From REST API to NuGet Package: Streamlining Code Reuse and Distribution en

The session teaches attendees the implementation of an SDK in C#. Starting with the discovery and exploration of a REST API, creating the corresponding types and methods to address the various API endpoints, writing (or better said generating) the unit tests, and finally deploying the implementation to the NuGet gallery. The workshop concludes using that NuGet package in a sample console or web application.

- API Discovery and its documentation: Reading the API structure, get the data models, and communication protocols from the documentation.

- Library Development: Implementing the client-side logic for interacting with the API, ensuring robust error handling and performance optimization.

- Unit Testing and Quality Assurance: Implementing comprehensive unit tests to ensure the library's stability and adherence to design specifications.

- Package Creation: Building the NuGet package, including dependencies, configuration files, and metadata for easy integration with other projects.

- Deployment and Distribution: Publishing the package to the NuGet Gallery and GitHub Package Registry, making it readily available for developers to consume.

This approach facilitates code reuse, promotes collaboration, and simplifies the integration of API functionalities into various projects. By packaging a REST API into a NuGet package, developers can streamline their workflows, improve development efficiency, and foster a more robust and cohesive development ecosystem.

Integrate Gemini into Your .NET Applications: Unleash the Power of Generative AI en

The world of .NET development just got a whole lot more exciting with the introduction of Gemini, Google's powerful large language model (LLM) API. This talk will guide you through seamlessly integrating Gemini into your .NET applications, unlocking a new level of functionality and creativity.

Working with the Gemini API

- Setting Up Your Project: We'll begin by exploring the steps to set up your .NET project for Gemini access. This includes acquiring the necessary credentials and installing the relevant libraries.
- Interacting with the API: Dive into making API calls to Gemini. We'll cover crafting clear and concise requests, specifying desired outputs, and handling various response formats.
- Processing the Results: Learn how to effectively process Gemini's responses within your application. This includes parsing generated text, interpreting data structures, and integrating the results into your application logic.

Why choosing Gemini?

Gemini offers a diverse range of features:

- Range of specific tasks, such as writing different creative text styles or translating languages.
- Streaming responses which allow fast responsiveness in your applications.
- 1M token to provide context and increase accuracy of responses.
- Multimodal support allowing the combination of text, images and videos for analysis and generation of content.
- Model tuning, which provides the ability to instruct a base model with your data for reality-augmented generation (RAG) and reduction of hallucinations.

Supercharge Your .NET Applications with Gemini

- Boost Developer Productivity: Spend less time on repetitive tasks like code generation or text formatting. Let Gemini handle the heavy lifting!
- Enhance Application Functionality: Integrate features like text summarization, sentiment analysis, or question answering to elevate your application's capabilities.
- Unleash Creative Potential: Generate new ideas, explore different writing styles, or even create prototypes with the help of Gemini's creative text formats.
- Stay at the Forefront of Innovation: Be among the first to leverage cutting-edge generative AI technology in your .NET applications.

Code Examples and Demos

Throughout the talk, we'll showcase practical code examples demonstrating how to integrate Gemini functionalities into your .NET applications. Live demos will further solidify your understanding and ignite your imagination for potential use cases.

Conclusion

Gemini opens a new chapter for .NET development. By integrating this powerful LLM API, you can streamline workflows, unlock creative possibilities, and build smarter, more engaging applications. Take the first step towards the future of .NET development – start integrating Gemini today!

P-AI-R Programming with Gemini en

During this talk attendees will get first-hand experience developing an application (either .NET 8 and/or Node.js) using Visual Code with Gemini. We are starting out from a basic project (provided via my public GitHub repository) and are going to "discuss" matters, refactor and extend the application with Gemini, our AI-based assistant.

P-AI-R programming, or programming with AI-based assistants, is a new paradigm for software development that leverages the power of AI to help developers write better code, faster. Gemini is a Google Cloud service that provides AI-powered assistance for developers, including code completion, code generation, code understanding, and code refactoring.

Use Semantic Kernel to enhance your applications with AI en

Semantic Kernel is a lightweight, open-source development kit that lets you easily build AI agents and integrate the latest AI models into your C#, Python, or Java codebase. During the session an attendee will learn how to integrate Semantic Kernel in their codebase and how to use plugins to interact easily with a selection of large language models (LLMs), how to add function calling, and how to use grounding to improve the quality of responses and reduce the risk of hallucinations. The demos will be done using .NET 9 and latest features.

Inference Your LLMs on the Fly: Serverless Cloud Run with GPU Acceleration en

This session dives into the exciting world of deploying and running large language models (LLMs) like Google Gemma and other open source models in a serverless environment. We'll explore the benefits of using Google Cloud Run with GPU acceleration for efficient and scalable LLM inference.

Discover how to containerize your LLM and deploy it to Cloud Run, leveraging the power of GPUs for faster processing and lower latency. Learn how to optimize your LLM for efficient inference on Cloud Run, including model quantization and efficient batching techniques.

Join us to gain practical insights and learn how to seamlessly deploy and scale your LLMs for real-world applications, all while enjoying the cost-effectiveness and ease of management offered by serverless computing.

Create a .NET Open Source Library: Lessons Learned en

This session shares practical lessons learned from the process of creating and maintaining a .NET open-source library. We'll go beyond the technical aspects, exploring the challenges and rewards of open-source contribution and providing actionable advice for aspiring library authors.

Target Audience: .NET developers interested in contributing to open source or creating and publishing their own libraries.

Learning Objectives: By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

- Understand the key characteristics of high-quality .NET open-source libraries, including inclusivity, stability, evolvability, debuggability, and trustworthiness.
- Apply best practices for library design, focusing on testability, dependency injection, and clear documentation.
- Effectively utilize NuGet for package creation and publishing, including versioning and handling breaking changes.
- Manage community contributions, feedback, and issues.
- Navigate the legal considerations involved in open-sourcing code from a workplace environment.

Session Outline:
Introduction & Defining Success: We'll kick off by defining what constitutes a "successful" open-source library – it's not just about download numbers! We’ll emphasize the importance of solving real-world problems and building a thriving community.

Technical Best Practices: This section will cover key technical aspects, including:

- Cross-platform compatibility: leveraging .NET Standard and multi-targeting.
Testability: building libraries with testability in mind from the outset.
Dependency Injection: strategies for incorporating DI without imposing opinions on users.
Documentation: the importance of clear, concise, and comprehensive documentation (inline, README, examples).
NuGet Package Creation & Publishing: Best practices for versioning (SemVer 2.0.0), metadata, and security.
Source Link: enabling easy debugging for library users.

Community & Collaboration: This segment will address the crucial aspects of community engagement:

Handling contributions: gracefully receiving, reviewing, and integrating pull requests.
Managing issues: effectively responding to and resolving reported bugs and feature requests.
Balancing community feedback with project vision: respectful handling of suggestions that might deviate from the core purpose of the library.
Open communication: maintaining a positive and helpful atmosphere within the project community.

Legal and Practical Considerations:

Open-source licenses (choosing the right license for your project).
Obtaining necessary permissions from employers before releasing work-related code.[4]
Maintaining motivation and dealing with burnout.
Setting realistic expectations and accepting that a project may not achieve widespread popularity.

Finally, we will conclude with a Q&A session and emphasize the importance of continuous learning and improvement in the open-source world. Participants will leave with a clearer understanding of the journey of creating and sustaining a successful .NET open-source library.

.NET Core on Linux en

Microsoft is opening up towards more Open Source Software (OSS), with the availability of .NET Core on Windows, macOS and Linux. Having Microsoft as a premium partner in the Linux foundation, there are great opportunities to extend your programming skills and business solutions to other platforms than Windows. Using .NET Core on Linux is just the beginning of cross-platform development in C#. Explore now and be ready!

Advantages and Opportunities of Cross-Platform Development en

Modern software development isn't limited to one single platform anymore. With recent technologies like Xamarin, Cordova, Electron, Unity or Unreal Engine it is easily possible to design, develop and deploy an application to multiple platforms in shortest time.

Running Windows applications on Linux en

Taking into consideration that the End of Support Lifecycle for Microsoft Windows XP is closing in one might be confronted with the question whether it would be possible to keep existing hardware and installed software applications without having the necessity to upgrade the operating system (which eventually might be incompatible or requires higher investment). The session provides a brief overview of potential solutions and demonstrates quickly how to install and run Windows software on Linux.

Integrate Google AdSense into your Ghost en

A little bit of extra pocket money at the beginning can with some effort turn into a solid passive income. Google AdSense is one of the many platforms to monetize your site.

Build anything with Google: Google Maps APIs en

Starting with a first integration of the Google Maps JavaScript API to add a map into your web site, you could add additional APIs and hence more value to your site and provide interesting features.

Additive Datenbanken zu Visual FoxPro de

- MSDE, MS SQL und MySQL - Die Datenbankengine von Visual FoxPro ist für alltägliche Anforderungen Ihrer Kunden 'garantiert' das richtige Werkzeug. Jedoch entstehen auch Szenarien in denen VFP garantiert nicht mehr die erste Geige spielt. Dafür gibt es unterschiedliche Anlässe: der Kunde verwendet bereits einen SQL Server, fordert höhere Sicherheit im Intranet oder linuxbasierte Server sind im Einsatz...
Damit ergeben sich für Sie als Entwickler verschiedene Fragen: Unter welchen Aspekten ist es sinnvoll, additive Datenbanken zu VFP zu verwenden? Welche Unterschiede und Besonderheiten haben die diversen RDBMS? Wie gestaltet sich die Installation und Konfiguration der Datenbanken und wie nutzt man diese mit Visual FoxPro? Sie werden in dieser Session einen kurzen Überblick erhalten. Danach können wir in eine Unterhaltung mit Erfahrungswerten und Problemlösungen übergehen.

From Idea to Inspiring IT Communities en

This "lessons-learned" talk is spinning around the creation of the MSCC based on an ambitious idea some years back, the up's and down's that we experienced to have a vital and inspiring eco-system of various user groups in Mauritius nowadays.

Introduction to Progressive Web Apps (PWA) en

During the session you will learn the key ingredients of Progressive Web Apps, and how to set the right elements into your HTML pages to get started.

Confirm your knowledge with a certification en

You probably graduated from university and you may hold some sort of degree in the field of IT or software engineering. Since then you working your daily job as a professional - either employed or freelancing. Over time you gain knowledge and valuable experience in the tools and programming languages you use.

But do you know whether your knowledge and experience is "up to standards"? Or how you would compare to other professionals in the same technology stack?

Certifications in the industry can help with that. They are standardized world wide and give you an indicator about yourself. During the session you are going to hear about my experience with various certification exams over the past years, and why a constant, probably daily, learning attitude is essential for your career and personal growth in the field.

Lastly, you are going to learn how to stay motivated during the preparation for an exam and how to keep yourself accountable following the #100DaysOfExam approach.

Explore the unknown: .NET software development on Linux en

Although the C# Language, [Standard ECMA-334](https://www.ecma-international.org/publications/standards/Ecma-334.htm), and the Common Language Infrastructure (CLI), [Standard ECMA-335](https://www.ecma-international.org/publications/standards/Ecma-335.htm), specifications are ECMA standards since 2002 the adaption of both in software development on Linux, particularly openSUSE is quite slow. A successful implementation of both ECMA standards was achieved with the [Mono Project](http://www.mono-project.com/) back in 2004. The [Unity Game Engine](https://unity.com/) based on Mono is one of the best real-time 3D development platforms.

Over 15 years later, the situation has been improved massively. Not only is Microsoft a [Platinum member of the Linux Foundation](https://www.linuxfoundation.org/press-release/microsoft-fortifies-commitment-to-open-source-becomes-linux-foundation-platinum-member) and a [sponsor of the Open Source Initiative (OSI)](https://opensource.org/node/901) the majority of their source code is hosted on [GitHub](https://github.com/microsoft/). Most prominent examples are [the official home of .NET](https://github.com/microsoft/dotnet) and the much appreciated text editor [Visual Studio Code](https://github.com/microsoft/vscode). And Unity has various [open-source repositories](https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/OpenSourceRepositories.html).

In this workshop you will learn how to setup your openSUSE workstation for software development using .NET Core, to write your code in C# using the open source, cross platform editor Visual Studio Code, and how to package and deploy your implementation as either standalone applications or containerized environments on Docker and/or Kubernetes. We are going to realize a small, instant collaboration application based on a service-oriented architecture (SOA) with server-side back-end, web client, and desktop client. The outcome of the workshop shall be that all attendees succeed to complete the implementation and will be able to join a common collaboration space.

Full source code in C# based on .NET Core will be hosted on GitHub and made available to the public.

If time allows we are going to have a peak into Unity (3D game development) and Xamarin (mobile development) to conclude the workshop.

Running SQL Server on GCP en

When talking about Cloud SQL instances on the Google Cloud Platform usually it relates to flexible and convenient handling of MySQL. Eventually, and probably less common, someone might actually speak about PostgreSQL. However in recent times Google added a third option to the Cloud SQL service: Microsoft SQL Server.

Cloud SQL is a fully managed relational database service and is fully compatible with applications using MySQL, PostgreSQL, and SQL Server. You can connect with nearly any application, anywhere in the world. Cloud SQL automates backups, replication, and fail-over to ensure your database is reliable, highly available, and flexible to your performance needs.

The described feature-set of SQL Server on GCP lists everything needed for secure, high-available, high performance, and scalable solutions. Cloud SQL instances can be easily reached from other GCP services, including App Engine, Compute Engine, Kubernetes Engine, as well as your workstation. BigQuery is capable to query directly an existing Cloud SQL database.

References:
https://jochen.kirstaetter.name/sql-server-on-gcp/
https://jochen.kirstaetter.name/sql-server-2019-on-ubuntu/

Develop .NET apps for GCP en

Microsoft is opening up towards more Open Source Software (OSS), with the availability of .NET on Windows, macOS and Linux. Having Microsoft as a premium partner in the Linux foundation, there are great opportunities to extend your programming skills and business solutions to other platforms than Windows. Using .NET on Linux is just the beginning of cross-platform development in C#. Explore now and be ready!

The session evaluates the possibilities to set up your development environment on Linux Visual Studio Code, develop an .NET application or service from scratch, and explains the different options to deploy and operate it on Google Cloud Platform (GCP).

Google Cloud Workstations: A Cloudy Way to Develop Software en

Google Cloud Workstations is a new service that provides developers with a consistent, secure, and scalable development environment. Cloud Workstations are pre-configured with the latest tools and software, and they can be accessed from anywhere in the world. This makes it easy for developers to collaborate on projects and to quickly get started on new work.

In this session, we will discuss the benefits of using Google Cloud Workstations, and we will show you how to get started. We will also cover some of the advanced features of Cloud Workstations, such as the ability to create custom images and to use Cloud Workspaces to manage multiple workstations.

Audience:
This session is intended for developers who are interested in learning more about Google Cloud Workstations. No prior experience with Google Cloud Platform is required.

Learning Objectives:
By the end of this session, participants will be able to:
- Understand the benefits of using Google Cloud Workstations
- Create a Google Cloud Workstation
- Access a Google Cloud Workstation from a web browser
- Use Cloud Workspaces to manage multiple workstations

State of GCP: .NET edition en

Google Cloud Platform (GCP) offers a wide range of services and tools that make it easy to develop, deploy, and manage .NET applications on GCP. As a result, there is a growing number of .NET applications that are being deployed on GCP.

Some of the key services that GCP offers for .NET development include:

✅ Cloud Funtctons: A serverless event-triggered platform to execute single functions written in .NET.
✅ Cloud Run: A serverless platform that makes it easy to run .NET applications without having to worry about provisioning or managing servers.
✅ App Engine: A fully managed platform for hosting .NET web applications.
✅ Kubernetes Engine: A managed Kubernetes service that can be used to deploy and manage .NET applications.
✅ Cloud Storage: A scalable and durable object storage service that can be used to store .NET application data.
✅ Cloud SQL: A fully managed relational database service that can be used to store .NET application data.
✅ Cloud Monitoring: A service that can be used to monitor the performance and health of .NET applications.
✅ Cloud Logging: A service that can be used to collect and store logs from .NET applications.
✅ Cloud Workstations: A service that provides template-based VMs for your team of software developers.

GCP also offers a number of tools and SDKs that make it easy to develop and deploy .NET applications on GCP. These tools include:

🟢 The .NET SDK for Google Cloud: A set of libraries that make it easy to interact with Google Cloud services from .NET applications.
🟢 The Google Cloud Platform Command-Line Tool (gcloud): A command-line tool that can be used to manage Google Cloud resources from the command line.
🟢 The Google Cloud Platform Console: A web-based user interface that can be used to manage Google Cloud resources.

The support that GCP offers for .NET has led to a number of notable .NET applications being deployed on GCP. Some of the most notable examples of these applications include:

🔵 The Stack Overflow website
🔵 The GitHub code hosting service
🔵 The JetBrains Rider IDE
🔵 The Xamarin mobile development platform

Overall, the state of .NET software development on GCP is very positive. GCP offers a wide range of services and tools that make it easy to develop, deploy, and manage .NET applications on GCP. As a result, there is a growing number of .NET applications that are being deployed on GCP.