Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Unleashed

by Powers, Lars; Snell, Mike

• ISBN13: 9780672329722
• ISBN10: 0672329727
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-05-30
• Publisher: Sams Publishing

Summary

"Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Unleashed" is an end-to-end deep-dive into the Visual Studio 2008 development environment. It is meant to provide guidance on how to squeeze the ultimate productivity out of the many features built into the most popular IDE in the world. Understanding how to use these tools will make you a better developer. The authors have folded in real-world development experience alongside detailed information about the IDE. The result is practical, easy-to-employ guidance that will make you a more productive and complete developer. The book also helps to ease the transition from other development environments, including previous versions of Visual Studio.

Author Biography

Lars Powers is an ISV Technical Advisor on the Microsoft Developer and Platform Evangelism team. He works with Microsoft’s largest global ISV partners to help them craft solutions on top of Microsoft’s next-generation technologies. Prior to joining Microsoft, Lars was an independent consultant providing training and mentoring on the .NET platform.

 

Mike Snell runs the Solutions division at CEI (www.ceiamerica.com). Mike and his team deliver architecture, consulting, and mentoring to clients looking to build great enterprise and commercial software. Mike is also a Microsoft Regional Director (www.theregion.com).

Excerpts

Introduction IntroductionThe release of Visual Studio 2005 and Visual Studio Team Systems marked a major revision to the .NET development experience. It brought us code snippets, custom project templates, refactoring, data binding wizards, smart tags, modeling tools, automated testing tools, and project and task management--to name just a few features.Visual Studio 2008 builds on these tools and provides additional core changes and additions to the Visual Studio integrated development environment (IDE). The languages have many new improvements, the Framework has a number of additions, and the tools have been significantly enhanced. For instance, Visual Studio 2008 includes such things as Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) for building richer client solutions, Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) to help build more dynamic service-oriented solutions, and Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) to enable structured programming around business processes. In addition, there are language enhancements such as the Language Integrated Query (LINQ) and team systems enhancements such as code metrics, performance profiling, and a revised team build system. All of these tools are meant to increase your productivity and success rate. This book is meant to help you unlock the many tools built into Visual Studio so that you can realize these gains. Who Should Read This Book?Developers who rely on Visual Studio to get work done will want to read this book. It provides great detail on the many features inside the latest version of the IDE. The book covers all the following key topics:Understanding the basics of solutions, projects, editors, and designersWriting macros, add-ins, and wizardsDebugging with the IDERefactoring codeSharing code with team members and the larger communityWriting ASP.NET applicationsWriting and consuming web services and using the Windows Communication Foundation (WCF)Coding with Windows forms and with Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF)Working with data and databasesCreating and hosting workflow-based applications using Windows Workflow Foundation (WF)Using team collaboration and the Visual Studio Team System productsModeling applicationsTesting applications at both the system and unit test levelManaging source code changes and buildsThis book is not a language book; it is a tools book. If you are trying to understand Visual Basic or C#, you will want a companion book that focuses on those subjects. If you can write C# or Visual Basic code, this book will radically help you to optimize your productivity with Visual Studio. Again, this book is not a primer on the .NET languages. However, we do cover the new language features (such as LINQ) in both C# and Visual Basic. We also try to provide simple examples that can be read by developers of both languages. By and large, however, this book has one primary focus: detailing and explaining the intricacies of the Visual Studio 2008 IDE to enable developers to be more productive. How Is This Book Organized?You can read this book cover to cover, or you can pick the chapters that apply most to your current need. We sometimes reference content across chapters, but for the most part, each chapter can stand by itself. This organization allows you to jump around and read as time (and interest) permits. There are four parts to the book; each part is described next. Part I: An Introduction to Visual Studio 2008The chapters in this part provide an overview of what to expect from Visual Studio 2008. Readers who are familiar only with prior versions of Visual Studio will want to review these chapters. In addition, we cover the new language en