Developer's Guide to Microsoft Enterprise Library, 2nd Edition (Microsoft patterns & practices)

Welcome to the era of software reuse! Microsoft Enterprise Library helps accelerate development by providing reusable components and guidance on proven practices. This guide helps you to quickly grasp what Enterprise Library v6 can do for you, presents examples that show it in action, and makes it easier for you to start experimenting with Enterprise Library.

Enterprise Library is made up of a series of application blocks, each aimed at managing specific crosscutting concerns. You can use them out of the box, modify them as required, and distribute them with your applications. The main themes for the latest v6 release are: simplifying the library all around, embracing semantic logging, increasing resiliency to errors, and streamlining programmatic configuration of all blocks.

The guide explains the concepts that drove development of the blocks, the kinds of tasks they can accomplish, and how they help you implement many well-known design patterns. And, of course, it explains -- by way of code extracts and sample programs -- how you can actually use the blocks in your applications.

Benefit from the capabilities of Enterprise Library, spend more time focusing on your business logic and less on the plumbing. Enterprise Library will do the heavy lifting for you! Happy Coding!

"This guide is an absolute must read for anybody looking to put Enterprise Library into practice. Its clear and pragmatic advice is invaluable."
S. Somasegar, Corporate Vice President, Microsoft Developer Division

"You are holding in your hands a book that will make your life as an enterprise developer a whole lot easier."
Scott Guthrie, Corporate Vice President, Windows Azure

Dominic Betts is a principal technologist at Content Master, a technical authoring and consulting company. An expert on developing applications with the Microsoft .NET Framework and Windows Azure, Dominic has produced numerous training courses, white papers, and other technical material.

Dr. Grigori Melnik is a Principal Program Manager in the patterns & practices group at Microsoft. He leads the Microsoft Enterprise Library, Unity, and CQRS Guidance projects. Prior to that, Grigori was a researcher, software engineer, and educator - long enough to remember the joy of programming in Fortran. Grigori holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Calgary, Canada. Contact him at http://blogs.msdn.com/agile or follow him on twitter via @gmelnik.

Fernando Simonazzi is a software developer and architect with 12+ yrs of professional experience. He has been a contributor to several projects for Microsoft's patterns & practices group, including Prism v4 and several versions of the Enterprise Library.

Mani Subramanian is a software tester on the patterns & practices team. His recent projects include Enterprise Library (Windows Azure, V5-6), CQRS Journey, Unity, Prism 4.1. He has 12+ years of industry experience. Prior to joining p&p, he was a developer for products that enable network security and worked as a project manager & test consultant.

Alex Homer is a technical writer in the Microsoft patterns & practices division. Following a career within and outside of the IT world, he spent many years as a software and training specialist before tiring of the conference circuit and joining Microsoft. Now he spends his days knee-deep in design patterns and architectural literature; writing books, documentation, sample code, and producing technical guidance in its myriad other forms http://blogs.msdn.com/alexhomer/.

Julian Dominguez is a software developer on the Microsoft patterns & practices team, producing written and code-based guidance for .NET developers. He has been a contributor on several projects with this team, including Prism, Enterprise Library, and CQRS Guidance.

Hernan de Lahitte is an engineer & development consultant at Digit Factory with 25+ yrs of experience in helping enterprise customers build scalable component frameworks. I worked on Enterprise Library v6, as well as the CQRS guidance, SOA patterns and several software factories.