Archives
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[Tools] CollapseAll Macro for Visual Studio .NET
Edwin Evans has created a very useful CollapseAll Macro for Visual Studio .NET. For the umpteenth time, I had to go looking for it again so I'm quite certain that I want to put a link to it here for my use and yours. You will find this simple tool extremely handy when you are trying to deal with very large solutions with lots of projects and sub-folders!
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[Tools] RUnit - an NUnit test runner for ASP.NET
RUnit lets you run NUnit tests from within ASP.NET. Having beaten my head bloody against doing something very similar, I am very impressed with this elegant piece of work. Nice job!
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[General] Again
Of Tobler.Tech(), someone kindly said, "But you're not a network tech!" They're right; I'm not. What do I do? Well, software architecture. Alfred Korzybski warned us against the semantic hazards of identification. I am *not* Tobler.SoftwareArchitect. Software architecture is something I do, not what I am. So, let's try Tobler.SoftwareArchitecture(). Hopefully, this weblog name will stick for awhile. Otherwise I may need to change it to "
Nom de Jeur ."
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[Tools] Using Virtual PC 2004
Simon Guest has a great article on the Top Ten Tips for Using Virtual PC 2004. This is a major tool that can let you compute in multiple environments. Really a "must have" for serious Microsoft-based software development shops.
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[Tools] The Windows Installer CleanUp Utility
So, I had this trial version of some software installed on my system. The vendor's uninstall did not correctly remove it. What to do?
I didn't know about this before, but there is a Microsoft tool for such quandaries, The Windows Installer CleanUp Utility. If you're not cautious, you could probably cause yourself some grief with this tool, so "Caveat User!"
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[Tools] Code<Template>.NET
I am always interested in code generation tools and handy utilities to reduce the amount of time wasted repeating what has already been done. I have found Eddie Velasquez's Code<Template>.NET a very handy VisualStudio,NETadd-in. It just sits up there in the upper right-hand corner of my IDE. I occasionally put templates into it. I frequently push the magic button and get nicely formatted and debugged blocks of code that I can tweak a little instead of writing them from scratch. Yes, there are other tools out there but this one is quite unobtrusive and helps me get the job done. I strongly recommended having a look at it. Of course, as always, YMMV.
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[.NET General] SQL Server Express "incompatible components" failure
When trying to install the CTP release of SQL Server Express, you may get an error message informing you that "Setup has detected incompatible components, ..." blah, blah, blah. It will tell you to run the "build uninstall wizard," sqlbuw.exe, but you may not have that installed anywhere on your system. In fact, it may be rather hard to find. This problem has been discussed on nikop's WebLog.
Having faced the same problem, the absence of sqlbuw.exe, I have found another solution that might help you get the necessary files.
- Go through the same install to the point where the error dialog box is on the screen.
- Explore your hard drive and you should see a temporary directory where the SQL Server Express installation files are being cached. It will be named with a bunch of hexidecimal numbers, probably right under the root on your C:\ drive.
- In that directory, find subdirectory "setup tools."
- In "setup tools," you should see a "build uninstall wizard" subdirectory.
- Copy the "build uninstall wizard" subdirectory to some temporary location on your system.
- Kill the install
- Run sqlbuw.exe from the command line in the temporary directory you copied.
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Article: John Tobler's Law
I have re-framed my post, "John Tobler's Law" as an article. It's permanent home is now here.
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[Laws] John Tobler's Law
It is time to stake a claim to my own law and its first corollary. Here they are:
John Tobler's Law:
"Wherever in this world you stand, you will soon be in someone's way."
Corollary to John Tobler's Law:
"Wherever in this world you want to go, someone will soon be in your way."
I penned "John Tobler's Law" on December 21, 2004 and its corollary on April 19, 2005. If you are aware that "John Tobler's Law" has previously been published under another name, please let me know as soon as possible.
For many years I have been an admirer of laws and rules, such as those published in Paul Dickson's famous 1978 book, The Official Rules(also, see Paul's other "Official Rules" books). Capt. Edward A. Murphy, for example, is frequently blamed unfairly for the operation of a principle he observed in effect at Edward's Air Force Base in 1949, while working as an engineer on Air Force Project MX981. Capt. Murphy saw something essentially true and stated it in a way that, apparently, no one had before. His project manager wrote it down and labeled it "Murphy's Law." Actually, Murphy stated it somewhat differently than we usually see it now (see Murphy's Laws Origin for an excellent history). Anyway, Capt. Murphy is neither guilty nor responsible for how Murphy's law has caused you difficulty; he just stated his observation and someone else restated it and named it in honor of him. The law was in operation long before Capt. Murphy existed, as any historian will testify.
I have long thought about these elegant statements of significant observed principle that heretofore went nameless. And, yes, I have hoped to join the list of those who discovered one. Now, I believe I have.
Why can't I just call it "Tobler's Law?" Simply because "Tobler's Law" already exists, named for W. R. Tobler, in 1976, and also known as "Tobler's First Law of Geography." That fascinating law states "Everything is related to everything else, but near things are more related than distant things." My namesake well deserves to have this wonderful law named after him and he has done the extended Tobler family proud! -
John Tobler's Law
It is time to stake a claim to my own law and its first corollary. Here they are:
John Tobler's Law:
"Wherever in this world you stand, you will soon be in someone's way."
Corollary to John Tobler's Law:
"Wherever in this world you want to go, someone will soon be in your way."
I penned "John Tobler's Law" on December 21, 2004 and its corollary on April 19, 2005. If you are aware that "John Tobler's Law" has previously been published under another name, please let me know as soon as possible.
For many years I have been an admirer of laws and rules, such as those published in Paul Dickson's famous 1978 book, The Official Rules. Capt. Edward A. Murphy, for example, is frequently blamed unfairly for the operation of a principle he observed in effect at Edward's Air Force Base in 1949, while working as an engineer on Air Force Project MX981. Capt. Murphy saw something essentially true and stated it in a way that, apparently, no one had before. His project manager wrote it down and labeled it "Murphy's Law." Actually, Murphy stated it somewhat differently than we usually see it now (see Murphy's Laws Origin for an excellent history). Anyway, Capt. Murphy is neither guilty nor responsible for how Murphy's law has caused you difficulty; he just stated his observation and someone else restated it and named it in honor of him. The law was in operation long before Capt. Murphy existed, as any historian will testify.
I have long thought about these elegant statements of significant observed principle that heretofore went nameless. And, yes, I have hoped to join the list of those who discovered one. Now, I believe I have.
Why can't I just call it "Tobler's Law?" Simply because "Tobler's Law" already exists, named for W. R. Tobler, in 1976, and also known as "Tobler's First Law of Geography." That fascinating law states "Everything is related to everything else, but near things are more related than distant things." My namesake well deserves to have this wonderful law named after him and he has done the extended Tobler family proud!
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[General] Renaming again!
Just not concise enough. This is my technical weblog, so let's just name it "Tobler.Tech()".
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[Music Composition] The Free OpenSource Psycle Music Creation Studio
Here some facts about Psycle:
- 32 Tracks Pattern Editor (this limitation will be removed in the future)
- Stereo Sampler unit, that supports high quality
stereo .wav files and .iff samples as well (more formats will eventually come)
- 8 internal Plugins (Sampler & Effects)
- more than 35 Native Plugins (Generators & Effects)
- VST + VSTi Host (still limited but most plugins will work fine)
- Internal .wav output
- .fxb loading for VST's
- Midi-In Support
- Configurable Keyboard Layout
- themes and skins support
- much more...
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[Music Composition] The Free Buzz SoftSynth
According to Buzzmachine.com, "Buzz is the first ever 'easy to use' free modular software based synthesizer." I have just started playing around with it and I must say that I am seriously impressed. One caveat for Windows XP users, you may need to set Compatibility for "Windows NT 4.0 (Service Pack 5)" for Buzz.exe (or in your Buzz shortcut properties) in order for Buzz to work at all. That may, in turn, cause some other problems. Unfortunately, while free, Buzz is not OpenSource.
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[Languages] RDNZL - a Common Lisp foreign function interface for .NET languages.
RDNZL (pronounced "Redunzl") enables Common Lisp applications to interact with .NET libraries. It's more or less a foreign function interface for .NET languages like C# built atop the C foreign function interface.
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[Languages] Foil - a Foreign Object Interface for Lisp
"Foil consists of a protocol and a set of libraries that facilitate access to popular object runtimes, such as the JVM and the CLI/CLR, and their libraries, from Lisp."
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[General] Renamed again
As long as I'm renaming, I have decided to follow the Principle of Concision and further simply this technical weblog's name. As a side benefit, we can now better enjoy the alliteration (by the way, Onelook is my favorite dictionary resource). I think that should permanently do it for name changes. Done deal.