The .NET/Mono Framework has never been a single, unified stack and over the years Microsoft and Novell added several new versions to cover Linux, OS X, and mobile devices. With the introduction of Windows 8 and Visual Studio 11 we can expect one, maybe two more. In an attempt to clear up some of the confusion this article reintroduces all of the major profiles and many of the lessor know ones.
It seems like every year we relay the announcement that the .NET platform is going to be available on the Nokia S60. In 2007 the now defunct Red Five Labs was talking about Net60, a version of the .NET Compact Framework. Then in 2008 Nokia announced that Silverlight 2 would be demonstrated at the MIX08 conference. Two full years later, we are just now seeing a public Silverlight for Symbian beta.
The AOP framework PostSharp now supports Silverlight, Mono, and .NET Compact Framework.
InfoQ informed the community about the free EQATEC code profiler for the .NET Compact Framework a month ago. In the meantime, the profiler has been well received by the community, and EQATEC released version 1.2 with new features and bug fixes.
McObject has released version 3.0 of its open source embedded database targeted at Java and .NET developers.
EQATEC has recently released a free code profiler for applications written for the .NET Compact Framework.
RIA technologies often need to integrate with established platforms such as .Net or JEE. FlurineFx is an open source library that bridges Flex and .Net. InfoQ spoke with FluorineFx's project manager and learned more details about it.
Microsoft is closing shop on a popular conference targetted at mobile device application developers.
The .NET Compact Framework is used for smaller devices such as smart phones and handheld computers as well as the XBox 360. The recently released 3.5 version now includes a host of debugging tools known collectively Power Toys for .NET Compact Framework 3.5.
