Click here to monitor SSC
A service from Red Gate
Home SQL .NET SysAdmin Opinion Blogs Forums Books
Sign in  | Join  | Help
Authors  >  Michael Sorens

Michael Sorens Michael Sorens
Michael Sorens is passionate about software that makes you more productive. To that end, he has just released SqlDiffFramework, an open-source product with a 150+ page manual that is a unique comparison tool for databases, letting you compare data from different systems (SQL Server, Oracle, MySql, plus any ODBC data source). He is a software engineer with BS and MS degrees in computer science/engineering who has worked at Fortune 500 firms and at startups. Current passions include .NET, SQL, and XML technologies. Spreading the seeds of good design wherever possible, he enjoys sharing knowledge via writing (see his full list of articles), open-source web sites (cleancode.sourceforge.net and SqlDiffFramework.codeplex.com), and teaching.
TortoiseSVN and Subversion Cookbook Part 3: In, Out, and Around
by Michael Sorens | 16 January 2012 |  1 comment |
Subversion doesn't have to be difficult, especially if you have Michael Sorens's guide at hand. After dealing in previous articles with checkouts and commits in Subversion, and covering the various file-manipulation operations that are required for Subversion,... Read more...
TortoiseSVN and Subversion Cookbook Part 2: File Operations and Subversion Filtering
by Michael Sorens | 21 November 2011 |  5 comments |
The second part of Michael's series of articles gives more recipes for Subversion Source Control. This time he explains how to add files, highlights tools and techniques for determining what to include in source control and shows how to quickly and efficiently... Read more...
Subversion and TortoiseSVN Cookbook Part 1- The Basics
by Michael Sorens | 03 November 2011 |
If you have more than zero developers in your team, then you need Source Control. In this article Michael starts a series that aims to provide clear and complete recipes for using Subversion, mainly through its simple, elegant, graphical interface: TortoiseSVN. Read more...
Further Down the Rabbit Hole: PowerShell Modules and Encapsulation
by Michael Sorens | 24 August 2011 |  6 comments |
Modules allow you to use standard libraries that extend PowerShell's functionality. They are easier to use than to create, but if you get the hang of creating them, your code will be more easily-maintained and re-usable. Let Michael Sorens once more be your guide... Read more...
Down the Rabbit Hole- A Study in PowerShell Pipelines, Functions, and Parameters
by Michael Sorens | 14 July 2011 |  4 comments |
For an experienced programmer to learn a new language can be a journey quite like Alice's in wonderland. Paradoxes, unexpected twists, blind tangents, bafflements and nice surprises. Michael comes to the rescue of anyone learning PowerShell with an explanation of... Read more...
Harnessing PowerShell's String Comparison and List-Filtering Features
by Michael Sorens | 07 June 2011 |  3 comments |
When you are first learning PowerShell, it often seems to be an 'Alice through the looking-glass' world. Just the simple process of comparing and selecting strings can seem strangely obtuse. Michael turns the looking-glass into wonderland with his wall-chart of the... Read more...
XPath, CSS, DOM and Selenium: The Rosetta Stone
by Michael Sorens | 04 April 2011 |  5 comments |
Some programming conventions are best represented in a chart. Nobody will claim that XPath or CSS are entirely intuitive, as they are terse, economical ways of identifying elements in a hierarchy. However, a chart with recipes and examples is a different matter.... Read more...
Web Testing with Selenium Sushi: A Practical Guide and Toolset
by Michael Sorens | 09 February 2011 |  3 comments |
How does one test the user-interface of a web application? Too often, the answer seems to be 'clumsily, slowly, and not very well'. The technology of automated, repeatable, testing of websites is still developing, but it exists; and Michael Sorens is here to... Read more...
LINQ Lycanthropy: Transformations into LINQ
by Michael Sorens | 05 January 2011 |
LINQ is one of the few technologies that you can start to use without a lot of preliminary learning. Also, it lends itself to learning by trying out examples. With Michael's help, you can watch as your conventional C# code changes to ravenous LINQ before your very... Read more...
LINQ Secrets Revealed: Chaining and Debugging
by Michael Sorens | 01 December 2010 |  3 comments |
LINQ has the capabilities of providing a great productivity boost. LINQ Chaining is particularly powerful magic, giving your code greater clarity and brevity. Using it, and debugging it, can be tricky without the right tools and techniques, but Michael is on hand... Read more...
Creating Tray Applications in .NET: A Practical Guide
by Michael Sorens | 04 November 2010 |  15 comments |
It isn’t widely known that you can use both WPF and Winforms with VS2010 to create a system tray application in .NET. Michael gives you a practical guide, illustrated by an example that is so effective it can be put to immediate practical use. HostSwitcher comes... Read more...
Taming Sandcastle: A .NET Programmer's Guide to Documenting Your Code
by Michael Sorens | 13 September 2010 |  15 comments |
The most effective way to document .NET code so that others can understand it and use it, is to use XML Documentation and SandCastle. It isn't that easy. Michael Sorens produces the easy guide to the process that Microsoft never managed, and introduces several... Read more...
Mixing WPF and WinForms
by Michael Sorens | 10 August 2010 |  2 comments |
You can embed WPF controls in a WinForms application or WinForms controls in a WPF application, using a simple adapter. Because of this inherent symmetry, you can build hybrid applications, mixing controls from the other platform. Michael Sorens gives a practical... Read more...
Creating WPF Prototypes with SketchFlow
by Michael Sorens | 18 June 2010 |  4 comments |
Prototyping with Sketchflow transforms what was once a frustrating and time-consuming chore. With SketchFlow, WPF prototypes can be created and changed with amazing ease. SketchFlow is WPF's secret weapon. Well, it was secret until Michael Sorens produced this article. Read more...
Essential Tools for the WPF Novice
by Michael Sorens | 19 May 2010 |  7 comments |
When Michael sets out to do something, there are no half-measures; So when he set out to learn WPF, we all stand to benefit from the thorough research that he put into the task. He wondered what utility applications could assist programming in WPF. Here are the... Read more...
From WinForm to WPF: A Quick Reference Guide
by Michael Sorens | 23 March 2010 |  5 comments |
Michael Sorens provides a handy wallchart to help migration between WinForm / WPF, VS 2008 / 2010, and .NET 3.5 / 4.0. this can be downloaded for free from the speech-bubble at the head of the article. He also describes the current weaknesses in WPF, and the most ... Read more...
Using LINQ Lambda Expressions to Design Customizable Generic Components
by Michael Sorens | 27 January 2010 |  2 comments |
LINQ makes code easier to write and maintain by abstracting the data source. It provides a uniform way to handle widely diverse data structures within an application. LINQ’s Lambda syntax is clever enough even to allow you to create generic building blocks with... Read more...
Using Three Flavors of LINQ To Populate a TreeView
by Michael Sorens | 02 December 2009 |
LINQ is a valuable technology. LINQ to XML, LINQ to Objects and LINQ to XSD, in particular, can save valuable time for developers and produce more maintainable code. Michael describes how he used three different flavours of LINQ to map XML to a Treeview component... Read more...
How to build a Query Template Explorer
by Michael Sorens | 23 October 2009 |  1 comment |
Having introduced his cross-platform Query Template solution, Michael now gives us the technical details on how to integrate his .NET controls into applications both simple and complex. With screenshots and code samples, this has everything you need to build your... Read more...
A Unified Approach to Multi-DataBase Query Templates
by Michael Sorens | 30 September 2009 |
While trying to get the information he needed out of various SQL, MySQL and Oracle environments, Michael finally got tired of endlessly flicking through reference manuals and having to work so hard just to formulate his queries. So he decided to build a... Read more...
Over 400,000 Microsoft professionals subscribe to the Simple-Talk technical journal. Join today, it's fast, simple, free and secure.

Join Simple Talk


Privacy policy | Terms and conditions | ©2005-2012 Red Gate Software
About | Site map | Become an author | Newsletters | Contact us