Tap My Mind

A Blog by Scott Isaacs

Tag: Technology Page 7 of 11

Deeper in .NET 2006!

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On March 5, 2006

In Uncategorized

As president of the WI .NET Users Group, I’m really excited about our upcoming conference on April 22, 2006.  Deeper in .NET 2006 will be at the Hyatt Regency Milwaukee (map).

We have five great speakers lined up for the day-long FREE conference:

  • Michele Leroux Bustamante — WCF Top to Bottom
  • Scott Hanselman — Anatomy of a Successful ASP.NET Application: Inside DasBlog
  • Julia Lerman — ADO.NET 2.0 Integration with SQL Server 2005
  • Bill Hatfield — AJAX and Atlas
  • Jason Beres — Using WPF to Create Compelling User Interfaces

We’ve also got a number of great sponsors lined up, and a ton of prizes to giveaway to attendees — at the moment we’re somewhere around $15,000 – $20,000 in prizes!  (And we hope to have even more by the time April 22 rolls around.)

Like I said, this event is free to attend — how can you beat that?  You do need to register in advance to “save your spot”, because last year, we had only standing room.  So if you’re anywhere within driving distance of Milwaukee, you should come.  For those coming from out of town, I’m trying to work out a special rate at the hotel, and will post more on the UG site when that is worked out.  I know we have people coming from all Wisconsin, Chiacgo, and Indianapolis.

Also, the UG is still looking for a few more annual sponsors for 2006, so if you work at a company that might be interested in sponsorship opportunities reaching nearly 2,000 .NET developers (*), architects and decision makers, by all means, please get in touch with us.  You can find out more info about our sponsorship programs here.

Most of the information about Deeper in .NET 2006 is available on our site, but if you have any questions, just ask.  🙂  I hope to see you there!!!

* Update: For clarification, our total membership and mailing list is nearly 2,000, and each member will receive a number of e-mails.  Actual meeting attendance is limited to venue capacity and will be somewhere between 500 and 600.  Sorry for any confusion.

More on CS 2.0

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On February 23, 2006

In Uncategorized

OK, so I’ve tweaked the blog skin a little (added a couple things to the side bar), and I’m getting used to it.  I also downloaded this from the CS site.  It lets me type code into my posts and it highlights it for me.  For example:

[code language=”VB.NET”]’ VB
Dim myString as String = “Hello world”[/code]

[code language=”C#”]// C#
string myString = “Hello world”;[/code]

[code language=”T-SQL”]– SQL
select ‘Hello world'[/code]

[code language=”ASP/ASP.NET”]<%’ ASP.NET %>
<asp:Label id=”Label1″ runat=”server” />[/code]

I don’t post a lot of code really, but maybe now I will… [;)]

Upgraded to Community Server 2.0

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On February 22, 2006

In Uncategorized

I just upgraded to Community Server 2.0.  It was pretty smooth.

It’s slick.  I haven’t found a skin I like yet, so I’m using the default.  Maybe someday I’ll get around to changing that.  Bear with me.  😉

Mouse Wheel in VB6

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On February 3, 2006

In Uncategorized

Now that VB8 has been out for a few months, and I’m using it as much as I use VB6 (mostly on VB7), I’ve finally found an answer to a problem that has bugged me forever.  OK, well, not forever, but for a long time.

Has anyone ever noticed that the scroll wheel on your mouse doesn’t work correctly in VB6?  A coworker sent me a link today that tells you how to fix that.

So, in case I’m not the only person to not know that such a fix exists (because I never bothered to search), here you go!  Enjoy!

What a great way to end a Friday…  😉

Free .NET CMS

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On February 2, 2006

In Uncategorized

I was reading Scott Guthrie’s blog post about a free CMS (content management system) written with ASP.NET 2.0.  I went to look at the site, and clicked on the link for a demo.  First sentence:

You can test and get to know the new AxCMS.net for 4 weeks completely free and without oblivion. (Emphasis added.)

Oblivion.  Funny.

Update: I checked last night (2/13/2006) and the word was corrected.

Update: Image Converter

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On February 2, 2006

In Uncategorized

A couple weeks ago, I posted a “slightly useful piece of software” which could be used to convert a bunch of BMP files to JPG.  We’ll I just updated it to allow you to select the source and destination file types.

I’ve replaced the old download with the modified one, and you can get it here.  Use at your own risk.

It’s pretty simple to use, but see the original post for more info.  Let me know if you have any questions or suggestions.  I probably won’t put too much work into it, but if it’s a good suggestion, I may.

An Introduction to F#

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On January 31, 2006

In Uncategorized

The next WI .NET Users Group meeting is on February 21st.  I’m looking forward to the next meeting where our very own optionsScalper (OS) will be presenting “An Introduction to F#” (register here). 

Why am I so interested?  Is it because OS is such a hottie?  While one could make that case, I’d have to say, “No”.  It’s because F# has been described to me as the “math language” of .NET, and you may not know it, but I have a B.S. in Applied Mathematics.    It’s been a while since I’ve had to do any serious “math-like” development, and even longer since I’ve done anything remotely academic, but talking to OS about this has definitely piqued my interest.

If you have any interest in math, finance, a “scripted/functional/imperative/object-oriented programming language”, or just cool, new stuff in general, then you owe it to yourself to attend. Get the details and register here.

Couldn’t Debug ASP.NET 1.1

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On December 15, 2005

In Uncategorized

I am setting up a computer, and I installed VS 2003 and VS 2005.  I opened 2003 today and found myself unable to debug any web apps.  I went through the help file, and every setting was as it should be, but I still couldn’t debug.

Well, I finally found the problem/solution, and since Gerry always tells me to blog everything, you get to read it.  Basically, when I installed VS 2005 it set my IIS (5.1, WinXP Pro) to use the 2.0 framework instead of the 1.1 framework.  (I don’t know why it did that.  I don’t remember that happening last time I installed 2005.)  Since I always use VS 2005’s built-in web server when developing ASP.NET 2.0, I just changed the setting back to 1.1 at the default level.

All is well again.

Ready Launch Tour 2005

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On October 25, 2005

In Uncategorized

There is a lot going on locally in the MS community over the next couple weeks.  For starters, on November 7, Microsoft will be launching a new series of development packages: Visual Studio 2005, SQL Server 2005, and Biztalk 2006.  The official launch will be happening in San Francisco, CA.

The WI .NET Users Group is having a Community Launch (aka, Ready Launch Tour 2005) on November 8.  It is a joint meeting with the WI SQL Server Users Group.  Because of the combined meeting, we will actually get started at 4:30.  You can register for either or both of the sessions (VS and SQL) on the UG site.  If you typically receive an e-mail newsletter, you can expect it today or tomorrow.

Then, just a few days later, Microsoft will be having a “local” launch in Chicago.  That will be at the McCormick Place on November 10.  Then in November in Madison and December in Milwaukee, MSDN and TechNet will be having “Best of the Launch”.  You can find links to those events on the UG site as well.

Not many of us in this area are going to be able to make it to the “official” launch in CA on November 7.  So make sure you get to at least one of these other events.  Our Community Launch will be filling up fast because we only have a limited number of seats (although we are meeting in a bigger facility than the Microsoft office where we normally meet). 

So pick one or more of these events and sign up today!!

Newsletter Sender

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On October 7, 2005

In Uncategorized

OK, so that’s a really lame name for a program, but I named it so I wouldn’t forget what it was.  I could have called it PhireFaacs, but really, do you think I would know what that was in two weeks?  Forget for a moment how much ridicule I would receive from my peers for choosing such a stupid name — that’s an even dumber name than “Newsletter Sender”.

Anyway, I wrote a simple little WinForms program last night (screenshots below) to help me send out the newsletter for the WI .NET Users Group.  (See how I decided on the name???)  In a nutshell it does a mail merge of some comma delimeted text datasource against an e-mail template.  “So what?”, you ask.  Yeah, I asked that, too, but it does make my newsletter sending a little easier.

Basic instructions (because there is no help file or tooltips):

  • Specify an SMTP mail server, and optional SMTP username and password.
  • Load a data file.  This can be any CSV formatted file, but there must be row headers.
  • Specify which field in the data file contains e-mail addresses.
  • Enter the “from” address.
  • Enter the message subject.
  • Enter the message body.
  • Specify a priority.
  • Click “Send”

The SMTP mail server, SMTP username, and from address can be stored in an XML file that gets created the first time you run the program (you have to edit it manually).  The subject and body can contain placeholders ({0}, {1}, etc.) that will be replaced with data from that column (note that this is zero-based index).

That’s basically it.

The ZIP download is available here.  Blah blah blah your own risk blah blah blah I’m not responsible blah blah blah.

Screenshots (also included in ZIP download)

The UI:

A Merged E-mail:

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