Brian On Software

About a year ago, Krzysztof Cwalina gave a presentation on Designing .NET Class Libraries at Microsoft Research.  This is not your typical tech talk…it’s actually three hours long and the content goes in great depth, covering various practices and guidelines to consider when programming with the .NET Framework.  I sure learned a lot of things about the framework and what to watch out for in my next .NET project, such as knowing which interface to implement in a given context, which attributes to decorate my class with in certain conditions and the reasons for it, etc.

If you have read Brad Abrams and Krzysztof Cwalina’s excellent book “Framework Design Guidelines: Conventions, Idioms, and Patterns for Reusable .NET Libraries” (the second edition is coming out later this fall!), this tech talk will surely complement what you have learned, since he recalls some of the ideas in the book.  Furthermore, there is also an accompanying PowerPoint presentation which is in sync with the video so you can take notes while watching it.

Just to give you a glimpse of what Krzysztof is talking about in his talk, here is a summary of his “Top 5 Things to Focus On When Designing APIs“:

1. Treat Simplicity as a Feature
2. Know Your User
3. Think Development Ecosystem
4. Use the Power of Consistency
5. Design to Last

This is a great tech talk to listen with your co-workers as you learn together the pitfalls to avoid and the tips to remember when designing an API with .NET.