Ponder.NET

Time reporting with TFS

Dave McKinstry (Microsoft) — Tue, 03 Jun 2014 13:09:55 GMT

One area that some people dislike about TFS is also an area that others vehemently defend – that of “time tracking.” TFS is optimized for agile projects and can easily manage and track point-in-estimates, remaining work and completed work on individual tasks. This is more that sufficient for standard agile project management techniques and reports nicely on burndowns and other standard agile reports. However some organizations require more…

If your team needs to use a standard timesheet model for tracking hours but doesn’t want to double enter data between your corporate systems and TFS, then Microsoft partner Imaginet may have the solution. Recently, Imaginet released the latest version of Imaginet Timesheet (formally Notion Timesheet), which integrates a formal time tracking system with TFS work items. In addition to supporting the latest TFS version, they’ve also added support for Visual Studio Online, improved reporting dashboards, and a free community edition for up to 5 users.

Interested? You can check out their documentation and download a version from: http://www.imaginet.com/imaginettimesheet

Not going to //BUILD? There are other options…

Dave McKinstry (Microsoft) — Mon, 31 Mar 2014 11:15:07 GMT

Microsoft’s primary forward looking developer conference (//BUILD/) is happening this week. Unfortunately, as usual, //BUILD/ is sold out. Fortunately, as usual, Channel 9 will be broadcasting the keynotes live and sessions (after a 24-48 hour delay)!

This is a great use for that second monitor and a headset, so you can at least partially tune in while still working on your daily activities.

However there is an additional opportunity for Denver audiences. If you want an excuse to head to Park Meadows and the Microsoft store, I will be there and the store will be streaming the keynotes on both Wednesday and Thursday:

WHEN:
- Wednesday, April 2 @ 9:30 AM
- Thursday, April 3 @ 9:30 AM

WHERE:
http://content.microsoftstore.com/en-us/detail/parkmeadowsmall
Park Meadows Mall
8505 Park Meadows Center Dr
Suite 2095
Lone Tree, CO 80124

DENVER: Are you Agile? Do you Scrum?

Dave McKinstry (Microsoft) — Fri, 21 Mar 2014 16:29:50 GMT

Scrum is the #1 framework chosen by Agile software development teams. Visual Studio is a leader in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) tools. The combination purge goodness (and so is the potential value for you and your development teams)!

The Microsoft Denver office will be hosting Professional Scrum Trainers Richard Hundhausen & Charles Bradley on Friday, April 11th for a free all-day session explaining what Scrum is and how it can work for your team. This session targets not only developers and testers, but all of the participants in your software development (including executives, manager, and business-decision makers).

Richard and Charles know the ins and outs of real-life development with Scrum and agile. Whether you are just investigating Scrum or you are a seasoned professional, this session will help you move to the next level. Be sure to ask us your hard questions as they show you ways to deliver business value in the form of working software while reducing risk and waste.

Agenda

Why Scrum works
Scrum in a nutshell
Getting started with Scrum
How Visual Studio supports Scrum
Setting up a Scrum team project
Planning and managing work in Visual Studio

Logistics

Registration is free, but space is limited.
When:
Friday, April 11th 2014
Where:
Microsoft Denver
7595 Technology Way
Suite 400
Denver, CO 80237
Lunch:
Complimentary and provided for free, but you must register!

Feel free to contact Richard or myself if you have any questions. I hope to see you there!

Las Vegas developers… mark your calendar!

Dave McKinstry (Microsoft) — Mon, 27 Jan 2014 13:20:41 GMT

If you’re a developer in the Las Vegas area and you’re interested in the latest development tools and technologies from Microsoft, we’re coming for you! Myself and other Microsoft technologists are going to be at the InNEVation Center on Tuesday, February 18th. This free half-day event (Modern Web and App Development with Visual Studio 2013) will demonstrate the latest productivity tools around modern web and team development.

If you’re a professional developer, you can bet that this half day investment will be worth your time!

For additional information, refer to the registration page. We hope to see you there!!!

2014 Development Events for the US Desert Mountain Region

Dave McKinstry (Microsoft) — Wed, 08 Jan 2014 10:24:26 GMT

I hope everyone had a great holiday season. This year is starting off fast with a variety of great events focused on Visual Studio, ALM and related development technologies. If you’re interested in learning what’s new, try one of these Microsoft or partner-focused events out. They are all free and some are available as online events (i.e., no need to leave your desk).

In-Person Events

Event Name	Date	Location	Registration
Modern Application Development Leveraging the Cloud with Visual Studio 2013 hosted by .NET Rocks! and Xamarin	January 13	Phoenix, AZ	Register
Modern Application Development Leveraging the Cloud with Visual Studio 2013 hosted by .NET Rocks! and Xamarin	January 21	Denver, CO	Register
Executive Round Table Enterprise Quality Series hosted by Northwest Cadence	January 28	Denver, CO	Register
Executive Round Table Enterprise Quality Series hosted by Northwest Cadence	January 29	Salt Lake City, UT	Register

Online Events

Event Name	Date	Presenter	Registration
The Longest Yard – Getting across the goal line when releasing to production	January 7	Imaginet	Register
How To Organize and Add Process to your Software Development Projects	January 9	Imaginet	Register
Unleash the Power of TFS Build	January 14	Crosslake	Register
How To Manage Your Test Labs Without The Headaches	January 16	Imaginet	Register
Build.Deploy.Test. Speed Up using Lab Management in TFS	January 21	Crosslake	Register
TFS – More Than Just Source Control	January 28	Crosslake	Register
Save Time & Money by Improving Your Software Deployments with Microsoft Release Management	January 30	Imaginet	Register
GIT it done with TFS	February 4	Webcast	Register
How To Organize and Add Process to your Software Development Projects	February 6	Imaginet	Register
How to Get Control Over Your Portfolio of Projects with Agile and TFS	February 13	Imaginet	Register
Save Time & Money by Improving Your Software Deployments with Microsoft Release Management	February 20	Imaginet	Register
Deliver Higher Quality Software with Automated Coded UI Testing	February 27	Imaginet	Register
How To Organize and Add Process to your Software Development Projects	March 6	Imaginet	Register
How To Manage Your Test Labs Without The Headaches	March 13	Imaginet	Register
Deliver Higher Quality Software with Automated Coded UI Testing	March 27	Imaginet	Register
Training: Available Upon Request by Northwest Cadence - Building Applications with Visual Studio 2012 - Agile Foundations - Enterprise Agility is not an Oxymoron	On Request	Northwest Cadence	Contact Rick Flath

More Visual Studio 2013 Launch events and ALM Webcasts

Dave McKinstry (Microsoft) — Thu, 07 Nov 2013 07:26:02 GMT

In addition to the Visual Studio Launch Events I wrote about in my previous blog entry, I wanted to pass on the rest of the launch information for the rest of the US. Here is an announcement from one of our developer tools solutions specialists (Laura Smith) handily crafted with upcoming launch events across the nation and also some of our partner webcasts through the end of the year:

Visual Studio 2013 Launch

Join the festivities on November 13th as we launch Visual Studio 2013. Anyone can participate from virtually any location. Simply log into the portal with a workstation or mobile device and watch the keynote speech live or at a time that’s more convenient for you. You can also hear how customers are already using Visual Studio and get detailed insight into using the product’s features and services by watching technical sessions conducted by the Microsoft development team. And for the first time you can view the launch in multiple languages. The virtual launch will start at 10:00 a.m. Eastern Standard Time on Wednesday November 13^th. Click Here for Virtual Launch and Local Launch Events Worldwide

The virtual launch will be followed by local events where we discuss:

What’s new in Visual Studio 2013 and Team Foundation Server 2013
Discuss Real-World Business Scenarios
Characteristics and Benefits of Modern Apps
Consider Business and Technical Insights

DATE	LOCATION	TIME	LINK
November 13, 2013	Webcast	7:00 AM PST/10:00 AM EST	Click Here
November 14, 2013	Boston, MA	9:30 AM – 4:00 PM	Click Here
November 18, 2013	Durham, NC	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8582501493
November 19, 2013	Alpharetta, GA	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8582820447
November 20, 2013	Oakbrook, IL	9:00 AM – 4:00 PM	1032569677
November 21, 2013	Orlando, FL	11:00 AM – 6:00 PM	8589833423
December 9, 2013	Chicago, IL	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8590128305
December 10, 2013	Denver, CO	9:00 AM – 12:00 PM	1032569314
December 10, 2013	Columbus, OH	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8590186479
December 11, 2013	Concord, CA	9:30 AM – 4:00 PM	1032569320
December 11, 2013	Creve Coeur, MO	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8590312857
December 12, 2013	Sandy, UT	9:00 AM – 12:00 PM	1032569315
December 12, 2013	Irving, TX	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8590379055
December 13, 2013	Austin, TX	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8590421181
December 16, 2013	Houston, TX	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8590519475
January 13, 2014	Tempe, AZ	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8590557589
January 14, 2014	San Diego, CA	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8590635823
January 15, 2014	Irvine, CA	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8590728099
January 16, 2014	Los Angeles, CA	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8590996903
January 20, 2014	San Francisco, CA	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8591161395
January 21, 2014	Mountain View, CA	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8591229599
January 27, 2014	Denver, CO	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8595721033
January 28, 2014	Boise, ID	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8594772195
January 29, 2014	Portland, OR	12:00 PM – 5:00 PM	8594960759

To register online, visit: www.msevents.microsoft.com . To register by phone, call: 1.877.MSEVENT (1.877.673.8368).

WEBCASTS

What's new for ALM with VS2013: Productivity and Collaboration - InCycle

Visual Studio 2013 incorporates a wave of new ALM features that will help your teams be more productive and collaborate with improved support for agile development practices that you can adopt incrementally to suit the needs of your organization. Features such as agile portfolio management, team rooms, Work Item Charting, Git integration, InRelease stand-alone, web-based code comments on change sets/commits and web-based test case management improvements are part of an integrated solution to help your team collaborate better and increase productivity.

DATE	TIME	CODE
November 20, 2013	12:00 PM – 1:00 PM PST	Click Here

Unleash the Power of TFS Build - InCycle

Automated builds are the lifeline of a development team, and is the first indicator of product health. Without a successful build, you have nothing. In today's Agile world, the most effective development teams constantly maintain high quality and are ready to ship at frequent intervals. The build is a key to that nirvana. No build == no working software == no testing == no customer feedback == badness all around In this webinar, we illustrate the power of using TFS as a build system and provide arguments for why teams should use it.

DATE	TIME	CODE
November 25, 2013	1:00 PM – 2:00 PM PST	Click Here

Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) in the Cloud – InCycle

How to take advantage of the Cloud to accelerate delivery and improve application lifecycle management? This session will give you an overview of scenarios where development teams can leverage the cloud Azure to develop, deploy and test their applications.

DATE	TIME	CODE
December 4, 2013	12:00 PM – 1:00 PM PST	Click Here

How to Get Control Over Your Portfolio of Projects with Agile and TFS - Imaginet

Scrum and agile management methodologies focus on iterative planning, development and release. This session will demonstrate how agile planning, management, and tracking are streamlined with Visual Studio 2013.

DATE	TIME	CODE
November 7, 2013	10:00 AM – 11:00 AM PST	Click Here

Make Your Development Team Successful Leveraging the Latest Features in Visual Studio 2013 - Imaginet

With the next 2013 release of Visual Studio and related tools, some features rise to the top as new stars. Some of these new features include: Agile Portfolio Management, Cloud Load Testing, Team Room Collaboration, New Code/Test Indicators, New Memory Diagnostics, Enhanced Web Based Test Case Management, Git Integration with TFS, In-Flight Release Management, etc.

DATE	TIME	CODE
November 14, 2013	10:00 AM – 11:00 AM PST	Click Here

How To Increase and Improve Developer Productivity with Visual Studio & TFS 2013 - Imaginet

The next version of Visual Studio is rich with new tools that enhance standard developer activities. In this session, we will review and demonstrate some of the new features, such as lightweight code commenting, the new heads-up display, Team Room collaboration, memory diagnostics, improved Team Explorer usability, new code/test indicators, Git integration, etc.

DATE	TIME	CODE
November 21, 2013	10:00 AM – 11:00 AM PST	Click Here
November 14, 2013	10:00 AM – 11:00 AM PST	Click Here

How To Organize Add Process To Your Software Development Projects with KANBAN - Imaginet

Kanban was originally created as a scheduling system to help manufacturing organizations determine what to produce, when to produce it, and how much to produce. Although this may not sound like software development, these lean principles can be successfully applied to development teams to improve the delivery of value through better visibility and limits on work in process.

DATE	TIME	CODE
December 5, 2013	10:00 AM – 11:00 AM PST	Click Here
December 19, 2013	10:00 AM – 11:00 AM PST	Click Here

Quality as a Team Sport – Northwest Cadence

Manual and ad hoc testing is a first-class, role-tailored experience in Microsoft Test Manager, but quality can’t stop—or start!—there. With the connectivity and traceability provided throughout Visual Studio 2013, the entire team can take charge of quality starting on day zero.

DATE	TIME	CODE
November 7, 2013	10:30 AM – 11:30 AM PST	Click Here

Advanced Quality in the Enterprise - Northwest Cadence

When your application’s critical, rise to the challenge with enterprise-scale tools for continuous quality enablement: web performance and load testing on premise or in the cloud; IntelliTrace diagnostics in all environments, even production; and advanced build-deploy-test workflows.

DATE	TIME	CODE
November 21, 2013	10:30 AM – 11:30 AM PST	Click Here

Azure Dev Test – Northwest Cadence

DevTest with Azure offers more than simply moving infrastructure to the cloud. Imagine enabling developers to quickly and safely deploy their latest changes, run a heavy-duty suite of automated tests, and grant access to QA for manual verification, with just a click. Creating a DevTest sandbox on Azure takes literally just minutes. Drive a configuration-as-code strategy, automate infrastructure, and most importantly, start turning around lightning-fast feedback between developers, testers, and operations to make your code production-ready faster (and better) than ever before.

DATE	TIME	CODE
December 3, 2013	9:00 AM – 10:00 AM PST	Click Here

Performance and Load Testing – Northwest Cadence

Performance and load testing are critical components of building high quality and scalable software. Visual Studio Ultimate provides scalable out-of-the-box tools to load test, from large systems with thousands of users, to small applications with a few dozen. Whatever your needs, the Visual Studio Ultimate tools can deliver the performance testing that you require.

This session will give you an introduction to on premise and cloud-based load testing, web performance testing, utilizing test rigs, tips and tricks for effective testing, and examples from real customer experiences load testing their applications.

DATE	TIME	CODE
December 12, 2013	9:00 AM – 10:00 AM PST	Click Here

Test Plans That Reduce Risk

Mark Mydland, Director of QA, Application Insights at Microsoft presents how you can:

Develop test plans that focus the development effort and reduce risk
Find regressions with fewer, more reliable tests
Reduce mean time to detect regressions using defense in depth
Find high-quality bugs using streamlined exploratory testing

DATE	TIME	LINK
On Demand	One Hour	Click Here

Game On!

Have a great idea for a game? Bring it to life at Game On! Join us for this FREE, hands-on event and learn how to build a Windows 8.1 game in record time. Whether you're a student, first-time developer or seasoned pro, we will provide the essentials for you to get started with creating an app with one of three gaming engines. You'll hear from expert developers who will cover different game frameworks and explain how to add graphics, levels and sound to games, while sharing other cool ways to make the game your own and ensure your game is available to millions.

DATE	TIME	LOCATION	LINK
November 12, 2013	9:00 AM – 4:30 PM	Irvine, CA	1032563265
November 13, 2013	9:00 AM – 4:30 PM	Los Angeles, CA	1032563295
December 3, 2013	9:00 AM – 4:30 PM	San Diego, CA	1032563296
December 4, 2013	9:00 AM – 4:30 PM	San Francisco, CA	1032563300
December 5, 2013	9:00 AM – 4:30 PM	Mountain View, CA	1032563299
December 5, 2013	9:00 AM – 4:30 PM	Portland, OR	1032563422
December 11, 2013	9:00 AM – 4:30 PM	Redmond, WA	1032563298
December 12, 2013	9:00 AM – 4:30 PM	Denver, CO	1032563301

Visual Studio 2013 Launch Events: Denver and Salt Lake City

Dave McKinstry (Microsoft) — Tue, 29 Oct 2013 13:56:50 GMT

Like many areas in the country, we’re going to hold regional Visual Studio 2013 launch events for our Desert Mountains customers. In specific we’re coming to…

Tuesday Dec. 10^th 2013

Microsoft Denver
7595 Technology Way
Suite 400
Denver, CO 80237

Thursday Dec. 12^th 2013

Megaplex Theatres
9400 South State St.
Sandy, UT 84070

Agenda:
8:30am Welcome
9:00am Keynote
9:45am Developing Web Apps
10:45pm Break
11:00pm What’s New in ALM
12:30pm Wrap-up

Both are half-day (morning) events and both have limited space.

If you’re interested, feel free to use the appropriate link above to register. If you have any questions, send me an email or ping me on the blog. Hope to see you there!

Windows Azure Learning Opportunities

Dave McKinstry (Microsoft) — Mon, 23 Sep 2013 10:10:11 GMT

In the past when asked about Windows Azure and the cloud in general, I would reply that it was a great technology and something that would be important in the future, but that it wasn’t mainstream yet. But that has changed. The future is NOW! According to Gartner, 80% of organizations plan to use the cloud within the next 12 months!

Are you up to speed on the cloud? Do you know how to leverage these new technologies? I’m going to do a few blog posts describing some techniques to use Windows Azure for dev/test environments. But if you’re interested in getting a head start, one of my Canadian counterparts (Adam Gallant) has posted a great “Using the Cloud for Dev/Test” video on Channel 9.

Beyond the dev/test focused videos and blogs, Microsoft and our partners are hosting some great IT Focused live events for the US Desert/Mountain Region. Although developers are definitely welcome, the focus for these events is generally the infrastructure and operations teams. Feel free to pass the following along or show up yourself if you’re so inclined…

Location	Event City	Event Name	Event Date	Reg Link
Arizona	Tempe	IT Camp: Windows Azure	10/10/2013	Register
Arizona	Phoenix	En Pointe Tech Summit and Golf Event	10/16/2013	Register
Arizona	Phoenix	Microsoft Technology Roadmap Event	11/5/2013	Register
Colorado	Denver	Azure IT Camps	10/9/2013	Register
Colorado	Denver	Microsoft Technology Roadmap Event	10/15/2013	Register
Colorado	Denver	IT Camp: Windows Azure	10/9/2013	Register
Nevada	Las Vegas	Your Organization + Office 365: A Powerful Combination	10/24/2013	Register

LightSwitch and the Enterprise

Dave McKinstry (Microsoft) — Tue, 09 Jul 2013 12:39:21 GMT

Recently, one of our customers asked some interesting questions regarding the use of LightSwitch (Microsoft’s modern Visual Studio-based RAD environment) within an enterprise environment. The fundamental question was how well LightSwitch applications fit within their model for enterprise applications. This post shares some of the ponderings that ensued…

DISCLAIMER: I do not work for the LightSwitch team at Microsoft and have limited knowledge of the internals of the tool or its roadmap. Please refer to resources at the bottom of this post for more LightSwitch resources.

What is LightSwitch?

History: Our customer had a Rapid Application Development (RAD) team as part of their organization; this team handles some of the custom development that didn’t make the cut for the enterprise development teams. These applications typically are important to a small audience or for a short time and don’t merit the investment that a full-blown enterprise application may require. Their RAD team currently uses Microsoft Access and SharePoint for basic CRUD, reporting and workflow applications and they were looking for a more modern alternative.

To answer the request, we demonstrated Visual Studio LightSwitch to members from both their RAD and enterprise development teams. LightSwitch is Microsoft’s modern RAD development tool. It is housed in Visual Studio and uses good design patterns on top of the Microsoft .NET platform. It is frequently viewed as the heir-apparent for shops using Microsoft Access as it provides more modern development, deployment and integration options but still supports a RAD approach.

Corporate UI Standards

Overall, LightSwitch demonstrated well with our client and built the interest that we’d expected. Why wouldn’t it? LightSwitch is a good fit for RAD teams. But their enterprise developers asked some interesting questions, including: “We use Bootstrap for our web development and user interface standards; can LightSwitch use Bootstrap?”

LightSwitch 2012 Update 2 can deploy Silverlight (client or browser-based) and HTML 5-based clients (including SharePoint and mobile devices). As a result, it seems possible that you could employ Bootstrap with LightSwitch but honestly I didn’t have a real answer. Instead, my teammate David Jung asked some of our internal experts and came up with this answer:

“The LightSwitch HTML Client controls are based on jQueryMobile. You can add bootstrap controls to a screen using Custom Controls and then create screen templates which are based on that. While this is technically possible it degrades the screen design experience and I am not sure whether I would recommend doing so. There might also be some conflicts arising between jQM and bootstrap. It seems like a lot of work and I wonder what the real underlying goal is. Would it be sufficient to restyle the jQM controls to look like bootstrap?”

Because the LightSwitch HTML client is based on jQueryMobile and not Bootstrap, it may be possible to achieve the desired use of Bootstrap, but doing so would greatly hinder LightSwitch RAD productivity. Instead, consider using the technologies inherent in LightSwitch (e.g., custom Themes and Shells using HTML/jQM/CSS or XAML) to achieve the look and feel of the corporate standards without trying to force-fit a different technology.

Integrating with Enterprise Services

I believe the bigger question from their enterprise developers involved how to integrate these streamlined RAD applications with the overall enterprise infrastructure. For the customer in question, this meant working with an Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) and utilizing a Contract-Driven methodology.

Out-of-the-box, LightSwitch can easily work with a variety of back-end technologies, including databases, SharePoint lists, OData Services and WCF RIA Services.

When you add one of these data sources to your project, LightSwitch automatically generates all the CRUD code to allow you to easily interact with that data source. The resulting code is automatically exposed as a backend OData services that your client applications can use. Using simple wizard-based mechanisms, LightSwitch can easily add a variety of screen types (e.g., Details, Search, List, Grid, custom) to the back end data sources.

So how does this fit into your enterprise? The answer is, it depends on your enterprise and your own standards. The customer in question asked how LightSwitch could leverage their Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) infrastructure. And although that isn’t enough information to actually answer the question, we can make some general assertions…

Generally, ESBs provide and consume a variety of endpoints with different serializations. If your ESB and standards support OData and/or WCF RIA Services, the integration can be very easy and is directly supported by LightSwitch. If you’re using a different technology such as XML/SOAP Web Services, the process can be more difficult.

Since the internals of LightSwitch use .NET (and in some cases JavaScript), you have a wide-open extensibility model. You can programmatically hook-in other services by simply writing a little code. Beth Massi has a nice post on how to call an XML web service from your .NET code from within LightSwitch. But the point to recognize is that this approach allows you to call out to other services, kick off workflows, and otherwise talk to other endpoints… But it doesn’t give you the full LightSwitch experience. That is, you can talk to other services but unless it is a supported LightSwitch data source, you can’t use the slick pre-built screens to quickly develop applications. You may be able to create a data source extension to handle your endpoint in a more graceful manner.

If you have existing service endpoints that aren’t compliant with the built-in LightSwitch formats and you need screen-level data integration, you may consider wrapping those services in something that LightSwitch can understand. This may allow the full LightSwitch experience but does require adding an extra layer.

One final question from this customer regarded their enterprise developers using Contract-Driven Design and whether LightSwitch can play nicely in that world. Again, that is a big question as “Contract-Driven Development” or design can represent a large somewhat ambiguous set of activities. If the question is whether LightSwitch can consume services authored using a Contract-Driven approach, the answer is “of course” (but pursuant to the limitations discussed above). If it is a question of whether LightSwitch is a Contract-Driven design/development tool, the answer is no. It is a RAD tool and the approaches are different. Since the LightSwitch server components are using .NET, you could add Contract notations to your code using tools such as Microsoft Research’s Code Contracts for .NET, but again, this is really trying to mix two vastly different approaches and you’re likely to cause more pain rather than solve more problems.

Conclusion

Although all enterprises are different and the questions asked above may not directly pertain to your organization, hopefully you see a pattern. LightSwitch is a powerful, flexible RAD platform making it easy to develop general CRUD line-of-business applications that can integrate with the rest of your enterprise technologies. That said, LightSwitch is not an enterprise development tool and is not suitable as a foundational technology in most enterprises. Continue to write your enterprise applications in .NET but feel free to use LightSwitch to integrate with your enterprise.

Resources

The following external links were explicitly referenced in this post or provide additional supporting information:

Any Plans for June?

Dave McKinstry (Microsoft) — Thu, 23 May 2013 13:46:00 GMT

It’s a time of year that many people are looking forward to Summer vacations. But as you sit in your office looking for other valuable distractions, consider joining Microsoft and our partners for some upcoming events…

Windows 8 App Factor (Tempe, AZ and other locations)
Tech Ed North America (New Orleans, LA)
BUILD 2013 (Sold out, but…)

Online Events in May and June

The following webcasts are offered by various Microsoft partners to help you understand various development and ALM tools and best practices. Click on the link on the dates to get more information, exact times, and to sign-up:

Quality Coding: What’s New with Visual Studio 2012 by Imaginet (May 23rd)
Best Practices for Coded UI Tests in Visual Studio 2012 by Neudesic (May 29th)
Client Side Test Driven Design tools like Qunit and Jasmine and Integrating them with ALM by Agile Thought (May 30th)
Top Business Benefits of Application Lifecycle Management by Imaginet (June 3rd)
Quality Enablement – Leverage Visual Studio to test on Cloud by InCycle (June 4th or June 18th)
Elevating Windows Azure Deployments by Neudesic (June 5th or June 19th)
Managing Test Labs Without the Headaches by Imaginet (June 6th or June 20th)
Unit Testing Without Fear by Northwest Cadence (June 10th)
Visual Studio 2012 - Testers Using the “Developer Testing” Tools in Visual Studio by Magenic (June 11th or June 25th)
QA & Visual Studio 2012: Using a Lab Environment for Your Application Lifecycle by Neudesic (June 12th or June 26th)
Getting Started With Coded UI testing: Building Your First Automated Test by Imaginet (June 13th or June 27th)
Quality Enablement – Create and manage automated tests with Visual Studio 2012 by InCycle (June 24th)
A Lap Around Microsoft Test Manager (MTM) by Northwest Cadence (June 17th)
ZERO260: Virtual Student App Labs for Windows 8 Game Creation (May 23rd, 28th, or 30th)

Windows 8 App Factor Series (Tempe, AZ & others)

Have app ideas? Have software development skills? If so, that’s all you need to learn, compete and enter to win! 6 Cities, 100’s of developers and 1000’s of great ideas. The opportunity is NOW! Don’t miss another chance to get in on the next great marketplace! Get your competitive juices flowing and participate in a FREE App Factor event. Visit: www.windows8appfactor.com for more info.

WINDOWS 8 APP FACTOR LEARN

Part one of the series, Windows 8 App Factor Learn is a fun day of “training and auditions” where you will learn what you need to know to take your skills and ideas into a new economy.

Form a team where you can use your skills and compete to win.
Learn how to build an app from idea to store submission.
Start from scratch or use a beautiful sample to get started.
Free consulting from the local evangelist team (in person or online).

Windows 8 App Factor Learn will be in Tempe, AZ on June13th. In addition, there will be other learn sessions in San Francisco, Bellevue, San Diego, Portland, Mountain View, and Irvine on other dates.

WINDOWS 8 APP FACTOR COMPETE

Part two of the series, App Factor Compete will provide you with an opportunity to show off your app (in-person) and hard work to the world and potentially win. Prizes will be awarded for best app (determined by judges), and peoples’ choice (determined by live audience).

Compete is being offered in San Francisco and Irvine, both on June 22nd. But if you can’t join us in either of these locations, you can also participate online…

WINDOWS 8 APP FACTOR ONLINE

If you don’t have time to attend ‘Windows 8 App Factor Compete’, no big deal, just submit your work of art online to be eligible to win fabulous prizes. Submission guidelines can be found at www.windows8appfactor.com/submit.

Tech Ed North America (New Orleans, LA)

Learn how Microsoft can you help improve productivity and drive down costs, preparing you to better advise business decision makers on future technology investments:

Windows
Windows Server and Microsoft System Center
Windows Team Foundation Server
Microsoft Exchange
Windows Azure
Virtualization
Application Lifecycle Management
Building Your Private Cloud, Public Cloud or Hybrid Cloud
Trustworthy Computing and Data Governance

Tech Ed North America will be in New Orleans on June 3rd through June 6th.

BUILD 2013 (Online or Waitlist)

Build 2013 is taking place June 26-28, 2013 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. Build 2013 is now sold out; however, you can still join the waitlist. If you are unable to join us in San Francisco, we will extend the Build experience online with live streams of the keynote, sessions, Channel 9 Live and more. Check out

http://buildwindows.comfor all the details. At Build, we’ll share updates and talk about what’s next for Windows, Windows Server, Windows Azure, Visual Studio and more. Build is the path to creating and implementing your great ideas, and then differentiating them in the market. Join us for three days of immersive presentations delivered by the engineers behind our products and services and getting the first look at what’s next.

Unable to attend in person? Join us for a world class online experience at: www.buildwindows.com.