Bill Evjen's Blog

I wanted to ... oh yes, I wanted to come to TechEd. It is one of the best conferences out there and it is something that you will find simply overwhelming. I am unable to attend as the product that I have been working on for more than a year for Lipper is about to release (June 15th) and that is tooooo close to be messing around at a conference (no matter how cool I think that conference might be).

I have to say though that the product we are releasing (for the financial services industry) is outstanding and will be the premier product in the collective investment space. I am simple amazed and stunned by it and will give you all more details after its release!

With that said, enjoy TechEd! If this is your first time - don't get hung up with all the PPT sessions. The absolute best experiences in learning that I have EVER had at TechEd is sitting with the MSFT teams in the exhibition hall and going over my issues and their futures. Keep that in mind. You will get the DVDs with all the PPTs and the audio and can review those later - you will not get the opportunity to sit next to Steve Lasker everyday and go over what you are dealing with in your SQL Server environment!

Another book! I and some friends just finished a new release of our Visual Basic book. This is another book I wrote with the wonderful Kent Sharkey! :) We really cleaned up this version of the book. This book came together quite well and shows not only the core of .NET 2.0 in depth - but it also covers the new ground of .NET 3.0. The .NET Framework 3.0 includes the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), the Windows Workflow Foundation (WF), and the Windows Communication Foundation (WCF).

The table of contents of the book is as follows - (the new chapters are in yellow):

 1. Understanding the .NET Framework.

2. Visual Basic 2005 Core Basics.

3. Object Syntax Introduction.

4. Object-Oriented Programming.

5. The Common Language Runtime.

6. Localization.

7. Generics.

8. Namespaces.

9. Exception Handling and Debugging.

10. Data Access with ADO.NET 2.0.

11. Using XML in Visual Basic 2005.

12. Security in the .NET Framework 2.0.

13. Visual Studio 2005.

14. Working with SQL Server.

15. Windows Forms.

16. Windows Forms Advanced Features.

17. Windows Presentation Foundation.

18. Integrating WPF with Windows Forms.

19. Working with ASP.NET 2.0.

20. ASP.NET 2.0 Advanced Features.

21. Assemblies.

22. Deployment.

23. Working with Classic .COM.

24. Threading.

25. Windows Workflow Foundation.

26. XML Web Services.

27. Remoting.

28. Enterprise Services.

29. Network Programming.

30. Windows Communication Foundation.

31. Windows Services.

32. Visual Basic and the Internet.

Appendix A. The VB.NET Compiler.

Appendix B. VB.NET References.