Editor's note
I kept this one deliberately mixed, which is usually when the strongest practical reads show up. Tim Deschryver’s piece on feeding Aspire MCP runtime context into AI tooling stands out because it moves past code-only assistance, and the EF Core pair on ExecuteUpdateAsync plus common performance mistakes is useful production-minded material. I also liked the Web Forms to .NET 10 migration article for being concrete about incremental modernization instead of pretending rewrites are easy.
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Today's Articles
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Jasen's take on today's picks
Improve your AI coding agent with runtime context from Aspire MCP
A smart extension of AI-assisted coding: give the agent runtime truth, not just source files, and the quality of analysis improves fast.
Interesting if you work with Hot Chocolate and need aggregation without punting everything to bespoke endpoints.
What's one mistake devs make when building cost-efficient AI apps?
Short, but the point is right: better context usually beats endless model tinkering on cost and outcomes.
How to migrate ASP.NET Web Forms to .NET 10 without a big rewrite
Pragmatic modernization advice. Incremental migration paths are what legacy teams can actually ship.
Secure Secrets Management in .NET Applications Using Azure Key Vault
Solid fundamentals piece for teams that still treat secret storage as an appsettings problem.
CQRS in ASP.NET Core: Practical Scenarios Where It Actually Makes Sense
A useful corrective to CQRS hype. Good when discussing whether the complexity is earned.
I Deleted the Repository Pattern From Our Codebase. Here’s What Happened.
I’m always interested in articles that remove patterns rather than add them. This one will spark debate.
Lock in C# 13 — Replacing lock(obj) with Something Better
Worth a look if you’ve not caught up with newer synchronization options in modern C#.
Spec-Driven Development: A Spec-First Approach to AI-Native Engineering
Spec-first thinking makes sense in AI-heavy workflows where drift between intent and implementation happens quickly.
Why ExecuteUpdateAsync() Is One of EF Core's Best Features?
ExecuteUpdateAsync really is one of those features that can remove a lot of noisy update code.
10 EF Core Performance Mistakes (and How to Fix Them) in .NET 10
This is the kind of EF Core checklist teams should review before blaming the database.
From RAG to Agentic RAG: Building Self-Improving AI Applications in .NET
Helpful overview of how RAG evolves once agents start planning, using tools, and refining results.
Building Context-Aware Enterprise Search Applications with ASP.NET Core
Enterprise search keeps getting more relevant, especially when context and retrieval quality are treated as first-class concerns.
Build Game UI Without the Pain: Gum Layout Tool for .NET | .NET Game Development
A nice change of pace from backend material, and game UI tooling in .NET rarely gets enough attention.
Context Engineering for AI Applications: Beyond Prompt Engineering
Context engineering is becoming the more useful umbrella term for real-world AI app work.
The Ultimate Guide to Observability and Resiliency in ASP.NET Core
Broad observability coverage, with practical attention to logging and failure handling in ASP.NET Core.
We built an AI tool for .NET/C# developers in 2 days
Fast-build case studies are useful when they include prompts, constraints, and what actually worked.
API Versioning Should Be Your Last Resort
I agree with the premise: versioning is often used to paper over weak API evolution practices.
Microsoft Extends Rust-Influenced Memory-Safety Push to C# - Visual Studio Magazine
Flagging this one carefully since the source text is thin, but memory-safety work in C# is worth watching.
Structured Outputs in LLM Applications: A Complete C# Developer Guide
Structured outputs are one of the biggest reliability upgrades available to C# teams building LLM features.