So after wasting about an hour and a half debugging why in the world I kept getting an invalid cast exception, I discovered a quirk in the way ASP.NET loads assemblies.  Apparently, the .NET framework loads everything in the \bin directory that even looks like a DLL.  For example, if you have a file called DLL_ the framework will load it anyway.  Why the hell it does this I don't know!!!  It's not even a DLL for God's sake!

Now you might be wondering why in the world I have a file called DLL_ sitting in my \bin directory but that's easy to explain.  Sometimes I want to use a different compilation of a DLL that might contain something like more debugging code, for example, in my ASP.NET application.  So instead of moving or overwriting the old version or recompiling my application or even changing which version is redirected to what other version in the config file, I simply change the old DLL to DLL_ or something of the like and drop the new DLL in the \bin directory along side of it.  Seems harmless and should work and in fact it does when .NET isn't being stupid and just loads DLLs. 

I spent all this time trying to figure out this problem, changing the code I was debugging over and over again, and when I finally said what the hell let me see what the code base is for DLL which contains the class I'm trying to cast to, I saw that it was <Path>\SomeAssembly.DLL_.  This is a bug as far as I'm concerned.  And as far as I can tell, there is simply no application for this type of behavior so I'll just call it retarded.

By the way when I say ASP.NET, I'm working with SharePoint specifically.

So after my complaining about SharePoint documentation you might be wondering how to get some good SharePoint training.  Well the answer is pretty clear cut.  You get training from Barracuda.NET, a company run by Ted Pattison and Jason Masterman both former DevelopMentor guys.

I've been going through their training now but it's clear that they not only wrote a very good training program but are determined to answer all your questions even if that requires offline research.  I think this is a quality that is very admirable and is one reason I feel you'll get your money's worth.

Personally my only problem with the class is I think the pace is too slow but I think that has to do with the diversity of the talent pool within the class.

I got a comment from a gentleman by the name of Anthony DeRosa asking for more details relating to how to load an assembly from a network location from my earlier post regarding the GAC.  So even though I found that this is addressed elsewhere when I googled for it what the heck another entry won't hurt anyone.

Let's start with the Assembly.LoadFrom method which most people are familar with.  One can easily load an assembly from a network location just using that method alone which may solve most people's problem.  But what if you want to be able to only load the assembly from a location if the .NET framework can't find it on it's own or you need some other algorithm to locate assemblies.  Little known to most people, beyond just the simple probing and checking of the GAC that .NET does, there is an event fired before the framework gives up on loading your assembly.  The event is AppDomain.AssemblyResolve.  You can subscribe to that event and do a simple Assembly.LoadFrom from a location known to you or even do some fancy loading of your own based on some system you engineer.  There are also TypeResolve and ResourceResolve events in the AppDomain that let you handle those aspects of resolving the various dependencies of an AppDomain.

Of course if you are loading an assembly off the network you need to make some CAS changes.

Just Googling for resources I found these:

• http://www.codeproject.com/dotnet/loadpoly.asp
• http://blogs.msdn.com/junfeng/archive/2004/04/25/119589.aspx
• http://staff.develop.com/candera/weblog2/articleview.aspx/CLR%20Workings/Dealing%20With%20Assembly%20Load%20Failure.xml

Also just as an FYI, there is also a ModuleResolve event of an Assembly.

So as I've stated before, my new role is partially focused on SharePoint.  Coming into this role, I had no experience with SharePoint and I really wanted to hit the ground running when I started my new position because a lot was expected out of me.  I quickly learned however that SharePoint documentation is scarce at best.  Microsoft has done a simply horrible job providing documentation relating to how SharePoint works beyond just the surface.  The documentation that is provided is also incomplete or completely void of any mention of particular topics.  They seem to have this completely impractical theory that SharePoint should be treated as a “black box.”  I find this to be ridiculous for several reasons, here are just a few but the list goes on:

• Not every environment hosting SharePoint is completely Windows based
• SharePoint has missing features such as replication, caching, and recovery
• Developers should understand what's going on internally so they don't mess things up or cause unnecessary overhead

So I find myself now relying on learning from trial and error and the expertise of those around me, which thank God is phenomenal.  The truth is I don't so much mind all this because I think I'll learn a lot from writing test code to discover how SharePoint works and it will make me a better programmer in general, but from a company's perspective it's retarded.  I should be spending time solving business problems not trying to decipher what is going on in SharePoint. 

Same story with the Enterprise Instrumentation Framework (EIF).  I'm trying to find documentation or even a whitepaper on it just to answer the simple question of whether or not I have to restart my ASP.NET application to turn on logging via EIF.  I believe the answer is no but I can't be positive unless I write my own code to figure it out.  This one in particular annoys me because EIF is a framework which makes documentation even more important!!!  Developers need documentation that is readily available via the internet.  Many companies have download policies so if the documentation needs to be downloaded it's useless.  Employees need to be able find out about what they want to download first so they can make a valid plea to the appropriate people.  Not having documentation for EIF makes me question whether Microsoft actually wants you to use it or if they are going to stop supporting it.

Ok I could go on about this ad nauseum but I'll spare you and quit whining about it (for now) even though it's really annoying....

I finished reading Mythical Man Month (aka MMM) recently and quite honestly I was amazed at how a book that was originally published in 1975 can be so on target with so man aspects of software development.  Obviously not everything in the book is so pertinent however his foresight is amazing.  The MMM is in a nutshell about debunking the theory that if you add more people to a project then you can speed the project up in a linear manner.  The book makes quite a bit of sense.  When you add in communication factors, learning curves, and the other items Brooks brings to light in the book you quickly see where he is coming from.  Funny thing is the place we are in software development now might also brings an additional factor to the table.  Offshoring brings even more of a communication gap.  Both time zone gaps and language differences come into play.  But I digress.  In truth, I think the book has survived this long because Brooks focused more on the human aspect of development than on the actual programming piece.  People don't change quite as rapidly as software so it makes sense that the book would still be applicable in today's environment.  People are still a limited and valuable resource and it will probably remain that way.  (Moore's Law is there for machines but not for people.)

For managers, I think the book is must read.  For everyone else, the book is easy reading so if you have time I would recommend you read it.  The first 17 chapters of the anniversary edition are the most worthwhile.  I think the other chapters are really him just defending himself against criticism and not really as important to read (but hell that leaves only 3 chapters and like I said it's easy reading).

Ever find yourself creating an input form in ASP.NET that required a lot of Controls to be validated? 

Well, I have.  It's tedious.  You have to add at least one validator to each Control you wanted validated.  Apparently after discussing this with other people I've found that I'm not the only person who was wishing at the time that they could just add one Control that would validate all the Controls on the Page.  What's the solution?  To create a Control on your own to do just that and that's what I did. 

Here's how you use it:

You add the Control to your page (sorry no “drag and drop” stuff I don't believe in drag and drop so I didn't find the need to write that kind of code but be my guest).  You set my Control's ControlToValidate property to a server Control containing all Controls you want to validate, eg. the DIV containing your let's say TextBox Controls.  That's it. 

Magic huh?  Not really, here's how it works:

My Control gets the ControlToValidate's Controls collection.  It goes through the Controls collection and checks for controls that can be validated [0] and adds a validator control [1] to the ControlToValidate's Controls collection [2] immediately following any control that can be validated.
[0]  To check for Controls that can be validated it uses the BaseValidator's GetValidationProperty method.  Now my control doesn't inherit from BaseValidator so I have an internal class that does and exposes a function the just returns the value of BaseValidator.GetValidationProperty().
[1]  The type of validator that is added is determined by you.  I really wrote an abstract class that you must inherit from and implement one method that returns a validator.  I've written the first one for you so you have an example.  It adds RequiredFieldValidators.
[2]  Controls don't have access to manipulate each other's Controls collection so I had to kind of hack my way around this.  I used reflection to change a private field in the ControlToValidate so that it would allow me to modify its collection.  Don't worry I change it back when I'm done :).

How do you get a hold of my Control:

You download it from my perpetually under construction homepage.  The code isn't elegant or well documented nor does it provide you with all the other nice things Andy Smith's MetaBuilders website Controls provide you with but it works.  Feel free to modify it as you will.  If you feel like you've modified it and created something of value all I ask is that you share it.

The one caveat is that my Control has to be before the ControlToValidate in the Page (or user control, custom control, composite control, etc)'s Controls collection.  The performance hit for using reflection was about 5% from my calculations on a Page with three Controls to validate however my testing environment was bad so I decided to quit testing.  I really don't think it will really affect your performance that much though.  Feel free to test it yourself and let me know the results.

One last thing just in case USE AT YOUR OWN RISK.  Oh and I guess people always say don't redistribute so don't do that either (I don't quite know why but still).

I finished training and started new position.  My official title is “SharePoint Developer” but I knew nothing about SharePoint coming into this job.  My boss therefore sent me this article to get my SharePoint knowledge to a working level.  I hightly recommend this article to anyone who needs to work with SharePoint or WebParts for that matter.  Since Whidbey is on it's way I think that makes everyone :).

It's not everyday that I feel confident in my career decision.  Many days I question why I'm chose to be a programmer.  My family wanted me to be a doctor and on those days that I doubt my career choice I'm often wondering what stopped me from going to med school.  I was a Molecular Biology and Biochemistry major (it's one track not two) as well as a Computer Science major.  I had gone so far as to take my MCATs and even started filling out applications.  The health care industry doesn't suffer from offshoring (well for now although some would argue otherwise [0], [1], [2]) and it could not care less about how the economy is doing.  I still can't put my finger on what did it but I had a sudden change of mind and those applications never went out.

The pressures of being in IT surround me everyday.  Sometimes I'm almost ashamed to say I'm a programmer because of the stigma that goes with it.  Programmers are looked upon as dorks, geeks, or whatever you want to call them.  In many ways I don't feel like much respect is given to programmers.  While maybe I didn't save someone's life today, quite honestly neither did most doctors.  (Not to equate the two which I think are very, very different.)  I work for an organization where IT is a cost center for the most part, which is sometimes a scary thought.  As nice as they want to be about it and as proactive about technology as they want to be, with few exceptions, the truth is technology is not a direct source of income.  The fact that may companies would cease to be competitive without us, however, is one of the many ways that illustrate how dependent daily life is on programs.  Everyday we hear about offshoring or something else that threatens our industry and we're in a cyclical field.  My brother insists that what is happening with programmers today is exactly what happened to the engineers of yesterday.  A big boom, then a big burst, followed by offshoring, and then ended with salaries dropping and being worked raw.  I'm no expert about what happened to the engineers but I can say so far he has been striking fear into my heart.

Despite all this, every once in a while something happens that makes me think, “Man!  I love my job.”  Today was one of those days.  Several things happened each resulting in me repeating that phrase.  I'll just give you a couple of examples. 

Today was my last day in training.  So we had a farewell event of sorts for our training class and an officer in the company came in with his son to show him what technology can do.  That kind of wowed me and made me feel at ease about the companies direction with technology.  If he was wanted his son to think more about technology as a career decision surely he was confident about its place within the organization.  Next, after the event I went and I spoke to my manager to check in and see if he wanted me to prepare in any way for my scheduled Monday start.  To begin with, as we were just chatting I couldn't help but think “what a cool guy” and his manager is amazing too.  I keep finding myself saying that at this organization which is the real kicker.  Normally I'm not quick to say things like that so when I do I mean it.  But more on the technical part of my job, I found out Rob Howard is coming to meet with us soon.  Stuff like that just gets me very excited about my job.

Also, I never realized how much I love to code until I went through this two month training program.  Don't get me wrong, I love learning about technology as well but it doesn't quench my need to code.  I'm dying to start my new position and start coding.  I'm really hoping I can make an impact.  I'll try my best.

So really I have no idea where I'm going with this all.  I'll probably never know whether I made the right choice or not but days like today me feel a lot more comfortable with my decision.  I just hope one day, when people think about all the ways computers have changed their life, they think a programmer wrote it and the respect for our field grows.  For now, I just have to feel fulfilled without recognition from the general public.

So as I mentioned before, I was reading The Practice of Programming.  I just finished the book today so I figured I'd give you guys some feedback of how I felt about the book.

Unfortunately, I felt the book was a waste of time.  The Art of UNIX Programming I felt covered the topics in a much better and much more generic way that is far more applicable for today's programming environment.  The Practice of Programming might be nice for a beginners book but for someone with any experience I think it is pretty much useless.  My feeling is the gist of the book is well summarized by the Appendix.  If you read that you don't need the book.  Look up the concepts in the Appendix that confuse you but otherwise the book is out of date for the programmers of today. 

I can see the book being a great resource maybe for hardcore low level C/C++ programmers but otherwise I'd skip it.

The newest book I'm reading is The Mythical Man Month.  The book was quoted in both The Practice of Programming and The Art of UNIX Programming and some of the speakers during my training at my new position referenced it so I got really curious about it.  While I'm still on page 13, I can tell you I only expect this book to wow me more and more as I go on.  The book was originally written in 1975 or so but as you read it you feel like the issues the book speaks about are those that you see every day!!!  I can't believe it.  Maybe it's because I'm still starting the book but I can say so far it's well written.  We'll see how I feel as I go on I'm sure :)...

I stopped reading the blogs and mail groups I subscribe to several months ago but now I'm back in gear.  I think the reason I stopped was because I felt overwhelmed.  I missed a couple of days of reading and found myself several hundred messages behind.  Not wanting to miss any exciting news, I tried reading more messages each day to catch up.  But then another day went go by where I couldn't read the messages and I found myself several hundred more messages behind.  Eventually, I gave up on reading blogs and mail groups all together and decided to just stick with books.  I thought to myself "There is too much noise on those things mediums anyway and I can probably get more out of a well written book."  To be honest, I still agree with that reasoning (I'll get back to this) but blogs and mail groups do have something special to offer that books can't.  Blogs and mail groups give you perspective and connect you with your peers.  The give you the benefit of thousands of eyes scouring different sources of knowledge then pointing you in the direction of the good resources.  They give you an understand of what people are doing that's different than you and how people are going about doing the same things you do.  Also, books are usually pretty far behind the times by the times when they come out compared to the information that's readily available to you online.  All this is very valuable so I decided to do something Brad Wilson recommended I do several months ago when I complained about how far behind I was... I deleted everything and started fresh.  I'm really glad I did too because now I've been pretty good about my reading of blogs and mail groups and I don't feel *as* overwhelmed by messages.  Should have listen to Brad from the get go but oh well.

Getting back to the topic of "blog noise" however, I still think a well written and concise book can give you more bang for your time.  The problem with blogs is that everyone and their mother has a blog!!!  And people blog even with they have nothing to say just for the sake of keeping their blog active.  I subscribe to a different view of how a blog should be run and I try to keep my blog up to those standards.  I only blog when I have something decent enough to waste my time and other people's bandwidth (both in the literal and metaphorical sense).  I hope I've been doing a good job of that.  For a while, I had nothing that interesting to speak about so my blog went pretty quite.  Now, however, because I changed jobs, I am getting many new perspectives on technology and I find myself wanting to share my thoughts about them more and more.  It's interesting working in a place where there are far more Unix developers than Microsoft developers because my mind is being opened to new worlds in terms of my own thoughts of technology.  That is something I love so there is a possibility, but don't hold me to this, that you'll see a lot more blogging out of me in the near future.

One last thing before I leave you, while I was deleting the old messages I decided to delete some blog subscriptions that I no longer was a fan of and add some new ones.  One of the new one's I've added is Chris Pratley's blog as per Tim Marman's recommendation to me while we were getting a couple of drinks.  Highly recommend it, high quality, low noise, just what I like :).