Recent VS2010 “Visualization and Architecture” Webcast

  • Article

I just recently presented a web cast that went quite well. Unfortunately, the resultant recording of that webcast has suffered from some quality issues. I’ll give you the various links to the webcast, but be forewarned, the audio link is probably your best best. Here are the links, which includes a link to the power point presentation that I presented:

Now I would like to address a few of the questions that were asked via the Live Meeting Q&A mechanism that. If you posted a question that you don’t see answered here, it was due to the fact that I didn’t understand what was being asked or it was one of the questions I answered verbally. If that is the case, please follow up with me directly.

Here are the questions / answers:

Q:Is the RC available for a trial download?

A: Absolutely, please follow this link.

Q: Can you provide a link to the Pet Shop solution you used?

A: Here ya go. Download the solution directly from here. There is an MSDN article that describes the solution more deeply here that I would recommend reading.

Q: What Version of Visual Studio 2010 has this architecture features?

A: Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate is where you can use these features to author new diagrams of all the types that you see here ( UML diagrams, Layer diagram, DGML documents ). However, you can view those diagrams in VS2010 Premium. It’s actually better than a read-only experience as you can change layout and change colors of elements etc., and save those changes. You just can’t add new modeling data or nodes.

Q: Is code generation supported?

A: Not in the RTM bits, but we will be releasing a PowerTool release shortly after launch that will enable that capability, plus a whole lot more. I will have a future post outlining more of the details here shortly.

Q: can you graph stored procedures or database objects?

A: I assume you mean in an ER-like notation? The simple answer is “No”. You could use UML and Profiles to represent database schema and procs, but most folks I know don’t like to do so. ;) So I’d point you back the database diagramming features that have been in VS for a long time now, as well as at the EDM designers if you are interested in generating an ORM above your database.

Q: Is there any way to integrate these layer-diagram analyziations with MS Build?

A: The layer validation capability is completely exposed through custom MSBuild tasks, so yes, this is completely doable. Please look at the Microsoft.VisualStudio.TeamArchitect.LayerDesigner.targets file located in %programfiles%\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v10.0\ArchitectureTools

Q: Are the new features described in "Understand the Code" available for native codes?

A: Not yet. That PowerTool I mentioned above will have the beginnings of the support, but we have more work to do on this front. Stay tuned! :)

Q: Is there a way to do layer validation at checkin time?

A: We aren’t shipping a checkin policy that does this, but this is absolutely doable given the fact that the analyzation process is exposed via custom MSBuild tasks. See above.

Q: What deployment requirements are required on the build server to add architecture validation?

A: Nothing. All the required bits are already there if you install the VS2010 version of Team Build.

Q: Is there any link from the UML diagrams to the actual classes in code?

A: Not at RTM, but again, this is something that will also be part of the PowerTool I mentioned above. Boy, I clearly need to get a post on the PowerTool done! :)

Q: Are there an Visual Studio 2010 SDK? How can i know all the points of extension has VS 2010?

A: Absolutely. See this post for more details. In addition, check out this MSDN topic for a comprehensive list of all the supported extensibility points for the new visualization and architecture tools in 2010.

Q: What version of the frameworks does the code understanding features support? 1.1?

A: Yes. If it is a managed assembly, we can visualize it.

Cheers!

Cameron