AMS302: “Atlas” Control Toolkit Unleashed: Creating Rich Client-Side Controls and Components
David Anson
The "Atlas" Control Toolkit is a set of controls and extenders designed to help ASP.NET developers easily integrate rich client UI features into their Web applications. As a community effort, the toolkit contains controls written by Microsoft and non-Microsoft developers who have joined forces to create a powerful, shared-source library for all to use. You will learn how to integrate toolkit components into your application as well as get an idea of how easy it is to create "Atlas" extenders using the toolkit.

AMS305: A Lap Around the New Enhancements for Web Developers in Visual Studio “Orcas”
John Hatch
Get an early preview of how Visual Studio "Orcas" takes web development to the next level. This session highlights the key new web tools experiences in the Visual Studio "Orcas" product. Areas covered include Visual Studio support for the Atlas framework, JavaScript enchancements, rich support for CSS standards, rapid development of data-bound web pages using DLinq, and more.

AMS301: Developing ASP.NET Web Applications with IronPython
David Ebbo
IronPython is a new fast implementation of the Python programming language running on the .NET Framework. While it stays true to the beauty and simplicity of the Python language, IronPython offers Python programmers seamless access to the richness and power of .NET libraries and applications in a fully dynamic environment as well as static compilation to produce pre-compiled assemblies. This session focuses on utilizing the IronPython dynamic language to quickly build full-featured ASP.NET Web applications. You will learn how to use IronPython to add rich scripting support to existing .NET applications and extend new applications with custom Python code. We will also demonstrate how IronPython can be used to combine a wide variety of .NET components and services. This talk is targeted at Python programmers looking to take advantage of the power of ASP.NET and at ASP.NET programmers looking to learn how Python can make building Web applications easier.

AMS304: Developing Data-Driven Web Applications with Language Integrated Query (DLINQ) in .NET Framework 3.5
Scott Guthrie
Language Integrated Query (LINQ) is a set of features that enable compilers to understand and implement query logic over in-memory collections of objects. .NET Language Integrated Query (DLINQ) is an implementation of LINQ that allows expression trees to be translated into query syntax for a given database engine. This session provides a developer overview of leveraging DLINQ to build data-driven web applications. This talk takes an in-depth look at DLINQ support with ASP.NET Web Forms, building an Object-Relational Mapping layer and using the ASP.NET data Controls to leverage DLINQ functionality. You will learn how to build scenarios involving filtering, master-details, Create-Retrieve-Update-Delete, sorting, paging, caching, optimistic concurrency and more.

AMS306: Developing Rich Web Applications with ASP.NET “Atlas”
Mike Harder
Mir Tariq
This session is a developer overview of ASP.NET "Atlas," Microsoft's new cross-platform/cross-browser framework for building rich, client-centric AJAX-style Web applications. Learn about data-binding, modernized object-oriented JavaScript techniques, server vs. client programming models and designing interactive UI behaviors as we cover "Atlas" fundamentals and more advanced Web UI design and development techniques. See how quickly you can enhance an existing ASP.NET Web site with powerful "Atlas" client & server controls and seamless access to remote application services.

AMS307: Tips and Tricks for Building Web Sites with Visual Studio 2005, ASP.NET 2.0 and IIS7
 Microsoft
Come learn about the most exciting releases of ASP.NET, Visual Studio and IIS yet: ASP.NET 2.0, Visual Studio 2005 and IIS7. See key tips on how these new releases enable developers and IT operators to dramatically reduce the amount of time, effort and code required to develop and deploy real-world Web applications. ASP.NET 2.0, Visual Studio 2005 and IIS7 each provides much improved administration and management support, and dramatically improved performance. This session includes discussions of master pages, themes/skins, site navigation, SQL output caching, personalization, membership, role management, Web site administration, IIS7 management, Web deployment and the significantly improved Visual Studio 2005 Web development experience.

AMS308: Using Visual Studio Team System to Design, Develop and Test Enterprise ASP.NET Web Applications
Jeff King
This session looks at how Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Team System takes the productivity of our Express products and extends that to each developer, tester, architect and project manager in your Enterprise. Team System's advanced engineering tools help developers find security vulnerabilities and performance bottlenecks. Testers learn to write, manage and execute everything from unit tests to full-scale Web tests. Architects learn to develop models that bridge the gap between development and operations. Project Managers learn how to monitor a project from inception to completion with Visual Studio 2005, Excel or Project. Visual Studio 2005 Team System ties all of this together with a new Enterprise-ready work item tracking data base, source code control system and reporting service; allowing each discipline to work naturally together throughout the software development lifecycle.

AMS309: Web Development on IIS7: Integrating IIS7 into the ASP.NET Web Development Process
Eric Woersching
Andrew Lin
Learn how the many changes in IIS 7.0 make developing and deploying ASP.NET applications on IIS 7 even better than before. In this session, we cover important aspects of IIS 7, like HTTP pipeline integration, which make ASP.NET even more powerful. You’ll see first hand how the new implementation of the HTTP pipeline, authentication, URL authorization, and custom errors have a powerful impact on ASP.NET applications. Witness the unified, distributed configuration model, and considerations you should make in XCopy deploying IIS and ASP.NET configuration in the same file. You’ll receive important best practices and recommendations for how to write ASP.NET applications that can take advantage of the capabilities in IIS 7. You’ll also learn important considerations for how to best prepare your existing applications for a smooth transition.

AMS310: Web Server Extensibility: Building IIS7 Modules to Enhance ASP.NET Web Applications
Andrew Lin
Have you written an ISAPI filter, or ASP.NET HTTP module? Ever wanted to write a module that intercepted every request and did something especially for your application? Have you ever wanted to implement your own wire authentication, URL rewriter, or your own custom logging or reporting infrastructure? Come see how IIS 7 makes all of these possible with brand new APIs. In this session, we’ll cover how to build core server modules with both native and managed code. If you’re a low level, high performance, or custom function kind of web developer, this session is for you.

DATA AND XML

ADX302: Architecting a Realistic Middle-tier with the .NET Framework 2.0—Part I
Dino Esposito
If you know about data readers and datasets, know that stored procedures are faster than SQL Server commands, and tend to feel iffy when you see a SELECT * or a Visual Studio .NET data wizard, then, congratulations, you passed the test and might just be ready to build a realistic data access layer with the .NET Framework 2.0. What do you need? First, a working knowledge of some design patterns to get started and get some guidance on how to lay out entities. Second, a working knowledge of collections and generics to more easily map groups of entities to programmable objects. Third, a clear idea of options and trade-offs about boring but necessary things like security, paging, caching, data formats. In the first part of the session, we’ll discuss and compare enterprise design patterns for the middle-tier including Data Mapper, Table Data Gateway, Data Transfer Object, and Factory. We also look at pros and cons of datasets and custom collections.

ADX301: Architecting a Realistic Middle-tier with the .NET Framework 2.0—Part II
Dino Esposito
The second part of the session is almost slideless and fully dedicated to practical source code. In particular, we’ll carefully review the source code of a sample open, SourceForge-hosted application—the Northwind Starter Kit—designed as the blueprint of a .NET layered architecture. The application employs a middle-tier designed using common patterns and data structures as illustrated in Part I of this session. We’ll also compare this approach to the wizards and the real code generated by the Visual Studio 2005 data designers.

ADX202: Minimize Code with TableAdapters and Strongly-Typed DataSets
Dan Wahlin
Version 2 of the .NET Framework includes support for new TableAdapter functionality that allows you to work with strongly-typed datasets easier than ever before. In this session Dan Wahlin will demonstrate how to use XSD schemas along with the new TableAdapter functionality in Visual Studio .NET 2005 to build an N-Layer ASP.NET application quickly and easily with a minimal amount of code.

ADX201: What's New in ADO.NET 2.0 and SqlClient?
Alex Homer
ADO.NET in version 2.0 of the .NET Framework is more an evolution that a revolution. Yet there are many exciting new features, and enhancements of existing classes that make it easier to accomplish common data access tasks and get better performance at the same time. This session summarizes all of the new SqlClient features that work with SQL Server 2000 onwards, and looks in detail at those that are especially exciting - such as asynchronous data access, promotable transactions, provider-independent code, the new database schema API, the changes to the DataSet and DataTable classes, and more.

GENERAL ASP.NET

AGN302: ASP.NET 2.0 Tips and Tricks
Rob Howard
In this session, we’ll look at ten tips and tricks for ASP.NET 2.0 that you can immediately put to practical use. For example, we’ll use the Master Pages functionality of ASP.NET 2.0 to show off how you can extend it with inheritance. We’ll also show off great tips like how to maximize SQL cache invalidation in your application.

AGN301: Building blogs.msdn.com
Rob Howard
Several of the blogs on blogs.msdn.com server over 10 million impressions per-month! All of this is accomplished on two Web servers and a single database server and is built completely on ASP.NET. In this session, we’ll walk through tips & tricks used to build a high-scale application such as this.

PERSONALIZATION AND MEMBERSHIP

APM301: Customizing the ASP.NET Provider Framework
Dave Sussman
One of the key features of ASP.NET 2.0 is its extensibility, which it makes possible using a Provider Framework. Features such as membership, role management and navigation to name a few, use the provider model, allowing you to replace the existing functionality with your own. In this session, we'll look at how the provider model works, how you can plug in your own providers, and how to create providers to allow your own data stores to be used with standard controls.

WEB FORMS AND CONTROLS

AFR302: Black-Belt Data Binding
Dave Sussman
The data source controls in ASP.NET 2.0 provide simplified binding, and at first seem too simple for complex or enterprise Web sites. They do, however, provide the best way to support display and editing of data. This session will cover advanced use of the data source controls, including hierarchical data-binding, using events to interact with the data both before and after the command has been run, and how to bind business and data layers in an n-tier environment.

AFR301: Building ASP.NET 2.0 Data-Driven Applications
Rob Howard
In this session we’ll use the new ASP.NET 2.0 data controls to build a real-world application in just minutes using new tools found in Visual Studio 2005. We’ll additionally look at some code generation examples to demonstrate how you can write an rich application in just a few minutes.

AFR201: Data Control Tips and Tricks
Paul Litwin
We've all seen the basic drag and drop demos of the 2.0 data controls, but you don't build solutions using demo code. In this session, you'll dig deeper into the data controls and the data source controls. During this session, you'll learn such things as how to add drop-down and check-box fields, how to set a default field value for inserts, how to update database fields that don't appear in a FormView or DetailsView, how to create GridView controls that can be bound to different datasets on the fly, and how to deal with Identity columns during inserts.

KEYNOTE SESSION

ASPKEY: Bringing the Web to Life with ASP.NET AJAX
Scott Guthrie
Brian Goldfarb
Microsoft ASP.NET AJAX is the official name of the technology formerly code-named ASP.NET “Atlas.” Follow along as Scott builds a complete Web site with interactive, responsive UI and more efficient server communication from scratch. See first-hand the end-to-end developer productivity and efficiency benefits of Visual Studio 2005, ASP.NET 2.0, IIS7 and Windows Vista.

DEVKEY: Windows Vista, the 2007 Office system, and ASP.NET AJAX
Scott Guthrie
Jason McConnell
Windows Vista and the 2007 Office System provide a wealth of new capabilities that enable you to build dynamic solutions more productively. ASP.NET AJAX technologies will help you create compelling Web sites with a richer and more interactive user experience. With these updates to the Microsoft application platform, you will enjoy productive and familiar tools for building a breadth of Windows, Web, and business solutions on a secure and dependable environment. This keynote session will provide you with an overview of these latest advances for building modern applications and reveal several new tools for helping you become more productive and achieve better results faster.

ARCHITECTURE, PATTERNS & PRACTICES

AAR201: Getting Started with Enterprise Library
Alex Homer
In recent years, the Microsoft Patterns & Practices (p&p) group has been producing guidance and software that makes building enterprise applications easier. Recent releases include the Enterprise Library - a combination of the various application blocks released in the past under as a single installable solution that combines integration between the blocks with a comprehensive configuration system that makes it easy to add the blocks to your applications, and configure them. The blocks also now support a standard system of exposing functionality to users, and enabling the creation of custom providers. This session looks at what the Enterprise Library can do for you, some of the ways you can use it, and an introduction to creating custom providers.

Navigation and Sitemaps

ANV201: ASP.NET 2.0 Navigation
Dave Sussman
Navigation in ASP.NET 2.0 is supported by a framework, integrating the storage as well as the display of menu items. This framework allows menu data to be stored in multiple locations, integrates with site security, and can be customized at run time to cater for custom navigation scenarios. This session will cover how to get the most from the navigation framework, including customized displays, security, and using additional tools to edit the site map and auto-generate site pages from the site map.

PERFORMANCE AND SCALABILITY

APF202: .NET Caching Best Practices
Steven Smith
Caching appropriately can increase Web application performance more than any other technique. Learn about how caching works, when and how to use it, and best practices to use in your code to avoid common errors associated with improper cache usage. In addition, this session will cover new caching features available in ASP.NET 2.0. This session is code- and demo-heavy and will not disappoint!

APF201: Improving .NET Application Performance and Scalability
Steven Smith
This session will focus on techniques for locating bottlenecks in .NET applications, and best practices for designing applications with scalability in mind. Load testing, HTML optimizations, caching, and other high-impact tools and techniques will be discussed and demonstrated. Learn how to efficiently identify the "low hanging fruit" in your application that can offer big performance and scalability gains with minimal coding. These techniques will work equally well for ASP.NET 1.x or ASP.NET 2.0.

REPORTING

ARP201: SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services for Web Developers, Part 1
Paul Litwin
In part 1 of this two-part session, you'll learn how to get started creating Web-based reports with SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services (SSRS). The session will start with an overview of the Reporting Services architecture. You'll learn how to employ the Reporting Services report designer within Visual Studio to construct complex tabular and matrix-based reports with ease. You'll learn how to create reports containing calculated values, groups, headers and footers, aggregate functions, and parameters. You'll also learn about conditional formatting and multi-valued parameters.

ARP202: SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services for Web Developers, Part 2
Paul Litwin
In part 2 of this two-part session, you'll learn some of the more advanced fearures of SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services (SSRS). You'll learn how to create matrix and chart reports. You'll delve into managing your reports using Report Manager and the SQL Server Management Studio Snap-In. You'll explore report and data source security and how to deploy your reports. You'll also take a look at the new server-less report designer and the ReportViewer control. Finally, we'll wrap things up by taking a look at the new end-user reporting tool, Report Builder, and how to provide data to end-user reports using a Report Model project.

WEB PARTS

AWP201: Building Portal Applications with ASP.NET 2.0 Web Parts
Stephen Walther
The Web Part Framework -- included with ASP.NET 2.0 -- enables you to build Web applications which can be easily personalized. By taking advantage of Web Parts, an application can be customized by each user or by a single administrator. In this session, Stephen Walther provides you with an introduction to the Web Parts framework. You learn how to build a simple portal application by creating custom Web Parts. You also learn how to take advantage of several advanced features of Web Parts such as custom verbs and Web Part connections.

INTERNATIONALIZATION AND LOCALIZATION

AIL301: A Data-Driven Approach to Internationalization with ASP.NET
Rick Strahl
Localization is a common scenario for Web applications. There are many approaches available and the most common suggestion is to use custom resources to provide translation at compile time. However, for true flexibility and the ability to more easily perform translation tasks, a data-driven approach that stores translation text in a database can provide much more flexibility and the ability to dynamically translate applications on the fly at runtime without recompilation. In this session, we'll see an implementation of a Language and Message manager framework that is hooked into the ASP.NET page and control model that allows for easy translation of your user interface controls at runtime. Featuring both the ability to perform the task of translation at runtime in the live UI as well as switching languages on the fly. Although focus will be primarily on language translation, this session also touches on related localization issues such as assigning locale information and dealing with character encodings.

MASTER PAGES AND THEMES

AMP201: Designing ASP.NET 2.0 Web Sites with Master Pages and Themes
Stephen Walther
Master Pages -- a new feature of ASP.NET 2.0 -- enable you to provide your Web site with a consistent look and feel. By taking advantage of Master Pages, you can create one page layout and apply the layout to all the pages in your application. Themes enable you to apply a consistent style to the appearance of the pages in your Web application. In this session, Stephen Walther introduces you to Master Pages and Themes and provides you with some advanced techniques for using these new features of the ASP.NET 2.0 Framework in your applications.

PROGRAMMING AND CODE

APG301: Asynchronous Programming for ASP.NET Developers
Julie Lerman
Asynchronous programming makes so much sense for Web applications but is often tough to acheive. With .NET 2.0, there are a number of new methods to simplify asynchronous development. These can be found in Web pages, in ADO.NET, in Web services and the component model base classes. This session will examine these various ways to leverage asynchronous programming in your Web development and make suggestions for which methods are appropriate for particular scenarios.

WEB SERVICES AND SOA

AWS301: Generate Dynamic Maps: Real Life .NET 2.0 XML and Web Services
Dan Wahlin
XML provides an excellent way to markup a variety of data and when combined with Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG), powerful and flexible applications can be created. In this session, attendees will see firsthand how XML containing world map points and airline flight routes can be converted into a dynamic SVG image using native .NET parsing APIs. The session will discuss the pros and cons of different XML-to-SVG techniques and demonstrate how to integrate Web services into SVG applications.

VISUAL STUDIO TEAM SYSTEM

ATS301: Test -Driven Development and Continuous Integration for ASP.NET and VSTS
Steven Smith
Learn how to set up a Continuous Integration(CI) environment and build server using the latest Microsoft developer tools. Build better applications through the use of "test-driven development" (TDD). This session will demonstrate unit testing, Web application testing, data-driven tests, performance tests, MSBuild, and Team Foundation Server, working together to create a highly productive development environment.

CLIENT SIDE AND AJAX

ACS201: An Introduction to AJAX Technologies with ASP.NET
Rick Strahl
There's lots of talk about AJAX and rich browser applications these days. But what is AJAX and how does it apply to the applications you need to build today? We'll walk through the technology behind AJAX and explore where it fits in current Web development scenarios and more importantly where it doesn't. Although the 'hot' topic at the moment, AJAX use should be carefully considered in light of browser requirements, accessibility and application design considerations as it has a significant impact on all of them. We'll look at technologies available to let you utilize AJAX technology in ASP.NET 1.1 and 2.0. In the process we'll look at Anthem.NET library for basic AJAX usage in 1.1 and 2.0 applications, client script callbacks in ASP.NET 2.0, a custom implementation for hover windows and the ATLAS framework forthcoming from Microsoft. We'll discuss issues such as balancing complexity vs. cool factor, understanding load characteristics, and choosing the right tools to build applications using AJAX technology.

ACS301: Atlas, XML and Web Services: How it all Fits Together
Dan Wahlin
Wondering how AJAX-enabled ASP.NET Web Forms actually work behind the scenes? In this session, Dan Wahlin will provide in-depth details on the role XML and Web services play with Microsoft's new Atlas technology. Learn how to expose Web services that can provide a variety of data to your pages without requiring page refreshes.

ACS203: Managing and Deploying ASP.NET 2.0 Applications and Web Services
Julie Lerman
Visual Studio 2005 has made drastic changes to the way we create, manage and deploy our web applications. This session will sort out working with the file-based Web server compared to programming against IIS and some of the issues that you may face. We will look at the various choices for deploying your Web apps and Web services, when to use each one and how to deal with updates. The session will also cover the security implications to be aware of when trying to use some of the deployment options. Lastly, we will take a look at the Web Application Projects add-in that was created for developers who do not want to give up the project model of Visual Studio 2003.

ACS202: Taking ATLAS for a Ride
Rick Strahl
ASP.NET "Atlas" is Microsoft’s new client-side/AJAX extension for ASP.NET slanted as an add-on for ASP.NET 2.0. It introduces a rich client-side library that brings many .NET classes and features to browser-based JavaScript. It also provides for a rich declarative markup language to define control layout and behavior and all of the plumbing necessary to make client-side calls to the server to return rich data to the client. In this session, I’ll introduce you to the core features that the "Atlas"framework provides and walk through a number of scenarios with examples that demonstrate the rich functionality available to build rich client applications running inside of the Web browser.

ACCESSIBILITY

AAC201: Maximizing Web Site Accessibility for Visitors with Disabilities
Alex Homer
It's easy to create great Web sites with ASP.NET, using the built-in features of the Framework and the range of server controls that are provided. But it's also just too easy to test the site with a few graphical browsers, and forget about the requirements of the many visitors that may be using text-based and other specialized user agents, which are designed to help them overcome physical limitations with regards to sight, movement, etc. Providing easier access and navigation, and opening up the content to these kinds of visitors, isn't that difficult to do - it just requires an understanding of the problems and the application of a few useful techniques. In this session, we review these techniques, see how ASP.NET 2.0 provides useful assistance in meeting accessibility requirements, and help you to build in features that can make the world of difference, without compromising your site as a whole.

SOLUTIONS AND CASE STUDIES

AMS205: MSNBC.com In Depth: A Look Into the Technology and Product Development Strategy Behind One of the Busiest Web Sites in the World
Travis McElfresh
Peter Durham
MSNBC.com is the award-winning news site widely recognized as the first choice for online news consumers across the board. MSNBC.com receives over 1 billion page views and over 72 million unique users each month! Come get some candid insight into our successes and failures. A whirlwind tour through the product development team structures, software development life cycle processes, and Microsoft .NET-based platform architecture used to balance an insanely agile breaking news cycle with a highly available, secure, and scalable publishing platform under extreme site traffic conditions.

EXECUTIVE KEYNOTE

EXECKEY: Get Ready for a New Day: Microsoft, Office, Windows Vista & Microsoft Exchange Server 2007
Ron Markezich
Learn how Vista, Office and Exchange work together better than ever! We'll show how you, as a developer and IT professional, can drive more value to your businesses by deploying these fantastic products. You'll see how Vista, Office and Exchange will help protect and manage content while reducing IT costs and improve security. You'll also learn how they'll enable you to simplify how people work together in your organization and how these products will help your business find information and improve insight. Join us for this keynote presentation, delivered by Ron Markezich - Microsoft's own CIO!

SPECIAL SESSION

SPECIAL: Election Night with MSNBC.com
 Microsoft
What’s it like to work at a top-tier web site on one of the busiest days of its year? Visit with the MSNBC.com team here at DevConnections for Election Night and find out! You’ll get an inside look at our technology and operations processes as we give the nation the vote results and analysis. In return, we want to find out about you, and see if you have what it takes to succeed on our team. Pre-registration and NDA is required, and attendance is extremely limited, to  enable one-on-one discussions. For more information, visit http://inside.msnbc.com/.