Hi,
MySQL Connector/Net 6.0.2, a new version of the all-managed .NET driver for MySQL has been released.  This is a beta release and is intended to introduce you to the new features and enhancements we are planning.  This release should not be used in a production environment.

This release was quickly pushed out due to a problem that caused 6.0.1 to not register with Visual Studio correctly.  We also made a small correction to a previous bug fix.  SQL generated from entity framework for stored procedures will now not directly reference the schema.  This allows the model to move to a different database without need of change.  We had previously made this change for tables but failed to do so for procedures.

It is now available in source and binary form from [http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/connector/net/6.0.html] …

MySQL Connector/Net 6.0.1, a new version of the all-managed .NET driver for MySQL has been released. This is a beta release and is intended to introduce you to the new features and enhancements we are planning. This release should not be used in a production environment.

We had three major goals with this release. Speed, Entity Framework support, and a better Visual Studio experience. I'm happy to report that we have met all three. Please see the complete list of changes below.

It is now available in source and binary form from [http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/connector/net/6.0.html] and mirror sites (note that not all mirror sites may be up to date at this point of time - if you can't find this version on some mirror, please try again later or choose another download site.)

• Massive speedups. We have increased the speed of the provider. In many situations it now matches or exceeds the speed of the native C connector. …

MySQL Connector/Net 6.0.0, a new version of the all-managed .NET driver for MySQL has been released.  This is an alpha release and is intended to introduce you to the new features and enhancements we are planning.  This release should not be used in a production environment.

We had three major goals with this release.  Speed, Entity Framework support, and a better Visual Studio experience.  I'm happy to report that we have met all three.  Please see the complete list of changes below.

It is now available in source and binary form from [http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/connector/net/6.0.html] and mirror sites (note that not all mirror sites may be up to date at this point of time - if you can't find this version on some mirror, please try again later or choose another download site.)

• Massive speedups.  We …

I’ve had about enough of Microsoft and its approach to help small businesses develop application. The .NET platform is FAR FAR from ‘working everywhere’ and being compatible to everything. Let me write down some points to what I mean.

Windows Applications that are developed in Visual Studio.NET by SMBs usually (almost always):

• Do not work on other machines, even when its .NET. Don’t assume a .NET application will work on every machine. You need an installation of visual studio for each machine you want your application to work on.
• Do not work with Crystal Reports. It might work “ok” on your computer, but if/when it doesn’t print on someone else’s machine, try to find some support.
  
• Stop working when you update …

MySQL Connector/Net 5.2.4, a new version of the all-managed .NET driver for MySQL has been released.  This release is of GA quality and is suitable for  use in production environments.  We strongly urge you to  review the change log that is shipped with the product for a thorough review of the changes.

We have a ton of fixes in this release so please review the changelog and see if your favorite bug has been fixed.  Version 5.2.4 works with all versions of MySQL including MySQL-4.1,  MySQL-5.0, MySQL-5.1, and the MySQL-6.0 beta.

It is now available in source and binary form from [http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/connector/net/5.2.html] and mirror sites (note that not all mirror sites may be up to date at this point of time - if you can't find this version on some mirror, please try again later or choose another download …

This past Tuesday I was doing more than just voting.  I was giving a live webinar on using MySQL with the Entity Framework.  We had a terrific time (demo machine crash included!) and had a great turnout.  I have been informed that we set records for most number of registrations and attendees.  I’m truly honored and hope that at least some of you got something out of it.

I’ve had a lot of people ask me for the materials from the session so I’ve made them available from my personal server.  You can get the slides, sample projects, and db script here.  The webinar was also recorded and will appear on this page eventually.

Thanks again to all who attended.  I’m hoping to give an expanded version of this session at our users conference …

There are a few podcasts I tend to listen to as I have time. Since I work with a wide range of technologies, I've tried to group them together into a semblance of order. There are a few others I am evaluating, but since I haven't listened to a large enough body of work, I'll refrain from listing them at this time. If there's one you think is particularly valuable or interesting that I don't have listed, please leave it in the comments.

.NET

.NET Rocks - http://www.dotnetrocks.com/

This is one of the best done podcasts out there and they cover anything and everything related to Microsoft .NET. That's a broad brush of most anything that interacts with Microsoft technologies. This one runs twice a week and is about an hour each podcast, but if you can spare the time, it's worth the listen.

Plumbers @ Work - …

The last two weeks I have been working on a .NET application using MySQL (3.21) for data storage. The application is basically a stand-alone PC application where MySql is used to store a lot of data from test equipment.

This is a bit different from what I spend most of my time on. No web site with lost of concurrent session, but instead a lot of installations of the software on local PC's. The also means we can not tune parameters on a live system, we have to set them before delivering to customers. Basically this is the main problem, since we don't know how the system will be run.

Well, if the scenario is different, the most important action was the same. Changing the field order in one of the indexes to match the queries better was our number one action, and the impact was larger than all other actions together. If your indexes are not righ, you should fix it before anything else.

An upgrade to MySql …

I have been working on a new assignment this week, with the goal to improve performance in a .NET application using MySQL (3.21) for data storage. The application handles a lot of data in what is basically a single user system.

The main rason for the performance problems was heavy searches where indexes did not match. Simply switching the order of columns in the composite key fixed most of it.

In the old version they copied data to a temporary table, to solve the slow query problem. Once we had the indexes fixed, we could drop this solution and use the ase table in all cases. This also speeded it up a lot.

The change to MySQL 5.0 made a few other changes possible
- switch to shared memory for communication between database and application
- buffering of indexes
- query caching
which all ment further improved performance

All in all quite successful so far. …

One thing is always certain about information technology: there is always change. This past week I was pitching in on a Citrix upgrade for my organization and I went to tweak the web interface. Though I'm not primarily a "server guy" and directory services administrator, I do have a web developer skillset (in fact, that's how I got my start where I work now). However, it's been a few years since I've done anything but touch up work with regards to web development and initially I got that blank feeling... the one where you know how to do things but it's like your mind is cycling through the archives to pull back that information and bring it to the forefront. After a thankfully brief period of "brain thrashing," I went to it.

This experience reminded me of a .NET Rocks! episode with noted Windows …