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Apex SQL Tools Blog

Product announcements, promotions, discussions, and other ApexSQL Tools news


Important announcement on ApexSQL Edit

Some of you have been chafing at the bit for fixes and new features in ApexSQL Edit. Some of us have too. We've made some fundamental changes at ApexSQL in the last few days that will ensure we're on the fast track to delivering these long awaited fixes, features.

As of this week we've restructured the "business" of ApexSQL Edit, which was formally a joint partnership between Ashton Hobbs and ApexSQL LLC.

Ashton created ApexSQL Edit from concept to release and used to manage the entire support forum. Overtime the partnership changed so that ApexSQL took over the help file, then support activities and testing. But even as we added economies of scale they were never enough to keep pace with the demands of this complex tool. Recently we have arrived at an agreement that allows ApexSQL LLC to fully acquire all remaining rights (and responsibilities) to ApexSQL Edit. This allows us to increase the through put on this app. exponentially, empowers us to effect change and frees Ashton to pursue some excellent technology for ApexSQL that he hasn't been able to release.

We have some challenges ahead to align ApexSQL Edit with our other apps, fix all outstanding bugs, streamline and simplify the app and then once a high quality baseline has been achieved launch an aggressive development schedule. The next few weeks will be spent managing this transition but we have already begun. I have already allocated some of my best devs and analysts to this task and we're going to be putting as many resources into this as the app. can hold.

The plan includes

Deprecating underperforming and/or overly-complex features that most users don't want or need. We'll be posting a list.

Replacing some modules - like formatting and extended props editor, that were underperforming, with completed, tested components we have ready.

Standardizing the code for a fully seamless experience with all other ApexSQL apps.

Fixing all reported issues

Streamlining the implementation of source control, to make it simpler and work better.

Adding some features like native source control drivers (Vault, Subversion, Team Foundation Server), Debugging and Profiling. The good news is all of this technology has *already* been built and tested and just needs to be rolled out. This doesn't mean it will be released immediately but does mean we won't have to start a dev cycle to build these.

In the interim we'll be accepting any and all constructive feedback on the forum. We are interested in your thoughts, suggestions and ideas on the ApexSQL Edit forum.

Specific business, comments, suggestions, complaints etc can be directed to myself. I understand and appreciate a lot of people's frustration with the delays. I wish this transition had taken place 6 mos. (or 2 years) earlier myself.

In an interesting historical note, ApexSQL Log was acquired in a similar way and now is one of our best selling products. It's quality and performance are top notch and it's outlived it's peers at Lumigent and Red-Gate. ApexSQL Log is now the unquestioned best Log Reader in the SQL market. My goal is to say the same thing about ApexSQL Edit very soon.

Your patience and continued support is very much appreciated.

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Product Update Alert - ApexSQL Edit 2005.30.0145

A Minor Fix version of ApexSQL Edit 2005.30.0145 has been released.

Use the following link for downloading.
Auto-updater should work on this build.

Here are the complete release notes for the new version.

Product Update Alerts will be posted on this blog. For automatic notification pls subscribe to RSS Feed.
The product will also automatically check for and notify users of new versions (as well as allow for automatic update via the application interface).

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New and Improved Apex SQL Edit

We're happy to announce a new and improved ApexSQL Edit. We have recently added some great new features, including:

  • New, easier Source Control mapping process with new menus, dialogs and objects
  • New Database Text Search feature that allows you to search within data values in the database
  • Improved Drill Down feature that allows you to find and edit across your entire database based on a single key value
  • Ability to create a Pivot statement from a table/view by picking the value columns, the pivot column and values, and the aggregate column and function using Pivot Snippets.
  • New Source Control Mapping reports

Get your feet wet on these new features with recently uploaded training videos and KB articles. Check out some screenshots of the new Edit in What's New?.



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Product Update Alert - ApexSQL Edit 2005.26.0141

A Minor Fix version of ApexSQL Edit 2005.26.0141 has been released.

Use the following link for downloading.
Auto-updater should work on this build.

Here are the complete release notes for the new version.

Product Update Alerts will be posted on this blog. For automatic notification pls subscribe to RSS Feed.
The product will also automatically check for and notify users of new versions (as well as allow for automatic update via the application interface).

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Beta Update Alert - ApexSQL Edit 2005.26.0141

A Minor Fix pre-release version of ApexSQL Edit 2005.26.0141 has been posted for public evaluation.

Here are the complete release notes for the beta version.

We encourage users to download and use the new version and send us any feedback to support@apexsql.com.

Use the following link for downloading.

Please have a look!

Product Update Alerts will be posted on this blog. For automatic notification pls subscribe to RSS Feed.
The product will also automatically check for and notify users of new versions (as well as allow for automatic update via the application interface).

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Beta Update Alert - ApexSQL Edit 2005.22.0137

A Medium Feature / Medium Fix pre-release version of ApexSQL Edit 2005.22.0137 has been posted for public evaluation.

Here are the complete release notes for the beta version.

We encourage users to download and use the new version and send us any feedback to support@apexsql.com.

Use the following link for downloading.

Please have a look!

Product Update Alerts will be posted on this blog. For automatic notification pls subscribe to RSS Feed.
The product will also automatically check for and notify users of new versions (as well as allow for automatic update via the application interface).

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Using sp_recompile

An article in SQL Cerver Central discusses how sp_recompile can make your stored procedure run at consistent speeds--whether called from a .Net application or from Query Analyzer.

Click here to read article.

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Article on ApexSQL Edit

An article has been posted about ApexSQL Edit on MSDN



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ApexSQL Edit vs Embarcadero Rapid SQL

Click Here for the comparative review

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Source Control Mapping in Edit

One of the most used features in ApexSQL Edit has always been the ability to integrate with Source Control systems and map database objects to Source Controlled items. However, this has never been easy and has always had some issues in terms of trying to explain exactly how the process works. It was also difficult for teams to share and use the same mappings or provide re-use across machines.

Well, now those days are behind us...



With the changes to ApexSQL Edit in the next release related to the Source Control integration, we have totally rewritten the entire Source Control inegration to make it easier to setup, to use, and more powerful.

Source Control integration will now be at a higher level and will allow easier sharing of mappings across different machines so that developers can share mappings and also so that mappings can be shared across different environments such as a DEV or PROD machine.

The mapping process is now wizard based, starting with the following page:



The process will then ask the user if they want to create a new project or add an environment to an existing project. The Project concept for Source Control integration now allows you to basically setup the mappings at a project level and then have different environments (eg. Dev1Machine, Dev2Machine, DevUnitTest, QATest, Production, etc) within the project that will all share the same mappings so that the objects will automatically inherit the mappings that are defined on different environments. This will allow the user to easily see which items may be on the DEV environment but don't yet exist on the Production environment.



When creating a new Project, the wizard will ask the user for information such as the project name, the environment name for the current connection, and the Source Control system that will be used.



Once the project, environment, and Source Control information have been set, the user can then specify the default Source Control projects/folders to use for each specific database type (currently table, view, procedure, function, and trigger are supported although we will be adding other types as well). This location will be where items of that type will be added when the user adds new items from the schema explorer.



The final step in the project setup process is setting up the mappings for the database objects. This can be done in 3 different ways. You can choose to script items from the database to the Source Control system, have Edit attempt to map objects automatically to existing items, or manually map items.



Once this step is done, the database is now mapped and a project will be created along with the initial environment. This information can either be stored in the default local data store that Edit uses or stored in a centralized SQL Server that the user defines. If using a centralized SQL Server, then other users using the same centralized server can choose to work under the same project and thereby get the same mappings for objects simply by selecting the project and then entering in the name of their particular environment (ie. AshtonDevSQL). They will then automatically have items mapped for the database and will share any further mappings that they or other developers define.

This new feature will also make it easy to get reports on what is mapped, what actions have been performed such as what items were mapped as well as what items have been applied to which environments when the application methods are used to apply items. It will also allow developers to easily apply new items that other developers have mapped to their own environments or to upstream environments like BLD or PROD.

This feature will be available in the next version of ApexSQL Edit which should be available soon. Existing mappings will also be converted so that users will be able to take advantage of the feature even if they have existing mappings for databases.



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Product Update Alert - ApexSQL Edit 2005.03.0109

A Major Feature/Fix version of ApexSQL Edit 2005.03.0109 has been released.

Pls see link for release notes.

This release requires .net 2.0 run time distributable.

Product Update Alerts will be posted on this blog. For automatic notification pls subscribe to RSS Feed.
The product will also automatically check for and notify users of new versions (as well as allow for automatic update via the application interface).

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Snippets - The Next Generation

There is a lot of talk about SQL Intellisense lately but the new functionality rolling out in ApexSQL Edit really transcends simple intellisense.

Snippets are fully customizable - really programmable - intelligent/interactive - dynamic code segments that explode off your cursor to implement integrated blocks of text, picklists, tooltips, smart cursor placement and more all just by typing a few characters.

to really see it you need to watch the video (approx 2 MB)

Snippets - the Sequel

Ashton's Mike is broken so you'll have to imagine him eating a sandwich while recording this - like he usually does.

You might notice different dialogs in the video. The next version of ApexSQL Edit will be .NET 2.0

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Rolled Gold

Congrats to ApexSQL Edit Team/Ashton on winning SQL Mag Gold Award for Database Development!

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ApexSQL Edit Snippets

One of the most helpful features in ApexSQL Edit is the ability to do VS2005 like Snippets. However, creating or even editing these snippets in ApexSQL Edit has been difficult at best...until now.


The next release of ApexSQL Edit will allow users to not only edit existing snippets, but to create their own. Snippets can even include custom tags that can be predefined to include things like drop down lists from custom queries so your own snippets can provide a drop down list of values for different replacement values.

Below is a screenshot of the new Snippet Management dialog in ApexSQL Edit:



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What Is...This

One of the features of ApexSQL Edit is the ability to use the "What Is..." feature to quickly get information about objects in the database. However, the previous look and feel has never been one of my favorites :)

With the next interim release of ApexSQL Edit, we have switched to a totally new look and feel (sort of)...



Below is the current What Is... screen in ApexSQL Edit:



With the next release of Edit, we have taken the object explorer and used it in the What Is... feature so that What Is... will provide more information than the current look and also provide additional data not currently available.

Here is the same table as above, but displayed using the new What Is...



We also modified the other object and even added Triggers to the Object Explorer and What Is... feature:



We plan to continue improving existing features in Edit (Object Notes, Query Manager, etc.) and add useful new features (Visual Table Editor, etc)

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Apex SQL Edit 2005 Released as BETA

We're releasing Apex SQL Edit 2005 as a BETA just to get some feedback before final release, which, if all goes well, will be next week..

This has been a long development cycle and a lot of new stuff has been added. This post will show some screen shots of new Apex SQL Edit 2005


THIS PRODUCT HAS NOW BEEN RELEASED TO PRODUCTION. pls see download page to download a 30 day eval

Shows Intellisense, split panel on the left with schema browser and source control mapping. Also management of query results is shown.



This is pretty slick. Ashton has closely implemented a dependency viewer into Apex SQL Edit that works seamlessly with the object browser. So you can navigate the dependencies visually, and track the selected object's properties in the Object Broswer.



The next screen shot shows value added management capabilities of object explorer - great for integrating with source control



Shows mapping database objects to source control



Intellisense implement with INSERT statements. Shows source control browser on left panel and object browser at the bottom



Advanced data editing capability showing grouping and column level filters



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Intellisense in Apex SQL Edit 2005

Apex SQL Edit 2005 (which should be out in a week or two) has some new features. This post shows some Intellisense highlights

The first example is auto-completion of @@ chars to show system variables.



This next issue shows standard auto-complete.



but Apex SQL Edit also recognizes table aliases ...



Here is auto-complete for Exec. The user doesn't need to type a period or any special character. The auto-complete list is shown after the space is typed in the normal course of typing the statement.



Stored procedure auto-complete get's a bit more exciting when you hit @. all of the params are written out and at least in one case you might get a drop down on first param for relevant object names. Not sure how ApexSQL Edit does this as this is simply a varchar(64) field. Maybe it's artificial-intellisense?



Creating data insert statements is a non-brainer with the auto-complete features Apex SQL Edit offers for this task.



The key feature is a column picking dialog built into the intellisense. This makes filling out insert statements very quick and easy as this dialog is called from the "pick columns" list item in the auto-complete list



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Another Sneek Peek at New Query Plan

I've been fooling with new demo of Ashton's Query Plan viewer. looks pretty good




My guess is that this will be out in the next version of ApexSQL Edit in late Dec or early Jan

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Query Planning

With the next full release of ApexSQL Edit, the current query plan viewer is going through a total overhaul to make it easier, more understandable, and to provide some new options for viewing query plans from SQL Server...

The new query plan (as seen in the screenshot below) looks entirely different than the existing version:



The new query plan viewer will also allow the user to zoom, change the color ranges so the user can control what get's highlighted with which color, ability to print the query plan, view the actual plan data, as well as the ability to get estimated and actual plans.

The next release of ApexSQL Edit will also allow the user to view 2 different queries side by side so the user can see the difference between running a query 2 different ways.

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Apex SQL Edit Blog Index

This is index for all Blog posts about Apex SQL Edit (more links will be posted here)


Preview of new source control module

SQL Profiler Pre-Announced

Some important news about ApexSQL Edit

Snippets - The Next Generation

ApexSQL Edit Snippets

ApexSQL Edit 2005.02 Product Update Alert (Fix/Feature)

ApexSQL Edit Lazy Debugging for 2005

Results Anywhere (ApexSQL Edit)

What Is...This

Unit Testing for Everyone

Apex SQL Edit 2005 Released

Kiss the TOAD away - upgrade Imceda SQL IDE today

Apex SQL Edit 2005 screenshots

Intellisense in Apex SQL Edit

Another Sneek Peek at New Query Plan

Query Planning

Cross Database Dependencies

Deployment Made Easy

Snippets everywhere

ApexSQL Edit 2.20: Snippets--Development Just Got Easier

Apex SQL Edit Screen shots

New Query Plan

Apex SQL Edit 2005 Q&A

Interview with Ashton Hobbs

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ApexSQL Edit 2.20: Snippets--Development Just Got Easier

One of the coolest new features of ApexSQL Edit 2.20 is the Code Snippets. These things are guaranteed to save you some development time.


Code snippets allow you to predefine blocks of SQL/Code and to define replacements throughout the snippet allowing you to customize the final inserted text. You can create multiple levels of snippets by creating subdirectories.

The code snippets can be inserted from the Edit main menu which gives you various snippet options in a dropdown list. Or by simply typing the shortcut text and then hitting the [TAB] key, you can bypass the visual dropdown entirely.

You can see an example of how the dropdown list appears when you invoke the snippet selection below in the screenshot:





In this screenshot you will see how you can specify (Literal) elements within the (Declarations) element. These Literal elements will correspond to a replacement that can be used within the actual body of the snippet. The Literal in the screenshot below can be seen highlighted with focus, while the other references to the Literal are also highlighted with dotted boxes.




And now when you manually enter a replacement for the Literal, all the references to the Literal are automattically updated. Simple!







Now you can see one of the reasons why we're so excited about the latest version of ApexSQL Edit. Check out the code snippets and other new features by downloading the latest version and see for yourself how cool some of these new features are!

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Apex SQL Edit 2.20 Screen Shots

This post contains some cool shots from the new Apex SQL Edit 2.20


The first screen shot shows Apex SQL Edit in source control mode with mapped files displayed in a treeview. It also demonstrates a split window view of two separate windows.



The next shot shows a good look at the treeview with files mapped and unmapped files, checked in and checked out. The window is a Table in data edit mode? The table has been grouped and a column level filter is in effect. The context menu shows additional filter options.



The third shot shows Data editing in the Object Explorer at a table level. The editing pane shows a Snippet being loaded. I have drilled down the snippet tree. The snippet has been selected but not yet created. You can see the description and shortcut.



The fourth shot shows the dependency viewer in the Object Explorer which can show dependency type (updated vs selected) and also shows the extensive context menu for editor pane.



Last but not least, the final shot attempts to show one usage example of Apex SQL Edit "intellilist" functionality. With an XML view in the results pane. Having just reviewed another editor recently I can really appreciate the time taken to implement Intellilist (aka codecomplete, aka Intellisense) in Apex SQL Edit. A good implementation flows with what you are typing and doesn't require unnatural events to trigger the list display. For example, in one editor I type in "Insert into " and nothing appeared. I had to type a period (not sure why a period exactly), get the list, select my item, then delete out the artifical event symbol - a period in my case. it would have been faster just typing the table name! Even the "into" is take can of in this case.



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Apex SQL Edit 2.20 Released - Major Feature Release

We have just released a major version to ApexSQL Edit. 2.20 has a ton of new features - I'll higlight one of the 4 major new features. There will be blog posts covering the others in the next few days.



OBJECT EXPLORER - this new panel allowes comprehensive views of each object and object tier. For example you can click on the tables node in the treeview and browse list of all tables. Or select an individual table and browse all categories of information related to that particular object.

The object explorer is particularly powerful when the Database object is selected and you can browse all of the objects. Group by Type and you have created a much more powerful implemention of the treeview. We're working on a few more design changes that will allow a lot of uses to pin the treeview and just use it for server browsing - and the object explorer for everything else - check in, check out etc.

What I like about the concept of a table based object browser is that it supports multiple columns and the ability to multi select items for batch check-in for example. A treeview is great for manipulating individual objects but for sorting, filtering by column, multi-select etc the paradigm is a bit limiting.

The object browser isn't just for viewing information. It supports 5 batch actions - meaning they can be executed on multiple objects at one time. check in, check out, get last, script to file, script to editor.

In the short term there will be significant additional features to object browser including icons (checked in, vs not checked in), color coded for mapped, drag and drop on editor, additional columns (is checked in) and much more. These additions should really put the finishing touches on a pretty cool mod. My goal for object browser is to allow it to supplant treeview totally for those who prefer to customize their interface this way.

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Update to Dependency Viewer (Video)

We have a video documenting the latest update to dependency viewer that should be rolled out to production shortly as part of ApexSQL Clean and ApexSQL Edit.


Click Here to watch the video

Running Time: 4:00 Mins
File Size: 25.3 MB
Posted On: 11/07/05

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ApexSQL Edit 2005 Q&A

It's nearing midnight on a Weds so I figured I'd catch Ashton with a few questions before he began his second shift of work. I thought I'd ask him some questions about SQL2005 support in ApexSQL Edit. Little did I know the interview would turn ugly ...


What can you tell us about SQL2005 debugger vs previous attempts at debugger from MSFT?

The new version of SQL Server actually has a public API for debugging unlike the SQL2000 debugger which was closed and more of a hack to provide debugging than a true effortat providing proper debugging. There are many posts on the web about getting the SQL2000 debugger to work properly dealing with DCOM, ports, etc. With SQL2005, debugging is a server level service built directly into SQL2005 and not some kludge added after the fact.


Can you explain SQL 2005 Service Broker object support?

Edit will provide some support for SQL 2005 Service Broker which is a combination message queue, async processor, and routing mechanism. I am hoping to provide a visual flow of the service broker routes, showing the queues, messages, contracts, etc and how a route currently works. It should also provide the ability to add/modify existing Service Broker steps.

Can you explain SQL 2005 HTTP EndPoint Creation/Querying?

HTTP Endpoints provide the ability to take a stored procedure and expose it as a SOAP Web Service. The nice thing about this is that under Windows 2003, you can run both IIS and use SQL Endpoints together, allowing you to easily export stored procedures as SOAP to allow them to be called by clients such as .NET, Java, etc. With Edit, we plan to provide the ability to easily select stored procedures and create endpoints out of them and then provide the ability to call an endpoint to get the result and display it in the editor, whether it is a resultset, scalar value, etc.

What are the major differences and challenges involved in supporting SQL2005 syntax?

The only real difference is that SQL2005 now has many new types and objects as well as new block structures like the CTE, query pivoting, try..catch blocks, etc. The goal in Edit will be to use SQL2000 support against 2000 databases and then use 2005 syntax for 2005 databases.

What support do you offer for XML/CLR support for SQL 2005 types?

Currently we don't offer any direct support of XML/CLR. You can write statements against SQl2005 now using CLR/XML syntax but there is currently no Intellisense type lists provided. We plan to attempt to add support to show methods and properties of CLR types as well as other items related to the new XML type and XQuery support.

What have you been working on lately? Any ETA on 2.20?

I've currently been working on the new Object Explorer feature, making it customizable so that users can add their own explorers to display when clicking on objects as well as adding Code Snippet technology similar to that available in VS2005. Code Snippets will allow the user to insert portions of SQL statements with replacements that can be tabbed through and modified. Some of the replacements name after a defined list of items will even display context lists so that a table field for example will display a list of tables for the current database.

I understand you’ve been lifting lately? How much can you bench press? Can you cover my back at PASS?

Well at my previous gym, I was lifting close to 280lbs on my final set of 10reps. My new gym is limited in amount of free weights they have and I don't like machines so I've switched to more calistenics so I'm doing more push ups and pull ups now. Don't worry, I've got your back at PASS. While your in Dallas, I'll be in Forth Worth covering you :)

actually this isn't technically turning "ugly" as I alluded to in the beginning of the interview (as cheap trick to get u to read thru this all!) but there ARE rumors Ashton is planning on causing trouble at SQL PASS conference next week in Dallas. Combined with his weight lifting and generally unpredictable behavior anything is likely to happen. pls stay tuned to this BLOG for more info and the blow by blow account.

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Using Edit - TODO: Items

There is currently a feature in Edit that most people are unaware of (I'm sure it's my fault :)

In an Edit window type the following:

-- TODO: My first TODO item

Now, press Ctrl+F2. A task list window will appear and will list the TODO item that you just added to your file. If the file you added it to has a filename, then that filename will appear. If there is no filename, then it will indicate that. In () the line number of the TODO item will appear. You can jump to that line number in that file/window by double clicking on the TODO item in the list. The active window should switch to the current window and the cursor should be on the line number that was specifed for the TODO item.

The task list will currently display TODO items for any open query windows. We would like to expand this feature in several ways. We would like to give the task list the ability to look in the database itself and find any procs, functions, triggers that have TODO items listed in them and allow the user to double click on these and have them opened. If the item is object mapped then it would open the mapped file and not the database item instead so the user could work on the source controlled version.

We also thought about making the TODO line non-editable by users and having the TODO process managed by the app. This would allow the user to add more TODO info such as user, status, etc., and allow the user to change the status of TODO items, add additional info, assign to users, etc., such that when viewing the task list, users could view TODO items specific to them, of a specific status, etc.

Try out the TODO feature now and see if you think it is useful in its current state and if it would be useful with the changes listed above or if you have changes you think that would make it even more useful.

Please post forum topics under the subject "BLOG:TODO Tasks".

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