Here is a list of my top 5 tools/APIs every technical project manager and leader should know.
1. Prism 4.0
Prism provides guidance designed to help you more easily design and build rich, flexible, and easy to maintain Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) desktop applications and Silverlight Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) and Windows Phone 7 applications. Using design patterns that embody important architectural design principles, such as separation of concerns and loose coupling, Prism helps you to design and build applications using loosely coupled components that can evolve independently but which can be easily and seamlessly integrated into the overall application. Such applications are known as often referred to as composite applications.
Prism includes reference implementations, QuickStarts, reusable library code (the Prism Library), and extensive documentation. This version of Prism targets the Microsoft .NET Framework 4.0 and Silverlight 4 and includes new guidance around the Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM) pattern, navigation, and the Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF). Because Prism is built on the .NET Framework 4.0 (which includes WPF) and Silverlight 4, familiarity with these technologies is useful for evaluating and adopting Prism.
You can learn and download Prism 4.0 here:
http://compositewpf.codeplex.com/
2. MEF
The Managed Extensibility Framework or MEF is a library for creating lightweight, extensible applications. It allows application developers to discover and use extensions with no configuration required. It also lets extension developers easily encapsulate code and avoid fragile hard dependencies. MEF not only allows extensions to be reused within applications, but across applications as well.
Learn and download MEF here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd460648.aspx
3. Enterprise Library 5
Microsoft Enterprise Library is a collection of application blocks designed to assist developers with common enterprise development challenges. Application blocks are a type of guidance, provided as source code that can be used "as is," extended, or modified by developers for use in enterprise development projects.
Learn more and downoad:
Microsoft Enterprise Library 5.0
Microsoft Enterprise Library 5.0 Documentation
4. Unity Application Block
Unity is a lightweight, extensible dependency injection container. It facilitates building loosely coupled applications and provides developers with the following advantages:
- Simplified object creation, especially for hierarchical object structures and dependencies
- Abstraction of requirements; this allows developers to specify dependencies at run time or in configuration and simplify management of crosscutting concerns
- Increased flexibility by deferring component configuration to the container
- Service location capability, which allows clients to store or cache the container
- Instance and type interception
Unity is a general-purpose container for use in any type of Microsoft® .NET Framework-based application. It provides all of the features commonly found in dependency injection mechanisms, including methods to register type mappings and object instances, resolve objects, manage object lifetimes, and inject dependent objects into the parameters of constructors and methods and as the value of properties of objects it resolves.
In addition, Unity is extensible. You can write container extensions that change the behavior of the container, or add new capabilities. For example, the interception feature provided by Unity, which you can use to capture calls to objects and add additional functionality and policies to the target objects, is implemented as a container extension.
Learn more abut Unity:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff663144.aspx
5. Performance Testing Guidance for Web Applications
This guide shows you an end-to-end approach for implementing performance testing. Whether you are new to performance testing, or looking for ways to improve your current performance testing approach, you will find insights that you can tailor for your specific scenarios.
The Final Release is Available! Start using the guide today, while we continue to make improvements.
Download the Performance Testing Guidance for Web Applications Guide
Learn more here:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb924375.aspx
So...
What's in your list? Let's share!