Two Roles Code

While performing my daily reading routine, I came across this interesting article which discusses a concept of having 2 roles for code. I read it all and found it really interesting. I am going to give it a shot and try to implement the points discussed.

If you are interested, please have a look here.

Enjoy.

Visual Studio 2012 Update Guide

Robert McLean has put together this awesome update guide for VS2012 and related tools/extension upgrade guide. If you're using VS2012, bookmark his page. I am sure you and your colleagues are going to need it one of these days.

Enjoy.

Code Quality

A very nice article about Code Quality. It covers some basic aspects within our code which we tend to ignore. I urge everyone out there to have a look.

Enjoy.

Time Management For Developers

Good time management skills are considered to be a key factor in the equation of success. It is not easy to be organized and manage our time effectively and efficiently. I read this article and I found it useful.

Enjoy.

Image Tool Extension for Visual Studio

Greg Duncan highlights the Image Tools Extension for Visual Studio available from the Visual Studio Gallery which provides a number of simple actions for working with images within the IDE. Please refer to this article for more details.

Command Query Responsibility Segregation - CQRS

Kanasz Robert shares a nice introduction to the concepts behind Command Query Responsibility Segregation, illustrating with examples in this CodeProject Article.

HTTP Codes

Ever wonder what the different HTTP status codes are? Well, please have a look at this site which serves as a really useful guide.

The Open Close Principle - OCP

It never hurts to get back to basics and refresh our knowledge about the basic fundamentals every developer should know. One of the basic principles in Object Oriented Programming is the Open Closed Principle. 

If you google it, you'll find a huge number of search results talking and discussing in deep details the definition of this principle. I came across this nice article I am sharing today.

Hope you'll find it useful.

Happy Reading.

Visual Studio 2012 - What's New?

I am not sure whether you have started using Visual Studio 2012 or not. As a matter of fact, I have. It is quite awesome. Many features have been added to it to make it even better. Our friends at channel 9 have prepared this video and many others to introduce Visual Studio 2012 and its new features.

Enjoy.

Client Side Coding - Be Careful

This post is inspired by reading a really interesting article posted on Code Project. We (I mean developers) in general, get excited really quickly about any fresh new idea, I'll tell you why in a moment.

When I take a look at the web applications I built during the course of my career, I see myself building web applications that relied heavily on server trips (postbacks), as this is what the technology provided at that time. I don't recall writing any client side code to interact with the server. My client code was all about input validations. 

With the introduction of AJAX and ASP.NET 2.0, I was really impressed by the idea of partial postbacks, and started planting update panels all over applications. The idea of not having postbacks was really great, and being able to have no page flickering was huge. But I was hit by the performance of my applications. The viewstate of my web applications was so huge it affected the overall performance of the applications. My applications performed like turtles when it comes to speed.

I had to find a robust solution, that's when I was introduced to JQuery and started using JQuery posts. To be honest, JQuery posts are really great when it comes to performance, but they required the developer to have a good knowledge in JavaScript and JQuery, and of-course more code should be written. 

If you are a developer who used or currently using posts in building your web applications, or you are someone who are planning to, believe me, it won't hurt you if you stop for five minutes and read this great article.

Enjoy.

NoSql Databases

With the emerge of NoSql databases, I think it is time every developer gets a hands-on coding experience against one of these databases. There are a lot in the market right now. I am not sure if these databases are going to replace the well-known RDBMS. But there is a considerable number of well-known organizations implementing and deploying software applications which use these types of databases as their main data repositories.

In short words, a NoSQL database provides a simple, lightweight mechanism for storage and retrieval of data that provides higher availability than traditional relational databases.

As a start, you can check out the following youtube clip which provides an overview of NoSql database.

Enjoy.

A Beginner's Guide to HTML and CSS

As a developer I tend to love coding. I can go writing code for hours, but when it comes to design I have my own doubts. I know that I am not alone in this area and I bet that there are a lot of you out there who feel the same way.

Well, let's face it, every web developer should have solid skills when it comes to design (HTML + CSS). At the end of the day, you don't want to call the designer every now and then just for minor design changes such as font types, font colors, etc...

I came across this comprehensive guide. For you developers out there, please have a look and I am sure you'll be impressed.

Here is the link.

.NET Framework Made Simple

Going back to basics is really good. Sometimes we tend to start our work taking things for granted and not digging into details. Time passes, knowledge starts to fade, and after a while we find ourselves lacking the concrete base, the solid ground that provides the real push.

No matter your experience level is, it is really good to get back to basics and read about the .NET Framework. During my daily reading routine I came across this really nice article posted on Code Project which gives really a straightforward and detailed description of the .NET Framework.

This is the link to the article .NET Framework Infrastructure.

Enjoy it. 

Visual Studio Keyboard Shortcuts

It is often more easier to use keyboard keys to perform a specific task rather than using the mouse and trying to locate the exact menu item or function. I am a big fan of shortcut keys and I rely on them a lot during my daily development work.

There are a number of sites with detailed lists of useful keyboard shortcuts. Well today I am giving you the lists I found really useful. 

Happy coding.

Visual Studio 2010 Shortcuts

Visual Studio 2012 Shortcuts

Large collection of Free Microsoft eBooks for you (+80 books)

As a developer, daily reading is a part of my daily routine. I check several development websites in addition to other blogs. Also reading books is one thing that I continuously do to keep my information and knowledge up to date.

So it seems that reading is an endless task for any developer. The other day while I was performing my daily routine I came across a blog post which lists 80+ free Microsoft E-books. It is really a very good list and you can find it at this location.

ASP.NET Performance

With the fast pace of our daily work as developers and to be in specific, as web developers, we often tend to neglect the performance of our ASP.NET applications.

In my opinion, the application's performance is not a feature. Every developer should take into consideration the performance of the page he/she is developing.

I came across this interesting free E-book by the great people at RedGate. I read it all, and to be honest I found it really useful. The great thing about this book is being straightforward. It is a summary about the most common fifty issues which may affect the performance of any ASP.NET application.

I encourage every ASP.NET developer no matter his/her level of experience is, to take a look at this book.

The book 50 Ways to Avoid, find and Fix ASP.NET Performance Issues can be downloaded from this location.