Saturday, March 18, 2006
What a week...
This has been one heck of a week. Lot's of stuff, so I'll break it into sections...
Some great training...
Spent 3 days this week in Wintellect training on the new features of ASP.NET 2.0. Pretty slick stuff. Jeff Prosise was our instructor, he did an awesome job. I highly recommend the company if you are thinking about having on site training at your place.
Anyway the new features were really cool. I especially like Master Pages. It's going to make putting together a site so much easier. Jeff also showed us how to make menus maintain state between postbacks. I have an itch to wrap it up into an inherited control. Speaking of new things...
ATLAS...
...is Microsoft's new answer to AJAX. Jeff spent some time showing us the new features and some code samples. I also did some digging the night before and saw some really cool demo's online. It's really going to make it easier to do Smart Client looking apps in the browser.
Spheres...
Speaking of Atlas, I found a new Desktop interface for XP called SphereXP. Makes for a very different way to use your PC. Go check it out. And it's written in .Net!
A Tragic Death...
My beloved iPaq 3900 died after four years. I loved it, used the heck out of it. So, as much as I didn't want to spend any more money, I found a good deal on a new iPaq 2495. Smaller but still has both a SD and Compact Flash slots inside, which means I can use the ones I had with my old iPaq. And, I scored a spare battery and charger on clearance at Staples for 9 bucks! I figured it must have been karma or something.
Coding fun...
I did finally get to do a little real coding this week. Used generics for the first time, sweet. It's just a type safe List to handle my record classes in my parent collection class, but still cool. Also worked a little more with the Infragistics stuff, figured out how to use a drop down combo with multi colums. Minor victory but fun.
Doodles...
My kids have been going nuts for these doodle bears. Stuffed teddy bears that you can draw on, wash, and then draw again. They each got one for Christmas last year. Well now they have all sorts of models, including one you can draw on with glow in the dark marker. We can't go to the store without them going "doodle bear doodle bear doodle bear".
What the don't know (I hope my oldest doesn't read this, she's gotten pretty good on the web. She's a freakin' genius, but I'm careful not to tell her this too often otherwise she'll get a big head) is that we have a couple of these bear things hidden in the trunk of my Subaru that I drive to work.
Speaking of the drive...
Since I got the new iPaq I have been download podcasts from DotNetRocks and Mondays and listening on the drive to / from work. Drive is a bit of a misnomer, I spend about half the time driving, the other half the time waiting on the traffic on Hwy 280, burning way over priced gas. What's the deal on the friggin' gas! Spring break is next week, and in one week's time gas jumped from 2.09 to 2.44. Crap! I didn't even get a kiss afterward.
I've found the only way to releive the stress over the gas prices is to distract myself with the afore mentioned shows. I've decided that one of the Monday cohosts, Mark Miller, is not only a coding genius but a comic genius. Listen to "The Grapefruit Show" for his rant right in the middle of his naked old man sighting. (Note that Monday's is a bit raw, make sure the kiddies are out of earshot. If any politically sensitive easily offended types are around, tell them some trees are getting mugged out in the parking lot so they'll be gone too.)
Is anybody out there...
If anyone is actually reading these humble ranting post a comment will ya! I'm not doing all this just for my ego gratification. Well, actually yes I am. But leave a comment anyway, before I'm forced to do something drastic like post another entry.
73!
Some great training...
Spent 3 days this week in Wintellect training on the new features of ASP.NET 2.0. Pretty slick stuff. Jeff Prosise was our instructor, he did an awesome job. I highly recommend the company if you are thinking about having on site training at your place.
Anyway the new features were really cool. I especially like Master Pages. It's going to make putting together a site so much easier. Jeff also showed us how to make menus maintain state between postbacks. I have an itch to wrap it up into an inherited control. Speaking of new things...
ATLAS...
...is Microsoft's new answer to AJAX. Jeff spent some time showing us the new features and some code samples. I also did some digging the night before and saw some really cool demo's online. It's really going to make it easier to do Smart Client looking apps in the browser.
Spheres...
Speaking of Atlas, I found a new Desktop interface for XP called SphereXP. Makes for a very different way to use your PC. Go check it out. And it's written in .Net!
A Tragic Death...
My beloved iPaq 3900 died after four years.
Coding fun...
I did finally get to do a little real coding this week. Used generics for the first time, sweet. It's just a type safe List
Doodles...
My kids have been going nuts for these doodle bears. Stuffed teddy bears that you can draw on, wash, and then draw again. They each got one for Christmas last year. Well now they have all sorts of models, including one you can draw on with glow in the dark marker. We can't go to the store without them going "doodle bear doodle bear doodle bear".
What the don't know (I hope my oldest doesn't read this, she's gotten pretty good on the web. She's a freakin' genius, but I'm careful not to tell her this too often otherwise she'll get a big head) is that we have a couple of these bear things hidden in the trunk of my Subaru that I drive to work.
Speaking of the drive...
Since I got the new iPaq I have been download podcasts from DotNetRocks and Mondays and listening on the drive to / from work. Drive is a bit of a misnomer, I spend about half the time driving, the other half the time waiting on the traffic on Hwy 280, burning way over priced gas. What's the deal on the friggin' gas! Spring break is next week, and in one week's time gas jumped from 2.09 to 2.44. Crap! I didn't even get a kiss afterward.
I've found the only way to releive the stress over the gas prices is to distract myself with the afore mentioned shows. I've decided that one of the Monday cohosts, Mark Miller, is not only a coding genius but a comic genius. Listen to "The Grapefruit Show" for his rant right in the middle of his naked old man sighting. (Note that Monday's is a bit raw, make sure the kiddies are out of earshot. If any politically sensitive easily offended types are around, tell them some trees are getting mugged out in the parking lot so they'll be gone too.)
Is anybody out there...
If anyone is actually reading these humble ranting post a comment will ya! I'm not doing all this just for my ego gratification. Well, actually yes I am. But leave a comment anyway, before I'm forced to do something drastic like post another entry.
73!
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Wow! Sounds like you are very busy. Maybe you should listen to my music to relax. Let me know what you think.
myspace.com/backyardsympathy
myspace.com/backyardsympathy
Pretty cool tune. Only found one song on the site, but it was sort of a nice relaxing rock/jazz thing.
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