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Understanding .NET: A Tutorial and Analysis
Firstly, this book doesn't attempt to act as a programming tutorial, and as a result is thin on code examples. Instead, the book takes a highly summative approach to the main technologies of the framework, broadly dividing them into: web services, the CLR and languages, the class library, data access, ASP.net and .NET my services.
Having said this, the central theme through the book is that of XML and web services, accurately reflecting their importance in the .net framework. It frustrates me how web services are often described as revolutionary, when built on technologies such as UDDI and WDSL which in turn are based on relatively mature technologies such as XML and HTTP. This book falls into the same trap of pandering to the hype surrounding web services, without really managing to convince me of what is so revolutionary about them.
The author dedicates a chapter to a summary of the main .NET languages, Visual Basic .NET, C#, and the managed extensions of C++. The author concludes that "Managed C++ adds even more complexity to an already complex language." Some may have reservations with this statement; garbage collection, interfaces, attributes and the managed types are only likely to result in less work for the developer even after a relatively short learning curve. The author appears to come out in favour of C# over the "more complex" Visual Basic. I would like to have seen some discussion on other .NET languages under development.
The chapter on the class libraries makes a relatively good job of summarising the massive .NET libraries. It's a fleeting overview of the most useful and interesting parts of the libraries. Remoting (remote method calls), reflection and the ubiquitous GUI libraries are just a few examples. This is one of the stronger sections of the book in my opinion, though this is coming from a developer's perspective.
There is a concise chapter on ADO .NET. The author acknowledges the fact that this is the latest in a long line of Microsoft data access libraries but fails to indicate why this one is better. The controversial .NET My Services is also detailed. The book doesn't really ponder the politics surrounding My Services, which is surprising as this element was always likely to be its downfall.
In parts, this book is overwhelmingly pro-Microsoft. In a particularly gushing moment, the author implies that COM was successful in its goals of interoperable component software, only failing to reach critical mass due to a failure by other vendors to support it. OMG's corba on the other hand was based on an incomplete standard, destined to failure due to Microsoft's decision not to support this 'doomed' standard. I would whole-heartedly disagree with this. Firstly, the distributed object technologies of CORBA are applicable to a different range of problems. Even overlooking the validity of this comparison, CORBA has seen massive support and is generally considered to be more successful than COM.
On a more positive note however, this book does provide isolated moments of insight. Some of the sidebars, for instance, tend to delve a little deeper, providing a little bit of the insight I was hoping to gain by reading this book. A brief look at the differences between MSIL and Java's VMs for instance led me to research further. Apparently future versions of SQL server are set to host a version of the .NET CLR natively, similarly to how Oracle 9i can run its own Java VM. For me, these insights go beyond the information which I could have picked up on any number of white-papers out there on the net.
In hindsight this book is perhaps too shallow, falling into the trap of using a barrage of acronyms and buzzwords without delving deep enough into any one topic. There is no mention of cross-language interoperability, and more importantly no mention of cross platform interoperability efforts -- which do exist. Also, even with a book so Microsoft oriented, I would expect to see either a distinct section, or at least more comments, on the pitfalls and barriers to takeup of the framework. A more critical and less Microsoft-centric text would for me have made this book more authoritative.
Table Of Contents
Preface
1. An Overview of .NET.
2. Web Services.
3. The Common Language Runtime.
4. .NET Languages.
5. The .NET Framework Class Library.
6. Accessing Data- ADO.NET.
7. Building Web Applications- ASP.NET.
8. .NET My Services.
Conclusion
You can purchase Understanding .NET: A Tutorial and Analysis from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
I might buy this book, except my managers won't touch .net with a ten foot pole, as once your in, you apparently can't get out.
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
Full-text follows:
"Security is job one at Microsoft. Make sure you make secure programs, and don't let anyone see the source code. Access to source code results in insecurity as the viewer may find holes in your application that they can exploit."
"less-Microsoft oriented.."
.NET implementation, this book is about .NET...
Hrm. MS invented the technology, there's no complete "alternative"
I'm just not sure how this couldn't help but be "Microsoft" oriented.
If you were me, you'd be good lookin'. - six string samurai
How long before MS changes .NET in order to break Mono?
The publisher appears to be Pearson Education, and not Microsoft Press, who really isn't trustable anymore in my opinion. I'm kind of surprised that they're reviewing a book that is a year old now, as far as Microsoft-oriented books go, this is almost an antique.
IBM had PL/1, with syntax worse than JOSS,
And everywhere the language went, it was a total loss...
I'm sure you meant 'trustworthy', but I wouldn't expect a "Linux Zealot" to know any better...
Mod parent up!
(This is the parent poster. Apparently I don't have karma to burn).
What doesn't really make sense to me is that the .NET framework is unlike any other I've worked with... When you write code in Perl, youuse Perl. When you write code in PHP or Java, you use PHP or Java. But with .NET, it seems you need to know VB and ASP and C# and... Am I off the mark here?
The writer of the article is Dave Chappell? hm, isn't he a comedian with Comedy Central? .NET really is a joke!
Sig- http://www.dreamhost.com/rewards.cgi?ayefly
There is a concise chapter on ADO .NET. The author acknowledges the fact that this is the latest in a long line of Microsoft data access libraries but fails to indicate why this one is better.
So the long quest for automated persistence is not over ?
Yes there may be unprovable theorems and unsolvable problems, as Corba and EJBs showed us...
Except for the minor problem that web services are not a central theme of the .NET framework. They are there, and they are well supported, but the majority of the framework would work unchanged if they didn't exist or are not used.
Slashdot quality declines as the number of hot grits posts decreases. - Provolt's Law, Apr-09-2005
When I first glanced at the author's name it looked like Dave Chappelle .. wouldn't that be an interesting book to read..
and reading the blurb on this review was way more descriptive. The student consultant at my University gave a tech talk on .NET and Tablet PC's and asked the audience what .NET was? A hush fell over the audience. Someone suggested "web services" and the presenter said "yes... exactly. Web Services". He stopped fielding answers cause to him that's all .NET was.
---- The geek shall inherit the Earth.
After reading this article I caught myself looking for Mozilla's "delete" button....
so don't take it any other way.
.net.
>>...this book aims to cut through the marketing hype....
But that's all I've ever seen on
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
To break Microsoft... actually this is EXACTLY what the next spec does. Microsoft were the only people who went for literal encoding, which is a bit naff. The next SOAP spec does away with literal and enforces the use of RPC encoding.
So actually this standards adherence stuff is already biting MS. But to compete in the enterprise space they have to adhere. Mono however is screwed.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
This is secondhand rumour, but I've seen comments on various .NET development forums that MS is going to drop Windows Forms and the CGI support and produce a whole new library once Longhorn comes out. Whoopee! Got to keep selling those fresh training courses and certifications!
You mean they were trustworthy till now ? Oh... looks like I slept too much
getSexySig();
...help the average technical manager or developer get a feel for what the .NET framework means for them.
Probably nothing to users who read this site.
"Understanding his ennemy is the best way to fight him efficiently."
I thought MS dropped the .NET name???
A language replacing an operating system? I don't think .NET will replace anything. Its like when C++ came out. It didn't stop people from using C. .NET is useful and easy, but it has more overhead than a lot of stuff out there.
Microsoft's core DLLs were most likely written in C/C++ and will remain that way for many, many years.
When boasting the greatness of .NET, you should consider this: What language was used to compile the framework?
Yet another signature that refers to itself. The irony and humor is dead.
Dot Net is the politically correct name for being neutered.
Well, as a developer, I think .net is pretty good. My happiness with .net goes up with the implementation of mono. .net is standardized, and open source is built on portability.
There is nothing more portable than being able to run a binary (sort of) on a host of different machines. C# is pretty good all around, it got right a lot of the things java got wrong, and choosing .net for your (windows) database app is never a bad decision, even if it may not be the best one. In a way its a lot like xml: there's a lot of hype, but the overall philosophy is good. Very unmicrosoftian in implementation.
When they get generics I will probably write all my own personal stuff in C#.
Stupid job ads, weird spam, occasional insight at
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000 04XPP0/qid=1044891265/sr=8-13/ref=sr_8_13/104-8379 361-6410304?v=glance&s=video&n=507846
Another battle of Good vs. Evil
.NET is so much more than a programming language. Read the whitepapers on .NET and then you understand.
Funny that MS & MS affiliates still can write a whole spec of a brand new platform that clone 99% of Java specs, not using a single time the word Java ;-)
... MS try to yet and again let people forget about the fact that MFC/VB/MTS/... are nothing but dead !
...
... too late MS ;-)
...
... they may now have a bit of a problem, isn't- it ;-)
Now, that everybody but fools know that dotNet is somehow Java cloned
MS skilled people are now asking if they should go to dotNet or Java. IF you are an independant, then you may have the lead over the choice. But if you are in a firm, this choice will be made for you by IT "polliticians".
For those who embraced Java since early years, dotNet is no fear at all has it do not change anything in way of thinking and building softwares.
But if you were a MS tied, now you are in trouble, because you are forced to make you object revolution ! Move or die in other words.
Big Enterprise solutions will certainly became more and more Java centered, just because investissment have already been made ! And IT leaders in order to keep ROI low, will keep away from having 2 competing platform on the same architectures.
Let's face to reality, there are no reason at all for a Java architecture to change to dotNet.
But they are tons of reason for an old tech MS-architecture to migrate to a Java platform
MS has triggered the platform revolution, but they may have sign their worst act since ever !
Because, MS still think that by damaging Sun they could slow Java market impregnation. But Java is no more lead by Sun anymore ! But the community does
All is a mater of time
And time is ticking !
LLO
PS: For those who said that xbox will be a "huge success" or the "best success story for ages"
PS2: Do you think that MS realy thought they could damaged Windows domination with dotNet or are they just S&M fans (with spikes and stuffs related) ?
Remember, revolutionary also means to go in circles.
/syle
Once I got "in" .net, I began doing everything in my power to keep from ever having to use VB6, VBScript, and/or "ASP Classic" ever again. The improvements are too great for me to go backwards unless I absolutely have to. Luckily, most of my clients are worried about the results more than the technologies used so I get to make that call.
The truth doesn't care what I think.
Microsoft Press publishes one of the most useful books I've ever seen - "Writing Secure Code", by a MS engineer. No, stop laughing, I'm serious. It's a great book. It even goes into great detail on how important it is to force secure coding practices onto the rest of the project team, and how you have to resist the temptation to add features or push up the release date at the expense of code review and good coding practices. It's usefullness is only enhanced by the delicious sense of irony you get when reading it.
For a similar, but maybe more technical overview, see .Net Framework Essentials from O'Reilly. It's a nice short book with a good number of simple code examples. I'm about half-way through it, and I've learned a lot.
Even if true, and I have no inside knowlege here, I presume that the Windows Forms and GDI stuff would be kept for backwards compatibility. I can only assume that if they really "dropped support" for these technologies they would have a lot of furious developers. Possible of course, although not hugely likely in my view... YMMV
PS: For those who said that xbox will be a "huge success" or the "best success story for ages" ... they may now have a bit of a problem, isn't- it ;-)
First and foremost, I don't own an X-Box, nor will I ever, so this is NOT an evangelistic plug for MS.
Apparently you don't know anything about business, or more to the point, how MS does business. It doesn't matter whether or not X-Box 1 is a success or not. If MS can tear out big enough of a chunk from Sony's & Nintendo's collective asses and wedge itself in enough into the gaming market, it paves the way for X-Box 2 to take it all over.
MS doesn't care one way or the other whether or not X-Box 1 makes any money for them, they just want the market presence gouged out for them. Once that is done, the console trolls who don't know any better will wait with bated breath for X-Box 2.
Spread the RC luvin'
The only reason I could see forking over the dough for this is for research purposes. It always helps when arguing with suits to have solid examples of why certain things are blecherous and should be avoided.
Lodragan Draoidh
The more you explain it, the more I don't understand it. - Mark Twain
.NET is language independent, platform centric.
Java is language centric, platform independent.
curly brackets don't make a language Java.
.NET version of Java. C# is a step forward from that. I'm sure the next version of Java will be a step forward from C#.
J# is the
The truth doesn't care what I think.
Also, even with a book so Microsoft oriented, I would expect to see either a distinct section, or at least more comments, on the pitfalls and barriers to takeup of the framework. A more critical and less Microsoft-centric text would for me have made this book more authoritative.
.NET, either.
Did you read the author's bio--even the short one on bn.com?
David Chappell is Principal of Chappell & Associates and the best-selling author of Understanding ActiveX and OLE (Microsoft Press, 1996) and Understanding Microsoft Windows 2000 Distributed Services (Microsoft Press, 2000). Through his keynotes, seminars, writing, and consulting, David helps IT professionals around the world understand, use, market, and make better decisions about enterprise software technologies.
He's been published by Microsoft, fer chrissakes. He makes a living as a consultant on MS technologies. You can't possibly expect him to be coolly objective about anything coming from Redmond.
Reading the author bio will often give you a clue about his or her technology bias, although it's no guarantee that the book will provide an objective perspective. I wouldn't expect Richard Stallman to write a wholly bias-free book about
to get you locked up for life.
Balmer: But bill, your giving them a chance to interoperate with our competitors using webservices.
Bill: They don't call me an architect for nothing, the DTD or SCHEMA will be a moving duck just like our Undocumented Windows API, HTML, cascading style sheets, etc. We control it all. ho ho ho
Balmer: ha, the fools don't realize they have a go to jail card coming up on their next dice roll.
* Jumps Up And Down *
Microsoft's DTD = Microsoft's API = Internet Explorer
Why don't you explain what's so special about it. I've read the whitepapers, I understand, and I'm not impressed.
There is a theme? KDE is copying it? What sort of theme are you talking about? A GUI? .Net is not a GUI. Are you talking about Windows XP? Windows XP is not .Net; Windows XP did not even ship with the .Net framework.
The truth doesn't care what I think.
Acronyms, acronyms... For the unitiated:
WDSL Wireless Digital Subscriber Line
WSDL Web Services Description Language
UDDI Universal Description, Discovery and Integration (not Description and Discovery Interface)
ASP Active Server Page
CLR Common Language Runtime
CORBA Common Object Request Broker Architecture
OMG Object Management Group
XML eXtensible Markup Language
MSIL Micro$oft Intermediate Language
ADO ActiveX* Data Object
.NET ?
* The correct spelling is a skull-and-crossbones character in place of the X but slashdot filters out Unicode 9760
Indeed, the only maturity in XML is relative. W3C keeps coming up with new standards on how you should define and process XML dialects. The XML standard as a whole is only five years old as of today (see W3C's site).
XML processing standards such as XSL, XSLT, XPath, XQuery, XPointer, XML Schema, SOAP/XML-RPC (getting confused yet? X marks the spot!) are still warm from the oven and they are being revised and replaced already.
Even given all that, XML is not much more than the latest fad for data processing: it is comparable to ASN.1 and SGML from the late 1980s and early 1990s, with its only saving graces being that the standards are free to download and use, yet partially endorsed by Microsoft. There is little indication that XML will prosper after the next big revolution in computing -- indeed, looking at previous "revolutions," a common theme is making it easier to use and/or develop applications on computers. XML so far fails this test. Stacking more and higher layers of data processing standards is not a revolution at all.
Then there's `code complete` and `writing solid code`. But hey, lets bash microsoft again and again. Take *that*, worlds largest company!!
Why use .NET? I am happy with my Mac OS X running Apache and FileMaker for the web. A little Perl, a few Java applets, what more do I need? If there is a reason for me to move my site to .NET please let me know. Is it worth the learning curve?
If it does, all readers will drop
I still have to see *one* reason to use a new framework to do the same work that is already well performed by well written software on solid operating systems.
This note was originally published at John Munsch weblog on January the 14th.
.NET to fail and fail badly
.NET "rebuttal" that I linked to above, "For non-profit use VS.NET can be had pretty cheaply, especially if you know anyone that is in college somewhere." Pretty cheaply? For a non-profit (that means charities, churches, universities, the hobbiest who is going to give away his work for FREE)... pretty cheaply? Wow. That is well and truly pathetic. To try and justify it, and say, oh well, you can try to scam an educational discount so it won't be so dear, is even more pathetic.
.NET commercials with William H. Gacy telling you how great it is without really ever telling you anything about it? Microsoft doesn't trust .NET to stand on its own technical merits and it knows it may go like cod-liver oil down the gullets of a lot of people who have seen how the company works behind closed doors even if it were the tech shiznit.
.NET just in case there wasn't any grassroots community who actually wanted to do it. Or maybe just in case there was and they couldn't control it.
.NET for other platforms? If those same people were working on giving us new libraries and new tools for an already existing language instead of pouring in the thousands of man hours it's going to take to build a copy of the C# compiler or a .NET version of Ant and JUnit?
Lots of reasons why I want
It's benefits a criminal organization. Not one that's been found guilty of crimes once or maybe twice, but lots and lots of times. Those crimes are many and varied, but here's just a few of them: Stac Electronics v. Microsoft, DOJ v. Microsoft, Sun v. Microsoft.
P.S. If you want to split hairs, Stac v. Microsoft isn't a criminal action, it's doesn't stem from a criminal abuse of their monopoly like the other two cases. Instead it was just a case of a small company being driven out of business by willful patent infringement, theft of trade secrets, etc.
Microsoft isn't just one thing anymore. It's too damn big for that. I'm sure even Bill himself knows better than to think that he truly controls the whole ship because it's become big enough that he can't possibly know all the projects, people, etc. anymore. But even a really large company still has a kind of collective personality that it exudes and a large part of the personality both internal and external to Microsoft for many years now is that of a total control freak.
If they don't own it, if they don't control it, if they didn't create it, if it doesn't have a broad stamp from Microsoft on it, then they don't want it. Sometimes it's sufficient for the thing to merely exist and they'll refuse to acknowledge it, other times they need to actively stamp it out because they can't control it.
When was the last time you can remember Microsoft saying they supported a standard? That is, not something they invented and submitted a RFC for, an actual, take it off the shelf and re-implement it without renaming it or "improving" it so it doesn't work with anybody else standard. C++? Basic? HTML? A video or audio codec? Java? Anything?
I'm sure there's something, somebody will point out their excellent support for TCP/IP or something and I'm sure that's true. But if you were to look at Microsoft as a person in your life, you'd wonder what was wrong with him or her such that so much had to be controlled by that person.
When your business is selling the operating systems that 90+% of everybody uses, software development tools should not be a profit center.
Why should I have to plunk down a couple of thousand dollars for a "universal subscription" in order to have access to compilers and basic development information? Sun doesn't have to do that? On this point I'll quote from the
Marketing. Have you been "lucky" enough to catch one of the
So they are going to pull a page out of Intel's bum-bum-buh-bum "Intel Inside" playbook and try to sell the brand like it's sneakers and cola. Trust us, you'll look cool if you use it, and we'll keep hammering the brand on TV so somebody who doesn't have much tech savvy in your organization will ask you if you are using it, or have plans to port to it, or whatever, even if he hasn't got a clue what "it" is in this case.
They don't trust you. They don't like what they can't control and they can't control you. They can try and they always will keep trying but ultimately you are going to see them keep trying to do things and always keep a step towards the door just so they can bolt if they have to. Want to see what I mean? Go visit GotDotNet sometime if you haven't already been there. It's the grassroots community website that Microsoft put up to support
Ever been to SourceForge? Of course you have, everybody has because that's one of the hubs of all open source projects. You can go there and get the source of thousands of cool open source projects and it really serves the community well. There's even hundreds of projects now that list C# among their programming languages. So why did Microsoft feel compelled to create their own GotDotNet Workspaces that is clearly just a ripoff of SourceForge?
A few reasons are fairly clear: First, at many of their workspaces you don't get in unless they know who you are. Ever been stopped at SourceForge and asked for a name and password to look at a project? What about download binaries or source? No? At GotDotNet you will, lots of projects are marked with a lock. Second, forget about all those messy licenses that Microsoft might not approve of, you don't need to worry your little head about BSD vs. GPL vs. LGPL. You've got the one true workspace license that you have to agree to, or else you won't be putting your project there. Lastly, well it's kind of obvious, but it's really all about control isn't it. After all, if you aren't under their thumb, that has to be a bad thing. So a SourceForge that they control is pretty much a requirement, isn't it?
It's a really sad way for a lot of people to waste a whole lot of time rebuilding that which already exists. Wouldn't the whole computing world be a lot better if there wasn't a team of people, maybe a couple of teams of people building complete copies of
In the end, we'll all just be left with another way to do the exact same thing only in a different language. Lord knows the world benefits now from being unable to share media between France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the US, and Japan because we can't all speak the same language. I benefit every day from the fact that I can't read a Japanese manga I might enjoy or understand a TV show from Europe. Once you are done building this tower, go build a few more right beside it using Perl, Python, and Ruby too. They're all trailing behind in certain areas, we need to make sure the same set of stuff is reinvented and rewritten for all of them too.
That's a negative, Roger.
ILDASM is the tool to use to disassemble an assembly, and the result is MSIL in readable form. Nothing i386 to it.
It's as much disassembling as any non-MSIL binary would produce. Has nothing to do with security.
Dave
Can someone please explain to me what the hell .NET is? I can't figure it out for the life of me. I mean, first of all, why the upgrade? Why not just stick with visual basic and visual C++ as they are? Aren't there already libraries enough for these huge expensive windows compilers? And second, why XML? Last time I tried to use XML I was typing syntax for several seconds for every data entry I wanted to do, and it seemed like a big fat waste of time to me. What's so much easier about storing database files in plain text where every entry is marked-up with extra syntax, as opposed to a traditional database, where the table is defined only once? And why bother with C# when we just heard about Sun urging its own people not to bother with Java? All these corporate-sponsored "revolutions" and languages are all smoke and mirrors.
Hmm, anyone know where I can get a copy of 'Writing Solid Code' published by Microsoft Press? I think it's from 1995. (Don't laugh!)
Remember that only a fraction of the effort in in development, most of it (in my experience) is in mantainence, and multiple languages in the same project means that all programmers should be able to at least read them all.
As a programmer just starting out, I'm curious what direction to take my training in the future. I was planning to learn to use C# and ASP.NET to develop database-driven web applications. After seeing all this criticism/skepticism/pessimism i'm curious: what would _you_ recommend?
In all matters of opinion, our adversaries are insane. -Oscar Wilde
It's the sound of the Microsoft LifeSuck2000 machine starting up to suck in as many people as possible to keep .net from going .t#ts-up.
boycott slashdot February 10th - 17th check out: altSlashdot.org
Its no secret that Longhorn will have a new API which makes some of the difficult tasks that currently require using PInvoke much easier.
No, WinForms and GDI+ are not being dropped.
Its here to stay.
Microsoft Press has release a bunch of good books including _Code Compelete_ and _After the Gold Rush_ to name just two.
I think even funnier is that nobody knew this was a joke.
Now for Chapter 2: Squashing your competitors.
Donate background CPU time to fight cancer.
What on earth are both guys on about... the author claims that COM didn't reach critical mass becuase other vendors didn't support it!?!?!? You mean vendors like Sun, BEA etc. crazy idea that they ever would support COM, yet on the MS platform (which is the
As for CORBA being generally more successful than COM.. you mean '.. on unix' surely. CORBA doesn't even come close to the same level on MS platforms, and there's a lot more of those about that unix servers. (regardless of what anyone thinks of these different platforms).
I have noticed a strong tendency for authors (and MS staff) to sing the praises of
I also think that its very pointless mentioning CORBA in a
Commenting on a sig is always going to be offtopic, but having
read this one so many times, I am going to finally take the bait.
It is basically a true statement. You are much less likely to
get shot if you are not carrying a gun. But it is also basically
a misleading statement, designed to lead the reader to a false
conclusion, specifically, that it is therefore unwise to carry
a gun.
Firstly, if one employs a weapon, and thereby becomes a
combatant, it is because the conclusion has been made that
it is better to assume the risks of combat than to abstain.
Personal safety is not the sole and overriding human value.
In fact, it is one of the basest human values. The quote
appeals to the lowest and most primitive factors in human
nature. Defense of defenseless others is a higher value.
Secondly, it glosses the distinction between open and concealed
carry. While open carry attracts attention and may thereby
entrain combat, concealed carry does not.
I might continue, but for the press of time. I will be
satisfied at least that I have not left the deceptive qualities
of these words entirely unchallenged.
-I like my women like I like my tea: green-
And read this book To Kill a Mockingbird, its a classic. The quote actually appeals to the highest principles that a man can hold. Namely peace in the face of aggression.
And the kicker is that Atticus Finch is the best shot in the whole town... go figure.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
I'm Steve Gibson, and that post gets my ALL CAPS GUARANTEE. I write everything in Assembler.
- yeah because a fresh install of VS.NET is vulnerable to the slammer worm straight out of the box! no sql server required.
Trustworthy computing brought to you by bill gates arse
'Be the change you want to see in the world' - Al Gore
Of all the posts, how many people have actually tried to write complex applications with .NET? I don't mean doing a simple ASPX page that displays simple rows from SQL Server. I mean creating a pool of objects or using ThreadPool to perform some heavy weight process. For example, say you have a sophisticated shopping cart system that has built in personalization. You want the server to preload some applications when IIS starts up. How do you load presets and have them behave in a persistent manner? Do you use global.asax and application start to contain that logic? Is there a standard mechanism that allows for management of those persistent objects while the server is running? How do you get around the fact ThreadPool is limited to 25 threads? What happens if you exceed 25 threads? Is it desirable to have ThreadPool of ThreadPool? Do you manage delegates in those situations to make sure you don't over synchronize, but still make sure you get the right data out? All those saying how great .NET is haven't really tried to implement complex applications with life-cycles that aren't request/response oriented. Saying Biztalk is where that stuff might go, doesn't count, since it's not out yet.
Anyone seen the TV commercials for the .NET framework?
.NET platform is supposed to offer. And, before long, they'll be wanting .NET-enabled appliances so they can check and see if they turned the stove off from his/her cellphone!
.NET?? If there's not, someone really needs to start on the development cycle for that. If the MS Marketing juggernaut convinces Joe Average Consumer that he needs and wants this supposed "interoperability" and "interconnectivity" that MS promises (and they will convince Joe Average Consumer that they need it), then the OSS movement will be relegated to those of us considered "computer geeks" and the general populace will never get that OSS is much better than the MS Tax that they have to pay.
It's almost frightening as to how integrated and easy they try to make everything look.....especally the "1 deg. of Seperation" they tout.
IMHO, this massive ad campaign by MS will cause the average customer base to require the services that the
Is there anything in the works for an open source solution similar to
--CypherDragon
One of the many design flaws of .NET is that it is made by Microsoft.
Even if I say something insightfull or inteligent, it doens't matter cause I'm an ass.
Of course Microsoft Press agreed to publish the book under the condition that the author wouldn't follow the practices that he wrote about as they certainly impact the inclusion of nifty marketroid requested features and possibly push back their product delivery dates.
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
I've been developing for Classic ASP since 1997 (ASP 2.0), and I'm definitely looking forward to ramping up on .NET. True, this will lock me into a Microsoft-type world -- but I've already make the decision to develop primarily using MS technologies, so that decision really doesn't affect me too much.
.NET promises a solution to all of these issues, and it appears to also be more of a true programming language now than scripting. Which is nice, because I really do appreciate OOP -- especially when you combine it with Microsoft's vaunted ease-of-use. I'm sure there will be hiccups along the way -- security patches, bugs and such are always to be expected -- but it seems to be an excellent improvement beyond those MS tools that I already use.
What does affect me are the limitations currently imposed by Classic ASP. Error-handling is atrocious -- "On Error Resume Next" seemed to be a dirty little secret for a long time, and work in a very hamfisted, kludgy manner. ADO is functional, but trying to get the proper combination of properties set to get your data from different providers still frustrates me 5yrs after-the-fact. And it's starting to show its age -- I had expected ASP 3.0 to introduce a lot of new, useful features to the mix, but a lot of it left me less than impressed.
http://www.cgisecurity.com/java.shtml
It's a shame so many people are taking this "oh god don't lock us in" stance. To me, and people will disagree with this, .NET is the Sun/Java 'write once, run anywhere' concept done right because it's:
I've been in this industry too many years (over 20) to ever believe that there will happen to be a true cross-platform write once run anywhere application platform. The closest thing we've ever seen, and will ever see is *nix... and that's just the OS, not the apps. Everything else is just a kludge, and as long as there exist multiple platforms manufactured by different business competitors, there will *never* exist such an animal as true cross-platform runability for one single app. Of course our friends up northwest are certainly doing everything they can to eliminate that nasty problem of the existance of multiple business competitors.
We have trudged through lame names like My Computer and My Network Places. Now we get ".NET My Services". Is there a MS manager out there who got a bonus for that idea? I don't know - it's like a murky security blanket. Microsoft keeps saying it's mine, but I know it really belongs to them.
Remember, you don't actually have to tell anyone who or what Gabbo is, you just say "GABBO!" and flash the words on the screen, leaving everyone to wonder, and when Gabbo finally makes his appearance, boom! Instant audience. Krusty doesn't stand a chance.
.NET is the same way. .NET is a sort of vague, nebulous... thing that nobody truly understands, but everybody is supposed to want to be a part of. Is it a framework, a runtime, Web services, what? Well, the truth is... it's all of that, and much much more. It is more certain things than others depending on the marketing angle of the day, but whatever it is, it is set to become the dominant computing paradigm of the new millennium!!! *dramatic, victorious music*
Well,
N4st0r, trixx0r h0bb1tz0rz! Th3y st0l3 0ur pr3c10uzz!
I'm not sure how people take this.. Some people look at Borland and say "dead company" "nothing to offer" while others see it as "breath of fresh air" and "light at the end of the tunnel." I know that Borland is developing a Delphi .NET solution and was wondering if people even consider this to be a viable alternative?
- DK_911
The book is a good survey of the very large .net world. It is not an in-depth view of any particular part, but gave me a very good overview of just what the parts *are*, so I could build a conceptual framework on which I could hang the detailed knowledge I got from other books. It was a quick read, too. .net is a bunch of different things, including languages, language-independent libraries, a virtual machine, and standards for interoperability. The book covers all of that, walking the line between "too high-level to be useful" and "too detailed to grasp easily". It is trying to cover several different audiences, and succeeds pretty well, I think.
.net system and how it all fits together, and have a good base for the rest of the knowledge you need to collect.
The book has "executive overview" summary sentences beside each paragraph, which are obviously aimed at, well, executives. But at the same time, the paragraphs themselves have good solid information about how the CLR works, how the libraries are structured, how VB.NET and C# are similar and where they differ, including actual code examples. It makes you aware of what pieces are out there, so when you need an encryption algorithm (for example), you know there are some standard library routines you can check out before coding one from scratch.
Don't get the book if all you want is a C# reference (get the O'Reilly book for that). As a matter of fact, don't get the book if you want a really in-depth discussion of any particular part.
*DO* get the book (or borrow it from the library, like I did) if you want to know more about the whole
for the non-technical writer. All those full stops...
Parent deserves a 5. Even if it's just a formulation of Standard Operation Procedure in the security field, which everyone but Microsoft agrees on.
Karma: Excellent (My Karma? I wish...:-( )
Java's bytecode has limitations that make implementing some languages efficiently difficult. In particular:
1. The only mechanism you can use to implement closures is a class. For functional languages, which make intense use of closures, this is not good enough. The Scheme and Lisp implementations on the JVM, for instance, are substantially less performant than those based on more appropriate VMs.
2. There is no way to optimise tail recursion. Again, functional languages use tail recursion a lot.
http://www.drbob42.net/SideWinder/. First shots of Borland's .NET IDE. I'm looking forward to this IDE, because I'm getting pretty tired of all the bugs in VS.NET EA, plus the service pack we should have had a loooong time ago is released AFTER April 24th, when VS.NET 2003 is released (with the fixes). VS.NET 2002 can't work with .NET v1.1, so you have to upgrade. This will cost $29.- but still... 2003 doesn't have refactoring f.e. So yeah, I'm pretty looking forward what Borland is releasing this summer. Especially their integration of tools for the complete development path from design to code is interesting. VS.NET EA fails on that part imho (visio 2002.NET is horrible).
Never underestimate the relief of true separation of Religion and State.
Because the chapter listing is right there in review.
Oh my... a bucket full of "Q: What's .NET?" "A:[insert synonym for crap here]" postings...
.NET is, you don't know what software deveopment is. What's Java? (besides the slang for coffee or the Indonesian Island). A language? true. But also a platform. .NET is a platform. Not a language, but a set of api's, functionality if you will. So it compares to 'Java, The Platform (tm)'. C# compares to 'Java, The Language (tm)'.
If you can't figure out what
So there. Now we got that out of the way, can we discuss the review instead of the crippleness of MS' marketing-droids? thanks.
Never underestimate the relief of true separation of Religion and State.
A NET is what one uses to ensnare something. Watch the cartoon network, turner's last great effort, for more tips on net setup.
Why do Linux users so passionatly hate M$ but go head over heels to look, act, feel, smell like M$???
/. email updates are CONSTANTLY peppered with ads for M$ .NET !!!
I just installed KDE 3.1 last week and it defaulted to a "look and feel" that SMACKED of Winbloz XP.
If you like XP so damn much USE IT!! Let's keep M$ crap out of Linux world people!!!
I left M$ garbage to be free of the beast! I don't want ANYTHING to do with ANY M$ products, ever, for any reason. I spend all my spare moments praying for the collapse of the Evil Empire and the arrest and conviction of "The Evil One"...
I'm appalled that my
Jeez people!
Unfortunately, Microsoft middle managers periodically get infatuated with stupid naming conventions. ActiveFoo, DirectFoo, Foo .Net, whatever. It's like pixie-dust -- you just rename your project ActiveDirectFoo++ .Net 2000 XP to get it noticed. (I worked there for 5 years, so I've seen this first-hand.)
They slapped the .Net name on a bunch of different things:
Anyway, I hope this provides some info on what the .Net name covers, and why. The .Net name originally started as an umbrella name for the centralized network services that Microsoft wants to provide (Hailstorm, Passport, blah blah). Later, Microsoft decided to plaster it all over a bunch of other things, and it was just a confusing disaster.
In my opinion, the most important part to focus on is the new language platform -- MSIL and C# and the managed C++ extensions are a really Good Thing, and they are also -- surprisingly -- "Open". They have been submitted to ECMA as public standards, and Microsoft has pledged that any patents they hold that are involved in implementing the standards may be used, royalty-free, by anyone who wishes to implement the standards.
Also found Here
Last time I checked, you were allowed to use Microsoft products AND read Slashdot....
It's comments like these that frighten average people away from Linux. The 'RTFM' and 'Bomb Redmond' attitudes have got to go, or Linux will rot. Linux-nazis are probably more harmful to the promotion of Linux than any of it's technical deficiencies. Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of Linux, and it's come a long way, but the aggressive power trip of some linux zealots makes being a linux newbie really suck.
Excuse me but I do not use M$..
I have no idea where you get that idea from, I quit using M$ last year.
Mandrake 9.0, KDE 3.1 kernel 2.4.20
P4-2ghz, 512m, 140gigs, GF4-Ti4200/128m
I left M$ because of the utter lack of security and dependability. I refuse to use a broken product. I won't purchase something that will bring trouble to me.
Using M$ would be like ripping the locks off of my doors and putting signs in my front yard inviting bums, hobos and thieves to enter my home for fun and games. Sure, call me a Linux-nazi if you want but at least I'm free of the GRIP of M$ and finally have broken free of the "click and drool" crowd.
Linux forced me to use my mind and got me back in touch with the inside of the box.
I like the freedom that Linux has brought to me..
It paints .Net with broad, heavy-handed brush strokes talking much about the political ramifications (read: FUD) on software development and leaves very little room, leaving little room for technical discussion. The author often compares .Net with other platforms, showing what those lack instead of giving you a big, independent picture of .Net itself. Bottomline: this is for managers, not developers.
As a programmer who's used .Net for nearly a year now and have watched programmers around me learn it, I can safely say that the best way to learn .Net is to learn it with a .Net language (C#, VB.Net, etc). While the libraries (FCL) are language-independent, you really can't get a grasp of the concepts till you start coding. So, instead of this near-worthless book, I would recommend picking a .Net language and learning .Net alongside with it.
The O'Reilly C# book is by far the best one I've read so far (out of 8 books).
Google agrees: what is .net
Or actually how much I understand it.
.NET apps by default are literal, which will no longer be supported. Hence this is a big issue as they need to go around and change all those WSDLs, re-deploy the services and change the defaults from the application.
The SOAP RPC encoding IS the only one going forwards. The problem is that most
This is an issue for Microsoft and it is something that from my involvement in this area that I know more about it that I would wish to. Yes you can write custom encoders, but the issue here is with the current MS implementation, most other vendors only support literal because of MS, and their default is RPC.
It won't kill them of course, but it is alot of effort from where they went for the wrong one of two options.
The issue is the OLD services out there that will have to be redeployed. RPC services will not have to be redeployed.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
.Net sucks all the way .
We tried it and it has too many issues.
We are back to Java that really works
VB6 == .Not .Not sucks as bad as VB
he is, IMO, a paid astroturfer
i am a troll.
i recognise a troll.
has his nose so far up Microsofts principle orifice, he is not able to breath properly and consequently not able to think very well either.
.NET. The whole talk was very flimsy reasons why Java was bad and .NET was good. I would rather ask his editor her opinion of .NET. I feel it would be more relevant.
He gave a talk at a Microsoft dog-and-pony show in Denver that was supposed to be about
Moderation +5
.NET stories. the wording is lifted word for word from some guys ace weblog - (use google) there is a load of extra insightful stuff there, which puts the whole comment in context (the guy was half asleep ehen he wrote it and it is basicaly just a well formed spontaneous angry rant) It is emotional and therefore usually gets an emotive response of +5. When i altered it slightly to make it angrier it was modded troll.
.NET in this discussion - and even something like MONO gets only a luke-warm cautious reaction. This is a generation that knows Microsoft is untrustworthy and view their reinvention with suspicion and contempt. a lot of us are not going to be beguiled by a fancy studio environment and a world of new TLA!
.NET story come up why not try and get the 'fail .NET' comment up as an early AC post, but once it has been posted just once (even unmoderated) in a story please please stop. Think of this as a way to fight back against those ugly unwelcome .NET banner adverts here on /. (for the few that actually see any adverts)
60% Interesting
20% Insightful
20% Underrated
i love this post. I made it this time but it appears to turn up independantly a couple of times in recent
Is it a troll? No if anything its a dupe.
Is it astroturfing? No because its unpaid and entirely independant.
If anything its just a duplicate post(ok repetition is evil) I am using to gauge fellow slashdotters opinions over time. Look at how hostile everyone generally is towards
I'm gonna keep on posting it from time to time until the moderators start modding it down - don't want to waste time posting off-groupthink comments no-one ever reads (like this one)
anyways - if anyone sees a
i'm tired now. glad my karma is so low i'm all out of posts so posting this AC
thankyou and goodnight
I be um.?. J
without really managing to convince me of what is so revolutionary about them
I don't think that would be the point. Did the book convince you that they were a good idea though, and did it provide examples of good use, or specifics about what technology web services is supposed to replace or extend ? Would you be more likely to use them having read this book ?Never, ever lose a file again. Ever.
Your top point is language independence. This sounds great; what are the actual benefits of this?
.Net can enlighten me.
.Net, and right now it has the support of companies like IBM that actually care about platform independence, rather than companies like Microsoft that thinks "platform" and "Windows" are synonymous.
.NET actually turns out to be cross-platform then it probably will not be more performant because both virtual machines are doing the same thing and companies have been working on the JVM for the last 8 years. The jury is still out on this one until there are more .NET benchmarks to peruse.
.NET is support for Microsoft's new language C# and the promise of platform independence. Microsoft can choose to encourage this independence and eventually lose control over .NET or continue to promise openness while producing yet another (albeit nice and new) Windows development platform. Microsoft didn't exactly lose money or influence with ASP, VBScript or any of their other Windows-only technologies. Which path do you think they will choose?
Porting the bytecodes to another platform should be easier since there is only one set of instructions to implement, but I suspect that Microsoft will do something to make sure the bytecodes don't run on non-Windows platforms. Otherwise how are they going to make money? Time will tell on this one.
Another advantage would be the ability to open code written in one language and use another language to make edits. I have my doubts about this as well, since most people choose to use a language based on what other languages cannot do. Wouldn't code written in one language violate rules of other languages? Maybe someone who has worked with
Your second assertion regarding platform independence is puzzling. Java is already quite a bit more platform independent then
Your third assertion is difficult to support since the only benchmark I know of that compared the two was commissioned by Microsoft. If
So it looks like the best we can hope for out of
but it isn't ".net".
.net) and a couple windows (which, once again, are windows and have nothing at all to do with .net).
.net. "look" is not what .net is about at all. "widgets" could describe .net but you've only mentioned the "look" of widgets which doesn't really mean much to me, especially in a .net context because widgets can look like anything and some widgets don't have a "look" at all but we are talking about .net and .net doesn't really have much to do with looks, it is a programing platform. If you write a .net desktop application and someone runs it on windows 98, it looks like every other desktop app does (more or less). If you run it on windows xp, it (probably) looks like every other windows app does on xp (more or less). I think you have confused the windows GUI with .net and then decided to raise hell and bitch about something even though you were mistaken and had no right, authority, nor knowledge of to bitch about.
.net is, just ask. If you don't want to know, then stop pretending like you do.
all I see on that screen shot is a start menu (which is windows XP and has nothing to do with
it looks like you're talking about Windows XP GUI themes which have nothing at all to do with
If you would like to know what
The truth doesn't care what I think.
error handling exists in .net .net String class. He sent one back explaining what a freaking nerd I must be. I replied "no, I'm serious, it really is that fackin cool!" He didn't care.
ADO.net isn't perfect, but gives you several new ways to tackle the everyday problems
OOP is the way it always should have worked.
I actually sent a friend of mine an email explaining how much I loved the
The code behind model is the next logical step in ASP programming and takes about 5 minutes to learn but is appreciated forever.
Debugging in ASP? It's here now. How did we live without it?
ASP.Net uses a language, not a script. This full effects of this are demonstrated over and over, each time I realize "whoa, I really can do this now".
I started with VB.net and then looked at C# and realized it was the route for me (I'm lazy and C# rolls off the fingers/mind a bit easier). I sincerely hope I never have to do an "ASP Classic" project again and will do everything in my power to make it so.
The truth doesn't care what I think.
There's this girl I like. I call her 'Pichu'. Whenever I'm programming, I have a tendency to name all my variables some variation of Pichu such as 'PichuPichu' or 'ilovepichu'. When someone looks at my code and asks me what this or that code means, I generally furrow my brow after five minutes of concentration and say, "I have no fucking clue."
Lesson? Don't give a bunch of unrelated shit the same goddamned name.
[o]_O
Thanks to both of you. A most interesting discussion carried out with passion but without insults. Informative.