I had a great time talking about Globalization and Localization for ASP.NET applications last night at the New England ASP.NET User Group.  There are definately a lot of things that you need to be aware of when you're localizing a site.  Thanks to Dean Serrentino for inviting me to speak.  I've uploaded the slides and demo applications below.

The 1st New Hampshire Code Camp is being help Saturday, Feb 28th at Daniel Webster College.  Registration is now open at http://www.thedevcommunity.org/.  We're looking for developers or DBAs to present at this event.  We're also looking for component vendors or recruitment firms to sponsor the event with giveaways, or to help cover food costs. (Contact me - phil@denoncourtassociates.com or Pat Tormey)

I love going to code camps, I always learn a lot about technologies that I don't get to use in my day-to-day life.  It's nice to network with other developers, learn what problems they're running into and how they're solving them.  The manifesto describes it best: By and For the Developer Community, Always Free, No Fluff...

With the economy in apparent decline, a lot of you developers are looking for ways to make yourselves more marketable.  According to ToastMasters International, presentation skills are "crucial to success in the workplace".  Code Camps are a great way to start refining your speaking skills.  Nobody expects a polished speaker.  All we're looking for is someone to show us some code, help facilitate a conversation, or show us something new.  If you get nervous when you speak in front of people and that's deterring you, partner up with a buddy to deliver the talk with you. Presentations should go about an hour, and budget time for dialog/Q&A.

Here's how to register to speak at the NH Code Camp:
1) Create an account at thedevcommunity.org, or sign into your existing one.
2) Complete a Speaker Registry profile
3) On thedevcommunity.org 's home page, click the submit a presentation link next to Code Camp New Hampshire
4) Repeat (as necessary)

Looking forward to seeing you all there...

I'll be giving a talk on implementing Speech Recognition in .NET this Saturday.  There will be 24 presentations delivered at the code camp.  Register to attend the code camp here.

Adding Speech Recognition to your Application

Since version 3.0, the .NET framework has built in support for speech recognition. It is easy and straightforward to use. You will learn how to use the speech recognition capabilities of .NET. We'll talk about the capabilities of the speech recognition classes. And we talk about best practices and lessons learned.

I haven’t taken the time to upload the materials yet, so thanks to Steve Coombes for hounding me about it.  Here are the files:

Powerpoint Presentation

Source Files/Demo

In case you haven't heard...  Notice the new location in Nashua.

New Hampshire Dot Net Users Group is back just in time for Microsoft’s latest releases of Visual Studio

We’ll be meeting In our new home at

6:00-8:30 May 15th

Eaton Richmond Center room 100

Daniel Webster College

The Guest Speakers will be

Phil Denoncourt

Overview of the AJAX control toolkit:

AJAX is an way to make websites more interactive and responsive.  It's powerful and easy to use.  The AJAX control toolkit is a set of controls that use AJAX and wrap common UI scenarios.  Cascading dropdowns, Auto completing textboxes, in-page popups, hovering menus and dynamically populated textboxes are some of the controls we'll go over.  No AJAX experience is required.

And Pat Tormey will be presenting

What’s new and important in VS 2008 with a little bit of WPF and Expression Suite

Stay tuned to http://www.nhdn.com for details and register up for notices…

On Wednesday, March21st, I'll be giving an introductary talk on Data Mining for the Boston Access User's Group.  I was scheduled to do this last month, but I got sick.

Introduction to Data Mining in SQL 2005
Data mining is the act of deriving patterns and trend that exist in your data.  SQL 2005 provides a host of different algorithms that allow you to explore your data for hidden patterns and trends.  Popular uses of data mining models are used to predict future sales, target customers for marketing, examine patterns of navigation through a website, and group products that are likely to be purchased together.

Phil will give an introduction to data mining concepts, an overview of the different algorithms, and how to incorporate the data mining results into your applications.

Phil Denoncourt is a .NET consultant, who over the past 5 years has developed a wide range of .NET applications and has over 20 years experience writing software. He is the leader of the New England C# User Group and has acquired the MCPD, MCTS, MCSD, MCDBA, MCSE, MCAD, MCSA and MCP+SB certifications. When not coding, or spending time with his wife and 5 children, Phil is an avid fan of the Boston Red Sox and New England Patriots.

On Wednesday, February 21st, I'll be giving an introductary talk on Data Mining for the Boston Access User's Group.

Introduction to Data Mining in SQL 2005
Data mining is the act of deriving patterns and trend that exist in your data.  SQL 2005 provides a host of different algorithms that allow you to explore your data for hidden patterns and trends.  Popular uses of data mining models are used to predict future sales, target customers for marketing, examine patterns of navigation through a website, and group products that are likely to be purchased together.

Phil will give an introduction to data mining concepts, an overview of the different algorithms, and how to incorporate the data mining results into your applications.

Phil Denoncourt is a .NET consultant, who over the past 5 years has developed a wide range of .NET applications and has over 20 years experience writing software. He is the leader of the New England C# User Group and has acquired the MCPD, MCTS, MCSD, MCDBA, MCSE, MCAD, MCSA and MCP+SB certifications. When not coding, or spending time with his wife and 5 children, Phil is an avid fan of the Boston Red Sox and New England Patriots.

I'll be speaking at two user groups in the upcoming weeks:

Introduction to WCF (Windows Communication Foundation).

.NET 3.0 was released in November.  WCF is one piece of the 3.0 puzzle and is a substantial improvement over ASP.NET web services. 

Phil will show the overall architecture and how easy it is to develop WCF Services.

Phil Denoncourt is a .NET consultant, who over the past 5 years has developed a wide range of .NET applications and has over 20 years experience writing software. He is the leader of the New England C# User Group and has acquired the MCPD, MCTS, MCSD, MCDBA, MCSE, MCAD, MCSA and MCP+SB certifications.

When not coding, or spending time with his wife and 5 children, Phil is an avid fan of the Boston Red Sox and New England Patriots.

Jan 11 2007 at New England C# Users Group

Jan 18 2007 at New Hampshire .NET Users Group

Tomorrow I'll be speaking at the New Hampshire .NET User's group.  More information can be found at www.nhdn.com

6:00 - 7:00 PM Xml Serialization.  XML Serialization is the process of transforming a complex object to and from XML.  This is made straightforward with the .NET framework.  We'll take a look out how to serialize a simple object and some of the attributes used to control the output.  Then we'll take a look at some of the more advanced features like capturing processing errors, overrides and unknown elements.  Finally we'll take complete control of the serialization process using the new features of the 2.0 Framework.  Be the envy of all your coworkers by mastering XML serialization

7:00 - 8:00 PM Xml in SQL 2005.  There are a variety of different ways that SQL Server can work with XML data.  Phil will demonstrate the various methods such as the XML datatype, OpenXML, How to return XML data in queries, Annotated XSDs, and interoperability with .NET

Phil Denoncourt is a .NET consultant, who over the past 4 years has developed a wide range of .NET applications and has over 20 years experience writing software. He is the leader of the New England C# User Group and has acquired the MCPD, MCTS, MCSD, MCDBA, MCSE, MCAD, MCSA and MCP+SB certifications. When not coding, or spending time with his wife and 5 children, Phil is an avid fan of the Boston Red Sox and New England Patriots.

March 2nd, I'll be in Boston at the Beantown Dot Net user's group giving a talk on XML Serialization.

I'll be speaking at Boston Access Day (The Boston area Microsoft Access usergroup) this Wednesday, February 15th.  I'll be doing a two part talk:

Introduction to SQL Server Express - SQL Express is a lightweight version of SQL Server 2005 that is easy to install and use in your applications. Unlike its predecessor MSDE, this engine has been optimized for small business applications. Phil will talk about the features, capabilities and limitations of SQL Server Express.

Improving SQL Server Performance - How to troubleshoot performance problems in SQL Server, and ways to overcome them.  Phil will talk about common problems, the tools used to monitor SQL Server, and possible fixes for the problems.

I've been a member of this group for over 10 years.  I haven't done Access development in over 5 years, but it's good to go back and see old friends.

I will be speaking at the next meeting of the New England C# User's Group on New Features of the 2.0 Framework.  If you're in the Manchester NH area, stop on by.

I've just finished uploading the presentations I did at the New Jersey Code Camp to their site .  The demo files can be downloaded at my website under the file tab.  Sorry for the delay!

This past weekend I had the opportunity to present at the New Jersey Code Camp in Iselin NJ. I gave two talks; Troubleshooting Performance in SQL Server 2000 and Scraping Websites with the .NET framework. The talks went pretty well and had a lot of lively discussion. My son Ben made the trip with me and helped me by running the powerpoint show. On the way back we stopped at the New England Air Museum in CT. That is a really cool place if you are an aero euthusiast.

It was great to meet some of the developers from that area, including Scott Watermasysk, Don XML, Miguel Castro, Frank La Vigne, Kevin Goff, Hilary Cotter and Jim Bonnie. The NJ area has a very active community.

Carl and Richard stopped by on their tour and showed a little VB 2005 and a little mobility. Very interesting stuff. I got to go on the bus after the meeting and was even interviewed on DotNetRocks! (The small guy way in the back with the blue shirt...That's me!). All in all, a great weekend and a good time.

Next Meeting October 13th
5:30 - 6:00 .NET Trauma Center
Stumped?   Frustrated?  Is your forehead sore from banging your head against the keyboard?  Bring in your application and see if some of the area's local experts can provide some guidance.

6:00 - 7:00 Visual Basic 9.0 Language Changes
Joe Sarna of JJS Systems will outline the changes that VB has undergone in the upcoming release of Visual Studio 2005.  Come learn about the new features such as operator overloading and the My namespace.

7:00 - 8:00 C# 2.0 Language Changes
Phil Denoncourt of Denoncourt Associates  will highlight the changes that C# has undergone.  He will cover templates, anonymous delegates and other fun features.

November 10, 2005 -  We got Sam Gentile!  An INETA sponsored event.  Boston .NET expert Sam Gentile will give us a look a C# 2.0 Generics.  Pizza will be served.

December 15, 2005 - Visual Studio .NET Launch event.  Come learn about the new version of Visual Studio and SQL Server.  Door prizes will be available.

Code Camp IV, held this past weekend was pretty cool.  It was amazing to see the incredible turnout.  The support the Boston community has for these types of events...  All the attendees I talked with loved the sessions.  One of the main themes I kept hearing was, "I know something about topic XYZ. But you never know what you don't know.  The session gave me a lot more depth."

I delivered three talks that went over reasonably well.  It was cool to meet some of my fellow user group leaders like Julia Lerman and Jason Haley.

Can't wait for Code Camp V!

Code Camp IV – Developers Gone Wild

If you are looking for a lot of great information, check out Code Camp IV this weekend.  Here's a link to register here.  I’ll be presenting three sessions:

Sept 24, 2005, 7:15PM – Rhode Island Room

Scraping Data from Websites with the .NET Framework

Sept 25, 2005, 10:45AM – Providence Room

Introduction to Code Access Security

Sept 25, 2005, 1:15 PM – Technical Briefing Center

Improving the performance of your SQL 2000 database

See you there!