DevBlog

Today I got the following email from a VFP developer:

We are looking to a way to distrubute the application server load (FoxPro MTDLL) by using a COM+ clustering configuration. Question: How FoxPro COM+ state will replicated through all cluster members? The COM+ are mainly to access MS SQL DB.

The answer is:

You can never count on state being replicated across servers. COM+ itself is designed to be stateless. You'll need to keep state information in a central location, for example SQL Server, or send all the state information every time you CREATEOBJECT() on a COM+ object.

Today at Microsoft's Professional Developer's Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles, Windows 7 was shown for the first time. It appears the main emphasis is to fix some perceived issues with Vista and add more fit and finish. What Microsoft showed is in the product and will be included in the release. In other words, no pie in the sky features. The demo was run on a new laptop with 1Gig RAM, but Win7 only requires 512. Here are some things you'll see in Win7:

• New task bar similar to OSX Dock
• Jump lists
• New Start menu
• Windows Explorer Libraries
• Home Group Networking provides separate profiles for home and work. You'll be able to plug your work laptop into your home network and not compromise your work files
• Vista Sidebar is dead. Gadgets just go on the desktop
• New light weight media player
• System tray is locked down by default. You can decide what goes there.
• New Action Center. It's a superset of Vista Security Center. It will also queue up "toast" notifications.
• Touch UI is built in and usable with no code changes. One reporter said, "It's like a big friking IPhone".
• WordPad now supports ODF and has a new Ribbon interface, similar to Office 2007.
• Paint is finally updated and also Ribbon interface.
• UAC is more controllable and less intrusive. There is a UAC settings in Control Panel. You can set the level of UAC protection via a slider.
• Reduced memory footprint and disk IO
• Better power management. Microsoft spent time on end-to-end testing with playing a DVD on battery power.
• Faster boot
• Native Virtual Hard Drive monitoring. You can directly mount and boot from VHDs.
• Bit Locker works on USB devices
• Remote Desktop supports dual monitor
• Windows key + P goes into new Presenter Mode
• Shutdown button is customizable

Microsoft promised a beta early next year. It will be feature complete but will not be ready for performance testing. The beta will be public and available on microsoft.com. It will be followed by on Release Candidate, then RTM. While Microsoft did not give a date for release, the press is reporting it will be available late 2009.

More Win7 details are expected at the WinHEC conference in about 10 days.

Here are some links to screen shots and more info on Win7 and Office 14.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1675
http://www.techflash.com/microsoft/Microsoft_taking_Office_to_the_browser.html
http://content.zdnet.com/2346-12354_22-244222.html
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=575
http://www.flickr.com/photos/longzheng
http://www.neowin.net/news/live/08/10/28/introducing-the-windows-7-ui
http://www.winsupersite.com/win7/
http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1676
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10805_3-10074795-75.html?tag=newsLeadStoriesArea.0
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10076864-56.html?tag=newsLeadStoriesArea.0
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10805_3-10076883-75.html?tag=newsLeadStoriesArea.0
http://www.winsupersite.com/office/office14_web_preview.asp

Labels: Windows 7

Do you need to create an ActiveX control for you VFP app? Are you adding functionality to your VFP app though .Net? Are you migrating your VFP app to .Net, but can't move the entire app at one time? The Forms Interop Toolkit was developed to assist you in all these scenarios. I've just published a new paper, Integrating .Net Winforms with Visual FoxPro that show how to use the Toolkit to do all this. As an added bonus, the paper also shows how to COM-enable a WPF control and use it on a VFP form.

Labels: .Net, ActiveX, VFP, Winforms, WPF

It's official. Windows 7 will be called Windows 7. I applaud this decision. In the past, Windows has used version numbers (3.1, 3.11), years (2000), and even other names (XP, Vista). But I have always preferred version numbers. It goes back to when I was a Clipper developer using the version "Summer '87". Because of updates, you had to check the time stamp on the compiler exe to make sure you had the 2:00 am version. It's so much easier to just check the version number. So hooray to Microsoft for going back to version numbers. I hope other Microsoft teams and other vendors follow.

"Utah topped the Center for Digital Government's (CDG) 2008 Digital States Survey after delivering the clearest evidence yet that electronic delivery of government services has matured.

To reduce energy costs and carbon emissions, Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. announced in June that most state offices would be closed on Fridays. With more than 800 state government services online -- many boasting high user adoption rates -- Utah could close physical offices statewide without inconveniencing citizens." http://www.govtech.com/gt/418945?topic=117673

After a long absence, an MSDN event has been scheduled in Utah! "MSDN Events Unleashed: Demystifying WPF, Silverlight 2 and Visual Studio 2008 SP1" is scheduled for Thursday, October 23 from 1:00 - 5:00 at the Microsoft offices in the International Center.

The first 50 people to register will get a free copy of the book "Applications = Code + Markup" by Charles Petzold.

The event overview states:

Today’s applications need to do more than simply work. They need to draw
in the user, and provide a differentiated experience. This means moving beyond
battleship gray forms boxy UIs and simple HTML forms, and providing a positive
user experience. Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) and Silverlight 2
provide powerful capabilities to develop compelling user interfaces, on the
client and in the browser, respectively.

At the heart of
these rich applications is data. There are a growing number of choices of
technologies available to access data, create database abstraction layers and
expose data as services. Visual Studio 2008 (and .NET Framework 3.5) SP1
include the production release of the ADO.NET Entity Framework, ADO.NET Data
Services, as well as some enhancements to the Web Programming model
(REST-Friendly) in WCF.

In this session, Rob Bagby will
examine the core concepts of WPF and Silverlight such as layout panels, data
binding, styles and control templates, and will use them to develop an
application UI from the ground up. Rob will further examine and demystify
the options available to you to expose data to your rich applications.

Register here.

I am honored to again have been named a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional. The award is given for providing community support in both online and in-person venues. I look forward continue to helping you understand Microsoft technologies and develop outstanding applications for your customers.