.NET Study Cases Overview
Aleksandrs Lielbriedis
Microsoft Consulting Services
alekslie@microsoft.com
Agenda
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Introduction to .NET
Dollar Rent a Car
Scandinavian Airline Systems
Mobile Internet Toolkit with Demo
Telenor
Xerox Global Services
Smart Device Extensions with Demo
Summary
Microsoft .NET
Connecting your world through XML Web services
Dollar Rent a Car
Profile
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One of the world’s largest car
rental agencies, with close to 400
locations in 26 countries
Web site: http://www.dollar.com
Mobile web site:
http://mobile.dollar.com
Dollar Rent a Car
Business Need
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Wanted to provide partners with direct
access into Quick Keys, its VMS-based
reservation system
CORBA, Java RMI, DCOM, and socket
programming were all considered, but
dismissed as inappropriate
Dollar Rent a Car
Solution
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Created a re-usable interface into
Quick Keys based on XML Web
services using the Microsoft platform
Used Microsoft Mobile Internet Toolkit
to create a solution that supports all
major mobile devices
Dollar Rent a Car
Benefits
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Several million dollars in incremental
revenues
Lower transaction costs (no GDS fees)
Flexibility, rapid integration of new
partners
Re-used the interface four additional
times to rapidly and cost-effectively
meet new business needs
Dollar Rent a Car
Comments
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“The speed at which Pete’s team completed the
proof-of-concept and the simplicity of the
solution actually startled us. I remember Pete
and I discussing whether the solution could
really be that simple. We kept looking for the
catch, but never found one.”
Larry Zucker Executive Director, Application
Development
Dollar Rent a Car
Mobile.dollar.com
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Heard another car rental company was
90 days away from being the first to
deliver a fully mobile-enabled Web site
Delivered in 30 days, beat other
company to market
Costs were 10 percent of a third-party
solution, project completed 2-3 times
as fast
Dollar Rent a Car
Comments
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“The Microsoft Mobile Internet Toolkit and
Visual Studio .NET enabled us to create a
mobile site that can be accessed by a wide
range of mobile devices in less than 30 days.
All we had to do was build the pages once,
call our existing XML Web service to access
the mainframe, and we’re good-to-go.”
Don Horner Senior Programmer/Analyst,
Advanced Technology Group
Dollar Rent a Car
Integrating New EDI Partners
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Tour operators are one of Dollar’s target
sales channels
Integrating each new tour operator required
hand-coding mainframe routines to parse
flat files (2 months per partner)
Delays were resulting in lost revenue
In 14 hours, one developer created a proofof-concept using BizTalk Server 2000 that
received a flat file, parsed it, and used
Dollar’s existing XML Web services interface
to send reservations to the mainframe
Dollar Rent a Car
Comments
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“All future EDI interfaces will be done using
BizTalk Server and our existing XML Web
services interface. This will reduce the time
required to integrate each new business
partner by 75 percent—from two months
down to two weeks—and we won’t need to
modify our mainframe applications for each
new partner.”
Peter Osbourne Group Manager, Advanced
Technology Group
Scandinavian Airlines System
Profile
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Scandinavian Airlines System is a
successful international airline and a
leader in Star Alliance
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Web site:
http://www.scandinavian.net
Mobile web site:
http://mobile.scandinavian.net
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Scandinavian Airlines System
Business Need
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Provide new levels of service to their
increasingly wireless customer base
with variety of cell phones and PDAtype devices
Existing VB6, COM+ application to
extend it to mobile devices
Scandinavian Airlines System
Solution
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Chose .NET platform because:
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Low development, maintenance cost
Easy to administrate over time
Initially planned just to do rebooking
but extended it to add XML Web
Service
Run same business logic on desktop &
device
Identify top 3 devices
Scandinavian Airlines System
Devices
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Some devices use
wbmps
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Others use GIFs
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Nokia, LCD b&w
displays
PocketPC
Use <device>
selection feature of
MMIT
Scandinavian Airlines System
Devices
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Take advantage of the feature set
Scandinavian Airlines System
Benefits
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Broad device coverage from a single
mobile Web page
Customization for specific devices,
such as Pocket PC
Fast time to market and low
maintenance cost
Improved customer service
Scandinavian Airlines System
Comments
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“Visual Studio .NET, along with the
Microsoft Mobile Internet Toolkit, was an
easy choice to make, it allowed us to
deliver customized pages for myriad
devices quickly and cost-effectively, plus
we have the flexibility to build in exciting
new features that will help SAS serve
customers even better in the future.”
Peter MüllerDeputy Director, Scandinavian IT
Group
Mobile Development Situation
Web
Site
Mobile Development Challenge
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Form factors and device capabilities
Multiple mark-up languages
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Cookie support
State management
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Browser Variations
Content pagination
Development tools
The Solution
 An
SDK that…
 leverages ASP.NET to empower
developers to build mobile web
applications and sites that target multiple
mobile devices.
 integrates with the Visual Studio .NET
development environment for ease of
use.
Microsoft Mobile Internet
Toolkit
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Write-once mobile web pages
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From a single code base target multiple devices
Support multiple mark-up languages
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WML1.1 (WAP); cHTML 1.0, and HTML 3.2
Support for a variety of devices
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Web enabled Cell Phones, PDAs …
Customizable and extensible framework
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Add new controls and support for new devices
Integrates with Visual Studio.NET
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World-class development tool
How MMIT works…
Create
mobile Web Form
Mobile
Presentation
Layer (controls)
Integrate
Business Logic
Test
Target Devices
Device
Capabilities
Mobile.aspx
Pages
Mobile Controls
&
Device Adapters
generate display
Post to
Web Servers
Development
Environment
HTTP
Request
HTTP
Response
Windows 2000 (with IIS)
.NET Framework
Mobile Internet Toolkit
Production Environment
Extending .NET Framework
Web Services Platform
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ASP.NET
Web
Forms
Mobile
Web
Forms
Win Forms
Web Services
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Mobile Internet
Controls are
ASP.NET controls
Programming Model
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Services Framework
Base Data Debug
…
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Common Language Runtime
System Services
Control/object/event
model
State management
Desktop and mobile
applications can
share code
DEMO
Telenor
Profile
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Norwegian telecommunications group
with extensive and fast growing
business operations in a number of
countries in Europe and Southeast Asia
Norway's leading distributor of voice,
information, knowledge and
entertainment through a broad range of
modern communications services.
Web site: http://www.telenor.no
Telenor
Business Need
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Replace legacy point-of-sale online
system, that was difficult to use and
hard to expand
Telenor
Solution
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The need for rapid development led Telenor
to use Microsoft Visual Studio .NET as its
integrated development environment
Microsoft .NET Framework, leveraging its
great support for XML Web Services.
Telenor’s new SOLO point-of-sale
application, which has now been completed,
deployed, and is in full service today for all
of Telenor’s 2000 dealers
Telenor’s SOLO
Telenor
SOLO Details
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Microsoft Windows® 2000 Advanced Server
with load-balanced front-end Web servers
Integrates with IBM WebSphere using XML
Web services, showcasing XML and SOAP
as an industrial-strength mechanism for
enterprise application integration
The solution calls more than 30 XML Web
services with complex data types as
input/output to the back-end systems
Telenor
Benefits
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Completing a project that could be
delivered with ease on budget and on
time
Customization for specific devices,
such as Pocket PC
Fast time to market and low
maintenance cost
Improved customer service
Telenor
Comments
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“Microsoft Visual Studio .NET provides an
integrated design environment (IDE) that
has everything the developer needs –
without ever having to leave the IDE –
whether it is for design, coding, or
debugging”
Kenneth Hansen Developer at Telenor
Xerox Global Services
Profile
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Xerox Corporation is primarily engaged
in the global document market selling
equipment and providing document
solutions including hardware, services
and software
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Web site: http://www.xerox.com
Xerox Global Services
Business Need
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Extend its current Microsoft® .NETbased asset management solution to
mobile devices, eliminating error-prone
pencil-and-paper recording for field
technicians.
Xerox Global Services
Solution
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The mobile solution was written in C#
with Windows® Forms using the .NET
Compact Framework and SQL Server™
2000 Windows CE Edition on a Pocket
PC with an integrated bar-code
scanner
The device communicates over a
wireless link, when available, or via
ActiveSync® technology, to a .NET
server application using SQL Server
2000.
Xerox Global Services
Solution
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3 developers to build application in 2
month
Planned number of users and devices
for deployment is around 5000
Eliminate human error from duplicate
data entry and reduce time to input
data into system
Improve synchronization of data in
central database
Xerox Global Services
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Instance updates
No paper
Collect data for nonetwork devices
View the service
history
Xerox Global Services
More Details
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Technicians can use the Pocket PC to
receive email alert notifications from
networked devices that have gone down
Bar code reader to capture asset numbers
Wireless networking when it is available
otherwise detached mode, and can
synchronize using a cradle.
SQL Server CE acts as the mobile device's
local data store
Xerox Global Services
Benefits
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Able to share code between server and
mobile device
Single environment for desktop, server,
and device development
.NET Compact Framework supports a
single compiled program across all
.NET Compact Framework devices
Most needed services were already
available in the .NET Compact
Framework
Xerox Global Services
Comments
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“We were able to port some of our C# code from
the desktop to the mobile application, which
helped our productivity. Our developers were
already familiar with the C# language and
Windows Forms. It was easy and natural for
them to learn the .NET Compact Framework.”
Kirk Pothos Software Development Manager
Xerox Global Services
.Net And Devices
Visual Studio.NET
.NET Framework
web pages
Mobile Web
Browser
code
.NET Compact
Framework
Device Client Application Model
web services
soap
Visual Studio.NET
Smart Device Extensions
code
.NET Compact Framework
.NET Compact
Framework
Windows
Development Environment
Device OS
Target Device
Visual Studio .NET Benefits
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Enables RAD development for devices
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Design and code editing customized for
devices
High fidelity device emulation
Rich debugging in the emulator or on
device
Support for multiple platforms
Device functionality fully integrated
with Visual Studio
Supported Functionality
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Common Base Classes
 IO, collections, math, drawing
Connectivity
 Networking, HTTP classes, calling XML Web
Services
Data Access
 ADO.NET, SQL Server CE, SQL Server
XML
 XmlDocument, XmlReader/Writer
Windows Forms
Unsupported Functionality
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ASP.NET
COM Interop
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P/Invoke enables calls to Win32 DLLs
No support for writing a COM object
Remoting
Serialization
Install-time JIT (nGen)
Networking Support
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Sockets
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Streams
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Synchronous and
asynchronous
Multiple protocols
Built on top
of sockets
Synchronous
and asynchronous
HTTP request
and response
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Use stream model
Requires no user
knowledge of HTTP
Applications
.NET Compact
Framework
Web Services
HTTP Req/Resp, Network Stream
Sockets
Common Language Runtime
XML Web Services Support
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Calling XML Web Services
Synchronous and asynchronous
invocation
Basic and Digest authentication
Secure Sockets Layer support for
encryption (SSL)
Custom SOAP headers
Smart Device Support
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Client-side rich mobile application
development for Visual Studio .NET
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Visual Basic .NET and Visual C# .NET
Remote debugging
Emulation
Targets the .NET Compact Framework
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XML Web Services
Rich Forms and Drawing
Building Smart Device Apps
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Device-specific project settings in
Project Properties
Device Extensions toolbar exposes
deployment device
Tools Options to change device
configurations and connectivity
Building Smart Device Apps
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Same user experience as desktop
 Use desktop compilers to build the
application
 Deploy to selected device
 Output Window used for deployment
messages
Supported features include
 Debug on the device or in the emulator
 Breakpoints
 Multi-language debugging
DEMO
Desktop App. Advantages
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Richer UI
Responsiveness
Performance
Off-Line mode
Efficient use of edge resources
Easy integration with local
application and APIs
Summary
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Smaller development resources
Higher productivity (RAD)
Single IDE
Easy integration with other
applications
Low maintenance costs
Great developer story
“It must be a catch somewhere”
Questions?