[AccessD] time to retire ?

Hi Arthur --

> There are parts I don't like (Linq, for example...
Do you mean LINQ in general or just LINQ for SQL or ADO.NET EF LINQ?

LINQ in general - I mean using it in your C#/VB.NET coding - is a very powerful development tool/programming language concept.
LINQ is a "green light" for full scale functional programming (FP) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_programming) within general purpose programming language as C#/VB.NET are.
Have a look: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ericwhite/archive/2006/10/04/fp-tutorial.aspx

LINQ is very close to "ordinary SQL" - in fact they both have common roots in Propositional Calculus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propositional_calculus) , Set Theory  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set_theory), Relational Algebra (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_algebra) etc. One can treat LINQ as  OOSQL ("first generation") come true.

Using LINQ may change your (and mine) "old habits" of practicing mainly "data centric" application development - read more about "Model First" approach here:

http://www.devart.com/entitydeveloper/model-first.html

http://ianhammondcooper.wordpress.com/2007/06/10/being-ignorant-with-linq-to-sql/

All in all "LINQ (to SQL)" and FP seems to be very good tools for the one considering to retire but still keeping doing  custom development as the more one gets familiar with that tools the more short, the more streamlined and effective their programming would become, the least support costs would be "tied" to that coding - and so one can keep competitive for a long time :)  

"Ordinary" programming has usually a lot of routine (plumbing) work and LINQ and FP allow to minimize that work by making your coding working on higher levels of abstraction and "getting things done" quicker...

Parallel LINQ (PLINQ) and FP are also the base for "automagic scaling" of your programming solutions as pure functional coding can be automatically scheduled to be executed in parallel on many processor cores or  - in the future(?) even - computer systems or all over "computing clouds" and (P)LINQ expressions can be also interpreted in parallel, and that "parallelization" will be done by .NET Dynamic Language Runtime (DLR) automatically...

Recap: LINQ and FP alone would let to keep one's brain cells active solving programming tasks "cool way", or I can even say "lazy but cool way" meaning "lazy evaluation" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazy_evaluation) - the core of LINQ expressions evaluation strategy implemented in .NET DLR...   

Thank you.

-- Shamil

P.S. Consider also using OpenXML (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_Open_XML) and Open XML SDK 2.0 (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb448854.aspx, http://openxmldeveloper.org/) as a good substitute for many tasks usually done using MS Word, Excel, PowerPoint Automation, as well as

Excel Calculation Services
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint-server-help/introduction-to-excel-services-and-excel-web-access-HA010105476.aspx

and

Word Automation Services
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff742315.aspx

which should be available for Office 365 developers...

22 ноября 2011, 02:10 от Arthur Fuller <fuller.artful at gmail.com>:
> I agree with you, Stuart, but I am also diving into C# 2010 in a serious
> way. There are parts I don't like (Linq, for example, but that's due to an
> old and perhaps obsolete bias that "Everything the db can do, the db should
> do." I don't like putting db logic in the front end; it sticks in this old
> craw; but maybe I will learn that this old adage is nearly as obsolete as I
> am :)
> 
> A.
> 
> On Mon, Nov 21, 2011 at 5:01 PM, Stuart McLachlan <stuart at lexacorp.com.pg>wrote:
> 
> > Not in my world where internet access is still slow and expensive and will
> > be for quite a few
> > years to come.
> >
> > At the same age as Rocky, I reckon I've got a good few years left before
> > my Access skills are
> > ready for retirement.
> >
> > --
> > Stuart
> >
> >
> --
> AccessD mailing list
> AccessD at databaseadvisors.com
> http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd
> Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com
>