SQL Server 2005 - T-SQL Grows Up

Some very important "improvements" on T-SQL supported by the new version of MS SQL Server 2005.
- TOP X
- Structured Error Handling
- Common Table Expressions

http://dotnet.sys-con.com/read/163743.htm

Combine Microsoft Project and Visual Studio Team System

Hmmm... here it is something that lets you create a Project Plan, handle roles, tasks, assignments, share it with team members, import / export from MS Project, build the architecture of your project, develop in .NET (oh, yes, all-in-one, Visual Studio, handle versions with Visual Source Safe), quality concepts and testing, handling work priorities... did I mention everything ?

Sounds good, but does it do the job? Also... is it KISS enough? Seems to me that the project being managed/built with this system has to be a big one, very big one OR the merged applications have to be very easy to handle so you do not waste much time on synchronizing and managing everything you need. I don't like the idea of "all in one" unless it is really easy to use and actually leads to a gain in time not to a waste.

Read more:
http://www.devx.com/dotnet/Article/30187?trk=DXRSS_DOTNET

User-defined interfaces in PHP 5: Implementing (X)HTML Widgets

Something that I already did in other scripting languages, but now that PHP5 supports classes and Object-Oriented structures, why not doing it here, too.

The article gives you some idea about building interface classes in PHP5, but I wouldn't suggest you to use this technique for everything. My opinion is that you should use this technique on generating specific elements on interface as error warnings (error handling "DIV" messages poping up on user actions), titles and other static sections of the page, etc. I am only considering the interface here, because I am also building in PHP5 classes that allow me to handle better the database connectivity, formatting dates, numbers and strings, etc...

Read full article here »

Latest Vista Beta Is Just a Pretty Face

Of course we have news on Microsoft! Every few articles we talk about it, what do you think?!

Here it is an acid article on the new MS Windows named Vista. It is still Beta, but it worth taking a look over both article and screenshots.

Article:
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1904935,00.asp?kc=EWRSS03129TX1K0000610

Screenshots index:
http://www.pcmag.com/slideshow/0,1206,pg=0&s=26945&a=167795,00.asp

MVC and web apps: oil and water

MVC = Model View Control

- Model—those functions that wrap calls to your db
- View—the templates / scripts that output HTML
- Controller—the stuff that examines variables like $_GET and $_POST and works out what to do next.

Very interesting article on code architecture, languages and programming techniques.

http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2005/12/22/mvc-and-web-apps-oil-and-water/

Top 7 PHP Security Blunders

For you PHP lovers (I know some of you):

Article on PHP security issues. Some of these issues are well known but it worth taking a look, especially if you are in the web business.
I will quote out of the article two interesting lines:

The most important thing is to develop a proper security mindset and to know
your tools well.

Remember: just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there's no one out to get
you.

http://www.sitepoint.com/article/php-security-blunders

Top Ten Web 2.0 Moments of 2005

Since the year is ending, we have all kind of retrospective articles and links. I am a fan of TOP X type of articles...

Here it is one.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/web2explorer/?p=80

Random, but great Links

HipCal - Great Online Calendar built on AJAX
http://www.hipcal.com/

Google Reader - to read RSS Feeds
Click here to check it

HTML Online Editor
http://tinymce.moxiecode.com/

Online Notes
http://www.aypwip.org/webnote/

RSS 2 PDF
http://rss2pdf.com/

thinkfree Office
http://www.thinkfree.com/

Web 2.0 Command Line
http://yubnub.org/

Web Site Validator
http://web2.0validator.com/

Wikiworld: The Experiment

Little bit of Wikipedia history and predictions.

http://www.smartmoney.com/esquire/index.cfm?Story=20051215wikipedia

One thing is beyond doubt: Wikipedia is a powerful idea. And already the wiki
concept has spread well beyond the encyclopedia. Volunteers have created a
dictionary (Wiktionary), a quote collection (Wikiquote), a news service
(Wikinews), and a bank of freely licensed images and other media (Wikimedia
Commons).

How come great ideas are so simple? :-)

Instant Messaging Standards ?

Looks like we have standards in the IM area, too.

Google is contributing to multimedia extensions to the open Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) that will enable XMPP-based instant messaging applications to conduct sessions involving voice and video.

Let's see how will this bend Microsoft and Yahoo with their IM.

I bet they will start approaching the XMPP standards and rules enforced by Google in two years from now. See how Microsoft is getting into Google Style with MS Live project and see all this last year improvements that yahoo brought to their search and email features.

http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/12/16/HNgoogleimstandard_1.html

"New" Linux: Ubuntu

I've been reading all over the place about Ubuntu. Why?
Simple: because it is easy to install and easy to use and has all kind of applications and neat features that come as part of the distribution, but that is not what makes a difference.

It is important for a Linux distribution to have all the described above, it is actually very important if it targets the masses: every users' home. But what makes a difference is when, right after the successful install, you get a popup that starts to download latest updates available for your version. Now that is cool!

Not only that you get it installed with no pain (and benefit of so many free, already installed applications as Open Office or some free Project Planner), but you get updates without being a Linux guru.

Good job.

Official website :
http://ubuntulinux.org/

Ubuntu: Is the new Linux distro for you?
http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/index.php?p=1294

A critical look at Ubuntu or: What companies could learn about PR from open source http://blogs.zdnet.com/open-source/index.php?p=236

P.S. I also liked Mephis a lot... promising, not that easy to install though.
http://www.mepis.org

XML again

I really like it when I receive hits on great articles. This is what this Blog is about: IT readings, what do we read and like, what do we read and can use further...

Here are some XML related articles:

How To Validate an XML Document by Using DTD, XDR, or XSD in Visual C# .NET
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;307379

and the basic knowledge here:

XSD How To
http://www.w3schools.com/schema/schema_howto.asp

Thank you, Laur

Funny stuff: RSS icon “standardized”

I just find this funny. Sounds such a hard-core situation that Microsoft decided to follow Mozilla with it's standard RSS Icon :-)

Actually there should be a common sense about this. Me as a developer, I find it difficult and useless not to have two browsers supporting same DOM and basic methods. There are differences that are not justified.

Both sides are in it: IE and Mozilla. I have to recognize they are getting better lately, but I still cannot forget and forgive the Netscape 4.7 days...

http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2005/12/14/rss-icon-standardized/

From $0 to $1 million in only a year

I shouldn't even bother to post links from the SitePoint.com... they are all cool and interesting (except a few boring article advertising stuff from their website).

Here's another blog post that describes in a few concise words a nice story. Sounds like "the american dream" to you? Yeah, you might be right... this does not sounds well. Still it is well written and makes you (and the others as you can see from the comments) think about.

http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2005/12/15/from-0-to-1-million-in-only-a-year/

The top 4 things project managers do to reduce software quality

Good title. It certainly made me look over it :-)

Being a project manager that actually does the job on time and with the requested quality it is a complex and rare job. Time constraints, Customer's constant requirements and complaints, human interactions, though decisions, technical decisions, planning tasks, assigning the right resource for the right job... and so many more items are placed on your shoulders.

Trying to do your best might harm the delivered product... even if it sounds strange. We all know that by trying to do something good you might end up making that particular situation worst. Here are some of the things project managers use to do and by doing them harming the project's quality.

http://techrepublic.com.com/5100-10878_11-5991800.html?part=rss&tag=feed&subj=tr

How to Freelance Your Expertise

As if you don't know this, as if you didn't already think about becoming a freelancer...

But it is good to know there are others thinking about it, too and sharing some of their experience. I also like that the article is organized and addresses the most important elements in becoming a freelancer.

It is not that easy to just switch from a day-to-day job into a freelancing, it will be much harder and painful to handle things but you can succeed by paying attention to several things.

http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/0,4621,322656,00.html

Thanks Adrian, great article!

Logging Client Side JavaScript Errors to the Server using AJAX

I didn't try it yet, but a perfect error handling implementation on a software application would probable need to track Client-Side errors, too.

I'll know where to look for a solution when needed; here:

http://www.codeproject.com/Ajax/LogClientSideJSErrors2Srv.asp

10 Things You Shouldn't Do with SQL Server (& .NET)

There are so many other things we should't do, yet we keep on doing them...

But read these because some of them are interesting and we use to ignore them even if they are easy to implement.

http://www.sqljunkies.com/Article/92CC4817-604D-4344-8BE0-4490F8ED24B6.scuk

Database Cache and ADO.NET 2.0 Notifications

Brief description:

When working with big databases (as data volume not as number of objects) or when working with applications that need several database hits per second (volume in transactions), then you have to figure out how to optimize the process. After you carefully write the code looking up for useless data handling or database connections, after you review your queries for performance, etc... you can also apply the following development technique: you identify all the tables that are mostly read-only (definition tables for example - tables where you keep default system data) and you cache that data (save that data into a cache structure that can be accesses / used without running a query on the database, usually using middle tier cache techniques). This way you take some of the load off the database.

But there it is a problem: how do you know when those tables change? If you do not consider that the tables' data can change, then the above solution is ok, but if that table might change sometime (99% of the situations data in that table will change once and a while) then you probable have to update your cache on a frequency you kind of "guess".

ADO.NET 2.0 provides the possibility to be notified if that data is being changed, so you don't have to update the cache on a frequency, but only when the data changed. Cool.

Read the full article here

Business, ethics, and morality

Remember this article talking about the offshore work? It generated a lot of interesting comments.

Here's another one, it involved offshore work and they also added a lot of comments on it. Also interesting, not only about off-shoring work, about business in general.

http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2005/12/09/business-ethics-and-morality/

The Anatomy of Web Fonts

This seems a well-documented article on Fonts. It is not a history - article, it is just a web-oriented fonts article, presenting several CSS aspects and properties.

It surely looks documented to me.

http://www.sitepoint.com/article/anatomy-web-fonts

Some marketing links

I don't read a lot of marketing stuff, because I am a technical resource, but I enjoy some good information from time to time. Here are some links:

http://www.fastmarketingresults.com/articles4.php

http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2005/12/06/wht-about-hiring-a-salesperson/

Forecasting Declines for Sony, Google, IBM, Oracle, RIM and Apple

Interesting business case study. Well documented and presenting a little story for each of the companies in the title here. I enjoyed every single one and I was surprised by some.

Definitely read this:

http://www.technewsworld.com/rsstory/47652.html

Bill Gates to Visit India

Sounds like simple news, but it is not. If you read the article you figure out one idea: Microsoft is working hard to gain back what is loosing. India is on the way out of Microsoft as more and more servers and institutions are moving on Linux or other open source applications and alternatives to that.

Why India? Because of two things: India has a billion persons in there and a growing economy, therefore several business opportunities, and the second thing: India built itself a well known IT image, it has lots specialists and they are recognized all over the world… If most of these specialists will be “converted” to trust Microsoft, then it is a big advantage.

http://www.ecommercetimes.com/rsstory/47661.html

Tips for Securing your .NET Web Applications

If you don't already know these, then you have a problem. These are just some basic security rules you have to follow when building a web application.

http://www.devsource.com/article2/0,1759,1896102,00.asp?kc=DSRSS04029TX1K0000651

If you need a nice XML development environment tool ...

If you need a nice XML development environment tool ...

Here it is, just launched the XMLSpy® 2006. I used their 2005 edition and I enjoy it.

http://www.altova.com/products_ide.html

Download here free "Home Edition" Environment and Processors:

http://www.altova.com/download_components.html

There are also other FREE full alternatives to the Altova solution above. Try the following:

http://www.exist-db.org/

but it will probable be harder to setup (as all free stuff :-) ) but there it is support and I also followed another helpfull link: http://xml.sys-con.com/read/155664.htm to get it running.

Editing VB.NET code at runtime?

I need to try this .NET hint, because the author is so right about it:

1. Build the VS.NET solution. That will take a long time to build.

2. You start debugging your application. You realize you made a small mistake.

This article is an attempt to alleviate that problem by showing you how to use Edit and Continue in ASP.NET, without recompiling the whole application.

http://www.codeproject.com/aspnet/ASPNETEditAndContinue.asp

XML Queries and Indexing in SQL Server 2005

I remember posting something about this MS SQL Server & XML tip, but, because I am still finding it interesting, I will post more.

XML standards proved to gain more and more success in both open sources and corporate software products as Microsoft for example (the new Office will come up with new document formats based on XML structures, and guess what: their structure might be even documented and fully accessible to anyone). XML is what most of the companies choose as a format for data and it is quite a simple and useful invention.

Microsoft, with its new product line: new .NET framework and new MS SQL Server is counting more and more on this type of structures. Here’s a simple view on SQL query & XML type of column.


http://www.codeguru.com/Csharp/Csharp/cs_data/xml/article.php/c11023

Skills for a Job in 2010?

What do you think about getting an IT job in 2010: what would be the skills and requirements you need to fulfill in order to be hired in 2010 as an IT Resource?

Here’s a quote from the next article:

Try to approach your IT role as a business person, as somebody who is really
looking to assist the company's business processes, as opposed to just focusing
on the technology.

Read more:

http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/career/article.php/3567881

What do we leave behind us? - 10 Years of Java.

I find this article quite revealing. It asks a crucial question: in the past 10 years, since Java was on the market, what was it’s contribution to the application’s world? What is the outstanding application used by everyone that is built with Java? Can we live without it, would it be a loss not to have Java with us?

I personally think that the author of the article is too hard and the idea he express is not based on reality and this is because you cannot judge a technology by asking how many “popular” applications it created. Nobody asks about how popular is a medical application, but yet, everybody that is in that particular hospital has his life depending on it (just to give an example).

Still, I find the article revealing for developers: it raises a few questions: Do we use the proper tool to generate a great application? Do we need to learn and support a specific technology just because it is “cool” (or just because it is not Microsoft :-) ). And the hardest question: what do we leave behind after 10 years of working on a project? Is it… used? Was it worthy? Or it just paid our salaries…

http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2005/12/02/10-years-of-java-for-what/