Carl Franklin

Early Days

A lot happened during this time. You can read about it here.

Web Development

I began programming for the Internet in 1994, when I learned about Sockets and how I could communicate over the Internet with them in Visual Basic.

I wrote the first article in print that used the words "Visual Basic" and "Internet" in the same sentence. I was early to the party. I started speaking at conferences about programming the Internet with Sockets.

That led to a book deal with John Wiley & Sons for "Visual Basic 4.0 Internet Programming", and a revamp in 1996 called "Visual Basic 6.0 Internet Programming."

That book didn't talk at all about how to build websites. That came later for me as Windows NT and Internet Information Server came on the scene. Next came ASP, then ASP.NET, and finally cloud services like Microsoft Azure, which is where I do most of my web development these days.

I currently operate a consulting company called App vNext. We have a proven track record with many happy customers. We do hourly consulting for ad-hoc help, but we also do fixed-price contracts for longer-term projects. Fixed-price means the customer never has to pay more than the agreed-upon price for the agreed-upon deliverables.

Specialty Development

I have always been interested in audio as a musician, producer, and software developer. In the early days of .NET Rocks! before there was Skype, I wrote what was essentially a two-way Internet telephone using audio libraries and sockets.

I wrote my own tools for audio production as well as a MIDI component that I used in my own apps.

In 2015, I wrote a custom installation for the Mystic Seaport Museum that includes a touch-screen kiosk, and a surround sound app using 6 speakers. It's a little dark room with seating. The idea is to have a narrator in the front center, and have music and sound effects slowly moving around the room in a circle. I built the tool for creating the panned files, as well as the playback tool. It's still going strong after all these years, and you can experience it yourself at the Seaport's Charles W. Morgan exhibit space. Fun fact: My mother's father was a carpenter, and built some of the cases in the exhibit space at the north end of the Seaport, which you can still see to this day.

In March of 2023, I wrote a Blazor Component for capturing audio and playing audio by stuffing buffers in real-time. I showed a demo on my YouTube show BlazorTrain, that streams the audio between browser clients (using SignalR) and shared the GitHub repo with instructions for creating the demo, along with the source to the component, which relies heavily on JavaScript.

I'm a generalist at heart, and find new programming challenges rewarding.

Blazor Train

In May of 2020, I started doing a YouTube show called BlazorTrain as a free and open-ended training series for those interested in building web apps (and more) using the C# language with Microsoft Blazor. As of this writing there over 100 episodes on various topics.

The Blazor Puzzle

In August of 2023, I started doing a YouTube show called Blazor Puzzle with Microsoft's Jeff Fritz. Each episode shows a short Blazor coding challenge that you can solve and win prizes.

The .NET Show

In anticipation of the release of Microsoft MAUI, I started a new YouTube show called The .NET Show in April, 2021.

Since MAUI wasn't really available yet, I started by talking about its predecessor, Xamarin Forms.

The most recent shows as of this writing show you how to publish mobile apps to the Google Play Store (Android) and the Apple Store (iOS).

Early Days

In 1996, I started teaching in-person Visual Basic programming classes at local hotels. I was hooked!

Franklin's Net

In 1999, I started Franklin's Net, offering myself for in-person training, both at my facility in New London (which would evenutally become Pwop Studio) or on-site.

I was teaching Visual Basic at first, and then when Microsoft .NET Came on the scene in 2002, I morphed my classes to Visual Basic .NET. I held the first big training session for a Microsoft customer at their Waltham, MA facility - a contract that would reach over 200 developers.

Franklin's Net was very successful. We even hired other trainers to teach their own classes under our banner.

Everything changed on September 11, 2001. Nobody was traveling. Companies were afraid to send their developers to our classes. That change ushered in the recording and publishing of an audio talk show for .NET Developers, .NET Rocks!, which would eventually become a podcast.

App vNext

In 2015, I started a new consulting and training company, App vNext. I was reguarly sending newsletters to the listeners of .NET Rocks!, who all opted in to listen to the podcast and get the newsletter, which has thousands of subscribers.

I included a blurb in one of the newsletters looking for developers who had 15 or more hours a week to spend on fun projects (which would come later) with me. I got over 100 responses. I interviewed the first 30, and invited most of them to a Slack channel. Over the next few years, there were only a handful left in the Slack channel, and (no surprise) these guys got the opportunities when they presented themselves. They still do.

Blazor Train

In May of 2020, I started doing a YouTube show called BlazorTrain as a free and open-ended training series for those interested in building web apps (and more) using the C# language with Microsoft Blazor. As of this writing there are 96 episodes on various topics.

The Blazor Puzzle

In August of 2023, I started doing a YouTube show called Blazor Puzzle with Microsoft's Jeff Fritz. Each episode shows a short Blazor coding challenge that you can solve and win prizes.

The .NET Show

In anticipation of the release of Microsoft MAUI, I started a new YouTube show called The .NET Show in April, 2021.

Since MAUI wasn't really available yet, I started by talking about its predecessor, Xamarin Forms.

The most recent shows as of this writing show you how to publish mobile apps to the Google Play Store (Android) and the Apple Store (iOS).

Select the audio and video menu option for more about my audio and video production.

vMix

vMix is a powerful Windows application for live streaming. It's similar to OBS, an open-source streaming app, but it's definitely kicked up a notch.

During the pandemic I really got into using vMix to do my own live streams (music and software training), and then I started getting live streaming jobs for people and companies in my social networks.

In 2023 I did the live stream for The Polly's - WebXR Awards at ZeroSpace in Brooklyn, NY. That gig took a lot of concentration, but it was extremely fun and came off without a hitch.

I am available for live streaming consulting, training, and production.

.NET Rocks!

In August, 2002, I was still doing on-site training, but it was slow-going due to the World Trade Center attacks the previous year.

I am and had always been a fan of "edutainment" shows on public radio such as Car Talk, Whadya Know, and Wait Wait Don't Tell Me. Microsoft .NET had recently come out, and I wanted to share the knowledge in a different way. Thus was born .NET Rocks!, the Internet Audio Talk Show for .NET Developers. This was 3 years before the word "Podcast" existed.

One of my students whom I became good friends with, Mark Dunn, agreed to be my co-host. We recorded phone conversations (using primative technology) with key Microsoft people and also some budding technical evangelists who were learning, teaching, and writing about .NET.

The short version of this long story is that it took off, becoming the most popular means of learning about Microsoft .NET technology. It has taken me across the US on multiple sponsored road trips, allowed me to build my recording space, Pwop Studios, and has brought me all over the world speaking and recording live shows with my co-host, Richard Campbell, who came on as co-host at show 100.

Mondays

In 2003, I started experimenting with a new format of .NET Rocks! Shows 50-100 are two hours long and have two guest interviews interspersed with music and comedy. It was fun, but our listeners really just wanted the guest interviews.

So, in 2005 I started Mondays to scratch the comedy and music itch. Afterall, Podcasting was now coming into its own, and I wanted to produce a more accessible show that could reach a broader market.

Mondays is really a chronicle of the lives of Mark Miller and Karen Mangiacotti who met each other on the show while they were unhappily married to other people. They married and had two children together, Giada Storm (Horror Baby #1), and Campbell Franklin (Horror Baby #2), who was named after Richard Campbell and Carl Franklin.

Security This Week

In early 2021 I had been talking to my friend and colleague Patrick Hynds about getting more into the IT security space. We agreed that a weekly podcast was a great way to do that, and have some fun at the same time.

In July, 2021 we started Security This Week. Patrick is a veteran, literally, of not only the Gulf War but of IT security. His co-hort, Duane Laflotte, is a true ethical hacker. Their company is hired to do penetration testing, basically to try and hack into a company's IT infrastructure to find the vulnerabilities.

Even if you're not interested in IT security, this podcast is entertaining as well as being educational.

2 Keto Dudes

2 Keto Dudes is a podcast about ketogenic dietary interventions that I do with my friend Richard Morris. Richard switched to a ketogenic diet in April of 2014 to treat his type 2 diabetes, and dropped his HbA1c from 11.2% to 5.2% where it has been since November 2014. I began a ketogenic diet in February of 2016 to treat type 2 diabetes, lowering my HbA1c from 7.4% to 5.2% and losing 80 pounds in the process.

The podcast isn't as active as it used to be, but the information is timeless.

Food Schmooze

Faith Middleton (formerly of CT Public Radio) and her gang (including me) get together to share recipes and food experiences on The All-New Food Schmooze Party Podcast. I mostly talk about low-carb versions of what everyone else is talking about. I also record and produce the show and the website.