Microsoft details new domain-specific modeling tools
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Microsoft Corp. is continuing its push into the enterprise-level development market with a new framework and tool for Visual Studio Team System.
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(InfoWorld) - Looking to assist developers in building business applications, Microsoft published a second beta version of ADO.Net Entity Framework this week and a community technology preview of tools to work with the framework. The goal of the ADO.Net Entity Framework is to eliminate the impedance mismatch between data models and languages, saving developers from having to deal with these. An example of such a mismatch is objects and relational stores. Automation of complex processes is critical to the framework. "Today, when a developer builds an application, they have to write code that fills in the gaps between the way the data is stored in however many databases they interact with and the way they want to manipulate the data in their application," said Britt Johnston, product manager for data programmability tools at Microsoft. "Generally, what they do is create an object model that they write their code against." Developers might write an application that manipulates a CRM system with data for customers stored in 12 different tables, said Johnston. "With the Entity Framework, you can automate the process essentially of bringing all that data together and presenting it to the developer as a single entity so they can interact with it at a higher level of abstraction," Johnston said. Key new features in the framework beta release include events to customize code generation; complex programming types and entity key serialization. A key is a unique identifier for an entity, such as a customer ID. Metadata annotations and better support for LINQ (Language Integrated Query) also are included. LINQ features extensions to the .Net Framework to encompass language-integrated data query, set, and transform operations. Developers can access the framework on Microsoft's Web site. ADO.Net Entity Framework is due for general release as part of .Net Framework 3.5 in early-2008. Most would get it as part of an operating system update. The ADO.Net Entity Framework Tools Community Technology Preview for August features an early version of the ADO.Net Entity Designer, enabling users to visually design model and mappings using the Visual Studio 2008 Beta 2 release. The tools preview is accessible on Microsoft's download page with the tools to be part of Visual Studio 2008. With the framework, developers could focus on the needs of an application instead of the complexities of bridging disparate data representations. The framework consists of a data model and design-time and run-time services that allow developers to describe application data and interact with it in a conceptual level of abstraction appropriate for business applications, according to the company. This helps isolate the application from underlying logical database schemas.
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Microsoft on Monday added to an already dizzying array of planned Visual Studio 2005 offerings by unveiling a new version of the toolset for developers who fall between hobbyist and professional levels.
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Microsoft has started shipping the a BI tool set that lets users access its financial budgeting and forecasting capabilities through Excel and other Office applications.
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Higgins-project developers are creating a tool equivalent to Windows CardSpace but need Microsoft's go-ahead for certain features.
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Microsoft researchers talk about a variety of location-based tools they are developing.
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IBM this month plans to release an upgrade to its Rational Software Architect design and development tool that integrates with the IBM WebSphere Business Integration Modeler tool. The integration between the two offerings is intended to enable IT architects to take business models from the WebSphere tool and convert those to solutions via the UML-based Rational product, according to IBM officials. "They'll get a fairly good understanding of what the business process is that theyâre supposed to implement," said Alan Brown, IBM Distinguished Engineer.
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Microsoft Corp. is developing a common code base for all of its Dynamics ERP (enterprise resource planning) applications, a company executive said Wednesday.
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Three new models are designed for businesses and home office users.
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InfoWorld - Microsoft will work with 3D design and visualization software developer Dassault Syst&#232;mes, to add a new dimension to its Virtual Earth mapping and satellite imagery service, the companies announced Tuesday.
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InfoWorld - Sybase later this year will ship PowerDesigner 11.0, an enterprise data modeling tool for building or re-engineering business processes and aligning business and IT goals, according to the company.
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(InfoWorld) - At its partner conference this week MicrosoftÂ released new tools to help partners navigate two of the company's more complicated offerings: product licensing and the Windows Vista client OS. The licensing tool, called Microsoft LicenseWise, builds upon a previously released tool for Microsoft customers, Product License Advisor. Product License Advisor helps customers configure an IT environment and generate a report online that would tell them what licenses they would need and the cost, Mike Oldham, general manager for Microsoft's worldwide licensing and pricing, said in an interview at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference in Denver. LicenseWise picks up for Microsoft's business partners where that tool leaves off, he said. It allows a partner to access a quote a customer generated in Product License Advisor, build its own pricing into it, and then generate a proposal back to the customer for how much it would cost to license those products through the partner. Microsoft's complicated licensing schemes have long been a headache for partners and customers, but the company has made a concerted effort in the past several years to simplify the process, Oldham said. For instance, just two years ago, Microsoft had 74 licensing models customers could choose from; now they have nine, he said. More information about LicenseWise can be found on Microsoft's partner Web site. The new Vista tool also is an extension of software that is already available, called Windows Vista Hardware Assessment, said Mike Sievert, corporate vice president of the Windows business group. That application helps business users see how much effort it will take to migrate desktops in a company to Vista by testing the hardware and device-driver capability of PCs against the OS and issuing reports about those results The new tool, Windows Vista Business Value Assessment, allows partners to sit down with customers to not only assess how Vista will impact their network, but also figure out how to improve the TCO (total cost of ownership) of the installation, Sievert said. TCO is "front and center on the minds of our customers" when it comes to Vista, he said. Sievert acknowledged that business customers are still in the early stages of deploying the OS, which was released to business customers last November, so it's important Microsoft articulate how to upgrade to Vista in the most cost-effective way possible.
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The tools, part of an upcoming Visual Studio update, are focused on making it easier to create customized Web applications.
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Microsoft released on Tuesday a preview version of new tools intended to make it easier for companies to create custom Web applications.
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Also: Microsoft plans new BizTalk release for this year. [News.com Extra]
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Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 offers new features such as graphical systems views and enhanced reporting tools, and has been designed to be easier to deploy than its predecessor.
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Microsoft has previewed &quot;Whitehorse,&quot; a set of visual design tools intended to support the design and validation of Web services-based applications.