Just wanted to mention that the Interop Warriors are at it again. We have a number of events coming soon that we're beginning to prepare for, and we'll be showing off our latest in San Diego at this FREE event. For more information, check this out:

http://www.interopwarriors.com/PermaLink.aspx?guid=f3f79b24-a4df-49d2-9323-b8fb3b59b832

This whitepaper is finally live and you will not believe how cool the new localization features are for ASP.NET 2.0, I'm duly impressed with the new integrated IDE support for resources, and in particular with the extensibility of localization expressions. Peaked your interest? Read it here:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/asp.net/whidbey/default.aspx?pull=/library/en-us/dnvs05/html/ASP2local.asp

I really enjoyed working with Achim Ruopp and Simon Calvert of the localization team at Microsoft on this paper. They were a fantastic resource for getting me up to speed on the underpinnings of the new localization features of ASP.NET 2.0. I could not have written this paper with as much detail without some insider feedback so I really have to thank you guys for answering all of my detailed questions and for all the time you took to give comprehensive feedback during each review cycle. Thanks guys!

Resources for this webcast today can be found here:

http://www.dotnetdashboard.net/sessions/handlers.aspx

The webcast starts at 9:00am PT, you can register online (see a few blog posts ago).

For today's webcast, my resource page is:

http://www.dotnetdashboard.net/sessions/globalization.aspx

I have new samples to post here, and shortly a whitepaper on ASP.NET 2.0 localization features, so keep an eye on this link for changes in the next few weeks!

Thought I'd christen my newly repaired blog (crossing fingers) with a new post about Service Pack 1 for the .NET Framework 1.1 - which has been available for over a month now (yes, I have been busy):

SP1 - http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=A8F5654F-088E-40B2-BBDB-A83353618B38&displaylang=en

Yesterday I finally had a chance to update my machines and take a closer look. Ironically, on the same day I had a fantastic conversation with Vivek Nirkhe from the VS 2005 Team System group ( http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/vs2005/teamsystem/ ) on the issues of versioning; updating assembly version versus file version; and best practices for build process to handle distribution during development, the pass to QA and final release. He was kind enough to provide feedback on some of my concerns about SP1.

Much to my surprise, SP1 doesn't version the updated .NET Framework assemblies, which happen to contain a long list of fixes. My immediate thought was:

Why aren't they versioning their assemblies and shipping a publisher policy?

A publisher policy makes it possible for you to deploy updated assemblies to the GAC, and all installed applications will automatically bind to those updated assemblies. UNLESS, they override policy in their own app.config file. Therein lies the problem, according to the following blog post by Junfeng Zhang on the subject: 

http://blogs.msdn.com/junfeng/archive/2004/10/11/240822.aspx

In summary he states:

1. The service pack is security related, and we don't want customers to opt-out by publisher policy override
2. The main reason for the concern in #1 is because through publisher policy override you must specify which assembly to override. Since SP1 includes multiple files, it is possible that applications will forget to include ALL of the assemblies in the override, and thus create a situation where some assemblies are 1.1, others SP1.

Ok, so this is a good call, because we all know this would happen and create a support nightmare. But, this exposes an inherent limitation to assembly versioning in .NET 1.1, which I have spoken about in some of my talks on the subject.

Assembly redirection, publisher policy overrides, and related assembly binding concepts can be configured in XML, through the local app.config or web.config for particular applications and subdirectories. But, you have to specify individual assemblies one-by-one even if you are configuring a single policy that should apply to multiple assemblies. If you miss one, time to trouble-shoot. But, if all SP1 files all carry the same version number, and no other group of updates carry that number, then shouldn't it be possible to specify a publisher policy override in one fell swoop, by identifying the version number the override applies to? 

My wish list on this subject:

1. Make it possible to deploy a publisher policy-like DLL to my local app.config, that supplies a binding policy that could group a number of assemblies and policies in a single DLL. Easier than an open XML config file that can be edited, and less error prone because it can be tested and deployed to clients.
2. With this, SP1 could have updated version, shipped a publisher policy, and provided a publisher policy override in assembly format for anyone to override just in their application. They might need to do this, if for example they need some time to update fixed to their application for the service pack. I know, it is supposed to be backward compatible, however sometimes clients depend even on bugs in previous versions, for their code to work...strange and lame, but true.
3. With this, deployment of fixes to local applications not installed in the GAC could include policy DLLs instead of hand-rolled updates to the local app.config/web.config. What if the customer has edited those config files? That means our installations have to edit the config, not ship a new one. This is painful. Let me ship a DLL that specifies a policy.

We don't have these options today, readily available, so they made the right choice for SP1 and vendors will have to make sure their apps function against it. And, there are plans to improve the versioning and deployment of framework vs. application assemblies in the future. Find out more in this insightful article by Cathi Gero and Jeffrey Ritcher:

http://www.theserverside.net/articles/showarticle.tss?id=AssemblyVersioning

So, the dogfood is just ok, and that's why with SP1, MSFT opted out of eating it. For single-assembly updates, it tastes a little bit better.

Ok, I have no idea what happened to it, but all of the blogs I host, including this one, were returning junk to the Web browser at random. Except, it started not to be so random of late. What happened? I have no freaking idea. I rebuilt this blog with the latest dasblog files, and I removed the log files, and it works.

If you see any strange behavior...let me know. Oh, wait, if you see strange behavior, you won't be seeing this entry will you...so, you'll have to memorize my email address from this blog, and keep it with you at all times, in the event you see any strange behavior, aside from the lengthy useless entry this is turning out to be...

Kinda like when people say “to make a long story short” but really, they just made the short story longer...

I'm working on a problem that this blog has been having, displaying junk characters intermittently. Stay tuned...sorry for any inconvenience.

Hey guys, these webcasts are FREE, and there are a lot of really great topics being covered this week. Apparently you have to register soon because they have limits on the number that can participate live! I'm doing a new and improved version of my favorite talks on ASP.NET on Oct 21 and 22 first thing in the AM (see level 200 in the links below)....don't miss!

Here's how you register:

Now I can say I'm non-fluent in one more language, Italian. What a fabulous place, too bad my site went down while I was gone and unable to grab email depite numerous efforts. Sigh...back to work...alora, no me piache...