April 2006 - Posts
I had a great time at CodeCampOz this year. Geoff (Gringo) Appleby and I drove up together and had a really good chat on the trip.
Of the sessions that I really enjoyed, first up was Windows Workflow Foundation by Dan Green. This was a really good presentation and Dan obviously knows his stuff. Unfortunately there was only so much that could be fit into the hour and WF is a big topic. I'm keen to learn a lot more about this one.
Introduction to WinFS by Chris Hewitt was an interesting glimpse at the next file system to be released. I am looking forward to seeing how this new system goes when it is released. I think the greatest thing that will come out of this database driven file system will be some amazing file searching capabilities. Being database driven, this will no doubt mean many 3rd party searching programs will be developed.
Intro to Windows Presentation Framework by Joseph Cooney and Charles Sterling and More advanced concepts in WPF by Joseph Cooney & Deepak Kapoor were two great sessions about this cool technology. I think that WPF along with ClickOnce will be the two main technologies that push the industry towards smart client software rather than the current focus on internet based development. Out of everything presented, WPF is what I get most excited about for future development.
Intro to Vista Development Features by Darren Neimke was a very enjoyable session about what developers can expect from working with Vista. While Mitch attempted to start some fights in several of his sessions, this session by Darren probably sparked the greatest reaction from people. It seems that developers are not liking the security restrictions that they will face when developing with Vista. I am looking forward to developing on Vista and using the new UI controls being released with it. Doing .Net development on Vista with the next version of Visual Studio along with WPF, WCF and WF should be a really fun experience.
Introduction to LINQ by Mitch Denny was a good overview of LINQ and how this technology can be used. The parts of this session that I found most interesting were the discussions around the design and implementation of LINQ across the languages.
I found Services Consulting - Tips & Tricks by Dave Lemphers very interesting. I had spent about 45 minutes with Dave talking about similar topics before his session so it tied in really well for me. A lot of what he said was common sense and also included a lot of knowledge that has come out of his own experience (good, painful and otherwise). The participation from the crowd added to this session very well as people shared their experience and opinions.
Hacking Applications by Rocky Heckman was a definite crowd favourite. With a title like that it was destined for greatness. Everyone enjoyed this very insightful session about abusing programs. Unfortunately it is way too easy to find weaknesses in application security. I think this session was a great wake-up call for developers.
Apart from the sessions, the chance to catch up with people I met last year and to meet new people was awesome. Going out to dinner on Saturday and Sunday night was a great opportunity to catch up and chat to people. It was a pleasure to meet Dave Lemphers, Rocky Heckman, Grant Holliday, Daniel Crowley and Corneliu Tusnea (seriously Corneliu, where's the blog?) among others. It was a shame that Bill McCarthy and Frank couldn't make it this year.
Looking forward to next year. With so many exciting developments in the industry over the next 12 months, CodeCampOz will absolutely rock next year too.
[Updated: Corneliu's blog is here]
My website has not been able to send me emails for quite a while. This was highlighted to me by Darren (in the most unfortunate of circumstances). This means that I didn't get the email if you have used the contact/email form on this site to get in touch with me. Sorry about that. I am trying to get the problem resolved.
Some people on the AusDotNet list (which you subscribe to right?) are starting to talk about getting together for dinner on Saturday night. If you are interested in getting together for a feed and catch-up, email the list or leave a comment here.
If (for some bizarre reason) you are not signed up to the AusDotNet mail list, click here to subscribe.
I was walking through Civic at lunch yesterday so I could get a break from the screen. As I was walking around, I passed some buskers. I don't think I have ever heard buskers that actually sound good, but these guys were awesome. They were kind of a John Butler style. Hopefully I will hear them again. I couldn't not give them some money.
This morning I have been reviewing some code that has been checked into TFS based on work items I have created. When reviewing files that have been checked into source control, several times I have seen code commented out (old version of the code), with code added below the commented block (new version of the code).
I never quite understood this particular behaviour. What is the point of leaving commented old/dead code in source control. Isn't that what source control and commented version entries are for?
I just went to a website for a company that a friend now works for. They have included a search engine in their site. Given that I am interested in the contents of this site, I thought I would give the search a go.
No matter what search criteria I enter, I get taken to a FAQ page. So is this a bug in their code, or were there just no results and they assumed that I would figure that out?
This is a great example of poor design. If the user is expecting results, don't give them something else. If there really are no results, just say so. Don't take the user somewhere they didn't ask for.
Here ends the rant.
I have been trying to pull off something very interesting in recent days. I need to hijack the rendering of a DetailsView control so that it renders different html rather than the inbuilt table element structure.
I have mostly pulled this off by using browser files and control adapters to hook into the rendering process at which time I can get the control to render into a custom HtmlTextWriter. This is great because the page developer just needs to use Microsoft's DetailsView rather than a custom one.
There is a hitch though. In an attempt to allow certain fields to not render in certain DetailsView modes, I need to render additional information into the html which the HtmlTextWriter can pick up so it will know what HTML to ignore and what HTML to render.
Overriding the RenderBeforeTag and RenderAfterTag of the HtmlTextWriter looked like the go. Unfortunately there is a really simple bug in the framework which I can't do anything about. See here for more info.
Simple unit testing should have picked this one up. This puts a serious road-block in my path.
What is the difference between geeks and nerds?
I have heard this one hit around a few times in the last couple of years. If I have to pick one of these for myself, I would say I was a geek rather than a nerd. Nerd just doesn't seem to fit. Not that I have anything against nerds, but I can't stand it if someone calls me a nerd. Geek isn't so bad, but I would prefer not to be called either.
To fit my view of the world, I like to think that geek = nerd + social skills. To counter that, my wife says (in jest) that geek = nerd - intelligence.
What's your view?
BTW, she also said that putting this question out to the blogging community is a bit of a skewed sample, so you should also ask any non geek/nerds in your life. ![Big Smile [:D]](/emoticons/emotion-2.gif)