Here it is in the waning hours of 2005 and I haven't put together my predictions for 2006 yet. Considering how badly I did predicting 2005 maybe I should stay out of the prognostication game. In any case 2005 has been a very good year for me and my family. We have been blessed to be healthy and prosper. I know a lot of people who suffered through and are still sufferning from hurricanes, floods, fires, and all sorts of other natural and man made disasters can not say the same thing. It is my hope that 2006 will bring to you and yours health and happiness.

Are you looking for something to do over the holiday break? Do you want to sharpen up your Visual Basic or ASP .NET skills? Well then Microsoft has a deal for you. Just go to http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/learning/elearning_promo/default.aspx and read the details on how to sign up for one of the following 15 free e-learning classes.

Upgrading from Visual Basic 6.0

• Course 4335: Upgrading from Microsoft® Visual Basic® 6.0: Microsoft Visual Studio® 2005 Development Environment

  This three-hour online learning course teaches Visual Basic 6.0 developers how to use their existing skills with the Visual Studio 2005 development environment. Specifically this course covers the wide range of features included in the Visual Studio development environment, how to open and save projects, and how to build and debug projects. This training is designed with the Visual Basic 6.0 developer in mind to allow for a simple transition to the .NET Framework.   

• Course 4336: Upgrading from Microsoft® Visual Basic® 6.0: Introduction to the Microsoft .NET Framework

  This three-hour online learning course teaches the Visual Basic 6.0 developer about the .NET Framework 2.0 including the Common Language Runtime, the Common Type System, Garbage Collection and COM interoperability. The course also introduces the .NET Framework namespaces and base classes. This training is designed with the Visual Basic 6.0 developer in mind to allow for a simple transition to the .NET Framework.   

• Course 4337: Upgrading from Microsoft® Visual Basic® 6.0: Microsoft Visual Basic 2005 Language Enhancements

  This three-hour online learning course teaches the Visual Basic 6.0 developer how to develop applications with Visual Basic 2005. The course covers, variables and types, decision and loop structures, managing data using arrays and collections, and error handling. This training is designed with the Visual Basic 6.0 developer in mind to allow for a simple transition to the .NET Framework.   

• Course 4338: Upgrading from Microsoft® Visual Basic® 6.0: Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming

  This three-hour online learning course teaches the Visual Basic 6.0 developer how to benefit from an object oriented approach to application development with Visual Basic 2005. The course covers classes, including properties, methods and attributes, and also how to control the lifetime of an object. The course also covers both interface and implementation inheritance and how to override methods and properties. This training is designed with the Visual Basic 6.0 developer in mind to allow for a simple transition to the .NET Framework.   

• Course 4339: Upgrading from Microsoft® Visual Basic® 6.0: Deploying .NET Framework Applications

  This three-hour online learning course teaches the Visual Basic 6.0 developer how to deploy an application written with Visual Basic 2005. This course covers creating deployment projects, managing deployment applications and making assemblies available to other applications. This training is designed with the Visual Basic 6.0 developer in mind to allow for a simple transition to the .NET Framework.   

• Course 4340: Upgrading from Microsoft® Visual Basic® 6.0: Upgrading Visual Basic 6.0 Applications

  This three-hour online learning course teaches the Visual Basic 6.0 developer the considerations and methods for upgrading an application written in Visual Basic 6.0 to Visual Basic 2005. The course includes upgrading best practices, the Visual Basic 6.0 Code Advisor, and the Migration Wizard. This training is designed with the Visual Basic 6.0 developer in mind to allow the Visual Basic 6.0 developer a simple transition to the .NET Framework.   

ASP.NET 2.0

• Course 2913: Creating Your First Microsoft® ASP.NET 2.0 Web Application

  This three-hour online course covers the entities that form the foundation of Web applications written with ASP.NET 2.0. This course is a great starting point for anyone who has not worked with Visual Studio 2005 or ASP.NET 2.0 before.   

• Course 2914: Writing Master Pages and Content Pages in Microsoft® ASP.NET 2.0

  This three-hour online course covers the exciting new features of ASP.NET 2.0, Master Pages and Content Pages. Master Pages allows you to easily create a consistent look and feel across your Web applications. This course will teach you how to create Web Applications with Master Pages and Content Pages.   

• Course 2915: Working with ADO.NET 2.0 Within Microsoft® ASP.NET 2.0

  This three-hour online course covers the exciting new ASP.NET 2.0 data source model, the data-binding mechanism, and the process of connecting a Web control to a data source element. You will learn how to use these new data access features.   

• Course 2916: Working with Microsoft® ASP.NET 2.0 Wizards and Site Navigation

  This three-hour online course covers the exciting new ASP.NET 2.0 application services including Wizards and Site Navigation. You will learn how to use these new application service features.   

• Course 2917: Working with State Management in Microsoft® ASP.NET 2.0

  In this three-hour online course, you will learn how ASP.NET 2.0 goes beyond the ASP.NET 1.x Cache object and ASP Application and Session objects. ASP.NET 2.0 introduces control state for custom ASP.NET controls, custom session-state management options, and a mechanism for handling custom cache dependencies, including SQL Server database dependencies.   

• Course 2918: Working with Web Parts in Microsoft® ASP.NET 2.0

  In this three-hour online course, you will learn how the Web Parts framework provides a simple and familiar way for ASP.NET developers to create modular Web applications that support end-user personalization.   

• Course 2919: Working with User Profiles and Themes in Microsoft® ASP.NET 2.0

  In this three-hour online course, you will learn how to build an effective personalization layer into a Web application by employing two new features of ASP.NET 2.0, user profiles and themes.   

• Course 2920: Improving Security in a Microsoft® ASP.NET 2.0 Web Application

  In this three-hour online course, you will learn how forms-based authentication in ASP.NET 2.0, which is arguably the only viable approach to restricting access to real-world Web sites, is even easier and quicker to use.   

• Course 2921: Working with Microsoft® ASP.NET 2.0 Configuration and Instrumentation

  In this three-hour online course, you will learn how to use the tools that ASP.NET 2.0 supplies to programmatically update the configuration files.     

If you are having a hard time breaking the habit of querying sysusers then maybe this download from Microsoft will help. It is a PDF with the system views in SQL Server 2005 along with the relationships between them. Now if I can just get access to that plotter to print out a poster size version that I can put up on my cubicle wall.

I realize that Christmas is over but I wanted to let everyone know that I wish them a Merry Christmas. I love this time of year, especially the way that people seem to take the time to think of others. As I was reading the news this morning and looking at the stories of the memorials on the one year anniversary of the tsunami in Asia I remember what a sick feeling I had that morning and then later the feeling of pride as I saw the world pull together to help those affected. This year has seen hurricanes and earthquakes that have tested the faith, charity, and resources of a lot of individuals and countries. I hope that we will always band together to help anyone who is suffering.

I checked my e-mail this morning and there was an invitation to the Utah Geek Dinner tomorrow night. Now, I know it is not much notice but it is more than the last one. The dinner will be held at the Mayan resturant. You can get more information and sign up for the event at http://www.devutah.com/geekdinners.htm. I am not sure what the topic will be but I look forward to seeing you all there.

Yesterday I spent all day at a MSDN and TechNet events showing the "best of launch" in the 2005 products. It was great to meet up with some people that I have not seen for a long time. There was an excellent turn out. Between the morning and afternoon sessions there were just under 1000 people attendees. A lot of them were there for both the morning and afternoon sessions.

The training I will be teaching on the 13th and 14th was also announced. I heard that the class already has 35 people signed up. It sounds like there is a lot of interest in the new development products. 

[Note: I must have missed the memo but the dates are different than I originally posted. The correct dates are Tuesday the 13th and Wednesday the 14th. I have also updated the information below with the correct dates. The registration web site has the correct dates.]

I will be teaching a 2 day class on Visual Studio 2005 in the Microsoft Offices on December 13th and 14th. It will be a lecture format with some demonstrations of each of the concepts. The class is intended for developers that have at least 1 year experience with Visual Studio 2005. I have included more information below.

What's New in Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 for existing Visual Studio .NET Developers

This two-day instructor-led lecture seminar will provide the student with a focused environment to experience the new features and functionality of the Microsoft® Visual Studio® 2005 product.

Audience

This workshop is intended for experienced, professional software developers who are already skilled in building software using Microsoft Visual Studio® .NET or Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003, including those employed by independent software vendors or those who work on corporate enterprise development teams.

At Seminar Completion

After completing this seminar, students will be able to:

§       Apply knowledge of new productivity features and functionality in Visual Studio 2005 Integrated Development Environment (IDE) to develop software more efficiently

§       Write applications that use the Microsoft Visual Basic® and Microsoft Visual C#® programming language enhancements

§       Build managed code to run inside SQL Server 2005 (codename "Yukon")

§       Write data access code using the improved functionality in ADO.NET

§       Build Microsoft Windows® Forms applications using new controls and new functionality in the Visual Studio 2005 IDE designers

§       Deploy rich client applications using the new ClickOnce application deployment functionality

§       Build ASP.NET Web applications using new controls and new functionality in the Visual Studio 2005 IDE designers

§       Use the improved enterprise development tools to aid in the design, build and deployment of Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) applications

Prerequisites

Before attending this seminar, students must have:

§       Experience (at least 1 year) as a full-time developer using Visual Studio .NET or Visual Studio .NET 2003

§       Experience in developing applications in one or more of the following fields:

Web Application (ASP 2.0), Windows Forms Application (Smart Clients with ClickOnce deployment), Server Component , XML Web Services

Student Materials

The student kit includes a comprehensive workbook. This event is a lecture only presentation with demos.  The student materials used are from a 3 day training course; the instructor will be making adjustments to the course to cover all materials in a 2 day class format.

Lunch

In appreciation for your attendance to this seminar, Microsoft will be providing lunch for the duration of the event.

Seminar Dates and Location:

December 13^th and 14^h, 9:00 am - 5:00 pm

Microsoft Corporation

123 Wright Brothers Drive, Suite 100

Salt Lake City, UT 84116

801-257-6400

http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/info/usaoffices/rockymtn/saltlakecity.mspx

Register today at: http://www.microsofttraining.com/devonsites

Class/Invitation ID 304327 

 

In a blog post at http://www.sysinternals.com/blog/2005/10/sony-rootkits-and-digital-rights.html Mark Russinovich reveals that a CD he bought from Sony installed a rootkit as part of its DRM (Digital Rights Management) software. I don't oppose the right of Sony or anyone else to protect their software/music/intellectual property but when they resort to installing rootkits that could be used to hide other malware then they have gone too far. I haven't purchased a copy protected CD and after the problems that some Mac users had years ago where they couldn't eject the copy protected CDs I was a little skeptcal of their value. Now I am really beginning to wonder if the marketplace shouldn't speak up loud and clear that this is totally unacceptable behavior.

Lately it seems that there has been a lot of discussion about the Google Library project that aims to digitize and index a lot of books. Yesterday there were two well written articles in the opinion section of the newspaper. The first article expounds on the virtues of the project and how it will bring the great literature of the world to a larger audience. The second article is from the point of view of an author who is saying that the whole idea would cut authors out of the royalties that they deserve.

I have to admit that I am torn about this whole idea. For novels and other articles I can see the Google argument that they would protect fair use by only allowing downloads of a few pages at a time so it would be impracticle for anyone to read a novel start to finish without being very good at guessing which search terms would bring up the next set of pages. For technical articles, however, I think that the damage would be huge. I read a lot of articles start to finish but I also spend a lot of time looking for specific answers. If the Google Library would allow me to read a paragraph or two that would answer my question then I don't need to buy an entire book. I think it would lead me to decide that I didn't need to buy the book because I could get the information on-line.

I have heard the argument that I could do the same thing at a book store or at the library but I don't think those arguments are valid for two reasons. The first reason is that unlike Google that gets revenue from advertising, neither the library nor book store make any money off of me because I entered their store. There is no company that is offering them money for "impressions" on the advertising that exist in the store windows. So even if I don't find what I am looking for Google can gain money off of the fact that I was even looking. The second reason is convenience. While there is a library just a few blocks from where I work it still represents several orders of magnitude more effort for me to physically go down to the library, look in the card catalog, find the book on the shelf, and puruse in it to find the information I am looking for, and to copy the information so I can take it back to work and use it there than it is to just use Google from the office. I am not a legal expert but I think this is equivalent to the protection given to people taping shows off of broadcast TV vs. the people downloading MP3s from illegal file sharing services. One is fair use and the other is not.

I have never been paid royalties for anything that I have written but I do sympathize with the authors. For most of the writing that I have done the hourly rate comes out to something well below minimum wage. I do it because I am interested in the topic and think I have something to say not for the money. One of these days I might decide to write a book or more likely an e-book that I self publish. If I do write a book I would hope that there would be a market beyond Google for it.

I think the easy way to solve the controversy is to either only index books that have no copyright protection on them or to secure the permission of the copyright holder first. If you only index old books it might reduce the relevancy of the searches for technical and timely ideas but would still preserve the great works of the past. By securing the copyright holder's permission Google could figure out a way to pay the holder of the copyright. Napster and iTunes are able to figure out a way to pay for music downloads so there should be a way for Google to pay for book downloads.