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Framework Design Studio Released

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When I was coming back from Mix 2007, I was bored on the plane and so started to write a dev tool. What a geeky thing to do on a plane. :-)

The tool allows comparing two versions of an assembly to identify API differences: API additions and removals. Comparing versions of APIs comes very handy during API design process. Often you want to ensure that things did not get removed accidentally (which can cause incompatibilities), and as APIs grow, you want to review the addition without having to re-review APIs that were already reviewed. The tool, called Framework Design Studio (FDS) supports these scenarios.

Later on, I got lots of help from Hongping Lim (a developer on our team), and David Fowler (our 2007 summer intern). David ported the application to WPF, and Hongping basically took it from an early prototype stage to what it is today and made it possible to ship it externally.

Anyway, you can get the tool at the MSDN Code Gallery, the user guide is attached to this post, and lastly, here is the API diff output that the tool generates. Hope you find it useful.

FDS

FdsUsageGuide.docx

Comments

  • Anonymous
    April 04, 2008
    Does the tool support viewing the public and protected interfaces independently?  Do you think that would make sense as a feature?

  • Anonymous
    April 04, 2008
    Greg, We don't support it today. But it's on the TODO list. Thanks!

  • Anonymous
    April 04, 2008
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    April 04, 2008
    Nice to see the project got released!

  • Anonymous
    April 05, 2008
    One of my co-workers, Krzysztof Cwalina has been working on a tool that makes detecting the changes between

  • Anonymous
    April 05, 2008
    De pequeñito quería ser como Krzysztof Cwalina ,... bueno, igual exagero un poco, pero es que el bueno

  • Anonymous
    April 07, 2008
    If you are building and evolving APIs, Framework Design Studio is a tool you should check out. 

  • Anonymous
    April 07, 2008
    Nice tool but how do merge the comments back to you code?

  • Anonymous
    April 09, 2008
    I haven't tried either tool, but how different FDS is from LibCheck http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=4b5b7f29-1939-4e5b-a780-70e887964165&displaylang=en

  • Anonymous
    April 14, 2008
    I like this tool and the timing couldn't be better.  My group is just about to start our API review and this tool will help tremendously.  One question I couldn't find an answer for in any of the documentation, what does it mean when an API element is shaded in gray?

  • Anonymous
    April 14, 2008
    The gray elements mean they are inherited, and so the API design decision has been made during the design of the base class or an interface, not "this" type.

  • Anonymous
    April 28, 2008
    PingBack from http://archiveloper.wordpress.com/2008/04/15/framework-design-studio-released/

  • Anonymous
    May 04, 2008
    The tool space for software architecture has been growing. There are new tools and continuous improvement

  • Anonymous
    May 04, 2008
    The tool space for software architecture has been growing. There are new tools and continuous improvement

  • Anonymous
    May 04, 2008
    O espaço das ferramentas para arquitectura de software em vindo a crescer. Têm vindo a aparecer novas

  • Anonymous
    May 12, 2008
    PingBack from http://www.hanselman.com/blog/VS2008AndNet35SP1BetaShouldYouFearThisRelease.aspx

  • Anonymous
    May 12, 2008
    The Beta of .NET 3.5 and VS2008 SP1 is out . I'm sure everyone is blogging the heck out of it, so I'll

  • Anonymous
    May 22, 2008
    PingBack from http://www.wowgoldip.com/2008/05/22/vs2008-and-net-35-sp1-beta-should-you-fear-this-release/

  • Anonymous
    August 30, 2008
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    September 01, 2008
    You know, you could have contributed to NDepend instead of reinventing the wheel again...

  • Anonymous
    June 18, 2009
    PingBack from http://outdoordecoration.info/story.php?id=1898