Google adds to search

Google has begun rolling out 3 new additions to its search engine on November 20th. The search engine giant added a Promote, Remove and Comment buttons beside each search to help users define their results better.



The Promote feature will allow you to move results up to the top of the list of your results, for future searches. This little addition to the search engine will help users by adding their favourite web sites to the top of each individual search result, that brings back that page. So for instance, if a user wished to promote www.neowin.net to the top of the page, and query a search for a keyword on the front page, it would place Neowin.net on the top of your search results. This is a benefit for people who promote their favourite sites like Neowin to return the first result.

Beside the Promote button, comes the Remove button. This button will delete that result from your future searches, to prevent it from coming back up again. This could be helpful in blocking those web sites that provide no helpful information to you. This is a great way to stop going back to the same bad result time and time again.

Finally, the Comment button, where users can leave a comment about any result, making it useful for coming back to later. Users can add helpful comments for other users, or for themselves when visiting the site next time.

Google has become one step closer to being your next bookmark organizer. Now you can view, save and edit your favourite sites all within Google. The bad thing about these features is, the fact most people don't search the same thing all the time, making it hard to take advantage of some of these features.

More model-driven development in .NET Framework "4", Visual Studio "10"

Microsoft gave hints about coming releases of the .NET Framework "4" (4.0?) and Visual Studio "10" (2010?) at the Microsoft SOA & Business Process Conference. They’ll be part of a multiyear effort called "Oslo" that aims to make composite applications more mainstream.
The most interesting parts of the press release were the first mentions (that I have seen) of the future versions of the .NET Framework and Visual Studio:

Building on the technology available today, the “Oslo” advancements will be delivered through Microsoft server and tools products in five key areas:
•Server. Microsoft BizTalk Server “6” will continue to provide a core foundation for distributed and highly scalable SOA and BPM solutions, and deliver the capability to develop, manage and deploy composite applications.
•Services. BizTalk Services “1” will offer a commercially supported release of Web-based services enabling hosted composite applications that cross organizational boundaries. This release will include advanced messaging, identity and workflow capabilities.

•Framework. The Microsoft .NET Framework “4” release will further enable model-driven development with Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) and Windows Workflow Foundation (WF).

•Tools. New technology planned for Visual Studio “10” will make significant strides in end-to-end application life-cycle management through new tools for model-driven design of distributed applications.

•Repository. There will also be investments in aligning the metadata repositories across the Server and Tools product sets. Microsoft System Center “5,” Visual Studio “10” and BizTalk Server “6” will utilize a repository technology for managing, versioning and deploying models.
Not every programmer is thrilled in model-driven development, but I think it has it’s place in certain types of projects where reusability is easier to achieve.

Microsoft Unveils Next Version of Visual Studio and .NET Framework

Microsoft Corp. today provided the first look at the next version of its developer tools and platform, which will be named Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4.0. Microsoft described the next release through the following five focus areas: riding the next-generation platform wave, inspiring developer delight, powering breakthrough departmental applications, enabling emerging trends such as cloud computing, and democratizing application life-cycle management (ALM).

Today’s announcement included an in-depth look at how Visual Studio Team System (VSTS) 2010 (code-named “Rosario”) will help democratize ALM with a unique solution that brings all the members of a development organization into the application development life cycle, and removes many of the existing barriers to integration. Additional details on the other focus areas will be disclosed over the product development cycle.

“With Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4.0, we are focused on the core pillars of developer experience, support for the latest platforms spanning client, server, services and devices, targeted experiences for specific application types, and core architecture improvements,” said S. “Soma” Somasegar, senior vice president of the Developer Division at Microsoft. “These pillars are designed specifically to meet the needs of developers, the teams that drive the application life cycle from idea to delivery, and the customers that demand the highest quality applications across multiple platforms. You can expect to hear a lot more about Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4.0 in the coming months.”

Democratizing Application Life-Cycle Management
Today, much of application development remains siloed throughout the enterprise, leading to decreased productivity and lengthy product development cycles. With VSTS 2010, Microsoft is taking the next step forward in giving individuals and development organizations an advanced solution that enables them to integrate effectively and build and deliver high-quality applications.
This includes new capabilities that make it easier for all contributors on the software team to participate throughout the life cycle — from the core developers and testers to the wider team of project managers, designers and business analysts. Highlights include the following:

• Modeling tools.
With VSTS 2010 Architecture, Microsoft will enable both technical and nontechnical users to create and use models to collaborate and to define business and system functionality graphically. The new version supports both Unified Modeling Language and Domain Specific Language support, so development organizations will have the right tool for right job. The new modeling capabilities in VSTS 2010 are a core part of the larger Microsoft modeling platform, which will also include the “Oslo” repository, tools and language.

• Improved efficiency throughout the test cycle.
With VSTS 2010, Microsoft has made a significant investment in testing features and dramatically simplifying the tools required to integrate testing across the life cycle. New features include the ability to eliminate nonreproducible bugs, fast setup and deployment of tests to ensure the highest degree of completeness of test, focused test planning and progress tracking, and ensuring that all code changes are properly tested.

• Substantial improvements in collaboration capabilities.
Microsoft has made major investments in the capabilities and scalability of Team Foundation Server (TFS) including significant improvements that allow teams to configure and adopt any flavor of Agile development processes. Teams can track and trace work more easily with richer linking of work items enabling hierarchical work item relationships. In the source code management system, TFS now provides visualization tools for tracking changes across branches and into the production build. VSTS 2010 also introduces workflow-based builds that catch errors before they have a chance to affect the rest of the team or, worse, enter production. Finally, administrators will find dramatically simpler TFS deployment and management.

“The application life cycle is an integral part of today’s business. Regardless of core competencies, all organizations are driven by software that is created and customized to deliver a competitive advantage,” said Theresa Lanowitz, founder of voke, inc. “Enterprises that invest in an ALM solution can decrease their total cost of ownership of applications in their IT portfolio, and bring about a global approach that is an integrated and expansive system consisting of people, processes and technology. This global approach to ALM facilitates collaboration and takes the risk out of software development to produce predictable and reliable results for an optimized business outcome. Solutions such as VSTS are poised to take advantage of market opportunity by offering an application life-cycle platform to help enterprises realize this ROI benefit.”
In another move to increase integration across the life cycle, Microsoft also announced that VSTS 2010 will provide a unified VSTS Development and Database product. As a benefit to existing Software Assurance (SA) customers, those who currently own Visual Studio Team System 2008 Development Edition or Visual Studio Team System 2008 Database Edition will receive all the following products starting Oct. 1, 2008, for free:

• Visual Studio Team System 2008 Development Edition
• Visual Studio Team System 2008 Database Edition
• Visual Studio 2005 Team System for Software Developers
• Visual Studio 2005 Team System for Database Professionals

The products will be available to SA customers through their normal Microsoft Developer Network channel. More information can be found at http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/sa.
More information about Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4.0 is available at http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9537302.
Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

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