Reading Notes #676

This #rd explores practical insights on leveraging GitHub Copilot for enhanced .NET testing, the rise of AI-driven documentation solutions, and the importance of security in coding agents. From dissecting Docker’s MCP servers to debating the merits of Minimal APIs, we cover a mix of .NET updates, developer workflows, and emerging best practices. Whether you’re refining build processes, optimizing codebases, or staying ahead of security trends, these notes offer a curated selection of ideas to spark your next project or refactor.

Let’s unpack what’s new and impactful in tech!

AI

• A New Approach for Coding Agent Safety | Docker - Security must be part of our top priorities, and it's very interesting to see docker's effort in this area

• Supercharge Your Test Coverage with GitHub Copilot Testing for .NET ( McKenna Barlow) - It's only in the insider version for now, but I'm looking forward to trying it and seeing if it's really better than the one prompt

• Are There Any Good AI Documentation Apps Out There? (Rachel Kaufman) - Great question! I believe there is a simple way to do that. More to come.

• 6 Must-Have MCP Servers (and How to Use Them) | Docker - Nice list of tools that can help your agents.

• Ask AI from Anywhere: No GUI, No Heavy Clients, No Friction (Frank Boucher) - A cool little tools that you can call from any terminal (yes it works via ssh too!) that call AI and ask a question or does a web research for you. The post and the video explains how it works and where to find the code.

Programming

• Reinventing how .NET Builds and Ships (Again) (Matt Mitchell) - This post is not a 30-second read, but it's a detailed story that explains all the facts and how it was built. That great new version 10 in terms of the build.

• Fetching GitHub content from C# (Thomas Ardal,) - Yes, those APIs are pretty cool.

• Why you must use Minimal APIs over Controllers for new apps (David) - I really like minimal API, but don't get in a rush to convert all your existing projects; the controller approach is also very valuable.

~frank

Reading Notes #602

It's reading notes time! It is a habit I started a long time ago, where I share a list of all the articles, blog posts, and books that catch my interest during the week.

Having interesting content? Share it!

Cloud

• Azure SDK Release (April 2024) (Hector Norzagaray) - Lots of SDKs updates for many different languages and services.

Programming

• .NET Aspire preview 6 - .NET Aspire - The more a play with Aspire the more I like it. .NET developers you must give it a try.

• How to upload a file with Blazor SSR in .NET 8? - (Jon Hilton) A nice quick tutorial with all the code snippets we need.

• What's new for the Microsoft Fluent UI Blazor library 4.7 - (Vincent Baaij) A lots o new features and improvements in this release.

• Why don’t we talk about minifying CSS anymore? - (Salma Alam-Naylor) An interesting post. I didn't think about it but it's true, we used to talk way more about minification...

• Minimal APIs Nuget Packages - (Shawn Wildermuth) Same great tools but new names to make it easier to remember and more of the same family.

AI

• #SemanticKernel: Local LLMs Unleashed on #RaspberryPi 5 - (Bruno Capuano) This is the perfect tutorial to get started with local AI. No powerful computer required.

~Frank

Reading Notes #601

It's reading notes time! It is a habit I started a long time ago, where I share a list of all the articles, blog posts, and books that catch my interest during the week.

Having interesting content? Share it! 

Suggestion of the week

• Announcing: Azure Developers (Mehul Harry) - Looking forward to this event. I have the pleasure to present a session with Jerry Nixon about Data API Builder. Join us!

Cloud

• Demystifying Azure CLI pagnination (Jeremy Li) - That's great! It's so sad when all the information is "throw" on us without any control and it's on us to find our "needle" we are looking for in those screens full of line. This will definitely helps.

Programming

• Blazor Basics: Localization Using Resource Files (Claudio Bernasconi) - A nice and complete tutorial.

• What's new for .NET in Ubuntu 24.04 - .NET Blog (Richard Lander) - This is a good news! Definitely going in the right direction.

• Minimal APIs Nuget Packages (Shawn Wildermuth) - Same great tools but new names to make it easier to remember and more of the same family.

• Useful features in Entity Framework Core 8 for your application (Dennis Frühauff) - A great post with detailed explanation and code samples that covers the major new feature and enhancements of EF8.

• Better Minimal APIs Endpoint Organization With Carter in ASP.NET Core (Ivan Gechev) - Carter looks like a very useful library definitely something to explore a bit more.

• Warp’s Team plan for developer productivity is available today (Melanie Crissey) - I started using this terminal a few weeks ago on a personal device. It's interesting to see all the different options an the possibilities for teams.

Open Source

• Open sourcing MS-DOS 4.0 - Microsoft Open Source Blog (Scott Hanselman, Jeff Wilcox) - That a cool news! I'm curious what people will do with it, what kind of experiments they will try.

~ Frank

Reading Notes #559

It is time to share new reading notes. It is a habit I started a long time ago where I share a list of all the articles, blog posts, and books that catch my interest during the week. 

If you think you may have interesting content, share it!

Programming

• The Git repository that vanished by Mark Seemann (Mark Seemann) - I love it! I really enjoy those investigation posts, I think we learn more in those. Thank you for sharing it!

• Creating RESTful APIs with Minimal APIs and Entity Framework Core in ASP.NET (Bruno Sonnino) - Fast way to build an API meet efficiency to talk to the database!

• Demystifying WebAssembly: What Beginners Need to Know (Robert Kimani) - Wasm is a great addition to your toolbox. This post explains what makes it different and goes over the pros and cons.

• How to use plugins with Semantic Kernel | Semantic Kernel (Nilesh Acharya) - Short tutorial that helps us with a ready-to-try sample.

Databases

• Kusto Emulator on Linux (Vincent-Philippe Lauzon) - Great announcement! Faster and smaller perfect for us!

Miscellaneous

• Power Apps is empowering coders with next-generation AI capabilities (Ryan Cunningham) - Looking forward to using that AI to do the little repetitive thing in Power platforms.

~Frank

Reading Notes #539

Good Monday! 

It's time to share new ReadingNotes. Here is a list of all the articles, podcasts, and blog posts, that catch my interest during the week. 

If you think you may have interesting content, share it!

 

Programming

• Making an Asynchronous Breakfast in .NET (Assis Zang ) - This post explains so well using a task that we all did the difference between synchronous and asynchronous code. It's in .NET, but valid for all languages (that support async code of course).

• A first look behind the scenes of minimal API endpoints: Behind the scenes of minimal APIs - Part 1 (Andrew Lock) - First, of a series, this post digs into the code to understand why minimal APIs are so performant. There is a lot in there, looking forward to reading the next one.

• December Extensions Roundup: Improving Visibility for Your APIs and Images (Amy Bass) - I use more than I create docker images these days but I can see how this extension would be useful.Very cool!

• Exploring the model-binding logic of minimal APIs: Behind the scenes of minimal APIs - Part 3 (Andrew Lock) - The third post in a series where we dig into how Minimal APIs do their magic.

• Extracting metadata from a minimal API handler: Behind the scenes of minimal APIs - Part 2 (Andrew Lock) - Another deep technical post of the series where Andrew shows us are things works under the hood of minimal APIs.

• How To Use GitLens To Figure Out Who Introduced A Change In Your Code (Mohd S.) - Great post that shows how to use a tool with a real case. Nicely done!

• Reducing Blazor WASM size by providing custom ICU data - Gérald Barré (Gérald Barré) - This is a nice tutorial with all the code snippets to help us understand and get started.

Podcasts

• Best of DevOps 2022 (DevOps and Docker Talk) - Nice review of 2022, DevOps style, by 3 Docker captains.

• Source Open vs Open Source and IdentityServer with Dominick Baier and Brock Allen (.NET Rocks!) - I used in the past IdentityServer and didn't know the story. Very interesting post about Open source.

~Frank