It's easy to think of Microsoft and open source as implacable enemies. But in
fact, many people are building open source code with Microsoft tools, and others
use open source tools to build proprietary software. In this book, Brian Nantz
surveys some of the intersections and provides plenty of pointers to good tools
and sample code.
VMware has long been the leader in virtual machine technology for Windows and
Linux developers. The recent acquisition of Virtual PC by Microsoft has brought
new competitive pressures to bear, but a peek at the next version of VMware
shows that they're not about to give up.
Sure, your IDE includes a button control. But isn't it sort of boring? If you're
looking for an inexpensive way to make your applications look more exciting,
Arcadia PowerButton may be the answer.
Does the development world really need another IDE? Well, maybe not. But whether
it's needed or not, Omnicore's X-develop (now in open beta) offers an
interesting feature set with some worthwhile innovations.
If you want to get corporate management to approve your software projects, it
helps to be able to speak their language. That's the basic premise of this
software engineering economy book. You might find it heavy going at times, but
if your job involves making the case to people with suits, Steve Tockey's work
can help you out.
OurayCM is a relatively new cross-platform configuration management package that supplies fully ACID operations and complex branching in a solid package.
Many developers have found themselves on the unit testing bandwagon, setting up
tiny tests to check all of their code whenever they make a change. In the Visual
Studio .NET world, this has required running an external tool to exercise the
tests. With the advent of TestDriven.NET, that's no longer true.
Oracle wins PeopleSoft, Microsoft and Sun make nice, Eclipse declares independence. These were some of the big events ADT covered in 2004. Here's a look back at the year that was.
Microsoft is making a big deal right at the moment about their first ever
Microsoft Office System Developer Conference. But really, this event is just the
most recent of a long line of Office developer conferences. Still, it might
prove worth your while to attend.
Here's a selection of insights, opinions and practical tips gathered this past year from gurus of the software industry.
By now, just about every developer knows the basics of XML. Indeed, it's getting
hard to find a development environment or distributed application that doesn't
involve XML. But there's a difference between just knowing the basics and
knowing how to make effective use of XML. That's where Elliotte Rusty Harold's
book comes in.
Want a numeric, financial, charting, and statistical package written in 100% pure Java? Then JMSL ought to get your attention.
Have you been transferred from a corporate position to a service provider as
part of an IT outsourcing contract? Here's a chance to make your voice heard.
Automation utilities are traditionally seen as tools for systems administrators. But why shouldn't developers use them too? Some time spent with AutoMate suggests interesting possibilities here.
MyGeneration is an object-relational mapper and code generator for .NET. It
supports a great variety of databases, handles regeneration of existing code,
and it's even free.
Instead of building e-mail into your bug-tracking system, why not build bug-tracking into your e-mail client? That's what SSW eXtreme Emails does, bringing an agile bug-tracking system to users of Microsoft Outlook and Exchange.
Like more and more developers, I'm carrying a USB drive around with me these
days: 256MB of faux disk that I can load up with software. Besides my current
working project files, here's what I've loaded it up with.
Desktop search is the latest software niche where Google and Microsoft (along
with smaller competitors) are going head to head. But what's the big deal here?
There are lots of books out there that tell you how to write correct code. But
we all know that there's a lot of incorrect code out there in the world. Adam
Barr's new book is one of the few that actually helps you deal with this
incorrect code by showing you plenty of examples and explaining how to find the
bug.
The next-generation storage system known as WinFS has been a long time in coming
- and now it looks like it will be even longer. By the time it actually ships,
will anyone care? I doubt it.