Category: programming

Here’s a good blog entry, explaining the .Net 4 client profile stuff. To some extent, I think this all just makes things even more complicated then they already were. On the other hand, there are certainly times when being able to distribute a smaller framework to the client is desirable.

This blog post pulls together some useful links to VS2010 post-launch resources.

I do now have a copy of VS2010, but I haven’t installed it yet. I want to concentrate on getting through the book on 70-562 for now. If I keep up my current pace (about one chapter per weekday), I should get through it by the end of the month. Then, I can take the test in early May. After that, I can figure out if I want to start messing with VS2010 or try to go a little further with VS2008 exams.

WPF Text Blog : Blind Comparison VS2008 vs. VS2010
Speaking as a guy with relatively poor vision, I appreciate any efforts to make text more readable on computer screens. This blog entry is making the point that WPF now renders text as well as GDI, so the code editor in VS2010 should be as easy on the eyes as the one in VS2008. I downloaded VS2010 on Monday, but I haven’t actually installed it yet, so I can’t say how it looks on my own machine. Oh, and this blog entry also has links to a few interesting color schemes for Visual Studio. I need to try a couple of these.

Looks like I could spend most of the day tomorrow watching VS 2010 stuff on Channel 9. Not sure if that would be the best use of my time, but I think I’ll at least watch the keynote.

I had mostly made up my mind yesterday to take the ASP.NET 2.0 test, 70-528, next. I have the book for that one, and the one after that, 70-547, both bought used (and cheap) from Amazon.
However, I just got exam vouchers for 50% off (and a free second take) that are only good for the tests on the VS 2008 / ASP.NET 3.5 track: 70-562 and 70-564. So, I’ve decided that the VS 2008 path is the better way to go. (And as added incentive, the vouchers expire on June 30, so I need to stick with a pretty good pace and get through them by then.) I went out to Borders this morning and bought the 70-562 book, so I can get started with it in earnest on Monday.
The 70-564 exam is going to present a challenge though. If you look at the “preparation materials” tab on the web page for this exam, you see the following:

Classroom Training
There is no classroom training currently available.
Microsoft E-Learning
There is no Microsoft E-Learning training currently available.
Microsoft Press Books
There are no Microsoft Press books currently available.

Hmm, this could be a problem. I do have the book for the VS 2005 equivalent to this exam, so I could start with that, and supplement it with various stuff off MSDN and from other ASP.NET 3.5 books, but it won’t be as straightforward as having an official exam study guide.

I passed 70-536 today! This was my first Microsoft exam, so I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect.
The questions on the exam weren’t much different from the questions on the practice exam included with the book. I was somewhat worried that the actual test would bear little resemblance to the practice tests, and/or be much harder than the practice tests.
Getting through the preliminaries at the test site was pretty smooth, all things considered. I don’t know why, but I was expecting the test center bureaucracy to be a bit worse than it was. They were actually pretty friendly and professional.
So, all in all, not a bad experience.
I still haven’t completely decided if I should take the ASP.NET 2.0 or the ASP.NET 3.5 test next. I have the book for the 2.0 test, and I’m going to be more familiar with that, so that’s the easy way to go. On the other hand, the 3.5 certification would look a little better on my resume.

I just discovered MSDN’s lightweight view. Wow. Much easier to read than the “classic” view.

Some of the “recipes” in this book are proving quite helpful in my attempts to learn everything I need to know to get through the 70-536 exam. There’s a newer version of the book out now, but it’s this older version that I’m using via Safari.
Here are a few of the useful recipes:

• Recipe 8.6. Using Event Logs in Your Application
• Recipe 8.11. Implementing a Simple Performance Counter
• Recipe 8.16. Determining Current appdomain Settings Information
• Recipe 17.3. Encrypting and Decrypting a File
• Recipe 17.16. Securing Stream Data
• Recipe 20.2. Controlling a Service

Raj Kaimal has a two-part blog post on Using Delegates in C# (Part 1). Here’s part 2.  I don’t really have any problem understanding delegates & events, but I will admit that I usually need to stop and think for a minute any time I need to set up anything non-trivial using delegates and/or events.

This blog entry is a great overview of writing a simple Windows Service in .Net. Good study material for 70-536. I don’t think I’ve ever stumbled across the BCL Team blog before. Useful.