Developing on Windows Vista

David J. Sokol — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 03:02:20 GMT

Developing on Vista can be annoying. Mostly because of the security enhancements and compatibility issues. Well, only because of the security enhancements and compatibility issues. I, personally, am used to running around on my development machine with full administrator privileges dropping database tables and debugging on IIS. Sadly, in Vista, this isn't possible. Even installing the standard development tools is annoying and requires special steps and patches. A few months ago, I set up a development machine at my house. It took about a day, plus more troubleshooting time. I was about to uninstall Vista entirely, but that would have been the waste of a day.

I recently got a new laptop, a Dell D630, dedicated solely to code/other. It came with a Vista license, and I stuck with it. This is my experience.

The Timeline

2:19PM - Put in the install disks. I'll skip the non-developer related steps.
2:38PM - Vista installed, started installing patches (23 updates) and missing device drivers.
3:18PM - Started installing helper programs, such as Switcher, WinRAR, and setting up WMP11.
3:29PM - Installed the core development utilities: TortoiseSVN, gVim, FireFox, FireBug, IE Developer Toolbar, changing folder options to show hidden files & extensions.
3:48PM - Received "A device attached to the system is not functioning." error. Restarted. Was pretty sure my install was already hosed.
3:58PM - Started installing Visual Studio.NET.
4:17PM - Started downloading Visual Studio 2005.NET Service Pack 1. Averaged 320kbps.
4:43PM - Started installing VS.NET Service Pack 1.
4:57PM - Finished inspecting configuration, actually gave me the prompt to install Service Pack 1.
5:14PM - Received "Error: 1331. Failed to correctly copy MFC80UD.dll file: CRC error." Twice. Doesn't seem to have caused a problem. 2nd error so far.
5:20PM - Downloaded and installed the Visual Studio Service Pack 1 Update for Windows Vista.
5:29PM - Started SQL Server Management Studio Express install.
5:36PM - Realized I didn't have my Office and Visio CDs readily available. Started tearing apart my room.
5:40PM - Started installing Office 2007.
5:49PM - Setup error, had to roll back the office 2007 install. 3rd error. A cryptic one at that.
5:54PM - Started Visio Install.
6:19PM - Initial checkout of the current code-base. (Delayed, I got distracted by Internet :( )
6:23PM - Started Visual Studio.NET
6:26PM - Realized I needed the ASP.NET AJAX extensions installed. Made it happen.
6:32PM - DEVELOP ON!

4 hours 13 minutes. Half a day and a smoke break.

Tips and Common Problems

Run the Visual Studio.NET installer as Administrator.
Run the Service Pack 1 installer as Administrator.
Run the Service Pack 1 Update for Vista as Administrator.
Run the SQL Server Management Studio Express installer as Administrator.
Whenever you run Visual Studio.NET, run it as administrator. If not, things fail in odd ways. Mainly related to IIS debugging.
Whenever you run SSMSE, run it as administrator. If not, you won't have god rights to the database. (This might be desirable, you can just set up mixed-mode authentication and connect with that. I'm lazy.)
If you're having trouble with Internet Information Services 7, read this post.
Yeah, pretty much run anything that deals with memory as Administrator. It gets annoying, but necessary. It's better then having applications silently fail.

Overall Experience

Once you know the exact steps you need to do for Vista development, it's not all that bad. Yes, you have to install a lot of applications, but it's pretty quick. I think a much faster machine helped. (I was using a 5 year old HP ZE5300.) The most annoying thing, by far, is UAC. It pops up constantly. It blacks out my screen whenever I need to start Visual Studio. And whenever I start SSMSE. And I can't directly open .sln or .proj files anymore. But damnit, I'm running this OS as Microsoft intended, though I think it's going to end up pissing me off. UAC problems aside, I've done 16 hours of development on Vista with no other major setbacks. Just don't mess with the Program Files folder with your app or through explorer.

But wait, you're only doing Windows Development!

This is very true. If I used Eclipse, or Java, or Ruby, or Python, or some god-awful Lisp descendent, I wouldn't do it. There are too many potential problems. Vista ain't `zactly shiny. If you're using a desktop, don't bother. Most of the benefits of Vista (that I appreciate) are based on notebooks, tablets, and networking. Otherwise, stick with XP (or OSX or whatever the hell Linux Distro is hot.) If it comes prepacked with a new PC, I wouldn't recommend reverting. You're gonna hafta get with with the future at some point. Or you could just run Windows 2000 for two years after XP's release, like I did.

Microsoft Surface

David J. Sokol — Thu, 31 May 2007 04:58:18 GMT

I'm going to take a stab at writing on something cool, hip, and current. Microsoft Surface was announced today. Before reading further, I urge you to visit the site and watch the videos. Was the site down? Have you watched them? Good.

My first reaction to the whole product pure unadulterated want. It's not up to need yet, but it's close. I saw the technology about a year ago on Channel 9, back when it was called "touch light". Minority Report come to life, yeah, cool. I won't be around to see it. Then today's announcement came. End of 2007! Crap! I might even see this in my house before I hit 25! Clearly this is something to get excited about.

The different types of software that could be developed for this technology is phenomenal. Entertainment, enterprise, other areas listed in the numerous news articles: they could all benefit from this kind of cool. I want an SDK, I want this hardware, and I want to on the cutting edge writing the cool stuff. My friends have said the same, quote [capitalization improved]: Man, I would kill to be able to work on something like that. As this Forbes article states, this is Microsoft's Mac. A direct successor to their successful console line.

Which means I won't be developing software for it anytime soon.

Microsoft's best SDK strategy for this device, in my humble, un-educated opinion, is to keep development expensive and closed. Same thing Apple is rumored [Still rumored? I'm not sure.] to be doing with the iPhone. Technology built for user interaction, needs to be 100% reliable, usable, and stable. Windows has thrived due to easy access to development tools. Anyone can develop any type of Windows application cheaply. 'Anyone', sadly, isn't a developer. Most Windows applications are shoddy and bug-ridden. They're hard to use. Ugly icons abound. Microsoft can't let junk applications like this touch [ah! ah?] Surface.

Google for screensavers. Screensavers are graphical programs that all provide the exact same functionality: preventing monitor burn in. Yet dozens of different companies have developed competing versions, all being differentiated simply by bling. Looking at this evidence, the market for screensavers or animated dancing girls on a consumer Surface device would be huge. Development companies would be crazy-stupid to miss out on the opportunity; they'd all rush software to market, full of the WPF equivelent of animated GIFs.

And that would blow. My coffee table has big enough problems dealing with beer-can rings. It certainly doesn't need crap software infiltrating it's OS. Microsoft is sticking with corporate customers to start off. Good call. A consumer grade device would either need to have incredible software restrictions or be closed entirely. I'd wager that all software placed on such a device would have to go through the equivalent of the hardware WHQL process. It'll be out of the range of the average independent software developer. The thought really saddens me; I don't care to wait for other certified developers to write cool applications for Surface. I want to do it myself. The best software strategy for Surface just happens to disagree.