The Daily Grind 801

Another week, another doctor appointment. Not much longer till there's another baby to go with it.

Software

• Yesterday saw the release of a new CTP of various WinFX runtime components including Windows Presentation Foundation (aka "Avalon" or WPF) , Windows Communication Foundation (aka "Indigo" or WCF) and Windows Workflow Foundation (which Microsoft is now desperately trying to get people to abbreviate as WF rather than WWF). Here's the links (thanks to Tim Sneath for collecting them in one place):
  • Microsoft Pre-Release Software WinFX Runtime Components - January Community Technology Preview (CTP)
  • Microsoft Prerelease Software WinFX Runtime Components (January CTP Build) online ReadMe file
  • Microsoft Windows Software Development Kit (SDK) for the January 2006 WinFX Runtime Components Community Technology Preview (CTP) - English
  • Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Extensions for Windows Workflow Foundation Beta 2
  • Microsoft Visual Studio Code Name “Orcas” Community Technology Preview - Development Tools for WinFX
  • There's also a Go-Live license now for WCF and WF.
• TargetProcess:Suite 1.5 - New version of this Web-based agile project management and bug-tracking software. My review of version 1.0 is here, new features are here, online demo is here, you can download a trial or a simplified free version, pricing from $149 per user.
• UrlRewritingNet.UrlRewrite - Open source URL Mapping component for ASP.NET 2.0 that supports regular expressions, themes, masterpages, and postbacks.
• DotNetBar 5.5 - I think this is the first control suite for .NET to support Office 12 style ribbons (among lots of other options). Looks pretty darned spiffy. Video tutorials here, trial download here, pricing from $199, source code is available.
• Syntext Serna 2.5 - New release of this WYSIWYG XML editor has better support for XInclude, direct editing of the underlying XML of a selection, and more. Release notes are here, trial download here, pricing from $89.
• Blobber - A "Web Site Interaction Platform" that lets you communicate in real-time with visitors to your Web site (at least, visitors who are using IE). Currently in free beta testing.
• Microsoft SQL Server 2005 JDBC Driver - If you want to get to SQL Server 2005 (or SQL Server 2000) data from Java, help is at hand. It's a full Type 4 driver.

Information

• Using Filemon/Regmon to solve "Access Denied" issues - Good quick tutorial from Rahul Soni.
• Useful Run Commands for Windows - Ravikanth tells you how to launch everything from the Bluetooth Transfer Wizard to Remote Desktop (and tons of other things) by using Start, Run.
• The Code's The Thing - Developer.com asked me to write up the results of the balloting for their .NET Tool or Add-In of the Year contest, and I was happy to oblige.
• January CTP Released -- Nothing New In Avalon - Karsten Januszewski points out that there's no point to downloading the new WinFX bits if you're only interested in WPF and you've already got the December CTP installed.
• Oracle releases patches for 82 flaws - What was that about "unbreakable" again?

Community

• WindowsCommunication.net - New community site for WCF/Indigo developers with forums, samples, and other resources.

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Mike Gunderloy is the lead developer for Larkware and author of numerous books and articles on programming topics.

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