Rob Mensching's Blog - page 15

Today we released WiX v3.6 RC0. If you are on the WiX v3.6 Beta or you were waiting for Burn to become fundamentally stable or you are looking for VS 11 support, this is a great time to upgrade. Core scenarios work and we do not expect any further breaking changes. At the same time, we are still fixing most bugs that are filed. That means if you do hit an issue in RC0, there is a good chance we can get the fix in before locking down. Wondering what's left?

My interview with Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell at .NET Rocks went up yesterday. Like all interviews or public speaking gigs, I had some butterflies before the show. But when Carl Skype'd me the world just floated away and I on! The whole interview was tons of fun but there were a couple things that I thought went particularly well.

Since the beginning, or at least as long as I can remember, WiX Toolset builds were released on Fridays. Friday seemed like as good a day as any. It was at the end of the week, so it would have whatever contributions were made that week. Plus everyone looks forward to Fridays. Well, starting this week we're moving the build to Monday.

This morning I came down the stairs to be greeted by my wife blowing a party horn and waving streamers in front of a banner strung from the cabinets that read, "Happy New Year!" She then wished me a, "Happy birthday!" In case there is any doubt, I have a wonderful wife who truly listens, loves and supports me.

This morning, Jenny and I were mourning the loss of Mike Fucito and Lamar Neagle in a trade to the Montreal Impact for Eddie Johnson. Jenny loved Fucito (she'd yell, "That's my boy!" any time he touched the pitch) and Neagle was one of the few Sounders to score a hat trick at home. They were also great members of the Seattle community. The trade unexpectedly touched a nerve in me personally and I wondered, "Do software engineers get traded?"

Bob just sent me a link to the Redis Manifesto via Twitter. He's was supportive as I vented off some of this week's frustrations. After reading the link, I believe Bob is right. I need to write the WiX Toolset Manifesto.

It is with great pleasure that I announce the WiX toolset's new home is fully operational: http://wixtoolset.org. This site is now our central hub for information about the WiX toolset. We will consolidate the WiX content that makes sense and link to the WiX content hosted elsewhere. The most important feature back online right now is the weekly releases.

If you only follow my blog via the ATOM feed, then you probably missed the fact that / and /blog/ have a brand new look. The whole site was rewritten and redesigned. "Why?" you might ask. Read on for why, what went well and what didn't go so well.