Greg's Cool [Insert Clever Name] of the Day

Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Free Vista Business or Office 2007 Professional for Watching Webcasts (for US only... sorry)

Dan Wahlin's WebLog - Free Copies of Vista Business and Office 2007 Professional for Watching Webcasts

"I just came across Microsoft's new http://www.powertogether.com Website and it looks like there's some great free stuff available in exchange for getting educated on Vista and Office 2007. If you watch 3 Webcasts you can get a free copy of Vista Business edition or Office 2007 Professional (depending upon which 3 Webcasts you watch). Here's part of the fine print about getting the freebies:

"To be eligible to receive Windows Vista Business, you must register at www.powertogether.com and participate in at least three (3) qualifying Webcasts and/or virtual lab sessions within 30 days of registration. To be eligible to receive Microsoft Office Professional 2007, you must register at www.powertogether.com and participate in at least three (3) qualifying web casts and/or virtual lab sessions within 30 days of registration."

Not a bad deal at all from what I've seen. Read more about it at the Website. ..."

I'm a huge sucker for free stuff...

But I'm having a big problem registering. I can't seem to get past the registration process...

Either I get a "session timed out" right after selecting a gift (which is not the real error as I JUST logged in 2 seconds before as I clicked on the Register button) or a "system error" after entering my name and address... Probably system load issues.

I'll give it a try later today...

One thing to note is that this offer is only valid for the US...

TFS Permission and Administration Tools

SRLTeam - TFS Permission Manager 1.0 is Finally out

"...

Using this tool you can:

Add or remove TFS group membership, Reporting Services role membership and SharePoint role membership
Set Server and Project-level permissions
Set AreaPath and Source Control permissions
Create new TFS users with permissions identical to those of specified existing user
Save user permissions as template and use it later to create new or update existing users.

..."

There's a new TFS permission administration tool in town... This one seems to take a step further into TFS, allowing more permission tweaks then the TFS Admin Tool.

I like the sound of the template feature...

I've installed it with no problems and pointed it at my TFS server and it seems to work.

For simple permission admin, I'd say stick with the TFS Admin Tool. When you need to do more, or to go deeper, then this tool comes into play...

(via Ozzie Rules Blogging - Another tool for administering Team Foundation Server Security)

Upgrading a PC from XP to Vista is actually something to consider?

Shell Blog - Welcome to the Upgrade: A Sneak Peek into Windows Vista's Upgrade Architecture

"A long, long time ago, before Windows Vista, techies preferred clean installing the latest release of Windows to upgrading. They knew that there was a lingering problem specific to upgrades that never really went away, long after application compatibility and driver issues had been resolved. This frustrating problem was simple: upgrades left behind tracks of the old OS. After upgrading, you would see binaries from the old operating system left around in the Windows installation directory and the registry was tatooed with keys that would never be used again. Some friends of mine just did a clean install even though they had to back up and restore files and reinstall applications because their PCs performed better this way.

This has all changed with Windows Vista...

Upgrades are super-charged Clean Installs

Upgrade to Windows Vista are no longer a 'merge' with the old OS. First, Windows Vista's setup gathers old OS settings and user settings and data and stores them. Then it wipes away the old OS and applies the new operating system image (which is really fast thanks to Image Based Setup). Next, setup applies stored settings and data to this clean install based on per-component logic in manifests and plug-ins, which magically brings back your applications and data in a brand new OS. Your registry and file system are free of goo that is no longer needed by Windows Vista.

..."

Now that's interesting... Like those mentioned above, for me a new OS = new clean install. Having been burned in the past when upgrading, I gave up trying and would always install each new OS fresh... No stinking upgrading for me!

Which is why the upgrading of more of my home machines to Vista is on hold, pending new HD's and/or ghosting of my XP installs...

But this post has given me a little hope. Enough hope that it might work that I might actually try an upgrade from XP to Vista (on my wife's machine... ;)

(via AddressOf.com - Concerning Windows Vista "Upgrades")

Sunday, November 26, 2006

Visual Studio 2005 extensions for .NET Framework 3.0 (WCF & WPF), November 2006 CTP = Final VS2005 Release

Channel9 Cider Home Page - November CTP Release Notes

"Welcome to the November Community Technology Preview of Cider, the Visual Designer for the Windows Presentation Foundation. This is the Final release of the Visual Studio 2005 based CTPs of Cider. It is an incremental improvement over the September CTP. The focus for this CTP is to release an updated toolset that is fully compatible with the RTM release of .Net Framework 3.0.

...

This November CTP is the last planned release of Cider as an extension to Visual Studio 2005. Future CTPs of Cider will be available in the preview releases of the next full version of Visual Studio which is currently code named "Orcas". ..." [GD: Emphasis added]

I had missed this...

Looks like the November WCF/WPF Extensions for VS 2005 CTP is the "RTM" version (at least for VS2005).

Download: Visual Studio 2005 extensions for .NET Framework 3.0 (WCF & WPF), November 2006 CTP

(via AddressOf.com - WPF Development with Visual Studio 2005)

Saturday, November 25, 2006

Fiddler2 (Fiddler + HTTPS) Alpha Released

Fiddler - Fiddler2

"Fiddler v2 is a Alpha version of Fiddler which supports HTTPS.

This experimental edition of Fiddler is currently called "Fiddler2" and it should install side-by-side with the public version of Fiddler. ..."

Fiddler2 - Frequently asked questions

"...

Q: Why release Fiddler2?

A: Fiddler2 was released to help web developers discover and correct performance, functionality, and security bugs within their HTTPS sites. Fiddler2 brings Fiddler v1.x's ease-of-use to debugging HTTPS sites.

... "

The very cool (and pretty much standard utility belt item) Fiddler is being updated to support HTTPS...

Open XML/Word 2007 - Content Control Toolkit

Open XML Developer.org - Content Control Toolkit

"If you're working on Open XML solutions that use Word 2007 content controls and bind them to nodes in your custom XML data part, then you need this tool. It provides a simple graphical view of the content controls and custom XML nodes in a document, and you can bind a node to a control by simple drag&drop operations. Click on the screen shot here to see how it works.

It's a great way to manually create a data-bound document, and it's also a good developer tool for learning about the markup you need for binding controls to data. You can generate well-formed data-binding markup with a few clicks, then look at how it works and use the same markup in your custom solution as needed.

..."

I've got a feeling that I'm going to be doing a lot of Open XML related development in the future, so I'll be keeping my eyes open for cool sites, tools and info...

(via Certifications and Software Development - An Absolute Must Have Tool for Word 2007 Content Control Solutions)

Friday, November 24, 2006

Picture Post Windows Liver Writer Plugin v1.0.0.4 Released (Web Proxy Release)

The Picture Post WLW Plugin has been updated and released to better support web proxies.

The cool FlickrNet library already supported proxies, so all I had to do was feed it the web proxy settings from WLW (see related post).

Now on to the Related Post Plugin, which is going to take a little longer as the My.Blogs library doesn't support proxies. (yet ;)

bLaugh Windows Live Writer Plugin v1.0.0.1 Released (Web Proxy Release)

The bLaugh WLW Plugin has been updated and released to better support web proxies.

The very cool XML-RPC.Net library already exposed a Proxy setting, so all I needed to do was get the configured Windows Liver Writer Proxy.

Flickr4Writer led the way with Tim showing how he's supporting web proxies.

The magic is in "WindowsLive.Writer.Api.PluginHttpRequest.GetWriterProxy()" function which returns a System.Net.WebProxy object. That can then be passed through to supporting libraries (like FlickrNet, XML-RPC.Net, etc).

FYI, I'm now moving onto updating my other web accessing WLW Plugins (Related Post and Picture Post) with web proxy support too...

CPU Temperature Monitor System Tray Utility

INauseous() - CPU Temperature Monitor

"Given the issues with Toshiba laptops running very hot with Vista Glass Aero enabled, and just in general with XP as well ( Hot enough to burnout motherboards that require replacements from the manufacturer) I wrote this utility to give me system tray status on the current CPU temperature. I'm currently adding GPU temperature but that requires distribution of licensed components (dynamic libraries).

...

Basically, it just sits in your system tray showing the current CPU temperature with the following color schemes:

Green - Running at below 50% of critical temperature
Yellow - Running at > 50% but < 75% of critical temperature
Red - Running >= 75% of critical temperature.

...

The WMI namespace and object is root\WMI, MSAcpi_ThermalZoneTemperature

..."

Great timing...

I just had a HD issue related to heat (it's officially bad when your notebook HD is too hot to handle and makes a loud "clunking" sound... :| ) so I'm "heat aware" right now.

This is a cool little utility which sits in your system tray that monitors CPU heat. The C# 2 source is also available...

.Net Validation Framework (Domain Object Validation via Attributes)

CodePlex - .net Validation Framework

"Use .NET attributes to provide validation for your strongly typed business objects.

...

[RequiredStringValidator]
[LengthStringValidator(50)]
public string FirstName...

[RequiredStringValidator]
[RegexValidator("Invalid email format.", @"\w+([-+.]\w+) *@\w+([-.]\w+)*\. \w+([-.]\w+)*")]
[LengthStringValidator(50)]
public string EmailAddress...

[RequiredIntValidator]
[CompareIntValidator(18, ValidationCompareOperator.GreaterThanEqual)]
public int Age..."

Visual Studio Magazine - Validate Business Objects Declaratively

"... I’ll show you how to construct the Declarative Validation framework to validate business objects by decorating class properties with attributes. The framework consists of six built-in validator attributes: RequiredValidator, LengthValidator, RegexValidator, RangeValidator, CompareValidator, and CustomValidator. You can plug the framework into any architecture. It comes with two abstract base classes that you can use to make implementation trivial by querying the IsValid property. ..."

I really like the idea of using attributes to validate my strongly typed domain/business objects...

(via Steve Michelotti - Validation framework on CodePlex)

Thursday, November 23, 2006

Blogger Backup v1.0.0.2 Alpha Release

Blogger Backup v1.0.0.2 has just been released...

Highlights:

Web proxy support added (accessed via the Tools/Options menu)

Better handling of long paths (i.e. > MAX_PATH)

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

Blogger Backup v1.0.0.1 Alpha Release

Just released is v1.0.0.1 of the the Blogger Backup Utility.

My primary to do's before beta are incremental/just new stuff/get stuff since last run/etc backups and BlogML support...

Here are the v1.0.0.1 release notes:

Fixed Blogger 3.0 issue.
Now works with both Blogger 2 and Blogger 3

Added Release History text file and related Help menu item

Added "Append Blog Title to Backup Path" option, defaulted as true/on.
This will add an additional folder level, named based on the given blog's title.

Updated descriptive label text, changing case, etc.

Updated tab order

Swaped positions of "Get only the most recent:" and "Overwrite existing backups?"

PortableApps Suite

PortableApps.com - PortableApps Suite

"PortableApps Suite™ is a collection of portable apps including a web browser, email client, office suite, calendar/scheduler, instant messaging client, antivirus, sudoku game, backup utility and integrated menu, all preconfigured to work portably. Just drop it on your portable device and you're ready to go.

...

PortableApps Suite (Standard Edition): ClamWin Portable (antivirus), Firefox Portable (web browser), Gaim Portable (instant messaging), OpenOffice.org Portable (office suite), Sudoku Portable (puzzle game), Sunbird Portable (calendar/task manager) and Thunderbird Portable (email client) and runs comfortably from a 512MB drive.

..."

Nice.

Add this and the Sysinternals Suite (Sysinternals Suite (8MB of Complete Sysinternals Goodness)) and you've got a pretty cool portable environment... ;)

(via Larkware News - The Daily Grind 1019)

NetMon 3.0 RTW

Network Monitor - Network Monitor 3.0 has released!!

"After many months of hard work we are proud to announce the Release to Web of Microsoft Network Monitor 3.0 (NM3). The final version is available from Microsoft Connects site (http://connect.microsoft.com). The Connects site does require you have a passport account, but this is also free.

What you get for your money

Well since it's free, I suppose you get infinite value. But in nut shell here are some of the key features of NM3.

A completely new user interface
Real time capture and display of frames
Simultaneous capture on multiple network adapters
Multiple simultaneous capture sessions
Network conversations and a tree view displaying frames by conversation
A new script-based protocol parser language, and script-based parsers
Support for Vista/Windows XP/Windows Server 2003
Support for 32bit and 64bit platforms

..."

When you go to Connect, don't let the "Network Monitor 3.0 Beta" throw you. Once you Apply to join the beta, you get access to the 3.0 RTM...

Downloaded, installed and it looks pretty darn cool... This is not your Father's NetMon... ;)

Grab the Desktop as a bitmap...

Ozzie Rules Blogging - Create a magnifier by painting the Desktop into your form

"Had a question about how to create an application magnifier and was amazed at how easy it was to get a prototype working! Depending on what you consider lines of code it is about 3 lines!

...

Desktop_Hwnd = GetDesktopWindow()

Desktop_HDC = GetWindowDC(Desktop_Hwnd)

Debug.Print(StretchBlt(g.GetHdc, 0, 0, Me.Width, Me.Height, Desktop_HDC, 0, 0, Me.Height / 2, Me.Width / 2, SRCCOPY))

..."

This reminds me of a project I want to try. I want to see if this works (grabbing the desktop as a bitmap) on XP while a Remote Desktop session is running/logged in, but disconnected.

I.e. run an agent on a XP machine, running in the logged on user's process (so we get their Desktop), saving a screenshot to disk even when the user is disconnected (not logged out, but disconnected) from the session.

Thank about 120+ "work horse" machines running batch processing "stuff" that you have to monitor, all of them running Remote Desktop sessions... It would be cool to see their current Desktops without have to RD into each system (through there are ways that that can be made easier...)

It should work... (But I've said that before about other things that should work in disconnected RD sessions...)

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Blogger Backup Utility v1.0.0.0 Alpha Released

I've just uploaded the source and the Setup for the first alpha release of the Blogger Backup utility to the CodePlex project.

It's FUBLY, but it seems to work (on my machine, against my blog, etc), there's little to no error checking, your mileage may vary, use at your own risk, etc, etc, yada, yada...

It makes no changes to your blog, only writes XML files to a path you select, makes no changes to your system, so it SHOULD be pretty safe to use (but your mileage may vary, use at your own risk... ;)

Here are some screenshots of the utility in action (see I told you it was FUBLY ;)

To Do:

Add BlogML support
Test with Blogger 3.0/beta
Add More/Better/Some error handling
Make it prettier
Allow the user to select specific posts for backup
Implement incremental backup (i.e. "Backup the newest stuff, the stuff added since the last backup...")

Maybe New features like Archive Title Page HTML generation, with optional grouping/sorting by date, etc.

Think "archive page, but just with Titles (as links to posts), sorted and grouped by week, or month, or year, etc".

Think about an annual post with the titles from that year. Or a summary, sorting the titles alphabetically. Or my post size. Or stuff like that...

Now that I can get all the posts from my blog, just think of the stuff you can DO with all that data! Muhahahaha...

Related Past Post XRef:
Blogger Backup using the C# GData Client Library...

Update #1 11/21/2006 @ 10:00 PM (PST):

I just signed up for a Blogger 3 (beta) blog and this backup utility DOESN'T work for Blogger 3(i.e. beta.blogger.com).

There seems to be a problem in during the post download/save phase... I'll look at it tomorrow...

Note To Self: Send To Folder Location for Windows Vista

One of the first things I do when getting a newly installed Windows OS is to add a shortcut to Notepad in my Send To folder. This gives me a very quick and easy way to open any given file in Notepad (right click -> Send To -> Notepad).

So since I'm now doing my personal dev on Vista... Um... where's the Send To folder now?

Given its new location I want to make sure I can find it again in the future...

Vista Send To Folder Location:
C:\Users\[UserID]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\SendTo\

Windows XP Send To Folder Location:
C:\Documents and Settings\[UserId]\SendTo\

Gee, I wonder why I didn't find it right off.... :|

Here are a couple related posts/articles:

Finding the User Settings in Vista
Windows Vista Tip – Customizing the “Send To” Menu

"My" Lego Mindstorm Fun...

Coding4Fun - Programming LEGO Mindstorms Robots using the My Namespace

"This article walks through creating an extension to the Visual Basic My namespace to easily enable programming Lego Mindstorms RCX robots...

...

Nostalgic memories returned as I opened the box to the Lego Mindstorms Robotic Invention System I remembered the spaceships, fighter planes, sprawling space docks, towering skyscraper buildings—each coming to life accompanied by the soft click of LEGO bricks going together. And now you can automate your creations! If I had owned this kit as a kid there would have been some serious infractions of lights-out time at night.

With the release of the Microsoft.NET Interface for LEGO Mindstorms you can program your Mindstorms robot using any .NET language. In this article we will make the Microsoft.NET LEGO interface available via the Visual Basic My namespace.

Getting Started

You first need to download and install the free LEGO Mindstorms SDK 2.5. This will install the drivers required to send commands to Mindstorms robots via the infrared tower. You'll need Visual Basic 2005, which you can get for free from Visual Basic Express Edition 2005. You'll need to install the Microsoft.NET LEGO interface which will provide the interface between Visual Basic and your robot. You can get that by installing the Visual Basic LEGO Starter kits: Download Visual Basic LEGO Starter Kits If you run into any problems setting all of this up, see the setup tips in Tips and Tricks for LEGO Mindstorms programming by John Wingfield.

..."

There's something that's very cool about programming my Mindstorm from VB.Net (please, no jokes about toys/languages/etc ;)

Monday, November 20, 2006

Blogger Backup using the C# GData Client Library...

I think I've finally found a viable, working method to easily back up my Blogger Posts to disk.

Using the Google GData API and their C# client library implementation, I've created a simple proof of concept Blogger Backup utility in which I was able to save all of my 2058 blog posts to individual XML files.

Rock On!

Here's a couple screenshots of the results...

I've just requested a CodePlex project and will be getting the code into releasable shape (beta at least) tomorrow (being on vacation means I can code all day... ;)

The current output/save format is Atom XML (which comes for free in the GData library). One of the things I'd really like to do is also support BlogML. Since it's XML to XML, that should be a simple transform away...

More to follow in the coming days...

Hemi - Move TFS Work Items From One Project to Another Utility

Eric Lee - A Humble Blog - Work Item Moving Tool is back!

"Hey guys, I've finally had a chance to update my work item moving tool to work with the RTM release of Team Foundation Server. Along the way, I made some modifications and changes that I've wanted to do for a while. I haven't thought of a better name than 'work item mover' so for now I've code-named it if you will 'Hemi'.

I’ve posted the tool to: ...hemi.release.zip . You’ll also need: C1.Win.C1FlexGrid.2.zip..."

If you've been playing with Team Foundation Server (TFS) one of the things you may have wanted to do was to move a number of Work Items from one Project to another, yet found there's no easy way to make such bulk moves... One at a time is easy, but what if you're consolidating projects, moving from many smaller ones into one bigger one?

That's where Hemi comes in. Hemi is a very cool utility which makes it easy to query, copy/move work items from one Project to another (on the same server).

I've tested it out briefly and it works just as advertised, is simple and yet feature complete.

If you're looking to do some bulk work item copies/moves you should check this utility out...

bLaugh Windows Live Writer Plugin v1.0.0.0 Released

I've just uploaded the source and released the WLW bLaugh Plugin...

Now you can simply and easily select and insert a bLaugh comic into your current WLW post. Because all work and no play... yada, yada, yada... ;)

Related Past Post XRef:
WLW bLaugh Plugin Preview
bLaugh WLW Plugin?

AniBOOM - Get your Animation on...

My son is currently into online animations (and I'm getting pretty sick Magical Trevor ;). I'm almost afraid to tell him about AniBOOM...

AniBOOM is a site which focuses on short animations, with the expected social aspect (tagging, rating, comments, etc).

There are two things that peaked my interest, Awards and Revenue Sharing.

They are currently holding the AniBOOM 2006 Award voting, which lets you vote for you favorite animations. The winner is supposed to receive $25k and the 5 runner-ups, 5k each. Not a bad deal.

I also thought the Revenue sharing plan, which is tentatively scheduled to start in late 2006, an interesting idea. Here's a blurb...

"aniBOOM believes in rewarding hard working artists for their labor, so we have created a REVENUE SHARE model based on Number of Views. This means that the more people who watch your movies - the more money you’ll earn.
Each registered aniBOOM member who has uploaded movies will receive their proportionate share, calculated in accordance with their relative contribution and Number of Views racked up."

I find these two items interesting primarily because they encourage/require original content. Meaning this site will likely/hopefully not fill up with prated, hacked, recorded, previously copyrighted content.

That and they seek to payback the authors/creators in hard cash...

While the site is still in beta, but that doesn't mean I don't have a "want list". ;)

A. API
It doesn't looks like it has an API, so no WLW Plugin writing for me... :(

B. Animation tools (or links), tutorials, suggestions, etc.
After watching a few animations, the next thing I wanted to do was create my own... It would be cool if they provided authoring/creating/etc resources for the budding animation creator.

Still, all in all, it's a cool site to spend some stress release time on...

Sunday, November 19, 2006

Windows Live Writer Picture Post Plugin v1.0.0.1 Beta Released

I've just released the first public beta of my WLW Picture Post Plug on the WLW Picture Post CodePlex project.

This version supports both Flickr and 23Hq. I can't seem to get a response to my Zooomr Product Key requests, so Zooomr support will wait until there's any easier product key request method/procedure...

I've also used this time to move my personal project development over to Vista, installed on an older IBM T30 Thinkpad. I'll post on that soon...

Here are some screenshots (with kitty pictures to satisfy my monthly cat picture blog post quota requirements ;)

There's still a good bit to do, but it works (as seen above... all the above pictures were posted with the v1.0.0.1 beta).

Now that I've released this, I can move onto getting the bLaugh plugin into beta. ;)

Update #1 11/20/2006 @ 6:37PM (PST):

Updated the href links for the above pictures...

There's a bug in how I'm handling the Web URL's for 23HQ... It's not just a "replace www.flickr.com with www.23hq.com" fix up. The format of the WebURL's are different enough that more parsing/fixup is needed.

Fixing it now...

Friday, November 17, 2006

"Data Dude" - Visual Studio Team Edition for Database Professionals RTM's 11/30

C# Distilled - Visual Studio Team Edition for Database Pro's will RTM November 30th

"... It appears though that Microsoft has even more goodies in store for us developers before the month is out. Microsoft will release to manufacturing the latest member of the 'Team System' family, Visual Studio 2005 Team Edition for Database Pro's on November 30th. ..."

Nice... I've been looking forward to this RTM'ing (having Team Suite already means I'll be getting it for "free" ;)

I'm also looking forward to the next release, which I believe will include visual design/diagramming (i.e. like ERWin, etc).

User Agent String Utility version 2 - Tell IE7 To Pretend it's IE6...

Microsoft Downloads - User Agent String Utility version 2

"... Whenever Internet Explorer releases a new major version, Microsoft makes every attempt to coordinate the change with major web site owners so that users who upgrade to the latest version can take advantage of new features available on the upgraded browsing platform. A character string called the “User Agent String” identifies the major version of the browser to web sites so that the sites can offer certain functionality on particular browser versions. In some cases, websites might misidentify a new version of IE as an outdated version, with results ranging from rendering and behavior issues to total rejection of the user. This utility changes certain registry keys on an IE 7.0 installation to allow a user to emulate an IE 6.0 installation as a simple workaround until problematic sites update their code. It also offers users the option to report these problematic sites to Microsoft.

..."

In-house our current (but being slowly replaced with TFS) web based defect tracking system doesn't like IE7.

"Microsoft Internet Explorer : 4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 5.2; .NET CLR 1.1.4322; InfoPath.1; .NET CLR 2.0.50727) is not supported!"

Dogh!

Since it's not likely we're going to upgrade it, I was thinking I was going to have to fallback to a IE6 Virtual Machine to access it... Then I saw Sandi's post about the User Agent String Utility.

Downloaded, installed. When executed/run I can access our defect tracking system!

Rock on...

(via Spyware Sucks - User Agent String Utility Version 2 has been released...)

Related Past Post XRef:
WinXP SP2 IE6 VPC Image

Office 2007 MSDN Product Key Note (One Key Per Application Only, More Keys Coming 11/21))

Ben Walters InfoPath MVP - Office RTM Product Key Issue Update

"Office 2007 Product Keys from Subscriber Downloads

Many Office 2007 applications were recently posted to Subscriber Downloads, however a unique product key was not posted for each product. Although these product keys are worth several activations, once a product key is used to activate a particular Office application, it can only be used to activate additional installations of the same application. For example, a single key was posted for Office Project 2007 and Office Visio 2007, however once the product key is used to activate an Office Project 2007 installation, it can only be used to activate other Office Project 2007 installations.

Additional product keys are expected to made available from the Subscriber Downloads' Product Keys page on Tuesday November 21^st, 2006. When the additional product keys are posted:"

This is a very important note, one I'm glad I saw this before installing InfoPath / OneNote / Groove or Visio / Project.

In short, "... one key to rule them all ..."

"HowTo: Determine Wireless Strength in .Net" [via WMI & System.Management]

Derik Whittaker - HowTo: Determine Wireless Strength in .Net

"So, have you ever wondered how to get the information about the strength of your wireless signal using .Net? It is actually pretty easy through .net.

...

Getting the information about the wireless strength is pretty straight forward and can be done in about 5 - 10 lines of code.

..."

I know I'll need this one day...

The problem with WMI is that it's SO compresive. There's just SO much stuff, it's sometimes hard to find the right namespace/class/object...

The magic in this case is the Ndis80211ReceivedSignalStrength property of the MSNdis_80211_ReceivedSignalStrength class.

Why does my shared [Remote Desktop] clipboard not work? (Part 1)

Terminal Services Team Blog - Why does my shared clipboard not work? (Part 1)

"The TS shared clipboard allows you to copy and paste data between local and remote sessions. When it works its really simple and seamless, but what about when it doesn’t? Diagnosing clipboard problems can be hard and frustrating!

The majority of clipboard problems fall into the category of clipboard viewer chain related issues.

...

Symptom: Remote-to-local copy and paste broken.

Possible Cause: RDPCLIP is not in the clipboard viewer chain.

Possible Solution: Kill and restart RDPCLIP.

Symptom: Local-to-remote copy and paste broken.

Possible Cause: TS client is not in the clipboard viewer chain.

Possible Solution: Close the TS client and reconnect to the session.

Symptom: RDPCLIP or the TS client is using excessive CPU.

Possible Cause: There is a loop in the local or remote clipboard viewer chain.

Possible Solution: Kill and restart RDPCLIP. If this does not fix the problem, close the TS client and reconnect to the session

..."

I use Remote Desktop/Terminal Services Sessions all day, every day and find it frustrating when the clipboard/cut-n-paste stops working.

This article provides a some great detail as to what is going on and how to troubleshoot and resolve related issues...

Thursday, November 16, 2006

MSN Radio - Powered by Pandora

Brad Wilson - The .NET Guy - Pandora Gets a New Face

"MSN Radio launched, and it uses Pandora as the engine! I'm a huge fan of the way Pandora works, so seeing us make this deal is really encouraging to me. ..."

NICE.

Pandora is hands down my favorite way to listen to streamed music. It's cool to see it "do good"...

Now if only I could listen to MSN Radio/Pandora in Windows Media Player...

What wait until tomorrow when you can get Vista today (via TechNet/MSDN)

Ed Bott's Windows Expertise - Vista is ready for download

"If you have an MSDN or TechNet Plus subscription, you can go download your copy of the final version of Windows Vista x86 (and get the product keys to go with it) right now, a day earlier than expected. ..."

Downloading it now... ;)

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

WLW bLaugh Plugin Preview

Because I just don't have enough WLW Plugin's in the progress, last night I started working on my WLW bLaugh Plugin... :)

And here's the result (i.e. Gee look, it works!)

Here's a preview of the soooo very early alpha plugin...

One of the interesting things (for me) is that I'm using the VERY cool XML-RPC.Net library to provide strongly typed access to the bLaugh API. This is the first I've consumed an XML-RPC service and XML-RPC.Net made it pretty painless and easy....

To complete the plugin I need to add searching, etc, but I hope to have a release this weekend or early next week...

Another interesting thing (again for me) is that in this post I've used four of my five plugins. The WLW Related Post Plugin for the related post link at the bottom, WLW Text Template Plugin for the related post xref header text, WLW Picture Post Plugin to upload and post the screenshot and the new WLW bLaugh Plugin (codeplex project pending) to post the comic.

Now that's re-use! ;)

Related Past Post XRef:
bLaugh WLW Plugin?

Tuesday, November 14, 2006

PowerShell 1.0 RTM!

Windows PowerShell - It's a Wrap! Windows PowerShell 1.0 Released!

"Today at the keynote at ITForum in Barcelona, we announced the official release of Windows PowerShell 1.0!

For those of you unfamiliar with Windows PowerShell, it is a best of breed next-generation commandline shell designed from the ground up to be flexible and powerful while still remaining easy to use. Many thanks go to our friends at MySpace.com for coming all the way to Barcelona to show how they're using Windows PowerShell in production today for the mission critical task of maintaining and managing the second busiest website in the world.

To download Windows PowerShell, please use the links below:

Windows PowerShell 1.0 English only: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=75284&clcid=0x09 ..."

Nice!

Downloading it now...

Err... maybe not...

It looks like, as of 11/14/2006 8:16 AM PST, the download links are not working/hooked up, etc. When I click on the "Download the Windows PowerShell 1.0 WindowsXP-x86 English package now" link I get sent to the MS Search page.

According to the post's comments MS is aware of the issue and looking into it.

I'll update this post when the links are working (for me at least).

(via James' Windows & Development Blog - PowerShell 1.0 Released)

Update #1 11/14/2006 @ 9:02AM (PST):

They are getting closer...

Now when you click on the English XP2, x86 link you're going to the MS Downloads page...

That says "The download you requested is unavailable." LOL

Still it's better than the Search page. Give them just a bit more time... I'm sure we'll be happily PS'ing soon ;)

Update #2 11/14/2006 @ 12:33PM (PST):

Okay, it looks like it's available for download... IF you search the MS Downloads site for PowerShell 1.0

Here are some of the download links...

Windows PowerShell 1.0 English-Language Installation Package for Windows XP (KB926139)

Windows PowerShell 1.0 English-Language Installation Package for Windows Server 2003 (KB926139)

Windows PowerShell 1.0 Multilingual User Interface Package for Windows XP (KB926141)

Windows PowerShell 1.0 Multilingual User Interface Package for Windows Server 2003 (KB926141)

Sysinternals Suite (8MB of Complete Sysinternals Goodness)

Microsoft TechNet - Sysinternals Suite

"The entire set of Sysinternals Utilities have been rolled up into a single Suite of tools. This file contains all the individual tools and help files.

Download SysinternalsSuite (8 MB)"

I missed this item in the recent Sysinternals news bubble...

It's all the Sysinternals utilities you've come to love, all in one download (7.5k, 90 files).

(via David Douglass - Winner, Download of the Year Award!)

bLaugh WLW Plugin?

Chris Pirillo - Comic Freeware

"When we released the bLaugh API, I was hoping that some enterprising developer would use it to create something fun. Mike from Singer’s Creations just unleashed Comicazzi tonight. Essentially, it’s a desktop app that will let you drag and drop bLaugh comics onto your current wallpaper ..."

I saw this post and the FIRST thing that popped into my head was, "Oh I HAVE to create a WLW bLaugh plugin..."

So while I wait for my Zooomr Key (which is becoming a story in itself) for my WLW Picture Post plugin (which as of this weekend now supports both Flickr and 23Hq ;) I think I'll see if I can bang out a bLaugh plugin...

Monday, November 13, 2006

Windows Imaging Component Download

Microsoft Downloads - Windows Imaging Component

"The Windows Imaging Component (WIC) provides WIC-enabled applications to display and edit any image format for which a WIC-compliant CODEC is installed, and also to read and write metadata in image files

The Windows Imaging Component supports discovery of new and proprietary (e.g., Raw) image formats. Any application that uses WIC can take advantage of new image formats as soon as their CODECs (encoder/decoders) are installed on the computer. WIC includes updated CODECs for JPEG, TIFF, GIF, PNG, & BMP that are more secure than previously released CODECs for these formats, and also supports a new high-performance image format called Windows Media Photo. Additionally, WIC provides metadata readers and writers for common image metadata formats, and enables applications to preserve their own metadata inside image files so they don't need to create "sidecar files".

..."

From MSDN, Windows Imaging Component Overview

"The Microsoft Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) Imaging Component (WIC) for WPF provides an extensible framework for working with images and image metadata. WIC makes it possible for independent software vendors (ISVs) and independent hardware vendors (IHVs) to develop their own image codecs and get the same platform support as standard image formats (for example, TIFF, JPEG, PNG, GIF, BMP, and WMPhoto). A single, consistent set of interfaces is used for all image processing, regardless of image format, so any application using WPF or WIC gets automatic support for new image formats as soon as the codec is installed. The extensible metadata framework makes it possible for applications to read and write their own proprietary metadata directly to image files, so the metadata never gets lost or separated from the image. ..."

Being very involved in images, imaging, etc, I'll be keeping an eye out for more WIC info...

Mix and Match Fonts on a Label Control in VB 2005

XTab's Blog - Mix and Match Fonts on a Label Control in VB 2005

"A recent post in the VBCityForums has just reminded me of a technique that I meant to blog, but don't think I ever got round to doing. This is to show how you can customise a label so that you can have text that uses different fonts on the same label.

Normally of course, you set the font and forecolor in the Properties Window at design time, although you can also set or change them at run time too via the Font and ForeColor properties. But the key thing is that you can only have one font, one font size, one text color and one fontstyle for the whole label if you do this.

So what happens if you want to create something that has, for instance, a heading in red text - bold style and underlined and a second line with a message in black text - regular style font ?

...

This could come in handy.

I usually take the uber-lazy approach and just use different labels, but this makes it look so easy that I should think of doing it this way...

(via vbfeeds - Mix and Match Fonts on a Label Control in VB 2005)

Saturday, November 11, 2006

MS Office Compatibility Pack for Office 2007 Files (Open, Edit, Save Office 2007 files in Office 2000,XP, 2003...)

Microsoft Downloads - Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007 File Formats

"Open, edit, and save documents, workbooks, and presentations in the file formats new to Microsoft Office Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007.

...

By installing the Compatibility Pack in addition to Microsoft Office 2000, Office XP, or Office 2003, you will be able open, edit, and save files using the file formats new to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007. The Compatibility Pack can also be used in conjunction with the Microsoft Office Word Viewer 2003, Excel Viewer 2003, and PowerPoint Viewer 2003 to view files saved in these new formats. For more information about the Compatibility Pack, see Knowledge Base article 923505.

..."

With Office 2007 RTM, I'm sure it won't be too long before I start seeing the new Office 2007 "x" (docX, xlsX, pptX, etc. Think "X = Just XML") and "m" (docM, xlsM, pptM, etc. Think "M = Includes Macros") file formats...

(via The Road to Know Where - Freely Use Microsoft Office 2007 Files Without Office 2007)

Thursday, November 09, 2006

SlickEdit VS2005 Gadgets Updated

"A new version of SlickEdit Gadgets is available that fixes some of the bugs that have been reported. Many thanks to all the people who have reported them and gave us feedback. The new version (build 77) can be downloaded at the same location: http://www.slickedit.com/gadgets.

Summary of fixes:
1. The installer now allows you to install Gadgets to directories other than the default.
2. The SLOC report now works for VB and web projects.
3. The Data Object Analyzer has been fixed when generating a handler if a class file is not open.

Please uninstall the previous version before installing the new one. All of your settings will be preserved. "

I've found myself using the Data Object feature more than any of the other features... The Editor objects are cool, but I've found that they work best for me if I turn them on just when I need them, to not leave them on all the time...

Related Past Post XRef:
Slick Edit Gadgets - Free VS2005 Utilities

Wednesday, November 08, 2006

WinXP SP2 IE6 VPC Image

Microsoft Downloads - WinXP SP2 IE6 VPC Image

"A VPC hard disk image containing a pre-activated Windows XP SP2, IE6 and the IE7 Readiness Toolkit."

Upgraded to IE7 already, but now you have run into an issue where you need IE6? Well this VPC looks like it just might help.

I'm downloading it now to confirm that for myself, that this VPC can be used as a IE6 fallback resource.

One thing I can't tell is if the WinXP instance is timebombed or not. Guess I'll just have to wait and see...

Resource Refactoring Tool Powertoy for VS2005 (Refactor Strings into a String Resource)

Microsoft Downloads - Resource Refactoring Tool

"The Resource Refactoring Tool provides developers an easy way to extract hard coded strings from the code to resource files.

The Resource Refactoring Tool "Alpha Release" provides:
Lists existing resources by their similarity level to the text being replaced.
Automatically replaces hard coded string with a reference to resource entry
Support for with both C# and VB.NET projects.

Instructions

1. Run ResourceRefactorSetup.msi
2. Launch Visual Studio 2005
3. Open either a VB.NET or C# project
4. Right-click on a hard coded string in a a code window and choose Refactor - Extract to resource
5. Choose the resource file you want to use. Next, choose either an existing resource or create a new one.
6. Press OK to commit changes

The string will automatically be replaced with the reference to resource you have chosen"

Very nice. Now if they would release the source (or just integrate a spell checker for me) I'd be in heaven! ;)

[It looks like there already are resource file spell checkers... I'll have to check those out...]

Speaking of SMO, SMO for PowerShell - PowerSMO

Dan Sullivan - PowerSMO!

"Last year I wrote a blog article about using what was then called MSH with SQL Server Management Objects http://pluralsight.com/blogs/dan/archive/2005/12/29/17703.aspx. MSH is now called PowerShell and mixing some SMO with it makes PowerSMO!

SMO is a set of object models for SQL Server. With PowerSMO! you can manipulate those object models from the command line or with a script. The two object models probably of most interest to SQL Server developers and DBA’s are the Server and ManagedComputer object models and that’s what this article is going to use them to show how to use PowerSMO!.

..."

Nice...

C# String Library Inspired by PHP

C# String Library

"...it struck me that there are a number of useful functions in the PHP string library that are missing in C#'s implentation of String. This library is the result of that wee epiphany.

The intent of the article is to introduce you to the PHP inspired String Library for .Net. ...

Base64StringEncode: Base64 encodes a string.
Base64StringDecode: Decodes a Base64 string.
CaseInsenstiveReplace: A case insenstive replace function.
ReplaceFirst: Replaces the first occurrence of a string with the replacement value. The Replace is case senstive. [The inclusion of this method and ReplaceLast was suggested by a reader's comment.]
ReplaceLast: Replaces the last occurrence of a string with the replacement value. The replace is case senstive.
FilterWords: Removes all the words passed in the filter words parameters. The replace is NOT case sensitive.
HasWords: Checks the passed string to see if it contains any of the passed words. Not case-sensitive.
HtmlSpecialEntitiesEncode: A wrapper around HttpUtility.HtmlEncode.
HtmlSpecialEntitiesDecode: A wrapper around HttpUtility.HtmlDecode.
MD5String: MD5 encodes the passed string.
MD5VerifyString: Verifies a string against the passed MD5 hash.
PadLeftHtmlSpaces: Left pads the passed string using the HTML non-breaking space ( ) for the total number of spaces.
CaseInsenstiveReplace: Performs a case insenstive replace.
PadLeft: Left pads the passed string using the passed pad string for the total number of spaces. (It will not cut-off the pad even if it causes the string to exceed the total width.)
PadRightHtmlSpaces: Right pads the passed string using the HTML non-breaking space ( ) for the total number of spaces.
PadRight: Right pads the passed string using the passed pad string for the total number of spaces. (It will not cut-off the pad even if it causes the string to exceed the total width.)
RemoveNewLines: Removes the new line (\n) and carriage return (\r) symbols.
Reverse: Reverses the passed string.
SentenceCase: Converts a string to sentence case.
SpaceToNbsp: Converts all spaces to HTML non-breaking spaces.
StripTags: Removes all HTML tags from the passed string.
TitleCase: Converts a string to title case.
TrimIntraWords: Removes multiple spaces between words.
NewLineToBreak: Converts each new line (\n) and carriage return (\r) symbols to the HTML <br /> tag.
WordWrap: Wraps the passed string at the passed total number of characters (if cuttOff is true)or at the next whitespace (if cutOff is false). Uses the environment new linesymbol for the break text. "

There are some methods I can use here...

It's packaged as a single CS file, so if you're already using C# you can just compile it right into your app. Since I dream in VB.Net, I'll probably wrap it into an assembly (or maybe convert it?).

(via .Net Adventures - C# String Library by Chad Finsterwald)

Update #1 3/6/2008:
Fale (Alejandro Fallas) has found, and commented with, the new location for this library, http://www.wtfdeveloper.com/Default5.aspx).

Thanks Fale!

Tuesday, November 07, 2006

Customized .Net OpenFileDialog in C#(OpenFileDialogEx)

The Code Project - Customizing OpenFileDialog in .Net

"...

How many times had happen where you want to put some extra control in the OpenFileDialog control and you can’t…
Searching for code on the .Net I found a couple places where they used MFC, but nothing for .Net. OpenFileDialog is not native implemented in .Net, instead it make use of a Win32 API “GetOpenFileName”.
a) Create my own OpenFileDialog from scratch.
b) Create my own OpenFileDialog reusing resources, (using the API “GetOpenFileName” and provide my own template)
c) Hack on .Net OpenFileDialog and add the functionality I need for it.
A – Was not an option because it could require a lot of development time when there is a lot more stuff to be done, later when the product is finished I can review this.
B – Required to provide my own template using calls to Win32 API and resources.
C – Was the more viable option at this time, don’t think of this as a bad hack, basically a hack is when you want make the control do some extra functionality and you must from different thread or process.
So because I like the challenges, I decided to “hack” OpenFileDialog class to create my own customizable control. ..."

I was just thinking about a new/tweaked file open dialog (with a large image preview) for my Picture Post WLW Plugin.

Looks like Castor has just saved me a good bit of time... ;)

Visual Studio 2005 Extensions for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Announcement

SharePoint Apps: Alexander Malek's weblog - Welcome to VS extensions for WSS!

"Greetings from TechEd Barcelona! Today, we finally got to announce a project I've been working on for the last year: "Visual Studio 2005 extensions for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0". Yup, the name's a mouthful :). Explaining it is pretty easy though - make "F5" work for SharePoint stuff in VS! That's essentially what VSeWSS brings to the table. Once you have it installed, you can actually boot VS, create stuff for WSS and have it work. For example, if you want to build a web part, from the "New Project" dialog in VS, choose "Web Part" under the "C#/SharePoint" node. Add some code and you're done. You can hit F5 and immediately debug your web part. Pretty cool, no?

..."

Very nice... When/if I get back into the WSS dev biz, this could come in handy.

I'm very glad these VS2005 Extensions are coming out and we don't have to wait for Orcas to ship... (and thereby giving MS time to get Orcas right?)

Execute T-SQL Scripts (with GO's) Programmatically with SMO (or DMO)

Jon Galloway - Handling "GO" Separators in SQL Scripts - the easy way

"If you've ever had to execute one or more SQL scripts from ADO.NET, you've likely run into the GO batch terminator issue....

Until recently, there have been two ways to handle this problem - execute SQL scripts by shelling to OSQL, or splitting the script on GO separators and running them in sequence. Both solutions kind of worked, but SQL Server Management Objects (SMO) has a better solution for us: Server.ConnectionContext.ExecuteNonQuery(), which parses T-SQL statements and "gets" the GO statement as a batch separator. And the crowd goes wild!!!

..."

This is a very cool tip from Jon. And it smells much better than OSQL or GO parsing based solutions...

And for those of us in SQL2k land, it looks like SQL DMO has similar functionality in its SQLServer/SQLDatabase .ExecuteImmediate, .ExecuteWithResults, .ExecuteWithResultsAndMessages methods.

I tested ExecuteImmediate with a test T-SQL script with a number of GO's (creating a table, SP, dropping the SP, creating it again, all in one script with GO's separating the batches) and it seemed to work just as expected...

Related Past Post XRef:
Call SQLCMD from .Net with Output Capture

.Net 3 RTM's

I know you're probably already be seeing this news, but just in case...

The .Net Framework 3.0 (WCF, WPF, WF, etc) has been officially released/RTM/etc.

Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 Redistributable Package

Microsoft® Windows® Software Development Kit for Windows Vista™ and .NET Framework 3.0 Runtime Components

Visual Studio 2005 extensions for .NET Framework 3.0 (WCF & WPF), November 2006 CTP

Visual Studio 2005 extensions for .NET Framework 3.0 (Windows Workflow Foundation)

Now that it's real, it's time to REALLY start playing with it... WF here, I come. ;)

(via Bryant Likes's Blog - .NET 3.0 Released!!!)

Monday, November 06, 2006

Wow for WoW

Surround gaming with TripleHead2Go
World of Warcraft

OMG, that just rocks... I so want this.

Santa, you read my blog, right?

;)

(via The ADO Guy - Playing WOW With Matrox's Three Headed Card...I am jealous!)

Microsoft VHD Edition Day...

Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 Enterprise Edition VHD

Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 VHD - 32-bit version

Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server 2006 VHD

Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition VHD

"The Microsoft VHD Test Drive Program provides customers with an enhanced server-based software evaluation experience that’s faster, better supported and more flexible. You can now access the entire catalog of pre-configured Microsoft and partner products and solutions in the VHD format and start evaluating and testing today from www.microsoft.com/vhd.

..."

Run IT on a Virtual Hard Disk

"The Microsoft VHD format is the common virtualization file format that provides a uniform product support system, and provides more seamless manageability, security, reliability and cost-efficiency for customers.

Using the power of virtual machines, you can now quickly evaluate Microsoft and partner solutions through a series of pre-configured Virtual Hard Disks (VHD). You can download the VHDs and evaluate them for free in your own environment without the need for dedicated servers or complex installations. Start now by selecting a lab from the VHD catalog below.

..."

Very nice and makes good sense. Since Virtual PC is free, this is the near perfect way to let people play with different products.

For example, I'd like to check out Exchange 2007, but didn't want to deal with the whole install thing... This makes it a slam dunk.

Sunday, November 05, 2006

Another Weekend, Another WLW Plugin - WLW Picture Post Plugin

I've recently been bitten by the photo post bug... But I'm a lazy guy and want the photo uploading and posting to be easy and to not distract from my writing (such as it is).

While there's an already very cool Flickr browser/search plugin for WLW (Flickr4Writer), it doesn't yet allow uploading or support other Flickr API hosts (i.e. Zooomr).

So that meant it was time to put on my WLW Plugin Coder hat.

The above post is the result (i.e. it works, Yeah!!!)

It's still very alpha at this point, and I need to get permission from work to release it, yada, yada, yada. But it's do'able and it works. I'm waiting on my Zooomr API Key, after which I'll add support for it too...

Hat's off to Sam Judson(FlickrNet API Library) and Tim Heuer (Flickr4Writer) for their outstanding work. I'm standing on the shoulders of giants (which makes changing light bulbs much easier ;)

Friday, November 03, 2006

Zooomr Pro Upgrade Post...

Because I want a free Zooomr Pro upgrade...

Now I wonder if there's a Zooomr plugin for WLW, that includes uploading? Have to look, because if not, well... ;)

(via plaxoed! - Free Zooomr Pro account? I’m there!)

CORK - ClickOnce community Resource Kit

patterns & practices - Smart Client Software Factory: Downloads: Home - ClickOnce Community Resource Kit

"Deploying client applications with ClickOnce requires a lot of procedural steps to accomplish and there are many variations in the way development organizations want to manage their deployments. This ClickOnce Community Resource Kit contains over 70 pages of written guidance and How-To topics that will lead you through common scenarios. Accompanying the written guidance is a Manifest Manager Utility sample that will make it easier to accomplish those steps through a custom tool. This tool also provides sample code for how to program against the ClickOnce manifest APIs to create other custom tools for manipulating manifests beyond what Visual Studio and the SDK tools support. There is also guidance and a sample implementation for putting a custom server repository source for your ClickOnce application files using SQL Server. This material, written by IDesign architect Brian Noyes, author of Smart Client Deployment with ClickOnce (http://www.softinsight.com/clickoncebook), will help get you up and running with ClickOnce deployment quickly. You can contact Brian at brian.noyes@idesign.net." [Content Leached in full]

I made that up, CORK, but I like it so I'm going to use it... ;)

While the 66 page PDF focuses on ClickOnce and CAB, it also contains a good bit of additional great ClickOnce information. If this is the kind of stuff we're going to see in Brian's ClickOnce book, then I'm glad I have it on my Amazon wish list... :)

(via Eugenio Pace - patterns & practices Client Architecture Guidance - ClickOnce, CAB and SCSF)

Oracle Buys Stellent

ORACLE TO ACQUIRE STELLENT

"EDEN PRAIRIE, MN, Nov. 2, 2006 — Stellent, Inc. (Nasdaq: STEL), a global provider of content management solutions, today announced a definitive agreement for Oracle to acquire Stellent through a cash tender offer for $13.50 per share, or approximately $440 million.

..."

I've been using their OutsideIn technology (The tech behind QuickView, etc) for years now... I wonder how this will affect that product line?

It looks like Oracle bought them for their Content Management System. I hope their Component Division (where OutsideIn lives) doesn't die...

Since OutsideIn is a key technology (at least in the fields/ apps/ areas/ industries/ etc where it's used) with few competitors, they wouldn't let it die...would they? (sigh...)

Thursday, November 02, 2006

Slick Edit Gadgets - Free VS2005 Utilities

"SlickEdit has released SlickEdit^® Gadgets, a collection of free utilities or the Microsoft^® Visual Studio^® 2005 development environment. It is completely free.

SlickEdit Gadgets is an assortment of useful utilities to help programmers monitor, explore, and inspect the contents of their code.

SlickEdit Gadgets include:

Editor Gadgets: Four utilities that add visual pizzazz to your editor, such as background images and wallpaper.
Command Spy: Monitors command execution and allows you to see exactly what commands you've run, how many times you've run them and what key bindings are used to invoke those commands.
File Explorer: Provides an easy way to open solutions, projects, or single files in Visual Studio.
Data Object Analyzer: Inspects the contents of any clipboard operation, or drag-and-drop operation, from any other application.
SLOC Report: Provides a graphical report of the total lines of code in a file, project, or solution.

To download a free copy of SlickEdit Gadgets visit http://www.slickedit.com/gadgets. "

I just got the above email and while I usually don't post on marketing emails, this one is an exception.

The Editor gadgets look cool and the Data Object Analyzer is something I could have used just a few days ago (when I was playing my clipboard games).

The price is just right too (free)... No strings seem to be attached (no registration or anything is required to download) and you do not need to already have any SlickEdit products installed. It's a free, stand alone product to get you interested in their SlickEdit Tools for VS2005 product.

Downloaded and installed. So far, so good...

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

Orcas 10-2006 CTP

Microsoft Downloads - Microsoft Pre-release Software Visual Studio Code Name "Orcas" - October Community Technology Preview (CTP)

"...

Visual Studio Code Name "Orcas" delivers on Microsoft’s vision of smart client applications by enabling developers to rapidly create connected applications that deliver the highest quality rich user experiences. This new version enables any size organization to rapidly create more secure, manageable, and more reliable applications that take advantage of Windows Vista and the 2007 Office System. By building these new types of applications, organizations will find it easier than ever before to capture and analyze information so that they can make effective business decisions.

This download is the October 2006 Community Technology Preview of Microsoft Visual Studio Code-Named “Orcas”.

...

ADO.NET 3.0 Advancements

Developers can build can create scripts as actual programs –instead of VBS scripts- that are still completely self-contained in a single file and can be trivially modified, compiled and executed in any environment that has .NET installed.
eSQL language support enables developers to build applications that provide users with an ad-hoc query capability.

A new date time data structure that can specify an exact point in time relative to the UTC time zone.

New IO types that expose almost all pipe functionality provided by Windows.

Pipes can be used to achieve inter-process communication (IPC) between any process running on the same machine, or on any other windows machine within a network. We’ve added managed support for both anonymous pipes and named pipes.

..."

Some interesting highlights in this release...

Monday, October 30, 2006

Genographic Project From National Geographic

Genographic Project

"...

We're collaborating with indigenous and traditional peoples around the world to learn more about where we came from and how we got to where we live today. But participation is not restricted to indigenous and traditional peoples; we're also inviting the general public to join us on the journey. Together we can tell the story of us all.
About the Test

With a simple and painless cheek swab you can sample your own DNA and submit it to the lab. We run ONE test per participation kit. We will test either your mitochondrial DNA, which is passed down each generation from mother to child and reveals your direct maternal ancestry; or your Y chromosome (males only), which is passed down from father to son and reveals your direct paternal ancestry. You choose which test you would like administered.

What to Expect
Your results will reveal your deep ancestry along a single line of direct descent (paternal or maternal) and show the migration paths they followed thousands of years ago....

You will not receive a percentage breakdown of your genetic background by ethnicity, race, or geographic origin. Nor will you receive confirmation of an association with a particular tribe or ethnic group.

Furthermore, this is not a genealogy study. You will not learn about your great-grandparents or other recent relatives, and your DNA trail will not necessarily lead to your present-day location. Rather, your results will reveal the anthropological story of your direct maternal or paternal ancestors—where they lived and how they migrated around the world many thousands of years ago

..."

Okay that's officially cool. You purchase a kit ($99.95), swab the inside of your cheek, return it and they'll give you a genetic heritage migration map... Check out the sample results.

It's not cheap, but I think it's pretty darn cool. I think I'm going to ask Santa for a kit. ;)

TFS From a VSS User's Perspective...

How Steve Got Burned Today - Document: From VSS to TFS - An Introduction to Team Foundation Server Version Control from a Visual SourceSafe User's Perspective

"Over the course of the last few months, I have been part of a team working to bring TFS Version Control and MSBuild into my organization. My duties have included everything from process definition to hands-on migration of code from VSS into our TFS repository. An additional (and unwritten) role that I have assumed is to help our developers, QA, and Infrastructure people make the mental transition from the way VSS did things to the way TFS does them. This document was born out of those discussions. I decided to write this up with screenshots from the Version Control Tree Browser project on CodePlex so that it would not have any proprietary corporate information within it. That will allow me to post this for general public consumption without losing my job.

Please feel free to download and use it within your own organizations if you think it is worthwhile...."

Steve has made available a 25 Page PDF where he introduces TFS to the VSS user (Think "TFS Introduction for VSS Users 101").

It's a well written document and one that you should take a look at if your making the VSS to TFS move...

(via Rob Caron - Team Foundation Server Version Control from a Visual SourceSafe User's Perspective)

Copying Formatted HTML to the Clipboard (It's not as easy as you would think...)

For a VS2003 work project I needed to copy formatted data to the clipboard. RTF was overkill, so I thought I'd just use HTML...

Easy right? Just Clipboard.SetDataObject("<html><body>This is html</body></html>")?

Or maybe;

Dim DataObject As New DataObject
DataObject.SetData(DataFormats.Html, True, "<html><body>This is html</body></html>")
Clipboard.SetDataObject(DataObject , True)

Not even.

First of all kudo's to Stuart Radcliffe's post Copying HTML Link to the Clipboard which helped me get over this hump.

There I was, going crazy. I could copy and paste text easy, but my HTML was pasting as blank/empty. I was doing everything right as far as I could tell. My HTML was well formatted (and very simple), I knew how to post the data to the clipboard, etc. But it just wasn't working...

So I thought I'd look at what another app was doing when it copied HTML (and how that looked when I grabbed it back). Let's copy THIS from WLW.

Via the very cool ClipSpy Code Project Stuart also mentions, here's the raw HTML content in the clipboard (with some style stuff removed for readability so the values don't match any more...).

Version:1.0
StartHTML:000000237
EndHTML:000001414
StartFragment:000001344
EndFragment:000001348
StartSelection:000001344
EndSelection:000001348
<HTML><HEAD><LINK
href="C:\Program Files\Windows Live Writer\template\defaultstyle.css"
type=text/css rel=stylesheet></HEAD>
<BODY><DIV class=post><DIV class=body><DIV class=postBody >
<P>THIS</P>
</DIV></DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>

Wow, that's a lot of stuff for one word...

The magic is in the Header elements and the Start/End Fragment comments.

Yes, your HTML will need the Start/End header elements, with the correct values, if you want your posted HTML to paste as formatted HTML. That's where the JuJu is...

That's where Stuart's post comes in. Besides confirming that I'm not crazy (much) and do indeed need all that header stuff, he's also done much of the initial dirty work in generating the correctly formatted HTML for posting to the clipboard (i.e. calculating the Start's and End's, etc).

His code is working code and may require some tweaking to work for you, but it's a great start. (If you didn't have to tweak the code, where would the fun come from? ;)

At the end of the day, with help from his post, I had formatted HTML coping to the clipboard and pasting out as expected...

Saturday, October 28, 2006

Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 IDE Enhancements (VS2005 SDK Power Toys)

Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 IDE Enhancements

"Visual Studio 2005 IDE Enhancements are a set of Visual Studio extensions that are designed to make you more productive. These enhancements are directly integrated into the Visual Studio IDE. ... Previously, these enhancements were only available via the Visual Studio 2005 SDK. This installation does not require Visual Studio 2005 SDK. [Greg: Emphasis added]

...

Source Code Outliner : The Source Outliner tool is a Visual Studio extension that provides a tree view of your source code's types and members and lets you quickly navigate to them inside the editor.

Visual C++ Code Snippets:...

Indexed Find :...

Super Diff Utility: The Super Diff Find tool is a Visual Studio extension that compares text files. It uses color coding and graphics to show the difference between the files in deleted text (red), changed text (blue), inserted text (green).

Event Toaster Utility:..."

Some interesting utilities/power toys for VS 2005...

Thursday, October 26, 2006

Windows Live Barcode

"What is Windows Live Barcode

Windows Live Barcode is a set of services that transfer information between various media (PCs, billboards, magazines etc.) and handsets via Quick Response Code (QR Code), a two-dimensional barcode. It provides a new method for people to exchange information and enjoy various online services on handsets. Windows Live Barcode aims to enhance handset utility and provide you with more convenience and flexibility.

What is QR Code

The QR Code is a two-dimensional barcode. It contains a considerably greater volume of information in both vertical and horizontal directions than typical barcode in one dimension. "

I thought this a hoax/joke at first. Windows Live Barcode? LOL

But it's not and kind of makes sense.

It's meant to turn your Mobile device/camera in your phone into a barcode scanner.

You create the QR Code, the bar code. Print it, post it on a web site, display it somewhere, put it on your business card, etc. Then with the Live Barcode app on your cell, you take a picture of the barcode. The app then converts that bar code into text or a new Contact.

A QR Code can contain 450 characters of text or a kind of business card.

For mobile devices without a keyboard, it might really come in handy. A low tech, yet very easy method, to share a bit of data.

Here's an example.

If you had the Live Barcode app, you could point your cell phone's camera at your display and take a picture of this QR Code.

The app would translate it into this text;