MSDN published a great overview of message patterns that one might encounter in the course of implementing a Service Oriented Architecture. The article also gives a quick overview of SOA and touches on the benefits of message rather than method centric approach.

Another Microsoft conspiracy theory down the drain: LookOut is available for download. Update: download moved, updated link.

Mike Gunderloy pointed to the Visual Studio 2005 Product Line Overview page and commented that he doesn't understand why the Express line does not include source control support. This was one of the things that jumped out at me as well. The Express line of products is intended for a hobbyist programmer and one could do no greater service than introduce a beginner to the concept of source control. Fine, don't include VSS, but at least throw in the option to support SCC integration! IMO, SCC is the concept every beginning developer should be forced to learn. Thay may be too extreme...

An insightful blog entry by Aaron Stebner.

I blogged on this topic before, but just ran into a blog post by Paul van Brenk with a different set of issues.

Much has been said about ASP.NET code-beside vs. code-behind when the PDC preview of Whidbey (err, VS2005) rolled out. At the time, if memory serves, the IDE added support for code-beside and seemed to deprecate the code-behind model. The outcry from developers missing code-beside centered around the ability to check code for compile errors prior to deploying the application.The VS.Net team listened and, as of the May 2004 CTP release, brought back the ability to run a "compile" check against a web application. I put the word "compile" in quotes because no output assembly is actually generated, and therein lies one...