C# Windows Application Developer - 3rd Party Tools [closed]

Question

Scenario

I have recently graduated from university with a degree in Computer Science. My degree mainly focused on C#. I want to learn more and get better at what I do. I notice a lot of companies always want their developers to know and use 3rd party tools.

Question

If I was developing C# Windows Forms applications, what 3rd party tools/libraries/controls etc. would be of use to me and for what reason?

Answer 1

The answer to this question depends on how you define "3rd party tools". I usually take that to mean products from companies other than MS but excluding free open source software. When it comes to 3rd party products (for-profit) I cannot think of any common products that I've used or been asked to learn over the last decade that I've been doing .Net development. Most MS shops I've worked with turn to MS solutions (for good or ill depending on your personal view).

That said, in recent years the number and quality of the various FOSS solutions out there has risen dramatically. I use the following whenever I can:

• Logging: log4net
• Inversion of Control Container (plus more): Castle Windsor
• ORM: NHibernate
• Unit Testing: NUnit
• Mocks for unit testing: Rhino Mocks

For most of these projects there are many other options, these are just my current favorites. Learn to use these (and WHY they are needed) and you'll be many steps above the average .Net developer (sad but all to true).