This fall I got myself a new development computer. I did my usual indecisive Libra thing over for months before settling on something. My last machine was one that I got arm-twisted into building myself. I’m just not made for this. It should have been obvious when the parts list I selected from Newegg...

I just downloaded Office 2013 Pro Plus from MSDN to install on a machine that was running the preview. As this is a recently repaved computer, Office 2013 Preview was the only version of Office on the box. In prep, I sought out others’ reports on the web, but couldn't find anything except a note somewhere...

I have Crystal Reports 2008. This is the full application, not the Crystal Reports extension embedded into Visual Studio. This morning I pulled a solution with many projects and many crystal report files into Visual Studio 2010 for the first time. This application originated in VS2003, migrated to VS2005...

I love VS2010’s multi-framework targeting feature, yet it has bitten me in the rear-end more than once. The problem is that I have created projects in .NET 3.5 without realizing it, then at some point, when something doesn’t work as expected, if I’m lucky I discover the mistake. Typically, this happens...

I got bit when installing the VS2010 RC and it cost me a few hours of aggravation. Here’s why. I use Daemon Tools to mount ISOs to a virtual DVD. I have a Windows 7 machine and am using a new installation of Daemon. By default, Daemon’s auto-mount feature is turned off. I didn’t realize this. During...

Earlier this month, Rob Hale presented at the Vermont.NET User Group on what he learned at PDC. There was a lot of great information; but oddly, two tiny little Visual Studio features stood out for me. One is not even new to VS2010. Recent Project Tricks on Start Page There are a zillion new productivity...

Here's a post I wrote on my DevLife blog that shows how to easily discover and install VS extensions in VS2010 AND about T4 AND about T4 editors and even about EF4's use of T4 templates. Can you stand it? Get VS2010 Extensions easily with built-in Extension Manager (and checking out a VS2010T4 editor...

This cost me two very precious hours today, so I thought I would share. In preparing my laptop for my upcoming trip, I needed to get the latest version of an app I wrote for a client in case I need to do any work for them while I'm away. The application uses the latest version of Crystal Reports which...

I spent a ridiculous amount of time moving an app with lots of Crystal Reports from VS2005 to VS2008. The VS part was a breeze. It was the move to Crystal Reports 2008 that slayed me. I learned a lot of lessons during this process and wrote them into an article for ASPAlliance in the hopes of helping...

Why oh why did I check out Instant VB after I spent 45 minutes trying to translate one line of code from C# to VB? Read more... [A New DevLife post]...