Category: reviews

The Dew Review – C# 8.0 and .NET Core 3.0 – Modern Cross-Platform Development (Packt) by Mark J. Price

I received a preview copy of this new book, C# 8.0 and .NET Core 3.0 – Modern Cross-Platform Development, by Mark Price and wanted to provide some of my initial thoughts. I have reviewed the topics covered by the book and read several sections in detail to get a sense of who could benefit from reading it and how well it was written. So far, I have been very impressed by the quality, breadth, and depth of this book.

C# 8 and .NET Core 3 Modern Development

I would recommend this book to several different types of developers:

  1. New, aspiring developers – The book offers some great history on .NET development and lays a solid foundation for starting your development journey with Visual Studio, VS Code or VS for Mac. Language and framework fundamentals are explained and enhanced with useful exercises at the end of each chapter, reinforcing the concepts. Some basic development concepts/practices, such as inheritance and unit testing, are discussed in the early chapters.
  2. Experienced .NET Framework developers new to .NET Core – The chapters on .NET Core and ASP.NET Core step through the changes and enhancements that were significant to each release. There is a section on porting apps from .NET Framework to .NET Core, discussing how this can be done and whether it should be done (hint: usually not).
  3. Developers using .NET Core who are new to .NET Core 3.0 – There are some sections on the latest features of .NET Core 3.0, including Blazor and desktop development with WPF and WinForms Core apps on Windows.

While some of the more specific aspects of .NET development like ASP.NET Core, Blazor and Xamarin are not discussed in great depth, the author explains the basics well and provides a good kick-start on these topics. Readers can take what they learned on them here and go deeper with some other, more specific books. If you’re looking to build your first ASP.NET Core MVC or ASP.NET Core WebAPI project, this book gives enough details to give you a great start in those areas, in my opinion.

I work on a team that focuses on our application performance, so the chapter on Performance and Scalability was of particular interest. The author provides a solid introduction to .NET Core performance topics, including asynchronous programming with Tasks, locking concepts, and using async and await to keep your app responsive.

The section on Machine Learning with ML.NET is a great intro to machine learning concepts for developers with little to no exposure to it. It steps readers through the process of building a website that provides product recommendations based on a trained model and displays those recommendations in the site’s shopping cart.

I have really enjoyed this book so far. I’m looking forward to getting a print copy to continue exploring it. For me, print is the best way to get the most out of this kind of programming book. Shorter books on specific topics can work better as eBooks, but I like to keep copies of large reference books on my desk to quickly flip to earmarked pages. Check out the free Kindle sample on Amazon. I think you’ll like what you read and will want to order a copy for yourself.

Happy reading!

KuaiFit K Sport Headphones With In-Ear Personal Trainer – Unboxing and Initial Impressions

KuaiFit is a maker of personal trainer apps and sport headsets. A couple of weeks ago a representative from KuaiFit reached out to ask if I would be interested in a set of their new wireless earbuds in exchange for publishing my thoughts on the new product. Even though this is a “paid review” of sorts (just a free headset), you’ll get my honest impressions of the product.

The K Sport Headphones With In-Ear Personal Trainer just launched as a Kickstarter campaign this week. The super early bird is currently still available at approx. $20 U.S. Each set of these includes a free 3-month training plan on their mobile app. Being sweat and rain proof (IPX5), they ought to be perfect for working out.

I plan to use these headphones over the next several days for music, audiobooks and workouts, and will publish more detailed thoughts in a week or so. For now, I will provide my initial impressions after using them briefly last night. Let’s start with some unboxing pictures.

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Pic 1- Front shot in the box

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Pic 2 – Back shot in the box

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Pic 3 – What’s in the box

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Pic 4 – Dual charging cable

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Pic 5 – Small and light

The contents of the box include:

  • Two wireless earbuds
  • A dual charging cable to charge both simultaneously from one USB port
  • Larger and smaller cushions to get a perfect fit
  • A sheet with some basic instructions and the training plan activation code

Setup and pair was simple and painless for me. After charging the set during dinner, I got them ready to go in about a minute. You press the ‘K’ button on each earbud until the LED flashes red & blue to indicate it’s in pairing mode. Then open your phone’s Bluetooth settings and pair them like any other device. Whether one or both earbuds are on, they appear and act as a single device with your phone. (My phone is an Android – Moto Z2 Force.)

So far, I used the set with Audible and Spotify, listening to a few songs to check out the range. They sound crisp and clear with Hotel California, but could use a little more bass on Enter Sandman. At this size, weight and price point, I’m definitely willing to cut them a little slack on the lack of a more powerful, booming bass. The other thing I need to figure out is whether there is an option to configure the language on them. When pairing, the voice in the earphones sounds like some East Asian language. I’m no expert, and won’t assume which language I’m hearing. It may be that these early review units are not customized for the consumer’s country. I will clarify this before my full review is published.

I am sometimes a little hesitant to back a technology-based Kickstarter campaign, not knowing if the group can or will deliver on the product. I’ve been burned by a couple of smart watch campaigns in the past. However, I can assure that these earphones are not vapor. They’re already producing enough of them to sent out these early review units. At this price, they seem like a great option, but stay tuned for my full review in a couple of weeks. I’ll be sure to publish it well before the end of the campaign in 27 days.

Stay tuned!

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