Entry Level Enterprise

Philly Code Camp Registration Open

Chip Lemmon — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 23:16:49 GMT

Registration for the Philly Code Camp on January 12th is now open. I will be presenting "Entry Level Event Models". It is a part of my "Entry Level" series that will attempt to get "the willing" up to speed on fundamental architectural, design and development practices.

I'm psyched to kick off 2008 with a code camp presentation. This should be a good one, so go register now!

--chaz

NJUX Meeting TONIGHT!

Chip Lemmon — Thu, 22 Mar 2007 13:31:00 GMT

NJUX Meeting 3-22-2007

Chip Lemmon — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 17:33:00 GMT

Just a reminder that the kick off NJUX meeting will be tomorrow at the GasLight Brewery on South Orange Avenue in South Orange New Jersey. I hope to see you there!!!!

--Chaz

VB.Net Must Read!

Chip Lemmon — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 16:09:00 GMT

Don just posted A MUST READ for all Entry Level Enterprise Developers using VB.NET!

--chaz

Bad Tutorials

Chip Lemmon — Thu, 24 Aug 2006 01:43:00 GMT

As many of us do from time to time, Mike Nicholes had a rant on his blog. Most rants are just useless noise that makes the author feel better. But in Mike's case, he really hit the nail on the head! Nothing is truer than Mike's statement;

“I don't like the hours I used to waste spewing out Typed Datasets and binding them to Web Forms and then thinking that I was doing Enterprise development because Microsoft documentation had tutorials online that used the word "Enterprise". “

Hey all you enterprise folks out there, you've heard the saying; “people don't know what they don't know“. So if the one comfortable/trusted source of information(i.e. MSDN) says its so, who are we to disagree? Well, I guess WE (the enterprise folks) are... After all we seem to know what the others are missing. That is why I started my Entry Level Enterprise Development “ELEDev” effort. It is to train the folks out there that want to know what they don't know. It is to right the wrongs of demos, tutorials and samples gone astray.

Admittedly I've seen a whole lot more on the web (blogs) about architecture and enterprise development than I did a year ago. This is a great step, but let's not lose ourselves in the purity of the methodology. Let's remember that we write what we do on our blogs to educate, assist and sometime entertain our readers. Therefore, it may be necessary to explain the simple and the mundane stuff adnausium. But your efforts will go a long way toward helping folks get the hang of the “right” way to develop Enterprise applications.

Please consider presenting an introductory Enterprise Level topic at your next Code Camp!

--chaz

What's in a directory structure?

Chip Lemmon — Wed, 23 Aug 2006 00:32:00 GMT

Untitled Page What's in a directory structure? Well a lot. I tend to create a directory and source control structure that reflects my architecture. It is just another way of allowing the domain to blend into every aspect of your development.

So here it is plain and simple...

The top folder "CodeCampSourceControl" is the root for the version controlled projects both on the hard disk and in the source control system.

The two subsequent folders "Projects" and "Solutions" are rather self explanitory. Within the Projects folder, I create a folder that pairs up to my default namespace. Within the "NewJersey.CodeCamp" folder I have created a Database, DAL, Lob, UI, and UT project. The Database folder contains my SQL Scripts etc. I like to use source control rather than the database deltas to manage SQL versioning. The Data Access Layer (DAL) is the coding I use to bang against the database. In fact my DAL code actually interacts with the Enterprise Library's Data Access Application Block. My Line of Business (LOB) encapsulates ALL of my business logic. The LOB can contain other more granular projects.

The User Interface (UI) project contains only the code required to make the presenation layer work. I am a fan of the Model View Controller (MVC) design pattern. The concept of this pattern can be hard to grasp particularly for old school Visual Basic developers. It took me a long time to recognize when I was crossing layer boundaries and say managing data state in the UI logic. A definite no-no. The method I use to keep my boundaries as clean as possible is to modify all data in the business object, fire an event and have the UI react to the event.

Finally the Unit Test (UT) project is simply an isolated layer of code dedicated to executing N-Unit against the other application layers.

So there you have it... a simple explanation of a simple directory structure methodology. Although this topic is somewhat elementary for many of you, this is the first in a series of efforts I am calling "Entry Level Enterprise Development" or ELEDev. ELEDev attempts to address Enterprise Level Development for those who have not been exposed to it.

--chaz

NJ Code Camp II... Success!

Chip Lemmon — Sun, 04 Jun 2006 22:23:00 GMT

Well as I've come to expect after a Code Camp I am recharged and psyched about programming again. Like NJ Code Camp I, I met a lot of great people and made some new friends.

I have to say that I'm a bit shocked that there was more controversy in my “Down with Datasets!” session than my session on “Living in an Out-Sourced World”. I appreciate the honest and open dialog in both sessions. I received some great challenges to my stance on using custom objects over datasets. I really got out of this session exactly what I had hoped to and that was some real good discussion on overall architecture and design principals. Even if John and Kevin left me bruised from the pro-dataset camp. It was still great fun.

I was truly amazed at how my “Living in an Out-Sourced World” presentation went. First of all I was nervous about presenting such a risky topic. Secondly I wasn't sure that many people would attend something a bit off topic. Yet I felt that Out-Sourcing and Off-Shoring were such important topics for the developer community that I had to take the chance. And what do you know? People came. And people participated. The big shocker though was how the attendees were very academic about Out-Sourcing and Off-Shoring. I'd say 99% of the attendees felt that Out-Sourcing/ Off-Shoring was an integral part of the way business is conducted today. They also seemed to observe that there was a fair balance of pros and cons to the practice. We even got into discussing globalization, intellectual property concerns and innovation. I'd say this session exceeded my expectations by 200%. And I sincerely thank each and every attendee of this session as I really just moderated as you all provided the content.

I was fortunate enough to attend Dan Krhla's session on VB2005 for VB6 Developers. I am already fairly well versed in VS 2005 VB & C# and I still walked away with some great tips! And thank you John Baird for an excellent presentation on N-Unit. Unfortunately I only caught about half of it before I had to leave the room, but what I saw was great. John's enthusiasm about Test Driven Development and Agile Software Development got me excited about it too.

Lastly, thanks to Peter Laudati, Scott Watermasysk, and Don Demcsak for putting NJ Code Camp II together. I can hardly wait for NJ Code Camp III! Please remember to subscribe to the RSS feed at the NJ Code Camp site for updates! And if you missed NJ Code Camp II, you missed a lot. Be sure to attend the next one.

--chaz

Calling all Jersey Geeks

Chip Lemmon — Mon, 08 May 2006 23:56:00 GMT

Help! I so desperately want to present at NJ Code Camp II on June 3rd. But what? I am kicking around a couple of ideas and want to know what would get you to my session? Here are some ideas I've been kicking around...

1. One or more Application Blocks in the Enterprise Library - Code demo
    Just a display of how to incorporate these in your code.

2. Fun with Serialization - Code demo
    Show multiple ways to serialize and deserialize your objects to/from disk on a fat client.

3-A. Down with Datasets! - Code and debate
    I only use datasets as a transport mechanism. Like a REAL programmer I use custom objects to manage my data in memory. What's better is I bind UI components to my custom objects! Come tell me why I am wrong or share your enthusiasm for my extremist point of view.

3-B. Construct This (a follow up to 3A) - Code demo
        A demonstration on multiple ways to “hydrate“ objects by overloading constructors.

4. Source Control and Project Folder Organization - Best Practices Talk
    As boring as this topic may seem, I've seen great debate and dispare. My way may not be the only way, but it works!

Tell me if you like any of these or shoot me an idea of your own. All code demos will be provided in {GASP} VB.Net. I'm looking forward to your feedback!!!!

--chaz

Entry Level Enterprise

Chip Lemmon — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 14:20:00 GMT

I don't know if the term “Entry Level Enterprise“ has been used before. If it has I apologize to the originator and I respectfully yield credit to the individual(s) who used it before me.

I will be using Entry Level Enterprise a lot. To me it is a key component of seeing IT in the US survive. It is about helping our brethren of all coding persuasions to identify, understand and utilize tools and methodologies for developing Enterprise Level solutions. Some very simple examples are Test Driven Development, Patterns and Practices, and Domain Driven Design.

I'm not sure that I will be adding anything new to these and other spaces. My goal is to help IT professionals to understand these concepts in consumable pieces. And to help them identify when to or not to use them. It's not sexy or ground breaking, but it is important. I will certainly have my own personal favorite methodologies, but I will not pick superlatives in an attempt not to lose my message or audience. Anything less would undermine what I am trying to do.

And my message is; that Joe Shmoe developer can and should engage in these techniques and methodologies and not be overwhelmed. I want to give them a zero entry point into the space. I think there are a lot of folks that just need to be pointed in the right direction and I'd like to be one of many people to be pointing.

So the true reason for this post is to see if I am on to something. Does the idea have merit? Am I repeating something somebody else has already tried? Is the idea crap? Talk back to me, I really want your opinion on this one before I try to start any kind of crusade.

--chaz

NJ Code Camp - An Honor and a Privilege

Chip Lemmon — Sun, 16 Oct 2005 22:04:00 GMT

Update: My presenations are now up on the NJ Code Camp Site. I don't really think the Power Point does the presentation justice, but it's there.

Thanks to the many talented and wonderful people that attended NJ Code Camp 2005 this Saturday. This was my first time presenting at a Code Camp and the experience exceeded my every expectation. I came away with a lot of new ideas and I'm really excited to continue working with the NJ developer community.

A special thanks to Rob Jackson (Microsoft), Scott Watermasysk, and Don Demcsak (DonXML) for organizing a true community event. Nice job! Congratulations and a job well done to my fellow presenters as well!

(I will update this post when we have a place to push out our code and presentation.)

We couldn't have ended the day any better then with a special presentation from the guys at .Net Rocks! doing their VS 2005 Road Trip. There presentations were awsome as you would expect and Carl was absolutely hilarious on the guitar. If all that weren't enough, I got to join Carl, Richard and Geoff after the show for an interview with a few other attendees and presenters. I really must correct an oversight from my interview though. I really need to give props to Eric Evans whose book, “Domain-Driven Design”, Addison Wesley inspired my talk and had great influence on some of my comments.

If there is one learning I have walked away from this experience with, it is that I think there is a great need for training and support for beginners in Enterprise Level Development. I barely scratched the surface on “Knowledge Crunching” and defining a Ubiquitous Language, but that was more than enough for a 1 hour presentation to an unknown mix of skill sets. And the true target audience (RAD developers and early career developers) that I had in mind when putting this presentation together responded. They told me, that they need more of this kind of information. I think it is a challenge for those who do this work on a daily basis to present digestible bits of this type of information more frequently. If we really want our peers to follow the tenants of good enterprise level application development that is the challenge we must take on as a community.

Look around and tell me how many beginner level presentations there are on RUP, Domain Driven Design, Test Driven Development, Object Modeling or even Use Case Modeling. I don't think there are many. I think the reason is simply that these are very complex topics and are perhaps by nature not appealing to developers. With the wrong title/advertisement we may scare away those that are not well versed in these topics. Don't get me wrong, we should by no means “dumb-down” the material, we just need to make it digestible. We also need to help developers of all skill levels realize that these are tools/skills that will improve software they produce and ease enhancements and maintenance long term. I don't think developers don't want to do the right thing, they just don't know how, why and when to do it.

--chaz