Visual Studio 2008 - Early Release

[moosedude]

Get it here if you have a MSDN subscription, or a trial version if you don't;

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/default.aspx

It introduces the .NET 3.5 framework which now has integrated AJAX support (about time!)

I have to say I'm not terribly keen on this new release, I don't really care too much about what new features the GUI has but I'm a little worried this release is more about providing a new feature set than improvements to the existing features.

I mostly worried about the .NET framework, having used it for time I'm seeing lots of holes in it with regard to developing websites using object oriented methods, it doesn't strike me as entirely complete and it would be a pity if some thought for the new version hasn't gone into this.

anyway, tell me your thoughts regarding this new release!

[Partz]

I downloaded the beta a while back. We've been using studio 2003 here in the office and for reasons of cost are restricted to using 1.1 of the .NET framework throughout the current project.

I know that serial comms support has been in since .NET 2 but has it been a drag and drop control for all this time? (still using a cobbled together win32 interface here).

[PaulCunningham]

I mostly worried about the .NET framework, having used it for time I'm seeing lots of holes in it with regard to developing websites using object oriented methods, it doesn't strike me as entirely complete and it would be a pity if some thought for the new version hasn't gone into this.

I've recently downloaded the Express versions while our TFS guy gets his act together and will have a good look in the coming weeks.

What do you think its missing then?

[Absolute_Zero]

I've been on Orcas beta 2 since it became available so I can barely remember what it is that I like over VS2005... apart from not having Vista's UAC in my face on launch.

Installed last Fri, I use it mainly for C++ and it *seems* rock-solid so far.

[moosedude]

I mostly worried about the .NET framework, having used it for time I'm seeing lots of holes in it with regard to developing websites using object oriented methods, it doesn't strike me as entirely complete and it would be a pity if some thought for the new version hasn't gone into this.

I've recently downloaded the Express versions while our TFS guy gets his act together and will have a good look in the coming weeks.

What do you think its missing then?

oh, forgot to reply to this!

my main gripe is that I don't think you can fully apply the object oriented methods provided fully when developing a website. There are holes in developing user controls which aren't too friendly, dynamically create one for example uses a particular nasty LoadControl() function. I'm also at a lost how I could use a user control with a class constructor that has parameters passed into it.

The split between seperating the form design, and the code into different files can also grind a little because the links are not very concrete at times.

My main want really is code re-use, I'd love to be able to inherit from pages I've already written in the form given above (seperate files) and add stuff to them. The only way I can do that at the moment is too use a user control and that isn't ideal. Maybe I'm missing a trick here though, perhaps it all exists but my left brain hasn't engaged yet into this new way of thinking.

I would love a more fierce emphasis on polymorphism and inheritance when writing .NET coding, its just not there and everything sort of loosely fits together rather than being of a strong object orientated nature.

I thinks theres alot of potential thats being wasted at the moment in the language that I would love to see improved in later versions.

[AndyH]

You could always try master pages which can help a bit, but I know what you mean. I've not tried this version yet, still on 2005 but I've been using SharePoint Designer 2007 a fair bit recently out of necessity (basically it's the next iteration of horrid front page) which has the new render engine in the editor that allows the nice Dreamweaver like split editor/WYSIWYG view and it renders things much better. Masterpages for one look like they are supposed to!

[PaulCunningham]

my main gripe is that I don't think you can fully apply the object oriented methods provided fully when developing a website. There are holes in developing user controls which aren't too friendly, dynamically create one for example uses a particular nasty LoadControl() function. I'm also at a lost how I could use a user control with a class constructor that has parameters passed into it.

Yeah, UserControls are a bit of a hack / pain. There more like glorified include files. You could always do CustomControls but obviously they're a bit more work but either way you'll need a default constructor as the framework requires one (unless you want to create them all dynamically that is )

The split between seperating the form design, and the code into different files can also grind a little because the links are not very concrete at times.

Not really sure what you mean here.

My main want really is code re-use, I'd love to be able to inherit from pages I've already written in the form given above (seperate files) and add stuff to them. The only way I can do that at the moment is too use a user control and that isn't ideal. Maybe I'm missing a trick here though, perhaps it all exists but my left brain hasn't engaged yet into this new way of thinking.

Yeah, you're missing a trick

You can have MyBasePage inheriting from System.Web.UI.Page and then derive your other pages from MyBasePage - the designer won't do it for you but you can simply change the declaration at the top of the page manually.

Partial classes allow you to specify code in different files for the same class too.

And as mentioned above MasterPages will give you a nice common UI.

I would love a more fierce emphasis on polymorphism and inheritance when writing .NET coding, its just not there and everything sort of loosely fits together rather than being of a strong object orientated nature.

I'm not really a fan of the AutoEventWireUp junk they added - I'd much prefer overriding On.... events to be the mandatory way of doing that stuff. But even then someone could attach their own delegates to events to fire up some other arbitrary method to handle Load or Init or whatever.

I'm looking forward to the Linq stuff - not so sure about the MVC framework.

[moosedude]

Thanks for the reply Paul

...

The split between seperating the form design, and the code into different files can also grind a little because the links are not very concrete at times.

Not really sure what you mean here.

I was refering to how you can create two files for a webpage. for example the pages, myPage.aspx and myPage.aspx.cs. the former being for the web form design, whilst the latter for functional code.

my problem is that the link between these two files is rather fragile, in the myPage.aspx file you can specify a "codefile=" parameter which links the two files. sometimes when you copy files to create new pages, updating this link can be forgotten, but the new webpage will usually still work.

I would love a more fierce emphasis on polymorphism and inheritance when writing .NET coding, its just not there and everything sort of loosely fits together rather than being of a strong object orientated nature.

I'm not really a fan of the AutoEventWireUp junk they added - I'd much prefer overriding On.... events to be the mandatory way of doing that stuff. But even then someone could attach their own delegates to events to fire up some other arbitrary method to handle Load or Init or whatever.

Yes, me too. the events system just appear to be in a mess, even more so when you have events inside userControls to deal with. and it gets worse when you start too dynmically creating controls. (I understand why it is how it is, but I don't like it!)

I've encounted an unusual situtation were the only way I can get a website functioning correctly is too call the same "render" function twice, both in the Page_Load event and in the OnButtonClick event. The annoying thing is that onPostBack, dynamic buttonClicks won't work unless in the Page_Load event they are recreated.

I'm looking forward to the Linq stuff - not so sure about the MVC framework.

Hmm, not heard of Linq; is this it?

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-gb/netfra ... 04594.aspx

although that appears to be written in the language of microsoftese