Archives
-
We live, as we dream alone
Every now and then you will see blog entries which read along the lines of:
-
Using generics to build generic data logic layers
Consider exposing raw Generic collections from your data logic layers, such as:
-
Using the SiteMapDataSource to display lists of links
Danny Chen just blogged about the SiteMap and showed some interesting ways to make use of custom attributes:
-
Autonomous Interface Agents
Web applications that are context aware will be able to make greater use of autonomous agents to directly manipulate graphical objects and affect the users display. The MIT paper titled "Autonomous Interface Agents" says of autonomous agents:
-
Getting ASP.NET Membership running against your own database
If you want to install the ASP.NET V2 tables and procedures for things such as Membership, Personalization, etc you need to run the aspnet_regsql.exe tool against your database. The tool can be found in the %windir%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\{FRAMEWORKVERSION} folder.
-
Out of context - how to know whether Tweety can fly
In the excellent whitepaper titled "Out of context: Computer systems that adapt to, and learn from, context", there's a section nearing the end titled: "The view of context from other fields" - containing the following subsections:
-
Coaching end-users
Today I had a conversation with a friend who is a musician. We were discussing some of the similarities between music and software and even extending many of them to any creative pursuit where the output is consumed by others. One of the things that we noted was that, as with software, end-users of music do not always share the feelings and experiences envisaged by the architects of the product. I'm not sure how a musician can give corrective advice to an end-user about such a discrepancy at "runtime" but, in software we are fortunate that we can use context and UI elements to teach a user about the intended usage of a system.
-
Grokking Information technology
My days of using handcrafted Access database applications to automate inventory reconcilliation seems to be nothing but a distant blur. Too soon it seems that I was whisked away from my accounting world of Office applications and surrounded by millions of rows worth of raw data. There's something about real, raw data that seems to make my nerve edges jingle in a merry way.
-
Joe versus the volcano
After reading Mark's entry about Joe versus the Volcano I decided that I'd go out and hire it for a look. Finding a video store which had it in stock wasn't that easy, even asking for it raised eyebrows - this is not surprising given that the film was released at about the same time that some of the staff who were serving me were born.
-
Random quotes
"In the moment when I truly understand my enemy, understand him well enough to defeat him, then in that very moment I also love him."
- Orson Scott Card -
A lazy Saturday afternoon...
This week seemed to take forever and just felt like one of those really heavy weeks. I think that it started when I opened my mouth and spoke up against the tide of "professional demonstrators" who follow each other around and see it as their job to heckle the IE product. Then, I seemed to spend the remainder of the weekend reading every blogger take their turn to bag the crap out of a hundred or so people who have asked Microsoft not to end support of VB6 - makes you wonder really... I think that everybody must be getting restless while they wait for Beta 2 to arrive ;-)
-
The Groove buy - my opinion
I think that it's because the Office team at Microsoft finally found someone else who likes Sharepoint :P
-
This is what happens when you give people a soapbox
A couple of days ago, Chris Wilson wrote this about IE and standards:
-
Day 4: 3 subscriptions
Three additions today, bringing my tally for the week up to 9 (including one which I made up). This is well short of a budgetted quota of 5 per day which means that I'm falling behind already. Anyhow... todays additions are:
-
Day 3: added only 1 subscription
Just one subscription today as the submissions seem to be drying up...
Brad Abrams weblog
Hi Darren, Brad here, just wanted to drop my USP in for you to take a look at: -
Information Bridge
Next week I'm giving a demo on IBF (Information Bridge Framework). The IBF allows users to leverage some existing Office technologies - namely, the Research Task Pane and SmartTags - to perform interactions with line-of-business data.
-
Using sprocs or ad-hoc sql
I use stored procedures "religiously" when developing data-centric applications and I'm always interested as to why people who use SqlServer would want to use ad-hoc sql; I think that the main reason is probably is the perception of "duplicating effort".
-
Day 2: added 3 subscribtions
As per comments left against the USP post, I've added 3 more bloggers to my .Opml file. I think that Jeroen's USP is a little borderline in the compelling stakes but, given the lack of competition he gets in.
-
Office - the best of times and the worst of times
Every 3 or 4 months I'm enticed back into Office development; lured back by some incredibly interesting collaboration tools. And it seems that every time I'm left thinking that someone in the Office camp really just doesn't understand me.
-
New ProjectDistributor build: Codewise added
I've uploaded a new build of ProjectDistributor which includes some bug fixes and some major new functionality.
-
Signs that you should shut up...
From CityFlirting...
-
Active Sink
I don't know if it's just me but I have the distinct impression that ActiveSync is an application which gets worked on by the work experience people when there is no filing to be done.
-
Day 1: added 2 subscribtions
Yesterday I mentioned that, if you send me a compelling USP (Unique Selling Point) that I'll subscribe to your blog. Day 1 and only 2 people have taken up the offer so far:
-
Gimme your USP and I'll subscribe to you
Before I start, just think about this in relation to the reams of text that you shove into the arteries of the web each day/week/month... what's the Unique Selling Point of your blog? OK, on with the post...
-
John Bradford
Recently, a colleague posted an article on his blog highlighting a supposed issue with another website, only thing is that, as it so happens, his entry was probably not correct and was promptly removed from his blog. Of course, it wasn't removed immediately and he subsequently faced a bollocking at the hands of the accused, nothing too harsh, but the gloves were clearly out for a while.
-
Kanoodle offers bucks and extended reach for bloggers
Kanoodle, an online contextual ad player, is targetting bloggers as the new wave of publishers to supplement its recently announced BrightAds advertising tool. BrightAds is similar to Google's AdSense and some of the Moreover products in that they insert category-targeted contextual ads into content.
-
New Years resolutions - a running report
This year I scaled back from my normal 5-6 new years resolutions to a mere 2: excercise more regularly; drink more water.