VS 2008 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 Enhancements Training Kit

tbronzin — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 19:00:00 GMT

Microsoft have excellent resources for developers to get their hands and migrate to Visual Studio 2008 and .NET Framework 3.5 (including 3.5 Service Pack 1 Enhancments) in their training kits:

.NET Fx 3.5 SP1 enhancements:

ASP.NET AJAX 3.5 SP1

ASP.NET MVC

ASP.NET Dynamic Data

ASP.NET Routing

ADO.NET Data Services

ADO.NET Entity Framework

WCF 3.5 SP1

Visual Studio 2008 SP1

Link: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=355c80e9-fde0-4812-98b5-8a03f5874e96&displaylang=en

Visual Studio 2008 Traininig Kit ( LINQ, C# 3.0, Visual Basic 9, WCF, WF, WPF, ASP.NET AJAX, VSTO, CardSpace, SilverLight, Mobile and Application Lifecycle Management):
Link: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=8BDAA836-0BBA-4393-94DB-6C3C4A0C98A1&displaylang=en

ADO.NET Entity Framework Beta 3 & Tools CTP 2

tbronzin — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 12:04:00 GMT

If you are interesting to se what's new in ADO.NET Entity Framework and what Tools are available, go download the Entity Framework Beta 3 runtime and the Entity Framework Tools CTP 2.
This release works with the RTM releases of Visual Studio 2008 and the .NET Framework 3.5.

What's new? See below:

RuntimePerformance improvements

Much quicker object query execution
Simpler generated SQL
Faster view generation

Easier disconnected operation

Public, serializable EntityKey property on EntityReference
ApplyPropertyChanges
Attach on EntityReference
Improvements to EntityKey serialization

Extensibility and business logic enhancements

Partial methods in code generation for property changing and property changed events
Load with MergeOption
AssociationChanged Event

Query improvements

Additional canonical functions for LINQ to Entities
Apply operator elimination (makes more operations work in SQL Server 2000 and other databases)
Compiled LINQ query
ToTraceString() method on ObjectQuery<T> and EntityCommand to facilitate debugging

Other

Connection management refinements
Provider interface allows better reasoning about primitive types

Entity Designer

Generate a model from a database with the wizard and display it on the designer surface
Edit conceptual model properties (e.g. namespace, alias)
Embed Entity Framework metadata artifacts (CSDL/MSL/SSDL) in the output assembly or copy them to the output directory without worrying about the connection string
Cut/Copy/Paste entities and properties
Undo/redo support
Layout and control visual aspects of the design surface and persist changes
Add, delete, and edit entities, scalar properties, associations, and inheritance
Automatic set management
Automatic navigation property management
Control concurrency settings of properties
Validate model and mappings using the Entity Framework Runtime
Double-click on validation errors in the VS error window to take you to the right place in the designer where you can fix them
Automatic entity connection management in App/Web Config when .edmx file is renamed/moved in Solution Explorer
UI changes based on usability feedback, simpler context menu layout and icons

Entity Mapping

View mappings for a C-Side Entity or Association
View/Edit mappings using stored procedures (insert/update/delete)
Rename or delete C-Side objects without worrying about mapping
Map an EntityType to multiple tables
Apply multiple conditions to a table mapping
Map associations
Automatic generation of conditions and referential constraints on associations
Map an Entity hierarchy to a single table (TPH mapping)
Map an Entity hierarchy to multiple tables (TPT mapping)
Create and map abstract entity types in your model

Entity Model Browser

Understand and visualize the model in a tree hierarchy
Create, update and delete FunctionImports in your model
Update model and mappings if tables or columns in the database change
Navigate to nodes in the model browser from entities and properties on the designer surface

Visual Studio Integration

item template, model generation wizard, EntityDeploy MSBUILD task and Entity Framework validation on build

Other links

Samples
Readme
Documentation

Tomislav Bronzin [RD&MVP] : ADO .NET Entity Framework

VS 2008 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 Enhancements Training Kit

ADO.NET Entity Framework Beta 3 & Tools CTP 2