This blog post is part of a larger series named “Be a Better Developer”. You can check out the intro, “Stop Being a Code Monkey” to get started from the beginning. Each post will have a link to the previous ones and a final summary post will contain links to all entries in the series. In the last installment of this series I talked about needing to have to be a good salesperson and why, even as a full time employee somewhere, this skill is important.

I’ve been a big user of CodeRush & Refactor! Pro from Developer Express for several years now. These are awesome code “productivity” tools for Visual Studio and I highly recommend trying them out if you aren’t familiar with them. In fact, there is a free version called CodeRush Express that you can pull down. One of the biggest things the products give you is a slew of shortcuts and templates to use when writing your code.

The Central Ohio Day of .NET (CODODN) is scheduled for June 5th, 2010. We will again be having the event at the Roberts Centre in Wilmington, OH, which means it’s a great location for developers from Cincinnati, Dayton, Columbus and beyond! The Call for speakers is open and registration will open on May 2nd. Following along with the information on the event home page and deck your blog out with some CODODN Bling.