Rotating Knives

  I am getting deep into VSTS 2010’s modeling tools in my new gig.  Many developers and architects with which I have spoken are not using the tools, though they have been out for some time now.  I find that, because the tools are able to do so much, architects seem to be avoiding them until they can understand how to fully leverage them.  This is a shame, because like UML, the tools in Visual Studio 2010 are very effective at addressing modeling needs on wide spectrum of detail levels. Just because you CAN associate each use case with a work item and each class diagram with actual code doesn’t mean you have to.  There is still tremendous value in starting at the high level and leaving detailed plumbing for later.

Which brings me to this 9 part Channel9 video series by Microsoft Architect Evangelist Clint Edmondson. It is a very nice walkthrough of both Domain Driven Design and the Visual Studio 2010 architecture tools.  If you have been putting off using VSTS 2010 for architecture artifacts, then give this a watch.  Viewing all of them takes a decent block of time, but it is well worth your time.

1. UML with VS 2010 Part 1: Brainstorming a Project
2. UML with VS 2010 Part 2: Organizing Features Into Use Cases
3. UML with VS 2010 Part 3: Modeling the Business Domain
4. UML with VS 2010 Part 4: Capturing Business Workflows
5. UML with VS 2010 Part 5: Architecting an Application
6. UML with VS 2010 Part 6: Designing a Project’s Physical Structure
7. UML with VS 2010 Part 7: Sketching Interactions with Sequence Diagrams
8. UML with VS 2010 Part 8: Revealing Responsibilities with Class Diagrams
9. UML with VS 2010 Part 9: Organizing and Managing Your Models