Livin' the life...

Well sometime back I blogged about some good code converters that did c# to vb.net and visa versa.. This post is to update that post and to .. well.. delete one of them off the list. The one I'm referring to is www.kamalpatel.net/ConvertCSharp2VB.aspx.

A strange thing about this though (ie why it warrants this post) is that a little while before this happened, I found a little... asp.net security 'no no' in the site and I wrote the dude an email informing him about it. Then a couple days after, the site was down. Strange huh?

Anyway, the other ones are still up and running and of course they promise that they don't store your code.... *cough*.

Oh, last post was Sunday, wow, anyway, I'm back!

Well lately, Javascript and AJAX have had me very very preoccupied.. From researching to learning to forums to testing... wow! To be quite honest, I had no real intentions of looking deeply at javascript but as it seems somewhat integral in Ajax (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML), I've started to look at that as well.

Surprisingly to me though, javascript is pretty cool, well besides the everyone-can-view-your-source-code thing. Thanks to w3scools, javascript.com and a book from Microsoft Press I've learnt quite a bit. Of course, every now and then I meet up on some of those cross-browser problems, but once I find the right hack, everything's usually fine!

I hope the final version of ASP.NET AJAX comes out soon though, working with this beta version has been pretty uncomfortable for me. Come onnn MS!

Monday morning thought...

Prerequisite: When reading XML I usually use the XML.XMLDocument class and its SelectNodes() or ChildNodes() methods.

So today whilst using this method to read some XML which was output from a RPC I made, I again used the SelectedNodes method. Sad to say, this time it didn't work. When I tried "SelectedNodes("//result")" (which should return all the 'result' nodes), no nodes were returned even though they were there!

Upon investigation of this problem though (about 2hrs worth of searching I might add ), I found out that it was because the XML doc that was returned from the RPC had a default namespace included (this doesn't always happen, but mostly occurs from online XML output) i.e. the root node read "<bookstore xmlns="urn:newbooks-schema">".

Now, once a document has this included, one must use the overloaded SelectedNodes() function, which also takes an XMLNamespaceManager object. As MSDN Library states, "If your XML includes a default namespace, you must still add a prefix and namespace URI to the XmlNamespaceManager; otherwise, you does not get any nodes selected." <- i.e., what was happening to me!

So, now the 'fix'... assuming the XML document is a local file with the namespace suggested below.

Dim doc As XmlDocument = New XmlDocument()
doc.Load("newbooks.xml")

' Create an XmlNamespaceManager to resolve the default namespace.
Dim nsmgr As XmlNamespaceManager = New XmlNamespaceManager(doc.NameTable) nsmgr.AddNamespace("bk", "urn:newbooks-schema")

' Select all book titles.
Dim nodeList As XmlNodeList
Dim root As XmlElement = doc.DocumentElement
nodeList = root.SelectNodes("/bk:bookstore/bk:book/bk:title", nsmgr)

(This is an excerpt from the MSDN Library help. The full version, including the XML document can be found here.)

¹³ Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; ¹⁴ whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. ¹⁵ Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.” ¹⁶ But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. (James 4:13-16)

Looking for a good VB Reference? This MSDN site provides pretty good reference information for various aspects of the Visual Basic language.

Some good operator keywords to remember are: IsFalse, IsNot, IsTrue, OrElse, Xor, TypeOf, AndAlso and Like

-To get the content of a textbox use:

document.getElementById("MyTextBox").value OR with asp.net ajax use $get("MyTextBox").value

-To set the default button for a web page use:

The defaultbutton property of the form tag. IE. Set the defaultbutton property's value to the id/name of the textbox. eg. <form ... defaultbutton="MyButton">

Found this site a little while ago whilst viewing a friend's MySpace site. Apparently this is what is used to create the "cool" slideshows etc. that tons of people use on MySpace, Hi5 etc.

So, if you don't mind what looks like uploading your pics and signing up for an account with these people, .. this seems like a quick and easy way to put together a decent looking picture show.

Now this is something I've always wondered about - Can one access GMail/Yahoo! mail via an email client such as Outlook or Thunderbird (a free mail client from Mozilla). To be honest, in doing my own little research in the POP & Forwarding section of Yahoo! mail, I thought it was not possible unless one had the paid service eg. Yahoo! Mail Plus. 

This morning that topic came up again whilst I was chatting with a friend and he indicated to me that it is actually quite possible (thanks Andre!) using Thunderbird! So when I logged on to my pc, I immediately googled it and found what seems to be a really nice article on how to set it up. Admittedly though, I haven't tried it yet but it does seem pretty do-able.

Anyway, here's the article and you can use this link to get Thunderbird. Enjoy!

So it's a Monday morning and you just got to work, what do you need? A good laugh!

Just sit back, grab something to drink, watch and enjoy. I did!

lol, What can I say but... beautifully done Javon, Stickman and Posh! I give you an easy 10.0!

Just got home watching the new 00 (BEFORE its official release date - 17th November - I might add! ) and it was... pretty nice. Casino Royale starring the new James Bond definitely was another classic Bond with M, some tough scenes, flashy car, near-death experiences etc. Two things that was left out though were 1) the lack of "cool gadgets"... that was a slight let down. Believe it or not, I think his car this time was only a car.. :\ no rocket launcher, no push-the-red-button-and-make-it-a-submarine, nothing.. And 2) I don't remember hearing the James Bond theme anywhere in the movie, even at the end... (I could be mistaken about the end as I left kinda quick.)

Ways, in general, I'd say an 8.5/10, even though James got his but kicked by that guy in the beginning scene. Then again, that guy was PRETTY HIGH-CLASS, he had the guys in the audience going wild (myself included)!

OH, and this is a Sony Production so I guess this makes up a bit for the Open Season and Zoom which I spoke about here.

For the trailer, you can check the official site.

Today for probably the first time since I got back from studying, I did some shopping! To be honest though, prices here a bit.. er... more than in at Tescos though! And yes, I did do the exchange rate conversion... it's what, $3.88 BDS to £1 GBP now? :\

Ways, on the bright side, I saw Rich Tea biscuits!!! I thought was an England only thing! Also, guess what Kat and Pano, I saw Noodles!!! 3mins too!! Aww, that brings back memories... sadly there were only chicken and shrimp flavours.. no beef or bacon.. *arG! Anyway... good memories..

Lately I was explaining (the little I know about) PHP to someone and I was commenting on how it focuses on embedding code blocks into HTML which are processed server-side and then the .PHP page is sent to the user. For a comparison I mentioned how PHP and ASPX (ASP.NET pages) differs, in that ASPX uses a code behind file or some script code at the top of the page but there's not really any code embedded into the HTML. But it just clicked that this is wrong!

Something clicked today and I browsed to an MSDN site and clarified that code can be embedded into the ASPX page HTML content, similar to PHP and what was done in the ASP days. This site gives a good idea, but one can easily use the "<% %>" to indicate code. So it's like having the benefits of placing code either place ie. embedded (and thus easily viewable relative to your HTML) or neatly tucked away in the code behind file (where I believe 80% of developers put it).

Interestingly, a comment at MSDN stated "Embedded code blocks are supported in ASP.NET Web pages primarily to preserve backward compatibility with older ASP technology." (Ref) Now... to me this is a bit sad as I'd think that keeping it was a good thing because it gives developers the choice and possibly, since this is similar to PHP, you could probably lure some of the PHP following (as I assume is the reason for all these Express tools).

Anyway..., either way, I'm happy its there!

Just because I want to it don't mean I will
And just because I'm angry it don't mean I'd kill
And just because she looks good it don't mean I'm widdit
And just because I want to be happy it don't mean I'm gona snif it
I got discipline baby, and I use it a lot.

Always remember to use yours.

You've waited or rather... I've waited a while to say this and now I can... "ZUnE iS  HEre!!! *YEYY". Now that's off my chest, I'll act a bit more 'grown up'.

So today the 14th of November, Zune (the name of Microsoft's iPod challenger) is available to the public. It's a 30 GB, Wi-Fi-enabled, mp3 & Video-capable, (even plays unprotected ACC files), pretty looking, wide screen, (nb it's slightly bigger than the iPod) MonSter of a gadget *gRr! Costs $250 US too! (Ref)

I really recommend one check out this link for more information on Zune as who knows what'll happen? It just may become a serious competitor! One should also note that Zune has the purchasing software as well, similar to Apple's Music Store. 

As for me, since I don't own an iPod, or any.. serious mp3/vid player of this type, if that money tree in my backyard bears some $$, I just may get it too! (Of course though... I'll wait a while and read at least 30 reviews before splashing out the $250 US.)

For some talk on Microsoft's Zune Vs Apple Ipod, check this Tech-Barbados forum topic. 

I remember a rule I had which went something like this, "never work with or download for 'serious' use, anything with the label "BETA" on it" (granted this usually applied to IM prog updates, new OSs etc). But would I listen to my rule? Normally... yes! ... but with all the buzz about ASP.NET AJAX, formerly code named "Atlas", this time I made an exception and rushed to the site to get the ASP.NET AJAX 1.0 Beta 2 Release (released 9 days ago ie Nov 4th 2006 - yea, I'm right on the ball).

So I went and got the necessary installs, dlls etc. and honestly, from what I see here things look .. promising. The main problem I've had thus far though and this I also admit is totally understandable, is that finding nice examples on how things are done IN THIS CURRENT BETA release can be a pain (especially when some developers who really have good intentions post code but forget to document which release their code is geared for). 

What makes this problem more frustrating is that from what I see (and because I'm new to Beta releases this I guess may be a n00b exaggeration), the differences in the Beta versions is well not small eg. there are changes in tag name prefixes, how they are formatted, where elements and tags go etc.

I'm saying all this to remind myself (and whoever's reading) to keep my (your) distance or.. be cautious with that word 'Beta'. Experiment? yea sure, look at the features? yea sure, think about development? errr... take a rain check. In addition, keep in mind that some of the features in earlier Beta versions may not even be in the final product release (this relates to all Beta's but I'm mostly speaking about ASP.NET AJAX).

So now I'm at the stage of tinkering and hoping that some good/useful code/examples/documentation to suit this Beta 2 release will soon emerge. A good thing though is that "the fully supported version of ASP.NET AJAX that is scheduled for release near year-end" (Ref)... So, let's hope that means late November.

(Btw, don't ask me about the topic, I got a bit happy, :\)

Come with me to a third grade classroom....

There is a nine-year-old kid sitting at his desk and all of a sudden, there is a puddle between his feet and the front of his pants are wet.

He thinks his heart is going to stop because he cannot possibly imagine how this has happened. It's never happened before, and he knows that when the boys find out he will never hear the end of it. When the girls find out, they'll never speak to him again as long as he lives.

The boy believes his heart is going to stop, he puts his head down and prays this prayer, "Dear God, this is an emergency! I need help now! Five minutes from now I'm dead meat."

He looks up from his prayer and here comes the teacher with a look in her eyes that says he has been discovered.

As the teacher is walking toward him, a classmate named Susie is carrying a goldfish bowl that is filled with water. Susie trips in front of the teacher and inexplicably dumps the bowl of water in the boy's lap.

The boy pretends to be angry, but all the while is saying to himself, "Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!"

Now all of a sudden, instead of being the object of ridicule, the boy is the object of sympathy. The teacher rushes him downstairs and gives him gym shorts to put on while his pants dry out.

All the other children are on their hands and knees cleaning up around his desk.

The sympathy is wonderful. But as life would have it, the ridicule that should have been his has been transferred to someone else - Susie. She tries to help, but they tell her to get out. "You've done enough, you klutz!"

Finally, at the end of the day, as they are waiting for the bus, the boy walks over to Susie and whispers, "You did that on purpose, didn't you?" Susie whispers back, "I wet my pants once too."

May God help us see the opportunities that are always around us to do good.

Going to church doesn't make you a Christian any more than standing in your garage makes you a car.

Thanks for the forward N.

Ah, just got back from my sister's graduation ceremony which now makes her an official graduate of the Barbados Community College (BCC)! All in all the ceremony wasn't too bad, a couple speeches, addresses etc. you know how it goes.

One of the main points of the ceremony though, stressed by almost all the speakers, was that BCC can pride itself on usually capturing the most Barbados Scholarship and Exhibition prizes. All of you that are from Barbados would know that this is now a "standard" as secondary schools just can't catch up to BCC.

BUT ALAS! Here comes the big question, will this continue to be so after this year? The reason I ask is because the Ministry of Education has made it "a bit" harder to get Barbados Scholarships, especially at the BCC. NOW, instead of the award of a scholarship going to students who get a GPA of 3.8 to 4.0 (4.0 being the highest), the Ministry has made it such that to get a scholarship, YOU HAVE TO GET a GPA of 4.0 (Ref: HEAT newspaper Issue #49 Pg 3). Now... I not too too bright, but I believe this means... all an impeccable academic record.

As I glossed over the ceremony booklet I was given at the door, this year, only 1 person (out of the 6 scholarship winners) got a GPA of 4.0 (Congrats to that person I might add, Well done Mam!). But then again... I guess making the criteria a 4.0 is the way to go, as having 15 scholarship winners and numerous exhibition winners could signals that things might be "too easy" and also may act to draw away some of the prestige for the awards. (Here I must say that I'm sure that getting between 3.8 & 4.0 is no piece of cake however, it seems to be the opinion that this mark is now "too easy" to attain.)

Ah well... students at BCC (and all secondary schools as the criteria for them has been increased as well), all I can say is study hard, do your best and God will do the rest! ... Luckily my sister and I are past that college/secondary school stage... *PHEWWWWW!

And today the newspaper headlines read: "THERE ARE NEW KINGS of schools cricket in Barbados as The Lodge School (*bup *Bup) took the fight to seven-time champions Combermere who just could not get up and on and surrendered their title" (Ref)

Much respect due to The Lodge lads for finally getting rid of .. that.. other... "institution" (*heh).

You've made an 'old scholar' proud!

PS. To the right there is a photo of the celebrations (if you didn't guess already).

Sorrow Looks Back, Worry Looks Around, but faith... faith, looks up. (Got this from a forwarded email.)

Sometimes, I really, reallllllly like Open Source... They really hit the nail on its head at times. Two great examples being development of PostgreSQL (an alternative dbms to MySQL) and who can forget, The Red, Fiery Fox.

Interesting, almost all the "IT savvy" folks I know use FF. Also, I remember during my last stint at uni, using FF was the norm (that's right not IE - that was IE 6 though).

Ah Open Source..., I wonder what shall become of you.

In asp2 the Page.IsPostBack() property comes in rather handy at times but the key to its use is having a clear understanding of the property and when exactly it returns true or false.

To help me determine this, I checked the MSDN library and found the following Summary for the property: "Gets a value indicating whether the page is being loaded in response to a client postback (in which case it returns TRUE), or if it is being loaded and accessed for the first time (in which case it returns FALSE)."

Sad to say, this summary is actually a tad misleading. When it comments "or if it is being loaded and accessed for the first time", this to me gives the impression that ONLY the FIRST TIME that page is loaded/accessed (by that user), the property will return FALSE. This however, is not the case.

The actual times when the Page.IsPostBack() property returns FALSE are: a) when the page is being accessed (by that user) for the first time AND also b) if the page even though accessed already is being accessed again from another page (ie you went to Page 1 already but currently have browsed to Page 2... Now, whilst on Page 2 you click a link that takes you back to Page 1. Here, the Page.IsPostBack() property in Page 1 will return FALSE).

Hopefully this should clear things up a bit, it sure did for me.

This is sweeeet, I had to share.

Don't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you've got till it's gone.

Liverpool.

What great mates I made in UK! One of them snapped this photo for me on a visit to Liverpool. Cheers Andy! MUCH, much appreciated!

The Marine - 5.5/10 (although not "all that" when considering some parts of John Cena's acting..)

Gridiron Gang - 7.5/10 .. Touching stuff.. At first I didn't like it because it seemed a lot like Longest Yard, however, its a nice picture and also, is inspired by a true story. Between us... I almost shed a tear.. :\, but, that's JUST between us...

Ah great! I've completed the implementation of the change I mentioned in the previous post and also, did some basic testing and its running pretty well!

By now I hope you would've gathered that the change I made was in the layout and color scheme of the blog.. I played with the CSS and colors etc and found this to be a good mix of them all.

Well I hope you like the 'update' to the blog and it would be great to have some feedback (positive or negative, as is the case).

PS. I know there's an issue with this new layout and IE6 - issue being that the border lines around the posts sometimes disappear. I believe that this is the handy work of the IE6 'Peek-a-boo' bug... however, I don't think it's that big a problem to warrant the stress and hours needed to fix it, so... I've left it alone for now. Btw, good news, IE7 fixes that 'bug' and thus far is seeming more standards-compliant! Hopefully one day, I won't have to worry about creating a "beauty" in FF and then switching to IE and seeing a "beast" ! .. Here's to the future! *touches champagne glass

That's right! Its been one month since I made my first post!

I intend to do a little something special to celebrate so hopefully I get to incorporate it before the day is done.

PS. Thanks a lot to my readers (browser or RSS based), the support and comments have been pretty good and inspiring!

This weekend, Bim has some serious entertainment going on.

First, Saturday has this Sunset Jam thing with Damian Marley, Baby Cham (please don't make the mistake I did and type in babycham.com ...) and Coco Tea performing. And as Damian Marley is still pretty much "it" now and Baby Cham put out an album earlier this year, it probably will be worth it (depending on which ticket you get of course, ie $50, $60, $125BDS - cost/benefit analysis!).

On Sunday, there's the Miss Barbados Universe 2007 show to complete the weekend. Want to read a bit more on the contestants? (or if you're not from Barbados,.. want to see what Barbados has to offer? ) Check here and have a quick peek.

I honestly doubt I'll be making it to any of these shows so don't look out for reviews. . However, if you do attend and would like to post your thoughts in the Comments for this post, please, feel free, I'm sure they will be appreciated.

Does this picture remind you of yourself? Hum? Trying to fit in eating breakfast during your daily Internet ramblings? If it is, you're in bad bad shape.

For me its not looking good either, I finally got the courage to do the Internet Addiction Test and I scored a 52... and the Results box commented, "You are experiencing occasional or frequent problems because of the Internet. You should consider their full impact on your life." :\

Also, ... I think this blogging thing may be feeding my Internet addiction... *sniff, not good. I suggest you get tested too, probably we can start an IAA (Internet Addicts Anonymous) group or something... This is serious business people!!

When working with asp2, CSS is a must. Actually, when working with any web site project, CSS is a must. This I understand and am totally cool with.... UNTIL it gets to testing CSS in multiple browsers.

Time and Time again, I create a nice layout in IE (the default browser for VS'05) and try to run it in FF and there are problems. My latest problem is with the "em" which is used for text sizing (I believe it acts like a percentage... ie font-size: 1.2em is 120 percent of the normal text size).

Basically, what was happening was that some text in IE was showing bigger than text in FF. Why? I don't have a clue. I did some rough checking in the CSS files, however didn't find anything that strikes me as wrong. Before I go any further though, I must admit, I'm not a CSS guru therefore somewhere in my ".css" may be some ".foolishness", I accept that...

Now... On to the remedy or, "tip".. If you've been getting this problem or one similar to it, I suggest you LEARN CSS PROPERLY ... In the event that you're like me though and couldn't be bothered for now, just set your font-size to absolute values ie font-size: 12px and it should work fine (hopefully).

It's after midnight and I'm still awake pushing hard at my ASP.NET 2 (asp2 hereafter). Thus far it's been an interesting ride, and out of all these "cool" features that asp2 Webcast presenters boast of, I think the coolest (and easiest) thing I've seen is the entire 'securing the web site' functionality.

That's right, not Themes (CSS applied to .NET controls), or Master pages (a theory that was around for ages but now streamlined in VS'05) or even the new, very highly regarded GridView control (even though this is pretty cool!). The 'securing the web site' tools have taken the cake!

The way VS'05 + asp2 handles the basic security for a web site using the ASP.NET Web site Management tool (which integrates nicely with the behind-the-scenes ASPNETDB), Roles, Membership, Login controls, etc, is pretty useful once you get it understood. I've also tried to do some basic 'security checks' on some small test sites I created and the level of security seems to be pretty OK as well.

Now with asp2 going full steam ahead, I assume it'll soon be 'complete' (to an extent) and next up will be AJAX (I really hope that's fun...). That's one thing about the MS-route though, there's never a dull moment. .NET Framework 3.0 anyone??

I had the most shocking email in my inbox late Monday night, can you guess what it was about? I'll give you a clue, it has something to do with the 'Christians ... please, keep your eyes open' post.

Anyway, without wasting any more time, the email I am referring to is an Invite to SmutVibes.com (YES BELIEVE IT) titled "Join me on smutvibes.com". (Sounds familiar? The invite to ChristianVibes was titled "Join me on christianvibes.com".)

Now, if I got that email I assume some of you will get it soon also, just watch out for it and please, if you want to verify that the site is full of lewd stuff, DON'T DO IT AT WORk. I've been hearing some fishy stuff lately and the last time I checked, you get fired for that kinda stuff! (violating Acceptable Use Policy I think it should be.)

PS. Of course I will assume it was pure coincidence that that email was sent to me a couple hours after I wrote the ChristianVibes post.

Have you seen the front page of today's Nation newspaper? I think you should have a quick look here.

Yes, that's right another girl doing the now infamous "dutty wuk". But this is not new so why did I dedicate an additional post to it? ... Because, finally it has been documented (Ref- See front page of today's Nation newspaper and the continuation on page 4) that persons are actually dying from doing this dance! A dance I might add, which some night clubs (no name, no blame, no lockup) seem to promote (with competitions and prizes and such).

So in summary, girls, please, it is not cool, you can seriously injure yourself while doing this "rhythmic, rapid spinning of the neck and posterior simultaneously in opposite directions" (as The Nation describes it). And, like that 18-year-old girl they mentioned in the aforementioned article, you can die from the injuries sustained doing the dance. Now tell me, you would like to die from doing a dance? .. Really? Then again, I'm sure you will be remembered....... or not.

If persons don't take this seriously, someone (or organisation) with the authority may have to intervene and put a "ban" on this dance (not sure how they'll do/implement that one) and possibly also stop the the song from being played on the radio. I figure it'll take probably 1 person in Bim to die doing this dance and then, the "public" will start to speak... But won't that be 1 person too late?

(For those of you who've never seen the dance (if indeed that set of people exists), you can go to YouTube and do a search for "dutty wine" and watch a video or two to be educated on how... "unique" (for lack of a better word) this dance is.)