Archives
-
Performance Comparison of Java/.NET
Performance Comparison of Java/.NET Runtimes - Technical Consultant Kazuyuki Shudo has published a set of benchmarks comparing various Java Virtual Machine and .NET runtimes. Slashdot also has an on-going discussion of the results.
-
Lucene is now SearchBlackBox
I was looking at Lucene .NET for a full-text search engine implementation but I was surprised to find out that the Lucene.NET application library is not open source anymore. It has been relaunched as a commercial product called SearchBlackBox. Lucene .NET is the core search technology behind the popular Lookout plugin for Outlook (later bought by Microsoft). Too bad that such a cool technology is not open source anymore. Atleast the developers could have left the last stable release of Lucene .NET under a public license. I'm not sure if there's any other open source search library for .NET in the market.
-
TechEd India
I've just received an e-mail from the Microsoft .NET Delhi User Group regarding the Tech Ed India 2004 registration offer. The registration fees is Rs. 6000 (=USD 130) per person, but as a special offer you only need to pay Rs. 4000 (=USD 85) if you participate in a group of 6 or more. You will also receive MS Press Books worth Rs. 1000 if you register on or before August 7th, 2004. TechEd India will be held in 4 Indian cities, and its scheduled in New Delhi for August 25th-27th 2004.
-
MyXaml
Just came across this nice open source tool called MyXaml (dev blog), which offers declarative markup (XUL-like) capabilities to .NET 1.1 and 2.0, and ASP.NET applications. The website includes the product download (open source), documentation and articles on XAML.
-
Redesigning Microsoft.com - with CSS, without tables
Redesigning Microsoft.com - with CSS, without tables. A 62% file size reduction anticipated! "If multiplied out by my measly 1 million page views estimate, that 25 KB savings comes to about 23.8 GB in bandwidth savings per day, or 8.5 terabytes per year." Go for it MS!
-
SQL Jobs Auto-backup
A few days back, my friend Pankaj was enquiring about a particular case where he needed to automate the backup (in the form of SQL scripts) of all SQL Jobs (schedules) on a SQL Server (2000). DTS doesn’t support automatic scripting of SQL Jobs from what I could tell. I remembered doing something similar a few months back on a particular project but I didn’t have the T-SQL snippet for it, so I looked up a bit and found ... (complete article on my other blog).
-
J2EE vs .NET Web Services
The whitepaper J2EE vs. Microsoft.NET - A comparison of building XML-based web services is now online at TSS. The conclusions seem quite interesting, which also talk about the arguments for, against and supporting both platforms.
-
MSN Newsbot
Is the MSN Newsbot a Google News ripoff or an “innovative” competitor? I still like the simplicity and effectiveness of Google News. It does what it says - dynamically serve up-to-date news. Probably the only thing missing with Google News is a RSS/Atom feed.
-
More Acquisitions
Google acquires Picasa (a digital imaging solutions) and Microsoft acquires Lookout (a e-mail search solution).
-
Yahoo acquires Oddpost
-
BPO Buzz
Where in India are most BPO companies situated? Take the BPO Quiz and find out the facts.
-
Signal-to-Noise #9
- dotText pre-0.96 - Two new features (among others), Search and ScheduledEvents, in dotText (pre-0.96) that I'll be going through for sure to learn more on the implementation and design. From Scott's blog: “ScheduledEvents is a simple API for scheduling a recurring event (or once a day event). Examples would be clearing the stats queue or rebuilding the search index.” I hope it to be a cleaner and more appropriate solution to Scheduled Execution in ASP.NET.
- XPath in .NET - “Don't perform XPath queries against an XMLDocument or an XMLDataDocument. Use an XPathDocument instead.”, XPath Performance in .NET by Jerry Dixon.
- VS IDE - Tim Dawson shows in this article how you can use in your Windows application the same designer than VS use. Good overview of the designer architecture, if you are interested in building an IDE. [via Paschal L]
- Mono 0.30 has been released, with 30-40% faster compilation speeds (the compiler compiles itself in 2.3 secs on a 1.6ghz machine), a FileSystemWatcher, Cryptography fixes, WS bug fixes and more. [via Oddur Magnusson]
- The Northwind Example to DataTable Relational Operators in C#.
- Linux on Windows - coLinux (Cooperative Linux) is the first working, free and open source method for optimally running Linux on Microsoft Windows natively. [via Stefano Demiliani]
-
Signal-to-Noise #8
-
Signal-to-Noise #7
- A new version (4.1.3) of Inno Setup (an application installer & setup creation tool that I use quite frequently) has been released with an all-new Explorer-like folder browser.
- With Visual Studio Whidbey, Microsoft will deliver a set of tools (code-named "Whitehorse") that enable architects and developers to easily design service-oriented applications and operations infrastructure simultaneously. Whitehorse uses a drag-and-drop design surface to connect XML Web services, and then validates the resulting applications against the deployment environment. [via Dan Fernandez]
- Mapping Binary Data to a Structure - a summary of the primary ways of mapping binary data to a structure besides the standard approach using BinaryReader.
- Calculate the most effecient page size based on the catalog, in DB2, by Brett. Anyone know of a SQL Server variation to it?
- Axosoft, the creators of the team-based defect tracking and task management software - OnTime, announced that they will provide a free 3-user version of its OnTime Web or Windows edition product free to bloggers who agree to mention Axosoft in their blogs.
-
Signal-to-Noise #6
- Sample chapters (Part 1 and Part 2) from O'Reilly's ADO.NET Cookbook
- Ted Neward shares his thoughts on the talk Joel Spolsky gave on "Designing Applications With The User in Mind" at UCDavis
- Microsoft Interview Questions by Chris Sells. [via Jason Salas]
- New article at TSS: Managing .NET Development with NAnt
- Windows Future Storage services (aka WinFS, as part of Longhorn): Microsoft's Data Management Vision
- Eric Sink writes on Getting Started with Your Own Software Company
-
Matisse Database
Yesterday I posted a line on the Matisse Database, said to be The Ultimate .NET Database (PDF). Comments from that post got me thinking - can Matisse fit in an enterprise data management environment and how “ultimate” is it for use with .NET. Here are some interesting findings on Matisse ...
-
Signal-to-Noise #5
- The Unofficial Microsoft Weblog
- Now we know a little more about “Microsoft Venus” (i.e. ASP.NET 2.0).
- Matisse 6: The Ultimate .NET Database (PDF). There's even a new .Text DbProvider available for Matisse database. I wonder if any web hosts support Matisse as yet or is it only good for self-run self-managed servers for now.
- Longhorn Developer FAQ
- WilsonORMapper, an Object-Relational Mapper for .NET, by Paul Wilson.
- “For some reason, Microsoft's brilliant and cutting-edge .NET development environment left out one crucial tool...” says Joel Spolsky. For now, maybe the Salamander .NET Linker and Mini-Deployment Tool can heal some pain or we wait for Longhorn to arrive which should have the .NET framework pre-installed.
-
Worm ALERT: W32.Novarg
The W32.Novarg worm (aka MyDoom) is creating havoc, breaking records for new infections. Update your anti-virus definitions. The Worm has spread to 1 in 12 e-mail messages.
-
Signal-to-Noise #4
- Open Source Testing is a compendium of 138 open source testing tools, including unit testing, feature testing, performance testing, bug tracking, the whole gamut. If you're considering building some testing infrastructure, you should spend some time looking around here first. [via Ned Batchelder]
- NPerf - Performance Benchmark Framework for .NET.
- Data Access and Storage Developer Center, the home for developer information on Microsoft data technologies, was recently launched at MSDN. Keep up the good work Christa!
- I was doing some reading on the MetaWeblog API and came across this interesting article on What's Wrong with the MetaWeblog API?
- Joel Spolsky writes about how to get your resume read.
- Brian Noyes is on .NET Rocks! this week with Carl Franklin talking about AutoDeployment issues and how Microsoft is addressing them with ClickOnce, a new deployment and Windows application updater technology that will ship with the .NET Framework 2.0.
- .NET Bugs Registry - A registry of known .NET bugs.
- dotNETTools.org features a number of .NET resources and useful sites.
- Microsoft Win32 to Microsoft .NET Framework API Map.
-
Signal-to-Noise #3
- SQL Server Yukon seems to be the highlight in MSDN Mag (Feb 2004 issue) with articles on Yukon Basics, XML in Yukon, T-SQL in Yukon, Types (and Managed UDTs) in Yukon etc.
- Working with the System Registry using .NET
- Comparing the three Timer Classes (System.Windows.Forms.Timer, System.Timers.Timer, and System.Threading.Timer) in the .NET Framework Class Library. Complete article ...
- Java to .NET - This week Microsoft annnounced the beta availability of the Java Language Conversion Assistant (JLCA), a tool designed to ease migration of Java applications to the .NET environment. Notable in this release is the ability migrate J2EE 1.3-compliant applications, including JSP, JMS, JNDI and EJB.
- Craig Skibo writes about the 54 commandments of COM object model design.
- There is a Windows Installer for Mono 0.29 available now.
-
Signal-to-Noise #2
The Republic Day (Mon, 26th Jan) is near while the odd rains in and around New Delhi will hopefully not confine people indoors during this long weekend. To me, the most amazing sight in the city this time of the year is the evening view of the Rashtrapati Bhavan (Presidents House) which is all lit up and looks magnificent (see photo).
-
Signal-to-Noise #1
To organize my blog better I'm starting this new category of posts called Signal-to-Noise. Such posts will basically be aggregated random links, ideas, thoughts and resources from the .NET community and the technology sector. Here's today's scoop ...
-
ASP.NET Road Show notes
Jake Ashcraft shares notes taken by Greg at the ASP.NET Road Show event. A good read if you've missed the Road Show.
-
ASP.NET Code Migration
Need help migrating your application from PHP/ASP/JSP to ASP.NET? Checkout the ASP.NET Code Migration Assistants
-
Rory Rocks .NET
Rory Blyth is interviewed this week at .NET Rocks! Rory talks about the .NET community and the Open Source Software (OSS) community, writing, blogging, driving to the PDC from Las Vegas, Longhorn, and lots of other great stuff.
-
"use the filesystem as your database"
Stuart Langridge, writes about why he doesn't like databases and why to “use the filesystem as your database” (in context to the backend of a blog, I guess). IMO, it may hold some value to design a filesystem-driven data tier for ease-of-deployment or ease-of-maintenance (not that RDBMS administration these days is a highly complex affair for a sound DBA) or in the situation of “limited resource architecture” (where a physical database server may not be a feasible data source). But for ANY enterprise-level system or data-centric application, a database system undoubtedly provides high performance, efficiency, maximum storage capacity, extensive set of tools & components for interaction and management, a programming interface (i.e. SQL) and rapid integration capabilities (i.e. XML/SOAP) with legacy systems or other data sources. Persisting binary data (data blobs) in a database server is another story. Its a known fact that in a scenario where data query and server round-trips are high or constantly increasing, a filesystem-based data tier will bog down the entire application much quicker than a dedicated database-server. Talking of a larger picture, I doubt even Microsoft is moving away from this fact, with increased efforts to create a robust filesystem powered by a database engine (i.e. Longhorn WinFS). Filesystem vs database is an on-going discussion with two sides to a story. Considering SQLite, MySQL and PostgreSQL as inexpensive database server alternatives, I doubt cost has much to do with it.
-
Improving .NET Application Performance and Scalability
Beta 2 of Improving .NET Application Performance and Scalability from the Patterns and Practices book. As Sam Gentile blogged about beta 1 of this book, it contains a wealth of information for all .NET developers, but most particularly Architects. A must read!
-
J2EE verses .NET
The Middleware Company, a training/consulting company, conducted an experiment comparing J2EE and .NET performance. This whitepaper details those results. Free download - J2EE verses .NET performance comparison.
-
Tabbing in a TextArea/TextBox
Tabbing in a TextArea or a TextBox has been a distant feature to think of up until now, as Justin Lovell shares a simple JavaScript (IE 5+ only) which makes it possible to insert a tab via the keyboard into a TextArea or a TextBox. Here's the article and code ...
-
WinFX 247
I didn't knew up until today that Matthew Reynolds (dotnet247.com) has already launched WinFX247 (beta). The new site holds WinFX (that will be .NET's big brother when Longhorn comes out) namespace reference, newsgroup discussions and .NET 1.2 Structure. Cool stuff!
-
DataTable and Relational Operators
DavidM is running some interesting notes on DataTable Relational Operators (in C#) -- Introduction, JOIN, UNION, DISTINCT helper method, DIFFERENCE / MINUS, PRODUCT, DIVIDE, PROJECT. Each of these methods have various overloaded signatures and could easily be extended. David will dedicate a post for each of these operators.
-
Modal WebForms
Brendan Tompkins shares his approach (called Sticky Draggable Divs or SDDs) on creating Modal WebForms in ASP.NET. Although I personally don't like the idea of using excessive JavaScript and DHTML in project implementations except for some basic validation routines, but Brendan's concept reminded me of another neat idea, a client-side database modeler (e-store example) by davdstudio, which incorporates DHTML/JavaScript to produce similar draggable popup windows. Client-side GUI development sure is eye-candy but also comes with its baggage of browser incompatibility and usage inconsistency. WebOS should be a great start ...
-
New Year
Finally, back to where I left in December. The holiday season was great and it was fun to spend quality time with family & friends. Anyways, I'm back at work - immediately attending to an "interesting" vulnerability in a client's application (more on it later). Well, last year (2003) was not quite eventful but satisfactory. I was able to ...