From ScottGu's blog:

Today’s release is a major refresh that provides a ton of new functionality and rounds out the feature-set.  Some of the major new features added since the February preview:

• Event handler generation and wire-up from the WYSIWYG designer    
• F7/Shift-F7 Navigation Support (switch between page views)
• Add New Item Wizard to add pages based on Master Pages (easily pick master)
• Richer Publishing Support
• Connection String and Settings Support in Web.Config
• Resources and .Resx Resource Editor Support
• Support for building multi-project applications and sub-web projects
• .ASPX files no longer locked when debugging
• Support for root-path based image and stylesheets (/images/foo.jpg)
• Control Registrations within Web.Config files
• Web Service Cross-Project Reference Support
• Section 508 and WCAG Accessibility Checker Support
• Ability to create an IIS Vroot/Application setting within Project Dialog
• SQL DataSource Control Support
• ASP.NET Custom Folder Templates
• Component Designer Support
• Support to Drag/Drop User Controls, StyleSheets, Images from Solution Explorer to designer
• New Web Service Project Template
• SQL Express Support

Walkthrough, help links, screenshots, and more - I've been using it for a few days now, and it works as advertised - just what the doctor ordered.

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I've been blogging in one way or another for almost 3 years now, and I've become convinced that if you're doing software development, especially Microsoft-centric development, and you don't have a blog or at the least a loaded RSS reader... then you're just not doing your job.

About 2 hours ago, I posted about what I thought was missing in the new Web Project structure... an hour later, I had a comment from the Web Platform & Tools PUM letting me know that not only were they aware of the situation, but a) they're days away from releasing a final version of the Web Application Project add-in that will give me exactly what I want, and b) I need to really catch up on my RSS feeds, because he blogged about it last week!

I fired off a quick thank you email, figuring that was that - and just as Florida was finishing off UCLA, my smartphone lit up with a shiny new email in my box.  Well, it was none other than scottgu again, only this time brandishing a shiny new copy of what looks like the final version of the WAP add-in!

Well, I'm floored... I post a mini-rant at 6:30, and at 8:30 the Unit Manager for the MS web platform was read my blog, commented, and responded to my email with exactly what I needed.  The Oracles, IBMs, etc. of the world really ought to pay attention... Microsoft has great support for production problems in PSS, great large-audience support in the microsoft.public.* newsgroups, and has just about a monopoly on personalized support via the blogosphere... Scoble would be proud.  :)

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There must be a way to change this.  Finally on my way to developing my first full-fledged .Net 2.0 app as a side project, and I notice that the code-behind page that Visual Studio 2005 gives you is missing a few things, most notably the control definitions and Page_Init.  Well, problem easily solved... right-click the class name for the page, click "Find All References", and lo and behold, I get a list - one of which looks like this:

public partial class signup : System.Web.SessionState.IRequiresSessionState {

Well, that looks like what I'm looking for, so I double-clicked the result... and got this:



Are they serious?  That's the default for this sort of thing?  Hmmm... can't be just me looking for this, so I searched Google Groups... nothing.  Searched the web... one thing in Russian I think... not much help.  So (*groan*) I dove into the options... to no avail.

This is just silly.  I found this blog entry that discusses how ASP.Net 2.0 automagically wires up Page_* methods to events if AutoEventWireup is set to true in the @Page directive - automagic is fine, but there really should be a way you can take a look at and even control the code that gets generated.  Maybe it's just the talk by Charles Petzold that I attended last year, but not having control over something like variable declarations and event hookup, even if I wouldn't change it 99% of the time is just troubling.  If I've learned anything being a Microsoft developer, it's that if there's one circumstance that will cause their automagic, drag-and-drop demos to be not so magical - that circumstance will come up time and time and time again (see also: anything but a TemplateColumn on a DataGrid).

I know I'm late to the party - but I hadn't expected to hit this sort of thing the very first day I decided to wire up a control's events... lame.

[Update: I've opened a bug on the MSDN feedback site for this - give it a vote if you have a spare second or 3.]

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