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• Practical refactoring using unit tests

  - by awhite

  Having just read the first four chapters of Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code, I embarked on my first refactoring and almost immediately came to a roadblock. It stems from the requirement that before you begin refactoring, you should put unit tests around the legacy code. That allows you to be sure your refactoring didn't change what the original code did (only how it did it). So my first question is this: how do I unit-test a method in legacy code? How can I put a unit test around a 500 line (if I'm lucky) method that doesn't do just one task? It seems to me that I would have to refactor my legacy code just to make it unit-testable. Does anyone have any experience refactoring using unit tests? And, if so, do you have any practical examples you can share with me? My second question is somewhat hard to explain. Here's an example: I want to refactor a legacy method that populates an object from a database record. Wouldn't I have to write a unit test that compares an object retrieved using the old method, with an object retrieved using my refactored method? Otherwise, how would I know that my refactored method produces the same results as the old method? If that is true, then how long do I leave the old deprecated method in the source code? Do I just whack it after I test a few different records? Or, do I need to keep it around for a while in case I encounter a bug in my refactored code? Lastly, since a couple people have asked...the legacy code was originally written in VB6 and then ported to VB.NET with minimal architecture changes.

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• Are there solutions for streamlining the update of legacy code in multiple places?

  - by ccomet

  I'm working in some old code which was originally designed for handling two different kinds of files. I was recently tasked with adding a new kind of file to this code. Most of my problems were solved by filling out an extensive XML file with a new entry that handled everything from what lists were named to how the file is written in plural lower case. But this ended up being insufficient, as there were maybe 50 different places in 24 different code files where I had to update hardcoded switch-statements that only branched for the original two file types. Unfortunately there is no consistency in this; there are methods which operate half from the XML file, and half off of hardcode. Some of the files which look like they would operate off of the XML file don't, and some that I would expect that I'd need to update the hardcode don't need it. So the only way to find the majority of these is to run through testing the whole system when only part of it is operational, finding that one step to fix (when I'm lucky that error logging actually tells me what is going on), and then running the whole thing again. This wastes time testing the parts of the code which are already confirmed to work, time better spent testing the new parts I have to add on top of it all. It's a hassle and a half, and to my luck I can expect that I will have to add yet another new kind of file in the near future. Are there any solutions out there which can aid in this kind of endeavour? Something which I can input some parameters of current features, document what points in a whole code project actually need to be updated, and run something nice the next time I need to add a new feature to the code. It needn't even be fully automated, something that'll help me navigate straight to the specific points in everything and maybe even record what kind of parameters need to be loaded. Doubt it matters specifically, but the code is comprised of ASP.NET pages, some ASP.NET controls, hundreds of C# code files, and a handful of additional XML files. It's all currently in a couple big Visual Studio 2008 projects.

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• How accurately (in terms of time) does Windows play audio?

  - by MusiGenesis

  Let's say I play a stereo WAV file with 317,520,000 samples, which is theoretically 1 hour long. Assuming no interruptions of the playback, will the file finish playing in exactly one hour, or is there some occasional tiny variation in the playback speed such that it would be slightly more or slightly less (by some number of milliseconds) than one hour? I am trying to synchronize animation with audio, and I am using a System.Diagnostics.Stopwatch to keep the frames matching the audio. But if the playback speed of WAV audio in Windows can vary slightly over time, then the audio will drift out of sync with the Stopwatch-driven animation. Which leads to a second question: it appears that a Stopwatch - while highly granular and accurate for short durations - runs slightly fast. On my laptop, a Stopwatch run for exactly 24 hours (as measured by the computer's system time and a real stopwatch) shows an elapsed time of 24 hours plus about 5 seconds (not milliseconds). Is this a known problem with Stopwatch? (A related question would be "am I crazy?", but you can try it for yourself.) Given its usage as a diagnostics tool, I can see where a discrepancy like this would only show up when measuring long durations, for which most people would use something other than a Stopwatch. If I'm really lucky, then both Stopwatch and audio playback are driven by the same underlying mechanism, and thus will stay in sync with each other for days on end. Any chance this is true?

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• Multi-threaded library calls in ASP.NET page request.

  - by ProfK

  I have an ASP.NET app, very basic, but right now too much code to post if we're lucky and I don't have to. We have a class called ReportGenerator. On a button click, method GenerateReports is called. It makes an async call to InternalGenerateReports using ThreadPool.QueueUserWorkItem and returns, ending the ASP.NET response. It doesn't provide any completion callback or anything. InternalGenerateReports creates and maintains five threads in the threadpool, one report per thread, also using QueueUserWorkItem, by 'creating' five threads, also with and waiting until calls on all of them complete, in a loop. Each thread uses an ASP.NET ReportViewer control to render a report to HTML. That is, for 200 reports, InternalGenerateReports should create 5 threads 40 times. As threads complete, report data is queued, and when all five have completed, report data is flushed to disk. My biggest problems are that after running for just one report, the aspnet process is 'hung', and also that at around 200 reports, the app just hangs. I just simplified this code to run in a single thread, and this works fine. Before we get into details like my code, is there anything obvious in the above scendario that might be wrong?

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• Resizing a GLJPanel with JOGL causes my model to disappear.

  - by badcodenotreat

  I switched over to using a GLJPanel from a GLCanvas to avoid certain flickering issues, however this has created several unintended consequences of it's own. From what I've gleaned so far, GLJPanel calls GLEventListener.init() every time it's resized which either resets various openGL functions i've enabled in init() (depth test, lighting, etc...) if i'm lucky, or completely obliterates my model if i'm not. I've tried debugging it but I'm not able to correct this behavior. This is my init() function: gl.glShadeModel( GL.GL_SMOOTH ); gl.glEnable( GL.GL_DEPTH_TEST ); gl.glDepthFunc( GL.GL_LEQUAL ); gl.glDepthRange( zNear, zFar ); gl.glDisable( GL.GL_LINE_SMOOTH ); gl.glEnable(GL.GL_NORMALIZE); gl.glEnable( GL.GL_BLEND ); gl.glBlendFunc( GL.GL_SRC_ALPHA, GL.GL_ONE_MINUS_SRC_ALPHA ); // set up the background color gl.glClearColor( ((float)backColor.getRed () / 255.0f), ((float)backColor.getGreen() / 255.0f), ((float)backColor.getBlue () / 255.0f), 1.0f); gl.glEnable ( GL.GL_LIGHTING ); gl.glLightfv( GL.GL_LIGHT0, GL.GL_AMBIENT, Constants.AMBIENT_LIGHT, 0 ); gl.glLightfv( GL.GL_LIGHT0, GL.GL_DIFFUSE, Constants.DIFFUSE_LIGHT, 0 ); gl.glEnable ( GL.GL_LIGHT0 ); gl.glTexEnvf( GL.GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL.GL_TEXTURE_ENV_MODE, GL.GL_MODULATE ); gl.glHint( GL.GL_PERSPECTIVE_CORRECTION_HINT, GL.GL_NICEST ); // code to generate model Is there any way around this other than removing everything from init(), adding it to my display() function? Given the behavior of init() and reshape() for GLJPanel, i'm not sure if that will fix it either.

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• Java Regex for matching hexadecimal numbers in a file

  - by Ranman

  So I'm reading in a file (like java program < trace.dat) which looks something like this: 58 68 58 68 40 c 40 48 FA If I'm lucky but more often it has several whitespace characters before and after each line. These are hexadecimal addresses that I'm parsing and I basically need to make sure that I can get the line using a scanner, buffered reader... whatever and make sure I can then convert the hexadecimal to an integer. This is what I have so far: Scanner scanner = new Scanner(System.in); int address; String binary; Pattern pattern = Pattern.compile("^\\s*[0-9A-Fa-f]*\\s*$", Pattern.CASE_INSENSITIVE); while(scanner.hasNextLine()) { address = Integer.parseInt(scanner.next(pattern), 16); binary = Integer.toBinaryString(address); //Do lots of other stuff here } //DO MORE STUFF HERE... So I've traced all my errors to parsing input and stuff so I guess I'm just trying to figure out what regex or approach I need to get this working the way I want.

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• Are bad data issues that common?

  - by Water Cooler v2

  I've worked for clients that had a large number of distinct, small to mid-sized projects, each interacting with each other via properly defined interfaces to share data, but not reading and writing to the same database. Each had their own separate database, their own cache, their own file servers/system that they had dedicated access to, and so they never caused any problems. One of these clients is a mobile content vendor, so they're lucky in a way that they do not have to face the same problems that everyday business applications do. They can create all those separate compartments where their components happily live in isolation of the others. However, for many business applications, this is not possible. I've worked with a few clients, one of whose applications I am doing the production support for, where there are "bad data issues" on an hourly basis. Yeah, it's that crazy. Some data records from one of the instances (lower than production, of course) would have been run a couple of weeks ago, and caused some other user's data to get corrupted. And then, a data script will have to be written to fix this issue. And I've seen this happening so much with this client that I have to ask. I've seen this happening at a moderate rate with other clients, but this one just seems to be out of order. If you're working with business applications that share a large amount of data by reading and writing to/from the same database, are "bad data issues" that common in your environment?

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• Using WIndows PowerShell 1.0 or 2.0 to evaluate performance of executable files.

  - by Andry

  Hello! I am writing a simple script on Windows PowerShell in order to evaluate performance of executable files. The important hypothesisi is the following: I have an executable file, it can be an application written in any possible language (.net and not, Viual-Prolog, C++, C, everything that can be compiled as an .exe file). I want to profile it getting execution times. I did this: Function Time-It { Param ([string]$ProgramPath, [string]$Arguments) $Watch = New-Object System.Diagnostics.Stopwatch $NsecPerTick = (1000 * 1000 * 1000) / [System.Diagnostics.Stopwatch]::Frequency Write-Output "Stopwatch created! NSecPerTick = $NsecPerTick" $Watch.Start() # Starts the timer [System.Diagnostics.Process]::Start($ProgramPath, $Arguments) $Watch.Stop() # Stops the timer # Collectiong timings $Ticks = $Watch.ElapsedTicks $NSecs = $Watch.ElapsedTicks * $NsecPerTick Write-Output "Program executed: time is: $Nsecs ns ($Ticks ticks)" } This function uses stopwatch. Well, the functoin accepts a program path, the stopwatch is started, the program run and the stopwatch then stopped. Problem: the System.Diagnostics.Process.Start is asynchronous and the next instruction (watch stopped) is not executed when the application finishes. A new process is created... I need to stop the timer once the program ends. I thought about the Process class, thicking it held some info regarding the execution times... not lucky... How to solve this?

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• How would you start automating my job?

  - by Jurily

  At my new job, we sell imported stuff. In order to be able to sell said stuff, currently the following things need to happen for every incoming shipment: Invoice arrives, in the form of an email attachment, Excel spreadsheet Monkey opens invoice, copy-pastes the relevant part of three columns into the relevant parts of a spreadsheet template, where extremely complex calculations happen, like =B2*550 Monkey sends this new spreadsheet to boss (email if lucky, printer otherwise), who sets the retail price Monkey opens the reply, then proceeds to input the data into the production database using a client program that is unusable on so many levels it's not even worth detailing Monkey fires up HyperTerminal, types in "AT", disconnect Monkey sends text messages and emails to customers using another part of the horrible client program, one at a time I want to change Monkey from myself to software wherever possible. I've never written anything that interfaces with email, Excel, databases or SMS before, but I'd be more than happy to learn if it saves me from this. Here's my uneducated wishlist: Monkey asks Thunderbird (mail server perhaps?) for the attachment Monkey tells Excel to dump the spreadsheet into a more Jurily-friendly format, like CSV or something Monkey parses the output, does the complex calculations // TODO: find a way to get the boss-generated prices with minimal manual labor involved Monkey connects to the database, inserts data Monkey spams costumers Is all this feasible? If yes, where do I start reading? How would you improve it? What language/framework do you think would be ideal for this? What would you do about the boss?

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• Omit return type in C++0x

  - by Clinton

  I've recently found myself using the following macro with gcc 4.5 in C++0x mode: #define RETURN(x) -> decltype(x) { return x; } And writing functions like this: template <class T> auto f(T&& x) RETURN (( g(h(std::forward<T>(x))) )) I've been doing this to avoid the inconvenience having to effectively write the function body twice, and having keep changes in the body and the return type in sync (which in my opinion is a disaster waiting to happen). The problem is that this technique only works on one line functions. So when I have something like this (convoluted example): template <class T> auto f(T&& x) -> ... { auto y1 = f(x); auto y2 = h(y1, g1(x)); auto y3 = h(y1, g2(x)); if (y1) { ++y3; } return h2(y2, y3); } Then I have to put something horrible in the return type. Furthermore, whenever I update the function, I'll need to change the return type, and if I don't change it correctly, I'll get a compile error if I'm lucky, or a runtime bug in the worse case. Having to copy and paste changes to two locations and keep them in sync I feel is not good practice. And I can't think of a situation where I'd want an implicit cast on return instead of an explicit cast. Surely there is a way to ask the compiler to deduce this information. What is the point of the compiler keeping it a secret? I thought C++0x was designed so such duplication would not be required.

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• Generate random number from an arbitrary weighted list

  - by Fernando

  Here's what I need to do, I'll be doing this both in PHP and JavaScript. I have a list of numbers that will range from 1 to 300-500 (I haven't set the limit yet). I will be running a drawing were 10 numbers will be picked at random from the given range. Here's the tricky part: I want some numbers to be less likely to be drawn up. A small set of those 300-500 will be flagged as "lucky numbers". For example, out of 100 drawings, most numbers have equal chances of being drawn, except for a few, that will only be picked once every 30-50 drawings. Basically I need to artificially set the probability of certain numbers to be picked while maintaining an even distribution with the rest of the numbers. The only similar thing I've found so far is this question: Generate A Weighted Random Number, the problem being that my spec has considerably more numbers (up to 500) so the weights would get very small and supposedly this could be a problem with that solution (Rejection Sampling). I'm still trying it, though, but I wonder if there other solutions. Math is not my thing so I appreciate any input. Thanks.

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• JavaScript change to DropDownList.SelectedIndex not submitted

  - by Bellfalasch

  Hi So, I have a form to submit fighters. You write his/her name, country, and then the team they fight for + the team's country. When you start typing the name I have constructed my own Ajax AutoCompleter. It will find existing fighters that might match. When you click on one of the suggestions it will populate up to four fields depending on existing data in the database. If you're lucky the fighter already exists with information on country, team, and the team's country. The problems starts when submitting. The JavaScript follows and just get's the id of the country to select (also the value of the select-option), and the select-element itself. function dropdownSelect(value, element) { var dropdown = document.getElementById(element); for (var i = 0; i < dropdown.options.length; i++) { if (dropdown.options[i].value == value) { dropdown.options[i].selected = true; return true; } } } When submitting the ASP.NET-code halt's and says that my country-field is null. So my JavaScript-change of selected field couldn't be read by ASP.NET. Is this a limitation of how ASP.NET works? Or a limitation of my skills? ;P

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• Greasemonkey failing to GM_setValue()

  - by HonoredMule

  I have a Greasemonkey script that uses a Javascript object to maintain some stored objects. It covers quite a large volume of information, but substantially less than it successfully stored and retrieved prior to encountering my problem. One value refuses to save, and I can not for the life of me determine why. The following problem code: Works for other larger objects being maintained. Is presently handling a smaller total amount of data than previously worked. Is not colliding with any function or other object definitions. Can (optionally) successfully save the problem storage key as "{}" during code startup. this.save = function(table) { var tables = this.tables; if(table) tables = [table]; for(i in tables) { logger.log(this[tables[i]]); logger.log(JSON.stringify(this[tables[i]])); GM_setValue(tables[i] + "_" + this.user, JSON.stringify(this[tables[i]])); logger.log(tables[i] + "_" + this.user + " updated"); logger.log(GM_getValue(tables[i] + "_" + this.user)); } } The problem is consistently reproducible and the logging statments produce the following output in Firebug: Object { 54,10 = Object } // Expansion shows complete contents as expected, but there is one oddity--Firebug highlights the array keys in purple instead of the usual black for anonymous objects. {"54,10":{"x":54,"y":10,"name":"Lucky Pheasant"}} // The correctly parsed string. bookmarks_HonoredMule saved undefined I have tried altering the format of the object keys, to no effect. Further narrowing down the issue is that this particular value is successfully saved as an empty object ("{}") during code initialization, but skipping that also does not help. Reloading the page confirms that saving of the nonempty object truly failed. Any idea what could cause this behavior? I've thoroughly explored the possibility of hitting size constraints, but it doesn't appear that can be the problem--as previously mentioned, I've already reduced storage usage. Other larger objects save still, and the total number of objects, which was not high already, has further been reduced by an amount greater than the quantity of data I'm attempting to store here.

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• What changed in the DataGrid that means it won't work anymore?

  - by Jeff Yates

  I have a Silverlight app with a DataGrid containing some custom columns and all was working well. Then I updated to Silverlight 3 tools for VS 2008 SP1 and rebuilt it. Now it has the following problems: Rows aren't added when the collection is modified. The ItemsSource property is (and always has been) set to an ObservableCollection instance, which notifies when its contents change. This worked fine for Silverlight 2. However, in Silverlight 3 to get this working at all, I now have to null and then re-set ItemsSource - this seems like I'm hiding a bigger issue but I can't work out what that might be. I cannot select a row or a cell anymore. If I'm lucky, I can select one whole row before it stops working. I can't edit anything. I suspect this is related to the previous point. I'll post some source when I am able, but first I have to strip it down to the bare minimum. In the meantime, I was hoping someone might have some idea of what may be going on here. My gut feeling on the second two points is that my bindings are no longer working, but that's just a guess and if it is the case, I have no idea which ones. Thanks for any help anyone might be able to provide. Update So, I finally reduced my problem down to a simple works/doesn't work comparison. The problem seems to occur if I override Equals in my element type. As soon as I do that, something happens strangely in the ObservableCollection that contains that type, it seems, and my application breaks. To make it more interesting, there is a check to make sure that duplicate items don't even get close to being added to the collection. I don't exactly know why ObservableCollection needs to compare equality when inserting items (the stack trace indicates it is using IndexAt) but this seems to cause the issue. So, any thoughts?

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• facing issue when using JDBC in TomCat 7 with Struts

  - by Chethu2288

  Am developing a web application using Struts 2 where am trying to insert some values into my local MySql database. The code for connecting and accessing database works fine in console application. but its giving "java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: com.mysql.jdbc.Driver" exception when i tried the same code in Struts. Kindly help me on this. Connection conn = null; String url = "jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/"; String dbName = "testdatabase"; String driver = "com.mysql.jdbc.Driver"; try { Class.forName(driver).newInstance(); conn = DriverManager.getConnection(url+dbName,"root","root"); Statement statement=conn.createStatement(); System.out.println("HelloWorld.execute()"); int i= statement.executeUpdate("INSERT INTO testTable VALUES('15','Lucky')"); System.out.println("res: "+i); } catch(Exception e) { System.out.println(e); //setMessage(e.getMessage()); } Awaiting your response.

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• VS2010 + IE8 Debugging woes - Element not found

  - by Chin

  I am having great difficulty trying to debug with vs2010 and IE8, though I think the problem is more IE8 specific. When starting a debug session 9 times out of 10 I will have the following problem. IE tab says connecting.. - then after a 5 second wait I will get an error in VS saying element not found. Even when I click ok to dismiss the error, the IE window still shows connecting... I will then have to kill the IE process to be able to close IE to try again. Sometimes however I am lucky and it starts. But the whole thing is so random I have no clue where to start. One thing I have noticed is that I always have 2 IE processes started even though there is only one window open. One has a small footprint of 100k, I presume it is some kind of helper. I am using a static port with the built in WebDev server. If anyone has had similar problems please let me know how you resolved it. Its driving me nuts! thanks

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• Most effecient way to create a "slider" timeline in HTML, CSS, and JavaScript?

  - by ZapChance

  Alright, so here's my dilemma. I've got these two "slides" lined up, one ready to be passed into view. I have it working and all, but I can scroll over to the right to see the second slide! How could I have it you can only view the one slide? JavaScript used: function validate(form) { var user = form.username.value; var pass = form.password.value; if(user === "test") { if(pass === "pass") { var hideoptions = {"direction" : "left", "mode" : "hide"}; var showoptions = {"direction" : "left", "mode" : "show"}; /*$("#loginView").toggle("slide", hideoptions, 1000, function() { $("#loginView").css("margin-left", "100%"); }); $("#mainView").toggle("slide", showoptions, 1000, function() { $("#mainView").css("margin-left", 0); });*/ $("#loginView").animate({ marginLeft: "-100%" }, 1000); $("#mainView").animate({ marginLeft: "0" }, 1000); } else { alert("nope"); } } else { alert("nope 2"); } } As you can see here @ http://jsfiddle.net/D7Va3/1/ (JSFiddle), once you enter "test" and "pass", then click enter, the tiles slide. But. If you reload, you can see that you can scroll to the right of the screen and view the second slide prematurely, which is just not going to work for me. I still need to achieve the same seamless transition, but you must only be able to view one slide at a time. Also, I plan to expand with more slides, so if you're feeling lucky today, I'd really love to see an example of how I could support multiple frames. I'm very new to JavaScript (yet I know syntax rules, and general coding knowledge from other languages), so the better you explain, the more knowledgeable I can be, and I'd be very grateful for that. Thanks in advance!

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• Installing the Updated XP Mode which Requires no Hardware Virtualization

  - by Mysticgeek

  Good news for those of you who have a computer without Hardware Virtualization, Microsoft had dropped the requirement so you can now run XP Mode on your machine. Here we take a look at how to install it and getting working on your PC. Microsoft has dropped the requirement that your CPU supports Hardware Virtualization for XP Mode in Windows 7. Before this requirement was dropped, we showed you how to use SecureAble to find out if your machine would run XP Mode. If it couldn’t, you might have gotten lucky with turning Hardware Virtualization on in your BIOS, or getting an update that would enable it. If not, you were out of luck or would need a different machine. Note: Although you no longer need Hardware Virtualization, you still need Professional, Enterprise, or Ultimate version of Windows 7. Download Correct Version of XP Mode For this article we’re installing it on a Dell machine that doesn’t support Hardware Virtualization on Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit version. The first thing you’ll want to do is go to the XP Mode website and select your edition of Windows 7 and language. Then there are three downloads you’ll need to get from the page. Windows XP Mode, Windows Virtual PC, and the Windows XP Mode Update (All Links Below). Windows genuine validation is required before you can download the XP Mode files. To make the validation process easier you might want to use IE when downloading these files and validating your version of Windows. Installing XP Mode After validation is successful the first thing to download and install is XP Mode, which is easy following the wizard and accepting the defaults. The second step is to install KB958559 which is Windows Virtual PC.   After it’s installed, a reboot is required. After you’ve come back from the restart, you’ll need to install KB977206 which is the Windows XP Mode Update.   After that’s installed, yet another restart of your system is required. After the update is configured and you return from the second reboot, you’ll find XP Mode in the Start menu under the Windows Virtual PC folder. When it launches accept the license agreement and click Next. Enter in your log in credentials… Choose if you want Automatic Updates or not… Then you’re given a message saying setup will share the hardware on your computer, then click Start Setup. While setup completes, you’re shown a display of what XP Mode does and how to use it. XP Mode launches and you can now begin using it to run older applications that are not compatible with Windows 7. Conclusion This is a welcome news for many who want the ability to use XP Mode but didn’t have the proper hardware to do it. The bad news is users of Home versions of Windows still don’t get to enjoy the XP Mode feature officially. However, we have an article that shows a great workaround – Create an XP Mode for Windows 7 Home Versions & Vista. Download XP Mode, Windows Virtual PC, and Windows XP Mode Update Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Our Look at XP Mode in Windows 7Run XP Mode on Windows 7 Machines Without Hardware VirtualizationInstall XP Mode with VirtualBox Using the VMLite PluginUnderstanding the New Hyper-V Feature in Windows Server 2008How To Run XP Mode in VirtualBox on Windows 7 (sort of) TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Ben & Jerry’s Free Cone Day, 3/23/10 New Stinger from McAfee Helps Remove ‘FakeAlert’ Threats Google Apps Marketplace: Tools & Services For Google Apps Users Get News Quick and Precise With Newser Scan for Viruses in Ubuntu using ClamAV Replace Your Windows Task Manager With System Explorer

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• Developer’s Life – Every Developer is a Superman

  - by Pinal Dave

  I enjoyed comparing developers to Spiderman so much, that I have decided to continue the trend and encourage some of my favorite people (developers) with another favorite superhero – Superman.  Superman is probably the most famous superhero – and one of the most inspiring. Everyone has their own favorite, but Superman has been the longest enduring of all comic book characters.  Clark Kent has inspired multiple movie series, TV shows, books, cartoons, and costumes.  Superman’s enduring popularity has been attributed to his superhuman strength, integrity, dedication to good, and his humility in keeping his identity a secret. So how are developers like Superman? Well, read on my list of reasons. Secret Identities They have secret identities.  I’m not saying that all developers wear thick glasses and go by an alias like “Clark Kent.”  But developers certainly work in the background, making sure everything runs smoothly, often without recognition.  Like Superman, when they have done their job right, no one knows they were there. Working Alone You don’t have to work alone.  Superman doesn’t have a sidekick like Robin or Bat Girl, but he is a major player in the Justice League.  Developers have amazing skills, and they shouldn’t be afraid to unite those skills to solve some of the world’s major problems (like slow networks). Daily Inspiration Developers are inspiring.  Clark Kent works at The Daily Planet, Metropolis’ newspaper, which is lucky because he can keep some of the publicity Superman inspires under wraps.  Developers might go unnoticed sometimes, but when people hear about some of the tasks they accomplish on a daily basis, it inspires awe. Discover Your Superpowers You have to discover your superpowers.  Clark Kent didn’t just wake up one morning with the full understanding that he could fly, leap tall buildings in a single bound, and was stronger than a speeding locomotive.  He slowly discovered these powers (after a few comic book-worthy misunderstandings!).  Developers are always learning and growing as well.  You probably won’t wake up with super powers, either, but years of practice and continuing education can get you close. Every Day is a New Day The story continues.  The Superman comic books are still being printed, and have been in print since 1938.  There have been two TV series, (one, Smallville, was on TV for ten seasons) and multiple cartoon adaptations.  There have been multiple movies, with many different actors.  A new reboot came out last year, and another is set to premier in 2016.   So, developers, when you are having a bad day or a problem seems unsolvable – remember, the story will continue!  There is always tomorrow. I hope you are all enjoying reading about developers-as-superheroes as much as I am enjoying writing about them.  Please tell me how else developers are like Superheroes in the comments – especially if you know any developers who are faster than a speeding bullet and can leap tall buildings in a single bound. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com)Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL Tagged: Developer, Superhero

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• SQL SERVER – Free Print Book on SQL Server Joes 2 Pros Kit

  - by pinaldave

  Rick Morelan and I were discussing earlier this month that what we can give back to the community. We believe our books are very much successful and very well received by the community. The five books are a journey from novice to expert. The books have changed many lives and helped many get jobs as well pass the SQL Certifications. Rick is from Seattle, USA and I am from Bangalore, India. There are 12 hours difference between us. We try to do weekly meeting to catch up on various personal and SQL related topics. Here is one of our recent conversations. Rick and Pinal Pinal: Good Morning Rick! Rick: Good Morning…err… Good Evening to you – Pinal! Pinal: Hey Rick, did you read the recent email which I sent you – one of our reader is thanking us for writing Joes 2 Pros series. He wants to dedicate his success to us. Can you believe it? Rick: Yeah, he is very kind but did you tell him that it is all because of his hard work on learning subject and we have very little contribution in his success. Pinal: Absolutely, I told him the same – I said we just wrote the book but it is he who learned from it and proved himself in his job. It is all him! We were just igniters. Rick: Good response. Pinal: Hey Rick! Are we doing enough for the community? What can we do more? Rick: Hmmm… Let us do something more. Pinal: Remember once we discussed the idea of if anyone who buys our Joes 2 Pros Combo Kit in the next 2 weeks – we will send them SQL Wait Stats for free. What do you say? Rick: I agree! Great Idea! Let us do it. Free Giveaway Well Rick and I liked the idea of doing more. We have decided to give away free SQL Server Wait Stats books to everybody who will purchase Joes 2 Pros Combo Kit between today (Oct 15, 2012) and Oct 26, 2012. This is not a contest or a lucky winner opportunity. Everybody who participates will qualify for it. Combo Availability USA – Amazon India - Flipkart | Indiaplaza Note1: USA kit contains FREE 5 DVDs. India Kit does not contain 5 DVDs due to legal issues. Note2: Indian Kit is priced at special Indian Economic Price. Qualify for Free Giveaway You must have purchased our Joes 2 Pros Combo Kit of 5 books between Oct 15, 2012 and Oct 26, 2012. Purchase before Oct 15, 2012 and after Oct 26, 2012 will not qualify for this giveaway. Send your original receipt (email, order details) to following addresses: “[email protected];[email protected]” with the subject line “Joes 2 Pros Kit Promotion Free Offer”. Do not change the subject line or your email may be missed.  Clearly mention your shipping address with phone number and pin/zip code. Send your receipt before Oct 30, 2012. We will not entertain any conversation after Oct 30, 2012 cut off date. The Free books will be sent to USA and India address only. Availability USA - Amazon | India - Flipkart | Indiaplaza Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: Joes 2 Pros, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLAuthority Book Review, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology

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• Know Your Audience, And/Or Your Customer

  - by steve.diamond

  Yesterday I gave an internal presentation to about 20 Oracle employees on "messaging," not messaging technology, but embarking on the process of building messages. One of the elements I covered was the importance of really knowing and understanding your audience. As a humorous reference I included two side-by-side photos of Oakland A's fans and Oakland Raiders fans. The Oakland A's fans looked like happy-go-lucky drunk types. The Oakland Raiders fans looked like angry extras from a low budget horror flick. I then asked my presentation attendees what these two groups had in common. Here's what I heard. --They're human (at least I THINK they're human). --They're from Oakland. --They're sports fans. After that, it was anyone's guess. A few days earlier we were putting the finishing touches on a sales presentation for one of our product lines. We had included an upfront "lead in" addressing how the economy is improving, yet that doesn't mean sales executives will have any more resources to add to their teams, invest in technology, etc. This "lead in" included miscellaneous news article headlines and statistics validating the slowly improving economy. When we subjected this presentation to internal review two days ago, this upfront section in particular was scrutinized. "Is the economy really getting better? I (exclamation point) don't think it's really getting better. Haven't you seen the headlines coming out of Greece and Europe?" Then the question TO ME became, "Who will actually be in the audience that sees and hears this presentation? Will s/he be someone like me? Or will s/he be someone like the critic who didn't like our lead-in?" We took the safe route and removed that lead in. After all, why start a "pitch" with a component that is arguably subjective? What if many of our audience members are individuals at organizations still facing a strong headwind? For reasons I won't go into here, it was the right decision to make. The moral of the story: Make sure you really know your audience. Harness the wisdom of the information your organization's CRM systems collect to get that fully informed "customer view." Conduct formal research. Conduct INFORMAL research. Ask lots of questions. Study industries and scenarios that have nothing to do with yours to see "how they do it." Stop strangers in coffee shops and on the street...seriously. Last week I caught up with an old friend from high school who recently retired from a 25 year career with the USMC. He said, "I can learn something from every single person I come into contact with." What a great way of approaching the world. Then, think about and write down what YOU like and dislike as a customer. But also remember that when it comes to your company's products, you are most likely NOT the customer, so don't go overboard in superimposing your own world view. Approaching the study of customers this way adds rhyme, reason and CONTEXT to lengthy blog posts like this one. Know your audience.

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• WEB203 &ndash; Jump into Silverlight!&hellip; and Become Effective Immediately with Tim Huckaby, Fou

  - by Robert Burger

  Getting ready for the good stuff. Definitely wish there were more Silverlight and WCF RIA sessions, but this is a start.  Was lucky to get a coveted power-enabled seat.  Luckily, due to my trustily slow Verizon data card, I can get these notes out amidst a total Internet outage here.  This is the second breakout session of the day, and is by far standing-room only.  I stepped out before the session started to get a cool Diet COKE and wouldn’t have gotten back in if I didn’t already have a seat. Tim says this is an intro session and that he’s been begging for intro sessions at TechEd for years and that by looking at this audience, he thinks the demand is there.  Admittedly, I didn’t know this was an intro session, or I might have gone elsewhere.  But, it was the very first Silverlight session, so I had to be here. Tim says he will be providing a very good comprehensive reference application at the end of the presentation.  He has just demoed it, and it is a full CRUD-based Sales Manager application based on…  AdventureWorks! Session Agenda What it is / How to get started Declarative Programming Layout and Controls, Events and Commands Working with Data Adding Style to Your Application   Silverlight…  “WPF Light” Why is the download 4.2MB?  Because the direct competitor is a 4.2MB download.  There is no technical reason it is not the entire framework.  It is purely to “be competitive”.   Getting Started Get all of the following downloads from www.silverlight.net/getstarted Install VS2010 or Visual Web Developer Express 2010 Install Silverlight 4 Tools for VS2010 Install Expression Blend 4 Install the Silverlight 4 Toolkit   Reference Application Features Uses MVVM pattern – a way to move data access code that would normally be inline within the UI and placing it in nice data access libraries Images loaded dynamically from the database, converting GIF to PNG because Silverlight does not support GIF. LINQ to SQL is the data access model WCF is the data provider and is using binary message encoding   Declarative Programming XAML replaces code for UI representation Attributes control Layout and Style Event handlers wired-up in XAML Declarative Data Binding   Layout Overview Content rendering flows inside of parent Fixed positioning (Canvas) is seldom used Panels are used to house content Margins and Padding over fixed size   Panels StackPanel – Arranges child elements into a single line oriented horizontally or vertically Grid – A flexible grid are that consists of rows and columns Canvas – An are where positions are specifically fixed WrapPanel (in Toolkit) – Positions child elements in sequential position left to right and top to bottom. DockPanel (in Toolkit) – Positions child controls within a dockable area   Positioning Horizontal and Vertical Alignment Margin – Separates an element from neighboring elements Padding – Enlarges the effective size of an element by a thickness   Controls Overview Not all controls created equal Silverlight, as a subset of WPF, so many WPF controls do not exist in the core Siverlight release Silverlight Toolkit continues to add controls, but are released in different quality bands Plenty of good 3rd party controls to fill the gaps Windows Phone 7 is to have 95% of controls available in Silverlight Core and Toolkit.   Events and Commands Standard .NET Events Routed Events Commands – based on the ICommand interface – logical action that can be invoked in several ways   Adding Style to Your Application Resource Dictionaries – Contains a hash table of key/value pairs.  Silverlight can only use Static Resources whereas WPF can also use Dynamic Resources Visual State Manager Silverlight 4 supports Implicit styles ResourceDictionary.MergedDictionaries combines many different file-based resources   Downloads

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• Friday Fun: Spell Blazer

  - by Asian Angel

  Are you ready for some fun and adventure after a long week back at work? This week’s game combines jewel-matching style game play with an RPG story for an awesome mix of fun and fiction. Your goal is to help a young wizard reach the magic academy in Raven as the forces of darkness are building. Spell Blazer The object of the game is to help young Kaven reach the Lightcaster Academy in Raven alive, but he will encounter many dangers along the way. Are you ready to begin the quest? As soon as you click Start Game the intro will automatically begin. If this is your first time playing the game the intro provides a nice background story for the game and what is happening in the game environment. Once you are past the intro, you will see a map of the region with your starting point in the Farmlands, various towns and the roads connecting them, along with your final destination of Raven. Notice that some of the roads are different colors…those colors indicate the “danger levels” for each part of your journey (green = good, yellow = some danger, etc.). To begin your journey click on the Town of Goose with your mouse. You will encounter your first monster part of the way towards Goose. This first round takes you through the game play process step-by-step. Once you have clicked Okay you will see the details about the monster you have just encountered. It is very important that you do not click on Fight! or Flee! until viewing and noting the types of spells that the monster is resistant to or has a weakness against. Choose your spells wisely based on the information provided about the monster. Keep in mind that the healing spell can be very useful depending on the monster you meet and your current health status. Note: Spells shown in order here are Healing, Fireball, Icebolt, & Lightning. Ready to fight! The first battle will also explain how to fight…click Okay to get started. Once the main window is in full view there are details that you need to look at. Beneath each of the combatants you will see the three attacks that each brings to the battle and at the bottom you will see their respective health points. We got lucky and had an Icebolt attack that we could utilize on the first play! Note: You can exchange two squares without making a match in order to try and line up an attack. While it happened too quickly to capture in our screenshot, there will be cool lightning bolt effects shoot out from matched up squares to the opposite combatant. You will also see the amount of damage inflicted from a particular attack on top of the avatars. Victory! Once you have won a round of combat a window will appear showing the amount of gold coins left behind by the monster. When you reach a town you will have the opportunity to stop over and rest or directly continue on with your journey. On to Halgard after a good rest! Play Spell Blazer Latest Features How-To Geek ETC How To Boot 10 Different Live CDs From 1 USB Flash Drive The 20 Best How-To Geek Linux Articles of 2010 The 50 Best How-To Geek Windows Articles of 2010 The 20 Best How-To Geek Explainer Topics for 2010 How to Disable Caps Lock Key in Windows 7 or Vista How to Use the Avira Rescue CD to Clean Your Infected PC The Deep – Awesome Use of Metal Objects as Deep Sea Creatures [Video] Convert or View Documents Online Easily with Zoho, No Account Required Build a Floor Scrubbing Robot out of Computer Fans and a Frisbee Serene Blue Windows Wallpaper for Your Desktop 2011 International Space Station Calendar Available for Download (Free) Ultimate Elimination – Lego Black Ops [Video]

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• PDF Converter Elite Giveaway – Lets you create, convert and edit any type of PDF with ease

  - by Gopinath

  Are you looking for a PDF editing software that lets you create, edit and convert  any type of PDF with ease? Then here is a chance for you to win a lifetime free license of PDF Converter Elite software. Tech Dreams in partnership with pdfconverter.com  brings a giveaway contest exclusively for our readers. Continue reading to know the features of the application and giveaway contest details Adobe Acrobat  is the best software for creating, editing and converting PDF files, but you need spend a lot of money to buy it. PDF Converter Elite, which is priced at $100 has a rich set of features that satisfies most of your PDF management needs. Here is a quick run down of the feature of the application Create PDF files from almost every popular Windows file format – You can create a PDF  from almost 300 popular file formats supported by Windows. Want to convert a word document to PDF? It’s just a click away. How about converting Excels, PowerPoint presentations, text files, images, etc? Yes, with a single click you will be able to turn them to PDF Files. Convert PDF to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher, HTML – This is one of the best features i liked in this software. You can convert a PDF to any MS Office file format without loosing alignment and quality of the document. The converted documents looks exactly same as your PDF documents and you would be surprised to see near 100% layout replication in the converted document. I feel in love with the perfection at which the files are converted. Edit PDF files easily – You can rework with your PDF documents by inserting watermarks, numbers, headers, footers and more. Also you will be able to merge two PDF files, overlay pages, remove unwanted pages, split a single PDF in to multiple files. Secure PDF files by setting password – You can secure PDF files by limiting how others can use them – set password to open the documents, restrict various activities like printing, copy & paste, screen reading, form filling, etc.. If you are looking for an affordable PDF editing application then PDF Converter Elite is there for you. 10 x PDF Converter Elite Licenses Giveaway Here comes the details on wining a free single user license for our readers – we have 10 PDF Converter Elite single user licenses worth of $100 each. To win a license all you need to do is Like Tech Dreams Fan page on Facebook Tweet or Like this post – buttons are available just below the post heading in the top section of this page Finally drop a comment on how you would like to use PDF Converter Elite We will choose 10 winners through a lucky draw and the licenses will be sent to them in a personal email. Names of the winners will also be announced on Tech Dreams. So are you ready to grab a free copy of PDF Converter worth of $100?

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• The Oscar of Java Programming

  - by Tori Wieldt

  Why bother nominating a peer, yourself or your company for a Duke's Choice Award? I asked Duke's Choice Award winner Fabiane Nardon, whose team won in 2005 for the Healthcare Information System they created for the Brazilian government, what it was like winning the award and if it had any impact on her career. Here's what she told me: 1) What was it like to win a Duke's Choice Award? For me it was like winning an Oscar or a Grammy :-) I think that for a Java developer, a Duke's Choice Award is probably the highest award you can get, so it was really an honor. We had an amazing team working on that project and the team really deserved it. We were all very happy when we got that email with the announcement. That moment was one of the most important moments of my career. 2) What benefits have you gotten from being a "Duke's Choice Award Winner?" I think the most important benefit you get from winning a Duke is the fact that you become known by your peers. This opens many doors, since you are approached by more people, get invitations to speak in more conferences, you meet people with the same technical interests you have and so on. I certainly benefited a lot from it. We were lucky that in 2005, when we got our award, the winners were featured in the JavaOne keynote, with short documentaries produced about each one. So, we could be on the stage and talk a little about the project. We got lots of press at the time. We see  today's winners benefiting a lot from the press coverage. 3) How is the the Brazilian Healthcare Information System project doing today? Still running and getting new features every year. I'm not involved on the project anymore, but there are good people taking care of it. We opened the code since the beginning, so different cities could use and add features to it. There are many new developers working on that code base right now and I hope they can take the whole system to a new level. 4) What are you up to these days? I worked in the healthcare field for many years and a few years ago I decided that it was time to move on and take the experience I got designing large scale and mission critical systems to other fields. Since then I have been working with high access internet applications. I also co-founded ToolsCloud, a company that provides a development environment with open source tools in the cloud. We just launched ToolsCloud in USA, so other companies can get the same bundle of tools, hassle free, that several companies are successfully using in Brazil. Besides that, right now I'm personally working on the coolest project I ever worked on. It combines several technical challenges with a good dose of social impact. We should launch it in the second semester and I should keep it as a secret for now. Hopefully it will be useful to many people and disruptive enough to maybe get us a new Duke's Choice Award. Who knows? Read more about Fabiane in the "Heroes of Java" series by Markus Eisele. Her Twitter handle is @FabianeNardon. The Duke's Choice Awards celebrate extreme innovation in the world of Java technology. Nominate an individual, a group or company who show the best in Java innovation. Nominate via the easy online form at www.Java.net/dukeschoice. Nominations are open until June 15, 2012.

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