that Microsoft only let stay around because it was the only way to keep us around. (While the bratty spoiled, directory based "web site" project got all the attention she wanted.) Anyway, I'm sure there are a bunch more highlights for SP1 but since I had nothing to do with making it, I'd probably be a bad source of information on what they are. So go ahead and follow this link to VS2005 SP1.

Oh by the way...In case it was a bit too subtle, the format of this blog is changing a little bit. I've found my past postings to be a bit dry. While I like a good Brut as much as the next guy...I wanted to spice things up a bit and let a bit of my personality show through here. Hope you like.

And the hits keep coming...

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 17:06:18 GMT

I've been drooling with anticipation since they've announced it RTM and finally was able to download the release version of Visual Studio Team Edition for Database Professionals (From here on out Team Data) yesterday...well actually since I'm technically posting this on Saturday, it was the day before.

It was put on Subsriber Downloads with little to no fanfare. When I downloaded it, it still hadn't made the "New in Subscriber Downloads" list.

Anyway, I wanted to go to the local launch but (surprise surprise) the black hole, AKA monster project from hell dictated otherwise. Don't get me wrong, I love my job. It's just that I'm going to add crunch time to that list of fish and company. Except I'll extend the limit for crunch time to 3 weeks instead of 3 days.

I can't really complain. My manager (not in the "I went to business school and am good with people sense but the I can code your sorry ass under the table sense") barely got time to breath between projects so he's been going much longer than I. Here are some observations (some insightful, others humorous I'll let you be the judge) and maybe I'll get back to Team Data.

Red Bull combines surprisingly well with several other caffeinated beverages (for that extra kick). Try Red Bull and Mountain Dew (Mountain Bull) or Red Bull and Coca-Cola (Bull on Coke). Mix red bull and coffee at your own risk.
Speaking of red bull (or as our CTO calls it "liquid code"), the average person can only drink 40 cans in a 24 hour period before causing nerve damage from B12 poisoning...or so I've heard. Anyway just to be on the safe side know when to say when. I doubt the person who has consumed close to the limit can even finish off the last five cans without spilling it all over the place.
If you're going to eat the same thing for lunch every day...Jimmy John's makes a good sub...that is until they bitch at your Admin Assistant for ordering "too late" despite the fact that your company has spent well over $500 a week there for the past month. Then you look for alternatives...Qdoba makes party platters but you really don't want to be in a room full of developers who just had tex-mex.
One of the tenets of Agile development (small teams in close proximity) is oh so righteous! Ever since our team took over the conference room we've been so incredibly productive. The towers of red bull cans are evidence of that.
Forget trips to Dave and Buster's or corporate retreats. The tightest bonds are formed under intense circumstances. There's nothing better for team building than sticking five guys in a room for 5 weeks with an insane deadline. Then send them to dave and busters...and a corporate retreat.
Be proud of your code but not to the point that you take it personal when someone critiques it.
Respect is a privilege not a right. Give respect and do something worth respect and you will receive respect.
In the same line, the best motivator is respect. If the only weapon in your cache is the threat of firing an employee, you will never get them to stay in the office for 12+ hours a day 7 days a week. If you earn the respect of your employees, they will move the world for you. (Belching the alphabet, while cool, doesn't count.)
You never know how much you know until you find out how much you don't know. You know?
Technology is a sultry temptress. She woos you with gadgets and games when you're young, but keeps you around with promises of new tricks that she'll show you the next time you're together. (That's not an observation from this project but more of a general observation).
Learn from your mistakes, and adapt your processes to avoid them in the future.

I could go on easily...but you get the picture. I've worked brain muscles that I didn't even realize I had on this project. But it's been a fun ride. There are other big projects looming on the horizon, we've got a list of cool ideas that we'd like to see in an upcoming release. In the meantime, it's time to catch our breath.