It took the introduction of Microsoft’s Entity Framework and ASP.NET MVC for the same powers that be, to suddenly wake up and espouse all about domain-driven development. Naturally, I am not the one complaining.

I am currently reading Phil Haack’s co-authored book, Professional ASP.NET MVC 3, enjoying and referencing it for my current projects.

Finally I am being able to develop software with renewed passion!

The standard joke about software development is regarding the lack of understanding between stakeholders and the software developers. These days, Agile methodology of software development is the rage. This requires a close interaction between a domain expert and the development team in short multiple iterations. As a result, the amount of documentation done for recording requirements is lesser than in the waterfall approach.

Software systems like the business domain have objects that have properties, behavior and interaction. In Domain-driven development, the key aspect is to conceptualize software objects similar to the business domain, using the terminology that domain experts use.

It also pertains to the “strong typing” of these software objects so that the business domain is explicit to the development team. Business stakeholders will always use terminology they understand. If the development team embraces the same terminology while conceptualizing the system, it will result in a domain-driven system that will be very close to the real world business model. There may be concepts for which it may not be easy to use common terminology. In such cases, the stakeholders and development team members must arrive at a consensus.

For example, the domain expert for a healthcare domain sees pharmacist, physician, administrator, nurse, care manager as separate and distinct entities. They have their own behavior and distinct interactions. However, a development team following a domain agnostic approach may just see a “user” entity and assign role as an attribute (and in some cases, a collection of roles for the same user). Such an approach may lead to confusion during development and user acceptance. The focus would shift from the software matching the domain and its workflow to making the client adjust to so-called reusable software developed. A very strong proof of such software is when the end user requires explicit training to use the software.

In the last decade, the datatables have been really popular because their attributes can be changed dynamically at runtime. This flexibility comes at the cost of making it confusing for developers to understand the business model since it is no longer explicit. Datatables also cannot prevent the violation of the principles of “SOLID” OOPS.

My personal opinion is that use of datatables has resulted in a lot of domain-agnostic code written under the perception of software reuse.

Listed below are some of the key benefits that I see in a domain-driven development model. I may have missed a few benefits, while there may be some who would argue against those listed below. Please feel free to share your thoughts with me!

Key Benefits

While here at Build I've been in lots of conversations with customers, other attendees, Microsoft MVP’s, Microsoft Regional Directors, and Microsoft engineering team members. One of the recurring topics that I've been talking about ad nausium is the “boxology” diagram of the Windows 8 Platform and Tools (shown here). Now let me tell you, I have drawn a lot of these “marketecture” diagrams in my time and its not easy. These kind of diagrams are ne … Read More

via Doug Seven

I have been following browser usage statistics for the last couple of years at gs.statcounter.com. Although predictions can always swing 10-15% either ways, I am still venturing out to predict the changing scenario of IE 6 to IE 9 in the next 6 months in U.S.

• As per my analysis, IE 6 will fall below 50% by the end of this year and become negligible by March 2012.
• IE8 and IE9 will be almost level by March 2012.
• The rate of change could have been much more rapid had the adoption rate for Windows 7 not been so sluggish (and mostly due to budget constraints).
• Another key point to note is that there is a great chance that overall share of IE could come down from around 44% to around 41.5% in the next 6 months.

Avg +/- denotes average increase or decrease expected.

HTC Desire HD

If you are interested in understanding HTC Desire features, please feel free to visit http://www.htc.com/www/product/desirehd/overview.html

Let me talk about the non-technical stuff. I have not been able to explore all the features as yet (which is a good thing) but I have explored the following:

1. Camera – Although it is 8 Mega Pixels, it works best in cases where objects are not moving. I like the editing stuff.
2. Contact Management System – This is awesome. It helps you connect your contacts across Facebook, google and regular phone contacts.
3. Multi-tasking – Except when I use Skype,  I am able to multi-task with ease
4. HTC Sense – Even iPhone owning colleagues drool at its touch capability
5. Maps – Pretty good, but need to explore more
6. Browser – Great experience. I plan to try other browsers
7. Push Mail – very good, especially the suggestions they give on typing. I have not tried the mike much but it looks promising
8. Facebook, Twitter, Gmail integration is great. I can share anything at any point of time to multiple options.
9. Internet connectivity – the USB tethering based internet connection works great! The wireless hotspot also works.
10. WiFi connectivity – Works seamlessly. Skype works great on wi-fi. In fact, it feels I am speaking on a normal phone connection. On 3G, due to the inconsistent connectivity, the experience was not so smooth.

This is just the beginning, but one thing is sure. This is no poor man’s iPhone. It stands out on it own!

A small mention must be made about the battery life. While it does not get drained so fast on wi-fi or 2G; 3G seems to be drinking its battery.

Microsoft then retorted with “A Modern Browser”.

The only point the two have proven is eloquence of words. In reality Google’s chrome is the one proving the technical point.

Take for instance that Firefox’s much touted version 4 is still not out. Their adoption rate for new versions is next only to IE. Firefox 3.6 has the majority, but there are still many users for 3.5, 3.0 and a few beta users of 4.0. IE, as every one knows has IE8, IE7 and IE6 all being used in significant numbers. Look at chrome. Chrome 9 and chrome 8. No trace of the lower versions. This will be a very important aspect from a modern browser’s perspective.

Today a developer targeting IE has to cater to too many differences that are there between IE 6, 7 and 8.

The other challenge is that despite all the success of Windows 7, even in U.S., the number of WIN7 users has still not crossed WINXP. Even if IE9 comes out in a few months, it will take at least 2-3 years to become the standard browser when WINXP becomes a minority that no one is really worried about. The current trends for U.S. are less than 1% decrease for WINXP per month over the last 13 months. Currently around 32%, and at this rate, it will not take less than 30-36 months before it comes below 2-3% in U.S. (see http://gs.statcounter.com/#os-US-monthly-201002-201102)

For Firefox, the challenge will remain on how quickly they can bring out the stable version of 4.0 as user patience is very thin these days. Firefox was around 32.8% worldwide 13 months back. Today it is 30.5% worldwide. All the efforts of Firefox are not really leading to an increase in share. They too are taking a step in the right direction, . However, they have a long way to go and prove that they are a better alternative to Chrome. (see http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser-ww-monthly-201002-201102)

From an end-user’s perspective, I would love to use the browser which is the fastest and most memory/processor efficient. At the moment I will still choose to use Chrome although I like both Firefox 4 and IE9.

From a developer’s perspective, I know that there is going to be a 3 way split between IE, Firefox and Chrome/Safari. The one with the least matching features is the one that will stand out like a sore thumb for me because when making browser compliant sites, we will have to choose the least common denominator. No matter what I like, I have to program to IE6 / IE7 levels and I will continue to hate IE for doing that to me till the time I have to continue doing it.

There are many rich text editors available already for use in applications. One of the most popular is FCKEditor. Assign Labs has made a basic rich text editor that will be cross browser compatible, themeable using jQuery UI and at the same time keeping it light weight. The road map includes enhancing the rich text editor to include the following features CSS based styling control with ability to control which CSS style sheets are used Templates … Read More

via Assign Labs

I'm fascinated by the way Facebook operates.  It's a very unique environment, not easily replicated (nor would their system work for all companies, even if they tried).  These are notes gathered from talking with many friends at Facebook about how the company develops and releases software. Seems like others are also interested in Facebook…   The company's developer-driven culture is coming under greater public scrutiny and other companies are … Read More

via FrameThink – Frameworks for Thinking People

Where the feet are strong and fast, [feet here denote the worker class] And too bold and continuous working, That state will ever last, With no disturbances or jerking. Where the hands do not harass, [hands denote the soldiers and security] And never think of any cheat, That state will always be prosperous, And never tried by anyone's beat. Where the stomach has no disorders,[stomach is the system] And things are thoroughly digested, That state h … Read More

via Pranavkaushik's Blog

Women is the creator of life, She is the one who guides at time. She herself becomes advene, And leads the world to shine   Women of today’s era is present in all pursuits, She starts thinking, from where the men quits. She equally works for the development of world And helps in providing the daily bread.   Many social evils had affected her life, Whether it was sexual harassment, sati, purdah or dowry. It leads to her downfall in the s … Read More

via Nikita Agrawal

I can finally reveal a number of details about the first Windows Phone 7 update, a future major update, and how Microsoft intends to roll out updates generally. It’s not necessarily great news. But here’s what’s happening. The first update: “No Donuts” The first Windows Phone 7 software update, codenamed “NoDo,” will RTM in January, possibly this very week and in time for the CES keynote. But it won’t ship to users until early February, once the … Read More

via Windows Phone Secrets