In the tradition of Red vs Blue, Rooster Teeth has come out with a new video series called 1-800-MAGIC based on the new Xbox 360 game Shadowrun. It was so funny, I just had to post it here. This is episode 1 and 2, so there should be many to follow.

Tampa Code Camp 2007

Saturday July 14th, 2007

St. Petersburg College EpiCenter
13805 58th Street North, Largo Florida

What is Code Camp? Code Camp is a FREE one day event held on Saturday July 14th 2007. This is the third year for Tampa Code Camp. The event will have speakers from the local community and beyond. Speakers will be presenting some of the most requested topics like ASP.NET AJAX, Visual Studio Orcas, Silverlight, Widows Presentation Foundation, Share Point 2007 and SQL Server 2005. This event is like Tech-Ed for Free but its community driven and its the only place you can get this content for free.

We even supply breakfast and lunch.

I have been collecting a lot of very nice developer tools and thought I would start putting together a list of my favorite ones.  This will be an on going effort, so I will give it  a  permanent navigation link.

Top Developer Tools

1. Lutz .NET Reflector - Reflector is the class browser, explorer, analyzer and documentation viewer for .NET. Reflector allows to easily view, navigate, search, decompile and analyze .NET assemblies in C#, Visual Basic and IL.
2. Virtual PC - Free from Microsoft, Virtual PC allows you to run multiple operating systems at the same time on the same physical computer. I like to keep my Visual Studio 2003 tucked away inside a VPC.
3. Internet Explorer Developer Toolbar - Free from Microsoft, this is an add-in toolbar for Internet explorer that enables the developer to examine various part of a web page. I did a recent blog post on that can be found here.
4. ExamDiff Pro - Not a free program, but the best directory/file difference & merge tools I have found. I use this for code migrations to production servers.  If you are looking for a free open source program, try WinMerge.
5. Notepad2 - A fast, light and free notepad replacement with syntax highlighting aimed at the developers' needs. This is a must for any development toolkit.
6. .NET Webservice Studio  - This free tool is used to invoke web methods interactively.  This tool is located on GotDotNet which is being phased out.
7. WinSnap - Not a free piece of software, but one of the best image capture program I have found, and best of all, it works excellent with Vista, including Aero Glass with shadows and transparencies.
8. Paint.NET - This Photoshop like program is a free image editing and photo manipulation software designed to be used on computers that run Windows. It supports layers, unlimited undo, special effects, and a wide variety of useful and powerful tools. It is also written in C#.
9. Fiddler - Fiddler is freeware and can debug HTTP traffic from virtually any application, including Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, and Opera. Fiddler allows you to inspect all HTTP Traffic, set breakpoints, and "fiddle" with incoming or outgoing data.
10. XmlPad - This is a great Freeware XML editor with advanced features like auto-formatting and regular expression support. XmlPad is a must for any web developer and should be part of his/her toolkit.

Last Update - 12/10/2007

This weekend after playing the Halo 3 beta for a while, I started playing Command & Conquer 3 for the Xbox 360 some. I used to play the older games like Command & Conquer 2 and Red Alert and I really got into the multiplayer aspects of those games. My opponent and I would use two phone lines so we could play the game and communicate at the same time. We didn't have Xbox Live back then.

Also, the older games were PC based so I didn't know if I could adjust to playing a Real-time Strategy (RTS) with a console controller. I was just too use to being able to block in a selection of troops and issue them orders. The simple answer is yes, I adjusted just fine. The game developers laid out an easy to follow flow that gives you a very similar game experience. It is a bit harder to select just certain troops, but I am quickly adapting.

As with the previous games, the new one has Global Defense Initiative (GDI) and The Brotherhood of NOD at it again with a new third faction thrown into the mix, the Scrin. The Scrin are an Alien race that reminds me of the bug creatures from the movie Starship Troopers. As a further reminder, Michael Ironside is your Commanding General in game, "Do you want to live forever?".  Yes, once again Westwood/EA Games has opted for my preferred method of using live actors for cut screens rather than computer generated characters. This game uses well known actors from the TV shows Battlestar Galactica and Lost. Kane from the previous games is also making his return.

If you are a fan of the previous games than you won't be disappointed in the Xbox 360 version of the game.

Bungie's flagship first person shooter Halo 3 will be available tomorrow May the 16th in beta form.  Owners of Crackdown will be able to download it via Microsoft's Live Marketplace for free.

Here is what will be with the beta:

When gamers gather online to play the multiplayer beta via Xbox LIVE in May, they will be treated to three richly detailed, action-oriented maps: Snowbound, High Ground and Valhalla, which represent a mixture of large- and medium-scale combat environments and are brand-new to "Halo 3." Each map will test gamers' mettle as they are placed behind the controls of new "Halo 3" vehicles such as the agile Mongoose all-terrain vehicle, and armed with deadly weapons such as the new and improved Assault Rifle, the ferocious Brute Spiker, the devastating Spartan Laser and the treacherous new Spike Grenades. This is just a taste of what gamers will experience later this fall when "Halo 3" goes on sale.

Gamers worldwide who did not participate in the "Rule of Three" promotion but are interested in joining the multiplayer beta of "Halo 3" can still participate through the purchase of the critically acclaimed Xbox 360 title "Crackdown," which was launched in February. Each copy of "Crackdown" has been specially marked with a "Halo 3" beta sticker prior to the beta period, and starting May 16 the game will act as a key for gamers to download and participate in the "Halo 3" multiplayer beta.

The website can be found at Halo 3. I'll see you all online!

I'm not sure how I missed it, but the Internet Explorer Developer Toolbar version 1.00.2188.0 was released 5/7/2007. This is a free web page development tool by Microsoft. This is an add-on for Internet Explorer that enables the developer transverse and edit the page DOM, view object class names, match CSS selectors to page elements,  use a color picker and a pixel ruler. Other features include displaying image dimensions and table outlining.  

These tools are intended to help the developer diagnose and troubleshoot their web pages and doesn't including any script debugging at this time. I'll be adding this add-in a cool developer tool list that I have been working on.

I was reading my blogs yesterday morning and ran across this comic from Penny Arcade. I've played a bit of Xbox 360 and have run across this guy a few times. Usually I just avoid him, but this would be a nice option too.

Event Code: 117791

5/25/2007

9:00 AM - 4:00 PM

Welcome Time:
5/25/2007 8:30 AM Eastern Time

Join new and experienced Microsoft winform and web developers for a day long FREE Developer Event covering Enterprise Library and Software Factories from Microsoft Patterns and Practices. Learn to increase developer productivity and application quality using Enterprise Library building blocks, code generation, and proven practices for Smart / Mobile Clients, Web Clients, and Web Services.

More information here.