Jukka-Pekka Keisala

Damn you Microsoft! How I am suppose to keep up with all this cool stuff you realize (heh, funny typo) release?

This one I had missed somehow but while I bump to it via some Rails article. Microsoft Labs has announced a new project called Volta that looks like GWT for .NET. But Volta seems to be more advanced than GWT since it uses .NET enviroment to generate JavaScript directly from its preferred programming language. But Volta is really about developing an application and deciding later where the code executes. That’s very ambitious. It looks very appealing for a developer that doesn’t fancy JavaScript. Though, I am not really seeing a big picture on this for example how does Volta fit to MVC, Silverlight and AJAX.NET.

Thanks to Google and Firefox, the browser is the platform and if you are a .NET developer, keep an eye on Volta, it is certainly a keystone of Microsoft web strategy.

Back in 2001 I was in TechEd Barcelona where Microsoft unveiled Sharepoint and .NET 1.o. I remember like yesterday when Don Box was demoing WebServices from bathtub (SOAP) and coding c# from MacBook in Microsoft event!.

Anyway, after seeing Microsoft’s plan for following years I decided fully focus on Microsoft Technology. I saw first SharePoint which I think sucked. WebServices weren’t interesting either it just felt a bit too hairy for doing simple things. But what I loved was the whole concept of ASP.NET, C# and XML. After seeing XSLT in action I knew this is going to be my language, and it was. Well at least until now. XSLT is really great for templating websites, I gone through many tempalting engines but nothing beats good old XML/XSLT transformations. It is simple and fast. Well, it can get complex sometimes but usually when XSLT gets complex it means you are doing something wrong. Then it’s time to stop and think. Maybe, this is faster in code-behind or perhaps maybe it’s a good idea to write XSL -helper in code-behind for this.

I have to say, I have never come comfortable building sites from .NET controls basically because it was producing bad html markup-up and I don’t have full control how to build html on it but Microsoft has made it better over the time and nowadays it even produces valid mark-up. But still, I have to compile a DLL when making small updates. This is where XSLT rocks!

Because of this, I have waited (.NET 1.1)… and I have waited (.NET 2.0-3.5)… but there hasn’t been XSLT 2.0. Recently I read blog post in XML.com from M. David Peterson Question: Is Microsoft Working On An XSLT 2.0 Processor? Answer I am quoting him who quotes Microsoft XML Team’s WebLog : Chris Lovett Interview

“As for XSLT 2.0 - we’ve heard from customers and understand the improvements in XSLT 2.0 over XSLT 1.0, but right now we’re in the middle of a big strategic investment in LINQ and EDM for the future of the data programming platform which we think will create major improvements in programming against all types of data.”

DAMN!

Bad news for me… Now with all MVC/LINQ/WEB2.0 stuff… Isn’t XML cool anymore?

Microsoft Research Lab has done some cool work on “Microsoft Surface” -product. Based on multi-touch concept where they explore ideas how this could impact on future interface design. Worth of checking out.

See more PopularMechanics there is a whole article and another video about it.

Update: Microsoft released Microsoft Surface website.

This is going to be in the news all over today.

http://www.microsoft.com/ie 

Someone has created what Microsoft should have created, web developers and desiginers can now test their website without loosing IE6.

Run IE7 and IE6 at the same time without having to overwrite the previous version.

Internet Explorer 7 RC1 in standalone mode.

This is pretty obvious but I am going to make post anyway since I need to start to fork yet another JavaScript library. Atlas Javascript Library will be renamed to Microsoft AJAX Library and server-side stuff ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX Extensions.
From Ajaxian

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Scott Guthrie has announced the “Atlas” 1.0 Naming and Roadmap, which includes the news that Atlas 1.0 will ship around the end of this year, that it will become “fully supported” by Microsoft.

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Robert Scoble has left from Microsoft and he is going to join Silicon Valley startup PodTech.net as a videoblogger. I wasn’t really surprise that he left from Microsoft, IMHO he wasn’t really “Microsoft material” but just because of that he made Microsoft look much more interesting and appealing company through he’s blog. I would have expected him to go work at Google.  I think Scoble and Google would be a match, even the names fits together .

Well, best of luck to Robert Scoble I will continue reading he’s blog now with even more interesting news and thoughts.

Here is a useful tip how to get SSL in IIS on Windows XP.

1. Install IIS 6.0 Resource Kit
2. From the Windows Start Menu, go to the “\Programs\IIS Resources\SelfSSL” folder and select “SelfSSL”.
3. Type “selfssl” to run the program.
4. Type “Y”
and it works… More info about Enabling SSL in IIS on Windows XP Professional.

Bill just announces Windows Live and Office Live, both online services.

Windows Live: Primarily ad supported. Does not kill off MSN. www.live.com

Office Live: ?internet based services for growing and managing your business online.? extensible, thousands of partners. ad supported level with tier above requiring subscription.

MS answer for Google portal and “Google’s OpenOffice project(?)”.

The IE Developer Toolbar provides several features for deeply exploring and understanding Web pages.

• Explore and modify the document object model (DOM) of a web page.
• Locate and select specific elements on a web page through a variety of techniques.
• Selectively disable Internet Explorer settings.
• View HTML object class names, ID’s, and details such as link paths, tab index values, and access keys.
• Outline tables, table cells, images, or selected tags.
• Validate HTML, CSS, WAI, and RSS web feed links.
• Display image dimensions, file sizes, path information, and alternate (ALT) text.
• Immediately resize the browser window to 800×600 or a custom size.
• Selectively clear the browser cache and saved cookies. Choose from all objects or those associated with a given domain.
• Choose direct links to W3C specification references, the Internet Explorer team weblog (blog), and other resources.
• Display a fully featured design ruler to help accurately align objects on your pages.

Dowload here