Increasing .NET knowledge

Question

I would like to see if anyone can offer any advise on furthering my knowledge in the .NET environment...

Here a little background. I went to a university and got my BS in Computer Science (mostly worked in C, Java, and C++). Took a job right out of college for a small business doing internal development and a few commercial projects as a one man show. I do pretty much all my development in the .NET environment and most everything was self-taught. It is now 3+ years later.

I feel that I'm not using proper procedures (configuring, creating, maintaining, etc my projects in VS), using the technologies to their fullest potential, improper techniques, or just using some things wrong. I happy with the products I release and proud of the work I do, sometimes I just feel like I'm doing things wrong.

Can anyone make some suggestions (non-virtual environment) to becoming a better developer? Good .NET communities in TX (specifically San Antonio)? Or a book you consider to be a 'bible' when it comes to this stuff --being that I already own quite a few.

Thanks.

Answer 1

Download an open-source project and look at their methods of application organization. Paint.NET is a good one to start.

Another good method is to Google something you've already accomplished and see the way the smart masses have done it. Make sure they're actually doing something better before you adopt their methods though.

Answer 2

".NET Development" covers such a huge amount of things, you are going to get a wide array of information across the board on this. Even when I look at the tags and see "web-development" - that could mean a lot of different things as well.

My suggestion, if you want to learn more, pick out the technology that you're interested in (ASP.NET MVC, WebForms, Javascript/jQuery, whatever) and hop onto Amazon and find a good book that can help you get started. Once you have gone through the book, take those skills and try to apply them to your own web site (create a personalized one), or apply it directly to your job.

Answer 3

First off before you worry about your .Net knowledge if you really want to be successful in the business world you need to worry about your writing skills. "I would like to see if anyone CAN offer".

The average developer is so-so at their communication abilities (in fact the average person is only so-so) so by spending time learning how to communicate better and more clearly you'll have a huge advantage.

Second off before I worried about .Net in particular I'd worry about my core skills. A great place to start is here...

http://blog.jpboodhoo.com/BuildASolidCore.aspx

Answer 4

I would recommend checking out the NerdDinner tutorial if you haven't already done so - although it does focus on Web Applications which may not be your thing... it blew my mind...

http://tinyurl.com/aspnetmvc

Answer 5

Scott Guthrie is the Corporate VP of Microsoft's Developer Division. He is also an avid blogger, tweeter, and all around brilliant genius of a developer. He's not a stuffy shirted on the course golfing sort either. He really keeps up with the technology, he lives it. At any rate he writes some great example code and gives it out freely often. I have learned a lot of technique from him and he's well worth the read if you want to increase your .Net knowledge.

Scott's Blog

Scott's Twitter

A series on .Net 4 by Scott Guthrie