Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 Master Data Services Book Review

This is a very hands on book. It walks you through using every aspect of the current MDS tools. It starts out with an introduction to Master Data Services and then jumps right into installation and configuration. You then create an MDS Project and add a new Model to it by hand. The book does a great job of providing step by step instructions. As I went through the book I didn't get the feeling I was lost. The authors do a good job of keeping you moving forward at the right pace. The book has chapters on Starting an MDS Project, Creating Your Model, Integrating Master Data Services with Other Systems, Working with Hierarchies and Collection, Working with Master Data, Using Business Rules, Creating Versions of Data, Using Metadata, Implementing Security, Publishing Data to External Systems, and Extending MDS with Web Services. I cannot recommend using the current Microsoft MDM tools to anyone, but it can’t hurt to start learning them now. The Microsoft MDM tools are showing signs of improvement with Denali, but they still have a way to go before the product is a competitor to products like the IBM MDM stack. I can however recommend this book as a great resource for learning all about the current Microsoft MDM tools. The tools are not that straight forward to learn and this book does a great job of neutralizing the confusion and teaching you the ins and outs of the MDS tools offered by Microsoft in SQL Server 2008 R2. The authors provide a nice download that contains a sample model package, sample data in CVS files and a visual studio solution that wraps the MDS web service. All in all I highly recommend this book to anyone looking to get up to speed quickly with the Microsoft MDS tools.

Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 Master Data Services

Microsoft Expression Blend 4 Step by Step Book Review

Being primarily an architect and developer my use of Blend can be very limited at times. I use Blend mostly for prototyping with SketchFlow and I wanted to get a refresher on the functionality I don’t use day to day. Over the past several months I have been cracking this book open over lunch (when I get a lunch) and going through all the exercises. It has been a very fun exercise. The book starts out with an introduction to Silverlight and WPF and then has a chapter on the Blend 4 IDE. The book continues with a chapter on Designing an Interface, XAML and C#, Animations and Transformations, Adding Interactivity, Creating Design Assets, Resources, Skinning Controls, Working with Data, Using SketchFlow, and Designer/Developer Collaboration. Each chapter is a lesson or a set of lessons that introduce you to the topic by creating a hands on experience. One of the things I really liked was that the book introduced Expression Design 4 in the chapter Creating Design Assets and it touched on it in another chapter. I hardly ever get a chance to work in Expression Design so this was great. The book does a great job of showing you how to work with sample data. One of the main problems we as developers always face is populating the user interface to see how it will really work when there is no data available on the project. That is no longer a problem with Silverlight and WPF. One downside is the black and white print. I have started really enjoying the color books being put out on WPF, Silverlight, and Expression Blend. Have this one in black and white did not affect the quality of the lessons, but it would have been better in color. The code was very well organized and went together well with the book. There were no errors or issues with the code. The thing I liked best about this code was that the author only supplied the base which prepared you for the lesson. That made you do the lesson instead of reading about it and skimming the code. Having to finish the samples added a lot of value to each lesson. Overall I think the author did a great job of introducing a ton of functionality that is available in Blend 4. If you are doing anything with Silverlight and WPF you owe it to yourself to get familiar with Blend, and this is the book you should start with.

Microsoft Expression Blend 4 Step by Step (Step By Step (Microsoft))

Software Product Line Engineering Resource Kit

I recently decided to update the Product Line Engineering Assets I reuse from project to project. In the past I reused a baseline project that contained a folder structure and the UML stereotypes needed to do Use Cases, Feature, and Static Modeling.

For those of you who are not familiar with PLE, below is a context diagram I use to explain it and some links. I also put some of the better books on the topic at the end of this post.


Click here for larger image.

Software Engineering Institute Framework for Product Line Practices Site
Software Product Lines
Wikipedia Definition of Software Product Lines


I wanted to enhance that package a little by creating a UML Profile of the stereotypes needed to do Use Cases, Feature, and Static Modeling. Creating a profile makes them available from the toolbox and the resources tree.

I also wanted to recreate an instance of a Product Line Engineering software development process using Software & Systems Process Engineering Metamodel (SPEM) available in SPARX. You can use it as a baseline and tweak it for your project.

I may eventually populate it with the accompanying content. It was originally done in Rationale's XDE, so it mapped to RUP content. I would have to re-map it to OpenUP and other content to make it public.

The resource kit contains:

PLE_Template_Overview.doc- This document outlines the UML profile used to execute Product Line Engineering.

PLEBase.EAP- This project contains two main projects and the PLE UML Profile. One project is a Default PLE Process Instance and the other is PLE Base Folder Structure.

Process PDFs Folder- This folder contain a pdf of each of the phases included in the Default PLE Process Instance. It includes:
-Inception.pdf
-Elaboration.pdf
-Construction.pdf
-Transition.pdf
-SPE Context.pdf

Imports Folder- This folder includes exports of the resources included in the PLEBase.EAP project. These can be used to import the different assets into your other projects. It includes:
-Default PLE Process Instance.xml
-PLEBaseFolderStructure.xml
-PLEProfile.xml

Creating a UML Profile Folder- This is a copy of the material originally posted to the SPARX EA community site.
-ProfileCreationExamples.eap
-Creating a UML Profile in SPARX EA.docx

You can get the Product Line Engineering Resource Kit here.

The following images show the PLE UML Profile in the Resources and Toolbox that is created:






The following images show example diagrams that can be created using the PLE UML Profile. They are all explained in the downloadable documentation:


Click here for larger image.











Click here for larger image.

The following images show each phase of the instance of a Product Line Engineering software development process:

Inception Phase:

Click here for larger image.


Elaboration Phase:

Click here for larger image.


Construction Phase:

Click here for larger image.


Transition Phase:

Click here for larger image.

You can get the Product Line Engineering Resource Kit here.

New SPARX Enterprise Architect Learning Resources

SPARX has put up two new sites with new learning resources. They are both worth checking out.

Enterprise Architect Product Demonstrations
Videos and walk-throughs to help you get up to speed fast and leverage the full power of Enterprise Architect in your daily work.

Enterprise Architect Sparx Systems Channel on YouTube
Videos that show you haw to use the new features built into the latest version of SPARX EA. They include Using Working Sets in Enterprise Architect, Enterprise Architect Project Calendar, Customizing RTF Templates in Enterprise Architect, Business Rules in Enterprise Architect, Enterprise Architect XMI placeholders for missing external references, Win32 UI Profile and Patterns, Hand Drawn mode in Enterprise Architect, and Alternate Images - Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect.

Buyer beware the Microsoft Touch Mouse does not work with Visual Studio 2010 SP1 without some tweaks

I just got the mouse yesterday. Over all I like it, but may regretfully have to stop using it when in Visual Studio 2010 SP1. The scrolling does not work at all. I know Visual Studio has been plagued with this problem, but come on, this is Microsoft hardware.


I have a review on amazon here , but wanted to get a quick warning out to developers thinking about buying it.

I was hoping for interaction with the Windows 7 Phone Emulator, but there is none beyond the features available with a normal mouse. I expected it to at least work with Visual Studio.

UPDATE 8-3-2011: OK, so I gave it one more try on a third laptop. I did not have IntelliPoint 8.15 64-bit for Windows 7 on it. It installed with just the drivers. It worked in VS, but no gestures. I downloaded IntelliPoint 8.15 64-bit for Windows 7 and it gave me the gestures and VS stopped working.

I repeated that on my other laptop by uninstalling IntelliPoint and the other mouse drivers. Just allowing the USB to get its drivers installed allowed me to scrollin VS, but no other getures work without IntelliPoint 8.15 64-bit for Windows 7 on it. As soon as I installed I got the gestures but VS stops working.


UPDATE 8/4/2010- In order to resolve the issue of not running in Visual Studio 2010 you must run C:\Program Files\Microsoft IntelliPoint\ipoint.exe with elevated permissions. Right click on it, open properties, go to the compatibility tab and select Run this program as administrator.

What clued me in was that it did not work with the event viewer either, which was running elevated privileges also.