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msdn event |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
2/24/2005 4:00 PM
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just attended the MSDN event here in Grand Rapids. There were three sessions for the afternoon:
Session 1: Winforms
Session 2: Asp.NET troubleshooting
Session 3: Team Systems 2005.
Adrian (from work) and I were both there, primarily to see what Team Systems had to offer. We were pretty impressed with the product, what limited amount we were able to take in. They didnt really get into source control or project build options; but according to the presenter (Bill Steele, MSDN) the source control package is basically going to be an upgrade to the existing Source safe product; however it will be tied directly into the Team system. I think thats going to be an awesome alternative to a lot of products that are out there now; namely Rational's Clear Case/Quest products. The other two sessions were somewhat informative. Adrian and I both agreed that the Winforms presentation dealt with something that very few people are going to ever implement: skinning and custom form shaping. That stuff is cool and all,
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revamped site |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
2/7/2005 4:00 PM
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i've revamped various aspects of the site.
added tons of various modules.
tons of books to read lately. I've been asked to dive deeper into the db2 world and consequently I'm working through a whole new set of books now. I think what I'll do is concentrate on getting the db2 developer certification and that will 'force' me to pick up a good deal of information. I study better when I'm preparing for a test rather than just for myself. IBM does a great job of providing the resources, much like MSDN.
This is going to be a busy spring, between db2 work, c# certification and still plugging away at biztalk 2k4 at home.
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bleh |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
1/9/2005 4:00 PM
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not much to update.
still working thru the aforementioned books.
starting a heavy concentration of studying for mcsd. i need to finish that this year.
thats about it for today.... :)
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the book |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
12/19/2004 4:00 PM
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still working thru the Biztalk book. Its a decent book. Its very episodic in places tho. Its as if each individual chapter was written by a separate author. It started out great, for the most part. It had work thru examples, which is always a sign of a good development book; however the last 50 pages or so have been primarily straight reading. I'm the kind of guy that likes to have a few examples to try out every now and then. But overall its still relatively an engaging tech book. We'll see how it goes in about 400 pages or so.
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oh yeah! |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
11/25/2004 4:00 PM
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i finally have my hands on Scott Woodgate's new book "Biztalk Server 2004 Unleashed." My first 100 page impression is that the book is awesome. So awesome, in fact, that I'm thinking of NOT attending the BT 2004 class and taking something else instead. Theres really no sense in taking the class, because I'm in a working BT2004 Environment now and there are tons of things here I can do to help build this skillset up.
The book is definitely worth the $50 clams i had to drop down on the counter for it.
I would've paid more for this amount of knowledge.
Good stuff.
I'm anxious to get my hands on VS2005 and SQL2k5. So much is going to change for me because of that release.
Still no set date that i can see.
Sleepless nights will begin on that day, I'm sure.
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waiting |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
11/11/2004 4:00 PM
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waiting on Teksystems to approve the Biztalk 2004 class.
found one in Chicago with Developmentor. Sounds like a good deal.
Definitely a plus for the resume'.
Doing analysis and redesign at work. Currently working on a module with a huge validation sub. so huge, that when printed out, you could use it for wallpaper. which it is currently functioning as, while it hangs from my cube wall.
good times. great architecture skill building time.
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biztalk it is. |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
11/4/2004 4:00 PM
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well i decided. biztalk 2004 course for me.
will have to travel to redmond washington to take the course because nobody locally is offering the thing.
thats o.k. gives me a chance to check out seattle and get out of the cold weather for a bit.
:)
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hmmmm.... |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
11/2/2004 4:00 PM
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hmmm....biztalk class or c# class?
tough call
or maybe i should just buy books.
hmmmm.....
Scott Woodgate does have an awesome Biztalk 2004 book coming out next week, but i really think that I need to be in a structured training environment to really get a firm grasp on the thing.
I'll have to talk to the guys at Tek first, to see if its even worth it.
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short article |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
10/28/2004 4:00 PM
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Well in my quest to actually publish a book someday, I've begun the arduous task by writing a small series of articles for the TEKsystems newsletter. My focus for these articles will be upcoming microsoft technologies and their implementation for developers. writing a technical article is not a task easily undertaken. its a total polar opposite from the term papers and fiction that I had to produce en masse while in college. I am enjoying it though. It's helping me to focus on procedural writing rather than just conceptual dialogue. Hopefully the book can be complete sometime next year. the article can be found in the articles section of the site.
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UML |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
10/18/2004 4:00 PM
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o.k. so i underestimated the depth of UML. I always had this perception that it was simply flowcharting with a different terminology. but no. there are nuances that separate it from the old high-school programming courses that are absolutely unbelievable. And the integration with Visual Studio is awesome. I've been constructing Sql Server Databases based on my DB UML diagrams and I have to say that I'm very impressed. I'd like to take a look at some Rational products next.
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db2 course |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
10/12/2004 4:00 PM
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i'm sitting thru a db2 class for the next few weeks. its pretty informative. especially for someone as microsoft biased as I am. But I'm trying to not limit myself in scope. I find that developers who are so narrow minded in their preference, really limit themselves in opportunities that may come along in the future. Probably move on to Oracle next. And I need to throw some Java training into the mix. So many books, so little time. :)
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wiped out |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
10/3/2004 4:00 PM
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not much to blog today. wiped out. went to detroit for a three day break. brief summary:
-ate in greektown - awesome food!
-stopped by the casino to see what the hype was about. didnt spend any money cause logically the machines are designed and programmed to ween you out of your money. I just wanted to see what a casino looks like. sure was a bunch of lifeless looking old people there. prolly blowing their life savings.
-went to a Tigers Game - they lost.
-saw fireworks after the game. that was great; it was right over our heads and very loud.
-went to concert later - that was awesome.
-Went to Detroit Institute of Arts. Very cool. Michelle had a blast there.
-Went shopping and spent an hour looking for a mexican restaurant in Detroit. Ended up having Pizza in greektown.
-Spent some time with friends.
-took care of some "professional" business and what nots.
long weekend. but now i'm wiped out. need another vacation to recover.
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Writing Code documentation |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
9/27/2004 4:00 PM
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The Enterprise Development book that I'm working through is already having an impact on how I document code. I've noticed that I'm now leaning towards a reverse-engineered solution for UML markup. Previously I was flowcharting user interaction and data flow, but now I'm integrating all of that into a consistent UML diagram. Definitely a good book.
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Enterprise Architect |
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The Woolston Blog
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By daniel on
9/22/2004 4:00 PM
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I'm knee deep in this great new book, "Enterprise Development with Visual Studio .NET, UML and MSF". Its an awesome book. Well, I should say that its awesome so far. Some tech books have a habit of falling apart at the end; hopefully this particular title will not fulfill that prophecy. I finally have VS.NET Enterprise Architect to work with and I'm loving every minute of it. I dont think I could ever go back to using the stripped down version of Visual Studio. I love having the ability to concept in Visio and then have it dump the code out for me in VS.NET. Very cool. The aforementioned book spends a good deal of time describing Microsoft Best Practices and various architectural techniques. I find the most beneficial aspect to be the interactive exercises included throughout the entire book. They're very informative and straight to the point.
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