Jim Blizzards Blog

ASP.NET MVC 2 released

2010-03-12T13:14:11Z

I’m happy to announce that the final release of ASP.NET MVC 2 is now available for VS 2008/Visual Web Developer 2008 Express with ASP.NET 3.5. You can download and install it from the following locations:

Download ASP.NET MVC 2 using the Microsoft Web Platform Installer

Download ASP.NET MVC 2 from the Download Center

The final release of VS 2010 and Visual Web Developer 2010 will have ASP.NET MVC 2 built-in – so you won’t need an additional install in order to use ASP.NET MVC 2 with them.

So you’ve been using VS 2010 and have something to say?

2010-03-04T20:45:48Z

Here are some ways to provide feedback:

A survey: https://mscuillume.smdisp.net/Collector/Survey.ashx?Name=VS2010-RC “Thank you for taking the time to evaluate this pre-release of Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4. We would like to encourage you to complete the following survey. This is an opportunity for us to assess the overall health of the product prior to release.”
Forums: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/category/visualstudioprerelease “Visual Studio 2010 & .NET Framework 4 Release Candidate Forums”
Submit specific feedback (or report a bug): https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/content/content.aspx?ContentID=14625

And if you’re “going live” with the Beta or Release Candidate:

See: http://blogs.msdn.com/jeffbe/archive/2009/10/19/going-live-with-visual-studio-2010-beta-2.aspx (The blog post was written for users of the Beta 2 version, but everything still applies for the Release Candidate.) “Our Support team is staffed to help support Beta 2 if you encounter problems. If you plan to use Beta 2 for “go live” please send email to vsgolive@microsoft.com so that we can register you for beta level support.”

Slides from South Florida Code Camp Session

2010-02-27T23:54:22Z

Thanks to everyone who attended my Code Camp session this morning. Sorry some of you had to sit on the floor or stand, but it was cool having that many folks in the room. And y’all asked some great questions! Hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.

Here a link to my slides from the session.

If you’re interested in the Beta2 virtual machine image, here’s a link to Brian Keller’s blog which has download instructions. He also has 7 hands-on labs you can try out using the VM.

Or, you could download the Release Candidate and install the bits yourself. Here’s a link to a Channel9 video that walks you through downloading and installing the software.

Test plan documentation for Microsoft Test Manager plans

2010-02-27T01:20:22Z

Don’t know how I missed this last month, but the test team has created a Power Tool that creates test plan documentation from test plans in Microsoft Test Manager. See http://blogs.msdn.com/vstsqualitytools/archive/2010/01/11/test-scribe-test-plan-documentation-for-mtlm-plans.aspx and http://blogs.msdn.com/vstsqualitytools/archive/2010/02/26/test-scribe-for-visual-studio-2010-rc-test-plan-document-generation.aspx for more info.

Here’s a brief description from the blog:

This tool allows users of Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate Beta 2 to generate a Word 2007-compatible Test Plan Document from their plan, suites, test cases, and other artifacts. . . . The resulting document will contain (among other things) a list [of] suites with test cases and steps detail and pie charts detailing the overall progress of your Test Plan.

Slides from the Jacksonville Ultimate Event

2010-02-24T12:46:15Z

Thanks to everyone who attended the Ultimate Event yesterday. Great turnout, and excellent interaction.

Also, special thanks to Ryan Dorrell from AgileThought and Oleg Sych from Catapult Systems for their stellar work during the series.

Here are links to the slides from the event.

The slides from Quent’s Keynote and my Lap Around VS 2010 session are on my SkyDrive: http://cid-f9c5089cab158b62.skydrive.live.com/browse.aspx/Florida%20Ultimate%20Event%20VS%202010
The slides from Ryan’s Agile Project Management session are at: http://www.agilethought.com/Pages/2010UltimateEvent.aspx
The slides from Oleg’s No More No Repro session are at: http://www.olegsych.com/presentations/no-more-no-repro/
And Oleg’s slides from the Architecture session are at: http://www.olegsych.com/2010/01/uml-modeling-and-code-generation-in-visual-studio-2010/

Enjoy!

Slides from the FT Lauderdale Ultimate Event

2010-02-18T17:44:29Z

Thanks to everyone who attended the event last week. What a fabulous turnout!

Here are links to the slides from the event.

The slides from Quent’s Keynote and my Lap Around VS 2010 session are on my SkyDrive: http://cid-f9c5089cab158b62.skydrive.live.com/browse.aspx/Florida%20Ultimate%20Event%20VS%202010
The slides from Ryan’s Agile Project Management session are at: http://www.agilethought.com/Pages/2010UltimateEvent.aspx
The slides from Oleg’s No More No Repro session are at: http://www.olegsych.com/presentations/no-more-no-repro/
And Oleg’s slides from the Architecture session are at: http://www.olegsych.com/2010/01/uml-modeling-and-code-generation-in-visual-studio-2010/

Enjoy!

See you at the South Florida Code Camp, Feb 27

2010-02-09T12:12:00Z

It’s going to be a day-long total geekfest with12 tracks, 6 sessions in each tracks.

Agenda: http://www.fladotnet.com/codecamp/AgendaSL.aspx.

South Florida Code Camp site: http://www.fladotnet.com/codecamp/Default.aspx

My session is “How to be more productive by using VS 2010”

Want to know how you can be a more productive developer? In this session we’ll take a look at a typical day in the life of an application developer, who just happens to have VS 2010 Ultimate on his machine. First we’ll use a couple of the slick new tools to figure out how the app works. Then we’ll debug the app using IntelliTrace (historical debugging), perform some performance analysis to make sure the app rocks, fix some bugs, determine which unit tests to run using test impact analysis, create a Coded UI test to automate a regression test, then check the working code into Team Foundation Server. Get ready for a demo-packed session!

Be there or be square!

bliz

Visual Studio 2010 Release Candidate

2010-02-09T11:13:32Z

It was made available to MSDN subscribers yesterday, and will be available to the general public on Wednesday.

So how do you upgrade?

For Visual Studio, if you’re running Beta 1 or Beta 2, uninstall that first. Then install the RC.

For TFS, follow the guidance from Brian and Bryan. They provide details for pretty much any type of upgrade scenario.

VS 2010 testing videos

2010-01-26T17:33:37Z

Wow! I just ran across a link to this, a series of videos on coded UI tests, test management, etc., for Visual Studio 2010. (http://blogs.msdn.com/anutthara/archive/2009/12/21/vs2010-demos-for-testing-tools-mtlm-cuit-and-related-features.aspx)

The series looks at things from these 4 perspectives:

1. Perspective: Visual Studio Test Elements 2010 and Visual Studio Team Lab Management 2010 Key Benefits (single video)

2. Perspective: Visual Studio Test Elements 2010 and Visual Studio Team Lab Management 2010 Key Benefits (individual videos)

3. Perspective: Application Lifecycle Management viewed from lens of QA organization using Visual Studio Test Elements 2010 and Visual Studio Team Lab Management 2010

4. Perspective: Deep Dive with Coded UI Tests (individual videos)

Enjoy!

bliz

Trying to provide feedback about Live Mesh, but. . .

2010-01-22T16:50:00Z

When I click on the Feedback link, check out the screen that appears:

Heh. Guess the Live Mesh folks aren’t all that interested in feedback from everyone.

Tampa 2010 Ultimate Event

2010-01-20T22:13:00Z

[update: Jan 22, 2010] Added link to Oleg’s “No more ‘No Repro’” slides http://www.olegsych.com/presentations/no-more-no-repro/

[update: Jan 21, 2010]

I’ve just uploaded Quent’s keynote slides to my SkyDrive http://cid-f9c5089cab158b62.skydrive.live.com/browse.aspx/Florida%20Ultimate%20Event%20VS%202010.

Ryan has uploaded his agile project management slides to his AgileThought site. Browse to: http://www.agilethought.com/Pages/2010UltimateEvent.aspx

You can find Oleg’s blog post about using T4 and the UML modeling tools to generate code on his blog at http://www.olegsych.com/2010/01/uml-modeling-and-code-generation-in-visual-studio-2010/. And the slides from his “No more ‘No repro’” session are on his web site at http://www.olegsych.com/presentations/no-more-no-repro/

During the event, there was a question about Team Build 2010 and Team Build 2008 definitions. From the MSDN documentation, ~~it appears as though~~ the build definitions will have to be upgraded. See http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd647548(VS.100).aspx, and in particular: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd647553(VS.100).aspx for details. [another update: Take a look at Jim Lamb’s blog post for answers to frequently asked questions about the subject: http://blogs.msdn.com/jimlamb/archive/2009/11/03/upgrading-tfs-2008-build-definitions-to-tfs-2010.aspx]

Here’s a list of the supported operating systems for Visual Studio 2010 (taken from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=DC333AC8-596D-41E3-BA6C-84264E761B81&displaylang=en):

Supported Operating Systems: Windows Server 2003; Windows Server 2008; Windows Vista; Windows XP

Windows XP (x86) with Service Pack 3 - all editions except Starter Edition
Windows XP (x64) with Service Pack 2 - all editions except Starter Edition
Windows Vista (x86 & x64) with Service Pack 1 - all editions except Starter Edition
Windows 7 (x86 and x64)
Windows Server 2003 (x86 & x64) with Service Pack 2
Windows Server 2003 R2 (x86 and x64)
Windows Server 2008 (x86 and x64) with Service Pack 2
Windows Server 2008 R2 (x64)

And here’s a list of the supported operating systems for Team Foundation Server 2010 (taken from the TFS 2010 Readme file (http://download.microsoft.com/download/B/5/3/B5379D88-51D7-4240-9423-CE1427502784/TFS2010Beta2Readme.htm):

Windows Vista (x86 & x64) with Service Pack 2 or later (all editions except Starter Edition)
Windows Server 2003 (x86) with Service Pack 2 or later (all editions)
Windows Server 2003 R2 (x86) or later (all editions)
Windows Server 2008 (x86 & x64) with Service Pack 2 or later
Windows Server 2008 R2 (x64)
Windows 7 (x86 & x64)

[original post follows]

THANK YOU to everyone who attended the Tampa Ultimate Event on Tuesday! I just uploaded my Ultimate lap around VS 2010 session to my SkyDrive. As I receive links to the other decks from Quent, Ryan, and Oleg, I’ll update this blog post with the links.

So here’s the link to my Ultimate folder: http://cid-f9c5089cab158b62.skydrive.live.com/browse.aspx/Florida%20Ultimate%20Event%20VS%202010

Enjoy, and thanks again for attending!

bliz

Setting up Video Recording in Microsoft Test and Lab Manager – Vs 2010 Beta 2

2009-12-30T12:39:11Z

I had to set up a new VHD image earlier this week. When it came time to configure the Video Recording capabilities of Microsoft Test and Lab Manager, the instructions online were OK, but a bit lacking. Here are some easy-to-understand (for me, anyway) instructions for enabling Video Recording inside Microsoft Test Runner 2010 Beta 2.

Note: this assumes you’re using Windows Server 2008 R2 x64 as your operating system.

The steps:

1. Enable the Desktop Experience feature using Server Manager in Windows 2008 R2.

2. Download and install Media Encoder (always use x32 regardless of your OS)

3. Install the Media Encoder hotfix

4. Enable Video Recording in Microsoft Test and Lab Manager

5. Enjoy

The details:

Enable the Desktop Experience feature

1. Open Server Manager and select Features, then click the Add Features link on the right side of the screen.

2. Select the Desktop Experience checkbox, then “Next” your way through the wizard until you’re done.

Download Media Encoder from: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/forpros/encoder/default.mspx

Note: you MUST download and install the 32-bit version of the encoder, even if you have a 64-bit operating system. You MUST use the x32 version of the encoder, even if you have an x64 OS.

Yep, you have to use the 32-bit version, even if your operating system is 64-bit.

Download the hotfix from: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929182

Look in the RESOLUTION section. Download the file and install it. Note: to install the KB hotfix, you MUST use RUN AS administrator, otherwise the installation will fail.

Note: If you don’t use “RUN AS Administrator” the hotfix installation will not install properly, even though the final dialog box says installation was successful. Even if you’re logged in as Administrator or your UserID is a member of Administrators group, you still need to install the software using “RUN AS Administrator.

Instructional links from MSDN.COM:

· How to install the software to record: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd997558(VS.100).aspx

· How to record a video: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd286596(VS.100).aspx

In the “How to record a video” instructions on the MSDN site, the first step tells you to “Select the role to use to record the video” then leaves a lot to the imagination.

1. The real first step should tell you to open Microsoft Test and Lab Manager, and select the Lab Center.

2. Then click on the Test Settings tab, then the Test Settings Manager link below that, and you’ll see the Roles that are defined for your environment, as shown below:

3. Click Open, which opens. . .

4. The Test Settings for the Role. Click on “Data and Diagnostics” then check the Video Recorder checkbox.

5. Configure the Video Recorder as needed then Save.

6. Click Finish, and you’re ready to record.

Exercise – getting a jump on the new year

2009-12-28T18:50:37Z

Over the weekend I finally went for a bike ride: just over 12 miles, averaging only 17 mph. And I thought I was going to die. It was overcast, cold (for here, anyway), and windy.

When I got back home I felt like I’d just finished a marathon. What happened to 43 miles @ 17 mph from this summer? Not much riding lately, that’s what.

So today, on another windy (but sunny and not too cold) day, I decided to go for a brisk 30-minute walk. No special clothes required (other than my running shoes), no painful rump after 30 minutes, easy to see cars and get out of the way if necessary. . .

It was fun.

And I got to see stuff I would have missed on the bike.

When I ride my bike I’m always trying to keep the pace up, even when I’m tired. Which means my head is pointed straight ahead and I’m focused on the road in front of me; no time to look around.

On my walk I

saw a horse that looked like she was trying to give birth (she was too far away and not far enough along to tell for sure);
said Hello to the garbage men;
discovered the “executive home site” down the road is actually 336 feet across, not 334 as described on the sign; (the property is over 600 feet deep according to the sign – imagine, they could build a few soccer fields, or tons of tennis courts there);
heard a gate alarm whining away to nobody (except me), complaining that it couldn’t close.

On my bike I wouldn’t have seen, said, discovered, or heard any of that.

OK. Back to prepping demos.

VHDTool – special sauce for VHD disks

2009-12-28T16:27:32Z

Dear Reader, have you ever wished you could resize – grow – a fixed-sized VHD disk?

Earlier today I sure did. A couple of months ago I created a smallish fixed-size VHD file that I boot native into, to use as the “host” for running Hyper-V images. That’s all I used it for. Just to boot into it, then launch a Hyper-V image.

Worked great.

But, recently I thought, For my demos, wouldn’t it be great to run VS 2010 beta2 with SharePoint 2010 Beta in the boot native VHD host, and connect to the TFS server in the Hyper-V image?

Which meant installing Office 2007, VS 2010 beta 2, SharePoint 2010 Beta, etc, into my little bitty fixed VHD disk. It all installed, but there wasn’t room for anything else. Let’s say the VHD was busting at the seams.

Fixed size VHD = super fast. But, Fixed means FIXED, right? Can’t grow it.

Not necessarily. Ben Armstrong and his VHD team to the rescue. They’ve created a sweet utility called VHDTool that will allow you to manipulate a VHD file. One of the things it does is it allows you to expand a fixed-size VHD disk.

Insanely perfect!!!

I made a backup of the VHD, downloaded the utility, ran it with fingers crossed, and gave my VHD an extra 10GB. It finished within seconds. Lightning fast!

And it worked as advertised. Sweetness!

What else can it do? Create, convert, extend, and repair. Neat-o.

Check out Ben’s blog post about it: http://blogs.msdn.com/virtual_pc_guy/archive/2009/03/25/quick-fixed-vhd-creation-tool.aspx

Test Impact View in VS 2010 Beta 2

2009-11-25T12:12:00Z

There are a lot of blog postings around that tell you how to set up Test Impact View for VS 2010. Unfortunately, most of them are out of date, explaining how to do it using the CTP bits from last year, or the Beta 1 bits from earlier this year.

Here’s how to do it in Beta 2, using a simple example:

1. Create a C# console application with a public function int Foo()

2. Create a test project & unit test the method Foo()

3. Enable Test Impact in test settings (double-click the Local.testsettings file under the Solution Items folder in your solution to bring up the settings UI > Data and Diagnostics > Check the Test Impact checkbox)

4. Build the solution locally (not a TFS build)

5. In the editor, right click on the name of the method being tested (in our case, Foo()) > Show Calling Tests > TIV says nothing tests that method

6. Run the unit test by hand from the Test View , and the test has to PASS one time <— this is crucial. Until the test passes that one time, it won’t show up in TIV

7. Now you can right-click on the method being tested > Show Calling Tests > TIV displays the unit test in its list

8. Make a change in the console app method Foo()

9. Build local

10. TIV correctly indicates that the test is impacted

That’s it. Make sure you do step #6. The unit test has to complete with a “Pass” one time to establish the internal “wiring,” and you’re golden from then on. The test won’t show up in TIV until after the first time it passes.

Enjoy.

-bliz