Here is a brief introduction to my session IIS 7 for ASP.net Developers which I will be presenting at IMTC 2008 in Dublin on Friday 4th April 2008 at 11:30.

Recently VBUG Vice Chairman Tim Leung, prepared a brief video about the work we do at VBUG and the support we give developers in aiming to achieve our goal of Developing the Developer!, for the Microsoft VS08/SQL08/Server 08 Launch Event in Birmingham.  We didn't want to waste all of Tim's hard work and not use the video for anything other than the launch event, so last night I took a look into how we could stream the video using Silverlight and was surprised to see how easy it is :).

First I was concerned with bandwidth usage, yes it's a small video but still I didn't have any idea of how many view it would receive, but then I remembered that Microsoft are offering Silverlight hosting as part of the initiative to get developers working with the technology.  They provide 10GB of storage for videos and applications with an aggregated 5TB of Bandwidth per user account per month.  All you need to get an account is a Windows Live ID.  So off I headed to silverlight.live.com and setup an account :). 

Next I uploaded our video.  From here you can choose to create an application for your content.  I didn't have time for this and to be honest I haven't had chance to do a great deal with Silverlight yet.  So then I was stumped at how to embed our video on our pages at www.vbug.com but then whilst managing my uploaded video I noticed that it offered a code snippet with details of how to insert an iFrame into any web page, so off I went and copied this snippet into our VBUG home page and voila we now have streaming video content on our web site. 

I've also put the video here at the bottom of this post, to demonstrate how easy it is and to answer a few questions about what VBUG is and does.  Let me know what you think :).

I managed to get hold of this book a few months ago, about the time I flew out to Tech Ed in Barcelona.  Unfortunately it's taken me till now to write up my impressions and views on this book.  Initially I was a little apprehensive about reading this book due to two particular reasons: firstly I don't generally get along with Wrox Press books and in the past have found them difficult to read compared to other titles from other publishing houses; secondly this book is a considerable size - totaling 670 pages!!  I was however eager to read it, as I am any new titles that appear on the subject of IIS 7.  This one had particularly grabbed my attention due to it's initial indications of specific relevance of how to exploit the power of IIS 7 in ASP.NET Applications and Programming.

In essence I would say that this book is a must have on the bookshelf of any serious ASP.NET developer who is looking to exploit and use the full power of IIS 7 in their applications.  As opposed to a previous title I reviewed - Book Review: IIS7 Implementation and Administration - this book is most definitely aimed at the Developer.  There are only 12 chapters in this title however they are very detailed chapters and really go into great detail.  Topics covered include using the integrated configuration system (<system.webserver>), how to extend the configuration system, extending the management interface, extending the request pipeline and it even has a great chapter on the integration of WCF in IIS 7 - something which I've been looking for good sources of information on.

What is great about this book is how in each element Dr. Khosravi has gone into immense detail and broke down each part of the object model and configuration model, explaining the effects of each option and the affect that can have on your application and the web server itself.  This is a feature which I and I would imagine many others will turn to over and over again as new requirements appear in my/their projects.  Although initially the content of this book can be daunting to a beginner in time they will grow in knowledge along side this book, and it is a title which can be constantly revisited and digested at the reader's own pace, this is a must for any IIS/ASP.NET Developer's bookshelf.

In response to my initial two concerns about this title, I've been convinced.  I enjoyed reading this book and possibly my reading style and ability has improved/changed since I last read a Wrox title, but I didn't have a lot of problems reading this book, although the content can be quite heavy going as it is so detailed, which I've already identified as a strength.  The size of the book is also of no problem and indeed is vindicated in the quality of the content.

Book Details:

Title: Professional IIS 7 and ASP.NET Integrated Programming

Author: Dr. Shahram Khosravi

Publisher: Wrox

Link to purchase on Computer Manuals : http://www.compman.co.uk/scripts/browse.asp?ref=852426

Now to cover days 3-5 (Wednesday to Friday) of Tech Ed Developers.  On Wednesday morning I saw the final part of Carlos Aguilar Mares' session on Extending the IIS 7.0 Pipeline.  This was a great session and covered numerous ways in which Developers can extend the IIS7 pipeline using managed code covering elements such as Modules, Handlers, Configuration and Debugging - Carlos has posted the slides and examples on his blog - http://blogs.msdn.com/carlosag/archive/2007/11/07/TechEdBarcelonaExtendingIISPart1_2D00_2.aspx, also Carlos very kindly agreed to be interviewed for a forthcoming VBUG Podcast, look forward to publishing that soon.

Other sessions which I attended included a Virtual Earth Deep Dive, a session which I was looking forward to and hoping to get a lot from, but I left severely disappointed.  We didn't see a demo of Virtual Earth until forty minutes into the session and even then it was a very consumer related session.  This was a level 300 session and the high content of 'marketing' was very, very disappointing.  I was hoping as I assume were the many other developers in the room to see a lot more examples and information on the API and how developers can make best use of it.  In fact I saw a session on the whole of the Live platform last year at Tech Ed and felt I got more from that multi-facetted session than this supposedly specialised session.

I attended sessions on WCF and the Web, from Steve Maine, which was of a good high quality and showed how the platform is maturing with AJAX, REST and Syndication Services.  I also attended a very interesting session from Vittorio Bertocci on Securing ASP.Net and WCF Applications using Cardspace.  This session was very interesting and showed how easy it WILL be to implement Cardspace into applications, however there is one big flaw, the server controls and tools are currently not available and all that was said is they are coming 'soon'.  The session did however complement some of the knowledge I have of Cardspace and I will be looking into this further.  

Matt Gibbs, delivered a session showing ASP.Net Developers what is coming in the next version of ASP.Net, and by next I don't mean ASP.Net 3.5, Matt covered features coming in ASP.Net vNext which we should see sometime next year.  These new features included improved standardisation and adherence to standards, the session also covered in more detail Silverlight vNext, Astoria, new Data Controls and the MVC Framework.

The last session which I saw at Tech Ed Developers was on the topic of Avoiding Pitfalls with Windows Workflow Foundation in ASP.Net Applications presented by Gyorgy Balassy.  This was an excellent session but it was held on Friday morning and it was a level 400 session.  I was glad I was at the session as it was full of great content although as the presenter appreciated first thing in the morning this was a little heavy.  I'm looking forward to reviewing it again and writing up detailed notes on it.

I've finally managed to take a few minutes and sit in the community lounge and write up some notes from the first two days of Tech Ed Developers 2007.  We've had a couple of very busy days so far and the pace is most definitely not slowing.  On Monday morning a large group of like minded community individuals from all over EMEA went along at a MS Influencers event where various topics and issues that the community face were discussed, such as how to increase numbers, get funding and sponsorship, increase engagement and how to take the benefits of online technologies, such as Live Meeting as we at VBUG use for online meetings.

Monday afternoon was the Keynote from Soma Somasegar, Microsoft VP of Developer Division, this was by far a better keynote presentation than we received last year, it was vibrant and upbeat.  Plus although it had an element of marketing to it the key message was that Soma and Microsoft are very, very focussed on involving the Community and enabling everyone to benefit from the power which the community has behind it.  This is a great message to be hearing as a UK Community Leader and reinforces all that I believe in and it's a great boost to hear a senior VP have such passion that myself and the many other great leaders in the UK do.  There were a number of announcements in Soma's keynote, but what I really liked about the way he handled the announcements, was that yes they are important (some very), they were not the reason he was delivering Tech Ed - his other announcements and content was more important to him, it was an excellent way to handle the announcements.

Announcements in Soma's Keynote:

• Visual Studio 2008 will be available for download by MSDN Subscribers by the end of November 2007 with full retail launch February 27th 2008;
• Consequently .Net Framework 3.5 will be available for download by the end of November 2007
• Microsoft Sync Framework CTP -
• Software and Services Blueprints (The first in a series of blueprints for developing S&S)
• Changes to Partner Program
  • New open license terms for extending the VS IDE to support any platform
  • VS Premier Partners get access to VS IDE Source Code
• Popfly - 100K downloads since public beta was opened on October 17th!
• Popfly explorer plug in for VS released!

Read Soma's blog post about his Keynote - TechEd Developer in Europe.  Following Soma's keynote I attended a session on Developers and Designers working together delivered by Dick Lantim and Aude Moussett. I was looking forward to seeing the interoperability between the process flow from Designer and Developer however I was very disappointed with this session.  There seemed to have been very little preparation put in and the speakers seemed extremely nervous and uncomfortable with the language.  I didn't get as much as I'd hoped from this session.  I will review the session on video when the Tech Ed DVDs arrive but I was very disappointed.

From a disappointing session came a great one.  Next I saw Roy Osherove deliver - Agile Development with Team System.  Roy is a great speaker and I remember hearing about his infamous songs last year on the NxtGenUG podcasts.  Indeed Roy finished his session with a version of The Police's Every Breath You Take - this was amazing and as a Police fan I really enjoyed it.  Roy covered Agile Development, Scrum and TDD and I found this whole session development and whilst Roy showed how we can use Team System for elements of the Agile Process he actually covered the methodology more and explained what it is all about which was great and brought a lot of clarity to Agile Development for me.

Monday finished with the Exhibition Hall Welcome which was a great way of meeting people and socialising with exhibitors and the community.  Also it was the start of the community activities including Speaker Idol and Swaggily Fortunes, we have some pictures on the Tech Ed Facebook group - http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2713709966&ref=mf  and they can also be found on my skydrive account for those who don't have a Facebook login - http://cid-f697bcd4bd5a1c5a.skydrive.live.com/browse.aspx/Tech%20Ed%202007/

Tuesday was another great action packed day and I saw a great session on SQL Server 2008 and the Entity Framework, from Francois Ajenstat.  This was a great introductory session covering elements such as Resource  Governance, Intellisense, no longer having a requirement for IIS for Reporting Services and Multi Server Management.  The release date was also cleared up in that there are expected to be at least two more CTPs before a full release in Q2 2008.

Following this session I went to Ben Robb's session on Building Accessible Web Sites using Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and the Accessibility Toolkit for MOSS.  I am currently involved in a large project with MOSS for content managed sites and as I am very interested in Accessibility, and have been for a number of years, this was a must see session.  I'm going to cover this topic better when I get back home and can install the Accessibility Toolkit and have a full look at it and write up my thoughts and experiences.  In the meantime you can find out more about the Accessibility Toolkit at http://aks.hisoftware.com

The Final session I am going to cover from Tuesday (as the last one I saw was part one of a two parter due to finish on Wednesday morning) was Shanku Niyogi covering Developing Data Driven Applications using the New Dynamic Data Controls in ASP.Net.  I was quite intrigued by this session but I was disappointed by the delivery and therefore will follow up on this session also on my return to the UK.  Overall the first two days have been great and full of information, I think I could do with a pensieve though so I can save my thoughts, free some room up and add them back in at the end of the week!

This year I made my first steps on to the speaker circuit with a presentation on IIS7 for ASP.Net Developers.  IIS (Internet Information Server) is used the world over by many web developers on which to host their applications.  I have been dealing with IIS for a number of years, in both a Developer role but also as Administrator of a number of web servers and web farms.  This is where my interest in IIS has come from over the years.  IIS is a very stable platform and with IIS7 we know have, what Microsoft term as the most significant release of IIS since version 1.0, and I have to agree.

I recently got hold of a copy of this book: IIS7 Implementation and Administration written by John Paul Mueller.  This title appears to be very popular, and after speaking to Martin from Computer Manuals it would appear that is flying off the shelves. 

As stated earlier I am able to attack a review of this title from both an Administrators point of view and that of a developer.  The book is well structured and  at just over 360 pages in length it slotted nicely into my laptop backpack for carrying around with me on my recent engagements.  Split into three sections - Using IIS7; Configuring Older Applications; and Configuring Application Security  - the book is a great starting guide to using IIS7.  The first section gets the reader to grips with the basics of working with files and the new UI within IIS7 and gives enough information and detail with which to get up and running with IIS7.  In the Configuring Older Applications section, John Paul, guides the reader through working with ASP, IIS6 Manager and other application types such as PHP and ColdFusion.  This a key section for those looking to upgrade to IIS7 and take advantage of the new features and integrated pipeline but still running ASP/PHP/ColdFusion etc applications in addition/instead of ASP.Net Applications.

The final section of the book primarily covers Application Security, but also covers connecting to databases, globalization, application performance and application configuration.  This final section is goes into quite a high level of detail and although I have covered .Net Roles and Profiles quite extensively I still found this section very very useful.  In my presentations I cover the ApplicationHost.Config and Administration.Config files and this section covers the structure of the configuration files well and covers the question of administration delegation well and highlights the associated risks and benefits.

This book was a joy to read and I think that is suitable for beginners and experienced developers and administrators alike.  The book covers a lot of the new features which many developers are aware of, but now they are integrated into the pipeline, administrators can now read about and understand to help communicate with developers on an more level plain.  This book is a great guide to IIS7 and I would recommend it to anyone who has either previous experience with IIS or who are just getting into it and want to know more about IIS7 as a development and hosting platform.

Book Details:

Title: IIS7 Implementation and Administration

Author: John Paul Mueller

Publisher: Sybex

Link to purchase on Computer Manuals : http://www.compman.co.uk/scripts/browse.asp?ref=859158

I've finally moved to a new Blogging Engine, I've been taking a look at the various options available for a while now, and have finally taken the plunge and I'm trying BlogEngine.Net.  I had looked at Subtext and DasBlog but I've been trying BlogEngine.Net for a couple of months while I tested functionality and decided that I would give this one a try and so far I have been impressed.  BlogEngine.Net is a CodePlex Project and is regularly updated and the team behind it have a very impressive roadmap and vision for the engine.  No sooner had they released the recent v1.2 build than they are already looking at v1.3.  My only gripe so far has been with the Blog Import tool, but I managed to find a way round it by importing my blog into the v1.1 release then upgrading to v1.2 and then published the blog.  I'll give a full run down of features in a future post.

My reason for moving to an engine was that I didn't have time to constantly tweak and develop my self created blog and even at some points the time it was taking to prepare a post and actually publish the post was prohibitive.  By using an engine which is being worked on by the community the work is shared and a lot of the functionality which I wanted to develop is already here.  Also I can now use, and am currently with this post, Windows Live Writer to prepare posts and post directly from any PC, I'm also going to be taking a look at blogging direct from Microsoft Office Word 2007.  Hopefully with a better engine behind my blog I'll be able to blog a lot more frequently, so expect to see lots of new content.

I have also moved to a new hosting package with Discount ASP.Net.  Discount ASP.Net are a well known Award Winning Web Hosting provider and are always ahead of the game in providing functionality for ASP.Net developers to take advantage of.  For example Discount ASP.Net are currently offering a free Beta Account with ASP.Net 3.5 and IIS7 Hosting together, showing there commitment to innovation and industry leading services.  I've not been happy with the lack of speed with which 1and1 move as regards to providing there customers with new features, especially with the high end shared hosting package like I was on, such as AJAX and SQL Server 2005 Support (both still not provided), plus with the costs and pricing plan that Discount ASP.Net employ I will also be making a significant cost saving.  My experience so far with set up and facilities provided my Discount ASP.Net has been excellent and I would fully recommend their services.

My colleague Aidan Garnish has written a great review of the Scott Hillier's book, Microsoft SharePoint: Building Office 2007 Solutions in C# 2005.  It appears that this is a great book to get a good overview and grounding in the main concepts relating to Application Development using Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007.  Check out Aidan's review at http://aidangarnish.typepad.com/aidangarnish/2007/08/book-review---m.html and you can get the book at Computer Manuals - http://www.compman.co.uk/scripts/browse.asp?ref=814091

Aidan's blog is a great resource too for anyone getting into developing on MOSS2007.  Aidan has a lot of experience with SharePoint 2003 and is now along with the rest of the team working with MOSS 2007 to develop Internet Content Managed Sites.

Mike Volodarsky, a Program Manager on Microsoft's IIS Team, has published a great Blog Post on developing modules and handlers for IIS7 using .Net.  The post goes through how to decide which to develop, which tools you need and how to develop modules and handlers and deploy them to an IIS7 server.  This posting is well worth looking at if you are interested in IIS7 Development, http://mvolo.com/blogs/serverside/archive/2007/08/15/Developing-IIS7-web-server-features-with-the-.NET-framework.aspx.

This is the start of an IIS7 .Net Developer series, so keep an eye on Mike's blog for more content coming soon.

The reason why I've not been very active in my blogging recently is the time it takes currently to post an entry.  Currently it is very time consuming for me to post a new entry due to the model behind my Blog.  I built the blog based on an article by Bipin Joshi in ASP.Net Pro Magazine last year.  My plan was to develop the blog and add multiple items to it and make it easier for me to post on.

I have been looking at multiple engines to use and came across BlogEngine.net a project on CodePlex which appears to be very good.  I am likely to implement this after some testing and customisation.  Does anyone else out there use this?  What are your opinions of it?  Are there any other engine's you recommend?