Dynamic Data Changes - EnableQueryStringSelection

With the release of .Net 3.5 Framework SP1, the Dynamic Data tools have changed slightly. If you setup a site with a pre-SP1 version of Dynamic Data then this issue may have bitten you.

Runtime error - "Type 'System.Web.DynamicData.DynamicDataManager' does not have a public property named 'EnableQueryStringSelection'."

This flag on the DynamicDataManager enabled that manager to ensure that when a control such as GridView is associated with another control such as DetailsView that one would update when the other changed and vice-versa. One of the downsides of this behaviour is that your associated control had to be supported by the DynamicDataManager to be able to participate in the synchronisation - so many 3rd party controls missed out. Also all registered controls participated in the synchronisation from the Url.

To reenable this behaviour in SP1 use the DynamicDataManager.RegisterControl(Control control, Boolean setSelectionFromUrl) overload when registering the controls. When true is specified that control will get its selection from the Url. So there is now a lot more flexibility in defining which control is managed from the url, instead of all registered controls being managed.

VS2008 and .Net 3.5 SP1 released

Today Microsoft released the RTM of Visual Studio 2008 and .Net Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1.

What a great milestone! Hopefully this signals a new level of maturity and stability in these two technologies. Some organisations that I have associated with have been somewhat reticent to embrace .Net 3.5 as it is still perceived as too bleeding edge.

That aside, .Net Framework 3.5 has a great uptake in developer participation due to the exciting new framework and language features that it introduces. There is great buzz in the development community around MVC, Linq-To-Sql, Dynamic Data, Lamba expressions, ASP.Net AJAX, support for Astoria, ASP.Net Entity Framework, partial methods and so on. The speed at which these new technologies and frameworks are appearing is very rapid. What's more is that these features have led to whole new areas of application and platform design options that are easier to implement, reuse and maintain.

I believe this is a really exciting time to be involved in using these tools to develop applications. It reinvigorates the community.

What changes in SP1 do you think will be most beneficial to you?

.Net 3.5 SP1 Overview
ASP.Net Debugging

Combined Visual Studio 2008 and .Net Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1
.Net Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1 (no VS2008 SP1)