Nov 12, 2013

CSLA 4.0 Implementation - Update #3

As it is with any new technology, there is a ramp-up time to get proficient at it.
So far, the skill (learning C#) I was expecting to take me a long time to feel "semi-productive" with has taken a lot less time than I had anticipated. The skill (MVVM implementation) I thought was going to be easier to acquire has taken me longer. I'll go through each of the technologies I had to deal with in this journey and come back to this post to add or clarify certain items.

C#:

This one was, to me, the most intimidating, but once I got past the major "grammar" rules (how to declare a variable, how to do an IF block, a FOR loop, a FOR EACH loop, etc.) it was a breeze. I would say that Lambda expressions are the most non-intuitive ones, but once the structure of them is commited to memory, it becomes easier to read and understand the purpose of the instruction. Overall Level: Easy.

XAML (WPF / SilverLight):

I have wrestled with this animal before. It took some time to get reaquinted with it. The most challenging piece was to remember to correctly segreggate the scope of the items defined on the CollectionViewSource. Once those, scope levels are defined and you provide a naming convention that provides you with a good understanding about the data contained in that ViewSource, then you are set!  In addition, there are plenty of great examples online to better understand working with XAML.

MVVM (BxF Implementation):

The principle behind this pattern is great​! However tracking it in code and appreciating its behavior from reading code is a bit tricky. I ended up drawing UML diagrams to get a static (conceptual model) and dynamic (system sequence diagram) view of how the pattern is implemented with BxF.  I am in the process of refining a series of documents to help understand this a little easier for some of my colleagues at our shop. I'll re-post with those materials later. 

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