The Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF) is a new library which is part of the .Net 4.0 framework. MEF helps you build extensible and maintainable applications, which you can evolve over time, by providing a mechanism that promotes decoupling and separation of concerns, and supports plugins.

Come join us on this quest for enlightenment in the way of MEF. We will start our journey light with the essentials of composition in MEF: Import, Export and Compose. We will then travel together on the path as we elevate toward master, covering topics such as the following:

1. How to lazily instantiate parts to conserve processor cycles
2. Self-describing parts in order to allow more flexible discovery
3. Diagnosing common MEF failures
4. Adapting legacy components to work with MEF
5. Partitioning your Silverlight applications across multiple XAPs to reduce download cost and improve startup time
6. Providing default overridable parts
7. Using hierarchical containers for scoped composition
8. Creating custom catalogs to apply custom policy for filtering
9. Creating export providers to integrate with existing service providers
10. Composing UIs with MEF / MEF with Prism
11. Implementing MVVM with MEF

We'll also delve into MEF contrib where we will look at the Convention based programming model and Open Generics support, and integration with other IoC containers.

You will be a Master!

Glenn Block

Glenn is a former PM for the new Managed Extensibility Framework in .NET 4.0. Prior to Microsoft, he worked for 10 years in various startups and ISVs wearing many different hats all related to developing software. Glenn has been writing code practically since the time he learned how to ride a bicycle. When he's not writing code, he's continuously improving on ways to build better software. Glenn is a geek at heart and spends a good portion of the rest of this time spreading that geekdom through conferences, and the community through groups such as ALT.NET. When he's not working and playing with technology, he spends his time with his wife and four year old daughter either at their Seattle apartment or at one of the local coffee shops.

Glenn's blog can be found at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/gblock/