Starting out with Web Client Software Factory a.k.a WCSF

Lately, I've been completely submerged in Software Factories - WCSF and WSSF(Web Service Software Factory) and have come to like one of them, WCSF. I'm bit surprised about the fact that it hasn't caught on to lot of people's imagination albeit having lots of features to create ASP.NET web applications in a standardized way. 

What it is?

It is designed to help one quickly and consistently create web applications that adhere to well known architecture and design principles and patterns. It is an integrated collection of VS.NET solution and project templates, various code recipes, design patterns and prescriptive guidance about creating large scale modular web sites. It synthesizes ASP.NET, ASP.NET AJAX, MVP Design Pattern, Application Blocks of Enterprise Library, Windows Workflow Foundation and VS.NET Solution templates and wizards to create these modular web sites.

Why should one care about it?

There are various reasons why one should care about the Client Software Factory but there are few that stand out -

• It provides a sound baseline for creating web applications which provides a mature web solution structure, out of the box integration with various application blocks like Security, Exception Handling and Logging and, good separation of concerns between layers(through Dependency Injection) thus improving the testability of the application.
• The Factory allows an organization to customize and extend the code recipes and templates to suit their architectural style.

What is the best way to get started?

The best way to get started on WCSF is to install it and go through the hands-on lab on codeplex. One needs the following before installing the client factory -

• Guidance Automation Extensions - This would enable the custom recipes of WCSF. Please install this before the GAT.
• Guidance Automation Toolkit (for VS 2005) - This would facilitate customizations. Please follow this link if you have VS 2008 installed
• Finally, install WCSF from here

Though there are lot of how-to articles and help on codeplex for WCSF but I've found David Hayden's Screencasts an invaluable resource in understanding WCSF. He has brief presentations covering various aspects of WCSF and I would highly recommend viewing all his screencasts before starting out.