Microsoft Application Architecture Guide (eck?)

http://apparchguide.codeplex.com/

So i just stumbled across an unfamiliar offering from the familiar Microsoft Patterns & Practices group. Of course, any architecture guide provided by Microsoft immediately invokes thoughts of design-time application development. Unfortunately, although i admit i havent checked all that recently, Microsoft attempts to train everyone to do everything with the GUI. Why write code to databind a control when you can just drag-drop? Those of us with enterprise-level experience designing and building applications know that that drag-drop and other GUI features promoted by Microsoft quickly back you into a corner and don't lend themselves well to being incorporated into design patterns and architectural patterns generally accepted in the community (MS/Java etc). Admittedly there are many GUI features i enjoy and the VS IDE is indispensible but thats apples and oranges.

I spent about 2 mins skimming through the doc linked above and im not sure its worth going back...I suggest you head over to the GOF or buy the 'Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture' by Martin Fowler book instead.

(This post was written from a custom application development perspective)