Articles by Laxmikant

The three problems solved live in our TCS CodeVita Season 14 masterclass: simulation, a monotonic stack and coin-change DP, with tested C++ and Python solutions.

Test Python code with assert, unittest, and pytest, then build a tested command-line to-do app as a capstone.

Modules, packages, the standard library, pip, and virtual environments: organise and share Python code cleanly.

Read and write files with context managers, handle errors with try/except/finally, and use pathlib and the csv module.

Object-oriented programming in Python: classes, __init__, methods, inheritance, super(), __str__, and dataclasses.

Define Python functions: parameters, return values, defaults, *args and **kwargs, scope, docstrings, and type hints.

Conditionals and loops in Python: if/elif/else, for and while, break and continue, with FizzBuzz and a guessing game.

Lists, tuples, sets, and dictionaries in Python: how each works, when to use it, and how comprehensions help.

Work with Python strings: indexing and slicing, immutability, the most useful methods, f-strings, and formatting.

Understand variables, dynamic typing, numbers, booleans, None, type conversion, and Python's arithmetic operators.

Install Python, use the REPL and script files, and write your first program with print(), comments, and input().

Honest, itemized numbers for a small production ASP.NET Core app on Azure, the cost traps that bite beginners, and when a plain $12 VPS is simply the better call.

The modern Azure.ResourceManager SDK end to end: resource group, network, and a Linux VM with SSH keys from C#, plus scheduled start/stop to keep the bill sane.

The isolated worker model, honest cold-start numbers, and a practical decision table for Functions vs IHostedService vs container jobs.

BlobServiceClient with DefaultAzureCredential, access tiers and lifecycle rules, and user-delegation SAS links that expire in minutes instead of account keys that never do.

System vs user-assigned identities, RBAC role grants, and the DefaultAzureCredential chain that makes the same C# work on your laptop and in production.

Provision serverless Azure SQL with auto-pause, wire up EF Core with retry-on-failure, survive the firewall rules, and go password-less with Entra authentication.

az webapp up, GitHub Actions, Key Vault configuration references, deployment slots for zero-downtime swaps, and the gotchas that break first deployments.

The Azure mental model for C# developers: tenant vs subscription vs resource group, what app registrations really are, and how DefaultAzureCredential kills hardcoded secrets.

Coming from C#? Learn Python by building a small REST API with FastAPI — virtual environments demystified, Pydantic as your model binding, and a side-by-side C# to Python cheat sheet.

A pragmatic WCF migration path: pin behavior with generated-client tests, lift unchanged contracts onto .NET 10 with CoreWCF (verified end to end), then move consumers to gRPC on your schedule.

Find, launch, and use WCF Test Client: add a service by WSDL, invoke operations with complex parameters, read the SOAP XML, fix the classic quota errors, and know its limits.

Close the roadmap with OpenTelemetry: traces, metrics, and logs from a running API, custom spans and counters for business operations, cardinality rules, and sampling strategy.

The five filter stages, the built-in attributes you get for free, and custom action, exception, and result filters with dependency injection — verified outputs included.

While microservices architecture provides significant advantages in scalability, flexibility, and maintainability, it also introduces unique challenges that must be carefully considered when designing

What microservices buy, what they cost, how to find real boundaries — and why a modular monolith with schema-per-module ownership is the strongest launchpad either way.

Explore the differences between AI Agents and Traditional Software, their use cases, key benefits, and why they are shaping the future of intelligent applications.

Artificial Intelligence is no longer reserved for data scientists. Why every software engineer should build AI skills in 2026 — what to learn, in what order, and how it changes day-to-day engineering

Implement the Repository Pattern with ASP.NET Core Web API on .NET 10 — EF Core 10, DTO mapping with extension methods, async CRUD operations, and the built-in OpenAPI support with Scalar.

Automate build, smoke test, image, and deployment with GitHub Actions: SHA-tagged images, OIDC federation to Azure, environments with approvals, and pipeline hygiene.

Ship the container to Azure: choosing between App Service, Container Apps and AKS, pushing to a registry, secrets and managed identity, and capturing it all as Bicep.

A microservices architecture diagram explained, plus the patterns architects use: service boundaries, API gateway, sagas, database per service, observability.

Package the API as a container: multi-stage Dockerfile, layer-cache-friendly restore, non-root user, and the two real build failures you will hit — verified with a running container.

Cache the hot read path with IMemoryCache and GetOrCreateAsync, choose expirations, survive stampedes and invalidation, and know when Redis and HybridCache enter.

Issue and validate JSON Web Tokens in ASP.NET Core: token endpoint, bearer validation, role-based authorization, and the mistakes that turn tokens into breaches — with verified 401/403/200 flows.

What AutoMapper is and how to use it in ASP.NET Core Web API, its 2025 licensing change, and modern alternatives: hand-written mapping and Mapperly.

How to use areas in ASP.NET Core MVC: folder structure, the [Area] attribute, the {area:exists} route, view resolution, asp-area links, and securing an area.

Low-code and no-code (LCNC) platforms let you build working software mostly by configuring visual components and declarative rules instead of hand-writing…

Add a Dapper read path beside EF Core: read models behind a port, parameterized SQL, mapping gotchas we actually hit, and when each tool wins.

Implement the repository pattern over EF Core the useful way: use-case-shaped interfaces, AsNoTracking reads, unit-of-work saves, correct lifetimes, and the anti-patterns to dodge.

Build your first ASP.NET Core Web API on .NET 10 with Entity Framework Core — scaffold models from SQL Server, add an async controller, and test with the built-in OpenAPI document and Scalar.

Run MongoDB from the official Docker image with one command, keep data in a volume, and connect from .NET: queries, atomic updates, transactions and indexes.

Start the roadmap with a clean-architecture solution on .NET 10: domain entities with behavior, application-layer ports, infrastructure adapters, and a thin API — dependencies enforced by the compiler

Provision a complete Azure Linux VM from C# with the modern Azure.ResourceManager SDK — DefaultAzureCredential auth, VNet, public IP, NIC, SSH-key login, and a migration map from the deprecated Fluent

Build a reusable [FutureDate] rule with ValidationAttribute, add client-side checks via IClientModelValidator, and know when IValidatableObject fits better.

Publish and host ASP.NET Core in IIS: the ASP.NET Core Module, Hosting Bundle, app pool settings that matter, and the 500.19/500.30/502.5 troubleshooting table.

Wire Serilog into ASP.NET Core with console, rolling-file, and Seq sinks: request logging, enrichment, levels, and the named-placeholder habit that makes logs queryable.

How Azure Resource Manager works and why templates beat scripts — with Bicep as the modern authoring language: parameters, resources, outputs, what-if previews, and deployment commands.

To build a RESTful CRUD API in ASP.NET Core, model each entity as a resource, map the four HTTP verbs (GET, POST, PUT, DELETE) to read/create/update/delete,…

Choose the right redirect: RedirectToAction for app flows, 301 permanents for SEO, LocalRedirect against open redirects, and named routes with RedirectToRoute.

To keep EF Core migrations in a separate assembly, move your DbContext and migrations into a class library, tell EF which assembly owns the migrations with…

Create an SSH key pair with ssh-keygen, provision an Azure Ubuntu VM that accepts only that key using the Azure CLI, connect, and harden access — with cleanup commands.

Export SQL Server data to Excel in C# with ClosedXML instead of Office Interop: no Office install, safe on servers and containers, with a Web API download.

In Angular 22 a parent passes data to a nested child with signal inputs, input(), and the child reports back with signal outputs, output(). With model(), viewChild() and @for.

Find your Azure tenant ID, subscription ID, client ID and client secret in the portal or with az cli, then use them with DefaultAzureCredential.

To pivot data in SQL Server, use the PIVOT operator to turn distinct row values into columns while aggregating a measure. You supply an aggregate (like…

Configure CORS in ASP.NET Core Web API — default and named policies, origin/method/header restrictions, preflight requests, per-endpoint policies with RequireCors, and EnableCors/DisableCors attribute

Load 100,000 rows in under a second with SqlBulkCopy: column mappings, batch sizes, transactions, staging tables, and the constraint fine print — measured for real.

To render a partial view with a strongly-typed model in ASP.NET Core MVC, use the <partial tag helper and pass the model through its model attribute:…

EF Core Fluent API configuration in OnModelCreating — tables, columns, keys, indexes, relationships, query filters, value conversions, and when to prefer it over DataAnnotations.

Angular directives are classes that add behavior to elements in your templates, and there are three kinds: components (directives with a template), attribute…

Configure one-to-one, one-to-many, and many-to-many relationships with the EF Core Fluent API — HasOne/WithOne, HasForeignKey, OnDelete behaviors, and EF Core 5+ skip navigations without a join entity

Per-row table expressions: top-N-per-group queries, passing row values into table-valued functions, APPLY (VALUES) for named expressions, and when plain JOIN is all you need.

The options pattern done right: the host owns configuration sources, the library declares typed settings, and DI carries one to the other — with validation at startup.

Shape your SQL Server schema with DataAnnotations — Table, Column, Key, Required, MaxLength, Index, Timestamp, ConcurrencyCheck — and apply it with EF Core migrations, verified against a real database

Turn repeated Razor into reusable partial views: the partial tag helper, name resolution, passing models, and when a view component is the better tool.

Database-first in EF Core means you point a tool at an existing SQL Server database and it generates the entity classes and DbContext for you, instead of you…

Every Angular lifecycle hook in the order it runs: a diagram, a quick list of when each fires, code examples, and how signals replace ngOnChanges in Angular 22.

What a CTE is in SQL Server and how to use it: replacing subqueries, top-N per group, chaining CTEs, recursive CTEs for hierarchies, and CTE vs temp table.

To compare two ADO.NET DataTable objects, call AsEnumerable() on each to get a sequence of DataRow, then apply LINQ set operators: Except gives rows in the…

Test ASP.NET Core Web API endpoints with Postman — GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE with the status codes to expect, then the power features: JWT-protected endpoints, chaining requests with variables, asser

To bind a dropdown list in ASP.NET Core MVC, expose a List<SelectListItem (or a SelectList) on your view model and render it with the <select…

Deterministic cleanup in .NET means releasing a resource the moment you are done with it, instead of waiting for the garbage collector. You get it by…

The core difference is this: a stored procedure is a routine you execute to do work — it can modify data, run transactions, handle errors, and return one or…

The built-in .NET dependency injection container ships three service lifetimes: Transient (a new instance on every resolution), Scoped (one instance per…

Build an autocomplete textbox in ASP.NET Core with the native datalist element and fetch, a custom dropdown, or the jQuery UI widget, with debounced requests.

An Angular component is a TypeScript class marked with @Component that pairs a template with logic, and a signal is a reactive value that notifies Angular…

A user-defined function (UDF) in SQL Server is a reusable routine that takes parameters, runs T-SQL, and returns either a single value or a table. SQL Server…

An HTTP request in an ASP.NET Core MVC app on .NET 10 flows through the Kestrel web server into an ordered middleware pipeline, gets matched to a controller…

Convert or export a C# DataTable to CSV, a typed List<T> or a JSON string with three reusable extension methods that handle commas, quotes and DBNull.

What Kestrel is and how to configure it in ASP.NET Core: URLs and endpoints, request limits, HTTPS, reverse proxies, and appsettings.json vs code.

Cascading dropdowns populate a second <select based on what the user picks in the first: choose a country and the state list refills, choose a state and the…

Install Angular in Visual Studio Code: Node.js LTS and the Angular CLI, ng new, essential extensions, ng serve, and debugging Angular 22 in VS Code.

The difference between a temp table and a table variable in SQL Server: statistics, indexing, scope, transactions and recompiles, with a decision table.

Build a complete CRUD API with ASP.NET Core — verified create/read/update/delete requests, the right status codes for each, automatic validation, and the path from in-memory store to EF Core.

To set up an Angular 22 development environment you need three things: a supported Node.js LTS runtime, the Angular CLI installed globally (npm install -g…

Return JSON from ASP.NET Core MVC actions and call them from the browser — the fetch API for modern pages, jQuery $.ajax for legacy ones, POSTing JSON with FromBody, and common pitfalls.

Return files from ASP.NET Core with FileResult: FileContentResult vs FileStreamResult vs PhysicalFileResult, content types, download vs inline, and large files.

Exception handling in SQL Server is done with a TRY...CATCH block: you wrap risky statements in BEGIN TRY ... END TRY, and when any of them raises a runtime…

Connect to SQL Server from a .NET 10 console app with Microsoft.Data.SqlClient: connections, parameterized commands, data readers, transactions, and where Dapper and EF Core fit.

Model validation with DataAnnotations in ASP.NET Core — the attributes that matter, verified 400 problem responses, ModelState redisplay, client-side validation, and custom attributes.

To implement dependency injection in .NET Core, register your services in the built-in container (IServiceCollection) with a lifetime, then declare each…

ROW_NUMBER, RANK, DENSE_RANK, and NTILE side by side, PARTITION BY for per-group numbering, and persistent numbering with IDENTITY and SEQUENCE — all with verified outputs.

Create your first ASP.NET Core MVC application on .NET 10 — project structure explained, Program.cs walkthrough, default routing, and your own model, controller, and view.

How ASP.NET Core turns route values, query strings, forms, and JSON bodies into typed action parameters — binding sources, complex types, collections, and the classic empty-model gotcha.

All six constraint types on one table — PRIMARY KEY, UNIQUE, CHECK, DEFAULT, FOREIGN KEY, NOT NULL — each violated on purpose so you see the real errors, plus naming and FK-index guidance.

Serve HTML, JSON, plain text, XML, files, and bare status codes from ASP.NET Core actions — with content negotiation, verified response headers, and guidance on choosing.

Controllers, action methods, and every action result type in ASP.NET Core — View, Json, Content, status codes, redirects, and FileResult — each verified with the actual HTTP response.

A join in SQL Server combines rows from two or more tables based on a related column. The type of join decides which rows survive: an INNER JOIN keeps only…

Conventional and attribute routing in ASP.NET Core — the default pattern, API route templates, parameters and constraints, catch-alls, and generating URLs instead of hard-coding them.