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Editor's//Comment

Autumn Leaves

By David Riggs

I’ve always loved the old jazz standard Autumn Leaves. Originally a French song, it was made popular in the United States when Johnny Mercer penned English lyrics to it in 1949. Nat King Cole’s rendition didn’t hurt its popularity, either. Its soulful melody and sad lyrics help convey a sense of loss and despair. Something about a metaphor for summer turning to fall is supposed to be sad.

But frankly, after a summer of 100+-degree days, a valley clogged with smoke from wildfires and smog, and simply too many spare-the-air days, I for one am looking forward to some cooler weather, rain, and even our seasonal fog. And let’s not forget about football. All that comes part and parcel with autumn.

Sure, I hate to see the baseball season end. But it’s time. It’s also time to stop mowing the lawn and start raking the autumn leaves. And it’s time for another mailbox-busting bonus edition of asp.netPRO.

That’s right, I said mailbox-busting. OK, maybe that’s a tad hyperbolic, but you must have noticed a bit more heft this month. Because of the abundance of great content we receive, we are pleased to present 16 extra pages of code and content in this issue. We hope you enjoy the additional material, and we look forward to providing more of the same great content you’ve come to expect from asp.netPRO.

In particular, we are pleased to present the first From the Source article. Written by members of the ASP.NET development team, this new column will cover a broad range of topics leveraging the team members’ areas of focus and expertise. They’ll delve deep into ASP.NET, covering design details, testing procedures, how features work, and how to extend and customize your favorite technology for creating dynamic Web applications. They’ll also preview new features to get your feedback. This column should prove to be very beneficial to the development team and readers alike.

We present this new column for your benefit. Just like all our other content. All the tips, techniques, and teachings right at your fingertips. Like the incisive opinions of Jonathan Goodyear, the down-to-brass-tacks content from Michele Leroux Bustamante, Steve C. Orr, and Dino Esposito, and the invaluable contributions of many others — all presented to help you in your everyday development endeavors. Autumn leaves or not, there’s nothing sad about that.

And with all the development time you save by reading asp.netPRO, there’s more time for other things — like watching football and raking leaves.

Thanks for reading.

David Riggs is editor-in-chief of asp.netPRO and its companion e-newsletter, asp.netNOW. Reach him at mailto:driggs@informant.com.