Re: an old geezer running visual studio for the first time

Please refer to my reply to Jeremy.

Anyway, I am beginning to realize that a decision to adopt VS.NET is not
caused by a love-at-first-sght / wow experience, because it is about the
most unsexy, userunfriendly program I have seen in a long time. But my
experience in programming has taught me to keep my eye on the ball, which in
this case is called long-term productivity gains, a area in which VS.NET
will hopefully prove its worth.

TB


"Kevin Spencer" <kevin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:e%23Tvn$DcFHA.456@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>I agree completely with Jeremy. A good programmer is definitely a control
>freak, and wants to be in control of his/her app as much as possible. The
>"training wheels" analogy is perfect. For beginners, these types of tools
>can be the difference between getting started in ASP.Net and not getting
>started at all. But they are hardly intended to be a substitute for real
>hard-core programming, which is why the SDK has articles and tutorials on
>such subjects as designing and building custom Server Controls, etc. Some
>of the greatest aspects of Visual Studio.Net is that it can allow one to
>build something quick and dirty in a short period of time, or it will allow
>the developer to delve as deeply into the technology as one can go, all the
>way down to assembler and MSIL if necessary or desired.
>
> --
> HTH,
>
> Kevin Spencer
> Microsoft MVP
> .Net Developer
> Ambiguity has a certain quality to it.
>
> "Jeremy S" <A@xxxxx> wrote in message
> news:ejj2gqDcFHA.3040@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Hi TB
>>
>> From cruising through your various comments in this thread I gather that
>> you are very comfortable with the old school way to do things. One
>> thought is to just stay there. Seriously. If you need to get stuff done,
>> then might as well just stay where you are most productive (at least
>> until you are comfortable with the new stuff).
>>
>> Now, the new way to do things will involve somewhat of a learning curve -
>> but once you've traversed it, you'll be *way more* productive than you
>> ever could have been with the old stuff.
>>
>> From your other comments it appears that you view ASP.NET and ADO.NET as
>> somehow limiting what a developer can do - especially if the developer
>> wants to "get down and dirty" and write some code. Not true at all. Much
>> of what you have likely read is touting the "training wheels" that have
>> been included in Visual Studio - like drag-and-droping DataAdapters into
>> a visual surface. You should understand that most serious developers (at
>> least the ones I've met) simply do not use such training wheels. You can
>> ignore those and dive right into the code. When it comes to ADO.NET - you
>> can actually write more code than you could have in classic ADO. Remember
>> .UpdateBatch() in classic ADO? That actually writes a bunch of dynamic
>> SQL under the covers for you that you never get to manipulate. ADO.NET
>> actually gives you much more control and more granular control of
>> inserts, updates, and deletes. I highly recommend to you another book
>> "ADO.NET" by David Sceppa - Microsoft Press. A "must read" IMHO for
>> anyone familiar with classic ADO moving to ADO.NET. Sceppa presents the
>> new stuff and compares/contrasts it with classic ADO. Remember, ADO.NET
>> is not simply the next version of classic ADO... it's a whole new way to
>> interface with your data. And, to answer your particular question, yes -
>> ADO.NET will let you work as easily with PHP as you can with SQL Server,
>> Oracle, Access, or any other database or data store (even XML files).
>>
>> About the starter kits - I recommended the Commerce one because it is,
>> IMHO, the most straight-forward; it shows you a lot of the nuts-n-bolts.
>> This is on contrast to the Portal kit which shows some very cool stuff
>> (like serving up an entire non trivial site through only one aspx page) -
>> but it's stuff most projects likely won't need.
>>
>> -HTH
>>
>>
>> "TB" <tbpostbox-googlegroups@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
>> news:eaWTn63bFHA.3492@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>> Thank your very much for bothering to answer this "old newbie".
>>>
>>> I will follow your advice. Particularly I will desect some of the sample
>>> projects on www.asp.net to learn how code-behind truly works. Actually
>>> it sounds like an interesting concept, but I supose (without knowing
>>> anything yet) that there are several degrees of code-behind depending on
>>> how puritanic you are or how much time you have left to finish a job. I
>>> guess that it also difficult for .NET developers to resist the
>>> temptation to get dirty and throw in a bit of inline code here and there
>>> just to get a project out of the door.
>>>
>>> I will also take a serious look at the book you suggest.
>>>
>>> Another question, now that I got you "on the line": Is it possible to
>>> make VS.NET work perfectly / natively / transparently with MySQL?
>>>
>>> TB
>>>
>>>
>>> "Jeffrey Todd" <Me@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
>>> news:eM04AAsbFHA.1040@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>>> These 3 suggestions will hopefully help a lot:
>>>>
>>>> 1. Consider developing your aspx and ascx files in FrontPage,
>>>> Dreamweaver, Notepad, or whatever is your favorite HTML and/or CSS
>>>> editor - and limit your use of VS.NET to (1) all programming work
>>>> (code-behind logic) and (2) launching you application for testing
>>>> purposes. VS.NET 2003 most definitely NOT the place to write HTML - so
>>>> no need for you to think about grid vs flow layouts. Reason being that
>>>> VS.NET 2003 will rewrite your HTML for you - often with disastrous
>>>> results. This link from a Microsoft insider explains:
>>>> http://blogs.msdn.com/MikhailArkhipov/archive/2004/05/16/132886.aspx
>>>> The upshot is that many of us use FrontPage or Dreamweaver for all
>>>> HTML-specific work (i.e., ASPX and ASCX file development) and use
>>>> VS.NET only for programming/code-behind work. The way I develop is that
>>>> I keep a copy of Dreamweaver running at all times along side VS.NET
>>>> 2003 - and switch between the two. One last point here is that VS.NET
>>>> 2005 - due out in November or so - is expected to no longer have the
>>>> HTML rendering and management issues that VS.NET 2003 has.
>>>>
>>>> 2. Get this book: Programming ASP.NET - by Dino Esposito - Microsoft
>>>> Press. It puts everything in context - IMHO ideal for your situation.
>>>> It's not a step-by-step tutorial, but it is more valuable because tells
>>>> you how to understand ASP.NET.
>>>>
>>>> 3. Familiarize yourself with the starter kits at the following link:
>>>> http://www.asp.net/Default.aspx?tabindex=8&tabid=47. I'd especially
>>>> recommend that you download and disect the Commerce starter kit. The
>>>> starter kits are complete ASP.NET Web applications and include all
>>>> source code - which is very readable and well-documented. The Commerce
>>>> starter kit is one of the simpler - so it would be a good starting
>>>> point as it incorporates many fundamentals.
>>>>
>>>> -HTH
>>>>
>>>> -JT
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> "TB" <tbpostbox-googlegroups@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
>>>> news:eTCWZ3qbFHA.2212@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>>>> Hi all:
>>>>>
>>>>> If you think that the following comments are absolute amateurish, then
>>>>> please bear with me, or simply skip this thread.
>>>>>
>>>>> A couple of months back I made the decision to initiate a gradual
>>>>> upgrade of my web programming skills from Classic ASP / VBS to ASP.NET
>>>>> / VB.NET.
>>>>>
>>>>> While the study of the language differences and all the new features
>>>>> in .NET has so far not been a traumatic experience, I am a bit
>>>>> shell-schocked after installing and running for the first time Visual
>>>>> Studio .Net (2003 edition).
>>>>>
>>>>> Until now I have programmed everything in the old-fashioned way, i.e.
>>>>> with a bare minimum of tools: a simple editor for coding, a bit of
>>>>> Frontpage for page layout, and my browser to see the results when
>>>>> running the page against a local instance of IIS.
>>>>>
>>>>> I have done quite a bit web programming, developing anything from
>>>>> yellow pages to accounting programs.
>>>>>
>>>>> But when I ran VS.NET for the first time, I simply didn't know where
>>>>> to start.
>>>>>
>>>>> The program appears to be a sort of Swiss-knife approach to
>>>>> programming, eliminating the need for external apps. During the past
>>>>> couple of years I have developed my own little collection of helpers
>>>>> which I use during development.
>>>>>
>>>>> VS.NET creates files for "project mangement". My project management
>>>>> normally consists notes and diagrams. My reusable code (subs and
>>>>> functions) is kept in separate files, which I either reference to or
>>>>> cut/paste - depending on the situation.
>>>>>
>>>>> I normally use a GUI tool (Frontpage for example) to generate a page
>>>>> layout. In VS.NET I am met with the question whether I want the
>>>>> designed to be grid-based or flow-based.
>>>>>
>>>>> Finally, I discovered that VS.NET saves code and html in different
>>>>> files. I am used to keeping everything together, grouping functions,
>>>>> subs etc above the <head> tag, and then insert code snippets between
>>>>> <% %> tags. This approach seems to be frowned upon by VS.NET.
>>>>>
>>>>> Am I an old-fashioned guy? No, because I have made the desicion to
>>>>> move to .NET, although a bit late perhaps. But I would like to find a
>>>>> book, a tutorial, anything that can teach this old geezer to use a new
>>>>> toy which apparently could improve my productivity.
>>>>>
>>>>> Any advice / comments from people who may or may not have been through
>>>>> the same process would be most welcome.
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks
>>>>>
>>>>> TB
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>
>


.

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