Fingerprints. A little peanut sauce. A Cthulu ’08 sticker (why vote for the Lesser
Evil?).

Oh yeah. I also have these program which are little anthropomorphized series of data
which fight each other to death on a giant battlefield inside my computer in order
to keep Norton Antivirus from controlling my internet connection. I’ve upgraded my
main computers to Vista x64 (UAC OFF!), mainly because I like pain. Now that I’ve
been hostage to Vista for a while, I must say this about my captor: it’s not as as
bad as people say. As long as you’ve got a steaming hot lap warmer with 4gb of RAM,
it performs just fine and with UAC off, it’s not really annoying. Second….I don’t
know what MS was thinking with this thing. It’s got exactly ONE feature that I give
a sh– about as a user. For all of the pain of a new operating system and Microsoft’s
compulsion to MOVE EVERYTHING AROUND SOMEWHERE ELSE,
Vista doesn’t really offer much to give you a better user experience. I like the command/search/launcher
box in the Start Menu. That’s it. That’s the only reason I don’t just run back to
good old XP. One feature.

Anyways. We were talking about tools….

Development Tools

• Notepad++: Monolithic
  IDEs and design surfaces and friendly talking A.I.s notwithstanding, coding is still
  about text. Notepad++ is a solid replacement for the pathetic text editor dumped in
  the O.S. by ‘One Feature’ Vista. Syntax highlighting. Regex search and replace. Tabs.
  If I’m not in Visual Studio, I’m editing text in Notepad++.

• TortoiseSVN: All of the ‘new developer’
  resources I read seem to beg their readers to use source control. I was using source
  control before I started working in code. Having a system that backs up your information…and
  it’s changes…is magic. The amount of pain saved for very light cost is amazing.
  TortoiseSVN is a windows UI for the Subversion source control system. I use hosted
  SVN at Beanstalk even though it’s simple to run your own repository. A couple of bucks
  a month is a bargain value for not worrying about the safety of your data.

• CodeRush
  and Refactor Pro!: Currently I use CodeRush primarily for it’s templating engine.
  I think this is because I’m a bit too lazy to figure out a code generator. I may need
  to give that a little bit of thought. I like MyGeneration,
  but it’s CSLA templates seemed to be inadequate for my needs…perhaps I haven’t paid
  the right attention. Anyways. CodeRush is like Code Snippets on Spinach! At the flick
  of your fingers it creates classes and properties and all of the boilerplate code
  that we seem to write constantly in our development processes.  Writing in a
  high-ceremony language like C# can be a pain. CodeRush takes the pain away. And it
  does a million other things as well. CodeRush will amaze you in your first 10 minutes.
  And then you’ll still be learning amazing new things months later.

• Nullsoft Installer System: I started
  deploying my projects with the MSI project built into Visual Studio. Maybe it was
  too wizardy. Maybe I just never learned how it worked well enough. The fault was probably
  mine. However, what I ended up with was installers that wouldn’t upgrade to new versions,
  that were overly complex, and that I had to manually work with in deploying. NSIS
  is an installer from a simpler day. It zips all the files together and then copies
  them to where they belong on the users system. Some simple scripts define the files
  to include, where to put them, and where to put shortcuts. Upgrading is simply about
  running a newer version installer. Building is as simple as running a script. NSIS
  made my deployments simple and understandable.

• NUnit: Test Driven Development seems
  to be talked about everywhere these days. It’s an awesome methodology for making better
  code. I don’t do that. TDD means writing well architected code from scratch, all the
  time. I’m not sure what well-architected code is yet. I keep learning new things,
  and I’m coming along, but starting with perfection is a bit hard for now. However,
  Test-Enabled Development? I can see if the things I’m writing without firing up a
  GUI or IIS. I can make changes and check for breakage. I can refactor. And…well…making
  tests makes me thing about how my code could be better designed. Occasionally I do
  a little Test Refactored Development. That just makes me a better coder.

• Telerik RadControls: The basic .NET controls
  leave your application looking so generic, and while you can develop serious functionality,
  it’s a lot of work. Telerik’s UI controls make your product look beautiful, and most
  advanced functionality is just a matter of doing a good data binding. Grab your CSLA
  .NET objects, and you’re riding a giant rocket mounted to a railway sled! Exhilarating. 

• Mailbee .NET: I have barely used these, but
  I bought them to create a IMAP automation tool, and the result was quick, easy, and
  reliable. If your application needs to interact with email, I recommend these components.
  They aren’t very expensive, and the developer keeps updating them (updates are free
  for the folk who have paid).

• StyleCop: Code which is
  written to a formatting standard is easier to read, faster to understand, and safer
  to change. I’m not particularly religious about the Code Style you choose, but you
  should have one. Style Cop takes the uncertainty out of the process, since it has
  a ‘One
  Microsoft Way‘ standard style for you to use, and it will check your code for
  you. Start checking your code with it, and your code will look better for the process.
  Plus it gives you some cool busywork to do, when you’re staring blankly at your screen
  after the boss yells at you for showing up late to work after you chase that rabbit
  around all night.

That’s my list for now. There’s more stuff added  to it all the time. The focus
of the next installment will be selecting the proper athame and grimoire for writing
a daemon. Or maybe something having to do with cake.