Yesterday evening, we held a very interesting VBUG user group meeting at Maidenhead. This was made possible through the support of Sybase so many thanks to Steven Dunn for providing us with the venue and refreshments.

During the first part of the meeting, Dave from Sybase gave us a demonstration of what to expect in PowerBuilder 12 and also a glimpse of the next release of DataWindow. The key technical features of these products include support for WPF and tight integration into the Visual Studio IDE. For those who have never used DataWindow, Steve made the point that the major benefit of the product is productivity. As an illustration, Dave mentioned the 'code shoot-out' contest during the VBUG conference last year where he created a CO2 monitoring application in just 6 hours. For anyone wishing to purchase DataWindow, Steve has kindly offered a discount for VBUG members.

In the second part of the evening, Peter Eagling gave an excellent session on robotics. In the past, Peter has taken part in the BBC program Robot Wars and holds the world record on the robot that does the furthest long jump.

The session began with a discussion of what a robot is and included discussions about Asimovs and Tildens robotic laws. The picture below shows Peter's latest creation. This eight footed robot has a microprocessor on each foot. Plastic gearing is used which works very well at absorbing any knocks. The 'rules' for each foot are persisted in a SQL Server database. 

     
 Pictures of Peter's Robots

Overall, the talk gave a very good insight into the world of robotics and illustrated the multi-disciplined nature of the field. You must have an aptitude for mechanical engineering as well as software skills to create a good robot.

The topic of Microsoft Robotics Studio was briefly covered but hopefully, Peter will come back at some point in the future to talk more about the programming aspcts of this subject.

At yesterday's VBUG user group meeting in Bracknell, Richard Griffin gave a great talk on WPF/XAML including demonstrations on several interesting projects that he's worked on.

Here are links to some of the topics that were mentioned in his session:

Using the IDataErrorInfo interface:
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.componentmodel.idataerrorinfo.aspx

Dr WPF - A helpful WPF resource:
http://www.drwpf.com/blog/

KAXAMK - A lightweight XAML editor:
http://www.kaxaml.com/

WPF Profiler:
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa969767.aspx

Richard is actively involved in the Silverlight usergroup and his next meeting is likely to take place next month in London.

Well done to VBUG co-ordinator Jyoti Majithia for being chosen as one the 5 finalists in the Microsoft DesignIT competition!

This is a charitable competition and the winner receives a £15k budget to help implement a technical solution.

Jyoti is working on a project for 'Fauna and Flora International' to help save species and habitats from destruction. It works by making conservation information accessible through the web and mobile devices.

If you think that this is a good idea, you can vote for it here:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-gb/competition/cc487593.aspx

Voting ends on Friday 11th April 2008.

The next event that I'm organising will take place next Wednesday. Richard Griffin and Felix Corke will give a presentation on WPF/XAML which will include some real life 'war stories'. This should be a very interesting event so for more details or to register, visit the link below.

http://www.vbug.com/events/default.aspx?region=Reading

On Tuesday 24th April, the VBUG Spring Conference takes place in Birmingham.

The technical content includes WPF, Silverlight, and MOSS and will be delivered by an excellent line up of speakers.

Both Andy Westgarth and myself will be there so come by and say hello if you decide to attend!

There are still places left so for further details or to book a place, visit:

http://www.vbug.com/Conference/Conference-April-2008.aspx

Dave McMahon (one of the most hardworking IT community leaders) is currently organising the Fest08 conference in Reading. Here's the blurb and more details can be found here: http://www.nxtgenug.net/Fest08

"NxtGenUG don't do conferences, they just have a good time and FEST08 which takes place at TVP Reading, promises to be in the normal vein of NxtGenUG events.  Great sessions, Pizza and Swag.  The theme this year is "Data Today, Data Tomorrow" and there are new sessions from Oliver Sturm on F#, Dave Sussman on ASP.NET Dynamic Data Controls and Ridgian's BI expert Dave Morrow on SQL Server Analysis Services.  There will be the keynote from Rich and Dave and a brand new gameshow called "Who's Session Is It Anyway?
As before its free to all NxtGenUG members and £49.99 to non-members.  FEST07 was a memorable event last year, FEST08 will be equally memorable. You'll learn some great stuff about Data related technologies, meet some great people, have some fun and leave with a bag load of Swag! Don't miss it!"

SQL Server 2008 includes many enhancements in the reporting space and the latest CTP contains an updated preview of the 'Microsoft Report Designer'. The purpose of this is to provide an easy to use report authoring tool which is suitable for an end user. It is not intended as a replacement for Business Intelligence Development Studio or Visual Studio.

Over the past few days, I've been testing some of the features in this new designer. It is .Net based and installed into C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\100\Tools\Reporting Services\ReportDesigner by default. The contents of this folder can be copied onto a workstation and the current version can be run stand alone. The designer has an Office 2007 user interface and looks attractive. Since this is still a preview, anything could change.

The File > Open option allows you to open an RDL file. You can either save changes back into the RDL file or select an option to publish your work onto a report server.

On the left hand pane is a 'data view' that includes a number of Built in Fields, Report Parameters and DataSources. Compared to BIDS, it's nice to have these elements and the report surface always visible rather than being separated out over different tabs. When creating a new data connection, several connection types are available including 'Report Builder Model'. Dragging items around the design surface feels very similar to designing a Windows form in Visual Studio - lines appear to help you align controls and tool tips are shown that display how close you are to the neighbouring control in pixels. 

The Report Designer Surface with Office 2007 look and feel 

 
One of the Data Dialogs in Report Designer

In summary, I find Report Designer pleasant to use and think that it makes a great addition to the reporting capabilities in SQL Server 2008.

The November CTP of SQL 2008 has recently been released but unfortunately, my initial attempts at installing it have not been too successful.

After the main database engine failed to install, I was left with an installation that could not be uninstalled through Add/Remove programs. My second attempt resulted in an installation that prevented me from logging on using Windows/SQL authentication and I could not even login from the dedicated admin connection.

Over the past few days, I've learned a few things about SQL Setup and here are some notes on performing a manual uninstall. It's very possible that these suggestions will not work or may even cause further damage - I suggest them only as a last resort before hacking the registry.

When SQL Server setup is executed, several 'bootstrap' files are copied into C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\100\Setup Bootstrap.  These files are required to uninstall SQL and if you've deleted them, you'll need to replace them. One possibility is to run setup on a different machine and to copy the files back over.

In the bootstrap folder, you'll find a copy of ARPWrapper.exe. The link to uninstall SQL from Add/Remove programs makes a call to ARPWrapper and removal will fail if the reference to this has been lost. Therefore, a possible suggestion is to open a command prompt, go to C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\100\Setup Bootstrap (or wherever you've installed SQL) and type in the following command:

ARPWrapper.exe /Remove

If this fails, the documented approach from the readme file is to uninstall each component one by one. Again, open a command prompt, go to the bootstrap folder and run the following commands:

To remove the SQL Engine:
Setup100.exe /Action=uninstall /SQLInstanceID=<Instance ID for the Database Engine>/Features=SQL

To remove Analysis Services:
Setup100.exe /Action=uninstall /ASInstanceID=<Instance ID for Analysis Services>/Features=AS

To remove Reporting Services:
Setup100.exe /Action=uninstall /RSInstanceID=<Instance ID for Reporting Services>/Features=RS

If SQL Server 2008 was installed as the default instance, the Instance ID will be MSSQLSERVER. Make sure that Setup100 exists on a local drive. If it is run from a mapped a network drive, it is likely to fail with a security exception.

A third option for un-installation is to call the msiexec utility with the /x parameter. In the registry, the SQL 2008 components can be found beneath HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall in a folder identified by a GUID. At a command prompt, type in the following command substituting the GUID that appears in the registry:

msiexec /x {GUID}

On a more positive note, I finally installed the CTP on a fresh VPC. This time round, the install routine was slick and seamlessly included the installation of the .Net Framework v2. Cosmetically, the Setup screen looks different and includes an 'Installation Centre'. Within the install wizard, the items appear along the left hand pane and notice how the validation errors appear in a dropdown across the top.

The SQL Server 2008 Installation Centre

 
Part of the SQL Server Install Wizard with validation errors highlighted

The November CTP is great once it's installed. For anyone experiencing installation problems, I strongly recommend downloading the VHD instead or flattening your VPC before spending too much time on fixing the problem like I did.

Here are some details of upcoming developer events:

On Tuesday 4th December, there is an MSDN event on SQL 2008 at Thames Valley Park, Reading. You can register here on the Microsoft site.

The next VBUG event that I am organising has been tentatively set for Wednesday 15th January 2008. The topic is SharePoint and more details will follow soon on the VBUG website.

Following on from last weeks community day, the MSDN team are organising some events at various Starbuck cafes around the country. Details have not been confirmed but there may be a talk in Oxford on 13th December, 5pm. I suspect that more details will follow on the MSDN website.

At DDD6 last Saturday, Colin announced the details of Scottish DD. It will take place at Glasgow Caledonian University on Saturday 10th May 2008 and the call for speakers is now open. SQLBits2 was also announced for Saturday 1st March 2008 and takes place in Birmingham. The benefit of this is a larger capacity, holding up to 450 attendees.

On Saturday 3rd May 2008, Mick Lohan is holding a DDD style event in Galway, Ireland. Mick's been telling me all about this for the past 2 months so keep an eye on http://gamtug.spaces.live.com This event could be great excuse for visiting Irland and attending a great event!

On March 19th, the Visual Studio 2008 consumer launch event will take place in Birmingham. Beforehand, there'll be press launch event and Partner launch events in London. The theme of the event is "Heroes happen here" and more details can be found on the Microsoft site.

Finally, I caught up with Chris Dalby from the LiveMeeting user group last week. It was great to finally meet him and he is organising a 'mashup' party in London on the 17th December. More details can be found on his blog.