Ensuring clean .Net memory management

If you're a .Net developer, it would be good to review this article.

Yes, it's been a while since I posted mainly programming info, but I am trying to get back into it. I've been reading a lot of tech stuff, and will be adding some of it here.

Much ado!!!

Ever get stranded in an unfamiliar location? We did!!!

Let's see, where to start.

2 weekends ago, December 9th and 10th, I spent working on my work system, trying to re-install Windows XP Pro. Why? I get weird STOP errors when I go through my registry and other things. I tried to do it without wiping my drive, but couldn't until I removed one of my 512Mb chips of RAM.

This past weekend, 16th and 17th, Steph and I drove to CT for my sister's graduation party. All went well (other than the fuse blowing at the hotel room) once we got there. We were going to head up Friday, but a surprise late bill canceled that. (Our water bill should come to us, not the landlord, then it won't surprise us!)

It was on the way home we had trouble. We were doing fine, crossed the PA border and took the first exit to grab a bite to eat. Got back on the highway, accelerating to cruising speed, and we hear a big BANG! I pull over thinking a tire blew or something... nope, all looks well. Clear some junked lumber that was on the side of the road so we wouldn't drive over it (what a good spot to pull over?!?!) and start accelerating again to continue on our way. We're moving... but the transmission isn't shifting!!!

Transmissions aren't cheap... and you can't drive on the highway for 2 hours in first gear... doesn't work very well. So I pull of at the next exit and pull into a gas station. 2 exits... that's all we've made it into PA. So, I start making phone calls.

To shorten this up, we got towed to a Hyundai dealer (cause we were in our Hyundai Santa Fe), then wait for my brother-in-law to come pick us up. Thank goodness for family. We finally get home at about 2:00 AM. I get to start the day again at 7:30 AM, making phone calls to get the car fixed, and the warranty people to cover it. Plus work! Life is fun.

So, work... DataMatch 5.0. New features galore. A new, stylish look. (Try stylish in a windows form.) But we're getting there. It should be nice.

BTW, Donations are always welcomed.

New Cussler book

There is a new Cussler book, Skeleton Coast. I've added it to my list.

Also, I have cleaned up my list a bit, adding other books that have been out. (I haven't read them all.)

Lot's of stuff

More important stuff first. Had an Awesome CA this past weekend. Have a bible study, which seems to be going well. (For the first two studies anyways.) His wife has been studying with my wife. Very nice...

115 out of 117 territories finished with the tract work by the end of November. We've gotten to go-ahead to do the last two... so we will have completely covered our territory. As for the tracts... it's like feeding 5000 men with 7 loaves and a few small fishes... we still have a bunch left!!!

Updated my Cussler Books page. A few of the books I listen to as I work on audio books... it takes a lot less time.

Guess that's it... TTY L8R

My few travels

Well, I haven't traveled as much as some, but I always wanted to keep track of where I've been.

Here goes:
http://www.travbuddy.com/widget_map_display.php?id=11557

Star Trek all the way

I used to be more of a Star Wars guy. But as time goes on, I mature, and appreciate more and more the subtleties of Star Trek. Plus, having it on Sunday Mornings helps.

In other news, my system is not rebooting as much as it had been. It's getting a little more stable.

We're going to Wyoming in May. I guess I'll post pictures.

Aaargggg!!!

Our server is hogged! Hosed! and whatever else you want to call it that's bad. I'm at my wits end, which wasn't a long trip in the first place.

I also updated my quote at the top of the screen.

The beast is back

For those that don't remember (like myself) my Linux box is an 800MHz system that holds my website. (http://mark.phillk.net) I usually don't have to worry about it.

A while back one of the fans started making noise, the power supply fan. Then, last week, it started turning itself off. When it was on, I could smell burning electronics. Apparently, the fan died, and then the parts started to go into meltdown.

It's back up and running, with a slightly smaller Wattage supply. Yea!!!

Friends around the world

People I know are spreading around the globe. To keep track of who is awake when, I created this page:
http://mark.phillk.net/clocks.php

Enjoy!

Duh to me

Your wife wants a salad spinner. What do you get her? Napolian Dynomite. At least she doesn't know, yet...

More Cussler

I finally finished Pacific Vortex. This was the original Dirk Pitt story, and you could tell Cussler was just getting started. However, it was a good story. He used pieces of this story throughout the Pitt series (even though it leaves some holes) and helps fill in details.

I also caught up in the past few months on a few other of the cussler books. You can keep track here: http://mark.phillk.net/sellBooksCussler.php

In other news, did my second public talk Sunday, and it came out pretty good. Not perfect, but I'll never be perfect. I might change my outline a bit, but all-in-all, it came out good, and it's done. (Whew!)

C.O. visit this week, so things are keeping busy.

Work has been a nightmare! I lost track of all the things we've tried to get the site smoothed out. SQL errors, glitches, Internet providers shutting down on us. It seems like .Net 2.0 wasn't such a great idea. Too many new things to figure out, but oh well.

When ambulance chasing just doesn't pay the bills!

This guy want's to spread into new markets. Good for him.

Abducted by aliens? Lawyer for hire

BERLIN, Germany (Reuters) -- A German lawyer hopes to drum up more business by pursuing state compensation claims for people who believe they were abducted by aliens.

"There's quite obviously demand for legal advice here", Jens Lorek told Reuters by telephone on Thursday. "The trouble is, people are afraid of making fools of themselves in court."

Ninja Bunny!

Defender of Chicken Coops EveryWhere!

Another Weblog

http://wheretowhatfor.blogspot.com/

Too funny!

http://mark.phillk.net/funny1stGrade.php

I just had to laugh at this one

No, not everybody goes to heaven. Some have the hope of an earthly resurrection. But still, this was funny.

A Tom Sawyer Moment...

Three friends die in a car accident, and upon their arrival to heaven, they are all asked one question

"When you are in your casket and family and friends are mourning upon you, what would you like to hear them say about you?"

The first man says, "I would like to hear them say that I was a great doctor of my time, and a great family man."

The second man says, "I would like to hear that I was a wonderful husband and school teacher who made a huge difference in our children of tomorrow."

The last man replies:

"I would like to hear them say: 'LOOK! HE'S MOVING!'"

I am inspired

What you'll get in today's post:

Fam and Friends, a bit of an update

Coders and Geeks, a bit of love from MSDN, or in other words, highlights.

First off, why am I inspired? Last week, I realized, I have time to read RSS/Blog feeds with my PDA. So I installed pRSSreader on my Pocket PC. Sweet, I'm up to date on all I care about.

Coding
Then I went to the MSDN event in Harrisburg. Definitely not a snoozer. We talked about highlights of the new .Net 2.0 System.Net namespace, including a simple IsAvailable and Ping, so you can do some network checking in your apps, without major coding.

Then they talked about Windows Communication Framework. They showed us how to do a Windows/Web Service on steroids. Write one app with a built-in service contract, and expose it via Web Services, Named Pipes (for same PC communication), TCP (for same network communication), and MSMQ, MS Messaging Queue (for disconnected messaging). They showed a basic example, but all the way from start to finish.

Named Pipes and TCP used to be under the .Net Remoting, an mystical (to me) realm I dared enter and had no idea of the benefits. But picking the right communications protocol can improve speed. The demo showed a client app on the same system as the server part of the app. Named Pipes was the fastest, and Web Services was 4 times as slow!!! ON THE SAME PC!!! That must be a lot of overhead. (All that was transmitted was 'Hello World'.)

Finally, they showed us Ajax, using Atlas. The few controls they showed rocked!!! I'm sure I'll have a few growing pains when trying to implement it, but WOW!!! You don't need a full post back for simple .Net Server changes. Sweet, finally. I do too much to have figured it out on my own.

Family/Friends
Ok, it's not as exciting as my cousin moving to Indonesia to teach English, Health, and the bible. Or my friends the Ive's who are going to Malaysia as missionaries. But we had a fun weekend of camping in Pine Grove Furnace.

We cooked many meals over the fire. I was the heat master, with not just the fire pit, but count 'em, two (2) camp grills, one propane and the other an old Coleman stove. I do believe fun was had by all, though maybe not all at the same parts of the trip. We hiked, biked, chased the noisy neighbors all over the forest, and ate. That's the best part of camping, the food. The Coleman was $5, and the propane grill was $0. (Of course, I should have known that if it came with a tank of propane, it wouldn't be full.)

It rained the first night, but not terribly. Chris, my bro-in-law provided an awesome tent and cots, that kept us up off the cold ground, and outta wet's way.

Now that we're back, I have to finish my next public talk. And of course there is Lost. I like the idea of being lost on a tropical island. I don't know if I'd want to come home. Depends on who's trapped with me. Maybe I'd just 'help' them home.

Now I'm back eating my 'Oats and More', a 'Honey Bunches of Oats' knock off, that doesn't taste half bad. Time for my coffee and much more work.

Questions about any portion of this posting can be directed to the Comments link immediately below this posting.

A new neat weblog.

Check out the weblog of Ken and Sue Ive's. They will be going to Malaysia.

OH MY BOB!!!

Can't even put into words.
http://www.i-am-bored.com/bored_link.cfm?link_id=19521

New Blogger Link!

I added a link to another Blogger, my cousin Tom Kittrick.

His should be interesting, as he's going to be leaving the United States, to live in Indonesia. His blog is called Selamut Datang BATAM. Batam Indonesia is where he will be living.

Time to vent!!!

Ok, here's a Pet Peeve post:

Me: What's on the screen?

User: Nothing.

Me: So, the screens black? Did the power go out?

User: No, there's stuff on the screen.

Me: What kind of stuff?

User: Icons, Start...

Me: So you can see the Desktop.

User: Yea, and there's a message.

Me: Did that just pop up or was it there when I asked what was on the screen?

User: It was there, I didn't know you wanted to know that.

Me: What does the message say?

User: Something about an error.

Me: Ok, I want to help you fix that error, but first I need to know exactly what the error message says.

User: Oh, it says that file xxxxxxx.yyy can't be found.

Me: Ok, I will send a copy of that file. Just to speed things along, can you read me any messages or errors that pop up, especially if I ask, 'What's on the screen.'

User: Why do I have to do everything?!

One more funny story.

I came up with what I thought was a funny story. Check it out here.

Developers, make your life easier!

I'm raving about a new piece of software, Process Explorer. It's like Task Manager, but much better. It shows you each process, in a process tree. But you can change the View, to have a Lower Pane (window) with the DLLs that the process is using. Very cool.

Anything Sys Internals does is awesome. They really make tools developers can benefit from.

Clive Cussler

Just finished Inca Gold, followed by Shock Wave. Shouldn't say just, but since the last post.

Interesting spoof preview

See if you can view it here:
http://209.0.146.17/10/graphics/movies/movies_hate_commandments.wmv

I'm Bored

I found the link in my previous post on the 'Most Popular' section of www.i-am-bored.com.

Unbelievable! WTC photos

http://www.zombietime.com/wtc_9-13-2001/

Update on my father-in-law

Yesterday, Tuesday, my father-in-law underwent Gamma Knife therapy for brain tumors. Some of you may know that he has had brain tumors for a few years now. He's had two surgeries, but the doctors say they cannot open his head any more. So they felt the Gamma Knife, focused, heavy doses of radiation, would be the next best thing.

It was an outpatient procedure, requiring his head to be put in a halo. The halo was attached around 6AM with local anesthetic. The procedure began about 4:30PM. He was awake the whole time. The doctors did an MRI in the morning to get precise measurements for the tumors and said that it did not seem that they had grown much, and that there were no new growths. We'll know in 3 months how this treatment worked, when he has his next checkup.

Updated link

In an effort to help others avoid the issues I've faced, I've compiled a brief check list of To-Dos when it comes to securing your computer. In the upper right corner of this page (Top of my menu) is Secure Windows. This is a page I've created with links that will help secure your windows installation. If you have anything you think should be added, let me know.

When technology fails, life stinks

Never trust Microsoft to protect your Microsoft products. I had Windows Defender installed, which is supposed to block unwholesome software, it didn't. I was going through my e-mail, using (garbage pieace of #$%@#% crap) Outlook, with the preview window open. I right click on spam to mark it as junk mail, but of course, it loads it in the preview window. (When will you learn Kenyon!) Next thing I know, my AVG anti-virus is going berserk, and pop ups are loading all over the place.

AVG kept the infestation down to under 100. But I had to log in on a second account, because mine was so messed up. I ran an AVG full scan, and Windows Defender scan. But STILL had to load Spybot Search & Destroy to clean a couple things Defender couldn't. Needless to say, my work PC was down most of the AM.

Which brings me to my next point, Complete Wilderness Training! At first I thought, 'Hugh McManners? How could a name like that write this book?' But I tell ya, he was a life saver. He tells you how to find, prepare, and eat food when technology is not present. Although, he should add a section on how to de-scent a skunk. No matter, I'm fed, and alive. (No, I didn't eat skunk. Just a squirrel. But I did use this book while I had no technology to passify me.)

A bunch of funny stuff

I'm cleaning stuff off my old computer, before I move to the new one.

I found a trove of funny stories. Therefore I've updated my Funny Stuff page. Enjoy!

Quote of the day

'If you’re in a survival situation, the only thing you need to know about a spotted owl is that it tastes like chicken !!!' - Taken from the Survival Primer.

My Business Site!

Great

White

http://mark.phillk.net/GreatWhite/

Real Theocratic Heros!

This was too funny not to post. An ode to Mr. Really Long Comment Giver. (Link no longer available.)

If you have trouble, try here:
Link No Longer Available

Edit (8/22/2007): My link is no longer available, so I took the links out.
Edit (5/20/2008): This was not done by me. I had heard it, posted about it, and since removed the link and lost the file. I do not know who made it, or where you can get it or any like it. Sorry.

What happens when graphic artists get bored?

Check out some nifty pictures on my website.

DC in Reading PA

It was an awesome convention, but I guess I shouldn't have been staring at the camera. See why here.
And here's another one:
http://www.wfmz.com/cgi-bin/tt.cgi?action=viewstory&storyid=16915

Guess I better start practicing

I like this guy... he probably practiced long and hard to get this right.
Evolution of Dance

Hooligans invading your space?

Easy-does-it plan to irk hooligans

I just wonder how Barry feels about all this.

My Literature Tracker program

Here's the status so far:
I can enter in orders, and I can enter in inventories. The two main functions I designed this for, was to combine literature orders for a literature group. (Coordinator) Also to show movement of literature to aid in ordering.

I have pretty much all the literature listed in the program, more than half a dozen languages, and some of the movement functionality built in. But I haven't finished the 2 main goals.

As this is the convention season, I don't know how much time I will have to devote to this. We have ours in June, as well as a wedding. My parents have theirs in July, and my sister will probably be getting baptized there, but it is a long trip to see them.

If you would like, you can watch my weblog here or my web site (http://mark.phillk.net). I will post updates there. Also, as soon as I have a beta, or anything else to try, it will be here: http://mark.phillk.net/dskLitTracker.php

Sorry it is taking so long.

This really cooks my goose

K, I've got my ASP.Net project, I'm trying to debug and the debugger shows my updated code, but you can tell it's running the old code.

Here's my question.

Also liked this one:

Thought this was funny. Poor little bunnies...

Armless driver 'had foot to floor'

Check it out here http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/05/25/armless.driver.ap/index.html


Let's see, in other news... we're doing good. Steff's got a bible study. Had instruction talk and then we did a demo. Harmon family reunion this weekend. That's Steff's family. Week after her parents will be in a band having a gig. Week after that is the District convention. Week after that my buddy Jerry is getting married.

So, I'll try to keep us all posted.

For code stuff, work decided to update the look of the entire site. Well, the web guy they have was doing it in dreamweaver. I really held out for ASP.Net 2.0 master pages, and was allowed to do that for the forms. It's tricky... all the code had to be cleaned up, because 2.0 is stricter. So, now my boss is asking, 'Why'd we do that?'

It'll be better, I'm sure.

More pictures!!!

I like Yahoo Photos. It's pretty easy to use. Thus, I have put up photos of our trip to the Philly Zoo. A really nice zoo too.

http://photos.yahoo.com/qwert231

Woman ditches wheelchair, flees police

Just thought that was a funny story.

New domain name for my site!!!

I know you all regularly go to my site to make your online purchases...
You will want to update your bookmarks. We are not talking about this, my weblog. But my site will no longer be mark.arkaoss.com.

My site is now mark.phillk.net. Make sure to use 2 Ls. I have tried to check my links but I may have missed some.

To quote my brother, who's domain this is, 'If you have any questions please write them in sanskrit and submit them Via "a slow tortoise" to' me. (He's very clever, isn't he.)

Updates to my site, including train pics

I cleaned up my main page, added some pics to my train layout and some a picture of us.

The site is here.

The trains are here.

We are here.

RI wants to be the first with state-wide Wi-Fi.

PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island (Reuters) -- America's smallest state is seeking to become its first to offer a wireless broadband network from border to border.

So, they put in 2 or 3 antennas and call it a day.

I did it!

I pioneered in April, and I made my time! Yea! Had a lot of fun, and increased my joy!

Been working on DataMatch. Learning InstallShield some more. Trying out some things here and there.

I might have more to post. Going to work on my personal apps a bit more now I think. I'll keep you posted. Almost done on the territory one.

Yahoo Photos

I'll try to use this for photos now. Take a look

Major resources for all developers

You can view http://www.msdneventsbloggers.net/ and http://www.techneteventsbloggers.net/

(It will also help me if you click those links!)

More code, and more to come

I'm continuing to work on my Lit Tracker program... and it's coming along nicely. Hopefully we'll have some screen shots soon, and maybe even some beta testers.

In searching for solutions to problems, I saw that DataBinding to multiple listboxes with Data Relations was lacking. (There were multiple articles abound binding a listbox to a datagrid with relations.) So, in an effort to help, I wrote a guide to multiple listbox binding.

You'll see on that link, I have code, formatted to look a little more readable on the web. I have a page about the app I used. (Which I also created.)

I recieved a bunch of e-mail about the programs I'm working on... so I will try to keep up on them. I'm currently working on Inventory tracking in the Literature program.

More software posted, and more to come

I've recieved a lot of requests for the actually programs for my Theocratic software. It's not finished yet, so I haven't posted, but I will soon.

However, I have added something to my Current Projects page. A SQL to HTML converter. This allows SQL code to get formatted so that it's more readable on a web page. It takes certain words, and colors them, and any comments it colors green. It also cleans up the positioning by change spaces and tabs to & nbsp; tags. It's pretty cool, and the link I give has some sample code.

Coolest game ever!!!

In a continuing effort to bring you coolness, I present Stinkoman!

Why we need a new system!

'How'd the programming coming?'
'Pretty good Al.'
'How were the wings, did you like 'em?'
'That's not so good Al!'

Yes... the wings I had Monday night, caused me pain all day Tuesday. In fact, as I write this Wednesday morning... I still feel a little wierd. But at least I can eat today. Which brings up one of the not so bright spots to working from home... you can still work when you're sick. Anyway, pain like this is why we need a new system.

Edgar Rice Burroughs. He wrote Tarzan, but what I didn't realize, is he wrote the John Carter on Mars series. (A Princess of Mars, The Gods of Mars) Very interesting Science fiction. So, I read a few of the series, and was pretty intrigued. It's basically entertainment writing, but he forsaw some things that were pretty right on... like transmitting images wirelessly. And he was writing around 1911.
Then I thought, they should make a movie. And low-and-behold, I found this on IMDB.

Oh boy! Special Assembly day this Saturday. I'll try to get pics.

Updates to my current projects page, at last!

Yes... I have finally made some changes to my Current Project page. I have updated the pages to php to have my style applied. Actually, I created the php files, because previously the page had dead links.

I also added some Personal Projects on the site. Support for Personal Projects is on a completely donation arrangement. You can click the link to the right to make a donation. :)

Digging in to DataMatch; Using the SQL NULLIF function

I've gotten through InstallShield to the point where I can go back to DataMatch itself. At some point I'd like to update the projects page on my site, but for now I'll post here.

DataMatch is basically a Data Entry application so that photographers who shoot large volumes of pictures can rapidly enter data as to what packages or print sizes they would like for each image.

We had 3 different job types, and fields unique to those job types that could be viewed/edited while entering data. So I created tables to store which fields were going to be visible on the form.

However, 1 set of selections for each job type wouldn't work when you had multiple users at different stations and different jobs requiring different sets of fields available.

So I am working to make it so that each job will have the required fields associated with it.

To speed up data entry, we included an option to import data from text files for use in the program. Another feature I am trying to add is the ability for the program to see which fields have data and auto select them for that job, unselecting others, so that unnecessary fields don't clutter the screen. (Users can of course reselect them if need be.)

This is where I have been digging into SQL code. I figured I could do a stored procedure that would look at a table like this:
Field1   Field2   Field3
0001     (null)   PieceOfData
0002     (null)   PieceOfData
0003     (null)
0004     Something PieceOfData
0005     (null)
0006     (null) PieceOfData

And return something like this:
Field1   Field2   Field3
6        1        4

I thought at first I could do this:
SELECT
 Field1 = COUNT(Field1),
 Field2 = COUNT(Field2),
 Field3 = COUNT(Field3)
FROM
 Table

But that would also count zero length strings so, Field3 would return 6 instead of 4.

Then I tried SQL code like this:
SELECT
 Field1 = (SELECT count(Field1) FROM Table WHERE Field1 <> '' AND RecID IS NOT Null),
 Field2 = (SELECT count(Field2) FROM Table WHERE Field2 <> '' AND Field2 IS NOT Null),
 Field3 = (SELECT count(Field3) FROM Table WHERE Field3 <> '' AND Field3 IS NOT Null)
FROM Table

While this gave me the results I wanted, it also cause 4 passes over the table. (Or more if you had more fields.) Well... Maurits on Channel 9 offered this more elegant solution:
SELECT
 Field1 = COUNT(NULLIF(Field1, '')), -- string field
 Field2 = COUNT(Field2), -- integer field
 Field3 = COUNT(NULLIF(Field3, 0)) -- bit field... only count 1s
FROM
 Table

The NULLIF function checks the field (in parameter 1) for the value you specify in parameter 2. Changing the Field3 statement to check for '' I was able to get the results I wanted. ('' is for zero length strings. I have no bit fields in this table.)

This saves typing and time because it only makes one pass over the table.

Homestar in the house!!!

Or should I say Strong Bad. He's the one I watch the most. I've been looking through the Strong Bad e-mails to find the best to introduce people to why he's so funny. Here it is. You can click the Homestar Runner link on the menu.

Also, I'm writing this log from a New-To-Me laptop. A screaming 400 MHz! Hey, it works.

See! This is what I've been on about!

I know that somewhere on this great big internet, I described just this, an Ultra-Mobile PC. They stole my idea!!! Now I want one, figures, just when I get a mobile device, they up the ante!

Oh well... I'm good with mine for now. I can stream music from my home server wherever I have a wi-fi connection, I can search through all the data I need. I can pull up maps, and GPS. It's all good. And I'll have my PPC app up soon. It's pretty good.

Code, updates, and fun stuff

So... I'm working with InstallShield (FlexNet) 11.5 Pro right now. We've decided to let somebody else handle our install instead of maintaining code to try to handle all the quirks of install. You would think that install should be the easiest thing to handle. Go figure. I've learned a bit, and if you have questions, I'm willing to try to answer.

We were going to have 1 install with to setup types, Server (which would include MSDE InstallShield Object), and Client. Other than the MSDE they would be the same. I couldn't figure out how to get MSDE installed with just Server selected, so our boss said, 'just do 2 installs'. I think I figured it out now, but we have the 2 installs.

Now I have to figure out updates. I tried calling, but their phone support is down right now.

My Pocket PC app is coming along. I couldn't remember how to get my listbox to display values from a parent table when I filtered a child table, so I just walk the child table, and do a listbox.items.add() using the child row's parentrow property. More code, but accurate. Now I want to figure out how to save settings for the program. I may just add it to the data xml I'm using to save coding time.

On the fun side, here is a fun e-mail somebody just sent me. Remember to check out my funny stuff page. You never know what I might add there. And check out my For Sale stuff too... every bit helps.

Some online tutorials for .Net 2.0

If you're new to .Net programming, or just haven't heard much about the newest version of .Net (like me), you may find this interesting. It was gleaned from an MSDN Flash e-mail I received.

For instance, I see (via Brian Goldfarb's blog) that not only is the ASP.NET 2.0 webcast series free, but you can actually get some great swag for watching: Visual Studio 2005, a book, hosting and more.

And that's not the only place you can go to upgrade your developers skills. Go to http://www.thedifferenceisobviousvb05.com and attend the Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0 Webcast Series or register for a Microsoft Visual Basic 2005 E-Learning course. It's good training, and you'll have the chance to win a complimentary Visual Studio 2005 Discovery Pack.

Scott Guthrie has also put together a great list of ASP.NET 2.0 tutorial videos in his blog. These are code-focused (no slides or marketing at all, just lots of code) walkthroughs, and are a great way to get to know some of the new features in ASP.NET 2.0.

I don't want to leave SQL off the video training list. Microsoft Learning has several free, in-depth E-Learning courses for database administrators and developers, as well as business intelligence developers.

I'm making a Pocket PC app

It's working... it's working. And boy... I'm tired. But I've been playing with the Compact Framework, to make a call tracker. Here's a couple of pics.



You'll notice too a new section on Pocket PC development links here.

The wonders of technology

At this moment I am typing on a folding keyboard connected to an iPaq. I have saved long and hard for this.

I was looking into building a pocket PC app for tracking shipments from multiple package carriers. We'll see how this goes. Also, I'd like to write a Pocket PC call tracker.

A proud day!

Yesterday, Monday, we launched a new version of The Image Connection. Graphics and layout changes had been done mostly last year in December. We tried to launch then, but it had never been fully tested. This was somewhat our pattern. Well, the bosses finally had enough of launching without testing when all our users called up and complained for a week.

So I printed out guidelines, and forms for testing of beta applications. This was a long time in coming, and I had been collecting and creating this stuff for a while. So when they said, 'we need a better launch procedure', I was ready.

We obviously took the site down, and put the old one back up. But we put the new one into a beta site and had users test and retest, as me and our new programmer fixed the bugs. (Yes we had bugs. Things that were by design but they didn't like. No real broken things though... RIGHT!)

So, we launched yesterday, and other than a couple of minor launch quirks (virtual directories not pointing in the right direction) it seems to be a success. Now there are some features that we wanted to launch that we didn't, but the site works and orders are flowing.

I will post to my site some of the guidelines I came up with and documentation. Yes, we have been documenting everything, from which code uses certain component libraries we've created, to Requirements Documents for anything we touch. It's not there, but it's a beautiful thing.

Father-In-Law's status

Steve came through the surgery ok, although instead of the 2 tumors the doctors knew about, they pulled out 5 very penetrating tumors. Penetrating, meaning into the brain. While the cells were not cancerous, they were changing, so the doctors are going to treat him as if it is cancerous and start with intensive chemo therapy.

As for side effects, he is still pretty groggy. After his first surgery 1 1/2 years ago, his left leg did not function well, and never came back to 100%. After this current surgery, his right leg is not functioning, though his left leg is pretty close to where it was right before the surgery. (Less than 100%.)

Today (Monday) they hope to move him to another hospital, close to his doctor's office. This hospital has a rehab center that will start work on his leg. We're not sure when the chemo will start. We'll keep you posted with any major changes.

Also, the move went well. Thanks to the friends we had enough help to finish moving everything Friday, allowing us to be at the hospital Saturday. My office is set back up after some minor technical difficulties.

What a life!!!

If anybody tells you working from home is stress free, slap 'em. I'm going to tell you about my current life, and of course, Programming. You non programmers, listen it too. You'll enjoy it.

K, so this is Friday. My folks and grandmother are rolling in tonight, and my bro is coming in tomorrow. Sunday I have a public talk (45 minut bible lecture) on 'Evidence of God in the World Around Us'. This is my first talk of this length. Should be 70-90 people there.

Also, we are in the midst of moving. And I mean smack dab in the middle. Cookware to clothing is already half in the new place, and 80% of everything is in boxes somewhere. We are supposed to move in next Saturday the 28th. The new place is currently undergoing some needed renovations which our landlords are trying hard to finish. Kudos to them for their hard work, we really do apreciate it.

Next Wednesday, the 25th my sister-in-law and her husband will be flying in. They want to be here for Friday the 27th when my father-in-law has major brain surgery to remove 2 tumors.

Among all this issues is of course work. Last week, Monday and Tuesday, I was in CT for server and infrastructure upgrades. This was to be quick and painless, unloading some of the load from our aging web server and adding support for a possible second T1 line. It is now Friday of the 2nd week, 10 business days, since then. I just finished the last of the tweaking and setting up and at last our site seems to be back up.

Let's just say we went through quite a few re-installs of Operating systems, and Active Directory, as well as several reconfigurations of DNS addresses, IP addresses and network cabling. Finally ending with a surprise switch from Exchange 5.5 to an offsite hosting of e-mail.

While trying to manage with all of this, my office has been falling apart. First my filing cabinet drawer fell apart, spilling files all over the floor. Then my keyboard shelf fell off while I was in some critical phase of configuration, while the phone was ringing and my coffee was spilling.

The next day I started out with no internet connection to connect to work. This was fixed by rebooting everything, but later in the day, brown outs and power outages. Not one, but several. You can imagine how fun that was.

Well, my office is back together, other than all the stuff in boxes. I also just recieved my UPS, or Unineruptable Power Supply. This should keep me up through any minor power outages. The sites are all up. And best of all!!! OUR IT GUY IS OUT UNTIL WEDNESDAY!!!

Some cool Lego stuff

This guy must have a lot of time, or a lot of brains, or both. Check out his demonstration of earth's orbit. And then check out his Knitting machine.

Added a link to Secure Windows

If you'll notice on my menu to the right, I've added a link to SecureMyWindows.Com. This should help you rid your PC of spam.

Recently seen on ebay

Looking at an auction, I noticed the Question and Answer section:

Question & Answer Answered On
Jan-04-06
Q: Hello, Can you ship to Canada, please? I will pay for all costs. Thanks
A: Sorry. This auction is for US shipping destinations only. Thanks :)

Jan-03-06
Q: Do you accept to ship in Quebec, Canada ? Thanks !
A: Sorry. This auction is for US shipping destinations only. Thanks :)

Jan-01-06
Q: Hi. I'm from Italy. How much is the cheapest shipping cost? Thanks.
A: Sorry. This auction is for US shipping destinations only. Thanks :)

This was from a real auction.

Crazy Atheists!

Did Jesus Exist? Italian Court to Decide

I always wanted one of these...

Happy Fun Ball!!!

Site updates, new .Net links

I'm working on a project, built from the ground up in C#. This is my first full C# project, so I have a lot of questions. Good for you, because I save the links of my search and post them. Take a look here.

You'll notice one link, C# to VB conversions. If you ever wanted to know what an If statement from VB would look like in C#, this is the place to go.

I also organized the links a bit better, so it's easier to use the page and find what you need. Updated my main page too. (Click here.)

The C# project I'm working on is a simple FTP client for our customers/photographers. I'm using somebody else's FTP class for the brunt of the work, but I've learned about splitters and things like that. I'll be posting more info and more helpful links, so stay tuned.

Some tidbits before I go back to work

Still moving. Found this image by clicking a link on this site. Shows you have to be careful how you drive.

I do not endorse (nor have I visited) all the sites on this page. Interesting idea though.