General discussion

  • Creator
    Topic
  • #2185551

    Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

    Locked

    by akselsoft1 ·

    blog root

All Comments

  • Author
    Replies
    • #3047737

      Past the AJAX Hype – – Rick Strahl

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Rick is wondering about where to put Ajax technology in something like the West-Wind store.

      I’ve been reading a lot of the Michael Mahemoff‘s posts about Ajax as well as I become more and more familiar with Ajax.

      Certainly, it makes certain things easier to work with but it is just an approach that reduces screen redraws and server trips.

      That said, where could it be used in an e-commerce approach?

      1. Searching for products in a large inventory. As it finds new items, they get added to the list of what’s available.

      2. Recommended items based on what a user has chosen.

      3. Reducing the way “pages” are handled in a web -based application. Instead of having to go back to the server for each page, it could “flip” automatically.

      Sure, these are things that can be done today with a traditional approach but they all require server round-trips. You order an item and then once it’s been processed, it makes some suggestions. When I am just looking at a product, it would be cool if it could make recommendations without requiring an obvious trip back to the server.

      Take a read through Rick’s post, though – as he makes some valuable points about the impact Ajax may have on scalability.

      In the end, I think the AJAX approach will be just that – an approach to making web applications work better. It changes the expectation that users have about web applications – web apps don’t have to be slow and cumbersome – they can be instant and fast just like their desktop counterparts.

      (Of course, if developers just made their desktop apps slower, then we wouldn’t have this problem would we?)

      Past the AJAX Hype – Some things to think about – Rick Strahl’s WebLog

    • #3047738

      Mozilla Foundation Announces Creation of Mozilla Corporation – MozillaZine Talkback

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      As noted on Cnet’s Buzz Out Loud , all for tax reasons – ah yes…

      Not for partnering with other companies such as Google? Of course not.

      Let’s see…Mozilla provides a full cross-platform development environment with Xul and then Google provides the home page…who needs a GoogleOS? Would this be called Mozoogle or simply Goozilla?

      Mozilla Foundation Announces Creation of Mozilla Corporation – MozillaZine Talkback

    • #3047739

      I won with Dave’s iPAQ

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Well that was fun. Just got a Skype call from Dave Ciccone at Dave’s ipaq. Looks like I won the iPaq hw6300 they were offering through their podcast.

      Nothing like being “skyped” when you won! Thanks Dave!

      Can’t wait to try this phone out.

      iPAQ news, reviews, shopping, discussions @ Dave’s iPAQ

    • #3047733

      FoxTalk 2.0 GDI Article Available Online

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig’s GDI article is now online at the FoxTalk 2.0 site. As Craig shows, GDI+ isn’t just for FoxPro reports. You can also do it with forms as well.

      The SPS Weblog – FoxTalk 2.0 GDI Article Available Online

    • #3047734

      How to Shoot Yourself in the Foot

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Kevin notes that the entry for xBase says you have to use Clipper to shoot yourself in the foot. But if you read a little further,you’ll see:

      dBase

      You buy a gun. Bullets are only available from another company and are promised to work so you buy them. Then you find out that the next version of the gun is the one that is scheduled to actually shoot bullets.

      That sounds like an awful lot of other products that aren’t mentioned in this article too.

      But I love the ones near the bottom :

      Perl

      You shoot yourself in the foot, but can’t figure out how you did it so you find a dozen new ways to do it.

      Python

      You shoot yourself in the foot and everything goes so smoothly that you go ahead to to shoot yourself in the other foot then your legs, then your torso and then your head. Problem solved.

      How to Shoot Yourself in the Foot

    • #3047735

      Alex Feldstein – Welcome Claudio

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Alex Feldstein notes that Claudio has started two blogs – sounds like the boys at EPS are really embracing the blogosphere.

      Welcome aboard!

    • #3050103

      ScreenCasting just got a lot easier – thanks to GoToMeeting

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      The latest version of GoToMeeting now includes recording functionality as well as annotation.

      This means that you can record a meeting (yes, you still need a microphone for the audio) and annotate it during the meeting and then play it back.

      Yes, for more advanced usage, you may still want to use Camtasia or the free Camstudio product.

    • #3050104

      Joel on Software – Hitting the High Notes

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Great article on hiring great programmers, as opposed to good ones.

      What’s interesting is when Joel takes the stats of min vs max hours and then only looks at the top 25% (in terms of grades) – the differences in time are still there. As he notes with these studies: The quality of the work and the amount of time spent are simply uncorrelated.

      It’s not just a matter of “10 times more productive.” It’s that the “average productive” developer never hits the high notes that make great software.

      Joel on Software – Hitting the High Notes

    • #3050098

      Glen Taylor’s WinMerge plugin for VFP files

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Glen Taylor just released a plug-in for WinMerge that makes it easier to compare Visual FoxPro’s VCX, SCX ,FRX and LBX files.

      This is “for those who are not using the Source Control integration in VFP where you put the project into Source Control and VFP uses SCCTEXT to build the VCA, SCA and etc files.”

      Definitely interested in that!

      Visionpace: WinMerge plugin for VFP files

    • #3050099

      Claudio : What’s up with zero-based arrays?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Claudio – I always thought that it was because C programmers didn’t know how to count (or was it ActiveX developers?)

      Maybe it was just the Microsoft ActiveX guys – because by the time they got to the Outlook object model, at least they remembered that 1=1.

      It may just be a throwback to when people said “I’m going to punish the punchcard guy by shuffling his cards” or wouldn’t it be fun to do

      #DEFINE True .F.

      #DEFINE False .T.

      right at the start of my code?

      But your comment on “logic” reminded me: I took a philosophy class in university and after going through Plato, Aristotle and others, we came to logic. Do you know what the prof said? (this is why I hated that class)

      “Don’t try to understand logic – Logic doesn’t make sense – just memorize it” – Philosophy professor , Trent University, Canada around 1989.

      In fact, Logic (and Aristotle) were about the only things that made sense in that whole class.

      (I think the prof must have become an ActiveX developer )

      Claudio Lassala: What’s up with zero-based arrays?

    • #3050100

      The Bradcast: Biz Tech Ruminations from Calgary Alberta | The Bradcast: Engineered Thought from Brad Gibson

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I was listening to The Bradcast: Biz Tech Ruminations from Calgary Alberta | The Bradcast: Engineered Thought from Brad Gibson and when he was mentioning his favorite Business podcasts, I just had one thought:

      Steve’s Transition Journals

      If you’ve never read Steve’s posts, they are amazing. I don’t like that his Atom feed only shows the shortened text version (the posts themselves are full – Thanks Rick for clarifying that in comments) but it’s rare that I don’t forward them onto my business associates.

      And he was a FoxPro guru too….Great blogs Steve.

    • #3050101

      The SPS Weblog – Skinning a Form in Visual FoxPro

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

    • #3050102

      Why Too Many RSS Feeds May Not Be A Good Thing

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Rick Borup notes that he’s reaching the point of information overload, even with RSS.

      What is needed to make it easier to read 1000 RSS feeds a day? It would be useful if the News reader learned about the types of items that you DID read and then suggested key ones to you. (I can envision an interface similar to that of the Automatic Playlists in Windows Media player – feeds I read at night, feeds I read during the day, random pick, etc)

      This might make it a little easier – it would also be useful if the NewsReader aggregates the feeds themselves – so that if 10 sites all referenced the same main story – it only appeared as one news item, instead of ten (but with 10 different “story comments”)

      Hey Greg and Nick – you guys listening?

      fiat volpes: Deja View, or Why Too Many RSS Feeds May Not Be A Good Thing

    • #3050096

      When is a Beta a Beta

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      This has been discussed numerous times before but Windows Vista brings it up once again.

      I went on a rant on this on this week’s FoxShow related to user interface design but I agree.

      “As I pointed out last week, it’s not a beta until it’s feature-complete. Microsoft is showing off a prototype, a demo. When they have the new UI in place, and lock down the features they plan to actually ship, then it is time for beta evaluation and testing.”

      Ted’s Radio Weblog

      • #3049047

        When is a Beta a Beta

        by peter spande ·

        In reply to When is a Beta a Beta

        What about the opposite syndrome?  Google’s gmail and other
        projects are classified as Beta.  I’d say gmail might be ready for
        prime time.  

    • #3050097

      Word Up for Blogs

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Well Scoble can’t talk about it yet but the fact that Blogger now offers a Blogger add-in for Word in “kind of cool”, I guess.

      I spend more time in other products than I do in Word but I do know where I’ll be enjoying it – when writing articles.

      Blogger Buzz: Word Up

    • #3049054

      Is Wal-Mart dropping rfid ?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I heard this mentioned by a few people but still haven’t seen any real news reports on it.

      Wal-Mart supposedly has RFID readers in many of its stores since the Jan 1 deadline is looming but are they now going to pull the plug?

      While I can certainly see it from a privacy perspective , there are a lot of benefits of RFID for inventory management.

      Does anyone know any published source on this?

      From the Horizon FrontLine: walmart dropping rfid ? – an informal diary about working with the Horizon trucking software

    • #3048864

      Dijjer: A new way of getting around large file downloads?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Dijjer, is kind of like BitTorrent, only it doesn’t require you to have special software loaded. Instead, just add add “http://www.dijjer.org/get/” to your link and it should work.

      Hmmm….but where is the file located?

      It’s on their site and you do have to install some software to get it going but it offloads the bandwidth requirement from your server.

      Interesting.

    • #3049548

      What can you build with VFP?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      The Wiki is such a wealth of information but i recently saw this topic being updated and just had to post on it.

      As developers we often hear critics say “what can you build with FoxPro or VFP?” – well, with a few of these pages, you have the answer.

      List of Applications by Industry

      VFP Shrink Wrapped Products

      If you don’t see your application listed there, be sure to add it.

    • #3067206

      What Role Are You Doing?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      The FoxShow is one of my FoxPro and development business-related podcast. The latest episode (issue, cast, whatever) had an interesting piece that a colleague suggested I share in other areas as well.

      It starts about 8 minutes into it and talks about how even though every one may have a different title in a company, when it comes to customers, EVERYONE is a sales person, a support person and a developer.

      Part of this comes from the Return on Customer book I’m reading but it’s also something that I think many people see in their every day life.

      You’re always selling something – an idea, a product, a service, a design methodology

      You’re always supporting something – same as above

      and everyone is always developing something – it may be an idea, a software product, a hardware product, – you’re always trying to take it and make it into something more.

      The key takeaway – if you see someone in your organization that isn’t thinking this way, then think of the consequences. Do you want that person speaking for you in front of others?

      The FoxShow

    • #3066444

      ScreenCast: GKK ProjectManager

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Gregory Greene (sorry for mis-saying your name in this quick screencast) recently posted the GKK Project Manager for Visual FoxPro in the Universal Thread for downloads.

      Here’s a quick screen-cast on what it looks like and how you use it.

      It combines a lot of the great features found in separate tools in VFP and puts them into a new Project Manager, with built-in search, file compare, todo list, custom editors and more.

      Check it out! You can download the GKK Project Manager here

    • #3066445

      On Relational Databases

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Nothing quite like it when the original architects get interviewed and attempt to debunk recent statements on the criticisms of the implemented world. Such is the case with this interview that Ted points to with Chris date.

      I think he may have a point when he refers to the fact that “an object/relational system done right would simply be a relational system done right, nothing more and nothing less. ”

      But he does sound like a bit of the arch-typical college professor when he says “But the trouble with the relational model is, it’s never been implemented–at least, not in commercial form, not properly, and certainly not fully.”

      Great interview. Thanks for the link, Ted and congrats on your MysQL Certification!

      Ted’s Radio Weblog

    • #3066267

      Calvin Hsia’s WebLog : Foxpro Language into a table

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Wow – never even saw this function until Calvin highlighted it here.

      ALANGUAGE() returns an array containing the names of all valid Visual FoxPro commands, functions and base classes.

      You can even pass it a second parameter to dictate what the array will contain:

      1 – One dimensional array with the Command Name

      2 – Contains functions with the second column showing the number of parameters

      3 – Base Classes

      4 – DBC Events

      Very cool – almost saves the trouble of having to look into WIZARDS\FDKEYWRD which contains operators as well.

      Never looked into FDKEYWRD?

      USE HOME()+”WIZARDS\FDKEYWRD”

      The Token field shows the actual word or operator (including #, !, .AND. etc)

      The Code field identifies more of its purpose. P for Property, M for Method, C to identify that the term is more of a complementary keyword. Example: CURRENCY is marked for a CODE of “C”

      That’s because there is no CURRENCY function – rather it’s simply

      SET CURRENCY TO $

      Very cool function!

    • #3066241

      Sweet Potato!- What a Calendar Class

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Take a look at Craig Boyd’s FoxPro calendar class (source provided). Ya, ya – it looks like the ActiveX one except check out the second picture – you can highlight multiple days – very cool!

      The SPS Weblog – Visual FoxPro Grid – A Tip and a Calendar Class

    • #3068353

      Why do report layouts in VFP9 need wider field/expression controls than in VFP8 and earlier?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

    • #3067396

      Joel on Software – The Project Aardvark Spec

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Joel explains why XP isn’t the answer to everything:

      “Many times, thinking things out in advance saved us serious development headaches later on….As I worked through the screens … I realized that Aardvark would be just as useful, and radically simpler…Making this change in the spec took an hour or two. If we had made this change in code, it would have added weeks to the schedule. I can?t tell you how strongly I believe in Big Design Up Front, which the proponents of Extreme Programming consider anathema. I have consistently saved time and made better products by using BDUF and I?m proud to use it, no matter what the XP fanatics claim. They?re just wrong on this point and I can?t be any clearer than that.”

    • #3067395

      Andrew Coates – MapPoint Web Service COM wrapper and VFP Sample

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Cool – Andrew Coates shows how to call the MapPoint Web service via a COM component and VFP.

      I do a fair bit of MapPoint stuff but it’s all desktop based. This will make getting into the Web service much easier.

      Thanks Andrew!

      Andrew Coates ::: MSFT : MapPoint Web Service COM wrapper and VFP Sample

    • #3067293

      Getting Week Ending information

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      A customer asked me recently about how to build a FoxPro expression that would give them a string like 21/08 for the week ending based on a 7 day week.

      Using DOW , this is fairly easy;

      ? PADL(MONTH(DATE()-DOW(DATE())+1),2,’0′) + “/”+PADL(DAY(DATE()-DOW(DATE())+1),2,’0′)

      Why do the +1? Because DOW() gives you the day of the week and by subtracting the DOW ( ) would take you to the end of the previous week.

      Now, if you’re sorting by this, you’ll see I use the PADL so that it always put a zero in front of any single digit months (01 for January, etc).

    • #3067756

      So this is what happens today when a network goes on strike

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Those of you in the US, and those who really don’t listen to government sponsored radio, may not be aware of this but our national broadcaster (CBC, similar to the UK’s BBC) went on strike last week.

      So Tod Maffin of ILoveRadio, who reported a number of items prior to the lockout (including a post that said “email is no more, oh so is my voice mail”), started CBC Unplugged.

      The locked out workers have been doing podcasts, blogging and more. Even doing competing shows

      Even the managers from within the locked out building are posting.

      Some have suggested that this isn’t the way to get people to appreciate them.

      My brother, Keith, works for the CBC – at one time as a producer (even won some awards) and now I believe as a Manager. Haven’t heard from him on this although he lives up in Yellowknife so who knows.

      I’m not a big fan of strikes or lockouts but then I don’t like unions to begin with. But what would be interesting would be if what Tod had talked about doing with CBC Unplugged actually came true.

      Have a REAL online network – don’t just gripe about your picket lines and blah, blah, blah. Show the world (and I guess your managers at the same time) that you love what you do so much that you are going to do it WHILE you’re on the picket line and you’re going to do it SO MUCH BETTER than the normal CBC could do it.

      But enough anti-union spat, I think that it’s very cool that if enough like-minded individuals wanted to get together and start a “network” for news, music, commentary anything – that they don’t have to get the handouts from the government to do this. (CBC gets almost 1 BILLION dollars annually – maybe instead of looking for advertisers for the TheFoxShow, I should just go to the people who take all my money anyways)

      Speaking of a “real network”, I’m going to fire up the TechPodCast Network live feed. Why is this cool? Well, all 40+ members of the network upload their latest shows onto the Live Stream. As a result, you get the equivalent of “tech radio” – all day, all night.

    • #3067609

      From ProFox: Last Stand for First Sale

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Heard on ProFox – you think the Visual FoxPro EULA is bad?

      A woman wanted to resell software that she would no longer use.

      …She met neither requirement, Livingsoft told her, particularly because “when the president of Livingsoft contacted you personally to remind you of company policy in this matter, you informed him that your reason for selling was that the software ‘sucks’ … that reason doesn’t qualify for an exception to our general policy.”

      …I find it similar to buying a car, deciding to sell it, and then being told that I can do whatever I want with the car but transferring the keys to someone else is illegal.”

      Ed Foster’s Gripelog || Last Stand for First Sale: “r”

    • #3066799

      Rick Strahl: I’m a RegEx Weenie

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Ah yes – Regular Expressions – the expressions that make regular people say “back when I was a programmer, we could only code with 1s and 0s”

      Could an expression be any more geekier?

      “The following expression works well for this:

      <(.|\s) ?>”

      This almost looks like swearing in most cartoons.

    • #3066699

      Show It and Support It : Screen Casting tools for everyone

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Here’s an article that was previously promised to Advisor but they didn’t feel it was useful specifically for Foxpro developers. Oh well. Enjoy.

      It used to be that building a self-running video or demonstration of software required a great deal of expertise and money, hiring a production company who did the work in their own studio. Today, developers and trainers are building these “screencasts” themselves and in this article I’ll go through several options that are available to you.

      Andrew Ross MacNeill – Articles & White Papers: Show It and Support It : Screen Casting tools for everyone

    • #3068064

      What I Want From NewsGator – Now It Does It!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      A month ago, I complained that Newsgator needed to make it easier to add new feeds into individual folders.

      Whaddaya know?

      Today, I was subscribing to the Skinny on Sports and voila! I could now move it directly into my Podcasts folder.

      Way to go guys!

    • #3056266

      Terminal Server to the server’s active Console – Rick Strahl’s WebLog

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Never knew this either, Rick.

      Funny the way a critical feature like this never gets openly documented (so that people can find it immediately) or made easily accessible through the user interface.

    • #3053652

      Bradcast_050823: Why do you Blog?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      GOod podcast about blogging by Brad Gibson, fellow TechPodcast network member and the importance of figuring out what you actually want to talk about.

      This is why I have several blogs (one just for links, one for real content (this one), one for other stuff as well and of course, the FoxShow)

    • #3054836

      Alex and Katrina

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Good luck Alex ( I *think* you should be out of the worst by now) and to all of those who are embracing for Katrina’s impact.

      Hope everyone was able to get out when they could.

    • #3053964

      See What I Miss?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I go out of commission for 5 days (due to eye surgery) and look what happens.

      Good luck, Randy!

      Your efforts have been amazing and well appreciated!

    • #3063572

      FoxShow #20: Interview with Southwest Fox’s Bob Kocher

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Southwest Fox is shaping up to be an exciting conference filled with great Fox talks, the beginnings of FoxPro-like data access in Visual Studio and more….

      In the latest FoxShow, I spoke with the organizer, Bob Kocher, about what goes into the conference, why it’s so unique and how he goes about choosing what speakers are there.

    • #3063573

      The days of consistency are over – Signal vs. Noise (by 37signals)

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Great post about how the changes in iTunes 5 show that the concept of consistent user interfaces does not have to be about colors and styles but more about the behavior. Best comment from Chris Mear:

      “Consistency in the look is gone, yes. But consistency in the behaviour is here to stay, and this is what makes Apple so fab”

      How consistent is your application?

      How consistent is FoxPro for that matter? I’m personally getting peeved at the fact that my graphical radio buttons keep getting resized if they are less than 25 pixels in height and width.

      The days of consistency are over – Signal vs. Noise (by 37signals)

    • #3065700

      Calvin Hsia: : Creating a quick report from any cursor

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Calvin made a post about using the CREATE REPORT xxx FROM command , a tool which I’ve used numerous times and is extremely handy for quick reports.

      What Calvin didn’t completely note was some of the added features with that.

      CREATE REPORT dummy FROM test FORM – creates a form instead of a column based report – GREAT for coming with with screen output for single records

      CREATE REPORT dummy FROM test FIELDS custno,custname,street, address – lets you specify exactly what fields and the order

      CREATE REPORT dummy FROM test WIDTH – lets you even specify individual column widths

      No – it’s not a replacement for a good report writer but it is a good start.

      But Calvin’s post also discusses outputting it directly to HTML using the new VFP 9 Report Listener options. Very cool.

      Calvin Hsia’s WebLog : Creating a quick report from any cursor

    • #3065701

      MarkusEgger. The Wonderful World of Magazine Auditing

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Markus opens up the hood under Code and other magazines’ audits and it shows some very interesting numbers.

      Visual Studio Magazine:

      * 2001: 109,610 paid copies

      * 2002: 106,066 paid copies

      * 2003: 74,274 paid copies

      * 2004: 38,294 paid copies

      “So they are basically at a point where they lost two thirds of their paid readership. Ouch!” (from Markus)

      What he noted excitedly was that Code Magazine was continually increasing – which is great news – it’s a great magazine.

      But what are people reading? if you’re reading this, you’re likely in the same boat I am – I have magazines that I still haven’t gotten into but I’m getting the same great information online via Blogs, RSS and podcasts.

      It must be quite a struggle for magazines these days – I think I’ll ask Markus that when we get together for our FoxShow interview next week.

      MarkusEgger.com – Development Blog

    • #3065702

      Nothing like a rant on Backward compatibility

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Nothing I like more than a good rant.

      Basically: everyone should think about backward compatibility.

      Rant aside, one great statement:

      In this field of binaries, bits and data, one should design/create applications that are designed to last for decades, if not years. Something that should stand the test of time.

      Amen to that!

      Foxpro.catalyst :: FoxPro workBLOGS and more

    • #3065295

      The SPS Weblog – Learning Visual FoxPro Videos

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig,

      You beat me to it!

      Well, actually, I guess some of the FoxShow will be like an accompaniment to your videos.

      However, kudos to Craig Boyd, for putting up some initial videos on “Learning Visual FoxPro”. One of the new segments I’ll start covering in the FoxShow this week are “what is ____” or “how does ____ work” and the first topic is “what is a database?”

    • #3058207

      Microsoft Office 12.0 : Say Goodbye to the standard user interface

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Wow – for years, the familiar File, Edit, View menu approach has become synonymous with the “Windows” and “Office” experience (even though it was pioneered by Apple, PARC, etc) and now in one swoop, MS has decided to do away with it (at least once version 12 comes out)

      The slide show is linked about half-way down.

      While I’m a big fan of “task-groups”, I’m not sure how this user interface will fly. Why?

      1. While every application is different, having a standard interface does make it easier to learn and train new users on. Menus are “complexity browsers” and while Office continues to try and make it easier to use, having spent the last 10 years convincing people that menus are good – to come around and say they are no longer there, may not be quite the best default option.

      2. By grouping items into categories, it certainly helps improve the interface but if you look at the last slide (the “less-intimidating” Access), you’ll see that there’s a real danger when you continue to have lots of options available.

      3. I do like the idea of when you click on Write in Word, it shows “galleries” of areas where you can make changes like fonts in one section, paragraphs in another. It almost reminds me of the “toolbars” that appear in “other” operating systems and applications.

      Now, I’m sure MS has done their user research on this so I’m excited to see what it will look like in the end but don’t forget – MS User research also suggested that people would like “MS Bob” and Clippy. And some people do.

      What does this mean for the FoxPro developer? It will be interesting to see – because while FoxPro has kept up to speed on the “Windows XP” compatibility (Theme support, etc), it has always lagged behind with the Office user interface compatibility. With the new Office 12, the UI will most certainly be affected.

      I’m looking forward to what Ken has said regarding Sedna’s compatibility with Office 12- it’s likely more to do with the new XML file formats.

      But I think developers will face another round of “why doesn’t my application look like….” – sounds like a job for Arg Software Design!!

    • #3057447

      The SPS Weblog – Project LINQ – Can it be done in VFP?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig’s at it again.

      The LINQ (Language INtegrated Query) project in Visual Studio (yet another reason to hold off upgrading until Orcas!) is all about making data access easy.

      The idea?

      dim smallCountries = select country from country in countries where population<1000000

      And the result is a collection that can be accessed via any language.

      Well, check out Craig’s VOSQL: same results today. No need to wait.

      As Craig points out, he hasn’t seen LINQ in detail and has no idea as to the internals – but the basis for it is in the output.

      The SPS Weblog – Project LINQ – Can it be done in VFP?

    • #3058907

      Fox Show Interview with Steve Black: How to sell FoxPro

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      The most recent FoxShow has a great interview with Steve Black who hosts the Fox Wiki about a variety of topics, including his two sessions at Southwest Fox: “FoxPro’s Dead- Now what do you say ” – a guide to how to sell FoxPro to larger IT departments and companies as well as “Application Metadata”.

      We also got into a discussion about the evolution of the INTL Toolkit, a tool that really hasn’t changed that much since its last VFP version back from over 10 years ago. Steve talks about why its architecture, using the Design Patterns found in Gamma and Helms book, has helped make it so easy to work with for advanced developers.

      Definitely an interesting interview from one of the FoxPro community’s best speakers.

    • #3058894

      Drew and Brent Speedie – Tragedy

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I just heard the news and am shocked and saddened to learn of the tragic death of Drew Speedie and his son Brent, while on vacation at Yellowstone Park.

      He was a regular fixture at FoxPro conferences, filling sessions with his humour, knowledge and joy of life. Brent and Drew’s wife, Irene, attended many conferences with him.

      My thoughts go out to Irene at this time. My life was certainly richer for knowing Drew.

      Drew Speedie Tragedy – Visual FoxPro Wiki

      Original Posting by Yag

    • #3059318

      Gmail Problems

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Are you having problems with gMail?

      While some of these comments seem to be related to logging on (which I’ve never had a problem with), I just experienced what I would consider to be kind of a major issue.

      I sent three emails to my own other accounts this morning via gMail and none have arrived yet. Granted, this is the Internet and while many of us take instant speed for granted, there may be very many real reasons for the delay. (or, said with my conspiracy hat on, maybe other email systems are purposely delaying gmail mail as an attempt to discredit the service – if so, shame on them!)

      However, no problems with receiving emails. Maybe it is a good thing to simply use your gmail account as a “backup” for inbound email.

      • #3054515

        Gmail Problems

        by labobcat56 ·

        In reply to Gmail Problems

        I have only received a couple of issues with Gmail.  One as you have already stated for some reason I have been unable to receive from certain people even though they have been accepted and added to my address book.  One other issue that I do not like is that you are unable to refresh the screen and have your inbox functioning afterwards. 

    • #3059319

      Jon Udell: An interview with Amar Gandhi about Microsoft’s new RSS platform

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      If you have not listened to his interview with Amar Gandhi about Microsoft’s plans for RSS, you need to.

      Key highlights:

      – RSS Built into the OS with an Object model to access it

      – Built in security that essentially sounds like one-click subscriptions are going to be problematic

      – Future use within applications (RSS Calendar and RSS Contacts beware)

      Jon Udell: An interview with Amar Gandhi about Microsoft’s new RSS platform

    • #3058789

      Speedie Memories:: Rest in Peace, Drew and Brent —

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      A variety of memories of Drew and Brent have been filling the web the past few days.

      I often think of Drew when I think of frameworks and approaches, not just because of MaxFrame but because he had a great way of completely disagreeing with someone without making it personal – instead he made it humourous.

      I remember he joked about possibly being put on a “do not invite” list for an Advisor conference after making negative comments about the Fox team’s updates for the grid. His actual sessions were always packed with both attendees and information, and he was always there at other sessions, showing how much he was willing to give and still willing to learn more from others.

      I appreciated so much when he would come into one of my sessions and participate through questions and comments, envigorating a room. It amazed me that even when at the back of a room, writing notes for his next session or supporting other users on new features in FoxPro, he was always aware of what was going on and participated.

      And by his side, almost always, was Brent, watching, learning, coding and with them both, just as often, Irene. I first met him at the International Database Interchange in 1993 and looked forward to seeing them at every conference I attended.

      Anyone who met Drew knew almost instinctively, he was more than just a great speaker and amazing developer, who loved his work, he was a great father, husband, and human being, who loved life.

      Tamar marked a valuable sentiment in her tribute that I share wholeheartedly:

      Drew has been one of the cornerstones of the FoxPro community for more than a decade. His family has been part of our family. It’s hard to imagine our little corner of the world without Drew and Brent.

      I am a richer person for having known them and send my deepest sympathies to Irene and his entire family.

    • #3062473

      The FoxShow #22 has an interview with Markus Egger

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Episode (uh, issue, uh show) #22 of the FoxShow has been posted and includes a fairly long interview with Markus Egger , about a variety of things including Drew Speedie, the purpose of VFP Conversions, Southwest Fox and what’s happening with EPS and Code magazine.

      There was going to be a lot of other content but as you can see from the length of the show, it went on a bit (interview is almost 45 minutes).

      Check it out on the site or subscribe via RSS.

      The FoxShow

    • #3056988

      Evidence Details – Global Evidence Management System

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Another great Case Study using Visual FoxPro, once again in the law enforcement area for the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office.

    • #3056884

      DevBlog: EPS Down

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig notes that EPS is shutting down their offices due to Rita. Hope they all fare ok – I’m glad I got that interview with Markus earlier this week.

      DevBlog: EPS Down

    • #3056882

      Adding Columns in SQL SELECT statements

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Andy Kramek has a great post describing different ways of adding non-table columns into a cursor result set with SQL and Visual FoxPro.

      I use many of these approaches constantly. SQL Server veterans will be happy to know that they can use CAST in VFP now as well, reducing even more code portability between the two environments.

      Adding Columns in SQL SELECT statements

    • #3062141

      Visual FoxPro 9.0 Service Pack 1 Beta

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      The Fox Team has released a public beta of service Pack 1 for VFP 9.

      Download it and report any bugs to the Universal Thread in the FoxPro beta section.

    • #3062066

      Alex Feldstein – Off to the MVP Summit

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I’m jealous – I could be going but I’m going to be here in Ottawa, waiting for the news to come via the various MVP forums.

      Have fun Alex!

    • #3062067

      Shedding Some Light: Tips on the VFP 9 SP1

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Rick Schummer offers some tips on the VFP 9 SP1 installation as well as a reminder for testers:

      “Making a post noting “the report designer is broken” just does not cut the mustard. Provide concise reproducible steps, code examples, observed behavior, detail what you expected to happen, your hardware configuration, and any additional notes you think are important.”

      Shedding Some Light: September 2005

    • #3062068

      Beyond the Scope

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Sure hope I didn’t write one of those articles that contributed to Kevin’s “not based on any actual event”…but definitely a great initiative – which is why I like putting real details right onto the blog.

      Great initiative, Kevin.

      Beyond the Scope

    • #3062014

      That Darn Outlook PST (Chris Pirillo)

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I’m with Chris on this one. Case in point: my server hard drive was getting close to full so I decided to clean up some stuff.

      Removed about 10 GB of storage. Now I try to load up Outlook that runs with 4 different PSTs, NewsGator, Tasklineand the new Google and MSN search.

      And wait….and wait…and wait…

      So I cancel it out. It says “Newsgator is to blame” so I disable that.

      Now I try again. and wait and wait and wait….

      Makes me glad that I use gmail as my email backup and forward all emails there – at least I won’t be completely OUT of pocket.

      And all this after I’ve rebuilt my PSTs in the past 2 months.

      I realize Chris notes that he was close to the 2GB limit – but me? I’m talking two or three PSTs that are under 500MB each. Maybe Outlook is still choking because of the TOTAL MB.

      My big concern right now is that even though I use Newsgator online – what happens if these great posts disappear off the web? I always like to have them at least in archive format.

      Anyone found a news aggregator for Thunderbird? Oh yeah, I forgot – it already HAS one built into it.

      That Darn Outlook PST (Chris Pirillo)

    • #3062015

      The Joys of a HD Crash

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I feel your pain, Alex.

      Right after my last one, I’ve taken to running an XDrive backup on my Dev work and regular other updates otherwise. The big problem I always face is that FoxPro generates so many additional extra files that it’s really easy to get a massive backup file for a fairly simple project.

      I’m also posting my install keys to my TiddyWiki on my USB stick.

      Alex Feldstein – Powered By Bloglines

    • #3062908

      the WORKING PODCAST

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      If you have never listened to this podcast, it is GREAT!

      Twenty minutes – informative, funny and just plain great!

      the WORKING PODCAST

    • #3062722

      Fox Show #23: Interview with Craig Berntson

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      The latest FoxShow is up and features an interview with Craig Berntston, author, blogger, speaker and FoxPro developer. He talks about his Southwest Fox session on Coder to Developer and some of the recent showings at the PDC.

      It also features a quick poll on when are you most creative.

      Actually it ends up being one poll on when are you most creative and another on how do you get yourself creative?

      Enjoy and send feedback to foxshow at gmail.com

    • #3060988

      So what would be your one question?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      The Fox Show has been featuring interviews with the Southwest Fox speakers and other community members. Now every time I do an interview, I prepare a list of questions that deal with an upcoming session and their views on development, yada, yada, yada.

      Now, although there is some advertising on the FoxShow, it’s more to help cover costs than to make a million. In fact, in the last show, I made the point that if anyone in the FoxPro community wants to talk about a particular product, topic or just come on and tell me how wrong I am about everything, by all means please do. So it really is, similar to the Working Podcast, a community podcast.

      So that said, I have an interview coming up with a member of the FoxTeam (KL) – and so now I’m asking you – what question do you want answered?

      You can immediately dispense with the obvious ones: where is MS Marketing on VFP, when is VFP going to be in the CLR, etc- those are questions that have been asked and answered. And you can also see a lot of questions the group has already answered in David Stevenson’s interview right during DevCon.

      So with all the things that have been said at DevCon, on the VFP Web site, on the blogs, what is the one thing you want to know?

      Let me know.

      • #3072807

        So what would be your one question?

        by webx ·

        In reply to So what would be your one question?

        What is most important to me as a 10yrs+ experience fox programmer

        SQL and fox just don’t do well together… Select distinct and group seems to forget to include records in target table….

        Upon when will the most expensive, irrealistically expensive programming language going to do that right ?

         

    • #3073407

      Cindy’s Circus: The best of both worlds

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Cindy’s talking about some of the cool stuff she saw at the MVP Summit (I’m sure other posters will be shortly).

      In my recent interview with Ken Levy on the FoxShow, he noted how everything he discussed at the summit will be made publicly available (almost joking “what nda?”) – within the next few weeks.

      It’s an interesting interview because I had asked members of the community for questions – well, Ken had seen those and went to great lengths to answer most of them (even the ones about EULA and 64-bit).

    • #3073408

      Comments and Spam

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Argh! I got mega-comment spammed this weekend.

      I’m thinking of turning them off or forcing logins but we’ll see.

    • #3072878

      David was spammed as well

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      David,

      Here’s the solution: go to your Blogger settings under comments

      Turn on Word Verification – that should clean it up.

      David Stevenson’s Talking Fox: Republished Blog to Stop Spammer Comments

    • #3072879

      Beth Massi: What is an architect?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Now this makes it easier to decide : do I want VS Team for Architects, Designers or Developers.

      Thanks Beth.

      Dotnet Fox: MVP Summit is over…

    • #3072880

      The MenuDesigner on a roll again

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Rick’s post from the summit talks a little about Windows Vista but something else that I’m more excited about : a revised MenuDesigner from WhiteLight.

      So when does the beta begin, Rick?

      Shedding Some Light: September 2005

    • #3072881

      37Signals at it again

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      This may have been around for a while now but 37Signals is fast turning into my favorite Web-based software company.

      First BaseCamp, now this.

      Collaborative writing software online with Writeboard. Write, share, revise, compare.

    • #3072673

      Ken’s October Letter

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Ken’s letter introduces Craig as the newest MVP – congrats, Craig! Well deserved.

      As well, he notes that What’s New In Nine is now available online here!

      Visual FoxPro: October 2005 – Letter from the Editor

    • #3073211

      What’s in a Name?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      There’s a great story in the Big Moo on page 69 (actually there are a bunch of good stories on pages 1 through x) but this one stood out to me this morning.

      It was about how Isaac Newton “discovered” gravity. Of course , he didn’t discover it – in fact the biggest part of what he did was NAME it.

      Which brings us to Avalon’s renaming. Yes, I know it’s been known for a while but I was listening to Buzz Out Loud (Cnet’s podcast of indeterminate length) and Veronica (“I love apple above all else) commented on how she had seen the new Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) and really liked it…except what’s with the name?

      In the days when people complain about Miicrosoft’s ability to come up with cool names, Avalon wasn’t bad but its renaming has me scratching its head. It’s easy to get excited about a new operating system named “Tiger” (roar!) or , heck, even “Vista”. But hey, everyone raise your hands and get excited for the brand new ……

      “Windows Presentation Foundation”

      Doesn’t exactly send a chill through your bones….

      But enough about WPF – it’s only a feature right – sure it doesn’t Flash right out at you – but then when was the last time a product launch sent a Zorro to Europa (or Sedna, for that matter)?

      It only takes a nano-second to realize that the name game is still constantly being played. MS may feel obligated to stamp the Windows trademark name on everything, but as long as they do that, this is a game that they will always lose. Who cares, right? No one really cares about the acronyms, right – Mr. WIMPy interface – who needs a WIMP when you’ve got a LAMP?

      “The product is what matters. ”

      Maybe in the minds but not in the hearts of consumers and users.

      (as a side note, hotel buildings change names regularly – the hotel in Ottawa with the revolving restaurant has been the Holiday Inn, the Radisson and most recently a Marriott – when we were in Hawaii, the Hilton resort in Waikoloa was formerly the Hyatt, AND STILL referrred to as the Hyatt but the people on the Island – names DO stick!)

      So as I was reading the Big Moo, I thought of Avalon and WPF and what Newton could have called gravity instead?

      How about the Newton Declivity Theory? (NDT) – that would have stuck, right?

      Or IEM – Isaac’s Elevation Model?

      What if to this day, we continued to use the old way of announcing one’s self, I am Andrew, son of Donald, son of Karnac? My name isn’t Andrew, I am DO2 – Donald Offspring #2. Or better yet, DO70?

      It’s a moot point now – as the product has already been named but there is definitely something to be said for a product to be keeping its name.

      Check out the book – it’s short, funny and absolutely worth every penny (and proceeds go to charity)

      Meanwhile, I’m back to Europa.

      Remarkabalize

    • #3066218

      +Macros – more than what you may think

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions


      You may have seen the FoxCentral ad for +Macros 3.5 – I’m writing a review of it for FPA but it’s also being talked about in the upcoming FoxShow. It’s essentially a collection of useful FoxPro pieces, including some text editing macros, a better Data session window, and stuff like that. (many frameworks provide similar tools for viewing tables) The ActiveDesktop has a very cool surprised me with a Project Manager pane (shown here) that only appears when you click on it – you then find the file, double-click and the project pane disappears. Very cool.

      It’s inexpensive ($60 US) and has a free 30 day trial.

      Macros :

    • #3066216

      FoxPro Tip: Be Aware of Disappearing Index files (IDX)

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      There’s still a lot of older FoxPro code that relies on the old IDX file – especially for temporary indexes that only need to be created on an as needed basis.

      Now, you can create indexes on temporary cursors just as with regular tables but there’s a trick to be aware of.

      When you create an IDX file on a DBF file that physically exists , the IDX file will still be there after you close the table.

      However, if you create an IDX file on a temporary cursor, as soon as you do anything that may close the index, the IDX file is instantly deleted.

      Try it:

      USE HOME(2)+”DATA\CUSTOMER”

      INDEX on customer.city TO t

      DIR t.idx && the file is there

      SET INDEX TO

      DIR t.idx && the file is STILL there

      SELECT * FROM customer WHERE region =’WA’ INTO CURSOR wacust

      BROWSE

      INDEX on city TO wat

      DIR wat.idx && the file is there

      SET INDEX TO wat.idx && Error file does not exist

      Why ? Because the SET INDEX TO statement clears the previous index and attempts to reset it. But when it clears it, FoxPro recognizes that it is a temporary cursor and thus deletes the index.

      The solution?

      issue a SET INDEX TO ADDITIVE and that should keep it there.

    • #3066048

      MVP Summit Summary

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Alex Feldstein has done a great job outlining what was discussed at the MVP summit. As Ken noted in the FoxShow interview, it was NOT NDA and thus, everyone in the community can be aware of what’s coming.

      Alex Feldstein – Powered By Bloglines

    • #3069855

      Google’s RSS Aggregator

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Scoble notes Google’s new RSS Aggregator – but I’m in the same boat as he is – I’m not swithcing from NewsGator.

      I LOVE the Podcasting support within it.

      Google needs to get back onto the cutting edge instead of trailing as they have been with Google Talk and now Google RSS.

      Scobleizer: Microsoft Geek Blogger

    • #3070309

      VFP Solution Explorer Home

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Ah – it’s almost here…the VFP Solution explorer…but even more – so is FoxTabs.

      Thanks to Malcolm Greene for pointing it out on the ProFox list.

      How will you use it?

    • #3070310

      Less as a competitive advantage

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Sounds like Jason’s been reading Bill Jensen’s Do Less Accomplish More Simplicity Survival book.

      You need Less More, Less People, Less Time, Less Abstractions, Less Software – oh, and more constraints.

      Well put – from one of the minds behind 37signals.

      • #3070250

        Less as a competitive advantage

        by lukcad ·

        In reply to Less as a competitive advantage

        Nice post. My comment is banner. Everytime when this post will reviwed, you will see the new information in this advertise module implemented like comment into your post.

        Sincerely, LukCAD

    • #3060354

      R.I.P. WYSIWYG – Results-Oriented UI Coming (Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox)

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Saw this on ProFox (thanks AGAIN , Malcolm)

      It’s interesting that Neilsen jumps over the new “results-oriented user interface”, as noted by Office 12’s interface. His big statement: “We know from user testing that users often demand that other user interfaces work like Office”

      It will be interesting to see how this plays out – but keep the key poitns in mind from the new Office 12 interface – it’s still all about the document-centric vision.

      What do I mean by that? The O/S used to be application-centric – that is you choose the application to do the job you need done. Windows (and the web for that matter) has always tried to be more

      document-centric – you work in a document and choose the right tools to do the job.

      This new results-centric approach says you choose the tools based on the results you want and it’s the job of the interface to make it easier to show what the results are – in short, you don’t have to deduce or figure out what the tools mean, the interface should make it plainly obvious to you.

      MS has been doing this for a few years now -still it’s very telling that Jakob Neilsen is noting the big change in Office 12 as the telling signpost for the next generation user interface.

      His comment: “But Microsoft Word 2003 has 1,500 commands, and users typically have no clue where to find most of them.” Well the question really should be – do you NEED 1500 commands? (ask that to any Fox developer who knows all about dBloat) – maybe the real solution is the 37signals approach of less is more.

      Most people who are starting with word processing (and there are a lot of them) don’t get the difference between spaces and tabs or tables or columns so having 20 different commands for each of them essentially creates the UI conundrum.

      It’s a good article to read though – whether or not you agree or disagree with his conclusion that the Office 12 interface is going to be the defacto standard.

      • #3068909

        R.I.P. WYSIWYG – Results-Oriented UI Coming (Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox)

        by dalicoder ·

        In reply to R.I.P. WYSIWYG – Results-Oriented UI Coming (Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox)

        I read Nielsen’s article (http://www.useit.com/alertbox/wysiwyg.html) a couple of days ago.  I was particularly drawn to this quote:

        “The new interface displays galleries of possible end-states, each of which combine many formatting operations. From this gallery, you select the complete look of your target — say an org chart or an entire document — and watch it change shape as you mouse over the alternatives in the gallery. The interaction paradigm has been reversed; it’s now What You Get Is What You See, or WYGIWYS.”

        I interpret this remark to mean that mousing-over the gallery options gives you a “live preview” of the end result.  The current method is to select an option, look at what it does, then undo the command if you don’t like it.  If nothing else, I think I will love this new feature!

        I always find Nielsen’s articles on usability interesting and worth the read.  HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.  You can subscribe to his newsletter at http://www.useit.com/alertbox/[I received nothing for this endorsement and am not affiliated with Jakob Nielsen in any other way than as a loyal subscriber].

        –Dave

    • #3069688

      What’s New in Visual FoxExpress

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Mike, Toni and the team at F1 have put out Visual FoxExpress 2005 – smart naming idea , especially seeing that no one really knows what VFP 9 + Sedna will be called.

      Looks like a lot of new features are available – first and foremost a multi-user DBCX explorer and an improved App Builder interface.

      I’m hoping to hook up with Toni for an interview right before Southwest Fox for the FoxShow so I’ll be sure to ask her about it.

    • #3068855

      VFP 9’s ADDPROPERTY Function

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Sheesh – the things that just seem to slip through….

      Someone on the ProFox list was asking why his VFP objects created with
      SCATTER NAME didn’t have an AddProperty method.

      For example, if you do USE HOME(2)+”DATA\CUSTOMER”
      Then
      SCATTER NAME loCustomer

      The object is essentially an Empty object and has no methods or events.
      Which means you can’t add new properties to it, right?

      Not in VFP 9. Kevin Cully of http://www.cullytechnologies.com noted the new
      AddProperty function that lets you add properties to objects that don’t have
      the AddProperty method.

      =AddProperty(loCustomer, ‘NewProperty’, .T.)

      Very handy as I use SCATTER NAME in lots of different places. Thanks for the
      tip, Kevin!

    • #3068747

      VFP’s ADDPROPERTY Function

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Sheesh – the things that just seem to slip through….

      Someone on the ProFox list was asking why his VFP objects created with
      SCATTER NAME didn’t have an AddProperty method.

      For example, if you do USE HOME(2)+”DATA\CUSTOMER”
      Then
      SCATTER NAME loCustomer

      The object is essentially an Empty object and has no methods or events.
      Which means you can’t add new properties to it, right?

      Not in VFP 9. (uh correction, not in VFP 8 either – thanks Colin for noting it) Kevin Cully of http://www.cullytechnologies.com noted the
      AddProperty function that lets you add properties to objects that don’t have
      the AddProperty method.

      =AddProperty(loCustomer, ‘NewProperty’, .T.)

      Very handy as I use SCATTER NAME in lots of different places. Thanks for the
      tip, Kevin!

    • #3071684

      FoxShow Interview with Toni Feltman

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      So the Southwest conference has begun and I’m not there – but I did manage to slide in a last FoxShow interview with speaker Toni Feltman.

      It was a fun interview because Toni teaches database design at the university of Toledo as well so she sees both beginners and advanced users and the types of mistakes they make.

      She also lets us in on what’s in the toolbox for F1 Technologies and the new release of Visual FoxExpress.

      Check it out.

    • #3071685

      Southwest Fox – Day One Plan

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Looks like Kevin Ragsdale is right into blogging Southwest.

      What’s the wifi situation there? Will be getting live blog posts during the keynote?

      Southwest Fox – Day One Plan

    • #3071686

      The last 5 minutes…

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Interesting post – How well do you manage the last five minutes of a customer’s experience?

      Church of the Customer Blog: The last 5 minutes

    • #3071687

      Universal Thread Conference Coverage – Southwest Fox 2005

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig’s first posts from Thursday are a riot:

      “This is my first face-to-face run in with Rick. He exudes confidence and a certain amount of energy which makes me think… should I challenge him to a coding duel, or should I join forces with him so we can try and take over the world?”

      Looking forward to the rest of the posts….

      Universal Thread Conference Coverage – Southwest Fox 2005

    • #3071680

      Run the wizards modelessly

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Calvin shows one of the cool features found in the FoxPro Wizards.

      You can tell it wasn’t part of the actual spec – after all, who would have made a requirement that the third parameter be “snoqualmie::flew”

      In the last FoxShow, I noted how everything in Visual FoxPro is about extensibility. This illustrates the point further. Want to mess around with a wizard? This way you can do it interactively.

      Calvin Hsia’s WebLog : Run the wizards modelessly

    • #3071681

      The Life

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      This is a tremendous read for every software developer who works on his own or in a small company. It outlines what happened this past week with the acquisition of NetNewsWire, the Mac RSS reader by NewsGator.

      It was found from Scripting News but it’s so hard to read everything in there that I’ve separated the link.

      It’s hard to imagine the days of indie sw developers but there are lots of them. Rick Strahl manages to straddle being both primary coder and the business person behind West-Wind, along with other various jobs. But it’s certainly not the life for everyone, especially when you develop an RSS reader that is being used by thousands of people.

      But it would also do well for those “shocked” about the purchase to realize that Newsgator started as one of those types of tools as well and only became the entity it is in the past little while.

      NewsGator is in an interesting position – while today, they can claim to be one of the leading (if not the leading) RSS aggregator companies – they are also in the arena that is waiting for the 600 pound elephant (named Microsoft) to arrive. With their acquisitions and new tools, I think they are heading the right way – for example, with a Newsgator subscription, you can view your feeds on virtually every device (Mac, PDA, Win, Outlook, MediaCenter, Linux, etc) and still only get the LATEST news – not just all of it.

      They’ve also made it easy to localize which information you want to read on various sites. This reminds me of Rick Borup’s post about too much information. With NewsGator, you might set up your PDA to only look at specific sites whereas your Outlook may get all of them and your Media Center may only show family oriented feeds. It’s a great solution because it’s something that although they are aware of it, Microsoft isn’t dealing with it head-on in IE 7 (where the solutions are expected to be machine-based).

      So read The Life – it helps show the reality of the single developer with that one great idea.

      Daring Fireball: The Life

    • #3071682

      Gada Be – or not gada be

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I really like the concept behind Gada be – I mean hey, you can do a search by saying http://foxpro.gada.be and there it is.

      EXCEPT – this is what happens when I do something like trucking.gada.be. Hmmm…..


      Chris – you always struck me as a Windows fave and here you are wearing a red hat ….

      Object not found!

    • #3071683

      One of those days

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      What a weird problem….

      My application uses a Cursor Adapter class connecting to SQL server. When it runs in the VFP IDE, no problems whatsoever but as soon as I take it out to run it as its own EXE, after every few minutes, the Connection becomes invalid.

      Frustrating as…well, you know. Something is timing it out but I’m just not sure where it is…then again, it may be because I’m running the VFP 9 SP1 beta.

      Go figure.

    • #3053307

      Calvin Hsia’s WebLog : Ctrl-C to capture MessageBox and dialogs

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      And you wonder how the little secrets get found out…

      Calvin points out that on any VFP dialog, you can hit Ctrl+C and the entire text of the dialog is put into the Windows clipboard.

      This goes for errors, messagebox, any native VFP form (in other words, ones that are built directly into VFP – not done through the FoxPro code itself like the Wizards)

      Does that work for the C5 errors though?

      Have to try that….

    • #3072288

      FileMaker Names Jon Sigler Vice President of Product Management

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Remember Jon?

      Wow – remember File Maker? I recall, I think it was at the Miami FoxPro DevCon that Jennifer, Geri from Advisor commented on the similarities between the FoxPro and the FileMaker communities (Advisor puts on both devcons)…now they have even more in common.

      FileMaker Names Jon Sigler Vice President of Product Management: Financial News – Yahoo! Finance

    • #3071134

      SednaX

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Now that’s a good sign.

      Yesterday, there was only one lonely member in the Visual FoxPro SednaX community and now there’s 19.

      I sense Craig is hearing some pushback from former community members but his post “Want to invent VFP’s future?” is certainly a good read.

      No, the community may not be able to get MS to do everything they want – but there have certainly been a number of times when a lone FoxPro developer has come to MS and said “here’s what I did” and the reaction was nothing short of “wow”.

      And if you think about it – all of the little pieces found in VFP today – the FFC, the component gallery, the object browser, even the new Report Listener architecture – all of them are initiatives written, supported, developed, or architected by members of the community (heck, with few exceptions, most of the Fox team at MS is “FROM” the community)

      So how to start? Maybe the best idea would be to look at the Wiki list of things people want to see and figure out which ones are definitely NOT going to be handled by MS. Ah the list has already begun on the message board.

    • #3071135

      Understanding Buffering in Visual FoxPro

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Don’t understand Buffering?

      You’re not alone – Andy Kramek gives the whole low-down as to the hows and whys but still doesn’t explain why the functions are named the way they are.

      As he states

      “For example, to set buffering for a Visual FoxPro DBF file (which is a table) we have to use the heavily overloaded CURSORSETPROP() function. Why not a separate, unambiguous, ?SetBufferMode()? function? To confirm a pending transaction, the command is END TRANSACTION. Why not ?COMMIT? as in every other database language – a choice which is even more peculiar since the standard ‘ROLLBACK’ command is used to reverse a transaction?”

      Could have been worse – we could have to issue a

      SYS(2011,3) or something else that would have made Ken proud.

    • #3070865

      SW Fox 2005 Videos

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      There were a few videos of various sessions at Southwest that should be showing their heads shortly. I heard from Bob that he was just getting them all edited and arranged and stuff.

      The opening keynote, Tips and Tricks I learned from Drew and Steve Black’s What Do I Say session (as noted in Andy’s own review of Southwest:

      SW Fox 2005 is over, Get Ready for SW Fox 2006 – kudos to Bob for getting Steve to give that original session) – what else was taped?

      The latest FoxShow has interviews with first time attendee Kevin Ragsdale as well as Doug Hennig, who managed to turn a 75 minute session into 20 minutes.

    • #3045405

      Ribbon Control in Office 12

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Saw this on Scoble and of course, it’s DotNet only.

      So the next question will be is either the Argus Software labs who gave us CommandBars or the SednaX project going to be able to give us this in Visual FoxPro?

    • #3045406

      OzFoxRocks! – Aussie VFP podcast

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

    • #3045407

      Markus Looks at international gas prices

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Great read – I wish he had put in the Canadian equivalent of it because he missed one other aspect of it: the government taxes.

      For example, in Canada, we’re today at 90 cents a litre – but in truth, about 40% of that is taxes. Here‘s another site that explains it in more details. As the index shows , 98 cents a litre in Ottawa is really 66.9 cents when you take away the taxes.

      So when we compare ourselves to the US, we always say when they pay far less than we do in Canada (using Markus’ example, Canada we would be paying about $3.75 a gallon, far closer to the European example)

      But then Markus actually then puts it into perspective – compare how far it is for 100KM and then look at the changes across the board.

      Don’t single out the US – everyone in North America is getting the short end of the stick when it comes to rising gas prices. (oh, except the Canadian government who makes money when the price goes up)

    • #3045329

      FoxTabs Quick Screencast

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig Bailey and Scott Scovell did such a great job on FoxTabs – I just had to show a quick screencast of it.

      If you subscribe to the FoxShow, you’ll also notice it is posted there as well but in Windows Media Format.

      Guys – this is something that should definitely be put into the SednaX project.

      Liquid Web Project Streamer – aksel – FoxTabs

    • #3046036

      Further Optimization Analysis

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Calvin made a post about code optimization and noted that if you actually attempt to do a

      FOR i = 1 TO num

      IF wParam=ASC(“a”)

      wParam=ASC(“b”)

      ENDIF

      ENDFOR

      It would take longer than just using the direct values. So what happens if you used variables or #DEFINE statements.

      I first thought “i’ll use constants” , adding the following

      #DEFINE cn1 ASC(‘a’)

      #DEFINE cn2 ASC(‘b’)

      and changing the logic to:

      FOR i = 1 TO num

      IF wParam=cn1

      wParam=cn2

      ENDIF

      ENDFOR

      The Result? A little faster but nowhere close to the performance improvements gained by using the literal values. Why? Because it is simply replacing the cn1 and c2 with the ASC(’97’) statements.

      But even when I changed the #DEFINEs to variables and assigned the values, they still weren’t improved.

      The only time it came close was if I explicitly did

      #DEFINE cn1 78

      #DEFINE cn2 79

      Here’s a basic breakdown (non scientific) of my times:

      With literal values: 3.781 seconds

      With functions: 5.187

      With variables: 5.11

      With DEFINEs and Functions: 4.98 – 5 (I did run it twice)

      With DEFINEs and Literals: 3.782 seconds

      So the rule has to be – if you can avoid using functions and variables by using constants or the literal values, do it.

      Optimization…go figure.

    • #3046037

      Alex – Where’s Clippy when you need him

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      As Rick Borup pointed out, it’s hard to keep up with every post so I typically shy away from posts like this but Alex’s

      link to Coding Horror cracked me up.

      What’s more though – if you read the real Legend of Stinky, you’ll find it even funnier (in spite or perhaps because of the bathroom humour)

      One of my favorites:

      “”Well, at the beginning we tried COM components, especially Patrik was agile about that, but we encountered many problems with that compatibility stuff, new version of the application didn’t work with old version of components or vice versa. So, to make things simpler, I just threw away all that component stuff and put everything into one exe file. Since then we haven’t got similar problems. Who needs COM anyway?”” – funny as it may seem, I actually had a similar discussion just recently.

      I’ve got to read the rest of these stories – they are hilarious.

    • #3046038

      Mindjet: Gnomdex 6

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I know – nothing to do with VFP but I just LOVE MindJet!

      And this diagram gives you a great idea why…

      Now the big question – where is the OPML?

      Mindjet: Gnomdex 6

    • #3043724

      The Database Is Dead – Gartner

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Very amusing story in zdNet about how since individual devices will eventually all have RFID on them, a database is no longer required – just realtime access to where things are – right?

      Well, if you read further into the article, it’s not that it’s about databases themselves (hopefully Feinberg isn’t so naive as to think that tracking numbers isn’t a job for a database- but then who knows) – but rather it’s the DBAs.

      The quote:

      a point made by the Gartner analysts is that there’s a bit of urban myth to the idea that data must always be stored ? or cached ? in a database. Sometimes when you really think about the business processes that the data must support and then the degree to which the data must persist to support that process, you may realize that you don’t need a database after all. As data is moved closer to its source and only kept in one place, not only is the quality is better, according to Friedman, “the data is where you need it, when you need it and only lasts for as long as you need it.”

      Well – except when you need to track where it went, etc.

      However, for that, I do agree that

      ” The result is that structured data and SQL will take a back seat to XML and XQuery. “

      It’s an interesting idea and one that especially holds true after Steve Black’s session on how to sell VFP.

      Forget about talking about databases – and talk about information flow. I have always maintained that a database is simply the repository of information and those who like to make the arguments for and against specific formats are primarily guardians trying to protect their own little “kingdoms”. Best part about FoxPro is that it works with all of those formats.

      But it’s also a valuable time to think about the LINQ project – because if I can grab all of my data from its various sources with a single object declaration (better examples here)- then I should be VERY happy about that.

    • #3043623

      Poor Kevin : If My Data’s In Purgatory, Does My App Go To Hell?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

    • #3045666

      Who was that masked man? (correction)

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      – UPDATE: It was Tod Neilsen –

      In Fox Show #28, I was commenting on how Jon Sigler is now working a FileMaker and there was another name from the past who was front and center at a recent Oracle Developer’s conference. In the show, I threw out the name Robert Green, which is wrong. Ken Levy has pointed that out to me.

      But does anyone recall the news story? So much for the power of Google and search – it was a very short story but the essence was “developers must have done a double-take when they saw ________ at the recent Oracle conference”

      Thanks for the correction, Ken – now who was that masked man? It was Tod Nielsen.

      See here and here – uh, unless you can read Chinese you won’t have much luck with that last one – but funny enough, the English version didn’t turn up on Google but hey wow! Google’s translation did a good job – “Tod Nielsen is the Oracle whole world sale support and market department vice- President”.

      Too bad I can’t find the original story.

    • #3045490

      Ken’s been busy posting….

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Ken’s got a variety of posts including a link to the Southwest keynote, some hints on accessing VFP 9’s Report XML output, the PDC 2005 video, speaking at the Seattle Code Camp and Tamar’s new Taming VFP SQL book.

      Also, almost missed this but there’s a new case study as well, where they talk about automating Visio with VFP. Hey! didn’t I write about that somewhere?

      Ken Levy’s Blog

    • #3045488

      Ted notes VFP in eWeek

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Quote from Stephen Vaughn – Nichols:

      I haven’t been a big fan of personal database programs for a long time now. The only one out there these days that I care for at all is Microsoft’s Visual FoxPro. Yes, I can say good things about Microsoft products?when they really are good.

      Great quote – thanks Ted.

      Ted’s Radio Weblog

    • #3045489

      Comments in Regular Expressions

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Now this is something that would be really valuable when trying to make code readable. Granted, once you understand regular expressions, you probably don’t need them – but still I’m glad Claudio was able to explain that @”^(?=.*\d)(?=.*[a-z])(?=.*[A-Z]).{8,10}\s$ isn’t just a new swear word.

      Claudio Lassala in Software Development: Can you please put some comment on that Regular Expression?!

    • #3045486

      Alex Feldstein – Unscatched

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

    • #3045487

      OzFoxRocks – Direct link

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig and Scott had some issues with bandwidth so we’re sharing the duties over here – download the Australian FoxPro Podcast from our FoxShow mirror site here

      Great show!

      Ah – I see I didn’t need to mirror it. Oh well – I’ll remove it after the other one is reloaded.

    • #3045450

      Ok, say it with me… “Not For Resale.”

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      One quote should be enough to get the gist of this post:

      So let me try to make this VERY simple for anyone “on the fence” over what NOT FOR RESALE means… It means, “NO YOU CANNOT SELL THIS SOFTWARE!”

      I guess that would be kind of like those signed personalized copies of Visual Studio or XP that some individuals got that were promptly offered up to the highest bidder.

      Microsoft Small Business Community Blog : Ok, say it with me… “Not For Resale.”

    • #3044264

      VFP gets feedback

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Ken posted it yesterday but VFP is now part of the MSDN Product Feedback center. So what does that mean?

      Well this means you can submit bug reports, ERs, etc directly to the Fox team directly through this site, you can review existing bugs, etc.

      And hey! Emerson Reed and j_h_p_l were the first to take them up on it.

      What’s especially cool are the stats

      Statistics

      41627 registered users

      9282 suggestions

      20063 bugs

      Active Feedback

      1192 suggestions

      2988 bugs


      Is there any way we can get that shown to be specific to a product or technology like, say, VFP?

      All in all, another example of how, as Craig says, Microsoft IS supporting Visual FoxPro.

    • #3045067

      Photo Blogging Gets Looped

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      FilmLoop is a new player that Guy Kawasaki noted in his Garage list. It’s interesting – they call it photo broadcasting – sounds a lot like Flickr but the take is different. The slides are done in a nice looping show that you can add your own pictures to as you go through it.

      Adding your own Loop – it’s very cool – and easy to do – just add a bunch of pictures. People can comment on each one (like Flickr) but the slideshow context is a very neat idea.

      And there are sponsors throughout to help make it worthwhile. I just wish there was sound….

      FilmLoop is here

      FilmLoop Invitation from Guy Kawasaki

    • #3045065

      The Fox Show needs a cool graphic

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Any budding artists (or companies who have used a good Fox logo recently ) – I need a good logo for the Fox Show.

      I’m thinking of a cartoon Fox listening to a headset or a stylized logo with the Fox logo.

      Anyways shoot me an email at foxshow / gmail.com if you have some ideas.

      Thanks!

    • #3045066

      The End of an Era at SourceGear

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Great article on the memories that an office building can hold, especially as you prepare to leave it. Even if you can get wi-fi on a hog farm.

      The End of an Era

    • #3115545

      VS & SQL Server 2005 Available

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig notes it here and I just got my MSDN flash telling me so….this must be why the MSDN Subscription downloads page is SO SLOW this morning….

      Congratulations to all teams involved – the first of many releases that MS has coming

      I, for one, certainly hope Rick’s last issue is dealt with – nothing worse than telling us versionitis is going away only to have it come back.

      Ok guys – enough time in the sun – get back in and finish off Orcas

      I agree with the B-man –

      “We just can’t make our customers wait three or four years for the things which should have been on more interim cycles,” (Balmer) said at last week’s Gartner Symposium/IT Expo in Orlando. ”

      DevBlog: VS & SQL Server 2005 Available

    • #3115240

      VB + VFP = VB.Net 9?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Ken’s latest blog entry raises some interesting points – 1) he’s taking part in a chat on VB 9 Language Enhancements on Nov 1. We all know that the VFP team is working with the other groups especially as it pertains to data so this may be a good opportunity to hear more about it.

      But perhaps more importantly is the following comment:

      Parts of Sedna will be written in VB 9.0, and our current plans are to include all of the source code (VFP, VB, C++, etc.) of Sedna with Sedna.

      And then considering his comment in the October newsletter about attempts to make aspects of the VFP source available and then also possibly making a change in the EULA to make it distributable…

      Combine that with the SednaX project and you have a very COOL open community (not open source) initiative.

      It will be interesting to see what (if any) other features from VFP show up in the VB 9 language.

    • #3114390

      Ruby on Rails chases simplicity in programming

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Great article on Ruby on Rails, the environment that 37 signals uses for BaseCamp and Backpack among others.

      While I continue to hear about this framework to help web developers be more productive, I find myself thinking very much about West-Wind WebConnect 5.0, still in beta and the buzz that was generated at the Southwest Fox conference about it.

      No, they aren’t the same thing (one is open source, the other isn’t) – but the key goals are the same – simplicity in web development.

    • #3114211

      Rainer Becker’s the new FoxTalk editor

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      As noted on David’s blog, FoxTalk is getting a new editor. Before anyone jumps to any conspiracy theories, take a listen to David’s interview on the FoxShow where he explains why it was time to pass the torch.

      In an upcoming show we’ll talk to Rainer as well as he gets prepared for the 12th dFPUG conference.

    • #3114958

      Microsoft’s Linux lab and view on open source software

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Greg Hughes (via Malcolm Greene on ProFox) has a link to

      Microsoft’s Linux lab and view on open source software – a recorded session with Bill Hilf, who runs Microsoft’s Linux and Open Source Software technology group (yes, you read that right!)

    • #3116402

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3116401

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3116347

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3116348

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3116302

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3116303

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3116184

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3116185

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3116186

      Primate Programming(tm) Inc

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      This is old but hilarious!

      Got this from FoxPro.Catalyst – as quoted

      Visual Basic 6.0 ? was the preferred IDE for the majority of experiment primate subjects.

      Primate Programming(tm) Inc

    • #3116187

      FoxTabs beta available

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Awesome! STILL beta – but then what isn’t beta? Every software obviously required more testing when it breaks when you need it the most.

      Great stuff guys!

      I LOVE the Recent Files option – only what’s that Solutions popup for?

      Craig Bailey’s thoughts: VFP: FoxTabs beta available

    • #3114767

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3114766

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3114692

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3114693

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3114608

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3114606

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3114607

      A slideshow is worth a thousand pictures

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Late last month, I made a post about FilmLoop, and someone noted that Slide has been doing it for a while as well. Then I went to Nial Kennedy’s photos from the Live event and saw a show done via Flickr.

      Reminds me of blogging tools – so many companies doing similar things, competing – which is good, right, Ted?

      Now, FilmLoop has drag and drop but you have to download a player, Slide also has a player/intergration tool wih a sidebar. The tool you use is the one you like – but I really enjoy the concept of the slideshows over going to personal web sites and having to choose the pictures to view.

    • #3117064

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3117065

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3116854

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3116855

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3137802

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3137803

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3137897

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3137898

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3137763

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3137762

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3137699

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3137700

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3135747

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3135748

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3135745

      Dilbert boss syndrome -how sad…

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      is that ever sad…been there though – the cosmetic part is always true,though

      how many foxpro developers have a similar story due to the reality of
      the vfp native interface?

      “why can’t it look like a windows app?”

    • #3135746

      Fwd: why use vfp? reliability

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      http://foxpro.ntsl119.com/archives/00000540.html

      hmmm…wonder what rss reader he’s using….while i’m about ready to
      toss newsgator outlook – outlook and the pst file is just way too slow
      – newsgator online rocks!!

    • #3135744

      Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 E-Learning

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      While the jury may still be out as to the overall quality of Visual Studio, there’s still not an excuse not to learn it.

      Microsoft E-learning is offering FREE courses and clinics (for 90 days) on all aspects of VS for both Web and Desktop based development.

      Have to sign up soon though – offer ends Nov 17th.

    • #3135610

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3135609

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3120520

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3120521

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3120421

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3120422

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3120335

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3120334

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

      • #3120289

        TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

        by peter spande ·

        In reply to TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

        Some have suggested that this is a way for Microsoft to “chill” the
        marketplace.  By showing that they eventually will have this in
        the marketplace they stall people and companies from adopting similar
        offerings from other companies. 

        For me, this is a compelling interpretation of the whole “Live” demo. 

    • #3119094

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3119095

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118992

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118993

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118991

      How many lines of code is ideal for your program?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      While looking at the refactoring project over on SednaX, I found myself writing up some quick little code analyzer classes designed to see whether or not a function should be refactored or not.

      Looking at that chart, it shows FoxPro has some numbers like 35 single lines of code per function. Wow – that seems low but maybe not.

      So tell me – what do you consider to be the ideal number of lines per code / function for readability, maintainability in your programs?







      Take the Poll and let me know…





    • #3118909

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118910

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118479

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118480

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118356

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118357

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118354

      Loyalty to Visual FoxPro: the SednaX Generation

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Priceless –

      Korby Parnell’s Gotdotnet Wunderkammer : Loyalty to Visual FoxPro: the SednaX Generation: “May you stay long, do great things, and spread the good word about CodeGallery. Note: gotdotnet will be down today for a significant upgrade.”

      Don’t stop the discoverability – on that note, I’ll be at the Ottawa Visual Studio Launch tour today – not sure if I’ll blog it, podcast it or picture it – or all of the above.

      Could be fun…

    • #3118182

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118183

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3117761

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3117762

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3117687

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3117688

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3117631

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3117632

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3117595

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3117596

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3117510

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3117507

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3117508

      Hope your last name isn’t Bryant…

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Wow – it’s moved from Nigeria to the UK now…just got an email

      “My name is Susan Bryant, I am an artist with my husband Tommy Bryant, We own Sus Art World in London(United Kingdom)I live in London United Kingdom, with my two kids, four cats, one dog and the love of my life my husband Tommy Bryant.”

      and of course it goes on to say “I’ll give you 10%” for every transaction on my money orders”…

      Well it’s to be expected – Microsoft said they would work with Nigeria to crack down on it – so now the spammers move around.

      Shakespeare needs to be updated: First you kill all the lawyers, then the spammers, then the phishers…

    • #3117509

      Thoughts from the Ottawa Rocking the Launch

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      So yesterday was the Ready to Launch event in Ottawa, celebrating the release of Visual Studio 2005, SQL Server 2005 and the, uh, imminent release of BizTalk 2006.

      No Wifi – (which I found really hard to believe at a tech event) – which meant the GPRS on my ipaq6315 got a good workout but because I don’t have a good Pocket PC blogging tool for blogger (anyone know of one? – and no I don’t mean moblogs – that’s a PITA – I’ll rant on that later)

      OK – so we get the idea that they are ready to “Rock the launch” based on the music and the bouncing balls (where everyone applauds when they pop! – clean up crews must really like that).

      Visual Studio Rocks – where have I heard that before? Back in 2004 and before…

      Funniest pre-show comment: “do we have to watch this?” – one of the Microsofties who was managing registration (yes, likely a hired hand)

      My first thoughts? Well, let’s say 45 minutes on PowerPoint for a DEVELOPER launch? Jeff Zado and Craig Symonds should be burned at the crisp for that. They were READING their PowerPoints, the technology was glitchy – but hey! One slide managed to put a “Live Services” box around Windows, Office and more – good job so soon after Bill and Ray stillbirthed it.

      I was about ready to scratch the whole keynote up to a waste until 43 minutes into it, John Bristowe , who is a Developer Advisor at MS Canada, saved the morning with a brief tour of what we were going to see. Thanks John – ya, you were rushed but you rocked it!

      (On that note, I used to do the DevDays and PDC conferences in Ottawa. Back then, we used to complain that the video demo shown during the keynote always showed what we were going to show in the demos but at least they showed something. Note to Jeff and Craig – save the stats for the PHBs – as John noted – most of the people there were developers and wanted to see something.

      Thankfully they got right into it after the first hour which made them 15 minutes late. Now you know what happens when your first presentation is 15 minutes late and you don’t cut anything…it snowballs. (by the end of the day, they were almost an hour over).

      Also you would think that after years of presenting, the Visual Studio guys would have realized what the Fox team did when they added the “Small, medium and Large” font options to the Property browser and Project manager – it makes it easier for people to see. No one changed the font on anything so it made it very difficult to see in the larger sessions. Not only that but their fictitious company had employee pictures that were so faint that John kept on referring to them as “ghosts”.

      I obviously spent the majority of my day in the DevTrack (which was ALWAYS packed – good job they opened it up to the big room for the Team System because they could have used it for all of the Dev Tracks).

      John, along with Jerome Carron and Barry Gervin from ObjectSharp, did an excellent job going through the scripted demos. Watching a launch demo is always a bit surreal – as John noted – he felt like a cooking show where you pulled out the finished piece “right out of the oven”, but the enthusiasm was definitely there.

      Pop Quiz: What is the keyboard shortcut to compile in Visual Studio 2005? (constantly reminded by John – answer below)

      Also had a great chance to talk with David Campbell from the Ottawa Dot Net community user group – Microsoft Canada has a really cool User Group challenge – note it’s a PDF.

      Anyways back on the actual products themselves – some very cool stuff – it’s funny to see BizTalk still being promoted as much as it is. It’s a great tool but I think Microsoft really missed their mark on it by waiting for partners to build the various adapters, especially when one common theme I kept hearing was that they took what everyone wanted and put it into the product but then still were relying on their partners (kind of like when they build in functionality that shuts down third party vendors but then still actively solicit more partnership innovations). The businesses I deal with still work with EDI – which is what XML and BizTalk was supposed to transplant – so a lot of BizTalk stuff always seems like “demo” as opposed to real world. That said, Ottawa has a lot of BizTalk experts so maybe I’m just bummed about not being able to use it in day to day work.

      BizTalk 2006 certainly does look like it will make some of this pain go away – but not everyone deals with XML just yet – which is too bad. The “new” Flat file import wizard reminds me of every File Import wizard in other MS tools but it’s certainly a step in the right direction.

      Now while a lot of focus these days has been on the new stuff coming down the Orcas pipe, the Whidbey and Yukon tools really do offer a lot. Once you’ve mastered Try/Catch in VFP, having it in SQL Server seems so obvious – and the native support for an XML Data type made me wish we had that directly in VFP. No, it’s not as cool as the XML object type in VB 9, but it is still very cool. And while VFP developers always hear moaning about the 2GB database limit, it was quite funny to hear John and Barry gush about the new Max specifier with up to ‘2GB’ for storage. (yes, I know it’s at the field level but it struck me just the same)

      Although having CLR support in SQL server I think is great, I worry about onset of versionitis since the DLL is essentially put into the database itself. I guess we’ll see how popular that approach becomes but I am very excited about the possibilities it opens up.

      The Team System overview helped provide a clearer picture as to all of the offerings that companies or MSDN subscribers get to choose from. If you like to draw pictures and flowcharts, get Architect. If you like to code, get Developer and well, testing – the built-in web testing recorded, etc, and the load testing is very cool but certainly the code analyzers and tools in the Developer part are going to be well-used. (note for FoxPro developers – these are similar to the tools that either a) exist or b) are being discussed in the SednaX project). Certainly the big push is on for the new Source Control tool. Yes, it’s in SQL server (boy, I hope the SourceSafe team has their flak jackets on for these sessions – they really came down on how many things SourceSafe was missing)

      I do really like the ability of the tie-ins to Work Items and policies. The Project Admin sets a check-in policy and it’s “enforced” – well, until you let someone override it.

      At the launch, they have this section called Ask the Experts where a bunch of MVPs and softies hang out to answer questions which was great. I asked Nick G. about how SourceControl notifies people about changes – hoping for the great RSS answer –

      turns out – no it’s not built in – but they’re sure someone will do it because the entire platform is open. So do it now but expect to see it built into a future version because apparently, they DO have notification happening at Microsoft but they don’t have it in the product. hmm….do I smell service pack?. Also in the Experts section was John Marshall, a Visio MVP. Think we have a bad time? Visio hasn’t had a real update since 1998 and now they’re taking away features. He had been down to the MVP summit where there were only two of them. The Visio team is about 150 strong (including management). What’s the VFP comparison? How many MVPs to Fox team size?

      Sadly, I could only sit through the final Smart Client/Web development session before they talked about WinForms, instead focusing on the great improvements in ASP.Net 2.0. So I also missed my chance to win some new gaming tool that MS is launching soon.

      Immediate thoughts:

      Master Pages -> hopefully this will be the implementation idea that takes hold because none of the past ones have really been successful.

      GridView -> Awesome

      Code Snippets -> ummm….this is what Intellisense in VFP needs – or can do – or both – kind of like taking the Snippets from the Toolbox right into Intellisense. Awesome implementation.

      Better DataBinding -> Yes – finally!

      Wizard overload – wow there are still an awful lot of wizards for stuff – seems like mostly in BizTalk but still seems like way too many.

      These launch tours are a great idea and if you haven’t signed up for it, you definitely want to. Note: if you are going, be sure to wear some old MS stuff- they are searching for people wearing old Visual Studio shirts, buttons, etc to give cool stuff too.

      Yes, it’s a tour – the demos will be scripted – the samples will be very basic – but despite an auspicious start, John, Jerome and Barry did an awesome job at demonstrating their enthusiasm for the product. In a lot of the FoxShows, I asked should developers wait for better data access in Orcas and the answer is always, no – jump in now, VS 2005 is a good way to get into it. It definitely has a lot of great tools and the ASP.Net 2.0 stuff definitely rocks.

      interesting thought – nothing in the IDE jumped out that said “we can’t do this in FoxPro” and it left me thinking of what Rick Strahl notes in the next FoxShow (should be out today) that it would be really nice if the Sedna focus was made on ensuring that Fox applications looked like real Windows apps. You can easily make the Fox IDE look like VS and Fox’s intellisense still is way above anything else – so now it’s just a matter of making the actual apps look that real.

      I walked away very pumped.

    • #3119368

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3119369

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3119267

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3119268

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3119217

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3119218

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118845

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118846

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118817

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118816

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118764

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118763

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118727

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118728

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118729

      My life as a Code Economist

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Eric Rice continues his posts, certainly qualifying him to have one of the most valuable site for software developers and managers. This one is on Testing, or debugging, or the horrors of shipping on Halloween.

      Especially in the wake of Microsoft’s launch of Visual Studio, this post is an exceptionally good read. He describes each bug with four qualifiers: frequency, severity, cost and risk. Sound obvious? Read it – print it and then send it to your nearest manager. This is an article worth reading especially when he compares levels of severity:

      # The top of the graph represents a bug with extremely severe impact:

      “This bug causes the user’s computer to burst into flame.”

      # The bottom of the graph represents a bug with extremely low impact:

      “One of the pixels on the splash screen is the wrong shade of gray.”

      How many times have you had to fix the BOTTOM issue BEFORE the top one?

    • #3118673

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118674

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118675

      Sony BMG caves to outcry, drops DRM software

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Nice to see that with enough public outcry, Sony will react in the right manner.

      I guess now I can cancel those “No Sony” buttons.

      As noted:

      The whole ugly affair has turned into a nightmare for Sony BMG, and deservedly so. People were understandably angry about Sony installing software on their system that would cripple Windows if they tried to remove it while giving other malware authors another route into their systems. Thomas Hesse, President of Sony BMG’s Global Digital Business Division didn’t help with his assertion that what people didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them. Well now they know, and Sony is the one left with egg on its face. Let’s see what it comes up with next from its apparently bottomless bag of proprietary technology and bad DRM.

      Sony BMG caves to outcry, drops DRM software

    • #3118637

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118638

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118594

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118595

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3118567

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3118568

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3119860

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3119861

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3119809

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3119810

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3119750

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3119749

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3119685

      Windows Live Ideas ? Page d’accueil de Andrew

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Uh – how do I explain this to Americans…especially those who are behind building http://www.live.com&#8230;

      Just because someone is from Canada does NOT mean they only speak French.

      I sign into Live.com thinking this will be the second coming (despite the reviews) – hmmm…decidely underwhelmed….but then I say, maybe what’s new will have something.

      Oh they have something – in french. Now I’m not sure why – maybe because I said I wanted the weather in Ottawa, but the rest of the site is in English – is it something weird with my profile? (wouldn’t be the first time)

      But worse – you can’t change it to English. What’s up with that? (and before you ask, YES my settings were set to English (UNITED STATES).

      Anyways – I’ll hold off on final judgement but definitely underwhelmed. Even Google home page provides more right off the bat and that’s been out for a while….

      Come on guys – EXCITE ME – the dev teams’ work on LINQ shows that you have a lot of exciting stuff coming – was Live worth the demo?

      Gadgets are cool – uh, like Konfabulator and Google desktop….I’m with Dave.

      “We need Google to get some serious competition, and Microsoft is one of the places that can come from. (Apple and Yahoo are the others.) But they’re going to have to do much more than they did today.”

      Hmmm…maybe Office Live will be worth it. But based on what I’ve seen, they just aren’t getting it. Others may think otherwise so what am I missing?

    • #3119684

      TechCrunch ? Windows Live – More than an AJAX Desktop

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Yeah, ok so they have some stuff like VOIP integration – but it’s not there yet. It’s “coming” in the future.

      So what the purpose of the demo? Was it worth the negative press to show stuff that isn’t ready for primetime?

    • #3120000

      Tod Nielsen gets around…

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      First PM at Microsoft, then SVP at Oracle and now CEO or Borland. Seeing as he had just become the SVP at Oracle in September.

      Tod was the guy who I mentioned on the FoxShow at the same time as Jon Sigler who moved over to FileMaker.

    • #3120001

      Bricklin’s WikiCalc: Very Cool

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Just saw this over on zdNet but then wanted to try it out.

      I think David may be right when he talks about the potential of what this could do.

      Wikis aren’t just for group blogging or information – now you’ve got a live application for it as well.

    • #3119901

      Need a Lat/Long for a US address? Now you can get it for free

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      You can access it as a web service, directly over the web or wherever.

      I deal with a trucking software company and I always used to hear that this information wasn’t freely available – so the data may be slightly out of date but being able to pull this so freely is great.

      Pass it an address, city and state and it can come back to you in CSV or XML.

      geocoder.us: a free US address geocoder

    • #3130899

      Welcome Toni and Mike

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Thanks Alex for pointing this out!

      By the way, the RSS Feed for the F1 Technologies is hidden through Blogger but it’s available here!

      When does Mickey get his own Blog?

    • #3130898

      Visual FoxPro software helps teen win MS Award

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Great post Alex – glad you found this.

      Figures that Visual FoxPro would help out in drag race software.

      Alex Feldstein – Powered By Bloglines

    • #3130896

      Andy Disses the latest ILL-Advised Move

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      First thing I heard of this Andy – I’ve been down in the weeds of work for the past few days but it certainly doesn’t pass the smell test.

      Hmmm…I’m an editor with FPA – wonder if they’ll tell me why did this.

      Sounds like a surefire way of getting out of the FoxPro conference business.

      I know sometimes they’ve come back and said they were asked to organize their shows around other schedules such as launch, etc – I certainly hope no one from the MS Data Team has anything to do with this.

      FoxPro ILL-Advisor

    • #3130897

      If you blog, support the EFF

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Saw this on Anil Dash‘s site.

      It’s important to every single blogger out there today, even the ones who just want to talk tech. The US recently followed suit to Canada where any kind of commentary on a blog is akin to being a political contribution. I’m not typically political on this blog but I do want to support organizations who do stand for protecting our rights. The RIAA has shut down Mashuptown who went out of their way to promote the artist’s iTunes records.

      So why support the EFF? Because they are supporting you and your rights:

      – blog anonymously

      – keep sources confidential (think how Mini-Msft must feel)

      – Fair use of intellectual property (you do quote sources don’t you?)

      – Allow Reader’s Comments

      – Freely blog about elections

      – Blog about work (but be smart about it!)

      – Access as media

      Check out the EFF’s How to Blog Safely guide.

    • #3117375

      Andy Disses the latest ILL-Advised Move – updated

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      First thing I heard of this Andy – I’ve been down in the weeds of work for the past few days but it certainly doesn’t pass the smell test.

      Hmmm…I’m an editor with FPA – wonder if they’ll tell me why did this.

      Sounds like a surefire way of getting out of the FoxPro conference business.

      I know sometimes they’ve come back and said they were asked to organize their shows around other schedules such as launch, etc – I certainly hope no one from the MS Data Team has anything to do with this.

      Update: I have been told by Ken that in this case, the timing had nothing to do with the MS Data team. I’ll update more in a separate post.

      FoxPro ILL-Advisor

    • #3117374

      Why hold competing conferences?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      On Friday, I noted Andy Kramek’s post about the timing of the next Advisor FoxPro Devcon which is scheduled for August 27-31 in Phoenix, Arizona which would appear to conflict with the Southwest conference in Tempe, Arizona a few weeks later.

      Not only did I post about it, I also emailed my editor at Advisor asking if they were aware of the scheduling and why this might possibly be considered a bad move on part of the community.

      Not only did I hear from them, I also heard from Ken Levy who wanted to assure me that “Microsoft has nothing at all to do with the dates, locations, or speaker selection at any VFP conference world wide, and that the VFP team is not involved in any decision making there”. That’s good news – in fact, he heard the news when he first arrived in Frankfurt.

      So why would Advisor decide to do this? Well, for one, the FoxPro devcon isn’t their only conference. As it turns out, they are offering several conferences: GroupWise, Access, .Net, Lotus, WebSphere , Sharepoint, ZenWorks at the same time, and the same location.

      Some may say “hold it – I only want to attend a Fox-only conference” – for which there is the Southwest Conference and others. But as the last Foxpro survey suggested, Fox-only developers are rare – most developers, including myself, work with a variety of tools and just as the Visual Studio developers find cool features in FoxPro, it wouldn’t be unheard of for FoxPro developers to find other cool features in other technologies. Ken went so far as to suggest that this is a good thing for FoxPro and Ken, I would agree with you – more people in the area may mean more people exposed to FoxPro and no, you likely can’t plan your conference always around every single developer’s plan.

      So would you rather have a Foxpro Devcon in April of 2006 or August in Orlando? (they have other shows around there)

      As I noted to Advisor, there are many FoxPro developers who like to play the conspiracy theory game (at the end of one FoxPro devcon, it was suggested that because they had not announced the next one, that maybe there wouldn’t be one). And my original post may have suggested I was. I was not – and it was definitely not my intention to do so (hence my updates).

      Fact is – there are a lot of developers in the world and there are a lot of great conferences, both for VFP and other technologies. Advisor puts on conferences for a lot of them. It’s hard to get the facilities to put on conferences year after year – in fact, the cities that can hold them are only a handful if you want to hold them in great resorts as the Advisor folks usually do.

      In this case, if you attend this one in Phoenix, you also get the chance to attend others as well.

      And if you’re looking for a Fox-only conference, then there’s one right around the corner.

      So why talk about it? Some might say you’re just starting stuff up – but I say no. Maybe Advisor WASN’T aware of the conflicting schedules and maybe they should have been – but then by the same token, no one should jump to those conclusions. If, one believes (I do) in the concept of transparency and how it’s changing the way business is run, then having these types of discussions can be valuable.

      Let’s be realistic – the conference season is notoriously (some may say thankfully) short, there are only so many days, so many weekends, so many hotels. If only I could spend my life visiting each one.

      My original post

    • #3122258

      Maybe Ray Ozzie can change Microsoft…

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Boy, that “Microsoft is not evil” comment from BuzzOutLoud is going to continue to grow with Ray Ozzie’s new stuff.

      Microsoft’s Simple Sharing Extension for RSS is being released under the Creative Commons license Attribution share-alike license.

      And it answers one of my biggest complaints about the way Microsoft has done things for developers. To quote but we decided we?d never get short term network effects among products if we selected something complicated ? even if it were powerful. What we really longed for was “the RSS of synchronization” … something simple that would catch on very quickly.

      That’s the spirit!

      What’s funny is that he uses a Lotus Notes example to show what’s he talking about:

      Notefiles replicate by using a very simple mechanism based on GUID assignment, with clocks and tie-breakers to detect and deterministically propagate modifications. Something like this could easily be represented in XML.

      Now we’re talking!

      Ray Ozzie: Really Simple Sharing

    • #3122209

      Found: Translating for Instant Messengers

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      This is interesting. I’m communicating with a Russian programmer through MSN Messenger using this Paralink Online Translation utility.

      But the translation definitely needs some clarification but it works pretty well.

      Know what I think? I think someone should come up with an IM client that does automatic translation.

      Anyone know of one?

      Update: Paralink has one. Very cool – not completely integrated but close.

      Free Translation Online

    • #3123748

      Conferences: DevTeach – no Fox Tracks

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Just found out this morning that DevTeach won’t be offering a separate Fox track this year at all.

      No – Jean-Ren? isn’t abandoning FoxPro but it’s simply the economics of it – I imagine that with the last conference, there were a lot more sponsors and such from the DotNet world than from VFP and as a result, there’s no loss there. The real factor is that not enough VFP developers were attending. I wasn’t at the last show but it would appear that the VFP developer showing was fairly low.

      That’s really too bad for Fox developers as J-R puts on a great conference but not bad if you want to visit a great city and learn more about the internals of Visual Studio. I’m sure Markus and Kevin will do a great job of lining up great sessions.

      So now you either consider Advisor DevCon, Southwest Fox or any of the amazing European and Australian conferences.

      Hey Markus – how’s the VFP Road Show looking? Maybe that would be a good thing to wrap into a VFP CodeCamp.

      DevTeach

    • #3123746

      A truly interesting Scoble link

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Trying to keep down the noise/signal ratio, I try not to link too much to Scoble because either :

      a) everyone else already has

      b) if it’s a microsoft story, it’s usually redundant because of COURSE he has the story (and although I’m interested- there’s no sense in linking to it)

      c) it’s too much about Seattle and the West Coast which is nice but I’m not there so…

      d) I’m just not interested

      e) he no longer links to me – (KIDDING!)

      But his no-GYM posts have been really quite fun. What I really enjoyed though was this blog about the SunShine movie and Gia Milinovich, who is blogging it here.

      OK – it’s a SCI-FI movie – so big time geek alert – and so the blog has lots of cool posts about Sci-Fi trivia (et al) but this post about suttirat (a new adjective and name of the costume designer) was so cool. She actually BUILT communicators. From the post:

      “The comms units are a cool and geeky bit of kit. Suttirat got her inspiration for them from her Mac laptop, iPods and Army dog tags, which is evident when looking at them- two separate, but virtually identical sections with a ?breathing? blue light and rounded corners. They aren?t, however, just bits of plastic on string- they are actual, working communications units. The actors speak to each other through them” an example of true team collaboration (whoever though costume design could be geeky but “Though Suttirat designed them, they were made to work by the sound department.“- is anyone in the cell phone industry listening?

      I like the movie making process – it’s so easy for everyone to get wrapped up into “it’s the director and the actors and the writers” but there are so many little things that go on that actually explain why directors and producers take 90 minutes to thank everyone.

      And hey! – she even has a podcast or at least an interview with Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy.

      Thanks Robert for giving me a link to something that I otherwise would NEVER have found.

      Scobleizer – Microsoft Geek Blogger ? #65: Cool movie blog

    • #3123747

      Using NewsGator Folders smartly

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      1. Why is it that Newsgator can’t always find the right feed when I use the Subscribe with Newsgator shortcut? It couldn’t find the proper link to http://www.sunshinedna.com even though FireFox and other browsers could. It’s just very frustrating.

      2. I know a lot of people are coming up with great ideas about OPML and such as a way of sorting or weighting different topics – I use the Folders in NewsGator online all the time – it would make MY life (maybe others as well) a lot easier if I could assign Locations to individual Folders as well as specific blogs. For example, I have a folder called 10 Blogs I Must Read Immediately (which only has 3 in it right now) and then I have folders for FoxPro, Diversions, Microsoft, Podcasts, Tech, Product Stuff, etc. It works very efficiently as I can create my own type of Attention planning piece there – the only thing is – I wish I could have new blogs suggested for those different folders.

      If the Folders concept grew just a little further with a “Suggest Blogs for this folder” feature and a separate “OPML” Feed for each Folder – it would make it much easier.

      By the way, I’ve turned off NG Outlook and find I’m not missing a single thing thanks to the Online and Mobile editions of NGO. I LOVE Newsgator!

    • #3114070

      Why Good Programmers Are Lazy and Dumb

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Great site, noted from Wildfire.

      I particularly like this image:

    • #3114069
    • #3113758

      MailFrontier Phishing IQ Test

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Found this from Alex Feldstein’s link – a good quiz to take for anyone who responds to emails.

      MailFrontier Phishing IQ Test

    • #3113759

      Southwest Fox 2006 Dates Announced

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      From Bob Kocher:

      There are still some details to work out so specifics will have to wait a week or so. For now, I am extremely pleased to announce Southwest Fox will return to Tempe, AZ Thursday, October 19, 2006 through Sunday October 22, 2006. We have a great new location this year and we are working on a couple of new and exciting ideas.

      from Rick’s original post: Shedding Some Light: Southwest Fox 2006!

    • #3113760

      Ted’s on the “Why can’t MS do anything right or good” view again

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      There is a third alternative, Ted:

      Manufacturing can’t keep up and they figured it was better to ship what they had when they could and then keep them coming.

      Now then, the reports of the crashes? That can definitely be put into your formerly category.

      Ted’s Radio Weblog

    • #3044009

      Craig Bailey: What coffee were you drinking?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      A few of us were chatting around the coffee machine at work the other day discussing what would happen if Google bought Visual FoxPro from Microsoft.

      Now that’s an interesting conversation…for one, GoogleBase would likely be super fast and incredibly cool.

      Microsoft is on a “disruptive” streak these days – how could FoxPro be made more disruptive?

      Well, Craig’s started that one off. I wonder what wwGoogle would look like?

      I’m intrigued by what Rainer said on the FoxShow about what’s coming for the FoxExtend platform.

      In fact, I even had a dream last night (bad sign when you’re dreaming about work!) where I was describing ways that FoxPro could really take advantage of the new RSS and SSE services. Unfortunately, the details were in the part I can’t recall.

      Is it hard to make a product as old as FoxPro disruptive? I don’t think so – look at what Rick Strahl did with West-Wind. I remember back in 1994 seeing someone in Germany who had built a three dimension data viewer (a LIVE Pivot Table) in FoxPro 2.x.

      And then after years of hearing about how every UI innovation has to come from ActiveX, Alex Grigorjev pulls out the CommandBars – more work needed but still just as disruptive.

      And then you get Ed and Paul who are doing Dabo – Ed and/or Paul are going to do a FoxShow soon but first I want them to show me a la screencast.

      Still the mind boggles at just what Craig and associates were really drinking at the “coffee” machine…

    • #3123124

      Presenting Gates vs Jobs: A study in contrasts

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Great post comparing Steve Jobs and Bill Gates presentation styles – one that I saw mirrored at the Visual Studio launch.

      Considering that Microsoft Press publishes Cliff Atkinson’s Beyond Bullet Point, it’s amazing that Microsoft still allows people to present this way. Yes, it’s hard – especially if you’re presenting online because you can’t see their faces but then again, I don’t imagine that when they’re on stage in front of 2000 developers, Bill or Steve are looking at anyone’s faces either.

    • #3123123

      Name Twins: Would the real Andrew MacNeill please stand up?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Markus Egger sent me an email over the weekend, noting “this is scary…”

      Wrong spelling apart – what I found most interesting is that there is an Andrew McNeil who works as a senior product consultant for CIN Com in Australia with a comment like

      “While legacy thinking may be a problem, ‘herd thinking’ may be an even greater contributor to problems in IT organizations,” McNeil says. “This thinking leads to a silver bullet mentality, which causes technologies to be over-hyped then subsequently [creates] a backlash.”

      But of course, the first search result was from Mr. McNeil who is the director of Institute of Alcohol Studies, who “thinks a major factor in high consumption among young people is the affordability of alcohol,” (note only the Cached version of the site shows this reference anymore) and follows on with all kinds of funny comments like “Andrew, if you have the cojones to set me straight”

      It reminds me of the days when Micromega had Andy Neil working for them and we always used to get confused on Compuserve.

      Still happens a little bit even today.

      But I suppose I should feel worse if my name was John Smith or worse Robert Scobel. In Canada, there’s a politican named Robert Scobel who’s running in Calgary. The sad thing? When you search for his name, 7 out of 10 Google results assumes you REALLY want this Scoble instead.

      But maybe there is something similar between the two:

      14. Best advice you have received (for running in an election)?

      Honesty and integrity are your only platform.

      Who is your “name twin”?

    • #3122970

      VFPConversion’s has a newer look and feel

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I may have missed this earlier but the VFP Conversion site has been updated and it makes finding things a lot easier.

      Granted, Dan and Kevin look out of place with all of those haircut-challenged people but you can choose to read articles or blogs.

      What’s particularly cool though is you can build your own RSS feed, filtering on developers, managers or just articles.

      Welcome to VFPConversion.com

    • #3123408

      Excuse of the Day

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Rick – this is priceless.

      Just what I needed today.

    • #3123407

      Calvin shows Excel’s Gradient bars in VFP

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Calvin’s post shows how to write gradient bars in your grid. The actual execution is a bit wonky if you’re not running on Windows XP but you can still see the results here.

      Note: this reminded me a little of Mike Brachman showing colored browse windows in FoxPro DOS way back when – except that the colors move with the form because they are directly attached to its HWND. Nonetheless, it’s a cool example of what’s possible when you grab some features from some DLLs (in this case OLEACC.DLL and GDIPLUS).

    • #3128464

      Trumba Lets others see what’s Coming Up

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I used to live in Outlook for all of my scheduling but somewhere between Outlook crashing, hanging, syncing with my PDA and using gMail for more of my regular email, I’ve really started getting into Trumba’s Online Calendar tool.

      I can have both private and public calendars (or as many as I want). To protect privacy, I typically name the events fairly generically except as they relate to public endeavours such as podcasts, screencasts or public conferences.

      When users are looking at my public calendar, they can click the calendar icon and it will add it automatically to their own calendars (iCalendar, HotMail Calendar, Outlook, email or whatever)

      You can even allow others to update your calendar as well by sharing it. Or publish it as a Conference Schedule for easy access.

      Another very cool feature is the ability to synchro with Outlook so that my Pocket PC can always be up to date.

      Still – it’s not perfect.

      Some things I wish it could do:

      a) allow others to request meetings with me via email after they see the schedule
      b) allow users to switch between other views instead of just the monthly or something else
      c) have private meetings simply blocked out on the calendar instead of just being hidden.
      d) RSS Feeds (don’t even get me started on this one)

      Let me know if you’d like to try it out. I think it’s a by-invite only but I’m able to invite others to join.

    • #3126956

      Learning VFP 102: Scope

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig Boyd just posted his Learning VFP 102 : All about Scope (not the mouthwash), he also discusses arrays.

      Great stuff Craig!

      One of the things I wish he had for this was a “take-away” or some kind of call-out that popped out on top to tell people what he was saying about important rules. Sure he gives out the source code but cheat sheets would be really helpful!

      One note: great example for using DEBUGOUT.

      So I’ll start doing some on these take-aways. Although you may also want to refer to Andy Kramek’s two part article as well.

      Part I

      His Guidelines

      1. Stay away from public variables. Use screen properties instead for global objects or create a property on your form. Try and avoid them.

      2. Also avoid private variables. (huh? – and he really didn’t explain why.) Ah – he did mention on the side – send them as parameters instead.

      3. Always remember to declare your variables. Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should. ( I just did a screen cast with Ed Leafe about Dabo where they don’t call them non-strongly typed variables, they call them “Dynamic” instead.)

      4. Use Local Arrays. If you need to share arrays, don’t use Private – send it in as a parameter. Ah, Andy Kramek had a better suggestion a while back – pass it as an object!

      One other suggestion – run the online on a high resolution – I was set to 1024×800 and I still couldn’t see it well at all. The videos are available online and in SWF format.

    • #3128258

      Redmond | Column: FoxPro Not an Endangered Species

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      In case you haven’t seen it yet, here’s a direct link to the Mary Jo Foley column on FoxPro.

      Send her an email with your thoughts.

      There’s not a lot of new news in the article – what’s more interesting is that a journalist is covering it with the attitude of “maybe Microsoft sees that not everything is a DotNet world”. Funny, because I think most FoxPro developers see Microsoft’s attitude as being the opposite, despite the ongoing efforts but kudos to M-J for the article and the possible follow-ups it may generate.

      Let’s make no bones about Sedna though: it’s about making FoxPro play nicer in the DotNet and Vista sandbox. You can easily tell a bunch of VB developers to recompile their COM component in VS and now it’s a DotNet piece. You can’t say that to FoxPro developers because there’s no upgrade path so for those developers who believe that “COM is the answer” (a mantra by Microsoft prior to DotNet) and are now stuck in DLL version hell.

      I think with the Sedna initiative, they are trying to show an openness and possible support for future development. A few years ago, expecting MS to open the Office file formats would have been considered sacrilege – now it’s happening. As she notes in the article, the success of Ajax is forcing MS to re-evaluate “smart-client or nothing” approach (I’m currently taking a course on Smart client so I’ll report back on that in a separate post).

      Does Microsoft have bigger things in mind for FoxPro? I think Ken’s words on the Fox show were not “no” but “not at this time” and as we’ve seen, things have a way of changing. Want to enforce change? Get involved in the SednaX projects (Craig et al – are you guys simply doing it all or going to provide templates for how you want it done?)

      Now then, as to the comment “less than sexy database tool”? What is “sexy” about a database tool? Is it the interface design tools? Is it the applications that you can build with it? After seeing a demo on DABO, I’m beginning to think that the reason FoxPro is considered “less than sexy” is because developers treat most of these applications as “data entry” applications. You’re not building data entry applications – you’re building BUSINESS applications.

      Excel made number-crunching sexy – it didn’t mean spreadsheets sexy though. It’s what you can do with it. Look at Basecamp – project management can be boring – but it made it exciting by inviting everyone to see it. Microsoft would do well to make MS Project a more community based tool (Project Central just didn’t do it right) just like BaseCamp.

      The FoxTeam has shown with stuff like the Task Pane and Project Environment that you can make a cool looking interface with a typical application. That’s where developers should be jumping to. As long as we show a boring “data entry” application when someone says “what can you do with FoxPro?” – then it will always be considered less than sexy.

      Make it exciting – make your users excited – make the managers excited – make everyone excited about your product. That’s not Microsoft’s job – as the developer, that’s mine and yours.

    • #3126781

      Johnny Carson Podcasts!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      So maybe podcasts aren’t going to be around to stay but you can at least enjoy classic bits of the master on your favorite MP3 player…

    • #3126206

      XFRX now exports to OpenOffice

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      What is a harbinger of things to come from more tools I’m sure, Eqeus just announced that the new version of XFRX, a very awesome reporting engine for FoxPro, now exports to OpenOffice.

      So not only can you run your report (formatted) to Excel, Word and the rest of the world but now you can use your reports in the state of Massachusetts!

      Great stuff, Martin!

    • #3130105

      Bug Bash

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      And this says it all for a Friday!

      Too bad it’s only Wednesday…

    • #3124684

      Craig Bailey’s thoughts on stylish apps

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      “Anthony Hopkin” FoxPro apps?

      Oooh….now I have a vision of a Fox head with a muzzle on it…”yes, I ate the SQL with some fava beans and a nice Chianti….”

    • #3124683

      Using DABO to build an application

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Check out this Flash-based screen cast (the WMV version will be uploaded to the FoxShow shortly) about how the DABO Application Wizard works. It was done through an hour-long demo with Ed Leafe.

      Buliding Building an Application with Dabo

      I have some more casts on this technology that I’m just editing but I wanted to put this up so you could see it.

    • #3124575

      Yea! MindManager does OPML!!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      My favorite Mind Mapping tool, MindManager, now directly supports OPML files with both Imporing and Exporting!

      Looks like my show notes for the FoxShow are about to get completely OPML’ized!

      It even includes support for the new Simple Sharing Extension for shared RSS!!

      MindJet – thanks for listening!!

    • #3124530

      Visual FoxPro 9.0 Service Pack 1 Released

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Visual FoxPro 9.0 Service Pack 1 has been released.

      Be sure your version gets updated. Here‘s what they fixed.

    • #3130315

      How misinformation feeds FoxPro myths

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      So, Mary-Jo Foley calls VFP the “Rodney Dangerfield” child of Microsoft’s solution and we wonder why there are mixed messages.

      Steve Black emailed me this post where the supposed “Head of information technology” at an Indian company had to upgrade because “the software was not scalable as it had been developed on FoxPro”.

      Excuse me? The older software was probably not scalable because this guy, or the person who worked there before him, who had originally commissioned the software likely wrote it not to scalable. Yes, it was written in FoxPro – but it could likely have been written in Visual Basic.Net or Delphi or anything.

      Applications are not inherently “not scalable” because of the platform but more because of the design.

      Near the end of the article , the comment “Compared to legacy systems, which needed to be changed every six or seven years, SAP solutions are expected to prove effective for 20 to 25 years and beyond.” – – “are expected to”???

      SAP has only been in business since 1972 and while they have commendably only had 3 core versions but even so, R3 was only released in 1990 and I’m sure there have been upgrades since then. And is SAP written in the same language as it was back in 1979? I don’t THINK so!

      But why is it successful ? Because it was designed properly. (and I’m not an SAP expert – so I’m sure there are those who would say otherwise as well)

      I’ve seen this before in lots of organizations. It sounds to me like the “head of IT” was likely someone who designed poorly written systems in the past, recognized it, became a manager who preferred “third party” vendors who would have to do the real scalable design work and then blamed their past failures on the product. Have you ever run across those kinds of people before?

      By contrast, some businesses have been running the same FoxPro applications for years. One Canadian government agency refused to support FoxPro – their IT department thought that Paradox would be the next big thing – in the early 90’s , even though their survey applications and many internal office systems were running with FoxPro. Their IT department changed and went to Visual Basic and SQL Server solutions. While the SQL database may have been fast, their programmers designed the new survey applications poorly and as a result, they went back to the ten-year old FoxPo program which wasn’t just reliable but faster as well.

      Craig Bailey posted this about the new MS certified Architect – this sounds like something that every head of IT should have BEFORE spreading mis-information.

      General programming rule: It’s not about the product – it’s about the DESIGN!!!

      I even recall hearing someone who worked at Microsoft say exactly the same thing. Internal systems at Microsoft weren’t always written to be scalable and thus had to be re-architected.

      Heck! I’m in the middle of re-architecting an older application to be more scalable and run under SQL Server. The older application used indices and filters to show information to a user. Could it run with a million records? sure! Should it? No! So the issue is one of how do you redesign it? In VFP or under another language?

      In the most recent FoxShow (to be posted today I hope), John Petersen noted how he was interested to see how the arguments for FoxPro actually worked in a business meeting.

      After reading this article and the mis-information spread around through it and other journals and by otherwise ‘well-meaning” “IT experts”, you can start to see a pattern. It isn’t bad marketing that FoxPro is up against – it’s ignorance, plain and simple.

      How do you fight ignorance? By making BETTER applications (yes, I’ve said this before)

      Some have noted that Ruby on Rails doesn’t follow along the path of traditionally designed n-tier applications, choosing speed over architecture. Uh, tell that to 37Signals, the group behind Basecamp. Not sure how many users they have using it, but sure feels like a scalable application to me.

      So once again, let me repeat: It’s not about the product – it’s about the DESIGN!!!

    • #3130168

      Scaling VFP applications

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      So after my last post, I thought “hmmm—how does one ensure their application IS scalable?”

      Here’s a good definition.

      Rick talks about it here but it’s all about the web.

      Kevin talks about it when discussing the Mere Mortals framework here but again all about the web.

      The BlackBean site has a great repository of these and other articles.

      But once again, most of the articles deal with web-based VFP applications. No surprise there, I suppose. The fundamentals are typically the same and if you really want a scalable application, why not deal with an environment where there may be a million users coming in from all areas instead of your standard applications.

      What’s great though – is the summary of Rick’s To SQL or not to SQL. Using VFP data was recommended as a local data source for retrieving data.

      “When we converted from local data to a SQL backend data access turned more between 2-3x slower for short requests and up to 5-10times slower for complex queries. ”

      The downside: “The site needs to import new Inventory data several times a day and it was necessary to import it while the site was still running in live mode, while people were reading this data. This tended to corrupt indexes frequently causing mysterious crashes and data consistency errors. ”

      Ah, the index – the glory and bane of a FoxPro developer’s existence!

      But to note: “Overall performance of the site applications dropped by about 50% when the move to SQL Server occurred. This is something you should plan on if you make the move from local data.” However “The main reason for the move to SQL at Surplus was for better stability.”

      After you take away, it’s the design of the system that counts – and as Randy Jean noted in a comment on the original post, “it’s not just code design , poor database design (and management) will cause all sorts (of) scaleability issues.”

      So how should you work with server data? Consider the ideas noted here and here on the Wiki

      Of course as with the Wikipedia, all information shown here is deemed to be true until proven false.

    • #3197165

      Another Oz Fox Blogger: Scott Scovell

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig pointed this out but his partner in crime on the FoxTabs and Solution Explorer also has a blog where he goes through some of his trials and tribulations in coding with VFP.

      Great examples on this site!

      Scott Scovell on Visual FoxPro

    • #3197164

      Who thinks too fast?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Richard comments on my original post about misinformation, really promoting planning:

      “I usually spend two weeks (and sometimes even more) in the planning phase which includes the creation of the database structures and overall flow. ”

      I’m not sure I agree that “thinking fast” is necessarily a bad thing but I certainly agree that “thinking deeply” is required with it.

      Consider watching Rick, Markus, Ken or Steve demonstrate a concept at a presentation – these guys think fast – yet they also think deeply at the same time.

      Just as there are too many consultants and IT specialists who act too quickly, there are also far too many consultants and IT specialists who prefer to get paid for “thinking” instead of “doing”.

      The end result? Their project takes forever to get done and by the time it’s done, they haven’t really “thought” of what happens in the interim. Yet they get the reputation of being “great analysts”.

      I certainly don’t advocate stopping at the first thought and then moving ahead on it – as Richard notes, there are too many people who do that. But you need to be able to

      carry that thought through to its inevitable conclusion without spending days doing it. Then if it doesn’t work – you move onto the next idea.

      That’s definitely a skill – and there are tools that can really help do it for you! Both in software and project management.

      Nothing wrong with saying “let me think about it” and then coming back with something that is truly innovative – but wasting time on thought without having anything to show for it – is just plain bad. You may “feel” good about your introspection but in the end, what you just did was, in fact, nothing.

      Foxpro.catalyst :: FoxPro workBLOGS and more

    • #3197163

      Craig expands on the bar graphs…

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig takes Calvin’s original post and produces a revised set of classes, using GDI+ or not to great online bar graph examples.

      The SPS Weblog – Bar Graphs – Part II

    • #3125354

      Whil’s back: Moving from Windows to Linux and now back to Fox….

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Whil just announced the return of the Great Lakes Great Database Workshop 2006 with one track of 14 sessions covering every major aspect of Fox development.

      Sounds like he’s gotten 10 speakers all set and ready to go for for developers not looking for the faint of heart developer conferences – his original email said (updated):

      “What can you, the developer who is committed to VFP as a long term development platform, do to optimize the next ten years of your life?

      This is the question that GLGDW 2006 is going to answer.

      This is not a marketing conference masquerading as a technical conference. This is not FoxPro for Dummies. There are no ‘Intro to X’ pre-cons or ‘How to use feature Y’ sessions here. This is an advanced workshop – for experts.

      This is a workshop for thoughtful people with attention spans. This is an event about wisdom.”

      Sounds ambitious – but Whil usually pulls off a great conference and it’s nice that it’s focused directly on FoxPro and seeing it through for the next 10 years….

      But it also sounds like there’s now also an opportunity for that “Beginner to FoxPro” series that Craig is doing.

      The Dates:
      Opening Keynote starts at 7 pm on Friday, April 21.
      Regular sessions start at 8 am on Saturday, April 22.
      Closing Keynote ends at 12:15 pm Monday, April 24.

      The Sessions:
      Session Topics include Best Practices for…
      Development Environment Setup, Error Handling and Reporting
      Class Design, User Interfaces
      Data Access, Refactoring, Coding Standards
      Debugging and Scaffolding, Reporting
      Project Management, Deployment, Performance
      Professional Developer’s Toolkit

    • #3125234

      Congrats Rod and Jessica!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      DevBlog: Daddy Rod Paddock

      The pictures don’t seem to be coming up though…

    • #3125233

      Ed Bott to Microsoft: Loosen Up

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I love this post of Ed Bott’s”
      Scoble can talk about Office 12, but I can?t

      As with all those great NDAs: “This information blackout applies to everyone except Microsoft employees, apparently.”

      He forgot – and CNet employees too as it turns out. (granted Cnet is a news site – but since when is journalism and blogging not the same? – oh right, as of January of this year!)

      I’m with Ed. From the VFP perspective, it’s nice that the Fox team has opened up a lot more. Some users in the “private” forums are wondering “where is everyone?” because they’re all out talking abou FoxPro and what they’re doing. That said, it would be nice if they joined Craig’s latest goal“: Today position 20, tomorrow the world!

      Now Craig…about that SednaX discussion and the FoxShow interview….

    • #3125232

      Why should I use FoxPro?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Andy and Craig have already pointed to this:TPCI – TIOBE Programming Community Index. What I like is this statement:

      “The index can be used to check whether your programming skills are still up to date or to make a strategic decision about what programming language should be adopted when starting to build a new software system.”

      In other words, don’t come to me with ignorant statements like “no one works in Visual FoxPro anymore” or “it’s a dead language” – seems I heard that mentioned ten years ago when PowerBuilder was the tool of choice. Where is that now? Oh yeah, I think it’s number 90 on the list. Even last year, Visual FoxPro was higher than that.

      Sure the list is based on Google, MSN and Yahoo searches but hey – it’s ALL about mindshare and the VFP community has plenty of it.

    • #3125231

      Changing your community on the fly

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Anil’s Antisocial Behavior post is almost as good as all the comments under it as well.

      The reason that Google gets more “free passes” than Microsoft? Maybe there is something to that “Don’t be evil” thing

    • #3125230

      ‘The Perfect Fit’

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      This story keeps on getting more press.

      VARBusiness Nielsen and Borland – ‘The Perfect Fit’

      Interesting because back in 1999, it was Tod who “leads Microsoft’s Developer Group as it transforms the Web from a static tool into a vast network of personal and programmable services.”

      If you read the background story, it really is fascinating. Back in 1999, here was the comment “”If you’re building applications, I’d love to meet you, find out what you are trying to do, tell you about the products and technologies we have, and figure out a way for us to work together so you can build the best applications,” Nielsen says “That’s the key to success for developers and for ________.” – <---- enter company name here. What’s cool is that Tod is still completely committed to doing it. What’s interesting is where he’s doing it – he’s just raised my interest level in Borland which had dropped off a fair bit when Philippe Kahn was the CEO, who liked to show off his arrogance.

    • #3125229

      No Drag and Drop?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      As much as I like talking about Drag and Drop, I’m not always sold on its usefulness. So I immediately found this little article (found via Yahoo) interesting:

      Sesame Software: going against the flow | The Register

      One thing that bugs me about reading news articles online – the real lame ones never put links to the COMPANY (because they want all the links themselves) so here‘s where you can find Sesame Software and their Relational Junction ETL Manager (uh, I’ll just call it RJet!). a tool that lets you “Extract Transform and Load production data into your data warehouse. Integrate Oracle, SQL Server, MySQL, Sybase, and DB2 databases. Leverage your existing SQL skills with native SQL scripting, or use our SQL builder technology.” – oh yeah, did I mention? They have Visual FoxPro support coming soon.

      What does it do? It links data together so you can copy your data from one or more tables into a target table. Sounds a bit like BizTalk functionality but it does kind of cool. Because of the way it’s built, it can move 2 million records an hour and only use 67 MB of memory. Is that a lot? Hard to say but I can certainly see why Drag and drop isn’t a huge need here. Sure dragging and dropping makes for great demo – but when you’re trying to integrate databases, it’s not about the demo – it’s about the DATA!!!

    • #3135493

      Not quite the end of COM….

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I’m taking an online course about Developing Smart documents and one of the modules is on Developing DLL-based smart documents (with Visual Studio)

      While obviously you have access to all of the core UI components (text boxes, lists, etc), one comment struck me:

      If none of the built-in controls match your requirements, use an ActiveX one. Bear in mind that ActiveX controls written in .Net framework langauges are NOT (emphasis mine) directly supported and it is recommended that you use COM-based ActiveX controls.

      Sigh – the more things change, the more they stay the same….

    • #3135492

      How ironic…

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      that Microsoft would name their foray into web 2.0 conferences Mix 06 when their most recent product features the most ridiculous DRM schemes around…

      Oh sure, they like to get into the “mix” with CrossFader but come on!

      Next thing you know their next Office or Development product will be dubbed “Open Sourcer” or “FavaBeans”…

      Ya sure, I get that it’s not aimed at the DRM community but rather developers but calling it Mix just sits wrong with me.

      Cool logo though.

    • #3135290

      Becoming a GMailer….

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Gmail is slowly but surely taking over my life where a Microsoft product once held a very key place. (yes, this message has a lot of links just so you can see that it’s no longer one product but several that does what needs to happen)

      I used to live in Outlook but after having worked with various Outlook and Desktop search tools, NewsGator Outlook and the like – my Outlook just freezes or crashes all the time – and that’s AFTER reinstalling. gMail allows me to send emails and specify the outbound email (so it can come from my aksel address instead of my gmail).

      The Search is, not surprisingly, great (who needs to organize messages anymore?) but the biggest change just happened this week when they turned on mobile gmail at http://m.gmail.com.

      Where I used to rely on ActiveSync to ensure my PDA had all my inbox messages and the like, now I can get and respond to my email whereever I am (yes, I have a data plan with Rogers, my communications provider). Send email to others? Why not just blog it?

      Yes, I still need ActiveSync for syncing files but between gMail mobile, Trumba , Newsgator Online, Basecamp’s WriteBoards, it’s looking more and more like I could “live” on the web with minimal desktop software. I’m thinking of even downgrading my Newsgator account down to a non-business level – except that I couldn’t store and review all of my downloaded feeds. (hmmm….when are they going to improve Desktop search to search within DATABASES?)

      What I really need now is for 37Signals to make a more mobile friendly version of BaseCamp, Backpack or even just the TadaLists. Yes, the current versions are fairly light-weight on a web site but if they could do it more like mobile gmail or NewsGator mobile, that would be killer.

      Am I relying too much on an Internet connection? Possibly, yes but once the Google Grid comes online, I may be ready to be assimilated.

      Now I just need that online database…I’m not completely sold set on GoogleBase, Craig joked about it but hey, West-Wind lets you build the application with FoxPro, if I could build my rich front end with FoxML, and support online web reports via XFRX, I might be able to build that very cool Web app, right online!

      Haven’t tried gmail, ask me for an invite!

    • #3198077

      Craig Bailey’s BBQ stage

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      While I have been known to barbeque in the middle of winter, Craig’s post made me smile.

      Because I woke up this morning and it really does look just like Christmas – there is white snow everywhere and soft snowflakes have just started to fall….

      What a contrast to “The weather is warm, but not too humid, the days are long”.

    • #3198271

      Maybe France does get it after all..

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      After hearing about the strange laws being passed by France lately, this one really had me going.

      So you can’t have FREE software, but downloading ” copyrighted files is legal as long as it is for private use only” – hmmm…maybe they don’t get it after all. Then again, this was being reported from the Xinhua News Agency so who knows.

    • #3082286

      FoxBlogs : A dynamic tag cloud for the FoxPro community

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Very cool, Rick.

      As Visual FoxPro developers start blogging about things, they instantly get tagged.

      Very cool!

    • #3082158

      Finding patterns…

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      So now that Rick has put up the FoxBlogs tag cloud, some may be asking “what’s a tag cloud?”

      Basically it’s running the content analysis service from Yahoo (who knew they had one? Everytime Google talks about something, everyone’s on it but Yahoo? Needs to do better job of marketing to developers- or maybe I should just listen better )

      What does that do? Wow – no wonder no one likes to listen to developers ramble on…they talk and talk and talk but don’t really say what it does… (this is because I just went through 5 minutes of links without a good “stand on its own” description.)

      Essentially, it attempts to put things into context automatically. For example, when Ken Levy talkes about Headphones, , the entire set of threads are tagged with that term. Now how does it recognize that term? That’s the trick.

      From Yahoo’s own Y!Q (context query), “Y!Q analyzes the context you provide and determines automagically the most important keywords to use.” – so you can provide the context but it determines the keywords.

      Uh – “automagically?”

      In short, it must look for patterns. Patterns are really quite interesting. I’m just starting to read as opposed to listen, to Freakonomics by Steven Levitt and Stephen Drubner.

      (
      )

      (it was on my Audible wish list but I ended up getting the hard copy version)

      In one chapter, they describe how they identified that some teachers in the Chicago Public System were cheating on standardized tests (yes, teachers, not students – read the book – very cool chapter on why a teacher would be motivated to cheat) – and they did it through patterns ( teachers “fixed” certain exams with the correct answers in a “pattern”).

      Now patterns aren’t necessarily keywords but it would be very cool to take the TagCloud data at the end of, say, a year, and see if there are any patterns in the way people blog – kind of like a VFP ZeitGeist

      I love finding patterns in data – it’s one of the things I love about using FoxPro interactively. While the TagCloud application doesn’t do the analysis automatically, it is very cool the way it highlights keywords that everyone is talking about (obvious ones like Microsoft, vfp and visual foxpro) and ones that have only been mentioned a few times or only on a particular site (like that all important word, “argh!”)

    • #3082157

      On Teachers, certification and tests

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Jeez, I hate going from tangent to tangent but I was about to. On my last post about Tag Clouds, just as I started talking about the teachers cheating , I recalled a conversation I had this holiday season with a couple who are in the academic world and was amazed when they expressed outrage (yes, it was real outrage and incredulity) that a teacher had to pass a test to become a professor at a university, to gain a higher position. The conversion went so far as to even suggest that competitions for government positions was “beneath” someone who had gotten to a certain point and a certain age.

      (ok – have you stopped laughing at this yet? Because it’s true).

      I used the opportunity to drop in the obligatory Doonesbury ID joke because it’s based on the same premise – if things don’t grow, learn or evolve, then yes, I agree – it only needs to be tested once but since things DO grow, learn, mutate or whatever, then YES, test early and test often, I say.

      Small businesses may choose a database programmer, or a web designer based on their reputation or a portfolio of their past work but at some point, you will be competing with someone for a job. It’s a ……test. Certification is a way to help bypass all of those tests so you’re dealing with everyone at a similar level. And no, it’s not perfect (think of the drivers who really shouldn’t have passed their driving test) but it’s a start.

      I recently took an online MS Academy course. Unfortunately, I was disappointed. Not by the course, mind you but by the topic. There are certainly ways the course could be improved ( a topic for another post) . The topic looked very interesting but by the end of the course, I think everyone would agree that the technology involved was immature (or the tools involved were just not there yet) – to be used in a real business or complete software solution. But still, it was a technology to be learned about – which was great.

      Only an industry that has not changed in 100 years would not benefit from recurrent training – and even then, even if the industry or technology did not change, the sad fact is, PEOPLE change. (people learn more, people forget more, peope grow) In the aviation industry, recurrent training is a requirement. In the software industry, where some look at development as art and others as science, certification is still there. And while there are some cases of people who were not “trained” in a particular field being able to teach things and revolutionize an industry, most fields require people who are able to prove their ability. So why wouldn’t teachers believe this?

      And just as one would be frightened to think that a doctor who operated on me suffered from a debilitating disease, there may be teachers who are on education’s front lines who don’t feel they should have to prove they are capable of learning themselves.

      Are there other teachers that believe that they are beyond recurrent training?

      The mind boggles at the thought.

    • #3083008

      The FoxShow Listener Survey

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      If you’ve been listening to

      The FoxShow, please take our listener survey. This is something I am using to try and improve the overall quality of the show.

      Thanks!

    • #3083406

      Handling buffered data in Visual FoxPro

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Andy Kramek has done another one of his “and now let me explain how this works” posts with a great 6 page discussion on the two data buffering functions (TableUpdate and TableRevert) in Visual FoxPro.

      His original article on data buffering (which explains what is buffering and the like) may be found here

      Combining this with the other learning resources that the other FoxBlogs are offering and there is no excuse for knowing everything about Visual FoxPro!

    • #3082771

      Top 10 Fox news stories of 2005

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig does an excellent job of noting the top 10 Visual FoxPro stories of 2005.

      Among his notes: the departure of Mike Stewart, John Koziol and Randy Brown from the FoxTeam, the shipping of VFP 9, the loss of Drew Speedie, and the reranking of VFP in the TIOBE list.

      While he did note Whilfest 2006, he didn’t mention Southwest Fox which is coming back in 2006 and will be sure to be a big hit and the SednaX site, which I’m sure will be showcasing an awful lot in the coming year.

      The other thing that I think is still valuable to note, although not entirely VFP-related, is the elevation of Eric Rudder at Microsoft to focusing on the overall technical strategy for Microsoft. With that and Tod Neilson now running Borland, former Foxers seem to be everywhere, rather than nowhere.

      Anyone have any Visual FoxPro predictions for 2006?

      1. Ken Levy will sponsor the giving of Ultimate FoxEars headphones at Devcon 2006.

      2. After a slow start, the SednaX site will start to show very cool technology like the Solution Explorer and a new FoxLINQ.

      3. Urged on by Craig Boyd, FoxPro developers will ensure that FoxPro jumps another 5 points on the TIOBE rank.

      4. The first self-sponsored FoxPro CodeCamp will be held somewhere in the world and will be streamed somewhere. Unlike typical conferences, the CodeCamp will be more of an “un-conference”.

      5. Someone will figure out how to make object-oriented menus work with a way-cool designer.

      6. Bill Gates will actually say the words “FoxPro” and someone will take notice.

      7. Someone will predict the death of FoxPro and will be flamed by the entire community.

      8. Someone will predict that FoxPro will become part of DotNet, or that DotNet will become FoxPro, or something like that. No one will confirm it – but the Fox team will continue to instigate creative data handling ideas into Microsoft development environments.

      9. Microsoft will stop making presentations filled with bullets.

      10. A completely different way of using FoxPro will be shown, prompting everyone to say in unison “Fox rocks!”

    • #3082770

      Carbon footprint calculator

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I’ve seen this ad on local TV but finally got to the site today.

      Very interesting especially for those in the UK and US who are interested in how their lifestyle affects the environment.

      They didn’t have Canada so I had to settle for the US calculation but I’m about an 16. What was interesting was that if I travelled a bit more again, I shoot up to about a 20.

      What’s your carbon footprint?

      Carbon footprint calculator

    • #3081673

      Problems at Xdrive?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Looks like I’m not the only one either with problems with xDrive.

      I was looking for a reliable online backup facility. I agreed to pay them for the full year up front. Although my 5GB drive has approximately 1 GB free, one of my regular backups hasn’t been successful since October.

      I also received a nice little missive that said “we’ve moved to a large system upgrade intended to improve the overall performance. As a result, the service has been unreliable. We do not have an ETA as to when the site will be completely fixed.”

      Unreliable? I can’t even back up or upload a file without an error.

      I’ve been dealing with Henry Forrest who seems very interested in helping me but back on December 6th, I was told to be patient. My recent email from yesterday was greeted with a “Please provide me with your user name and password” – huh? That’s a workaround answer and I know it. You HAVE my user name – it’s on the case #. Their “superior customer service” list doesn’t even note that there is a problem although the forums are fairly detailed with some flame comments.

      According to the most recent post, Molson reports that their recent patch (from last week) had to be rolled back. Argh!

      Patience has its limits. I hope 2006 brings a completely improved XDrive, otherwise it will suffer the same fate as those companies who just can’t deliver what they promise.

      Update: I think what bothers me most about this whole thing is that I prepaid the year for only 5GB and I could have put the same money towards a 200GB USB drive that would have allowed me to back it all up and more. And the bad reviews for xDrive keep on coming.

      loose wire: Problems at Xdrive?

    • #3081916

      Best for the New Year!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Hope everyone has a great farewell to 2005 and a big welcome to 2006.

      The new year looks to bring lots of cool stuff, including more from the FoxShow and a new site, Learning Visual FoxPro, a collection of links to great new ways where new developers can learn about Visual Foxpro.

    • #3081129

      Guy Starts Blog

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      One of my favorite authors, Guy Kawasaki, has just started blogging. About what? “…about entrepreneurship, venture capital, innovation, public speaking, Macintosh, and hockey…” – subscribed.

      ?Let the Good Times Roll? by Guy Kawasaki

    • #3096119

      Someone needs Morae….

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I love usability testing, especially as depicted in this cartoon from Bug Bash.

      I had an opportunity to discuss user interface design with someone who worked for Nortel among others and it was amazing to realize how important user interface design was between engineers as well as from developers to end users.

      That’s why I was very excited about Morae, a usability recorder that tracks both user experience and actions and allows users to manage it. For one, it just reduced the need for someone to install a see through glass.

      Want to see how it worked? Check out the case study for Project Aardvark.

      Anyone else try it out?

      Bug Bash ? Archive ? Behind the Window

    • #3095404

      Who is Frank and why is he against VFP?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Not sure — but Craig’s fighting back with his latest promo, which when it started reminded me of the Matrix.

      I also like the first one.

      The issue now though is – what to do with them?

      A few ideas here:
      1 – Related animated GIF versions that sit on web sites (ya, kind of 90’s but they do remind people of the product)

      2 – Have a VFP day a la Dean Gray where every VFP site shows a clip

      3 – Burn CDs/DVDs that start with one of those clips and then contain :
      a) the Learning VFP library
      b) the latest VFP runtimes
      c) samples of popular applications written in VFP
      d) sample versions of developer tools (anything that’s available in shareware)
      e) industry related posts about VFP.

      and send these CDs/DVDs to companies that you know used to work in VFP and have since stopped.

      d) – what do you think should be done? Let’s discuss on the SednaX Site.

      Who knows … maybe Microsoft would help in getting a list of those companies but that may be unlikely since VFP registrations are now bundled with MSDN registrations.

    • #3094824

      CSI in a box

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Cool article about how software from HumanCore, a Canadian company, is going to make a process that used to take anywhere between 3 days to 3 months down to just a few hours…? CSI in a box | Emerging Technology Trends | ZDNet.com

    • #3094823

      The Art of Intrapreneurship

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Okay , I’m just a schill for Kawasaki – what can I say?
      The Art of Intrapreneurship is an excellent post of how to create change within an organization.

    • #3095617

      Opening the doors to VFP XSource

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      As Ken noted on Visual FoxPro: January 2006 – Letter from the Editor, the XSOURCE.Zip file for VFP 9 has its own license agreement, which includes the right to modify and redistribute.

      This is great news – why? Because now you don’t have to try and reinvent the wheel, you can simply enhance it without worrying about breaking it.

      For those who like to play with the EULA – this is a Microsoft Permissive License that says “Microsoft grants you a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free patent license under licensed patents to make, have made, use, practice, sell, and offer for sale, and/or otherwise dispose of the software or derivative works of the software.” as well as “Microsoft grants you a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free copyright license to reproduce the software, prepare derivative works of the software and distribute the software or any derivative works that you create.”

      Great news!

    • #3080041

      Toni’s Looking for automated testing

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      (Argh! after writing a nice little opus, Blogger crapped out on me and I lost it)

      At any rate, it looks like Toni is looking for automated testing tools.

      Yes, I wrote an article about the VFP Test Harness and FoxRunner but both of these tools (as Toni and I have discussed ) have a steep learning curve (kind of like having to learn a scripting language to install an application).

      Now I’ve tried Vermont Creative’s High Test Plus which worked well EXCEPT that it didn’t handle testing different directories or screen resolutions very well. Heck – I even used Microsoft Test, a tool so unknown that you can’t even find a good Google page for it except for all the people who used to have to use it.

      While I was looking in the archives, whatever happened to AutoManual? Roger Woodsmall’s tool was more for documentation but hey! it did test every little piece of your application and took a screen shot of it to boot.

      While yes, I suppose one could argue that if you did proper unit testing, you wouldn’t have much need for automated testing but that’s a bit far fetched because the problems never occur when you do things one at a time, it’s when everything is put together!

      And even then, everyone finds another way of doing it. Can you right-click or left click or what happens when you do something and the moon is full?

      I almost wish TechSmith would do something like Morae for automated testing – because they get the screen capture aspect of it down so well with Morae.

      One thing I really liked about FoxRunner was the number of features (it did do scripting with a VFP-like language and it did do some good work with test data ) but the UI was really tough to get used to.

      Hey – is there a new version for this tool yet with an improved UI? That might be the answer. Otherwise you’ll have to do as I suggested in my FoxAdvisor article, and write your timer code that just goes around hitting every button on every form, and the like.

      Any ideas – be sure to let Toni know and let everyone else in on the secret.

      F1 Technologies Blog: Automated Testing?

    • #3079689

      Now this is coffee….Flava Pods

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      For Christmas, I received a great B&D Home Caf? system and so we were just aching to try some “other” coffees – not just the ones that came with it. Enter Flava Pods.

      mmm….when you hear flavours like Mocha Cinnamon swirl or Cinnamon Bun, you’ve got to wonder if it will be anything like it. Wow! I think we are fairly early in their customer list (our invoice # was 927) and the package was hand-written, loved the personal touch!

      The coffee? Excellent. Really enjoyable and it arrived with individual pod pockets (so each one is sealed separately). If you do have one of the various pod-based single-cup coffee makers, check out FlavaPods. Excellent stuff!

    • #3079193

      Hosting a .NET ActiveX Control in Visual FoxPro

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig points out how you can build an ActiveX control in Visual Studio that runs in VFP.

      No – it’s not supported and of course, the runtime would require DotNet but hey! it seems like that’s a given these days.

      The SPS Weblog – Hosting a .NET ActiveX Control in Visual FoxPro

    • #3098481

      Fixing the Dragnet Timeout

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I use SourceGear‘s Dragnet product for tracking issues and the one thing that’s always bothered me is the timeout. So I would modify the timeout in the Web.Config file as well as the IIS but it still never seemed to take it.

      Much like Rick Schummer’s post about reading magazines for the right tips, subscribing to the SourceGear forums is also a helpful place.

      I’ve linked to the topic but for those who don’t want to click, the answer is in the IIS setting “shutdown worker processes after being idle…”

      As per users gmagana and kbonnin, In the IIS 6 Admin: Application Pools -> Properties -> Performance -> Shutdown worker processes after being idle for (time in minutes).

      So I created a new pool just for the Dragnet app and set it to 720 minutes which should be sufficient so it won’t time out.

      What’s sad is that the original report on this was made in April 2005 and then updated again in September and I’ve been living with it for months now. Hopefully this post will make it easier for others to find it.

      support.sourcegear.com :: View topic – The assault of the Error 500’s

    • #3098482

      Stonefield Query 3.0 Ships!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Shipping is a feature – congrats to Doug and the Stonefield crew on shipping Query 3.0, using all of the cool reporting features found in VFP 9 (and some in xFRX too I believe). Congrats!

      Now I’m back to debugging on my death march

    • #3098479

      Kevin’s got a conference this year

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Thanks to David Stevenson pointing to this, now I have a new Fox blog to add to the list as well as the proposed FoxForward conference. Awesome!

      Hmm and he’s got products there too like FoxBench for benchmarking applications.

    • #3098480

      Sound Proofing for the Computer Case – FrostyTech.com

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Found this really good article while looking for ways to sound proof my servers so I can actually podcast from my desk using my good microphone instead of having to get a uni-directional one.

      Melamine Foam Sound Proofing for the Computer Case – FrostyTech.com

    • #3097961

      Hello Tom!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Tom Meeks – blogging with his
      Beginning Visual FoxPro Tips

      Definitely a great resource – can’t wait to see more.

      As Craig points out, do you feel the Surge?

    • #3097960

      Visual FoxPro : Using Win32 (WinAPI) Functions

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Darn it – Craig you’re right! This IS a steal. – no need to look up 50,000 constants, having code samples and more right at my fingertips and all for VFP.

      Visual FoxPro : Using Win32 (WinAPI) Functions

    • #3110276

      So How Do I get involved with SednaX?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      The SednaX project has been filled so far with lots of talk and ideas but not a lot of direct output (this led Craig Berntsonto keep it off his 2005 highlights) but that’s about to change.

      I interviewed Craig, Rick and Doug on what the plan is and how the 400+ developers who have signed up can start getting involved with this open Visual FoxPro community project.

      As noted in the interview, it’s important to note that SednaX doesn’t have to rely on Dotnet components (although there may be some benefits there) and that each project will have its own timeline. It’s not a “packaged” solution – but more of a organization of several related projects.

      We touch on the commercial vs. open aspect of the project as well – so commercial developers (such as Doug and Rick) can know what to expect from such a project.

      What also struck me was Craig’s comment about “tricks up their sleeves” from the Fox team themselves – as things like source control are still being worked out, one can only imagine (at least my thought would be) what a great coup this would be if MS allowed the entire project to be driven from the Visual Studio Team system approach. It might give MS more credibility and visibility and it would benefit the Fox community as extra add-ons would be built to help integrate the two environments as Scott and Craig have talked about before.

      As Craig has noted, we live in exciting times…

      The Fox Show podcast: News, reviews and training on Visual FoxPro

    • #3110275

      Emoticon Patent ?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I agree with Rick – This is just plain scary or is it crazy?

      It’s only crazy if untrue so I would say scary.

      By the way, Tom and Molly from BuzzOutloud were about to patent the word “the” but someone told them it was already done. Darn – let the lawsuits fly.

      Someone needs to clean up the patent office.

      Shedding Some Light: Emoticons Patent? 🙁

    • #3109119

      Conference Costs

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Robert does a great job explaining why Conferences cost what they do – and what people can do about it.

      Great post and very valuable for those considering offering conferences vs. code camps.

    • #3134733

      Todd Cochrane and the IE 7 Beta Interview

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      If you haven’t listened to Geek News Central Revealing Technical News before, now’s the time to do it.

      Todd interviews Margaret Cobb from Microsoft’s Internet Explorer team (with the IE 7 beta being released today) – now that’s a coup!

      Of interest: “Which sort of tells me that the IE7 team and the Windows Media Player team may not be talking to one another as I don’t think from numerous conversations that the IE7 has any plans what so ever to support enclosures.”

    • #3134542

      Ken Goes Live!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      On his blog, Ken Levy has announced that he’s going to become a product planner over on Windows Live.

      While it’s sad to see him leave the Visual FoxPro community, it’s good to know that the community is going to be seeing some new stuff real soon on the Sedna side. Ken was a big proponent of moving the xBase stuff into a more flexible license for developers to work with.

      As for Ken, let’s see, we’ve got former VFPer’s working on Windows Live, Development
      Architecture, Visual Studio Data access, Borland, and
      FileMaker…hmmm…maybe we will take over the world soon.

      Good luck Ken and keep in touch! Maybe we’ll get to see a LiveX someday!

    • #3133257

      The Aunt Sara Principle: Treating customers like they’re your favorite

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      A great post from Hans on how to make your customers feel special.

      Bug Bash ? Archive ? The Aunt Sara Principle

    • #3133256

      DevBlog: Agile is dead!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Fantastic post from Craig – what a great conference to attend – especially at the start of April.

      The best session has to be “Testing: Saving the best for last!” – I think I’ve read her article: “If Today’s the Ship Date, I Must Be Done Testing.”

      DevBlog: Agile is dead!

    • #3108043

      State of the Language Address

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig must have been inspired by something, posting his The SPS Weblog – State of the Language Address

      Now, what was missing is where we are supposed to stand up and applaud!

      The real solution – better VFP applications being seen visibly as often as possible. Now that would be a Blitzy ad campaign. The challenge? Getting businesses who are persuaded by other “blitzy” ad campaigns to realize it.

    • #3134055

      Fox Forward 2006 Conference – A community conference for developers, by develoeprs

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      As Rick Schummer noted, it looks like the fall is once again the season of Visual FoxPro conferences with the new Fox Forward 2006 conference being scheduled for Atlanta on September 15th-17th.

      The “for developers, by developers” tag line sounds like it might get overused (I think DevTeach also uses it).

      Craig’s got a full list right here.
      but here’s the direct link to the Fox Forward 2006 Conference – A community conference for developers, by develoeprs

    • #3134054

      Using What You Need

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      A great post on life, resources and the great things people can do when they have little of both – and funny enough, it ties into Visual FoxPro.

      I’ll say what isn’t directly stated in this post – I just started running Visual Studio 2005 on my fairly new (one-year old) laptop and it just feels “sluggish” – it’s definitely resource hungry – no fault of the product – that’s just the way it is (like Office, OpenOffice, and many other products). I was hoping to find a good XSLT builder in VS but it looks like I may just have to build my one – unless someone knows of one that is light-weight and builds fairly good XSLTs. (yes, I know the Intellisense is great in VS 2005 but it’s almost like what I’m looking for is something where I can drag and drop an XML file onto a blank page and have it build a basic XSLT for me directly – lazy? Yes. Practical? Definitely. Just like the Object Browser)

      If VS does do this, please let me know how because it’s definitely not intuitive.

    • #3135087

      Effective Email 102

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I say 102 because my real guide for emailing comes from Bill Jensen’s book : The Simplicity Survival Handbook: 32 Ways to Do Less and Accomplish More

      However Guy’s effective emailer is a great refresher.
      Let the Good Times Roll–by Guy Kawasaki: The Effective Emailer

      1. Yes, I’m often guilty of #5 either by “fisking” or by sending back one line responses. But I’m working at it. My #1 frustration is dealing with those who do it as well so at least I can appreciate it.

      As Guy says “Take my advice and do as I say, not as I have done–or will do. :-)”

    • #3093165

      Competing against the best

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

    • #3093027

      Xdrive : Needs Help Right Away

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Wow – hard to imagine that a company whose SOLE Purpose for existing is to provide reliable storage via the web can’t solve a problem, not in 24, not in 48 , not in 72 hours, heck – I’ve had a problem reported since December 9th and they still hadn’t resolved it.

      I was told by Tony today that there were hundreds, if not thousands of people ahead of me in the support queue.

      WOW! – all I can say to people is

      STAY AWAY from xDrive.

      The concept is solid – the implementation is not. It simply DOES NOT WORK. I’ve already lost $90 because I let them say “we’re working on it” – no more.

      If you want to try their free trial, go for it – but don’t bother signing up for it. It will disappoint or worse, you will lose your files that they say have been saved.

      I had 1 gig of saved family videos from the very first day that I have never been able to retrieve. This company is a great example of Web -1.0.

      Their support group follow their steps – they try to be helpful but in the long run, they can’t help a sinking ship. If you use it, get out now – if you can get your files, consider yourself one of the lucky ones.

      Xdrive : 24/7 Support

    • #3092382

      OzFox Lite: The first FoxPro Code-Camp of 2006

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig notes how there is NO excuse for Pacific Rim FoxPro developers not going to OzFox Lite – it’s easy to get to, free and he’s giving plenty of notice (6 weeks – it’s on March 25th and 26th.

      Can’t wait to hear all about it.

      Craig Bailey’s thoughts on life and Visual FoxPro: VFP: OzFox Lite will be free

    • #3092128

      Freedom to Connect

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Exceptional link from Ted’s Blog. Wish I had seen this earlier.
      Ted’s Radio Weblog

    • #3092127

      Rick Borup shares the knowledge

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Rick announced that his Southwest Fox 2005 papers are published.

      I spoke with Rick about RSS and Wix on the FoxShow. Glad to see the content is now available.

      If, like me, you think developers should be doing more with RSS – read the RSS piece for examples of using RSS for error logs and updates.

      Now the last one (about updates) would fit in beautifully with NewsGator’s latest offering.

      And MORE – he just posted a videocast on using InnoSetup.

    • #3087509

      FoxPro Hits into eWeek

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Mary Jo is certainly doing her part keeping FoxPro in the news with her new post:
      FoxPro Developers Prep for Microsoft ‘Sedna’

      Interesting quote: “While Microsoft doesn’t state it quite so bluntly, Visual FoxPro’s foremost competitors are Visual Studio, Microsoft Access and SQL Server. That explains in large part why the Redmond software vendor isn’t jumping through hoops for Visual FoxPro.”

      Who needs Microsoft to jump through hoops? FoxPro developers are the ones who make DATA jump through hoops.

      I’m involved in a number of data conversion processes where applications are moving over to DotNet and I’m STILL going back to Visual FoxPro for building the tools that Visual Studio simply doesn’t include – sorry – not doesn’t include but rather hides amongst all of its other features.

      Case in point: I needed to build an XSL sheet based on a table’s XML result set. Nothing comes close to VFP’s text-handling functions – it just rocks!

    • #3089259

      Tod Maffin: This is the death of radio. (I Love Radio .org)

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

    • #3089260

      So Blackberry survives but at what cost?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Just heard (on the radio, wow!) that Rim has ended its court battle with NTP by settling. (hey – it hasn’t even made it onto their web site yet)

      But is this a case of too little too late?

      I got my first taste of Blackberry years ago – I loved their original (non-cell phone) device and lived on it for a good 2 years. This was before you could get Blackberry devices from your phone company and the like. Their stock was $10. Then it went to $180. Then they introduced phone devices. Then the competition started paying attention. BlackBerry still ruled back then but after the dotCom bubble broke. Down to $20 and now back to $81.

      I stopped using my Blackberry because of poor customer service (I wasn’t about to pay the equivalent price of a new device when I was simply “renting” mine for a repair). I only NOW have gotten to the point where I get the same results from my PDA (I use an ipaq but really rely on Google). Are my costs that much cheaper? Likely not. But there are so many more alternatives and hey, if I can do all of my computing on one device, then that would be ideal.

      But I’m glad they are saved. I like RIM – great product but now they just look like another one in the great PDA community. Where’s the innovation? I want them to make me go nuts just like they did with the original Blackberry.

      Now THAT device Rocked!

    • #3084495

      DBI includes ActiveX controls for VFP

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Not sure how I missed this post of Rick‘s but what a great contribution from DBi to Sedna.

      So it looks like “in the box” for Sedna will be some great ActiveX controls as well – just like we’ve been hoping for.

      Great company – I’ve been reviewing their stuff for years.
      DBI’s Visual FoxPro Community Site

    • #3084209

      Why PCs Do Not Make Good Gadget Makers

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I think this CNET story hits it on the head: “reality still trails Microsoft’s ambitions”

      I will say – I was very excited about the potential of Origami, a light-weight device that was as functional as a regular laptop but designed for hand-held use. An intelligent user interface, much like the one that appears to be happening with the Origami Program Launcher would be welcome for many businesses and end-users. But PC people who keep on thinking that users (even though this one is very positive about it) will shell out big bucks for these devices are just out of their heads.

      It killed me this year to have to shell out over $600 for a mobile phone PDA when my original Blackberry only costs $189. Yea, I know Microsoft wanted to make the device under $500 – but just like Apple’s Newton (which was similarly overpriced), $800-$1100 (for Samsung’s Q1) is just way to ridiculous. Even if they had managed to offer ONE that was under $500 (as they did with the xBox), they could have saved some face.

      But it did tell me one thing: I have no reason whatsoever to look at a Tablet PC. So with one swoop, MS managed to kill two products at once. The Tablet PC is still overpriced and now, they come out with this device which makes laptops even more attractive. Maybe even three if you consider that the Portable Media PCs may be a little cheaper but far less functional. And it’s not even Microsoft’s own.

      Now don’t get me wrong – I would love an Origami device but at that price, Microsoft has just opened the door for a company who does understand gadget pricing ( and one that reminds me I need to eat some fruit today ) and now runs on the Intel platform to really shake up the world of portable devices. Or maybe someone else.

      Too bad.

      Reality check for the much-hyped Origami PC | CNET News.com

    • #3267727

      Better Code in Visual FoxPro

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I love the kind of posts that say something so obvious, that very few people will disagree with like “Warn your users but don’t treat them like idiots” but then give an example of exactly how to do that.

      This is precisely what Andy Kramek has done in his latest post on “Writing Better code” . Yes, it’s for Visual FoxPro but the logic can be applied everywhere.

      And then he finishes off with “How do I know the average time? From testing!

      When I am developing the code, I test it. ”

      Brilliant. Great read. Can’t wait for Part 2
      Andy Kramek : Writing better code (Part 1)

    • #3147997

      What would you do?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      After reading
      Bawling over bowling, I am reminded greatly of Julie Leung’s presentation at Gnomedex (2005) – I only heard it but appreciated its candor.

      Other people who blog can appreciate the benefits of putting out personal stuff out in the open – where many others cannot.

      Thank you for sharing. And of driving home a point

      “If I have a chance to look at a screen and comprehend what it says, keep me alive. Otherwise please don’t perform heroic measures to keep me alive.

      I’d rather be kept alive only if there’s some chance of a decent quality of life.

      How about you? What would you like your family to do? Why don’t you write it down and tell them? Tonight.

      What would you do differently if you had only 1,000 breaths to take?”

      One person, a thousand miles away, touches a thousand more, all around the world. Technology at its finest.

    • #3147992

      My last UMPC Post

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Good to see that at least Scoble gets it – Ultra Mobile PC?s panned by New York Times

      But forget about a high-powered laptop – a quick search shows you can get a regular TabletPC (with keyboard) for about the same price.

      Maybe they should have simply looked at providing some of that UPMC software for those tablet PC users.

      It’s really too bad because I’m genuinely excited by the technology but these aren’t supposed to be PCs – they are supposed to be MobilePCs (kind of like Windows CE), designed to change my life.

      What did they used to say about Windows 3.x?

      Oh yeah, “A pig in a dress is still a pig.”

      If you want to introduce a consumer device, then price it like one (Nintendo gets it – Sony doesn’t) – obviously Microsft wasn’t able to convince their partners with the correct price either.

    • #3147993

      Aren’t colors fun?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      David Fung remarks on colors that don’t work properly between different versions of Windows in Grid and XP Themes

      It can get even worse. I created a new form and added a list box where the default SelectedItemBackColor was noted as RGB(10,36,106). Looked great on my LCD screen. I built my app and then ran the form on another machine that used a regular CRT monitor. The color appeared black.

      Hmmm…must be resolution right? So we changed the resolution on both machines to match – STILL no luck. What was going on? I created the form to display the default color (using a MESSAGEBOX(THIS.SelectedItemBackColor)) on both environments. They returned different values. Why?

      Blame it on Themes. Ya, it’s great when users can change the colors – not so great, when you want to build a consistent look in your application.

    • #3147994

      A VFP RSS Reader?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Jeez, I remember suggesting to Ken Levy that this would be cool to do and now I see Juan’s got one.

      Hey – this would be cool to post the source for this.

      Thanks to Craig for pointing out this great new blog from Juan!

      Juan Calcagno ‘s Blog

      And no, Juan, you’re not an idiot, you’re just the guy who is able to keep up with all his blogs in the same tool he used for development!

    • #3147995

      Online Meeting Sites compared

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Typically when you see a comparison chart, it always slants in favor of the “hosting” company. (“We do all 10 features whereas our competition only does 5 of them”)

      So when Guy Kawasaki originally said “check out Vyew” – I wasn’t completely overwhelmed with the feature set – it’s cool and it works and the fact that you have to do screen captures to show your desktop has some benefits (like being able to hide crashes or non-descript error messages) – but it’s definitely not a “demo” tool – more of a “meeting” tool but that’s good.

      But the thing that I loved about their web site was this page:
      Comparison chart

      Yes, on the Key Features, it’s heavily swayed to Vyew but when you go further, you see that they are identifying where they are missing features – things that I would consider to be key like “desktop sharing”, polling and the ability to record sessions.

      Best of all, it provides a good price differential so you can compare a number of the tools out there and see which ones will suit your needs.

    • #3147996

      The revolution should be ,um, streamed

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Hey Craig – as you go out on the VFP World Domination tour, (love the name), do us all a favor and record it.

      I know it’s always tough recording a session – but tools like GoToMeeting make it easier for others to come on and see it, OR you can use the free Windows Media Encoder to do it.

      This brings me up to one of my gripes about the various user groups. You guys are getting great speakers and great topics all around yet you aren’t letting the rest of the VFP world know about it afterwards.

      FoxIte will let you set up a blog quickly and easily – you can do your part with VFP World Domination by setting one up and making your reviews or coverages of your meetings available to all.

      If any user group leader has never taken part in recording a session like this, drop me an email and I’ll set one up to show you how it can be done. It takes very little time and it’s worth it for everyone.

      Since I’m doing “shout outs”, this goes double for conference organizers (but I think I’m repeating myself)
      The
      SPS Weblog – VFP World Domination Tour (cont.)

    • #3147988

      Stealth Upgrading of support

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Looks like Rick found an update that hasn’t been shared widely: Microsoft has extended the Support Lifecycle for VFP up to 2015 now.

      As he notes, that’s only one year before Visual Studio 2005 apps expire. Now, FoxPro (and other) developers have been building great applications in the past without real regard to the support lifecycle. But it started becoming a talking point when Microsoft started advertising it. Since Sedna seems like it’s going to be more of a download, rather than a full separate product, it will be interesting to see if this date changes anytime soon. If ever a page needed an RSS feed, this one likely does.

    • #3147989

      FoxPro Does Windows

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Vassilis Aggelakos shows us how Visual FoxPro really does windows. That’s a cool looking application. Reminds me of Visio and Vassilis notes that the UI concepts came from Ken Chazotte’s book.

      A great quote: “We have tried the same project in the past with Visual Basic, PowerBuilder and C++ but sooner or later all these tries failed because we couldn’t succeed an acceptable balance between Budget – Time and Features”

      Sounds familiar to my conversations with some other developers at larger companies. Now, I know many will come back and say “well that’s because they didn’t know how” but that’s entirely the point.

      Learning how to program can be easy – IF the tools are done right. Now I’m not saying that FoxPro always does it the right way – but large projects always seem to go off the rails when a new language is used and when the results look as good as that, go for it!

      Vassilis Aggelakos : What I have done with VFP, GDI+, and a ton of help from VFP Community (OR why VFP is COOL)

    • #3147990

      Rick and Detroit get dominated by Craig!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Rick Schummer has done an excellent job covering what Craig Boyd talked about at the Detroit FoxPro User Group. There are a series of posts:

      End Notes
      Vista and Visual FoxPro
      GDI+ – I’m not sure when I would use a button with 2 images on it but I’m sure I will at some point
      Encryption and RegEx – Question on this? Why wouldn’t you use the CryptoAPI FCC for encryption? I realize it is OS dependent but Crypto is fairly standard these days, no?
      Introduction to the Power of Community

      I hope the recording turned out!

      And I’m sure, fresh from all that, Rick just had to try and turn around some negative comments on ProFox. This is one of the reasons why I find myself simply not reading much of ProFox or any forum threads regularly anymore – I look at first run topics but that’s about it. For every 5 great posts, there are about 50 “fanboy” or “anti-fanboy” comments and just degenerate the old conversation.

      Great series of posts Rick!

    • #3147991

      Uninstalling Previous Beta Versions

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Ah , the perils of beta software. I had installed a few earlier builds of VS 2005 on an older machine and was finally getting around to upgrading it. Unfortunately every attempt to install updates resulted in “You must uninstall the beta version first”.

      Looking in Add/Remove proved fruitless. Nothing was listed there. Yet there was something in my registry or something lying around.

      Thankfully, there was this page with a direct link to this auto-uninstall tool. Solved the problem right away.

      Do they have something like this for the IE 7 Beta 1? It’s completely hosed my laptop and reinstalling SP2 and more just won’t cut it. (updated: reinstalling WinXP finally resolved the problem but what a pain!)

      I think the Fox team needs to expand their horizons and get EVERY team at Microsoft to support upgrading over beta versions. VFP 9 was a dream for this. Too bad the regular OS components aren’t.

      Uninstalling Previous Versions

    • #3146809

      Nancy Folsom’s blogging!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Thanks to Alex for pointing
      this out.

      Welcome Nancy!

      Now if I can only get some of those great refactoring ideas of hers into the Code Analyst project.

    • #3146160

      Eric Sink on Java

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I did try to really jump into Java, really I did. I tried to get into it with J++, I get around JavaScript fairly easily and I still like it as a concept. But I’ve never seen a “good-looking” Java application – they usually look so (I can’t even find the right word, drab, blah, amateur, I dunno) – but I do appreciate the language and what it means.

      As it turns out, so does Eric – his post Java and Tiger Woods is a must-read.

    • #3146161

      Folsom: Using #Define statements in refactoring

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Now that she’s blogging, Nancy is likely going to find lots of links pointing to some of her posts as fellow bloggers read them for the first time and find juicy nuggets of wisdom.

      As with any tidbit of code, however, the real good stuff is in the comments where you can see the discussion take place (in this case with Christian Wollenhaupt.

      More to my immediate focus, Nancy also linked over to Martin Fowler’s Refactoring catalog – more of whom which I’ll be looking at to implement into the Code Analyst.

      Experiencing Life on the Verge ? Using #Define statements in refactoring

    • #3147762

      Milind’s letter for May is all about Me , er, My

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      If you check out the Visual FoxPro: May 2006 – Letter from the Editor, Milind refers to the updated CTP documents. Without worrying about the DotNet CTP stuff and the update about Service Pack 2 (note that SP2 will be dealing with some of the stuff they’ve discovered about Vista), the real cool piece, at least to me, is this little add-on called “My”

      As Milind explains it, it essentially contains wrappers for SYS functions and Windows API calls, etc. Why is this a big deal?

      I remember a variety of devcons and ER requests for VFP where users would ask for “add a Machine Name function” and the response was “use SYS(0)” or any one of the other SYS functions. SYS was great for functionality but terrible for readability. My makes it a little easier although you have to be used to looking at a lot of “.”s.

      A lot of code I’ve seen puts these settings into memory variables for later use. I used to use SYS(0) as my example for using the SUBSTR and ATc function.

      lcUserName = SUBSTR(SYS(0),ATC(“#”,SYS(0))+2)

      But now with My, it becomes much easier and I don’t really need a variable anymore.

      Why bother writing the above when I can use:

      IF My.User.UserName=”andrew”

      ENDIF

      But My is going to be so much more useable than for things like this. Yeah, it has some stuff like My.Computer.Audio.Play but it also has direct access to the Registry with My.Computer.Registry and lets you retain settings with My.Settings.Add() and My.Settings.Load and Save.

      Why bother using AGETFILEVERSION() when you can simply say

      My.App.Info.CompanyName and My.App.Info.Version

      Yes, if you’ve been writing code for a while, you likely already have functions for this – for users just starting out ( or for readability with others who may be coming from VB 2005), the My workspace is going to be a lot of fun.

      Oh, and did I mention that the help file has a topic about how you can add your own classes to it? Now, THAT Rocks!

      Download the feature overview here to get a feel for it. The My spec is actually a help file which makes it even easier to read through and get a feel for.

    • #3156586

      and you thought VFP was getting bounced around…

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      This is a bit old (from two weeks ago) but I just saw it on the ProFox thread and thought I would share it here.

      Garrett Fitzgerald had posted it and when I saw it, I immediately tried to think of some cool use for it. maybe one of the conferences could use it as opening footage.

    • #3157599

      Craig’s awesome skill toolkit!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig noted about the most recent Sydney UG meeting that he had limited time to go through what he wanted to and that he was stumped by attendees saying they don’t find a lot of value in blogs. But he pointed to his articles and whoa! His VFP Business Skills help file (nicely done with HTML Help Builder) is chock-full of valuable examples, ideas and links to very useful sites to help with (not just promoting VFP) but also basic perception tips you can put into your application to make it better.

      It’s a fast read but what a great resource as an intro for VFP developers who are a) trying to make their app look good and b) trying to promote their own skillset.

      VFP Business Skills

    • #3165116

      Microsoft and Adobe: Leaving the way for Metro?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Ted may be starting to sound a little paranoid after Microsoft’s announcement about dropping PDF but who can blame him?

      It certainly is strange. Not supporting PDF is kind of like having a music player that doesn’t support MP3. Of course, since Microsof also won’t support ODF, that means their one hope for a “global” format is Metro, talking about at the recent HEC. There’s a spec here.

      From a developer perspective, having the entire doc format done in XML will make it easier for VFP developers to write tools that export data but that’s something being planned for interfacing with regular Office docs anyways, right? The big downside is that it immediately locks you into the Win platform. O/S debates aside, that wouldn’t be bad if Windows supported every device you used but that ratio is getting smaller, not larger (unless your home is outfitted with a Windows Media Centre, Win SmartPhone, XBox 360 along with your regular computer). Now I’m sure some people do live in those homes but there are just as many who are discovering Macs and other alternatives for their home automation enjoyments and how are they going to enjoy sharing documents between environments?

      Since anyone can readily support PDF (as Ted points out, GhostScript is free), the only answer I can think of is that they are doing a “well, we’ll just do our own thing” again. A bully move – but unfortunately, one that could put the nail into the Office coffin unless it plays out right.

      In a number of clients that I go to, they still haven’t moved up to Office 2003 because their corporate standard is something other than Microsoft. They buy Office to ensure they can work with others but their “standard” word processor and spreadsheet is something else (although these days, email is the “real” word processor alternative to Word). By not giving them a real compelling reason to upgrade to Office 2007 (and PDF support would arguably be it), some offices may find themselves 7 years behind the current version. And while I, like Craig, admit that the Office 2007 UI is cool, it’s not everywhere (note that the MS Project Team said that they “decided to stay with the core user interface have shipped in the past”) – instead offering cool features like Visual Reports and better business templates.

      Why is that? Wouldn’t the user interface changes (designed to make complex tasks easier to accomplish) be a cinch for a complex task like Project Management? My immediate thought is that the target audience for Project are companies that spend millions of dollars on training anyways so the benefits of “simplying complex tasks in the UI” is redundant. They’re going to be spending the money on training anyways – so why not put the development dollars into an actual business benefit as they’ve done? But the same could apply to the rest of Office? If Office’s main customers (read: the ones who make it a cash cow) are corporate and government (the ones who will send everyone away on training), will the new user interface be a real reason to upgrade? PDF output certainly could have been. So now the question is – why would a company choose to upgrade?

      Update: If you don’t think the reason for the new UI was ease of use, check here. Jensen Harris’ Office UI blog expressly states “our design goal was to require no training at all”

      Whoa – I’ve covered a lot in this one post. I think I’ll leave it for now to come back to individual topics later.

    • #3165115

      Office Ribbon Resources

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      If, like Craig, you are interested in the new Office 2007 UI, this is a great resource.

      Aside from showing how to extend the new Ribbon UI, it has a solution builder guide.

      The entire Office UI blog is a great resource for understanding the hows and whys of the new solution.

    • #3164993

      How to have a meeting

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Well, after all the great “How to” meeting posts over at Visionpace, I thought this strip was particularly appropriate.

      Bug Bash ? Archive ? Getting to Yes

      How many wasted meetings could be improved with this approach?

    • #3164992

      Brian Jones: Offering PDF for Free

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Just my luck. I read up from Ted and post a bunch only to find out from Brian that they plan on offering it as a free-download.

      Funny the way the world works these days. The big issue though is will IT departments really download it?

      I agree with Brian. It sounds like the conspiracy theory may be off for a while – if this is Adobe’s mistake, they should really smarten up.

      Brian Jones: Open XML Formats : Legal issues around PDF support

    • #3164892

      Name Your FoxPro

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      The SednaX admins have made a few noises about the need for a real “production” name for the SednaX project. (SednaX is a community-based initiative for add-ons to Visual FoxPro – since Microsoft code-named their next set of work Sedna, the SednaX kind of fit nicely). So the Name Your FoxPro poll results so far are favouring a VFPX (which is a play on VFP 10 as well as favoring the eXtended nature) but VFP.Next is also making a big play here.

      You can vote here and don’t be afraid to add your own suggestions. You can already see some fun entries such as:

      Ostrich
      Vixen
      Starlight

      or perhaps one that speaks to some VFP developers feelings about MS, “Futility”.

      It’s important to note that this is not about renaming FoxPro proper – it’s about getting a more public name for the SednaX work. Follow the discussion in the forum threads. The poll was simply put up to give an easy place to comment on it all.

    • #3165245

      Steve wants to replace the common controls

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Hmm…this looks interesting. Steve’s just reported that he’s submitted his VFP Common Controls replacement library to the SednaX group.

      Hey Steve- why not show us a sample with a screencast?

      Between this and Carlo’s excellent Status bar control, we’ll have updated UIs in our applications in no time!

    • #3165244

      The Microsoft Code

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      When I started reading this, I was worried it would get really long (and possibly boring). At 6 chapters, it’s short, sweet and just down-right funny. A hilarious send-off of the Da Vinci Code right at Microsoft.

      The funniest exchange (abridged) – a discussion on the user interface choices in Microsoft products:

      “It should be easy to rotate, I think it’s here on the Format menu, you just choose Font or Paragraph. Hmm, there is no Paragraph choice…”

      “Maybe it’s on the Edit menu, under Object.”

      The level 71 developer clicked a couple of times. “Object just highlights it. It’s probably somewhere on the Format menu. Is it Alignment? No, that’s just left/right/center.”

      “Let’s try the Text Box option on the Format menu,” “Great, it’s a modal dialog with tabs. What about the Position tab?”

      “Hey, what about the Text Box tab. Of course, we’ll have a dialog called Text Box and then put a tab called Text Box on it. Oh look, you can rotate the text by 90 degrees, but not 180 degrees.”

      “What about the Size tab?”

      “The Size tab? Why would rotation be on a tab called Size? Never mind, here it is on the Size tab.

      Quick and easy to read and just down-right funny.

      So who is Mini anyways?

      Proudly Serving My Corporate Masters: The Microsoft Code: Chapter 6

    • #3164781

      PodTech’s to-do list

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      In the spirit of those wacky MasterCard ads, Judi Sohn seems to have cracked the code:
      A View from Home:PodTech’s to-do list

      Except, I think they were able to stand the traffic. I was out of town.

      Great post though.

    • #3271089

      Welcome to DLL Hell 3.0!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      As Vassilis notes, Microsoft has gone back to
      Where the tools have no name. And some people aren’t that happy about it.

      Now maybe it won’t be that bad, but judging by the comments left when people tried to re-install Windows 2003 SP1, it seems like the supposed salvation is still somewhere lost in the details.

      And since many applications are still just running with DotNet 1.1, now you’ll have “do you have DotNet 2.0 on it” or maybe DotNet 3.0 or maybe they will have to rely on the actual four digit version #, which is how their directories are named.

    • #3155559

      Taming Dockable Toolbars

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Great tip from Mike on dealing with unwieldly toolbars. Mike notes that it’s come up with several customers – my guess is that it comes up with just about every developer and they just go “oh well – that’s how it works” – nice to know there’s an easy fix.

      Taming Dockable Toolbars

    • #3270145

      Virtual Earth Mashup does web services one better

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Ken posted this last week but I haven’t had a chance to try it out.

      Now that I have – I have to say, “wow – that was easy”.

      I had previously signed up to the MapPoint web services to see how we could use those. I’m sorry but the whole registration and entire process of using the web services made it a chore. The Virtual Earth SDK is how every web tool should offer itself over the web.

      I love MapPoint (although I have a separate post brewing in me about my latest trip through Penn State with it) – but the fact that I could say “Show me directions” and then switch over to the source code tab to copy and paste it into my very own web page totally rocks.

      Well done! This should be a model for how VS automatically creates web services – it’s not enough to show the sample call, show an example of how it works and then show the code behind it.

      Does it dumb down developers? I don’t think so – this is just like “Full Code Intellisense” – let me tell you what I want to do, you give me the starting point and I’ll take it from there. (and while i’m sure there are some code jockeys out there who believe that Intellisense is the single worst idea in the world – I’m sure most beg to differ)

      The Virtual Earth Interactive SDK

    • #3268637

      Dave wants to OutFox the World!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      So welcome Dave Crozier to the blogging world with his OutFox the World! blog.

      And what a way to start – the VFP Organizer is in beta. He had a video of it up a few days back (as noted on ProFox) but now he’s letting users download and use it. All done in VFP – check out the picture here.

      What’s funny is that I just finished submitting an article about dbi Technologies’s ctDays control for FoxPro Advisor and lo and behold , here’s the VFP Organizer.

      Looks great and welcome Dave! – can’t see how else you plan to outfox us!

    • #3270550

      Privacy Bill of Rights?

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I tend to keep out of political issues but after just seeing this headline – Hillary Clinton calls for “privacy bill of rights” – I have to ask – has the US Constitution been trampled on so much that no one has any regard for its amendment process?

      A separate “bill of rights” ends up being as useless as some group getting together to form some “taxpayer’s bill of rights” – they end up being silly, derided and a big waste of time.

      If loss of privacy is such a huge issue, then add it to the only “bill of rights” that the US has – the Constitution so that everyone, from the Supreme court on down, has to respect it.

      Or maybe she hasn’t really thought this through and just wanted talking points…

      Oh well, this is why I stay out of this stuff. Politically, there are MORE important things to worry about, like losing the ability to show public domain works.
      Update: And yes I do know that there is confusion about what the WIPO amendment might mean – but really, just as it’s important to focus on issues, it’s also important to put the results of that focus into something meaningful.

    • #3270551

      Shedding Some Light on shedding some light

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Rick points out some great new additions to Bob’s Southwest Fox 2006. He notes some of the great new speakers that were just added to the list but also about every attendee getting $150 in dbi Dollars. That’s a great opportunity especially considering that dbi is offering some of their controls as part of Sedna (so be sure NOT to use those dbi Dollars on those six controls).

      While perusing the site, I found this post of Rick’s, which is a very good read, especially for those developers or consultants who feel the need to pull out conspiracy theories.

      As Rick noted “this blog is not read by everyone” – but just by posting re-links to it keeps a valuable discussion going. Rick’s Shedding Some Light is a great blog and his report on Craig at the DAFUG was awesome!

      It’s tough to keep up with everything because there are so many feeds to read. I keep on putting posts that I want to make into my drafts folder because I just don’t have all the time to get them into a form that I’m happy with.

      This isn’t just a post about linking to Rick’s blog though – there have been stories that were posted six months ago that become popular again only once someone links to them. A lot of FoxPro developers are hard at work on some truly great things and when they put them out, they expect a thundershower of activity but it doesn’t come. Instead, it comes slowly as more and more people find out about them. I’ve written about some of them, others have written about others but all are appreciated.

      Keep them coming!
      Shedding Some Light: Southwest Fox 2006 – More revelations

    • #3141875

      Improving MapPoint

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Last week, I returned from a family wedding in State College, Penn. We decided to travel the way down after realizing that the time it would take to drive down would be about the same as it would be to fly after all the delays and waiting around airports (note: there are no real direct flights out of Ottawa except to “hub” cities). I had just received MapPoint 2006 and thought “now is the ideal time to try out the directions.” I also retrieved directions from Google Maps just to be on the safe side. Since I wasn’t bringing a laptop, I printed the directions and put some of the maps onto my Pocket PC just to be safe.

      As it turned out, both of the maps were fairly identical but what I want to note here are very small and useful features that could be used to improve just about any mapping service, with a focus on Mappoint.

      1. Export a Route to Pocket Streets.
      Why this one hasn’t been done is beyond me. You can choose to Export a map to Pocket Streets but if you choose too large an area, it tells you to select a smaller area. Well, when you’re traveling for 9 hours, you KNOW you’re going to be going to need a lot of maps. Why can’t the software just export out maps that are all along the route (that it knows) and then move them over? I have a GPS unit on my iPaq and because I didn’t print out all of the possible areas, I was frequently “Out of Map area”.

      2. Summary Directions.
      The entire route to State College was made up of a total of 2.5 pages of directions, all referring to “turn right on this ramp, turn left on this ramp, go 10 yards and then turn around”. Do you know what the real directions could have been?
      a. Take the 416 to the 401.
      b. Take the 401 to the US bridge near Kingston at Hill Island. This is highway 81 in the US
      c. Take 81 until Cortland US-11.
      d. Get onto SR-13.
      e. Get onto I-86.
      f. Get off at Lock Haven (US-220).
      g. Follow the signs to State College.

      That’s right – 7 simple sentences. I think having a Direction Summary may prove extremely helpful since the names of the streets and routes often change and aren’t always accurate. Yes, you need the details but – it’s hard to read the details when…the DIRECTIONS are wrong. Note the picture below:

      The directions state: Take ramp Right and then turn RIGHT towards pa-64 and Lamar. If you look at the map, Lamar is to the right but where is the highlighted route? It’s going left. Because of this simple mistake, we lost about half an hour (took the right towards Lamar and then got back onto I-80 and then got off 20 minutes later). Summary directions would have resolved this problem completely and made MapPoint look like a hero.

      3. Is Quickest really the quickest?
      Sometimes, a faster route may not always be faster. But if you want to change the Preferred Route segments in MapPoint, you have to click 5 times to get there (Route->More Options->Segments-Preferred Road Types). The final destination would have been 20 minutes longer but all on highways. Hmm…what an opportunity – especially since the other way did note construction delays. In addition, if we had gone that way, the direction list would have been four lines instead of 6. It might be useful to immediately highlight two routes and allow the user to pick one to really determine which is faster.

      Now, the GPS really helped us out big time- both in finding our way around Penn State but also ensuring we were going the right way but as I noted in #1, unless I had an easy way to print out EVERY possible map, it wouldn’t have worked out.

      This isn’t a complete rant against MapPoint. I love it for a lot of reasons and MapPoint 2006 would have been great to have put along with a laptop with me on this trip (then I would have had all the maps – but then I would have to buy a GPS when my phone already has one) – hmm – maybe I need that new Avertech UMPC with GPS. MapPoint 2006 certainly has some great features like a Text to Speech feature for reading the directions but of course, those aren’t on the Pocket Streets included with it. MapPoint 2006 boasts a few new features but all of these as far as I’m concerned really need you to have a GPS feature on your computer. Sure, it’s cool to export out and look at stuff on Windows Live Local but otherwise, every other feature was really designed around making it better on GPS. Is that the target market here? If so, why include Pocket Streets?

      As my wife noted, these are the reasons why people still don’t rely on mapping web services. Small little changes would make all the difference in usability. Time to pull out the big map all over again.

    • #3269502

      Offering Multiple Feeds

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig, I agree –
      I was also a bit disappointed when I realized that Rick Schummer has switched his feeds to only showing the partial feed instead of the whole one. Update: Rick’s feed is a FULL text feed but Newsgator is only showing a few lines of posts done later on. I wonder why.

      You can have a Feedburner that offers full feeds and another that offers only the partial feed (Feedburner calls this its Summary Burn).

      This is kind of like what Steve has done on the Wiki – choose between Full, brief or title only for updates.

      Another solution for you Craig – Fetchlinks. It’s a Newsgator plug-in that will actually download the entire piece into Newsgator (whoops – it’s for the desktop version only – i.e. Email version).

      But I agree with you – I’m getting to the point where it makes more sense for me to stop subscribing to sites that don’t give me full text. (again)

    • #3269275

      Zoho offers more than just typical web-apps

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      OK – I admit it – I read ZdNet and that’s where I first saw this. I was somewhat skeptical because there are so many “web-office” competitors out there – what makes this one so different?

      But after looking at the entire site, I have to agree with Richard when he says that Zoho may be well-positioned to take a stronghold in this area.

      Forget about Word-processing, spreadsheets and presentations for the time-being (oh yeah, those are FREE) – all of those are offered.

      Zoho offers a Virtual office much like the Webex Office. But it also includes a Page Creator (like Google’s), your own Planner, an online chat, but what really caught my eye was Zoho Challenges and ZohoCreator.

      You need to test people? Challenges works great. Here’s the way to do it. You add questions, identify the correct response and then assign the test to individual candidates. It lets you mark questions, show images and more.

      Need to create a web app? I have tried DabbleDB and really liked it so I was surprised to see that Zoho has one but it hasn’t really been talked about (at least that I’ve seen). But Zoho Creator has some features that Dabble just doesn’t. If you’ve been tracking your data on a spreadsheet up until now, Zoho lets you import it. Need to build it from one of their existing templates? No problem. From scratch? Sure thing. A real programming language? Uh – pretty close. They aren’t kidding when they say , “And we truly believe that Creator can be become the Visual Basic for the Web”

      This tool needs a screen cast. And it uses a language called Deluge – which looks pretty easy to work with. Look for one soon.

      As I mentioned previously about Dabble, , this is where the FoxPro web solutions may want to start looking to showcase their own great features.

    • #3142869

      WinFS Update: That Smarts!

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Ouch. Reading the comments, that must smart for the developers who have spent their time working on this.

      Sure, it’s cool to access the file system in a development environment through code access but this has been an oft-touted benefit of each new subsequent version of Windows.

      Maybe Ted is right, could an existing open-source file system be used instead with better results?

      Too bad.

      What’s in Store : WinFS Update

    • #3112501

      Defending Bob (and other unopopular UI choices)

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Adam Barr really went out on a limb with this one but reading the comments is where you’ll find even more gold in this great blog post.

      Dumping on the iPod, promoting the “Designer Era” and then hearing about different ways people interpret design.

      It’s a great post (comments included). I don’t know if Adam was behind the “Microsoft iPod” video but many of the comments make the same point. “Apple does defrag behind the scenes, if MS did it, they would still put up a big sign telling you they were doing it”.

      And no, Adam doesn’t defend Bob 1.0 completely – “Windows does not necessarily need to become Bob, it just needs to be designed right for *its* customers. Maybe some brilliant designers can figure out one UI that works for everyone, or not.” (for the record, Trish loved using Spot the dog as the Office 200x assistant and we did get a copy of Bob because it DID make computing somewhat less confrontational. Was it perfect? Absolutely not – but it did include some interesting ideas)

      But hey – I’m still looking for a useful UI because the whole Windows folder/explorer approach just doesn’t work (oh yeah, the finder works the same way) – maybe that’s why Google gets it right with gMail. You want to find something? Just type it into search and there it is.

      Maybe this is part of what Office 2007 is trying to do – but myself? I still find myself trying to find where all the old options were. I’ve tried “Rooms” – still doesn’t make sense. I find I’m living directly in a browser these days so maybe something will show up there. But – how do I code within a browser? Hmmm…

      Maybe MindJet should come up with a Web-version of MindManager. It could be a cool Ajax app for sure – and sync directly between mobile and desktop versions and could even do a great job of showing the links between everything you look at. Kind of like Cnet’s News Mapper tool.

      Proudly Serving My Corporate Masters: Code and Design

    • #3112157

      FoxPro is outdated – compared to what? (an example of what FoxPro developers are up against)

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I recently heard of an interesting story – you can read about it here – related to how the FBI recently canceled a project for a management system. No big whoop there except that the vendor in question was selling a FoxPro application. The full PDF report (from the Auditor General) is available here .

      Just so you don’t need to read it – here are the parts that were interesting:

      The customization was a slow process because the JusticeTrax LIMS relies on an aging code format, Visual FoxPro.While Visual FoxPro is outdated, it is still compatible with today?s technology. However, according to FBI personnel, Visual FoxPro is difficult and slow to customize compared to newer programming languages. While the extent of customization was the main obstacle, having to use the old code increased the delays.

      Note: JusticeTrax’s LIMS application uses VFP 9 and a SQL Server back-end. It is also used by a variety of law enforcement agencies and forensic labs across North America.

      What was the FBI currently using?
      The FBI currently uses Microsoft?s Access 2002 as the ECS database software.

      More:
      The IMPRB expressed additional concerns about project risks, including the fact that the Visual FoxPro code used for JusticeTrax?s LIMS is old technology

      Now there are a number of other reasons for the cancellation of contract (they wanted a web-based app – LIMS is a desktop app, poor project management, no champion, etc) but so many times, we hear that Microsoft wants examples of why we feel FoxPro has been badly treated and how they can help and here is a classic one. (I’m sure many VFP shops have similar stories)

      Now, the report does not note who the FBI personnel were who said that “VFP is difficult” – but look at the words being used : “old”, “difficult”,”slow to customize”,”aging code format”. Let’s deal with these separately:

      Old. OK. Java is “newer” compared to VFP but C++ isn’t. Uh – and unless I’m mistaken, there are still some mainframes in use in the US government.

      Difficult. What programming language isn’t slightly “difficult”? (is VFP any more difficult than, say , VB?).

      Slow to Customize? That’s more an attribute of the application itself. I’m sure that Windows is slow to customize as evidenced by the fact that you have to regression test it for millions of users, compared to a Linux or other O/S. One FoxPro application may be incredibly easy to customize whereas another is incredibly difficult – that doesn’t mean FoxPro is slow to customize.

      Aging code format – I wonder how many lines of code in VFP are STILL the same as they were back in 1990. Calvin? Any ideas?

      Now I’m not intentionally trying to spin this (see the various discussions on WinFS, for examples of Spin) but I am holding this up as an example of the challenges that FoxPro developers face regularly. None of the comments are true of the language or tool itself – yet inexperienced IT program managers or knowledge workers might read this and think otherwise. Is this Microsoft’s or the Fox Team’s fault?

      No – but clearly this is where better responses are needed. Maybe, someone should flash up the TIOBE index. Sending over case studies would be one option but once again, IT’s PRODUCT SPECIFIC – so it doesn’t answer the question.

      Maybe we should show the life cycle for extended product support.
      VFP 9 – 13/01/2015
      Access 2000 – 14/07/2009
      Access 2003 – 14/01/2014
      Visual Interdev (how many web apps were deployed) -30/09/2004
      Visual Studio 2003 – 08/10/2013

      How do you combat this type of ignorance? Can you?

      I don’t have the answers here – do you? How would you respond?

    • #3111009

      VFPX at CodePlex

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Wow – writing that headline almost sounded like a movie playing at a Cineplex but the VFPX site looks like it’s up at CodePlex, along with a cool little logo.

      Looking at the Logo, I think the VFPX name works well.

      It doesn’t look like all of the user rights have been assigned yet but the projects are there and ready to go.

      CodePlex looks pretty cool as an overall environment – it’s got issue tracking, source code control, releases and discussions (much like SourceForge).

      If you haven’t been involved much in the SednaX side of things, now’s the time to jump into VFPX – download the current version of tools and then start letting people know what works and what doesn’t.

      VFPX

    • #3111010

      Who knew…

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      I know many have seen (at least) the source of this before but this was a direct link after it was slashdotted that “Microsoft workers prefer Google.” – Before the chairs started to fly.
      Steve Ballmer – techno remix – Google Video

    • #3113474

      VFP Videos

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      If you haven’t downloaded them yet, take a flip over to Google Video and just go here. In fact, even if you have, do so! They’re great videos!

      Courtesy of Kevin Ragsdale, it looks like there’s a pretty catchy VFP tune there.

      Hey Kev – mind if I use it as well for future FoxShows?

      I loved the Project DOA one – is that video clip that you used public domain?

    • #3168534

      Bringing FoxPro to the Schools

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Wildfire notes that we really need to be showing these videos to students here.

      Well, hey! That’s what William Sanders group is doing with CollegeCon – his Intern group (CollegeCon is a separate programmer’s competition)!

      I wish they had a better web site to explain what they’re doing but I think this is a great first step!

      If schools are still teaching Paradox (see comments for post), then we should get on them to teach FoxPro!

    • #3168533

      Viscose Fibre Production or Visual FoxPro

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      Craig has an interesting post talking about GoogleTrends and where FoxPro really fits in. As it turns out, FoxPro is more popular than VFP but what it also highlights is the danger of using acronyms.

      If you look at this link, you’ll see that Visual FoxPro isn’t the only use of VFP in the world, which immediately skews some of the results (even Google can’t figure it out – look at the Adwords listed on that page and I can’t find VFP anywhere in it)

      Of course, it is nice to know that more people search for FoxPro than xbase and dbase combined.

    • #3168281

      Bill Coupe on Tiobe

      by akselsoft1 ·

      In reply to Andrew MacNeill – AKSEL Solutions

      FoxPro Moves to 12th? No, Stays in 13th!

      I wanted to ensure that others get a chance to read Bill’s take on the Tiobe (even despite the lone comment on this issue where you get the feeling his blog is usually more non-Fox than other Fox blog sites <bg>).

      He’s right that Microsoft won’t give VFP as much press as other tools but that doesn’t mean we can’t.

      My original post about the FBI’s own misinformation (insert your own conspiracy theory quip here) and the subsequent comments show that the problem isn’t Microsoft’s alone – it’s an IT problem. Maybe it’s a NIH (not invented here) reaction or simple ignorance – but it’s the challenge that needs to be overcome.

      I just received an email from a FoxPro “user” – he’s not a developer but he built a little app in FoxPro 2.x DOS and wanted to know how to get up to speed on VFP without having to spend a lot of money. I’ve mentioned Learning Visual FoxPro, a site I’m trying to fulfill with as much free content and links to tips , tricks and how-tos in VFP. There’s always the Wiki but that’s more of an encyclopedic approach.

      Where would you send him?

      technorati tags:foxpro, visual, vfp, programming, software, development

Viewing 357 reply threads