Brad Wilson

Book Review: .NET 4.5 Parallel Extensions Cookbook

Disclosure: I was offered a free electronic copy of this book in exchange for this book review. The publisher had no input on the review.

Parallel processing is one of the most challenging problems for the modern developer. The first time you start creating threads, you open yourself up to a whole host of problems, including deadlocks and data corruption. The ASP.NET team went to great lengths to hide all the difficulties of multi-threading by presenting a programming model that allows developers to reap the benefits of multi-threading without sweating most of the details. Similarly, the Task Parallel Library – introduced in .NET 4, and greatly improved in .NET 4.5 – attempts to bring that same level of abstraction without diving deep into the threading details.

Professional ASP.NET MVC 4

They say that writing a book is a hard way to make an easy living. This is especially true for technical books, which tend to have a short shelf life.

For me, the process was made easier by having three great seasoned authors to work with. We updated all the existing chapters of this 4th edition to cover ASP.NET MVC 4, and we've added three new chapters covering Membership & Security, Web API, and the building of the NuGet Gallery site using MVC. I like to think of this book as my Microsoft swan song. :)

Print Edition, Kindle Edition 

...Of The Decade

All throughout the day yesterday (before and after work), I was tweeting my own personal observation of best stuff of the decade. I collected them all here for your refutation. :)

Music Artist of the Decade: Opeth
Pop Album of the Decade: Discovery by Daft Punk
Rock Album of the Decade: In Absentia by Porcupine Tree
Metal Album of the Decade: Blackwater Park by Opeth

Author of the Decade: Neil Gaiman
Sci-Fi Book of the Decade: Chasm City by Alastair Reynolds
Fantasy Book of the Decade: A Storm of Swords by George R. R. Martin

Television Show of the Decade: Battlestar Galactica

Movie of the Decade: The Dark Knight

Comedian of the Decade: Patton Oswalt

Gadget of the Decade: iPhone

Board Game of the Decade: Puerto Rico
Video Game of the Decade: Half-Life 2