Search Results

Search found 4879 results on 196 pages for 'geeks'.

Page 90/196 | < Previous Page | 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97  | Next Page >

  • Get to Know a Candidate (11 of 25): Roseanne Barr&ndash;Peace &amp; Freedom Party

    - by Brian Lanham
    DISCLAIMER: This is not a post about “Romney” or “Obama”. This is not a post for whom I am voting. Information sourced for Wikipedia. Barr is an American actress, comedienne, writer, television producer, and director.  Barr began her career in stand-up comedy at clubs before gaining fame for her role in the sitcom Roseanne. The show was a hit and lasted nine seasons, from 1988 to 1997. She won both an Emmy Award and a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress for her work on the show. Barr had crafted a "fierce working-class domestic goddess" persona in the eight years preceding her sitcom and wanted to do a realistic show about a strong mother who was not a victim of patriarchal consumerism. The granddaughter of immigrants from Europe and Russia, Barr was the oldest of four children in a working-class Jewish Salt Lake City family; she was also active in the LDS Church. In 1974 she married Bill Pentland, with whom she had three children, before divorcing in 1990 and marrying comedian Tom Arnold for four years. Controversy arose when she sang "The Star-Spangled Banner" off-key at a 1990 nationally aired baseball game, followed by grabbing her crotch and spitting. After her sitcom ended, she launched her own talk show, The Roseanne Show, which aired from 1998 to 2000. In 2005, she returned to stand-up comedy with a world tour. In 2011, she starred in an unscripted TV show, Roseanne's Nuts that lasted from July to September of that year, about her life on a Hawaiian farm. The Peace and Freedom Party (PFP) is a nationally-organized political party with affiliates in more than a dozen states, including California, Florida, Colorado and Hawaii. Its first candidates appeared on the ballot in 1966, but the Peace and Freedom Party of California was founded on June 23, 1967, after the LAPD riot in the wealthy Century City section of Los Angeles, and qualified for the ballot in January 1968.  The Peace and Freedom Party went national in 1968 as a left-wing organization opposed to the Vietnam War. From its inception, Peace and Freedom Party has been a left-wing political organization. It is a strong advocate of protecting the environment from pollution and nuclear waste. It advocates personal liberties and universal, high quality and free access to education and health care. Its understanding of socialism includes a socialist economy, where industries, financial institutions, and natural resources are owned by the people as a whole and democratically managed by the people who work in them and use them. Barr is on the Ballot in: CA, CO, FL Learn more about Roseanne Barr and Peace and Freedom Party on Wikipedia.

    Read the article

  • Updated the Whiteboard Demo

    - by Bobby Diaz
    Just a quick update to let everyone know that I have updated the Whiteboard demo application.  I added a few options to make it more interesting to use!  I showed it to the kids and they loved it (even though they kept asking ME to draw pictures for them)!   Here is a list of available options: Color Picker for line color Slider for line thickness Save to XML file Open saved drawing Clear whiteboard Hold down ESC key to erase And here is a screenshot of my beautiful artwork! :) So what are you waiting for?  Go play with the Live Demo (and be sure to share with the kids) or download the source code. Enjoy!

    Read the article

  • Is Java Open?

    - by EmbeddedInsider
    One way to answer- “which one”  Brew, IBM, Nokia, Android?   Well lets look at the real deal- Sun Java.  How will this work for embedded devices: DEFINITIONS…. The use of Software in systems and solutions that provide dedicated functionality … or designed for use in embedded or function-specific software applications, for example but not limited to: Software embedded in or bundled with industrial control systems, wireless mobile telephones, wireless handheld devices, netbooks, kiosks, TV/STB, Blu-ray Disc devices, telematics and network control switching equipment, printers and storage management systems, and other related systems are excluded from this definition and not licensed under this Agreement. http://www.java.com/en/download/license.jsp Now, the interesting thing is the license between Sun and the people with Java clones.  Does that pass on this exclusion? Lawrence Ricci www.EmbeddedInsider.com

    Read the article

  • How to clear the resent server name list in SQL Server Management Studio

    - by Pavan Kumar Pabothu
    If you are using SQL Server management Studio much the we can observer that the list of server names in the log in of it. As you can imagin a period of time after 6 month or 1 year you will see a long list of server names in the login dialog. How to clear this list...? I doesn't provide a mechanism to clean nor clear the list, so you'll have to do a little browsing through your file system. For SQl Server 2005 Management Studio, we should delete the below file C:\Documents and Settings\<user>\Application Data\Microsoft\Microsoft SQL Server\90\Tools\Shell\mru.dat. For SQl Server 2008 Management Studio, we should delete the below file C:\Documents and Settings\<user>\Application Data\Microsoft\Microsoft SQL Server\90\Tools\Shell\SQLStudio.bin. After deletion we can re-login the Management studio and can see the empty list.

    Read the article

  • Displaying the Saved Pictures in the Windows Phone 8 emulator

    - by Laurent Bugnion
    One cool feature of the Windows Phone emulator is that it allows you to select pictures from your app (using the PhotoChooserTask) without having to try your app on a physical device. For example, this code (which I used in some of my recent presentations) will trigger the Photo Chooser UI to be displayed on the emulator too: private Action<IEnumerable<IImageFileInfo>> _callback; public void SelectFiles(Action<IEnumerable<IImageFileInfo>> callback) { var task = new PhotoChooserTask { ShowCamera = true }; task.Completed += TaskCompleted; _callback = callback; task.Show(); } void TaskCompleted(object sender, PhotoResult e) { if (e.Error == null && e.ChosenPhoto != null && _callback != null) { var fileName = e.OriginalFileName .Substring(e.OriginalFileName.LastIndexOf("\\") + 1); var info = new FileViewModel(e.ChosenPhoto, fileName); var infos = new List<IImageFileInfo> { info }; _callback(infos); } } In Windows Phone 8 however, when you execute this code, you will be shown an almost empty Photo Chooser UI: Notice that the “Saved Pictures” album is missing. At first I thought it was just not there at all, but you can actually restore it with the following steps: Press on the Windows button On the main screen, press on Photos Press on Albums Open the so called “8” photo album Press Back until you are back into your app and try again. This time you will see the saved pictures, and can perform your tests in more realistic conditions! Happy coding! Laurent   Laurent Bugnion (GalaSoft) Subscribe | Twitter | Facebook | Flickr | LinkedIn

    Read the article

  • PrairieDevCon &ndash; Slide Decks

    - by Dylan Smith
    PrairieDevCon 2010 was an awesome time.  Learned a lot, and had some amazing conversations.  You guys even managed to convince me that NoSQL databases might actually be useful after all.   For those interested here’s my slide decks from my two sessions: Agile In Action Database Change Management With Visual Studio

    Read the article

  • RoundhousE now supports Oracle, SQL2000

    - by Robz / Fervent Coder
    RoundhousE, the database migration software that is based on sql scripts has added support for Oracle and SQL 2000.  There have also been numerous other little things, including better logging and a script run errors table. The script errors table captures what went wrong when/if your scripts are not quite up to par or there is some other issue. A special thanks goes out to http://twitter.com/PascalMestdach and http://twitter.com/jochenjonc. They worked hard on this and all I did was provide guidance and help bring it back to the trunk. This is what an entry in the database looks like: This is a preview of new log: ================================================== Versioning ================================================== Attempting to resolve version from C:\code\roundhouse\code_drop\sample\deployment\_BuildInfo.xml using //buildInfo/version. Found version 0.5.0.188 from C:\code\roundhouse\code_drop\sample\deployment\_BuildInfo.xml. Migrating TestRoundhousE from version 0 to 0.5.0.188. Versioning TestRoundhousE database with version 0.5.0.188 based on http://roundhouse.googlecode.com/svn. ================================================== Migration Scripts ================================================== Looking for Update scripts in "C:\code\roundhouse\code_drop\sample\deployment\..\db\TestRoundhousE\up". These should be one time only scripts. -------------------------------------------------- Running 0001_CreateTables.sql on (local) - TestRoundhousE. Running 0002_ChangeTable.sql on (local) - TestRoundhousE. Running 0003_TestBatchSplitter.sql on (local) - TestRoundhousE. -------------------------------------------------- But what are you waiting for? Head out and grab the latest release today!

    Read the article

  • Mac OS needs Windows Live Writer &ndash; badly!

    - by digitaldias
    I recently bought a new  Macbook Pro (the 13” one) to dive into a new world of programming challenges as well as to get a more powerful netbook than my Packard Bell Dot which I’ve been using since last year. I’ve had immense pleasure using the netbook format and their small size in meetings (taking notes with XMind), surfing “anywhere”, and, of course blogging with windows live writer. So far the Mac is holding up, it’s sleek, responsive, and I’ve even begun looking at coding in Objective C with it, but in one arena, it is severely lacking: Blogging software. There is nothing that even comes close to Live Writer for getting your blog posts out. The few blogger applications that do exist on mac both look and feel medieval in comparison, AND some even cost money! It looks like some mac users actually install a virtual machine on their mac to run Windows XP just so they can use WLW. I’m not that extreme; instead, I’m hoping that the WLW team will write it’s awesome application as a Silverlight 4 app. That way, it would run on Mac and Windows (as a desktop app). I wonder if it will ever happen though…   PS: The image is of me, took it with the built-in camera on the mac and emailed it to the windows PC that I am writing on :)

    Read the article

  • A little tidbit on Team Build 2010 and error MSB3147

    - by Enrique Lima
    The problem? Performing a build on a ClickOnce solution would not be successful due to the setup.bin not being located. Ok, now what? Researched from corner to corner, install, re-install, update.  Found some interesting posts to fix the issue, but most of them were focused on Team Foundation Server/Team Build 2008, and some other on 2005.  The other interesting tidbit was the frequent indication to modify the registry to help Team Build find the bootstrapper. Background info:  This was a migration I posted about a few days ago, a 32 bit TFS implementation to a full 64 bit TFS implementation.  Now, the project has binaries and dependencies on X86 (This piece of information became essential to moving from a failed build to a successful build). So, what’s the fix? The trick in this case was to go back into the Build Type and check the properties/configuration.  Upon further investigation, I found the following:  Once you Edit the Build Definition, then select Process, expand 3. Advanced and look for MSBuild Platform, switch from Auto to X86.  Ran the Build, and success!

    Read the article

  • Windows Azure Training Kit October 2012 Release

    - by Clint Edmonson
    The Windows Azure Technical Evangelism team have been busy bees lately and we want to share with you what they’ve been working on. As you know we release the Windows Azure Training Kit on a regular cadence, so I’m pleased to announce the Windows Azure Training Kit October 2012 Release. This update of the training kit includes 47 hands-on labs, 24 demos and 38 presentations designed to help you learn how to build applications that use Windows Azure services, including updated hands-on labs to use the latest version of Visual Studio 2012 and Windows 8, new demos and presentations. Essential Links: Windows Azure Training Kit Download Windows Azure Training Kit Github [Issues] Updated Presentations With Speaker Notes Your voices were heard loud and clear! I am excited to announce Speaker Notes have been added to a the majority of the content we have available. Find the new updated decks which contain speaker notes below: Foundation SQL Federation Virtual Machine Overview Virtual Networks Windows 8 and Windows Azure Web Sites Windows Azure Cloud Services Windows Azure Overview Windows Azure Service Bus Deploying Active Directory Building Apps With IaaS and PaaS Identity and Access Control Linux Virtual Machines Managing Virtual Machines PowerShell Migrating Apps and Workloads Scalable Global and Highly Available Apps Security and Identity SQL Database SQL Database Migration Cloud Service Life Cycle DevCamps Cloud Services iOS, Android and Windows Azure Windows 8 and Windows Azure Web Sites Windows 8 and Windows Azure Mobile Services Added Localized Content Due to the excitement in the community surrounding the mobile services launch, it was apparent that we needed to make localized content available to continue to deliver the exciting message around Windows Azure Mobile Services. Localized content is available in the following languages: French Japanese German Chinese (Taiwan) Spanish Italian Korean Portuguese (Brazilian) Russian Updated Hands-On Labs To support those who have upgraded to Visual Studio 2012 or those trying out the Visual Studio 2012 Express Editions, we have made sure that the content is available and supported (selected labs only) in Visual Studio 2012 Express and up. Visual Studio 2012 Windows Azure Traffic Manager Introduction to Cloud Services Service Bus Messaging Introduction to Access Control Service This adds a significant amount of additional content, so we have revamped the Hands-On Lab Navigation page to include subsections for Visual Studio 2012 Labs, Visual Studio 2010 Labs, Open Source Labs, Scenario Labs, All Labs. Added Demos Demos are available for a number of presentations which are available in Foundation, DevCamp, ITPro Event & Device + Service DevCamps. You can browse through the demos on the respective Demo Navigation page or on Github (links provided in Demo listing below). HelloASP Connecting Cloud Services Service Bus Relay Windows 8 and Mobile Services URL Shortener iOS Client Migrating a Web Farm Deploying Active Directory URL Shortener Service  (PHP) Geo-Location Service (PHP) Geo-Location Android Client Getting Started with VMs Load Balancing Availability Deploying Hybrid Apps Migrate VM AppController Geo-Location iOS Client Scale Up/Down Using CSUpload URL Shortener Android Client Imaging Virtual Machines The Windows Azure Training Kit is open source and available on GitHub, enabling you in the community to Report Issues or Fork and either extend the solution or commit bug fixes back to the Training Kit. You can find out more details about  the training kit from our GitHub Page including guidelines on how to commit back to the project. Stay tuned to my twitter feed for Windows Azure and other Microsoft announcements, updates, and links: @clinted

    Read the article

  • Announcing the Winnipeg VS.NET 2012 Community Launch Event!

    - by D'Arcy Lussier
    Back in May 2010 the local Winnipeg technical community got together and put on a launch event for VS.NET 2010. That event was such a good time that we’re doing it again this year for the VS.NET 2012 launch! On December 6th, the Winnipeg .NET User Group is hosting a full day VS.NET 2012 Community Launch Event at the Imax theatre in Portage Place! We have 4 sessions planned covering dev tools, ALM/TFS, web development, and cloud development, presented by Dylan Smith, Tyler Doerksen, and myself. You can get all the details and register on our Eventbrite site: http://wpgvsnet2012launch.eventbrite.ca/ I’ve included the details below as well for convenience: Winnipeg VS.NET 2012 Community Launch Event Join us for a full day of sessions highlighting the new features and capabilities of Visual Studio .NET 2012 and the .NET 4.5 Framework! Hosted by the Winnipeg .NET User Group, this community event is FREE thanks to the generous support from our event sponsors: Imaginet Online Business Systems Prairie Developer Conference Event Details When: Thursday, Decemer 6th from 8:00 AM - 4:00 PM Where: IMAX Theatre, Portage Place Cost: *FREE!* Agenda 8:00 - 9:00 Continental Breakfast and Registration 9:00 - 9:15 Welcome 9:15 - 10:30 End-To-End Application Lifecycle Management with TFS 2012 10:30 - 10:45 Break 10:45 - 12:00 Improving Developer Productivity with Visual Studio 2012 12:00 - 1:00 Lunch Break (Lunch Not Provided) 1:00 - 2:15 Web Development in Visual Studio 2012 and .NET 4.5 2:15 - 2:30  Break 2:30 - 3:45 Microsoft Cloud Development with Azure and Visual Studio 2012 3:45 - 4:00 Prizes and Thanks Session Abstracts End-To-End Application Lifecycle Management with TFS 2012 Dylan Smith, Imaginet In this session we'll walk through the application development lifecycle from end-to-end and see how some of the new capabilities in TFS 2012 help streamline the software delivery process. There are some exciting new capabilities around Agile Project Management, Gathering Feedback, Code Reviews, Unit Testing, Version Control, Storyboarding, etc. During this session we’ll follow a fictional software development team through the process of planning, developing, testing, and deployment focusing on where the new functionality in VS/TFS 2012 fits in to make teams more effective. Improving Developer Productivity with Visual Studio 2012 Dylan Smith, Imaginet Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 enables developers to take full advantage of the capability of Windows using the skills and technologies developers already know and love to deliver exceptional and compelling apps.  Whether working individually or in a small, medium or large development team Visual Studio 2012 sets a new standard for development tools, helping teams deliver superior results for their customers that help set them apart from their competitors.  In this session we’ll walk through new features in Visual Studio 2012 specifically focusing on how these improve Developer Productivity. Web Development in Visual Studio 2012 and .NET 4.5 D’Arcy Lussier, Online Business Systems It’s an exciting time to be a web developer in the Microsoft ecosystem! The launch of Visual Studio 2012 and .NET 4.5 brings new tooling and features, and the ASP.NET team is continually releasing updates for MVC, SignalR, Web API, and other platform features. In this session we’ll take a tour of the new features and technologies available for Microsoft web developers here in 2012! Microsoft Cloud Development with Azure and Visual Studio 2012 Tyler Doerksen, Imaginet Microsoft’s public cloud platform is nearing its third year of public availability, supporting web site/service hosting, storage, relational databases, virtual machines, virtual networks and much more. Windows Azure provides both power and flexibility.  But to capture this power you need to have the right tools!  This session will demonstrate the primary ways you can harness Windows Azure with the .NET platform.  We’ll explain cloud service development, packaging, deployment, testing and show how Visual Studio 2012 with the Windows Azure SDK and other Microsoft tools can be used to develop for and manage Windows Azure.Harness the power of the cloud from the comfort of Visual Studio 2012!

    Read the article

  • System Center Service Manager 2010 SP1 Resource Links

    - by Mickey Gousset
    System Center Service Manager is a new product that Microsoft released last year to handle incident/problem/change management.  Currently the latest version is System Center Service Manager SP1, and there is a Cumulative Update for SP1 that you should grab as well. A strong ecosystem is starting to spring up around this product, with tools and connectors that fill needs not build into the product.  To find the latest list of these items, you need to do to the SCSM 2010 Downloads page.  Here you can find a list of the latest tools and add-ons from Microsoft, as well as third-party vendors.  The Microsoft Exchange connector, and the Powershell Cmdlets are definitely worth it to download and install.

    Read the article

  • What is the SharePoint Action Framework and Why do I need it ?

    - by SAF
    For those out there that are a little curious as to whether SAF is any use to your organisation, please read this FAQ.  What is SAF ? SAF is free to use. SAF is the "SharePoint Action Framework", it was built by myself and Hugo (plus a few others along the way). SAF is written entirely in C# code available from : http://saf.codeplex.com.   SAF is a way to automate SharePoint configuration changes. An Action is a command/class/task/script written in C# that performs a unit of execution against SharePoint such as "CreateWeb"  or "AddLookupColumn". A SAF Macro is collection of one or more Actions. SAF Macro can be run from Msbuild, a Feature, StsAdm or common plain old .Net code. Parameters can be passed to a Macro at run-time from a variety of sources such as "Environment Variable", "*.config", "Msbuild Properties", Feature Properties, command line args, .net code. SAF emits lots of trace statements at run-time, these can be viewed using "DebugView". One Action can pass parameters to another Action. Parameters can be set using Expression Syntax such as "DateTime.Now".  You should consider SAF is you suffer from one of the following symptoms... "Our developers write lots of code to deploy changes at release time - it's always rushed" "I don't want my developers shelling out to Powershell or Stsadm from a Feature". "We have loads of Console applications now, I have lost track of where they are, or what they do" "We seem to be writing similar scripts against SharePoint in lots of ways, testing is hard". "My scripts often have lots of errors - they are done at the last minute". "When something goes wrong - I have no idea what went wrong or how to solve it". "Our Features get stuck and bomb out half way through - there no way to roll them back". "We have tons of Features now - I can't keep track". "We deploy Features to run one-off tasks" "We have a library of reusable scripts, but, we can only run it in one way, sometimes we want to run it from MSbuild and a Feature". "I want to automate the deployment of changes to our development environment". "I would like to run a housekeeping task on a scheduled basis"   So I like the sound of SAF - what's the problems ?  Realistically, there are few things that need to be considered: Someone on your team will need to spend a day or 2 understanding SAF and deciding exactly how you want to use it. I would suggest a Tech Lead, SysAdm or SP Architect will need to download it, try out the examples, look through the unit tests. Ask us questions. Although, SAF can be downloaded and set to go in a few minutes, you will still need to address issues such as - "Do you want to execute your Macros in MsBuild or from a Feature ?" You will need to decide who is going to do your deployments - is it each developer to themself, or do you require a dedicated Build Manager ? As most environments (Dev, QA, Live etc) require different settings (e.g. Urls, Database names, accounts etc), you will more than likely want to define these and set a properties file up for each environment. (These can then be injected into Saf at run-time). There may be no Action to solve your particular problem. If this is the case, suggest it to us - we can try and write it, or write it yourself. It's very easy to write a new Action - we have an approach to easily unit test it, document it and author it. For example, I wrote one to deploy  a WSP in 2 hours the other day. Alternatively, Saf can also call Stsadm commands and Powershell scripts.   Anyway, I do hope this helps! If you still need help, or a quick start, we can also offer consultancy around SAF. If you want to know more give us a call or drop an email to [email protected]

    Read the article

  • Autocomplete in Silverlight with Visual Studio 2010

    - by Sayre Collado
    Last week I keep searching on how to use the autocomplete in silverligth with visual studio 2010 but most of the examples that I find they are using a textbox or combobox for the autocomplete. I tried to study those examples and apply to the single autocomplete from tools on my silverlight project. And now this is the result. I will use a database again from my previous post (Silverlight Simple DataBinding in DataGrid) to show how the autocomplete works with database. This is the output: First, this is the setup for my autocomplete: //The tags for autocompletebox on XAML Second, my simple snippets: //Event for the autocomplete to send a text string to my function private void autoCompleteBox1_KeyUp(object sender, KeyEventArgs e) { autoCompleteBox1.Populating += (s, args) => { args.Cancel = true; var c = new Service1Client(); c.GetListByNameCompleted +=new EventHandler(c_GetListByNameCompleted); c.GetListByNameAsync(autoCompleteBox1.Text); }; } //Getting result from database void c_GetListByNameCompleted(object sender, GetListByNameCompletedEventArgs e) { autoCompleteBox1.ItemsSource = e.Result; autoCompleteBox1.PopulateComplete(); } The snippets above will show on how to use the autocompleteBox using the data from database that bind in DataGrid. But what if we want to show the result on DataGrid while the autocomplete changing the items source? Ok just add one line to c_GetListByNameCompleted void c_GetListByNameCompleted(object sender, GetListByNameCompletedEventArgs e) { autoCompleteBox1.ItemsSource = e.Result; autoCompleteBox1.PopulateComplete(); dataGrid1.ItemsSource = e.Result; }

    Read the article

  • Gems In The Visual Studio 2010 Training Kit - Introduction to ASP.NET MVC: Learning Labs

    - by Jim Duffy
    Following up on my prior “gems post” is another nugget I found in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4 Training Kit. ASP.NET MVC has established quite a bit of momentum in the ASP.NET development community since it was introduced in early-ish 2009 though I’m sure there are many developers who haven’t had the time or opportunity to find out what it is, not to mention learn how to use it. If you’re one of those “I’ve heard of it but I’m not sure what it really is” developers then I suggest you start your research here. Ok, back to the gem. There are a number of fantastic MVC learning resources out there including the video tutorials on the ASP.NET MVC website. Another learning resource for your journey along the yellow brick road into ASP.NET MVC land are the hands-on learning labs contained in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4 Training Kit. These hands-on exercises walk you through the process of creating the “M”, the “V”s, and the “C”s of ASP.NET MVC and help you gain a solid foothold into the details of creating and understanding ASP.NET MVC applications. Have a day. :-|

    Read the article

  • June 2010 Chicago Architects Group Meeting

    - by Tim Murphy
    The Chicago Architects Group will be holding its next meeting on June 15th.  Please come and join us and get involved in our architect community. Register Presenter: Tim Murphy  Topic: Document Generation Architectures        Location: TechNexus 200 S. Wacker Dr., Suite 1500 Room A/B Chicago, IL 60606 Time: 5:30 - Doors open at 5:00 Sponsored by: del.icio.us Tags: Chicago Architects Group,Azure,Scott Seely

    Read the article

  • BizTalk 2009 - Custom Functoid Categories

    - by StuartBrierley
    I recently had cause to code a number of custom functoids to aid with some maps that I was writing. Once these were developed and deployed to C:\Program Files\Microsoft BizTalk Server 2009\Developer Tools\Mapper Extensions a quick refresh allowed them to appear in toolbox.  After dropping these on a map and configuring the appropriate inputs I tested the map to check that they worked as expected.  All but one of the functoids worked as expecetd, but the final functoid appeared not to be firing at all. I had already tested the code used in a simple test harness application, so I was confident in the code used, but I still needed to figure out what the problem might be. Debugging the map helped me on the way; for some reason the functoid in question was not shown correctly - the functoid definition was wrong. After some investigations I found that the functoid type you assign when coding a custom functoid affects more than just the category it appears in; different functoid types have different capabilities, including what they can link too.  For example, a logical functoid can not provide content for an output element, it can only say whether the element exists.  Map this via a Value Mapping functoid and the value of true or false can be seen in the output element. The functoid I was having problems with was one whare I had used the XPath functoid type, this had seemed to be a good fit as I was looking up content in a config file using xpath and I wanted it to appear the advanced area.  From the table below you can see that this functoid type is marked as "Internal Only", preventing it from being used for custom functoids.  Changing my type to String allowed the functoid to function as expected. Category Description Toolbox Group Assert Internal Use Only Advanced Conversion Converts characters to and from numerics and converts numbers from one base to another. Conversion Count Internal Use Only Advanced Cumulative Performs accumulations of the value of a field that occurs multiple times in a source document and outputs a single output. Cumulative DatabaseExtract Internal Use Only Database DatabaseLookup Internal Use Only Database DateTime Adds date, time, date and time, or add days to a specified date, in output data. Date/Time ExistenceLooping Internal Use Only Advanced Index Internal Use Only Advanced Iteration Internal Use Only Advanced Keymatch Internal Use Only Advanced Logical Controls conditional behavior of other functoids to determine whether particular output data is created. Logical Looping Internal Use Only Advanced MassCopy Internal Use Only Advanced Math Performs specific numeric calculations such as addition, multiplication, and division. Mathematical NilValue Internal Use Only Advanced Scientific Performs specific scientific calculations such as logarithmic, exponential, and trigonometric functions. Scientific Scripter Internal Use Only Advanced String Manipulates data strings by using well-known string functions such as concatenation, length, find, and trim. String TableExtractor Internal Use Only Advanced TableLooping Internal Use Only Advanced Unknown Internal Use Only Advanced ValueMapping Internal Use Only Advanced XPath Internal Use Only Advanced Links http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/microsoft.biztalk.basefunctoids.functoidcategory(BTS.20).aspx http://blog.eliasen.dk/CommentView,guid,d33b686b-b059-4381-a0e7-1c56e808f7f0.aspx

    Read the article

  • Twice as long and half as long

    - by PointsToShare
    We are in a project and we hit some snags. What’s a snag? An activity that takes longer than expected. Actually it takes longer than the time assigned to it by an over pressed PM who accepts an impossible time table and tries his best to make it possible, but I digress (again!).  So we have snags and we also have the opposite. Let’s call these “cinches”. The question is: how does a combination of snags and cinches affect the project timeline? Well, there is no simple answer. It depends on the projects dependencies as we see in the PERT chart. If all the snags are in the critical path and all the cinches are elsewhere then the cinches don’t help at all. In fact any snag in the critical path will delay the project.  Conversely, a cinch in the critical path will expedite it. A snag outside the critical path might be serious enough to even change the critical path. Thus without the PERT chart, we cannot really tell. Still there is a principle involved – Time and speed are non-linear! Twice as long adds a full unit, half as long only takes ½ unit away. Let’s just investigate a simple project. It consists of two activities – S and C - each estimated to take a week. Alas, S is a snag and really needs twice the time allotted and – a sigh of relief – C is a cinch and will take half the time allotted, so everything is Hun-key-dory, or is it?  Even here the PERT chart is important. We have 2 cases: 1: S depends on C (or vice versa) as in when the two activities are assigned to one employee. Here the estimated time was 1 + 1 and the actual time was 2 + ½ and we are ½ week late or 25% late. 2: S and C are done in parallel. Here the estimated time was 1, but the actual time is 2 – we are a whole week or 100% late. Let’s change the equation a little. S need 1.5 and C needs .5 so in case 1, we have the loss fully compensated by the gain, but in case 2 we are still behind. There are cases where this really makes no difference. This is when the critical path is not affected and we have enough slack in the other paths to counteract the difference between its snags and cinches – Let’s call this difference DSC. So if the slack is greater than DSC the project will not suffer. Conclusion: There is no general rule about snags and cinches. We need to examine each case within its project, still as we saw in the 4 examples above; the snag is generally more powerful than the cinch. Long live Murphy! That’s All Folks

    Read the article

  • LightSwitch Tutorial - Adding Image to a LightSwitch Screen

    - by ChrisD
    Last week, I have discussed how to control Screen Layouts in LightSwitch. Now, I will talk about how to add an image to the LightSwitch screen. In this demo, I will try to upload the image to the screen and will save the image into the database. The first step we need to do is start the VS 2010, create LightSwitch Desktop application with the name “AddingImageIntoScreenInLSBeta2” as shown in the following figure. The second steps, create a table as shown in the screen by selecting the "create a table" option in the start up screen. Then, we need to add a New Data Screen to our demo application. See the following figure which is the default screen layouts for the screen we have created. So we have to change the layout of this screen so that the uploading and using the image in the screen can be easily explained. Before adding the Model Window we have to prepare the layout. So delete the Highlighted fields as shown in the above figure. After preparing the layout to add the image, just add a new Group to the Person Property Rows Layout. To add a new group, [No: 1] – Select the Rows layout, it will shows you the Add button. [No: 2] – Click the Add button to select the new group. [No: 3] – Select the New Group. After adding the new group change the Layout type to Columns Layout. Here, -          Change the rows layout to columns layouts and give the display name as Uploading Image Example. -          Click on the add button to add the Photo field under the column layout. Add a new group under the Column layout group. Follow the [No: #] to create a new group under the columns layout group. After adding a new group of rows layout add the fields to the newly created group. [No: 1] – Select the Rows Layout group and change the display name as Details. [No: 2] – Click on Add button to select the appropriate fields to add to the group. [No: 3] – Add the fields to the group The above snippet shows the complete layout tree for our screen. Now the screen for uploading the image is ready. Just press the Play button. And see the result.

    Read the article

  • How Visual Studio 2010 and Team Foundation Server enable Compliance

    - by Martin Hinshelwood
    One of the things that makes Team Foundation Server (TFS) the most powerful Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) platform is the traceability it provides to those that use it. This traceability is crucial to enable many companies to adhere to many of the Compliance regulations to which they are bound (e.g. CFR 21 Part 11 or Sarbanes–Oxley.)   From something as simple as relating Tasks to Check-in’s or being able to see the top 10 files in your codebase that are causing the most Bugs, to identifying which Bugs and Requirements are in which Release. All that information is available and more in TFS. Although all of this tradability is available within TFS you do need to understand that it is not for free. Well… I say that, but if you are using TFS properly you will have this information with no additional work except for firing up the reporting. Using Visual Studio ALM and Team Foundation Server you can relate every line of code changes all the way up to requirements and back down through Test Cases to the Test Results. Figure: The only thing missing is Build In order to build the relationship model below we need to examine how each of the relationships get there. Each member of your team from programmer to tester and Business Analyst to Business have their roll to play to knit this together. Figure: The relationships required to make this work can get a little confusing If Build is added to this to relate Work Items to Builds and with knowledge of which builds are in which environments you can easily identify what is contained within a Release. Figure: How are things progressing Along with the ability to produce the progress and trend reports the tractability that is built into TFS can be used to fulfil most audit requirements out of the box, and augmented to fulfil the rest. In order to understand the relationships, lets look at each of the important Artifacts and how they are associated with each other… Requirements – The root of all knowledge Requirements are the thing that the business cares about delivering. These could be derived as User Stories or Business Requirements Documents (BRD’s) but they should be what the Business asks for. Requirements can be related to many of the Artifacts in TFS, so lets look at the model: Figure: If the centre of the world was a requirement We can track which releases Requirements were scheduled in, but this can change over time as more details come to light. Figure: Who edited the Requirement and when There is also the ability to query Work Items based on the History of changed that were made to it. This is particularly important with Requirements. It might not be enough to say what Requirements were completed in a given but also to know which Requirements were ever assigned to a particular release. Figure: Some magic required, but result still achieved As an augmentation to this it is also possible to run a query that shows results from the past, just as if we had a time machine. You can take any Query in the system and add a “Asof” clause at the end to query historical data in the operational store for TFS. select <fields> from WorkItems [where <condition>] [order by <fields>] [asof <date>] Figure: Work Item Query Language (WIQL) format In order to achieve this you do need to save the query as a *.wiql file to your local computer and edit it in notepad, but one imported into TFS you run it any time you want. Figure: Saving Queries locally can be useful All of these Audit features are available throughout the Work Item Tracking (WIT) system within TFS. Tasks – Where the real work gets done Tasks are the work horse of the development team, but they only as useful as Excel if you do not relate them properly to other Artifacts. Figure: The Task Work Item Type has its own relationships Requirements should be broken down into Tasks that the development team work from to build what is required by the business. This may be done by a small dedicated group or by everyone that will be working on the software team but however it happens all of the Tasks create should be a Child of a Requirement Work Item Type. Figure: Tasks are related to the Requirement Tasks should be used to track the day-to-day activities of the team working to complete the software and as such they should be kept simple and short lest developers think they are more trouble than they are worth. Figure: Task Work Item Type has a narrower purpose Although the Task Work Item Type describes the work that will be done the actual development work involves making changes to files that are under Source Control. These changes are bundled together in a single atomic unit called a Changeset which is committed to TFS in a single operation. During this operation developers can associate Work Item with the Changeset. Figure: Tasks are associated with Changesets   Changesets – Who wrote this crap Changesets themselves are just an inventory of the changes that were made to a number of files to complete a Task. Figure: Changesets are linked by Tasks and Builds   Figure: Changesets tell us what happened to the files in Version Control Although comments can be changed after the fact, the inventory and Work Item associations are permanent which allows us to Audit all the way down to the individual change level. Figure: On Check-in you can resolve a Task which automatically associates it Because of this we can view the history on any file within the system and see how many changes have been made and what Changesets they belong to. Figure: Changes are tracked at the File level What would be even more powerful would be if we could view these changes super imposed over the top of the lines of code. Some people call this a blame tool because it is commonly used to find out which of the developers introduced a bug, but it can also be used as another method of Auditing changes to the system. Figure: Annotate shows the lines the Annotate functionality allows us to visualise the relationship between the individual lines of code and the Changesets. In addition to this you can create a Label and apply it to a version of your version control. The problem with Label’s is that they can be changed after they have been created with no tractability. This makes them practically useless for any sort of compliance audit. So what do you use? Branches – And why we need them Branches are a really powerful tool for development and release management, but they are most important for audits. Figure: One way to Audit releases The R1.0 branch can be created from the Label that the Build creates on the R1 line when a Release build was created. It can be created as soon as the Build has been signed of for release. However it is still possible that someone changed the Label between this time and its creation. Another better method can be to explicitly link the Build output to the Build. Builds – Lets tie some more of this together Builds are the glue that helps us enable the next level of tractability by tying everything together. Figure: The dashed pieces are not out of the box but can be enabled When the Build is called and starts it looks at what it has been asked to build and determines what code it is going to get and build. Figure: The folder identifies what changes are included in the build The Build sets a Label on the Source with the same name as the Build, but the Build itself also includes the latest Changeset ID that it will be building. At the end of the Build the Build Agent identifies the new Changesets it is building by looking at the Check-ins that have occurred since the last Build. Figure: What changes have been made since the last successful Build It will then use that information to identify the Work Items that are associated with all of the Changesets Changesets are associated with Build and change the “Integrated In” field of those Work Items . Figure: Find all of the Work Items to associate with The “Integrated In” field of all of the Work Items identified by the Build Agent as being integrated into the completed Build are updated to reflect the Build number that successfully integrated that change. Figure: Now we know which Work Items were completed in a build Now that we can link a single line of code changed all the way back through the Task that initiated the action to the Requirement that started the whole thing and back down to the Build that contains the finished Requirement. But how do we know wither that Requirement has been fully tested or even meets the original Requirements? Test Cases – How we know we are done The only way we can know wither a Requirement has been completed to the required specification is to Test that Requirement. In TFS there is a Work Item type called a Test Case Test Cases enable two scenarios. The first scenario is the ability to track and validate Acceptance Criteria in the form of a Test Case. If you agree with the Business a set of goals that must be met for a Requirement to be accepted by them it makes it both difficult for them to reject a Requirement when it passes all of the tests, but also provides a level of tractability and validation for audit that a feature has been built and tested to order. Figure: You can have many Acceptance Criteria for a single Requirement It is crucial for this to work that someone from the Business has to sign-off on the Test Case moving from the  “Design” to “Ready” states. The Second is the ability to associate an MS Test test with the Test Case thereby tracking the automated test. This is useful in the circumstance when you want to Track a test and the test results of a Unit Test designed to test the existence of and then re-existence of a a Bug. Figure: Associating a Test Case with an automated Test Although it is possible it may not make sense to track the execution of every Unit Test in your system, there are many Integration and Regression tests that may be automated that it would make sense to track in this way. Bug – Lets not have regressions In order to know wither a Bug in the application has been fixed and to make sure that it does not reoccur it needs to be tracked. Figure: Bugs are the centre of their own world If the fix to a Bug is big enough to require that it is broken down into Tasks then it is probably a Requirement. You can associate a check-in with a Bug and have it tracked against a Build. You would also have one or more Test Cases to prove the fix for the Bug. Figure: Bugs have many associations This allows you to track Bugs / Defects in your system effectively and report on them. Change Request – I am not a feature In the CMMI Process template Change Requests can also be easily tracked through the system. In some cases it can be very important to track Change Requests separately as an Auditor may want to know what was changed and who authorised it. Again and similar to Bugs, if the Change Request is big enough that it would require to be broken down into Tasks it is in reality a new feature and should be tracked as a Requirement. Figure: Make sure your Change Requests only Affect Requirements and not rewrite them Conclusion Visual Studio 2010 and Team Foundation Server together provide an exceptional Application Lifecycle Management platform that can help your team comply with even the harshest of Compliance requirements while still enabling them to be Agile. Most Audits are heavy on required documentation but most of that information is captured for you as long a you do it right. You don’t even need every team member to understand it all as each of the Artifacts are relevant to a different type of team member. Business Analysts manage Requirements and Change Requests Programmers manage Tasks and check-in against Change Requests and Bugs Testers manage Bugs and Test Cases Build Masters manage Builds Although there is some crossover there are still rolls or “hats” that are worn. Do you thing this is all achievable? Have I missed anything that you think should be there?

    Read the article

  • Did Microsoft designers got their butts kicked 3 years ago?

    - by John Conwell
    This is something I've been wondering about for about a year now.  Microsoft has a history of creating very useful products, with lots of useful features.  But useful does not mean usable.  A lot of stuff coming out of Redmond the past 10 years don't really seem to have been well thought out from a user design point of view.  Lots of extra steps, lots of popup windows...very little innovative thinking going on about the user experience of these products.But about a year ago I started seeing changes in the new products coming out of Microsoft.  Windows 7 is a good example of a big change.  They really got their asses handed to them on Vista, so they had to make a change.  But it looks like this change in philosophy has bled over to other areas.  The new Office (2010) lineup has a lot of changes in it to make it way more usable. Given that big changes like this take about 3 years to go from start to actually shipping product, I'm curious what happened internally at Microsoft that really drove this change in product design.  I think that Microsoft got so focused on just adding new functionality for so long, they forgot about the little things that can really make or break a product.  Office 2010 is full of these little things that make it much nicer to use.  I just hope its not too late for them.

    Read the article

  • KERPOOOOW!

    - by Matt Christian
    Recently I discovered the colorful world of comic books.  In the past I've read comics a few times but never really got into them.  When I wanted to start a collection I decided either video games or comics yet stayed away from comics because I am less familiar with them. In any case, I stopped by my local comic shop and picked up a few comics and a few trade paperbacks.  After reading them and understanding their basic flow I began to enjoy not only the stories but the art styles hiding behind those little white bubbles of text (well, they're USUALLY white).  My first stop at the comic store I ended up with: - Nemesis #1 (cover A) - Shuddertown #1 (cover A I think) - Daredevil: King of Hell's Kitchen Trade Paperback - Peter Parker: Spiderman - One Small Break Trade Paperback It took me about 3-4 days to read all of that including re-reading the single issues and glancing over the beginning of Daredevil again.  After a week of looking around online I knew a little more about the comics I wanted to pick up and the kind of art style I enjoyed.  While Peter Parker: Spiderman was ok, I really enjoyed the detailed, realistic look of Daredevil and Shuddertown. Now, a few years back I picked up the game The Darkness for PS3.  I knew it was based off a comic but never read the comic.  I decided I'd pick up a few issues of it and ended up with: - The Darkness #80 (cover A) - The Darkness #81 (cover A) - The Darkness #82 (cover A) - The Darkness #83 (cover A) - The Darkness Shadows and Flame #1  (one-shot; cover A) - The Darkness Origins: Volume 1 Trade Paperback (contains The Darkness #1-6) - New Age boards and bags for storing my comics The Darkness is relatively good though jumping from issue #6 to issue #80 I lost a bit on who the enemy in the current series is.  I think out of all of them, issue #83 was my favorite of them. I'm signed up at the local shop to continue getting Nemesis, The Darkness, and Shuddertown, and I'll probably pick up a few different ones this weekend...

    Read the article

  • Working with packed dates in SSIS

    - by Jim Giercyk
    One of the challenges recently thrown my way was to read an EBCDIC flat file, decode packed dates, and insert the dates into a SQL table.  For those unfamiliar with packed data, it is a way to store data at the nibble level (half a byte), and was often used by mainframe programmers to conserve storage space.  In the case of my input file, the dates were 2 bytes long and  represented the number of days that have past since 01/01/1950.  My first thought was, in the words of Scooby, Hmmmmph?  But, I love a good challenge, so I dove in. Reading in the flat file was rather simple.  The only difference between reading an EBCDIC and an ASCII file is the Code Page option in the connection manager.  In my case, I needed to use Code Page 1140 for EBCDIC (I could have also used Code Page 37).       Once the code page is set correctly, SSIS can understand what it is reading and it will convert the output to the default code page, 1252.  However, packed data is either unreadable or produces non-alphabetic characters, as we can see in the preview window.   Column 1 is actually the packed date, columns 0 and 2 are the values in the rest of the file.  We are only interested in Column 1, which is a 2 byte field representing a packed date.  We know that 2 bytes of packed data can be stored in 1 byte of character data, so we are working with 4 packed digits in 2 character bytes.  If you are confused, stay tuned….this will make sense in a minute.   Right-click on your Flat File Source shape and select “Show Advanced Editor”. Here is where the magic begins. By changing the properties of the output columns, we can access the packed digits from each byte. By default, the Output Column data type is DT_STR. Since we want to look at the bytes individually and not the entire string, change the data type to DT_BYTES. Next, and most important, set UseBinaryFormat to TRUE. This will write the HEX VALUES of the output string instead of writing the character values.  Now we are getting somewhere! Next, you will need to use a Data Conversion shape in your Data Flow to transform the 2 position byte stream to a 4 position Unicode string containing the packed data.  You need the string to be 4 bytes long because it will contain the 4 packed digits.  Here is what that should look like in the Data Conversion shape: Direct the output of your data flow to a test table or file to see the results.  In my case, I created a test table.  The results looked like this:     Hold on a second!  That doesn't look like a date at all.  No, of course not.  It is a hex number which represents the days which have passed between 01/01/1950 and the date.  We have to convert the Hex value to a decimal value, and use the DATEADD function to get a date value.  Luckily, I have created a function to convert Hex to Decimal:   -- ============================================= -- Author:        Jim Giercyk -- Create date: March, 2012 -- Description:    Converts a Hex string to a decimal value -- ============================================= CREATE FUNCTION [dbo].[ftn_HexToDec] (     @hexValue NVARCHAR(6) ) RETURNS DECIMAL AS BEGIN     -- Declare the return variable here DECLARE @decValue DECIMAL IF @hexValue LIKE '0x%' SET @hexValue = SUBSTRING(@hexValue,3,4) DECLARE @decTab TABLE ( decPos1 VARCHAR(2), decPos2 VARCHAR(2), decPos3 VARCHAR(2), decPos4 VARCHAR(2) ) DECLARE @pos1 VARCHAR(1) = SUBSTRING(@hexValue,1,1) DECLARE @pos2 VARCHAR(1) = SUBSTRING(@hexValue,2,1) DECLARE @pos3 VARCHAR(1) = SUBSTRING(@hexValue,3,1) DECLARE @pos4 VARCHAR(1) = SUBSTRING(@hexValue,4,1) INSERT @decTab VALUES (CASE               WHEN @pos1 = 'A' THEN '10'                 WHEN @pos1 = 'B' THEN '11'               WHEN @pos1 = 'C' THEN '12'               WHEN @pos1 = 'D' THEN '13'               WHEN @pos1 = 'E' THEN '14'               WHEN @pos1 = 'F' THEN '15'               ELSE @pos1              END, CASE               WHEN @pos2 = 'A' THEN '10'                 WHEN @pos2 = 'B' THEN '11'               WHEN @pos2 = 'C' THEN '12'               WHEN @pos2 = 'D' THEN '13'               WHEN @pos2 = 'E' THEN '14'               WHEN @pos2 = 'F' THEN '15'               ELSE @pos2              END, CASE               WHEN @pos3 = 'A' THEN '10'                 WHEN @pos3 = 'B' THEN '11'               WHEN @pos3 = 'C' THEN '12'               WHEN @pos3 = 'D' THEN '13'               WHEN @pos3 = 'E' THEN '14'               WHEN @pos3 = 'F' THEN '15'               ELSE @pos3              END, CASE               WHEN @pos4 = 'A' THEN '10'                 WHEN @pos4 = 'B' THEN '11'               WHEN @pos4 = 'C' THEN '12'               WHEN @pos4 = 'D' THEN '13'               WHEN @pos4 = 'E' THEN '14'               WHEN @pos4 = 'F' THEN '15'               ELSE @pos4              END) SET @decValue = (CONVERT(INT,(SELECT decPos4 FROM @decTab)))         +                 (CONVERT(INT,(SELECT decPos3 FROM @decTab))*16)      +                 (CONVERT(INT,(SELECT decPos2 FROM @decTab))*(16*16)) +                 (CONVERT(INT,(SELECT decPos1 FROM @decTab))*(16*16*16))     RETURN @decValue END GO     Making use of the function, I found the decimal conversion, added that number of days to 01/01/1950 and FINALLY arrived at my “unpacked relative date”.  Here is the query I used to retrieve the formatted date, and the result set which was returned: SELECT [packedDate] AS 'Hex Value',        dbo.ftn_HexToDec([packedDate]) AS 'Decimal Value',        CONVERT(DATE,DATEADD(day,dbo.ftn_HexToDec([packedDate]),'01/01/1950'),101) AS 'Relative String Date'   FROM [dbo].[Output Table]         This technique can be used any time you need to retrieve the hex value of a character string in SSIS.  The date example may be a bit difficult to understand at first, but with SSIS becoming the preferred tool for enterprise level integration for many companies, there is no doubt that developers will encounter these types of requirements with regularity in the future. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions.

    Read the article

  • Atlanta Code Camp 2012

    - by SURESH GIRIRAJAN
    It was really exciting weekend at Atlanta code camp 2012. This was my first code camp, I presented on “Windows Kinect for Enterprise”. Walked through couple of demos, how we can integrate Kinect with WPF application. One of the demos I walked thorough how you can integrate Kinect with Microsoft Lync 2010 and other one on Car console app.   You can check the uploaded code here. I appreciate all the folks attended my session and thanks for all the organizers. Windows kinect for enterprise View more PowerPoint from sureshgiriraja

    Read the article

  • C#/.NET Little Wonders &ndash; Cross Calling Constructors

    - by James Michael Hare
    Just a small post today, it’s the final iteration before our release and things are crazy here!  This is another little tidbit that I love using, and it should be fairly common knowledge, yet I’ve noticed many times that less experienced developers tend to have redundant constructor code when they overload their constructors. The Problem – repetitive code is less maintainable Let’s say you were designing a messaging system, and so you want to create a class to represent the properties for a Receiver, so perhaps you design a ReceiverProperties class to represent this collection of properties. Perhaps, you decide to make ReceiverProperties immutable, and so you have several constructors that you can use for alternative construction: 1: // Constructs a set of receiver properties. 2: public ReceiverProperties(ReceiverType receiverType, string source, bool isDurable, bool isBuffered) 3: { 4: ReceiverType = receiverType; 5: Source = source; 6: IsDurable = isDurable; 7: IsBuffered = isBuffered; 8: } 9: 10: // Constructs a set of receiver properties with buffering on by default. 11: public ReceiverProperties(ReceiverType receiverType, string source, bool isDurable) 12: { 13: ReceiverType = receiverType; 14: Source = source; 15: IsDurable = isDurable; 16: IsBuffered = true; 17: } 18:  19: // Constructs a set of receiver properties with buffering on and durability off. 20: public ReceiverProperties(ReceiverType receiverType, string source) 21: { 22: ReceiverType = receiverType; 23: Source = source; 24: IsDurable = false; 25: IsBuffered = true; 26: } Note: keep in mind this is just a simple example for illustration, and in same cases default parameters can also help clean this up, but they have issues of their own. While strictly speaking, there is nothing wrong with this code, logically, it suffers from maintainability flaws.  Consider what happens if you add a new property to the class?  You have to remember to guarantee that it is set appropriately in every constructor call. This can cause subtle bugs and becomes even uglier when the constructors do more complex logic, error handling, or there are numerous potential overloads (especially if you can’t easily see them all on one screen’s height). The Solution – cross-calling constructors I’d wager nearly everyone knows how to call your base class’s constructor, but you can also cross-call to one of the constructors in the same class by using the this keyword in the same way you use base to call a base constructor. 1: // Constructs a set of receiver properties. 2: public ReceiverProperties(ReceiverType receiverType, string source, bool isDurable, bool isBuffered) 3: { 4: ReceiverType = receiverType; 5: Source = source; 6: IsDurable = isDurable; 7: IsBuffered = isBuffered; 8: } 9: 10: // Constructs a set of receiver properties with buffering on by default. 11: public ReceiverProperties(ReceiverType receiverType, string source, bool isDurable) 12: : this(receiverType, source, isDurable, true) 13: { 14: } 15:  16: // Constructs a set of receiver properties with buffering on and durability off. 17: public ReceiverProperties(ReceiverType receiverType, string source) 18: : this(receiverType, source, false, true) 19: { 20: } Notice, there is much less code.  In addition, the code you have has no repetitive logic.  You can define the main constructor that takes all arguments, and the remaining constructors with defaults simply cross-call the main constructor, passing in the defaults. Yes, in some cases default parameters can ease some of this for you, but default parameters only work for compile-time constants (null, string and number literals).  For example, if you were creating a TradingDataAdapter that relied on an implementation of ITradingDao which is the data access object to retreive records from the database, you might want two constructors: one that takes an ITradingDao reference, and a default constructor which constructs a specific ITradingDao for ease of use: 1: public TradingDataAdapter(ITradingDao dao) 2: { 3: _tradingDao = dao; 4:  5: // other constructor logic 6: } 7:  8: public TradingDataAdapter() 9: { 10: _tradingDao = new SqlTradingDao(); 11:  12: // same constructor logic as above 13: }   As you can see, this isn’t something we can solve with a default parameter, but we could with cross-calling constructors: 1: public TradingDataAdapter(ITradingDao dao) 2: { 3: _tradingDao = dao; 4:  5: // other constructor logic 6: } 7:  8: public TradingDataAdapter() 9: : this(new SqlTradingDao()) 10: { 11: }   So in cases like this where you have constructors with non compiler-time constant defaults, default parameters can’t help you and cross-calling constructors is one of your best options. Summary When you have just one constructor doing the job of initializing the class, you can consolidate all your logic and error-handling in one place, thus ensuring that your behavior will be consistent across the constructor calls. This makes the code more maintainable and even easier to read.  There will be some cases where cross-calling constructors may be sub-optimal or not possible (if, for example, the overloaded constructors take completely different types and are not just “defaulting” behaviors). You can also use default parameters, of course, but default parameter behavior in a class hierarchy can be problematic (default values are not inherited and in fact can differ) so sometimes multiple constructors are actually preferable. Regardless of why you may need to have multiple constructors, consider cross-calling where you can to reduce redundant logic and clean up the code.   Technorati Tags: C#,.NET,Little Wonders

    Read the article

< Previous Page | 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97  | Next Page >