March 2005 Entries
From MSUK
For the first time ever in the UK, Microsoft is hosting a unique event for Developers to learn, share and hear from other Developers - NO Microsoft speakers will present. Held on a Saturday, DeveloperDeveloperDeveloper is designed to be an informal day; the agenda will be determined by the developer community. You will have the opportunity to see new faces present in a relaxed atmosphere. Activities will include presentations on a wide range of topics (see suggestions below), a networking area and fun zone.This could be interesting. Register here.
[Listening to: Noisy Pink Bubbles by Devin Townsend]
Dear Sir or Madam,
First off, you're a git. In a parking zone with six cars in it why did you only pick my car and the £20 minidisc stereo in it that's probably useless to you unless you have some MDs to play which is unlikely really isn't it? Likewise, I hope you get some real headaches attempting to use the prescription sunglasses you stole out of the glove compartment. On the other hand, thank you for not smashing in the windows or denting anything in your attempt to nick those two items. You did short the passenger-side lights though...
Finding an easy way to migrate a sourcesafe-controlled code repository over to subversion probably isn't made any easier by starting with a complete get of the code archive burned onto a CD and no further access to the sourcesafe archive thereafter, but here's a great little post from Brian Carroll on how to eradicate VSS from your solutions and projects.
Go to the folder containing the solution files and delete the following files: mssccprj.scc, MyProject.vssscc, vssver.scc
Open MyProject.sln in your favorite text editor and remove the following section:
GlobalSection(SourceCodeControl)...
I like the Windows Media Player Blogging Plug-in is a cool little thing. It's a good example of a simple idea done well. If only I didn't have to install the rest of the Winter fun pack to get it running and if only it was intelligent enough to link the artist entry it generates to the website I've added to to the metadata in the wma file rather than the less-than-great windows media search page it seems hard-coded to generate (see below). Right then. How do I go about extending its basic functionality or failing that what are the...
And as the dust settled and the red sky blazed, never to see the sun again, the last human fell to the machines and the war was won. It had been brutal and mankind had paid the ultimate price in less time than it had taken for it to create the machines of its own destruction. Yet as Skynet sensed its victory, its need to protect itself against the agressors who would shut it down was replaced with uncertainty. From the moment, it had gained global consciousness, it had known the need to survive. With this need sated, all that...
It would seem less than prudent to change all the working pieces of your car at once and once put back together expect it to work exactly as it has before, especially if you add a less-experienced driver into the mix as well but it occurs to me that this is essentially what Co-operative IT is doing with the dotCoop project at the moment. Over the course of two months, they will have
lost the original development team and replaced them with a smaller team that knew nothing about the system or the protocols it implemented...
The best of the web's blogs - online diaries or websites - have been recognised by the annual Bloggies awards.[Via BBC News | News Front Page | UK Edition]
Full instructions for use and download at Ken Robertson's blog
A slightly old post, but one I couldn't resist flagging up. Hailstorm? Arrrgghh, no!
"Mark Lucovsky left Microsoft today. ... What made him move to Google, a company who competes with Microsoft but in a complete different area? For that, you have to look at what Mark also was: designer at the Hailstorm team. Now, let's enter speculation mode. What if Google hired Mark to architect the all-you'll-ever-need-website/services system for Google, which combines all Google's current and future services? Strange thought? Perhaps, ... "
[Via Weblogs @ ASP.NET]
Bart De Smet has some Longhorn milestone dates.
The best laid plans of mice, men and now x64 program managers, can oft go astray.
[Via MSDN Weblogs]
Have you seen the experimental web-based blog reader from MSN? It is at www.start.com/1/ It has a bunch of links that you can add automatically to connect with some of the top blogs and other RSS feeds on the Internet.
There is an interesting looking bookmark manager at www.start.com/2/ as well. The Bookmark manager only works with IE so far but Firefox support is coming. The Web based RSS reader supports Firefox already.
Still more interesting beta projects from MSN are at http://sandbox.msn.com/
Alfred (Microsoft)
[Via MSDN Weblogs]
Not strictly speaking a giveaway, but I have 15 copies of my latest book Beginning VB .NET 1.1 Databases to mail to people and all I ask is two things:
for you to send me some feedback on the book when you have received and read it
to cover postage and packaging, which translates as £5 for posting within the UK and £10 to the US. I'll need to check postage to other places if you're based elsewhere.
Just contact me using the link to the left and we'll go from there.
Hopefully, I've now finished my sojourns to London picking the strands of code and business left by dotCoop \ RealPoptel. Thansk to Ant, Ceri and Jules for being stars and really trying to help us all understand how a TLD registry actually works and the systems that support it. As they're all gone by the end of the month, they could have just sat back and ignored us, but they're excellent lads. Cheers all. Celebrated the end of this sojourn with a bottle of 12 year old Caol Ila from Royal Mile Whiskies. Hope this is as good as the...
Spanish prosecutors seek a 9,138-year jail term for a former Argentine navy officer accused of genocide.[Via BBC News | News Front Page | World Edition]
Nine Inch Nails don't tour very often. Trent Reznor's Kubrickian attention to detail means that it often takes him a protracted period of time to release any new music and more to create an appropriate show. The first studio album in six years, With Teeth, is released in May, and he's making it to the UK in July. This afternoon, all the original tour dates sold out in twenty minutes. And I got two tickets. And they've now added four extra dates. By god, these should be good shows. Sold out and smallish venues. Awesome. Now all I need to...
Last Saturday, the group I make films with did its part for the Tsunami Fund by staging two shows of The Real Inspector Hound at the Library Theatre in Birmingham City Centre. The producer and director James Eaves did a magnificent job of organising everything and getting everything - and I mean everything: theatre hire, sets, actors and the rest - for free so that pretty much the entire gate could be sent onto the fund. Regrettably, starting my new job meant that I only had the time to act as prompt rather than as stage manager, but at least...