MSDN Magazine - February 2009 - (Page 63)

“O s l O” B a s i c s Build Metadata-Based Applications With The “Oslo” Platform chris sells an application based on the Microsoft .NET Framework is traditionally defined by a set of compiled code and a set of associated resources. For example, an ASP.NET application is defined by compiled code (assemblies) that provide the logic of your Web site and the resource files (.aspx files) that define the pages themselves. The code is executed by the CPU (after compilation) and the pages are interpreted by the ASP.NET runtime. Similarly, Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) lets you define behaviors as a series of configured activities, all of which is just data to be interpreted by the WF runtime. Combine ASP.NET on the UI side and WF on the behavior side and you can start to imagine building entire applications as almost completely data, using code only to fill in behaviors not provided by the runtimes. The data that drives these runtimes is sometimes called metadata. Metadata can be defined as the data that describes an application, for example, how a home page is rendered or how the purchasing workflow operates. Your application data represents the state of the execution of an application, such as what Bob put in his shopping cart on your Web site or his shipping address in your checkout workflow. To provide a common set of tools for defining metadata so that it can be stored in a place that provides the same set of features as normal application data, Microsoft is creating “Oslo,” a platform for building data-driven applications. “Oslo” is composed of three elements: a family of languages collectively called “M,” a visual data manipulation tool called “Quadrant,” and a data store called the repository. In this article, I will introduce you to some of the concepts of the “Oslo” platform. I will also introduce you to the tools and technologies you need to employ to put those concepts into practice. In particular, I will discuss how “Oslo” enables you to build metadata-driven apps, using the MSchema and MGraph tools, and the basics of defining types and values in “M” as well as deploying them to the repository. This article is based on a prerelease version of the “Oslo” platform. all information is subject to change. This article discusses: • ”Oslo” and metadata • MGraph and Mschema • sQl scripts, packaging, and deployment • Visual studio integration Technologies discussed: ”Oslo,” sQl server 2008 code download: msdn.microsoft.com/magazine/cc135911 February 2009 63 http://msdn.microsoft.com/magazine/cc135911

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of MSDN Magazine - February 2009

MSDN Magazine - February 2009 Contents Toolbox CLR Inside Out Data Points Cutting Edge Patterns In Practice Best Practices .Net Interop "Oslo" Basics Patterns Silverlight Under The Table Foundations Windows With C++ .NET Matters Going Places { End Bracket }

MSDN Magazine - February 2009

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