The Daily Grind 937

The software world was buzzing this weekend.

• WinRadar v2 - Front end to Active Directory designed to simplify administration. Looks interesting. $395 for 1 admin.
• XMLSpy File Commander PlugIn - I didn't even know XMLSpy had a plugin interface, but it does, and this free component extends its file-handling functionality. (via Programmers Heaven)
• DevPartner Performance Analysis Community Edition - If you want to get a sense of how the DevPartner tools work, you can try this 45-day edition.
• VelocIT Tools - Odds and ends from Jon Galloway and Phil Haack.
• Web Service Software Factory - More guidance from the Microsoft patterns & practices folks. Tom Hollander has some background.
• Sandcastle - July 2006 Community Technology Preview (CTP) - First outside release of Microsoft's tool for creating developer documentation from .NET XML comments. FAQs are here. See also Creating a Chm build using Sandcastle, the (relatively extensive) list of steps for creating documentation with their NDoc-like tool. Mikael Söderström created Sandcastle Helper to make the process easier, and Scott Hanselman has a PowerShell script and instructions on making the tool work with .NET 1.1 apps as well.
• Mono VMware Image - The folks over at the Mono Project are out with a VMware Player image that includes tools, the MonoDevelop IDE, samples, documentation, and databases on a SUSE Linux base. Alternatively, you could go for the Mono Live LiveCD, built on a Ubuntu foundation and with a different cut of tools (available in either CD or VMware flavors). If you want to explore cross-platform .NET development you might also be interested in this post on Running NUnit on Linux.
• Aptana: The Web IDE - Free (and soon to be open source) JavaScript-based IDE for building Web applications, with cross-platform support for working with JavaScript, HTML, and CSS. (via Jesse Ezell)
• ASP.Net Libraries with Pages and UserControls - A project to put user controls, pages, and master pages into libraries for use in ASP.NET projects. (via K. Scott Allen)
• Released to Public: Excentrics World Server Controls v2.0, RTM! - Matt Hawley's new round of ASP.NET controls are out now.
• Team Foundation Sidekicks version 1.1 is released - Tools to make Team Foundation Server easier to use.

• Tao of the Windows Installer, Part 5 - The installer team covers testing in this section.
• Microsoft Office System Developers Conference 2006 Videos - If you're ready to dig into the Office 2007 platform, this is a good starting point. (via Don Campbell)

• US House: Schools must block MySpace, many other sites - Idiocy like this makes me happy that my kids stay the heck out of the public schools. Maybe the Senate will get a clue, but only if Ted Stevens takes a day off.

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