DotNetKicks.com : Stories kicked by estherschindler

Testing Apps For SmartPhones and Mobile Devices (Without Buying Out th

Wed, 23 Mar 2011 17:54:52 GMT

Testing desktop apps is comparatively straightforward, but there can be dozens of machines for a given mobile OS, each one slightly different in display, controls and usability. Fortunately, there are resources that let you test more easily and affordably.

Safest Career Choices for Developers

Tue, 22 Feb 2011 18:58:22 GMT

Don't want your job to go away? Mobile development's the way to move. And developers expending their brain juice on Java and Objective C are going to enjoy steady paychecks for a good, long time. Not that .NET hurts, either.

Who's who of bad password practices - banks, airlines and more

Wed, 19 Jan 2011 14:36:33 GMT

Ah, passwords. Love 'em or hate 'em, they're a necessary evil of the digital age. The reality is we all end up with an alphabet soup of passwords spread over dozens of various sites and services across the internet. Whilst we might not always practice it, we all know the theory of creating a good password; uniqueness, randomness and length. The more of each, the better. But what happens when the website won't allow you to create a secure password? Or at least when they severely constrain your ability to create long, random, unique passwords? And what about when they don't allow you to send it between your computer and their server securely? Even worse, what happens when our most "secure" institutions implement lazy password policies? Unfortunately, all of this is pretty rampant practice.

An Interview with C++ Creator Bjarne Stroustrup

Wed, 12 Jan 2011 13:57:49 GMT

With the new C++0x standardization process about to have the final technical vote Danny Kalev sits down with C++ creator Bjarne Stroustrup to talk about C++0x, new features, and future plans.

Create Custom Speech Bubbles in Silverlight.

Tue, 11 Jan 2011 17:05:32 GMT

I had a reader email me the following question: "How do you create Speech Bubbles in Silverlight/WPF without adding any extra .dlls? Right off the bat, I know at least two ways to create the speech bubbles that look just like the ones in comic books. Using the Callout Shapes included with Blend 4. Using the free 3rd party control named FreeBubbles (I used this before Blend 4). Unfortunately, we cannot use either of these as they will both add extra .dll's to the project.

The Windows 7 API Code Pack: Using the Task Bar Classes

Thu, 03 Jun 2010 14:29:39 GMT

Want your new Windows 7 applications to take advantage of the new operating system? Here's how to add functionality to the Windows 7 Task Bar, using the Windows 7 API Code Pack, .NET, and very little effort.

A PowerShell 2.0 Introduction for System Administrators

Tue, 25 May 2010 17:56:57 GMT

No longer an optional extra, but a built-in part of Windows 7, PowerShell 2 enables administrators to manage the computers in the enterprise from both the command line and from scripts. Here's an introduction that may be appreciated by the admins in your company even more than other developers.

SQL SERVER - Find Most Expensive Queries Using DMV

Wed, 19 May 2010 15:00:52 GMT

The title of this post is what I can express here for this quick blog post. I was asked in recent query tuning consultation project, if I can share my script which I use to figure out which is the most expensive queries are running on SQL Server. This script is very basic and very simple, there are many different versions are available online. This basic script does do the job which I expect to do - find out the most expensive queries on SQL Server Box.

Win the Latest Manning EBooks

Tue, 18 May 2010 02:15:52 GMT

Here's a chance for you to win copies of the latest Manning EBooks. There are 10 copies in total to be won of the following: ASP.NET MVC 2 in Action, jQuery in Action - 2nd Edition, C# in Depth - 2nd Edition, SQL Server MVP Deep Dives, and SharePoint 2007 Developer's Guide to Business Data Catalog.

Combining Virtualization and Microsoft SQL Server

Tue, 04 May 2010 14:56:16 GMT

Old mindsets and turf protections can kill any project. Beyond that key realization lays a number of real technical issues to solve. Here's what to look out for and what to ignore.

How to Automatically Schedule a Task in Windows 7

Thu, 08 Apr 2010 17:23:55 GMT

You want your clients to automatically clean themselves up? You need a program to start at a specific time? You want the PC to automatically send you an e-mail message in case a crash occurs? Windows 7's built in "Task Scheduler" can automate almost everything you want (including programming tasks but excluding getting you coffee). Here's how it works.

Essential C#: An Interview with Mark Michaelis

Thu, 08 Apr 2010 16:48:58 GMT

In this interview by Larry O'Brien, Mark Michaelis, the author of Essential C# 4.0, 3rd Edition, discusses the under-appreciated and under-used features of C#, why he embraces different programming paradigms, and his wish list for future versions of C#.

Ten Cool Visual Studio 2010 Features

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 14:00:00 GMT

The 10 most useful new features in Visual Studio 2010.

CouchDB - Document Persistence Powered by CQRS

Thu, 08 Apr 2010 08:36:12 GMT

CouchDB is a young document-oriented database that leans towards the web applications and is based on the CQRS principles. The latter gives it nice performance, distribution and scalability. Let's see how.

Programming Windows Phone 7 Series by Charlez Petzold - Free EBook

Tue, 06 Apr 2010 22:15:00 GMT

I got excited when I heard that Charlez Petzold is authoring a Book called "Programming Windows Phone 7 Series". To add icing to the cake, he is already offering a draft preview of his eBook FREE of cost!

Migrating an ASP.NET Site to the Cloud

Thu, 18 Mar 2010 12:20:40 GMT

Need to move older business software off its outdated platform and into a modern environment? Bruce Johnson shows you the steps in writing a Microsoft Azure web application.

A Visual Look At The LINQ SelectMany Operator

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:00:00 GMT

An inside look at how SelectMany works, along with visuals to help you more easily understand it.

5 Tips to get the most out of your coding time

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:00:00 GMT

I remember seeing an add from Microsoft I believe for hiring programmers and the jist of it was "We give you an office with a door". Why you might wonder?

An Overview Of System.Collections.Generic

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 19:19:03 GMT

A look at the different collection types in the System.Collections.Generic namespace.

C# 4.0 Features Overview

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:37:04 GMT

What's so great about C# 4.0? In this book chapter, Troy Magennis looks at the new features added into C# 4.0 that combine to improve code readability and extend your ability to leverage LINQ to Object queries over dynamic data sources.

Sending e-mail in Silverlight

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:30:44 GMT

Send e-mail is commonplace but there are still some sites that have their eye on the time to leave that space where we can contact you with questions, suggestions or complaints.

InformIT: Versioning REST Services

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:02:43 GMT

Scott Seely explains when developers need to create a new endpoint versus just adding data. This higher level, non-language specific article explains how to version REST services and when each choice makes sense.

HanselMinutes: Women in Technology in the Muslim World - with Aby And

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 07:30:14 GMT

Scott's in Egypt today and he had the opportunity to sit down with Lamees and Abeer, two successful women in IT. Lamees is a programmer transitioning to Systems Analysis, and Abeer is a veteran Senior Systems Analyst and Agile Project Manager at Dashsoft. Nearly 50% of the people at Cairo Code Camp are women. What is Egypt doing right to encourage so many women to choose technology as their career?

Why You Can't Pry IE6 Out Of Their Cold Dead Hands

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 21:49:05 GMT

Among the barriers to Windows 7 deployment is the need to upgrade users (and their apps) from IE6 to IE8. But too many of those users apparently refuse to give up IE6. Here's what's holding them back.

Ramblings on Windows Mobile 7 Development

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 05:30:35 GMT

Ramblings on Windows Mobile 7, Microsoft, and possible future development.