Re: Ozdotnet list

[Les Hughes]

I still read occasionally, if only to see what Greg K is trying to tame 
next ;)


Looking through my emails, I joined Stanski's list in 2002 (15 years!? 
eeep!) and moved across when the sever was in death-throes and Connors 
stepped up. I see a few people still posting from when I started, which 
is a decent track record given the period of time.


I'm hesitant in changing anything, just because I likely wouldn't log 
into a website or whatever else to view the content, and I suspect that 
old habits die hard for many others.


Cheers everyone :)

Les

 On 04/04/17 15:18, Tony Wright wrote:

Yep, all good if that's the case

On 4 Apr 2017 1:21 PM, "Stephen Price" > wrote:

Yep, If we keep the actual list email address consistent then all we
are changing is the implementation of said list.

I think it's a good idea to keep the primary function of the elist
as it is. Anyone currently subscribed to the list will be on the
replacement. It should be the same list, just delivered by a
different backend.

They can remove themselves if they decide they don't like it
(perhaps more traffic isn't what they want, or it's not applicable
to them anymore and they forgot they were on it... whatever the
reason).



*From:* ozdotnet-boun...@ozdotnet.com

> on behalf of David Connors
>
*Sent:* Tuesday, 4 April 2017 11:08:03 AM
*To:* ozDotNet
*Subject:* Re: Ozdotnet list
On Tue, 4 Apr 2017 at 13:06 Tony Wright > wrote:

That does worry me. First, I don't agree with broadening the
scope of the list as it benefits from being niche. Secondly,
moving to a new environment, while exciting, could spell the end
of the list as many spectators won't bother making the move across.


Probably pretty low risk if it can still function as an email list
(which doco says it does).


--
David Connors
da...@connors.com | @davidconnors | LinkedIn | +61 417 189 363

Re: [OT] ACS - relevant?

[Les Hughes]

> And I think that for a graduate visa, there is now a
> requirement of this ACS Professional Year Program

Really? If so: What a scam.

Rent seeking should be opposed in all of its forms. In my opinion, it's 
fantastic that IT (unlike most others) has been able to resist capture 
by some self-appointed body of "betters".


Cheers
Les

On 29/02/16 23:10, Yann VINCENT wrote:

The ACS certification can be important/required regarding immigration
process.
For a skilled visa, I had to get a skills assessment from ACS for
instance. And I think that for a graduate visa, there is now a
requirement of this ACS Professional Year Program
.


2016-02-29 21:54 GMT+10:00 Tony Wright >:

Point taken. I just have a problem with the whole idea that because
someone is a member of a professional body it is supposed to make
them competent. In 20 years I have only once seen a job that
specifically said ACS was desired and that was for a government job.
Which kind of means it is certainly approaching irrelevancy for me
at least.

On 29 Feb 2016 10:05 pm, "Greg Low (罗格雷格博士)" > wrote:

I follow what you’re saying Tony but the two concepts are
separate. 

__ __

You are describing what you are looking for in an employee. You
might consider that “professionalism” but you are not actually
describing what most other industries would describe as
professionalism. In most industries, professionalism is about a
formal agreement to adhere to a code of ethics, being qualified
in the first place, maintaining appropriate certifications,
carrying out ongoing learning, etc. And, more importantly,
ejection from the profession if you don’t do what’s required.

__ __

It’s just that the IT industry places more value on a perceived
ability to get something done. 

__ __

There’s nothing wrong with that per se, but people that we
consider to be IT professionals won’t ever be regarded as such
by most of the community, and we’ll continue to see people that
lurch from one disaster to the next with impunity. It’s worth
considering that very few other professions would tolerate the
failure rate that’s associated with IT projects.

__ __

Regards,

__ __

Greg

__ __

Dr Greg Low

__ __

1300SQLSQL (1300 775 775 ) office | +61
419201410  mobile│ +61 3 8676 4913
 fax 

SQL Down Under| Web:
www.sqldownunder.com

__ __

*From:*ozdotnet-boun...@ozdotnet.com

[mailto:ozdotnet-boun...@ozdotnet.com
] *On Behalf Of *Tony Wright
*Sent:* Monday, 29 February 2016 9:54 PM
*To:* ozDotNet >
*Subject:* Re: [OT] ACS - relevant?

__ __

I somehow don't think being a member of the ACS suddenly gives
you any more professionalism than any other person in the IT
sector. In fact, having read resumes of hundreds of people I
think I've only ever seen one that said they were a member of
the ACS. But alas, that person did not have the skills we
needed, so we had to pass. We were really looking for people who
were emmersed in the technology and the best evidence of that
was evidence of decent projects they'd worked on, attendance and
speaking at user group meetings, and evidence of leadership.
Certifications, sure, but not people who only knew how to do
certs. And people with personality and the right attitude. 

T.

On 29 Feb 2016 8:12 pm, "Peter Griffith"
>
wrote:

Well put David B

__ __

So I guess that means that IT cannot be regarded as a
profession 

__ __

Bourne out by industry who seem more interested in
experience rather than adherance to a professional code of
ethics, code of conduct, code of practice.

__ __

Is it unethical then for those working in IT to portray
  themselves as professionals?.

__ __

__ __

__ __

__ __

__ __

On 29 February 2016 at 17:06, David Burstin

Re: [OT] New PC no video

[Les Hughes]

+1. It's not new.

If you want to test the theory, reset the bios to factory default, and 
see what the video defaults to.


Cheers,
Les

On 24/01/16 16:23, Ken Schaefer wrote:

Could it be that someone’s already had a play with the board? Seems like
an odd configuration, and if it were normal, I’d guess that it’d be the
#1-10 hits on Google as every man and his dog would be running into the
same problem.

Also, just a thought, if the board supports Intel vPro, then the AMT
feature would allow someone to reconfigure the BIOS over the LAN, thus
getting around the Catch 22 situation you describe.

*From:*ozdotnet-boun...@ozdotnet.com
[mailto:ozdotnet-boun...@ozdotnet.com] *On Behalf Of *Greg Keogh
*Sent:* Saturday, 23 January 2016 6:04 PM
*To:* ozDotNet 
*Subject:* Re: [OT] New PC no video

My friend just rang to say he got the new box working, but in a way the
confused and worried him. He also could get no video out of the
motherboard, so in desperation he stuck a video card in, and it worked.
Then in the BIOS screen he set it to use "onboard video" (which normally
has to be the default), after which it works without the video card. So
how stupid is that?! A perfect Catch-22 .. you can't configure the video
to work until you get the video working. Sheesh! I'wondering if the
ASRock board come out of the factory with the wrong settings -- /GK/

On 23 January 2016 at 17:43, Ian Thomas > wrote:

We couldn't even get the BIOS screen to show -- /GK/

That’s tell-tale for RAM not seated, and/or CPU. I’m not sure with
these new MBs whether there is a connection to a speaker but it was
used as a useful fault detection by a pattern of “beeps”. Your MB’s
guide may show a pattern of LEDs for fault diagnosis (green/red
lights on the board).

Ian Thomas

Albert Park, Victoria 3206 Australia

Re: Code Mechanical Keyboards

[Les Hughes]

I use the Filco Tenkeyless (without the numeric pad on the right) with 
the blue cherry switches. I spent probably $220 on it all up (I've got 
the plain keys without lettering so the keyboard is completely black... 
can't touchtype? not 1337 enough to use my computer!)


If you spend 8+ hours per day on your keyboard at least five days per 
week, having a decent keyboard is mandatory, and not something to cheap 
out on in my opinion.


Given all of that, mechanical keyboards are great, and this keyboard 
looks great. I want it :P

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

On 24/10/14 13:34, osjasonrobe...@gmail.com wrote:

Anyone used/using one of these (or similar keyboard)?

http://codekeyboards.com/

Jason Roberts
Journeyman Software Developer

Twitter: @robertsjason
Blog: http://DontCodeTired.com
Pluralsight Courses: http://bit.ly/psjasonroberts

===
I welcome VSRE emails. Learn more at http://vsre.info/
===

Re: PDF and .doc generators for websites

[Les Hughes]

I've used Aspose.NET in the past, and while it is pricey compared to
some others, it works fantastically.

Cheers :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

On 22/10/14 14:43, Greg Low (低格雷格) wrote:
 Hi Folks,
 
 Anyone got strong opinions on particular PDF and .doc generators for use 
 with MVC ?
 
 Regards,
 
 Greg
 
 Dr Greg Low
 
 1300SQLSQL (1300 775 775) office | +61 419201410 mobile│ +61 3 8676 4913 
 fax
 
 SQL Down Under| Web: www.sqldownunder.com http://www.sqldownunder.com/
 

Re: [OT] Quiet

[Les Hughes]

On 19/09/14 17:54, Greg Keogh wrote:

JS is still ugly to me no matter what the hipsters says


You're too kind. It's an ulcerating boil on the history of computer science.

/Greg K/


Maybe... While languages without strict typing make me cry, Playing with 
angular is making me like JS a bit :P

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [ot] intranet

[Les Hughes]

MediaWiki on a LAMP stack powered by a Raspberry Pi.

Works great! :)

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au


On 28/07/14 15:22, anthonyatsmall...@mail.com wrote:


Anyone have or use an internet system to record their procedures, 
manuals etc.   I have all sorts of docs for installing dotnet,  
cerating a orchard cms site etc but need a central location to records 
these...maybe something like a wiki or intranet system?


Any suggestion would be appreciated?

Anthony Salerno| Founder | SmallBiz Australia
Innovation | Web | Software | M2M | Developers | Support
+613 8400 4191 | 2Anthony (at) smallbiz.com.au  | Po Box 135, Lower 
Plenty 3093 ABN : 16 079 706 737


www.smallbiz.com.au http://www.smallbiz.com.au/ | 
www.linkedin.com/in/innovativetechnology

Re: [ot] intranet

[Les Hughes]

To also add, MediaWiki installs fairly easily on UniServer (The Unform 
Server) which is a LAMP stack that runs from a no-install single-folder 
on a Windows Machine. You can run it from a simple VM (I do this from XP 
sometimes) with good results.


ASAIK, Atlassian provide Wiki services for free for up to 5 users, and 
it's fairly inexpensive after that. It might be worth looking into as well.


Cheers,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

On 28/07/14 21:36, Les Hughes wrote:


MediaWiki on a LAMP stack powered by a Raspberry Pi.

Works great! :)

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au


On 28/07/14 15:22, anthonyatsmall...@mail.com wrote:


Anyone have or use an internet system to record their procedures, 
manuals etc. I have all sorts of docs for installing dotnet,  
cerating a orchard cms site etc but need a central location to 
records these...maybe something like a wiki or intranet system?


Any suggestion would be appreciated?

Anthony Salerno| Founder | SmallBiz Australia
Innovation | Web | Software | M2M | Developers | Support
+613 8400 4191 | 2Anthony (at) smallbiz.com.au  | Po Box 135, Lower 
Plenty 3093 ABN : 16 079 706 737


www.smallbiz.com.au http://www.smallbiz.com.au/ | 
www.linkedin.com/in/innovativetechnology

Re: [OT] Laptop to replace macbook

[Les Hughes]

Taking a quick look, it appears the new models have higher price tags. 
This could be due to the popularity of the earlier ones.


I purchased the original-series 128GBssd/i5/4GBram. It's a few years 
old, but I picked it up from JB-Hifi for roughly $1k not long after they 
came out. I basically use this laptop for Powerpoint, live demos of 
software, remote desktop, excel, and occasionally bashing out some code 
on the move (I much prefer my desktop for development). The model Ian 
and Bec have both posted has higher specs, and that obviously comes with 
a premium. A quick look shows the 512sdd/8ram is on ebay for $2150 which 
suggests it would be even cheaper without ebay's fees. I guess this 
isn't cheap as such, but this is a high-end machine.


http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/8GB-512GB-SSD-ASUS-Zenbook-Prime-i7-UX32VD-13-3-FULL-HD-nVIDIA-SSD-Ultrabook-/151176280896?pt=AU_comp_laptophash=item2332cefb40

With most laptops coming from the same manufacturer and hardware 
becoming increasingly commoditised and more reliable, disregarding 
commercial support from the vendor (which may or may not be important), 
choosing a laptop is almost like choosing a shirt: Personal preference 
to your style and budget are the biggest factors.


My personal view is that the Asus Zenbook is a very attractive machine 
with a good form factor, and the newer versions fixed all of the 
nuisances with the first version. I am no expert on laptops and haven't 
taken a good look into the market for a while, thus my best suggestion 
would be to perhaps get out to a retailer and have a play with one.


Best of luck :)
-- Les



On 15/05/14 18:13, Ian Thomas wrote:

Which model do you have, Les? I see price range up to $2900 (512Gb SSD).

Ian Thomas
Sent from my Nokia Lumia 920 - Windows Phone 8

From: Les Hughes mailto:l...@datarev.com.au
Sent: ‎15/‎05/‎2014 15:46
To: ozDotNet mailto:ozdotnet@ozdotnet.com
Subject: Re: [OT] Laptop to replace macbook

On 15/05/14 16:08, Nathan Chere wrote:


Look into the 13.3” Asus Zenbook. I don’t generally like devices that 
try to hard to clone others but they do a far better Macbook Air than 
Apple does.






+ 1 for Zenbook.

Cheap, nice form factor, lightweight, overall very decent.

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au mailto:l...@datarev.com.au

Recruiter advice for Job Seeker.

[Les Hughes]

Hey all,

After been tied up for many years, I'm about to once again brave the job 
market. Last time I was looking for work (c2008) I ended up wasting a 
lot of time with recruiters who weren't particularly helpful (to say it 
kindly) and was wondering if anyone had recruiter recommendation, or 
even advice on who to avoid. (Private email if necessary).


I'm considering a few different career options, but for now I'm most 
interested in recruiters that deal with things similar to my most recent 
work, C#/Winforms/Office/SQL Server/Devexpress/etc.


Thanks heaps,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Recruiter advice for Job Seeker.

[Les Hughes]

Heya Dave,

I've found that some recruiters can be an invaluable resource due to the 
vast amount of contacts and opportunities they may hold, especially when 
looking for contract work. In the past I've dealt with a few who were 
really good (and a linkedIn search shows they were promoted out of their 
jobs!) in that they knew what they were doing (always a plus) and even 
helped me tailor my approach and prepare me for interviews.


Of course I'll be most likely applying for more jobs directly than 
though recruiters, but a good recruiter can be a win-win for employer 
and jobseeker alike.


Cheers,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Dave Walker wrote:


Why not try figure out who you want to work for and apply direct? Alot 
of companies will prefer not going through agencies. What city are you 
looking in?


On 20 Jan 2014 13:13, Les Hughes l...@datarev.com.au 
mailto:l...@datarev.com.au wrote:


Hey all,

After been tied up for many years, I'm about to once again brave
the job market. Last time I was looking for work (c2008) I ended
up wasting a lot of time with recruiters who weren't particularly
helpful (to say it kindly) and was wondering if anyone had
recruiter recommendation, or even advice on who to avoid. (Private
email if necessary).

I'm considering a few different career options, but for now I'm
most interested in recruiters that deal with things similar to my
most recent work, C#/Winforms/Office/SQL Server/Devexpress/etc.

Thanks heaps,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au mailto:l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Point of sale hardware for testing

[Les Hughes]

Craig van Nieuwkerk wrote:
This is a bit off topic but I need to test some receipt printers for 
my app, specifically Epson TM-T88 series. Rather than buy one (they 
are around $500) does anyone know somewhere that sells second hand POS 
hardware. 

On eBay they seem to come with a lot of missing power supplies and I 
have to wait for auctions. This is one that looks ok in Brisbane which 
I will probably buy if I can't find one in Melbourne. Alternatively, 
does anyone have one I could borrow for a few days in Melbourne area.


Regards

Craig


Heya Craig,

I can help you out with a loan, as I have a few lying around.
I've also done a fair bit of development with these devices (including 
callbacks running low on paper, top-part-thing is open etc. They are 
a solid printer and I'd recommend them.


PM me details if you are still looking.
Cheers,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Creating DLLImports

[Les Hughes]

Greg Keogh wrote:
Folks, I've got some DLLs written in Borland C++ with functions that I 
have to import for use in some C# code. I can see the functions inside 
the DLLs using depends.exe, but I can't get the signatures correct and 
I get unbalanced stack errors runtime due to mismatching signatures.
 
Is there some technique I can use to convert the DLL functions into 
correctly matching methods with [DLLImport]? The weak link at the 
moment is the human one, me.
 
Greg K


Solution is to destroy the weak link! Use a robot!

Have you tried this: https://clrinterop.codeplex.com/ It's *meant* to do 
make things easier.


Another thought: Could it be that your app is expecting 64-bit integers 
from a 32-bit dll?


Cheers,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Developer keyboard revisted

[Les Hughes]

Nathan Chere wrote:


Following on from the post about the Atwood-driven keyboard, I just 
found one which I’ll be buying once it’s released (I don’t do 
“pre-orders” with unproven vendors):


On the Atwood keyboard, what type of developer needs a backlit keyboard? 
I don't even have labels on my keys!


--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Office365 ? Nope, now an argument on the NBN.

[Les Hughes]

 in. If the costs were prohibitively expensive, 
we'd all end up dropping our connections and overloading the secondary 
infrastructure that does exist.

Wireless/4G/etc will be all that is left.
 NBN and government certainly don't want that and have to be market aware. If they aren't as market aware as they need to be, they will learn that soon enough. 
  
They aren't market aware at all, and I'd argue that to some extent the 
entire idea of having a top-down approach to a market problem using 
tax payer funds and while banning competition would be towards the 
opposite of anything market.

And as for Australia being able to afford it, don't believe the hype - the is 
the 21st year of economic growth in Australia (last 6 years with Labor, 
actually), and Australia now has a AAA credit rating from 3 ratings agencies. 
We can afford it, and if we have to replace the infrastructure anyway, we may 
as well do it properly and take advantage of all the opportunities that arise.
  

This is flawed reasoning on many levels.

I can afford a Ferrari, should I buy one? At what cost to other 
opportunity do I miss by making that decision? Just because I can afford 
it, does it mean I am paying a fair price, or too much?


Economic Growth figures are mostly bullshit (GDP/etc), and once again, 
just because you got a payrise doesn't mean you should take on many more 
years of debt.


On ratings, these are also mostly garbage, and one of the biggest 
factors is that Australia can never default on its debt because its 
denominated in AUD, and we can print as much as we want. Let's also 
remember that junk real estate was ranked AAA.


On having to replace the infrastructure, there is no reason that we 
have to. The market is already brining faster internet (or at least 
was, as the government forbid any fixed-line competition since they 
announced the NBN), and if fast internet is a necessity (which I believe 
it is becoming more of), the utility value will certainly be there for 
the market to act: Government just needs to make it possible for 
organisations to act.



So rather than the Coalition blowing $20 Billion of tax payers money, how about 
do it right instead - they're already spending 2/3 of the Labor budget already 
on 1/4 the speed, so how about spend the other 1/3 and do it properly.
  
Or maybe leave internet to the internet companies? It's a false choice 
to play the liberal vs. labor game.

Finally, the research also said:
 The main benefits of fiber are its exceptionally low loss (allowing long 
distances between amplifiers/repeaters), its absence of ground currents and other 
parasite signal and power issues common to long parallel electric conductor runs 
(due to its reliance on light rather than electricity for transmission, and the 
dielectric nature of fiber optic), and its inherently high data-carrying capacity. 
Thousands of electrical links would be required to replace a single high bandwidth 
fiber cable. Another benefit of fibers is that even when run alongside each other 
for long distances, fiber cables experience effectively no crosstalk, in contrast to 
some types of electrical transmission lines. Fiber can be installed in areas with 
high electromagnetic interference (EMI), such as alongside utility lines, power 
lines, and railroad tracks. Nonmetallic all-dielectric cables are also ideal for 
areas of high lightning-strike incidence.
  
We all know fibre is great. What does research say on the pricing, 
timing, and overall management of government projects, and government 
mandated bureaucratic monopolies over a sector which is constantly 
changing?


You have also used the reasoning above talking about Telstra as a 
monopoly, how can we be so sure this won't just end up as another 
private monopoly as well?


TL;DR: Telstra were not a natural monopoly, fibre  copper, but this 
doesn't mean government  private business in proving faster 
connections, it's not liberal vs. labor.


Cheers,
--
Les Hughes

Re: Office365 ? Nope, now an argument on the NBN.

[Les Hughes]

Tony Wright wrote:

It is absolutely Liberal vs Labor on this one, there is no other
choice!

Coke vs. Pepsi!

Pirate Party? Liberal Democratic Party? Family First? Wikileaks? lots more!

Sure, and the Liberals will probably win, but it doesn't mean that they 
will have the power to get the NBN though (they probably will though).


While I also think that single issue voters are mostly morons, since 
both major parties are mostly the same (you can disagree if you want, 
but this is a separate rant which could go on forever) I guess it can't 
hurt to vote only based on the NBN, but I don't think most people will.



 If Liberals weren't wasting $20 billion on this, if they had
decided not to spend anything at all then they would be an option. But
as it currently stands the Labor party have a significantly better
value proposition. Both parties are otherwise just as useless as each
other, evidence being that the Liberals came up with such a dumbarse
alternative in the first place. Since when did the Liberals become
interested in interfering in the market? Answer: never, so why now
  
Totally agree, except where you say that liberals aren't interested in 
interfering with the market. They love doing that!


My opinion: Labor's NBN is a good idea. In reality it will probably take 
2, 3, or more times as long, and be the same in cost. Is fibre great? 
Sure. Is fibre great at $10,000+ per house. No. Is $10,000 fibre per 
house even better when it's all controlled by a government monopoly? 
Yes! Whoops, I mean @#*#**$ NOOO!


Is the Liberals NBN idea just a cheap move to have a better business 
sounding plan in a pathetically poor effort to play politics and try to 
steal some of the NBN vote? Yes. Will their tactic work? They will 
probably win anyway, but I don't think their politiking here has been 
effective.


Just because someone thinks the NBN on the overall is horrible are they 
against fast internet? No. Does it mean they support the liberal plan? No.


--

As I said at the start: Coke vs. Pepsi at an inflated cost, and either 
way, we will pay.


:)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Office365 ? Nope, now an argument on the NBN.

[Les Hughes]

mike smith wrote:
On Mon, Apr 15, 2013 at 7:52 AM, David Connors da...@connors.com 
mailto:da...@connors.com wrote:


On Mon, Apr 15, 2013 at 3:21 AM, Les Hughes l...@datarev.com.au
mailto:l...@datarev.com.au wrote:

My opinion: Labor's NBN is a good idea. In reality it will
probably take 2, 3, or more times as long, and be the same in
cost. Is fibre great? Sure. Is fibre great at $10,000+ per
house. No. Is $10,000 fibre per house even better when it's
all controlled by a government monopoly? Yes! Whoops, I mean
@#*#**$ NOOO!


If one accepts the idea that fast broadband will economically
revolutionise the country by allowing people to do all sorts of
high bandwidth stuff, then the CVC charges need to go - full stop.
The direct result of that is that the project needs to be not
treated as an investment with a financial return, but just treated
as a social welfare project and moved onto the appropriate place
in the budget with health, education, etc.

Somewhat ironically, I would have a lot less of a problem with the
project if the government did that: Call a spade a spade. 


Bonus question: If you were spending your personal money on a
project that was proceeding at 1% of its stated goals, how long
would you continue investing? 



How long did people invest in Amazon?  For years it ran in the red, 
and I bet that wasn't a goal. 

And if they failed, it didn't cost me $1000's. If they run over budget, 
and their products were unviable, the market would punish them. No such 
mechanism exists with government investment.


There is a big difference regarding public risk that will benefit 
corporations vs. corporate risk.


--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: field/button/control labeling enforcement in Visual Studio sometime: who agrees with this proposal?

[Les Hughes]

 technology. Raising awareness 
(which your email does) is something that there is a need for, and I 
honestly believe that people do want to help their fellow human either 
by voluntarily making their software easier to use, or by supporting 
businesses/companies that make an effort to do so.


I welcome any further discussion, and any chance for to be better 
educated on this.


Thanks :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

[Friday OT] Eric Lippert, principal developer on the C# compiler team leaves Microsoft

[Les Hughes]

This might be of interest to a few of you:

https://blogs.msdn.com/b/ericlippert/archive/2012/11/29/a-new-fabulous-adventure.aspx?Redirected=true

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] sql convert datetime problem; forcing order of AND statements

[Les Hughes]

Wallace Turner wrote:
I'm running into an issue with a select query; it appears the CONVERT 
operator is performed before any other condition in the WHERE clause.


Consider the data below:



Now some queries,
This one works, note only 6 rows are returned:
|SELECT Value,CONVERT(DATETIME, [Value],6) from DatesTest 
WHERE   
IsDate([Value])=1 |



This one does *not *work: Conversion failed when converting date 
and/or time from character string.
|SELECT Value from DatesTest 
WHERE   
IsDate([Value])=1   
AND CONVERT(DATETIME, [Value],6)  GETDATE()|


1) Why is the CONVERT statement being executed first?
2) How can the IsDate be forced to execute first so the second 
statement works?


Cheers

Wal


Hi Wal,

Short answer is: SQL does short-circuit based on a mysterious tarot-card 
engine it has internally. It will not reveal its hidden secrets.


Check this for more info:  
http://weblogs.sqlteam.com/jeffs/archive/2008/02/22/sql-server-short-circuit.aspx


It also links to here which shows a good illustration: 
http://beingmarkcohen.com/?p=62


A CTE or the workarounds on the listed URLs are the way to go.
Best of luck :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] sql convert datetime problem; forcing order of AND statements

[Les Hughes]

Davy Jones wrote:

Hi

SQL always executes right to left
Are you talking about boolean evauluation? If so... False. (At least for 
2008 R2 which I have in front of me)

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

[OT] Almost Friday: New Programming Language, Objective CorporateSpeak++

[Les Hughes]

http://www.floopsy.com/post/32660494624/programming-language-objective-corporatespeak

:)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

[OT] Anti-Football League Greg Keogh

[Les Hughes]

Hi All,

Usually Greg posts the Anti-Football League stuff to this thread around 
now, and I haven't seen it yet, but reading theage.com.au I did find 
this: 
http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/upping-the-anti-on-afls-big-day-20120928-26r7e.html


Cheers :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Anyone using structs in C# Business Applications?

[Les Hughes]

On Fri, Aug 17, 2012 at 10:53 AM, Arjang Assadi 
arjang.ass...@gmail.com mailto:arjang.ass...@gmail.com wrote:

Hello

I have found myself not needing to use structs for any reason in the 
vanilla business apps ( DB to front end WindosForms,WPF,ASP.net etc) 
for past 7 years or so.
All BO's are classes, and I can't think of anything more fine grind 
than that.


Unless I have been missing something, my question is to Business App 
writers, do you use structs any where for any reasons?


In all the usuall VS demos I have not seen structs being used ( 
graphics demos do not count!)


Regards

Arjang

Tristan Reeves wrote:

Hi,
To answer your specific question, int, double, bool, DateTime are all 
structs.
I can't see any (even vanilla) business application getting by without 
them, can you?


Regard,
Tristan.


Int is a struct?

And yes, I use structs a fair bit for small things. Sure a struct is 
pretty much an class without methods/functions/whatevertheterminology, 
and maybe a class would be neater/better suited/etc but when I am 
returning a few small things, sometimes I'll hack together something like


struct sResult {
   public bool valid,
   public string[] errors,
   public string[] warnings
}

Just so I can have certain bits and pieces come back nicely to the UI.

Any reason why this is a bad idea?
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Is this thing on?

[Les Hughes]

Test Response Response

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Michael Minutillo wrote:

Test Response


On Thu, Aug 16, 2012 at 4:45 PM, David Burela david.bur...@gmail.com 
mailto:david.bur...@gmail.com wrote:


Test post, because a LOT of people are reporting that they can't
post to this list.

-David Burela

Re: Is this thing on?

[Les Hughes]

MAYBE IF WE TRY EMAILING LOUDER

Seriously though, everyone got my App-V question right? HALP!
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Craig van Nieuwkerk wrote:

I didn't get it.

On Thu, Aug 16, 2012 at 6:55 PM, Les Hughes l...@datarev.com.au 
mailto:l...@datarev.com.au wrote:


Test Response Response

-- 
Les Hughes

l...@datarev.com.au mailto:l...@datarev.com.au

Michael Minutillo wrote:

Test Response



On Thu, Aug 16, 2012 at 4:45 PM, David Burela
david.bur...@gmail.com mailto:david.bur...@gmail.com
mailto:david.bur...@gmail.com
mailto:david.bur...@gmail.com wrote:

Test post, because a LOT of people are reporting that they
can't
post to this list.

-David Burela

Compatibility: Office Interop from Winforms 4.0 App running on App-V

[Les Hughes]

Hi All,

I've got a Winforms app written in C# which grabs some data from SQL 
Server and dumps it into Excel with some pretty formatting. To do this 
it uses Excel Interop Libraries.


This app runs fine with Citrix XenApp, firing up Office in another 
window with everything playing nice, but I have heard there are issues 
with Office Interop when an app is hosted with App-V.


Does anyone have any info on this? Any feedback would be greatly 
appreciated.


Cheers :P
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] It's not Friday, but I've had a tough last 3 weeks ...

[Les Hughes]

Ian Thomas wrote:


I’ve had several calls like this in the last couple of years (and my 
wife had one just yesterday), but this overseas call from an 
(Indian-accepted) “Computer Maintenance Department” was spun out to 7 
minutes by one of the SMBIT guys who received it today. It lightened 
my mood considerably


Put all your computers in your … 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ht51A_AbHOYfeature=youtu.be


Received a call today from Computer Maintenance Department trying to 
tell me my computer was faulty and I needed to give them access to 
fix it it for me. Decided to have a bit of fun. The ending was 
unexpected and hilarious.




Ian Thomas
Victoria Park, Western Australia



LOL.

Some people hang up on them when they make the call, I'd recommend 
everyone playing a game of how long can I keep you on the phone. If 
everyone who wised on to them tied up their time, it would work somewhat 
like a scammer-DDOS.


Something else worth doing: if you are being phished via email, check 
that the URL has no identifying details (so they know it came from your 
email address) and fill out the form with fake info. If everyone filled 
out BS in those forms, it would once again eat up the time of these 
people, and perhaps help the banks see suspect logins when there are 
several failures on non-existent accounts from a certain IP address/range.


http://www.419eater.com/ is a website where the scammer gets scammed. 
Somewhat amusing if you have the time to take a look.

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] FYI, Large Dell Monitor Sale (again).

[Les Hughes]

Les Hughes wrote:

 but here is a pic of a 5 monitors I briefly set up a while ago.


Something to note, my $1,500+ monitor stands.

:P
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] FYI, Large Dell Monitor Sale (again).

[Les Hughes]

Corneliu I. Tusnea wrote:
I also love the MS Natural Keyboard. I'm surprised you changed it. I 
checked a review of that filco keyboard and sounds too noise for my 
liking. Even this MS keyboard is noisy but the design is fantastic.


I still have the MS Natural in my Work Office which I am currently using 
(the pic before was my home office). Given that, on my desk/mess-area I 
have these keyboards:


- MS Natural
- Filco Tenkeyless Cherry-Blue with Blank Keys
- Microsoft Arc
- Microsoft Multimedia
- Kinesis Freestyle
- Various cheap(ish) Logitech and Microsoft keyboards.

This is what I am looking for in the ultimate keyboard (of which I am 
yet to find)
- No keypad, so the mouse is closer to my body. A separate USB keypad 
can be used.
- Something tactile. The blue switches are somewhat noisy, the browns 
are quieter. With tactile keyboards you get instant feedback when the 
keypress actually happens, so you don't need to bottom out the keys 
which is where a lot of the noise comes from. It's an awesome keyboard 
experience.
- A keyboard where the arrow keys + 
home/end/pageup/pagedown/insert/delete are not moved. (This is a top 
level sin)
- A keyboard that doesn't default the F-keys to special ones where you 
have to hold down a function key just to press FX. (This is also a top 
level sin)


Having spent $500+ on keyboards for myself in the last year, if 
Microsoft did their Ergo keyboard with blue or brown mechanical switches 
and got rid of the keypad/made it detachable, I'd hand over $250+ for 
it. (Are you listening Balmer?)


For those interested in the Filco keyboards, they are around $150 inc 
shipping, and I'd recommend them. Here are two to look out for:
- http://www.auspcmarket.com.au/info/KE-FKBN87MC-EFB2/1838/ --- Filco 
Tenkeyless Blue-Cherry with Ninja Keys
- http://www.auspcmarket.com.au/info/KE-FKBN87M-EB2/1838/ --- Filco 
Tenkeyless Brown-Cherry with Regular Keys (slightly quieter).


You can also get them in regular size, but where is the fun in that? The 
ninja keycaps are nice, but you could also perhaps buy the blank ones 
for mad-1337h4x0r-cred.


--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Fancy pants unit testing

[Les Hughes]

Stephen Price wrote:

Hey gurus,

I'm thinking about a unit test that verifies the events raised from
setting properties of viewmodels.  I thought the test could load each
assembly in my solution, set each property that has a setter (in turn)
and check how many times the NotifyPropertyChanged event (for
Silverlight UI bindings) and fail the test if it raises more than
once.

The reason I'd like to test this is because we're using a tool called
Notify Property Weaver, which injects the necessary code into the
assembly and wires up the RaisePropertyChanged events. Sometimes
however, it's forgotten and developers add in one anyway. This results
in multiple events being raised. Normally you'd think that not much of
an issue but it has resulted in Ids being generated twice and some
other weird funkiness™ going on.

Just thought I'd throw that out there to see what people think.
Wasting my time testing properties? Maybe a fancy iterative bit of
Reflection magic someone has tucked away, waiting to share with me?

cheers,
Stephen
  


Heya Stephen,

First off, if you are using the Weaver, it should be obvious from the 
implemented interface that properties are wired up, so the programmers 
*should* be more careful. Granted that we don't live in the world of should.


One way off the top of my head (I may be wrong) which I believe you 
could test this is, as you mentioned, reflection.


Simply add the objects you want to test to an array of initialised 
objects, and for each object in the array, use reflection to get a list 
of the properties which you can set. For each of those properties, 
create a databinding to a text box, and update the property. Count the 
amount of changes on the text box, and if you get anything different to 
1 change, you have an issue.


An even better way would just be to subscribed to the propertyChanged 
event, and then change each property which has a setter. When 
propertyChanged (or whatever it is) is called, you will be handed a 
propertyField string. Simply add these strings to a 
SortedDictionarystring, int where the int has the count. At the end of 
the test see which properties are not in the sorted dictionary, and see 
which Keys in the sorted dictionary have a value of  1.


I can't be 100% sure this will work, but off the top of my head it seems 
like it would.


Something else you can do is use ILDASM to manually take a look at a few 
classes and see if the notify event is been called twice (or not at all).


Good luck,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

[OT] FYI, Large Dell Monitor Sale (again).

[Les Hughes]

Hi All,

After our monitor discussion a month or so ago, I thought some might 
find this interesting:


http://accessories.ap.dell.com/sna/sna.aspx?c=aucs=aubsd1l=ens=bsd~topic=24-30-monitors

Dell UltraSharp U2711
27Widescreen Monitor
Online Price From$899
Cash Off$225
Discounted Price From$674

Dell UltraSharp U3011
30W Monitor with PremierColour
Online Price From$1,699
Cash Off$510
Discounted Price From$1,189

Now if I could only justify spending the cash to get 3 of the 30 for home!
--
Les 'Not a shill for Dell' Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] FYI, Large Dell Monitor Sale (again).

[Les Hughes]

Tom Gao wrote:

I have 6 x 24 at home

Larger screens are probably better for gaming but interms of simultaneous
applications I think more smaller screens will be better. Took a little
while for my brain to adjust to the 6 monitors.

Now I run virtual desktop so 4 x 6 monitors = 24 monitors... that's how
everyone should work :)
  
While solitaire would be amazing on a large screen, programming is more 
of my game.

Code space is one real estate investment which won't bubble out.
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Colour Returns to Visual Studio 11 User Interface

[Les Hughes]

David Connors wrote:
On Wed, May 9, 2012 at 1:24 PM, Ian Thomas il.tho...@iinet.net.au 
mailto:il.tho...@iinet.net.au wrote:


At a tangent, I hate Metro styling with a passion. Did MH have
anything to do with its adoption?

I couldn't agree more. Metro is shite and should be dropped into a bin 
along with The Ribbon. The fact they are farting around with colour 
selection while you still have to run VS.NET http://VS.NET as 
administrator for some types of development is insane.



I actually like the Ribbon.

Over the past 3 years I've done some heavy MS Office development with 
tight application integration and find that the Ribbon lets me make 
useful and simple interfaces easily.


MS certainly could have done some better work when placing some of the 
functionality when they moved to the ribbon, but overall I think it's 
actually quite decent.


P.S. Friday Flamewar already? :P
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] Detect ADSL modem in use

[Les Hughes]

Ian Thomas wrote:


Don’t ask why …

What would be the best way to programmatically detect the modem in use 
at any particular time?


For the sites under consideration, each modem (different makes) has a 
logon ip of 10.1.1.1 (it’s one of the common addresses that the 
manufacturers use), so I’m thinking that a method might be to start a 
browser process (or open a web page with that address in a form), and 
look for some modem-specific text there).


Or is there a much simpler method not dependent on ad hoc testing of 
modems?




Hi Ian,

Not sure what you are after, BUT:

You could get the gateway address, and using that get the MAC address.

Each Modem should have a different MAC address, so you can determine the 
one in use from that.


--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] Detect ADSL modem in use

[Les Hughes]

David Connors wrote:

Ah right. So if you're after that then build on Les' suggestion.

1. Look at the local PC's IP configuration. Get the default gateway.
2. Issue and ARP request for the MAC address of that IP (fkd if I know 
how you do that in .NET).
3. Send that MAC to your web service. 


If that MAC changes, then they have changed the router.


Step 1: Get the gateway address.

From: 
http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/forums/en-US/netfxnetcom/thread/c4d1a32a-9bde-4178-bb97-acf7be038949


-

using System.Net.Networkinformation

PGlobalProperties ipProperties = IPGlobalProperties.GetIPGlobalProperties();
foreach (NetworkInterface networkCard in 
NetworkInterface.GetAllNetworkInterfaces())

{
   foreach (GatewayIPAddressInformation gatewayAddr in 
networkCard.GetIPProperties().GatewayAddresses)  
   {

   txt_gateip.Text = gatewayAddr.Address.ToString();
   }
}

-

Step 2: Send the machine a message so it's details are in your local arp 
table.


This will do: ping IP.AD.DR.ESS -n 1

Maybe something like this: (not tested)

|using (Process ping = new Process())
   {
   ProcessStartInfo startInfo = ping.StartInfo;
   startInfo.FileName = ping.exe;
   startInfo.Arguments = |IP.AD.DR.ESS -n 1|; // www.example.com
   startInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
   startInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
   ||ping||.Start();

   // here you could check your 'ping.StandardOutput' to see if the ping 
was successful, but who cares?
   }
|


Step 3: Check your ARP table.

This can be done by doing a arp -a in windows. Your output will be 
something like:


Interface: 10.0.2.15 --- 0x10003
 Internet Address  Physical Address  Type
 10.0.2.2  00-12-DE-AD-BE-EF dynamic  


So same deal as above, except run arp.exe with arguments -a

Then foreach line in the output, find the one that starts with your 
gateway IP address, and your MAC (Physical address) is right next to it. 
(split by blankspace/etc)


---

There are a few other ways you can do this with several dlls around, 
which avoids the 'hacky-type' process calls, but this should work, and 
ping.exe and arp.exe have been around and worked for a long time.


Good luck :)

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] Hash collisions

[Les Hughes]

Greg Keogh wrote:


The strings produce quite different MD5 hashes as you would expect, 
but when I XOR “fold” the buffers down I get the same 4 byte result. 
This seems statistically infeasible. Using SHA1 you get collisions 
with 7Fw and X9z. I have a dozen other examples.




Let's say each character in the string: 7Fw. Each character is a byte. 
(could be ASCII, but whatever...)


You are trying to turn 3 bytes (of which there are ~17 million 
combinations) into a 4 byte hash (of which there are ~4 billion 
combinations) using an algorithm which works for strings of near 
infinite length.


This means there is a 1/250 chance (0.4%) that strings of 3 bytes will 
have the same 4 byte hash).


Considering you are only trying 3 characters, and that there could be 1, 
2, 4 1 characters, a 1/250 chance for a length 3 doesn't seem 
that bad.


Long story short: It's interesting, but not surprising.
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] Hash collisions

[Les Hughes]

Les Hughes wrote:

Greg Keogh wrote:


The strings produce quite different MD5 hashes as you would expect, 
but when I XOR “fold” the buffers down I get the same 4 byte result. 
This seems statistically infeasible. Using SHA1 you get collisions 
with 7Fw and X9z. I have a dozen other examples.




Let's say each character in the string: 7Fw. Each character is a 
byte. (could be ASCII, but whatever...)


You are trying to turn 3 bytes (of which there are ~17 million 
combinations) into a 4 byte hash (of which there are ~4 billion 
combinations) using an algorithm which works for strings of near 
infinite length.


This means there is a 1/250 chance (0.4%) that strings of 3 bytes will 
have the same 4 byte hash).
Actually, who needs approximations? 3 bytes into 4 bytes is 1 in 256 (8 
bit!)


Again: while you might want an even distribution, as the hash function 
is trying to do an even distribution over an unknown and unlimited 
string length, a bias such as this for 3 chars is expected.

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: About Validate Email

[Les Hughes]

Joseph Clark wrote:
I'm no expert on this either, but I'm fairly certain that this 
business requirement is simply not achievable. Due to the way mail 
servers operate on the Internet, there is no way for a sender to know 
if an intended recipient address is valid.


An email may go through several mail exchanges before it arrives at 
the one that will ultimately deliver to the user's inbox. At any point 
along the way, the email may be rejected for any variety of reasons 
and this rejection may occur asynchronously.

Hi Muhammad,

While I share a similar view about the requirements as the other 
posters, that what you are trying to do will not be possible as a 100% 
working case.


BUT

Here are a few things you can do:

- Let's say your domain is taxionline.com: set the 'return-to' header 
variable to bou...@taxionline.com


- Have some code which retrieves the bounce@ emails, looking for the 
emails which have 550 errors + the rest of them. Note that some returns 
will be Out of Office replies and so-forth. Here is some java code 
which helps sort emails by category: 
http://javaclue.blogspot.com.au/2009/09/detect-bounced-emails-part-2.html


As others have noted, there are (at least) the following issues:
- Your email might be rejected as spam by a server somewhere between you 
and the end mail server

- When the email is dropped, you might not get any confirmation.
- Any confirmation can take a long time to come back, making the whole 
exercise pointless.

- Bounces might not be to standard, meaning you miss them.
- Classifying an innocent email as a bounce would be disastrous for any 
legitimate user of your service.
- While I don't know your business case, it seems automating this might 
be problematic in terms of how you deal with it, and something like an 
SMS/Phone confirmation (while also having inherent issues) might be 
something else to consider.


Regardless, good luck :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

P.S. For those interested, here is a good regular expression for email 
validation:


(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:(?:(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t]
)+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|(?:[^\\r\\]|\\.|(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t]))*(?:(?:
\r\n)?[ \t])*)(?:\.(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(
?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|(?:[^\\r\\]|\\.|(?:(?:\r\n)?[ 
\t]))*(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*))*@(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\0

31]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|\[([^\[\]\r\\]|\\.)*\
](?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*)(?:\.(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+
(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|\[([^\[\]\r\\]|\\.)*\](?:
(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*))*|(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z
|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|(?:[^\\r\\]|\\.|(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t]))*(?:(?:\r\n)
?[ \t])*)*\(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:@(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\
r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|\[([^\[\]\r\\]|\\.)*\](?:(?:\r\n)?[
\t])*)(?:\.(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)
?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|\[([^\[\]\r\\]|\\.)*\](?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t]
)*))*(?:,@(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[
\t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|\[([^\[\]\r\\]|\\.)*\](?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*
)(?:\.(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t]
)+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|\[([^\[\]\r\\]|\\.)*\](?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*))*)
*:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*)?(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+
|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|(?:[^\\r\\]|\\.|(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t]))*(?:(?:\r
\n)?[ \t])*)(?:\.(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:
\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|(?:[^\\r\\]|\\.|(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t
]))*(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*))*@(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031
]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|\[([^\[\]\r\\]|\\.)*\](
?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*)(?:\.(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?
:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|\[([^\[\]\r\\]|\\.)*\](?:(?
:\r\n)?[ \t])*))*\(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*)|(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?
:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|(?:[^\\r\\]|\\.|(?:(?:\r\n)?
[ \t]))*(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*)*:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:(?:(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] 
\000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|(?:[^\\r\\]|

\\.|(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t]))*(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*)(?:\.(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:[^()
@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|
(?:[^\\r\\]|\\.|(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t]))*(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*))*@(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t]
)*(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\
.\[\]]))|\[([^\[\]\r\\]|\\.)*\](?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*)(?:\.(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?
:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[
\]]))|\[([^\[\]\r\\]|\\.)*\](?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*))*|(?:[^()@,;:\\.\[\] \000-
\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])+|\Z|(?=[\[()@,;:\\.\[\]]))|(?:[^\\r\\]|\\.|(
?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t]))*(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*)*\(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t])*(?:@(?:[^()@,;
:\\.\[\] \000-\031]+(?:(?:(?:\r\n)?[ \t

Re: [OT] Weather data

[Les Hughes]

Greg Keogh wrote:


After an interminable search I found something dead simple, but which 
is heading towards what I was after. Try this in your browser:


http://www.google.com/ig/api?weather=Moorabbin

I was surprised to find that it knew this was my local area, not 
somewhere in the USA. As this article explains 
http://blog.programmableweb.com/2010/02/08/googles-secret-weather-api/, 
it’s either unofficial or not released yet. The resulting xml is a bit 
inconsistent, but it’s okay for now until I finding something better. 
I forgot about this web site: http://www.programmableweb.com/ which is 
a good jump off point.


I’m reading the google xml with a WebRequest GetResponse stream and I 
had my app using it in 10 minutes.


Greg


Heya Greg,

That xml file looks good. You can also scrape the data from ninemsn or 
weatherzone.com.au


The BOM is also a really good source.

Something else worth looking at is metar information. It's airport 
weather information done by local weather stations and used by pilots. 
An example for Moorabbin is this:


http://www.airservicesaustralia.com/brief/html.asp?/cgi-bin/avreq?p01=ymmb

(if you are ever at the airport there, you can see the weather station 
about 30 meters south of the control tower).


Weather information is in predictable formats with METAR METAR YMMB 
281230Z AUTO 04002KT  // NCD 14/13 Q1019 being an example.


How to read a metar 
http://www.studentpilot.com/training_aids/ground_school/article.php?ground_school_id=20

This is maybe overkill, but I thought you might find it interesting :)

Good luck :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] My new monitor is unreadable

[Les Hughes]

David Kean wrote:


I purchased the HP ZR30w – lovely monitor, although I am on the second 
one (the first one had a defect where it would flicker). I only 
purchased this end of last year, but I paid over $1300US at the time.



Just had a quick look @ pricing, and FYI:

US$849 
http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=uscs=04l=ens=bsdsku=224-8284redirect=1



AU$719

http://accessories.ap.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=aul=ens=dhscs=audhs1sku=210-31399~ck=bncat~bk=gr:CategoryRec_Default,g:RecentPopular,rk:


--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] My new monitor is unreadable

[Les Hughes]

David Connors wrote:
U3011 is $1600 bucks which means probably 1400 or less through your 
account rep. I would love them but it starts getting a bit exe when 
you're putting them at work, home, and remote customer sites where you 
work. :)

Yep.

I've got 2 x 24 (1080) at one client site, and using them after the 27 
feels like I'm programming on a mobile phone (well... not quite).


I find the 27 to be pretty darn big, and I fear that the 30 would be 
too much. Any word on that?


Stephen Price wrote:
and at work I've got 2 x 17 monitors (plus the laptop screen). Had 
monitors on order since I started here 3 months ago and still don't 
have them. Internal ordering nightmare.

ಠ_ಠ

Government?

I don't want to play a game of first world problems but from a 
productivity point of view over 3 months, dropping even $500 on 2 x 24 
would make a world of difference. Getting 2 x Dell 27 would also be a 
cheap option.


Oh the humanity!
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] Sample projects for 'testing' Reaction Time

[Les Hughes]

Ian Thomas wrote:


An OT “project” of mine.

A friend has Parkinson’s disease, and is getting the jitters. He was a 
senior manager in a major IT corporation (he is not a programmer, did 
some FORTRAN for his MSc, years ago – but he’s smart enough). About a 
year ago wrote for himself a simple reaction time (mouse response to 
some cue appearing on screen) in MS Excel (VBA), but he would like to 
do some .NET programming, and also write something more appropriate 
for his condition.


I have seen a few things on CodeProject that might be adaptable, but 
most are too elaborate (games, which assume super-quick reaction time 
but also are too involved in terms of story line, graphics, etc).


Over time, I would be grateful if anyone on the list can just post a 
URL that I can have a look at. I’ve got him working with VS2008 
Express, but might need to use a more capable / more recent IDE.


(Those of you who are aware of tests for behavioural neuroscience may 
know that this is a reasonably involved area of research and testing, 
*but* is also a very fertile area for internet money-raking, by 
individuals whose ethical behaviour is similar to those advertising 
p3nis enlargement!)


Thanks – it would be good to get a few tips.



Ian Thomas
Victoria Park, Western Australia



Hi Ian,

Just an idea which came to me, not sure if it is much use (at least in 
the short term), but it seems like a game similar to tetris (maybe even 
a simpler version with only 3 or 4 shapes) might be good for testing 
reaction times. You can graph the average response time from when a 
shape appears to where it is placed, and see how it goes as the game 
gets faster. Obviously this will not give good results after one game 
(because reaction times will also depend on what shapes you have at the 
bottom and ability to problem solve), but I think the data gained over 
the longer term can show trends and averages/etc.


Also maybe a game that shows you three images, where two are the same 
and one is different, and using left, down, right on the arrowpad you 
need to select the one that doesn't match. You could once again keep the 
data and graph this over the long term.


Anyway, good luck, and I'd be interested to here any progress.

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [Friday OT] unstoppable force meets an immovable object,

[Les Hughes]

Arjang Assadi wrote:

Apologies, it was development database not test, the test server and
production database/server had identical rights,
Wouldn't want any rights on the production server ! That is one place
left to the powers to be for good.

Regards

Arjang


Get a rouge box on the network with VMWare and set up a shadow network. 
A wireless router can also help if the wired network is a little 
discriminatory.


Fight the power!
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Generics/Type question

[Les Hughes]

Hey all,

It's kind of difficult to explain what I am looking to do, and it might 
seem a little wacky, but here goes a simplified version of the question


I've got some lists of data in a database which I have a GenericList 
interface for (from the database), so no matter what type of data is in 
the DB, it has a way of displaying it as a GenericList.


Each bit of data can be loaded into a data cache by using:

public void loadDataT(vars) where T : GenericList

To load lots of data at once I would do this

void someMethod()
{
   ClassType vars = new ClassType();

   loadDataName.Space.Settings(vars); // load settings
   loadDataName.Space2.CatPictures(vars); // load cat pictures
   loadDataName.Space2.OtherMemes(vars); // load other memes
}


What I am wondering if I can do something like this: (obviously the code 
below isn't valid, but it should illustrate what I am trying to do)


void someMethod()
{

   Type[] typeArray = new type[]{ Name.Space.Settings, 
Name.Space2.catPictures, Name.Space2.otherMemes };

   ClassType vars = new ClassType();
  
   for (int i = 0; i  typeArray.length; i++)

   {
   loadDatatypeArray[i](vars); // load each one of those types
   }
}

-

Any ideas? Thanks heaps :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] how to convert Unix man to useful text

[Les Hughes]

Ian Thomas wrote:


Can someone tell me - How can I convert a unix man file to text 
readable under Windows? (w/o installing Cygwin) – it’s not just the 
line endings that need to be handled.


http://www.cogsci.ed.ac.uk/~richard/rxp.txt 
http://www.cogsci.ed.ac.uk/%7Erichard/rxp.txt


rxp is an xml checker (I’m just curious about it), no docs except this 
file.




Get a *nix user on the list to do it?

:)

cat rxp.txt | col -b  rxpFixed.txt

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au
RXP(1)  RXP(1)



NAME
   rxp - XML parser program

SYNOPSIS
   rxp [ -abemnNRsStvVx ] [ -o b|p|0|1|2|3|i|d ] [ U 0|1|2 ] [ -c encoding
   ] [ url ]

DESCRIPTION
   rxp reads and parses XML from the url (or standard  input  if  none  is
   provided)  and writes it to standard output, optionally expanding enti-
   ties, defaulting attributes, and  translating  to  a  different  output
   encoding.

   rxp  accepts  XML  1.0  and  1.1, and the corresponding versions of XML
   namespaces.  It implements the Oasis XML catalog specification.

   Common option combinations are -Nxs  to  check  a  document  for  well-
   formedness  and  namespace well-formedness, and -VNxs to also check for
   DTD-validity.

OPTIONS
   -a Insert declared default values for omitted attributes.

   -v Be verbose.

   -V Validate the document.  Repeating this option will make the pro-
  gram  treat  validity errors as well-formedness errors, and exit
  after the first validity error  (otherwise  a  warning  will  be
  printed for each one).

   -d Read  the  whole DTD (internal and external parts) regardless of
  any standalone declaration.   Otherwise  a  declaration  stand-
  alone='yes'  will  prevent  the  external  part from being read
  (unless validation is selected).

   -N Enable XML namespace support.  The document will be checked  for
  correct namespace syntax, and if -b is specified  qualified ele-
  ment and attribute names will be displayed with their URIs.

   -R The value of this flag is a time limit in seconds,  after  which
  the  program  will abort.  This is to protect against denial-of-
  service attacks using malicious documents.

   -S Keep track of xml:space attributes.  This will only affect  out-
  put when -b is specified.

   -e Obsolete, do not use.

   -E Do not expand entity references (opposite of old -e flag)

   -s Be  silent  (that is, suppress output).  Useful for benchmarking
  or if you just want to see the error messages.

   -b Print output as bits.

   -n Treat the  input  as  normalised  SGML  rather  than  XML.   Not
  intended for general use.

   -o If  this  flag is p, output is in the default (plain) format. If
  it is b, output is printed as bits (equivalent to  -b). If
  it is 0, output is suppressed (equivalent to -s).  If it is 1, 2
  or 3, output is in first, second or third canonical form.  If it
  is  i,  output is a dump of the document's infoset.  If it is d,
  output is in a form suitable for use with diff; in  particular
  attributes are sorted into alphabetical order.

   -m Merge  PCData  across  entity references.  This will only affect
  the output when -b is specified.

   -t Read in the input as a tree, rather than bits.  Should  make  no
  difference to the output.

   -u base_uri
  Use the specified base URI when resolving system identifiers.

   -U This  flag  controls  Unicode normalization checking and is only
  relevant when parsing XML 1.1 documents.  If it is 0, no  check-
  ing  is done.  If it is 1, rxp checks that the document is fully
  normalized as defined by the W3C character model.  If it  is  2,
  the document is checked and any unknown characters (which may be
  ones corresponding to a newer version of Unicode than rxp  knows
  about) will also cause an error.

   -x Strict  XML  mode.   This  suppresses  some  warnings (eg entity
  redefinitions) but treats  all  XML  well-formedness  errors  as
  fatal.   This  flag  implies  the  -a  flag, and sets the output
  encoding to UTF-8 unless the -c flag is given.  It sets the out-
  put  format to first canonical form unless the -o, -b or -s flag
  is given.

   -c encoding
  Produce output  in  the  specified  character  encoding.   Known
  encodings  include  ISO-8859-1, UTF-8, ISO-10646-UCS and UTF-16.
  16-bit encoding names my be suffixed

Re: HEADS UP: Fwd: Microsoft: Windows Azure - Activation Benefits

[Les Hughes]

Tony Wright wrote:


I seem to get calls from large corporate like Telstra, Big Bank, Big 
Insurance suggesting they can do me a better deal etc. Then they ask 
you to verify your identity. I hate this, and refuse to do it.


I usually say, give me your extension and I will call the switch and 
get put through to you. The funny thing is, they usually complain 
about this, although it usually turns out that they are legitimate.


The scary thing is, anyone could call you with the same spiel and many 
people would gladly give up their details, including passwords!


But the important thing is to find out the phone number independently 
of the person calling, then call their switch and get put through – 
otherwise you have no idea who you are talking to.


T.



Every now and then various organisations that I have accounts with will 
ring me up trying to sell me some new 'fantastic' product, but before 
they can reveal said product they forcefully ask for the verification of 
personal details. I love revealing private details before I can hear a 
sales pitch.


Although I am somewhat security conscious (can hack gibsons via TCP139 
BSOD), I'm generally just as lazy/vulnerable as most. Dependant on how I 
am feeling about the call I sometimes ask the caller to validate who 
they are before I hand over my precious details. Usually this request is 
met with absolute confusion by the other party which is further 
increased by my stipulation that they could be an organised gang of 
international digital thieves wanting information in order to transfer 
my far-superior Farmville assets to their flailing and baron 
agricultural endeavour. All they wanted to do was upgrade my credit card.


I once had someone from AMEX ask me to validate the phone number that 
they just called me on. What is the expected result? Yes, you caught me 
out, I actually robbed Les, stole his phone and still have it turned on. 
I would have also enrolled him in your extended insurance plan had you 
not foiled me with your infallible test tripping me on my ability to 
work out caller ID.


Anyway, the point of this rant is to show that most organisations still 
are not well equiped when it comes to security, and Joe Citizen hasn't 
progressed much either. While we as a populace have mostly built up 
resistance to Nigerian Princes contacting you because it's easier to 
give you $10 million than to deal with the banks, your average scam has 
progressed perhaps at a better pace than user education or technological 
counter-measures. One scenario could be where they already obtained 
enough of your details to convince you of their identity, another could 
be where they have put in great efforts to make their spoof attempts to 
look legit sometimes even taking advantage of XSS to give you an almost 
100% genuine experience.


I'm an IT professional and sometimes find it hard to tell the difference 
between the legit and the not so much. The hinderance of watching my 
details to be frustrating at the best of times especially given the lack 
of detail-request-protocols from businesses, so what hope is there for 
others?


The whole thing is just another 'pro' on my list for becoming Amish.
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] SMS Gateways

[Les Hughes]

Kirsten Greed wrote:


Hi All

Can anyone recommend an SMS Gateway, so that I can write apps that 
send text messages?


Thanks

Kirsten



I'm using MyNetPhone for testing of an app right now. Their API is 
fairly easy, just a HTTP Post request. It's 15cents per message, so when 
I go live I'll certainly be shopping around.


For a few messages per month though, it's decent.

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Editing DOCX (mail-merge) and DOCX - PDF

[Les Hughes]

Hi All,

I currently have a legacy app which uses an Access database to do a 
mail-merge with Word 2003. Due to upgrades, all of the Access 03 stuff 
is getting its last rights. Since we are now SQL server with security, 
mail-merges are a little harder than before, and not really practical. 
(but maybe I'm missing something?)


A few questions:

- Any good advise/links on how to do a similar thing to mail-merges?
- I've been playing around with using System.Packaging to unzip the docx 
and find/replace on the merge fields.


I'd like to be able to export the docx file to PDF without having Word 
on the machine, I've had a look at Aspose.Words and it seems pricey for 
what I want to do (docx-pdf on multiple client sites = ~$3000). Does 
anyone have any advice or experience with one product over another?


I'm not 100% sure about what I am trying to do yet, so any 
info/stories/links/whatever would be appreciated.


Thanks :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Set property of texbox by name

[Les Hughes]

James Chapman-Smith wrote:

Hi David,

What do you mean by incredibly slow? How many buttons are we talking about?

I just did a test with 1000 buttons and it took 3.47 milliseconds. With 5000 
buttons it was 16.78 milliseconds.

Did I miss something?

Cheers.

James.
  


I'm with you James.

I usually do something like (psuedoish)

foreach (Control c in this.Controls)
{
   Button b = c as Button;
   if (b != null)
   {
   if (b.Name.ToString().ToLower().Trim() = foo) b.Text = bar;
   }
}

I have no issues with speed. I also do this recursively with no issues 
for controls in controls/etc.


--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.a,u

Re: [ot] Junior dotnet/web programmer required to start yesterday!

[Les Hughes]

Michael Ridland wrote:
Can we ban this spammer please? 


I think the general consensus from a while ago that posting jobs is 
okay, as long as it's not recruiters.


Given that, the gmail address and name listed in this case don't inspire 
a great deal of confidence.

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: unit testing gone mad

[Les Hughes]

Tristan Reeves wrote:

Hi list,
I'll describe the situation in as little detail as possible.

There's some code in which a class BaseClass, and a class ClassForUse 
: BaseClass are defined.


BaseClass is used in a unit test that calls its constructor with mocks.
ClassForUse is used in production with a 0-param constructor which 
calls the base constructor with hard-coded arguments.


Forgetting (for now) any issues with all this (and to me there are 
plenty), we then find the following unit test:


[Setup]
var _instance = new ClassForUse();

[Test]
Assert.That(_instance is BaseClass);

...to me this is totally insane. But I seem unable to articulate 
exactly the nature of the insanity.


A little further on we have (pseudocode)
[Test]
Assert _instance._MemberOne is of type A
Assert _instance._MemberTwo is of type B
Assert _instance._MemberThree is of type C

where the members are (if not for the tests) private members set by 
the 0-param constructor which pushed them into the base constructor. 
(all hard coded).


So...is this really insane, or is it I who am crazy?? It's made more 
perplexing to me because the author of this code says it's all a 
natural result of TDD. And I am far from a TDD expert.


I would love some feedback about this Modus Operandi. esp. any refs. 
It seems obviously wrong, and yet I am unable to come up with any 
definitive argument.


Thanks,
Tristan.


Heya,

I'm no TDD ninja so I can't really speak for convention/etc, but it 
seems the test is making sure that the derived class is a child of the 
parent class, and then goes on to the compiler/language features more 
than the actual functionality of the code itself, which could be argued 
as somewhat unnecessary.

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Friday! Resign Patters... [an extension of Design Patterns]

[Les Hughes]

It's Friday, Friday, Friday. Tomorrow is Saturday, Saturday, Saturday: 
Developer, Developer Developer day (melb)


Anyway.

Resign Patterns!
http://fuzz-box.blogspot.com/2011/05/resign-patterns.html

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

More Friday Fun [was: Re: Govt .net jobs?]

[Les Hughes]

David Connors wrote:
On Fri, May 20, 2011 at 11:57 AM, DotNet Dude adotnetd...@gmail.com 
mailto:adotnetd...@gmail.com wrote:


Wikipedia is taking the piss itself with this quote from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taking_the_piss


Definitely wasn't written by an Aussie.


Not enough 'crikey's and 'mate's in the article, ay, crikey mate!

Something else for Friday...

I've flying Jetstar from Hobart to Melbourne on Sunday, and I just had 
my boarding pass emailed to me saying Please print the attached PDF. 
There is no PDF attached (apparently their systems have the same 
forgetful habits we do?). When I rang them up to ask 'bleh?' I was put 
on hold, hearing one message saying something similar to ... Jetstar 
travels to many exiting countries such as Australia, Vietnam, Hawaii, 
The Philippines...


Why is everything so hard?
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] Visual Studio 2010 Premium Edition

[Les Hughes]

Greg Keogh wrote:

Oh well, it seems that the Harris price is on the low end for SAO MSDN Premium 
with VS2010, so I've begrudgingly paid for the upgrade so I can get the Office 
and Expression suites and kits on top of the SDKs, DBs and OSs (I'm begrudged 
because for the same price I can get a week long holiday on 5-star private 
island resort in Fiji). The subscription is petty cash for a large company, but 
it hurts a bit when you're a one man business. However my wife reminded me that 
it's a tax deduction so I would feel better -- Greg
  
What about our Fiji.NET 1.5 week conference at the Hyatt Suva, where we 
have daily development talks situated at the bar in the swimming pool?


:))
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: In Melbourne in June, who's interested in a geek dinner?

[Les Hughes]

Greg Keogh wrote:


I’m back in Melbourne for 4 weeks starting 10^th June. Anyone 
interested in getting together for a geek dinner/drinks?


Just try and keep me away from any dinner and drinks! Let us know 
when, when you know-- Greg



Yep. Keep us all updated :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] Visual Studio 2010 Premium Edition

[Les Hughes]

Greg Keogh wrote:


Folks, my MSDN Pro level subscription will expire in a few weeks I was 
considering upgrading from the Pro to the Premium level so I can get 
the Expression and Office suites. I went to Harris Technology where I 
bought my last subscription two years ago for about $1500, and that 
price has barely changed. I saw on the same web page that the Premium 
is $3981. After discussing that price with the misses she determined 
that it was financially acceptable for a two year subscription and how 
much value we’d get from it.


THEN ... I notice that the $3981 price is for a Premium _renewal_. It 
looks like the full price is $9468.



Renewal @ Amazon US$2103.31

http://www.amazon.com/Visual-Studio-2010-Premium-Renewal/dp/B0038KVCYW/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8qid=1304918950sr=8-6

Visual Studio 2010 Premium with MSDN US$4,842.99

http://www.amazon.com/Visual-Studio-2010-Premium-MSDN/dp/B0038KRM6Y/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8qid=1304918950sr=8-4

I am sure there are cheaper options than Amazon, but long story short, 
Australian pricing is a joke, how can a $5k difference be justified!?


Anyway, shop around, and as Stephen said, if microway will price match, 
that seems like a good option.


Good luck :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] TabletPC recommendations

[Les Hughes]

Wallace Turner wrote:

http://www.kogan.com.au/shop/7-inch-tablet-pc-android/

Has anyone got one of these? $150!  (no 3G)
For reading/browsing would suit


I just looked at that site, and there is javascript that increases the 
price by $0.001 per second.


OH NO, THE PRICE IS GOING UP! BETTER BUY NOW!

This is incredibly tacky.
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] Virtual machine alternatives

[Les Hughes]

Adrian Halid wrote:


I use Virtual Box and find there is a very active community with 
regular updates.


 


Very simple to use.

 


Has all the standard features of snapshots etc.

 

Virtual box also has dual monitor support for Guests O/S. I think 
VMWare also does.


 


Another cool feature is Seamless mode.



+1 Virtualbox (along with quite a few others). Also, I've used the dual 
screen stuff, it's certainly decent, it can also do x3, x4, etc.


FYI: I use Ubuntu as my desktop OS running XP VMs for development. Works 
well.


Good luck :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Multiline Text in source code

[Les Hughes]

Anthony wrote:


How do people normally handle a long text string that you create in code

This is what i normally do but was hoping this is an obsolete 
technique? I hate having to esacpe the characters eg the double quotes 
within the quotes!



   POAck.AppendLine(?xml version=1.0 
encoding=UTF-8?)


   POAck.AppendLine(!DOCTYPE cXML SYSTEM 
http://xml.cXML.org/schemas/cXML/1.2.009/cXML.dtd;)


   POAck.AppendLine(cXML payloadID=  Payloadid  
 timestamp=  TimeStamp   xml:lang=en-US)


   POAck.AppendLine(Response)

   POAck.AppendLine(Status code=200 
text=Successful received purchase order..thank you/)


   POAck.AppendLine(/Response)

   POAck.AppendLine(/cXML)

regards

Anthony (*12QWERNB*)




Hi Anthony,

I usually...

[C#]
string multiline = deerppp  +
   derp derp derp herp herp herp derp derp derp herp herp herp derp 
derp derp herp herp herp  +
   rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble 
rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble;


with {\} for quotation if used.

It looks like your example is VB...

dim multiline as string = deerppp   _
   derp derp derp herp herp herp derp derp derp herp herp herp derp 
derp derp herp herp herp   _
   rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble 
rabble rabble rabble rabble rabble;


I don't think you can avoid the multiple quotes () in .NET. In PHP, 
you can use single quotes for strings, then happily use double quotes 
inside, I have no idea what .NET does about this, if anything. (Anyone 
else in the know?)


Herp herp derp,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Synertec...

[Les Hughes]

Stuart Kinnear wrote:

Hi All
 
I have a HP DV7 laptop purchased early on in the year and was 
disgusted to find it would not support 64bit virtualisation. Live and 
learn about the chipset tweaks required !
 
Anyway it has Windoze 7, 4Gb RAM, 2.2 chip  7200rpm drive so in 
reality I thought it should still drive a VMware server 32bit system 
reasonably well. - more than one set of VMware systems running and 
it's a dog running round with two broken legs.
 
So, I think it's time to buy another Laptop  render this one in the 
obsolete box for the kids to play with.
 
I want to avoid draining my brain and coffers any more than necessary: 
can anyone provide useful tips on brand/configuration so I can move 
forward ? 



Hi Stuart,

I was doing a job at Synertec, and saw your name on some code. It was 
the Atomica/AtmDC/Whatver project.


I recognised your name from the list here (although, it's been a while).

Anyway, just thought I'd drop you a line.
Take care,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

I'm not very good at email.

[Les Hughes]

Dear List.

Please disregard my inability to master email. The file explaining why 
is attached :P

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

TFS Feedaback? Anyone moved away from it?

[Les Hughes]

Hi All,

I was just looking to get a little feedback on CVS tools/etc?

I am to start another project with a small team, and was wondering is 
TFS is worth using (I haven't even seen it run yet... wondering if it is 
worth the time...)


Also, has anyone after using TFS decided to go back to subversion/etc? 
If so, why?


Thanks :)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Access Database Replication

[Les Hughes]

Ian Thomas wrote:

Les

You could always suggest some separation of the 'common' info for each
client office, and create additional and separate Melbourne-only and
Singapore-only tables. 


Over years, I've done a lot of migration of databases / info systems to and
from Access. Often, the clients wanted to keep Access front-end (but really
didn't care if it was SQL Server at the 'back', and didn't know whether the
data they 'saw' was in one or several tables). 


There are many ways to do this, depending on the foibles / vagaries /
peculiarities of your clients' environment. 


I wasn't advocating that you just put an Access back-end database file or
two (MDB) up in the sky. It would be sensible to convert the data to SQL
Server format and host the data up there, though. 


What I was suggesting, as you probably deduced, was to use a common location
in the first instance. As you probably realise too, Microsoft has some quite
affordable Azure accounts for micro and small businesses. In short-speak,
SQL Azure.

Just as a recent example article and step-by-step instructions, with some
reasonable links to further explanations at the Microsoft Access Team Blog
and to Azure pricing, try this - 


Microsoft Access and Cloud Computing with SQL Azure Databases (Linking to
SQL Server Tables in the Cloud) 

http://www.fmsinc.com/microsoftaccess/cloud/link-to-azure-sql-database.html 

This does NOT require you to invest in any of FMS products. 


Of course, it would always be open to you to rewrite the front end in .NET
at some stage - essentially keeping it as a desktop application. We're not
talking any great sophistication in architecture or technology here. 


There are of course a growing number of people offering SaaS hanging off
Azure, like Informatica Cloud's Access Integration product - 


http://www.informaticacloud.com/products/cloud-integration-processes/ms-acce
ss-integration.html 

That gives synchronization, replication, backup, etc etc ... at a price. 

Now, your client wouldn't want to pay for that, I'm guessing! 
Thanks for all of the information Ian (and the rest of the list!)... 
it's really helpful. The link you sent is awesome, I'm really wanting to 
have a client app work with Azure, but I am not sure this will be the 
client for that... or perhaps for anything I suggest :/


A lot of the time I get asked to do things which 'seem' simple, but are 
massive pains (such as this case), and because it seems simple We just 
want this to go there, there is the perception that it shouldn't cost 
more than $500. I'm sure many on the list have been here at some point.


Anyway, I've said it before with Office stuff, I'll have to buy you a 
beer (or perhaps 15) at some point.


---

Some comments on Office Development/etc:

Over the last year, I have fallen into a fair amount of work doing VBA 
- .NET stuff, having never messed with Access/VBA/Excel/etc before. In 
many ways, VBA is great, as it allows regular folk to put together their 
own little apps, but these apps grow big and businesses become 
dependant on 50,000 lines of spaghetti code, living in constant fear of 
something going wrong, and watching technological changes slowly shove 
an axe into the back of their app. Five years later, long after the last 
person who knew anything about the internals left the business leaving 
not a shed of documentation, 'simple' changes are needed I think 
this last year of development has aged me about 5 years; and this is 
before you get to the bastard issues/bugs with the Office package. I 
wonder if there are insane asylums decided to maintenance developers?


bleh.
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Access Database Replication

[Les Hughes]

Hi All,

I've got a legacy MSAccess app in VBA which is been used at two separate 
office locations (Melbourne  Singapore), with two separate copies of 
the database.


There is a table with 5,000 rows in it (about 30 columns) which has 
inserts/updates at both offices, and we were looking for some way to 
propagate the changes.


Ideally, we would either migrate the app to .NET/SQL Server (which would 
be fairly expensive... management say 'grrr'), or use RDP and having the 
app on one computer. (which is also for some reason is also 'g')


Based of my knowledge of access/mdb's, there are no triggers, meaning 
the only way we could really track updates is to modify the Access forms 
to update a flag column with a datetime or something similar, and then 
have a batch process move updates every now and then.


This idea seems dirty to me because if someone changes with the tables 
directly, or there are updates around the same time it becomes quite 
messy in keeping a clean dataset/dealing with race conditions/etc.


Long story short:

Has anyone dealt with something similar to this before? Any ideas would 
be appreciated.


Thanks heaps,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Access Database Replication

[Les Hughes]

Craig van Nieuwkerk wrote:

Ideally, we would either migrate the app to .NET/SQL Server (which would be
fairly expensive... management say 'grrr'), or use RDP and having the app on
one computer. (which is also for some reason is also 'g')




Is the cost of SQL due to license issues or redevelopment costs? If it
is a license problem you should look at SQL Express. Free to use and
suits most non enterprise or large scale applications.

Craig.
  


Redevelopment costs I've heard you can throw SQL Express directly on 
the back of an Access App (Access 2003), has anyone had any success with 
this?


Cheers,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Melbourne Nerd Dinner

[Les Hughes]

Tiang Cheng wrote:


Hi All,

Let’s get together for dinner on Thursday night 6:15 for a 6:30pm start.

Pelligrinis 66 Bourke Street.

Just a heads up, that place is really small... and seating is two long 
benches, one on the side wall, one on the counter, maybe 10 metres long 
each!? (not sure exactly) It might not be the best venue for a social thing.


Given that, it's not a bad place for some authentic Italian at a 
reasonable price.


Please RSVP to me by Thursday 12pm so I can make the booking. I’m 
looking forward to meeting you Melbourne dotnetters, and confirming 
firsthand that Silky isn’t a email bot.



I can confirm that silky is real, although, not made of silk.

:)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Access Database Replication

[Les Hughes]

Ian Thomas wrote:

What are the problems of putting the MDB back-end in the cloud (using the
term loosely)? Surely both ends have a permanent always-on internet
connection?
  


I think there is some data they don't want shared between the offices? 
No idea really.


This is one of those scenarios where I am asked questions on a 'need to 
know' basis, so instead of been given the bigger picture and a set of 
conditions in which to form a solution, all I get is a we can't do 
that


Gr :/

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] SQL injection attack vectors

[Les Hughes]

silky wrote:

In fact, I explicitly remember there usually
being a statement on assignments saying that you can assume the input
will be valid.



Well, the lecturer/teacher should specifically be called out on this
as input validation is critically important, as you highlight. It may
not always be their fault, if they are following some course guideline
and just want to get the core stuff done.
  
Note: My comments have nothing to do with anyone/any organisation except 
for myself, and they should be considered as the rantings of a madman.


---

Last year I was part of the teaching staff at Monash Uni for FIT1004  
FIT2010 (Database
http://infotech.monash.edu/units/fit1004/ ), and although security is 
something I am fairly interested in personally, there simply isn't 
enough time in a Semester to get to anything regarding it outside of the 
occasional mention about dodgy user input.


There is quite a bit of theory behind Databases/Data Management, and 
that is before you even get to Queries/PL-SQL 
(Oracle)/Normalisation/etc. Also, due to the nature of IT Courses where 
many students aren't programmer types (Business Information Systems: 
Analysts, etc), techniques regarding SQL Injection/etc would just go 
straight over the heads of the majority.


Many assignments which are given do allow the user to assume valid 
input, but this is because the course is about understanding the 
theories behind each paradigm, not spending hours trawling libraries or 
trying to write regular expressions which account for every user/error 
case. Given that, this year in 1st year, 1st semester Java (Computer 
Programming FIT1002), marks were allocated for handling invalid input, 
and even required in some of the assignments.


Although there are many students who are great programmers, you can't 
expect a university graduate to have any idea on how to write software.



In my not so humble opinion (on this matter), like you suggest, there
is significantly more that should be being done at the University/TAFE
level in regards to secure-programming education. 
Universities can always do more, but it is my believe that universities 
are academic institutions, not vocational ones (there is overlap.. but 
for simplicity...). you are trained in 'Computer Science'/etc, not in 
'programming'. Upon graduation, students should be equipped to think for 
themselves, as well as being able to recognise and solve common 
problems. While Universities definitely have some role in making 
students aware of security (there are masters courses on this exact 
thing, also, there is a 3rd year Advanced Database unit, I am unsure of 
the content), I think it is industry is better equipped to train 
developers for specific/temporal security issues. this should be 
part of the curriculum from an organisation given to a Junior Developer.


One issue which I have experienced personally, is many organisations 
simply do not invest any $$$/time in developing the skills of their 
programmers, nor have any processes for mentoring junior developers.


/rant

:)
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: maybe the greatest day in computer science, proof that p != np?

[Les Hughes]

silky wrote:

I don't see what's good
about destroying someones work, though.
It's fantastic when that happens... progress! I can see why you would 
disagree though Silky, after all, you have the brainpan of a stagecoach 
tilter. (Simpsons reference)


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrenology --- Now dismissed, but some 
people put a lot of their lives into this stuff, and other people 
destroyed their work.

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

[OT] Monash: Research Matters [was: maybe the greatest day in computer science, proof that p != np?]

[Les Hughes]

silky wrote:

I can see why you would
disagree though Silky, after all, you have the brainpan of a stagecoach
tilter. (Simpsons reference)



Oh. there's no doubt that one day I'm going to have to accept my fate
and don the appropriate hat and find a cart ...
  
I have no idea what a 'stagecoach tilter' is... checking google, I was 
able to find one link... it said perhaps an obese person, who would make 
the suspension tilt when aboard!?


On problem solving, Monash University is having a few free events in the 
IT faculty (for 'Research Matters'). There are three different events; 
one which may be of interest to a few people here is:


Solver Patterns for Complex Problems by Professor Mark Wallace

The text from the site:


In planning Victoria's transport network, the government has to decide 
how best to exploit a limited budget to best support our travel and 
transportation needs.  Such planning involves many choices which 
interact with each other.
This talk introduces some ways of combining optimisation techniques 
(which we term solvers) to match the needs of different problem 
classes. This need is motivated by reference to a variety of 
applications from sports scheduling to traffic planning.


The challenge we are addressing is to develop the ultimate solution - 
a match between solver patterns and applications.  This remains a 
major practical and theoretical research question.


Details: Wednesday 18 August, 2010, 5.30 pm arrival for a 6-7 pm 
lecture, 30 Collins Street, Melbourne 3000


Check here for more details, and two other events: (Distributed 
Computing + Overview: Opening Digital Doorways)
http://www.infotech.monash.edu.au/about/news/archive/2010/research-matters-2010.html 



If anyone needs more info/etc, feel free to contact me.

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

[OT] Friday - Recruiters

[Les Hughes]

I was at an Australian (alleged) News site where they have job ads from 
their sister sites/sponsors in one of the columns, one was for a Senior 
.NET Role, so I thought I'd have a sticky beak... The first requirement was:


5-10 years in C#.Net 2.0-3.5

VS2005 release was October 2005, with the 2.0 Framework Redistributable 
made available in Jan 2006


Why why why?
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Open Source .NET CMS?

[Les Hughes]

Hi All,

Can anyone recommend an open source .NET CMS?

Thanks in advance,
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Advice for Data Access - Hibernate/Linq/Fluent/etc

[Les Hughes]

Nic Roche wrote:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vcsharp/bb688085.aspx
 
Nic


http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vcsharp/bb688085.aspx == 
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vbasic/bb688085.aspx


I think the 'vcsharp' and 'vbasic' directories are just virtual dirs 
meant for making more readable/searchable urls.


--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

[OT] Friday - Conway (or.. Labor govt) once again delays Internet Filter

[Les Hughes]

http://www.theage.com.au/technology/technology-news/conroy-backs-down-on-net-filters-20100709-10381.html

Election year anyone?

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: [OT] Friday - Conway (or.. Labor govt) once again delays Internet Filter

[Les Hughes]

Greg Keogh wrote:

I was disappointed several years ago to learn that it's illegal to tell
people not to vote, and perhaps also to tell them to vote for the donkey or
to write your opinion of politicians on the ballot paper instead of ticking
the little boxes. I remember some TV host dipstick comedian girlie made
comments in this area, and on the following weeks show they had to make an
apology for what she said and explain the conundrum.

Although I don't think it's illegal to actually vote for the donkey or write
a poem on the ballot paper, because thanks to the anonymous system we have
they can't track the offender. I also think it's not illegal to be not
registered to vote.

I still have this dream of watching election night and the big tally boards
behind the presenters start racking up the numbers ... 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0.001%
0% 0.0023% 0% etc. I wonder if the Australian constitution could deal with
such a situation where almost no one made a valid vote.

Any legal experts in here? I know we have at least one who writes software
as well.

Greg
  


I'm certainly not an expert (although, I am an avid watcher of Judge 
Judy), but a quick look at the constitution seems to show nothing 
particular about  individual voters. Check 
http://www.comlaw.gov.au/comlaw/comlaw.nsf/440c19285821b109ca256f3a001d59b7/57dea3835d797364ca256f9d0078c087/$FILE/ConstitutionAct.pdf


Taking a quick look around, it appears we are forced to vote via the 
Commonwealth Electoral Act (1918), and I believe there are also state 
acts for state elections (I could be wrong, but I received a fine from 
the VEC once, and I recall it been a state act).


On Federal elections, some info from 
http://www.aec.gov.au/About_AEC/Publications/backgrounders/files/2010-eb-compulsory-voting.pdf


In 1911, the former Act was amended to make enrolment compulsory. In 
1924, to increase voter turnout and reduce party campaign expenditure, 
the Act was amended to make voting at federal elections compulsory.


Somewhere on the site it says $20 for federal elections, and from 
memory, it is $50 for the Victorian state elections, or it might be 0.5 
penalty units. I am not sure. I am pretty sure that it is illegal to 
donkey vote, but the nature of anonymous voting makes it unenforceable 
(until they bring in CSI: Ballot sheets to do DNA matching/etc or not)


I agree with you that voting shouldn't be compulsory, but I think 
because it is, we should add a box that says They are all inferior 
choices. I am pretty sure that box would win.


Anyway, that's enough from me, have a good weekend everyone :P
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Crazy Friday.

[Les Hughes]

Ian Thomas wrote:


 Rx .NET is very cool and quite fun (if this is the Rx you mean)

 if anyone knows somw cool blog posts, code snippets or videos urls
 I would really appreciate them, as the doc's are a bit barren, there 
is a few I have found


Channel9 videos?



http://channel9.msdn.com/

From Wikipedia:
*
*Channel 9* is a Microsoft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft 
community site used to promote conversations among Microsoft's 
customers targeted at Microsoft Windows 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Windows users and developers. 
Channel 9 features video channels, podcasts and screencasts including 
interviews with Microsoft developers about their products, discussion, 
and a wiki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki,^[1] 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channel_9_%28discussion_forum%29#cite_note-wiki-0 
which has been adopted by various Microsoft teams as a way to 
aggregate feedback and respond to issues.


Unfortunately, no **/Eddie/* */McGuire/* 
http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=enclient=firefox-ahs=qSOrls=com.ubuntu:en-US:unofficialei=fbT4S8S2K8GGkAW95aDPCAsa=Xoi=spellresnum=0ct=resultcd=1ved=0CBYQBSgAq=Eddie+McGuirespell=1  
on this channel nine. /s

*
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au
*

Re: natural language processing

[Les Hughes]

silky wrote:

I don't suppose any of you have done any work in this area, have you?
If so, what sort?

  


I haven't worked in this area, but there is plenty around check out 
Professor Graeme Hirst  ( http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~gh/ ) from the 
University of Tronto who specialises in Computer Linguistics ( 
http://www.cs.toronto.edu/compling/Research/research.html )...

Bio:

Graeme Hirst is a professor of computer science at the University of 
Toronto, whose research covers a broad but integrated range of topics 
in computational linguistics and natural language understanding.He is 
the author of two monographs: Anaphora in Natural Language 
Understanding and Semantic Interpretation and the Resolution of 
Ambiguity. Hirst has received two awards for excellence in teaching, 
and has supervised graduate students in more than 35 theses and 
dissertations, four of which have been published as books. 


He gave a talk at Monash last month about some of his research. Also, 
somewhat to do with lingustics, is a another talk this Wednesday

Title:

To Search, Perchance to Find: Enhanced Information Access over
Troubleshooting-oriented Web User Forum Data

Date: Wednesday 26th May 2010
Time: 2:00pm
Venue: Seminar Room 26/135 Clayton School of IT, Monash University

Speaker:

Timothy Baldwin
University of Melbourne

Abstract:

The ILIAD (Improved Linux Information Access by Data Mining) Project is an
attempt to apply language technology to the task of Linux troubleshooting by
analysing the underlying information structure of a multi-document text
discourse and improving information delivery through a combination of
filtering, document categorisation, discourse analysis and information
extraction techniques. In this talk, I will outline the overall project design
and present results for a variety of sub-tasks.


Bio:

Tim Baldwin is an Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science
and Software Engineering, University of Melbourne and a contributed research
staff member of the NICTA Victoria Research Laboratories. He will be visiting
the Monash Faculty of Information Technology throughout May, and has
previously held visiting positions at the University of Washington, University
of Tokyo, University of Saarland, and NTT Communication Science
Laboratories. His research interests cover topics including deep linguistic
processing, multiword expressions, deep lexical acquisition, computer-assisted
language learning, information extraction and web mining, with a particular
interest on the interface between computational and theoretical
linguistics. Current projects include web user forum mining, information
personalisation in museum contexts, biomedical text mining, online linguistic
exploration, and intelligent interfaces for Japanese language learners.

Tim completed a BSc(CS/Maths) and BA(Linguistics/Japanese) at the University
of Melbourne in 1995, and an MEng(CS) and PhD(CS) at the Tokyo Institute of
Technology in 1998 and 2001, respectively. Prior to commencing his current
position at the University of Melbourne, he was a Senior Research Engineer at
the Center for the Study of Language and Information, Stanford University
(2001-2004).

Contact:
Ingrid Zukerman


School Seminar Co-ordinator:
David Albrecht

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Crazy Friday.

[Les Hughes]

Did a Friday just pass with not only no craziness, no arguments, but no 
posts at all?


Maybe Thursday is the new Friday, and everyone stayed in bed today
--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: How To do something every so often

[Les Hughes]

silky wrote:

I still think Bill's answer was superior, as it also accounts for multiple
threads/etc (although, not required in this case).  Second to that would be
a (if blah  rah; print thing; blah = 0) ...as your tests indicated.



You are crazy.
  

Reality can seem that way to some.


On hard to read/complexity/whatver... I would argue that for a seasoned
developer, using boolean logic isn't anything tricky, nor hard to read when
used appropriately. If the hex figure scares you a little, you can throw it
into calc.exe to get the value, or even just comment it in.



Your argument would be ridiculous.
  

 according to you.

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: Adelaide CodeCampSA 24-25th July - Call for presenters, Sponsors

[Les Hughes]

Peter Griffith wrote:


*cid:image001.jpg@01CAEFCE.4FF1AB60***

* *

* *

*Adelaide CodeCampSA 2010 – 24-25^th July –Call for Presenters, Sponsors*

http://www.codecampsa.com.au



404.

http://www.codecampsa.com/

--
Les Hughes
l...@datarev.com.au

Re: How To do something every so often

[Les Hughes]

Bill McCarthy wrote:

I'd guess that in a tight loop it would probably be slightly faster to reset
the counter rather than continually get the modulus, eg:

counter+=1

If (counter And H2000) = H2000 Then 
  ' every 8192

   counter = 0
End If

By resetting you also don't need to worry about integer overflows etc. 
  


+1 this way.

For 100,000

If (counter And H186A0) = H186A0 Then 


' every 100,000
  counter = 0
End If