Microsoft Dev Labs released an Ajax application optimization tool called Doloto. Doloto is very useful for large and complex Web 2.0 applications that contain a lot of code. Doloto analyzes AJAX application workloads and automatically performs code splitting of existing large Web 2.0 applications. After being processed by Doloto, an application will initially transfer only the portion of code necessary for application initialization.

Doloto reduces the size of initial application code download by hundreds of kilobytes or as much as 50% of the original download size. The time to download and begin interacting with large applications is reduced by 20-40% or dozens of seconds as shown below, depending on the application and wide-area network conditions.

The Doloto process proceeds in three steps, which correspond to wizard steps in the Doloto GUI.

• First, the application you want to optimize is profiled. Doloto performs profiling by running a local proxy on your machine that intercepts JavaScript files and instruments them. This is done in a browser-independent manner.
• Second, the profiling information is used to calculate code coverage and a clustering strategy. This determines which functions are stubbed out and which are not. This also groups functions into groups which are downloaded together, called clusters.
• Third, the JavaScript code is rewritten and saved to disk so that you can upload it to the server. Note that the entire process happens entirely on the client – that is, on your own machine, without needing access to the server. This way, you can profile and optimize the JavaScript of a third-party site such as cnn.com or maps.bing.com without having any sort of special access to their servers. It’s only when you are satisfied with the results of Doloto rewriting that you need to deploy the Doloto-rewritten files to the server.

This document is a step-by-step guide on how to use Doloto.

Download Doloto

Bing team in Microsoft working very hard to add more and more new feature in Bing. Bing team is now trying to build a bridge between Bing search results and social networking website. Bing & Ping will enable users to share their Bing search results with their friends on different social networking websites.

How Bing & Ping would Work ?

Bing & Ping will appear at the bottom of search results and users will be able to share these search results information with their friends via Social networking websites including Facebook, Twitter or they can simply send them an E-Mail.

Bing & Ping allow Bing users to share any kind of search results with their friends.

Bing & Ping is not yet available for testing yet but Microsoft only delivered a taste of the feature in the screenshots included with this article. If you’re interested in previewing this feature, be sure to become a fan of our Facebook page. Microsoft will be sending a special invitation to our fans to preview Bing and Ping. Check it out and let Bing team know what you think, if you like it and how Bing Team can make it better.

Erwin van der Valk and Francis Cheung walks you through the various topics of this guidance in the following videos:

Setting up the Contoso RI

Walkthrough of the Contoso Reference Implementation

How to use the configuration component?

How to use the logging components?

How to use the SharePoint Service Locator?

SuperPreview is a tool that comes with Microsoft Express Web , SuperPreview shows how your web pages render on different browsers. SuperPreview that comes with Express Web 3.0 is not free but SuperPreview for Internet Explorer is a free program that can be used by Web Developers and designers to see how their website is rendering on different versions of Internet Explorer.

Expression Web SuperPreview for Internet Explorer is a stand-alone visual debugging tool that makes it faster and easier to migrate your sites from Internet Explorer 6 to Internet Explorer 7 or 8. With Expression Web SuperPreview for Internet Explorer, you can ensure that your Web sites work correctly in Internet Explorer 8 while also maintaining compatibility with earlier versions of Internet Explorer.
Expression Web SuperPreview for Internet Explorer shows your web pages rendered in Internet Explorer 6 and either Internet Explorer 7 or Internet Explorer 8, depending on which version you have installed on your machine. You can view the pages side by side or as an onion-skin overlay and use rulers, guides and zoom/pan tools to precisely identify differences in layout. You can even compare your page comp to how the targeted browsers render the page.
Expression Web SuperPreview for Internet Explorer not only shows a high-fidelity rendering of how pages will look on different browsers, but it also identifies the element’s tag, size and position, applied styles, and location in the DOM (Document Object Model) tree so you can quickly fix the error.
Expression Web SuperPreview for Internet Explorer is a standalone, free application with no expiration and no technical support from Microsoft.

Please note: DirectX must be installed on your computer before you can compare a web page to a PSD image. To install DirectX on your computer, visit the DirectX download page.

System Requirements

• Supported Operating Systems: Windows 7; Windows Vista; Windows XP Service Pack 2

• PC with 700 MHz or faster processor
• 512 MB of RAM or more
• 1.5 GB of available hard-disk space
• DVD-ROM drive
• 1024 x 768 or higher-resolution monitor

Download Microsoft Expression Web SuperPreview for Windows Internet Explorer

Take a walk through the 4.0 landscape from ASP.NET and learn how you can get involved in shaping ASP.NET future. This talk focuses on the next release of ASP.NET including Web Forms and MVC. Do you love web forms? See how you can taking control of your control IDs, learn about better ViewState managment in GridView and ListView, and get more control over the CSS markup of ASP.NET server controls. See how Dynamic Data makes building you data-driven apps easy. If you’re interested in AJAX, we show you further advancements in client rendering and binding. If you’re considering MVC, we look at the feature set and understand how to create applications with this technology.

Via Dot Net TV

The Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 provides the documentation, samples, header files, libraries, and tools (including C++ compilers) that you need to develop applications to run on Windows 7 and the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1. To build and run .NET Framework applications, you must have the corresponding version of the .NET Framework installed. This SDK is compatible with Visual Studio® 2008, including Visual Studio Express Editions, which are available free of charge.

This release of the Windows SDK does not include a .NET Framework Redistributable Package. Windows 7 includes .NET Framework 3.5 SP1. Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 include .NET Framework 3.0.

Users running Windows Server 2003 and Windows XP must install the .NET Framework 3.0 or 3.5 SP1 to run and develop .NET Framework applications. Some samples and tools included in the Windows SDK also require you to install .NET Framework 3.5 SP1.

Along with content that ships in the Windows SDK, Microsoft offers additional free developer tools and resources that you might find helpful, including:

• LUA Buglight™ is a tool to help both developers and IT professionals (sysadmins) identify the specific causes of admin-permissions issues (LUA bugs) in desktop applications running on Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, or Windows Vista. Once the specific causes have been identified, the bugs can more easily be resolved by fixing the app’s source code, or by making configuration changes, allowing the app to work correctly for non-admin users.
• Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 is the latest update of the .NET Framework, and contains many new features that are compatible with both .NET Framework 2.0 and .NET Framework 3.0. The .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 includes several fixes for .NET Framework 2.0 3.0, and 3.5.
• Microsoft DirectX SDK Developer Center provides links to the resources needed to build cutting-edge, media-rich, interactive applications. It includes runtimes, headers and libraries, samples, documentation, utilities, and support for C++ development.
•  Microsoft Visual Studio Express is a set of free, lightweight and easy-to-use tools for the hobbyist, novice, and student developer.
• Microsoft Windows PowerShell™ command-line shell and scripting language helps IT Professionals achieve greater productivity. Using a new admin-focused scripting language, more than 130 standard command-line tools, and consistent syntax and utilities, Windows PowerShell allows IT professionals to more easily control system administration and accelerate automation. More information on Windows PowerShell is available from the PowerShell Team Blog and the Windows PowerShell Technology Center.
• Windows Developer Center is the official site about development for Windows Client platforms, including Windows 7 and earlier operating systems. The Developer Center includes links to the Windows 7 Developer Guide and many other resources.
• Windows SDK Developer Center is the official site about development using the Windows SDK and provides information about the SDKs and links to the Windows SDK Blog, Forum, online release notes and other resources.
• The Application Compatibility Toolkit (ACT) enables IT professionals, software developers and independent software vendors (ISVs) who work in a corporate environment to determine, before deployment within the organization, whether their applications are compatible with a new version of the Windows® operating system. ACT also enables such individuals to determine what impact the periodically published Windows Updates will have on their applications. ACT users can then use testing and mitigation tools contained in the toolkit to fix many of these compatibility issues.
• The Microsoft .NET Compact Framework is a key part of realizing Microsoft’s goal to provide customers with great experiences any time, any place, and on any device. The .NET Compact Framework’s managed code and XML Web services enable.

Download Download Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1

Product Description

• The foundation for most Web services, XML can also be used with ASP.NET to display data from an infinite variety of sources in a Web site
• After covering the basics, the book explores the many ways that XML documents can be created, transformed, and transmitted to other systems using ASP.NET 2.0
• Two major case studies address issues such as reading and writing XML data, XML data validation, transforming XML Data with XSLT, SQL Server XML integration, XML support in ADO.NET, and XML Web Services

Microsoft Expression Web 3 gives you the tools you need to produce high-quality, standards-based Web sites: built-in support for today’s Web standards, sophisticated CSS design capabilities, and visual diagnostic tools. Whether you work with PHP, HTML/XHTML, CSS, JavaScript, ASP.NET or ASP.NET AJAX, Expression Web makes it faster and easier to create and maintain exceptional Web sites.

Expression Web 3 Overview Video

Excel worksheets can read in Visual studio by using Office API’s. To get start working with Excel file we first need to understand the structure of Excel files. For programming Excel files we first creates an Excel Application object, read Excel file in workbook and read sheets from this work book.

To get start with Excel programming you first need to add Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel reference in your project. Instead of writing the simple code for reading Excel file i have created one class for reading excel file and it also help you read workbook and worksheets. you can directly use this class in your project to read excel file.

Imports OfficeExcel = Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel
Namespace MyExcel

    Public Class ExcelRead
        Dim _xlApp As OfficeExcel.Application
        Dim _xlWorkBook As OfficeExcel.Workbook
        Dim _xlWorkSheet As OfficeExcel.Worksheet
        Dim _XlFilePath As String
#Region "Constructor"
        Public Sub New(ByVal filepath As String)
            _XlFilePath = filepath
            OpenExel(_XlFilePath)
        End Sub
#End Region

#Region "Protected Method"
        Protected Sub OpenExel(ByVal fileName As String)
            _xlApp = New OfficeExcel.ApplicationClass
            _xlWorkBook = _xlApp.Workbooks.Open(fileName)
        End Sub
#End Region

#Region "Public Functions"
        Public Function GetWorkSheet(ByVal sheetname As String) As OfficeExcel.Worksheet
            For Each xlsheet As OfficeExcel.Worksheet In Me.XLWorkBook.Sheets
                If xlsheet.Name = sheetname Then
                    _xlWorkSheet = xlsheet
                    Return _xlWorkSheet
                End If
            Next
            Return _xlWorkSheet
        End Function
        Public Function getExcelWorkBookNames() As List(Of String)
            Dim workBookNames As New List(Of String)
            For Each wb As OfficeExcel.Worksheet In Me._xlApp.Worksheets
                workBookNames.Add(wb.Name)
            Next
            Return workBookNames
        End Function
        Public Function XLFilePath() As String
            Return _XlFilePath
        End Function
        Public Sub closeXL()
            releaseObject(Me._xlApp)
            releaseObject(Me._xlWorkBook)
            releaseObject(Me._xlWorkSheet)
        End Sub
#End Region

#Region "Read Only Property"
        Public ReadOnly Property XlApplication() As OfficeExcel.Application
            Get
                Return _xlApp
            End Get
        End Property
        Public ReadOnly Property XLWorkBook() As OfficeExcel.Workbook
            Get
                Return _xlWorkBook
            End Get
        End Property
        Public ReadOnly Property XLWorkSheet() As OfficeExcel.Worksheet
            Get
                Return _xlWorkSheet
            End Get
        End Property
#End Region

#Region "Private Functions"
        Private Sub releaseObject(ByVal obj As Object)
            Try
                System.Runtime.InteropServices.Marshal.ReleaseComObject(obj)
                obj = Nothing
            Catch ex As Exception
                obj = Nothing
            Finally
                GC.Collect()

            End Try
        End Sub
#End Region
    End Class

End Namespace

My next post use the same class that today we created to learn how to Format excel cells and draw charts.