Here's the latest from Microsoft on VS2008 *Beta 2* Expiration:

 

Many of you have been testing the Visual Studio 2008 Beta 2 VPC images, http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/default.aspx.  It has been brought to my attention that the current Visual Studio 2008 Beta 2 VPC images will expire on November 1, 2007, rather than March 15, 2008 as originally announced.  It is strongly encouraged that you take all necessary steps before November 1, 2007 to back up all your projects and move your Team Foundation Server data to an alternate location.  For instructions on moving your TFS data please refer to the article Moving Team Foundation Server, http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms404879(vs.90).aspx, located on the MSDN Library.

 

For the latest information and up to date information on this please refer to the Visual Studio Developer Center, http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/default.aspx.

 

FAQ

Q. Will my data be available after November 1, 2007?

A. This is still being researched, however, currently the understanding is that customers will NOT be able to access their date after November 1^st unless the data is moved to an alternate installation location.

 

Q. Can I reset my system date to re-enable the OS image?

A. Again there is still research being done, however, from the current understanding of the problem resetting the system date back DOES NOT re-enable the OS image.

The next version of C# will have a new feature called object initializers.  What's great is that you can initialize objects without creating extra constructor overloads and they save code by avoiding an extra statement for each property to initialize in cases where a required constructor doesn't exist.  Here's an example:

 

    public class Customer
    {
        public int ID { get; set; }
        public string Name { get; set; }
    }

    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            Customer cust = new Customer() { ID = 1, Name = "Joe Mayo" };

            Console.WriteLine("ID: {0}, Name: {1}", cust.ID, cust.Name);
        }
    }

 

Notice the curly braces after the new Customer() instantiation?  These are the names of the properties of the Customer type.  Just use a property with a public set accessor and assign a value and you are good.  You could also use public field, but who would want to do that?  While other new C# features exist primarily to support specialized scenarios, this is definitely one that I'll use often.

TonyG is within miles of the fires in Southern California and is blogging the latest events.

 

Scott Guthrie recently announced that his team is working on an MVC Framework for ASP.NET.  I'm positive about this because there are tons of benefits to be had.  I've been using an MVC-like pattern in my ASP.NET applications for years, but from what I can see, this will be much better.  Scott Hanselman has info about it on his blog, along with a couple video presentations.  Here are a few notes of items I particularly like:

 

1.  Testing support.  Testing an ASP.NET application today is difficult.  This will enable you to perform many types of testing without having the ASP.NET runtime running.

2.  Separation of Concerns.  Pages don't post back, interfaces are used, and communication is via HTTP.  Essentially, it will be hard (which is very good) for programmers to stuff  (which is bad) all of their business logic into code-behind pages, which is part of the V in MVC.  Instead, business logic will be part of the controller (very cool), which is the C in MVC.

3.  Extensible and pluggable.  If you don't like the default implementation, you can change it.  i.e. maybe you prefer to write your own URL mapping engine.

4.  URL routing engine.  Allows you to administratively configure routing to controllers, rather than hard-coding.

For years, developers have been able to dis-assemble the .NET Framework Class Libraries using tools such as Lutz Roeder's Reflector.  However, we still haven't had full access to the real source code... unitil now.  Scott Guthrie has recently announced that Microsoft will be releasing the .NET Framework source code, beginning when they release .NET 3.5 and Visual Studio 2008. 

 

This is pretty good news from my perspective.  Now, it won't be so hard to figure out how certain API's work because of the lack of documentation.  If you need to solve a problem, there won't be anything stopping you.  That said, the .NET Framework documentation is pretty decent overall and needing to go into the source code will probably be a rare occasion for most developers.

 

This will be great for education too.  I'll often refer people to an example in the .NET Framework on how a certain language feature or technique is used.  i.e. there are tons of great examples of the usefulness of interfaces and how they solve problems that would either be impossible or more difficult via other means.  Today, I can see design patterns being used, but it would be great to crack open the API and be able to show the code that implements the patterns.  A rich set of examples in a real-world scenario is invaluable.