Rick Strahl's Web Log

Weblog Posts in March 2005

Updating a tree display using the HTML DOM
March 30, 2005 @ 9:10 pm

I decided today that after posting a bunch of links into my help files that it would be nice to sync the help topic and TOC in my help links. These help files are generated by Help Builder and I've now updated the functionality so that a topic selection syncs both topic and TOC. Here's how this works.

5 comments

Need a little help with Web Browser Control editing - Focus issues
March 29, 2005 @ 3:16 pm

I've hit a snag in my Html Edit Control integration in Help Builder where focus to the control is lost and cannot be returned properly into the active cursor position. When tabbing off to another app and returning focus returns to the control, but the control is no longer in live edit mode.

16 comments

A few trivial performance test to verify some 'assumptions'
March 28, 2005 @ 10:07 pm

I ran a couple of tests dealing with performance comparisons between direct object access vs. property access, using different DataRow indexers and the effect of up casting objects.

3 comments

What, no Whidbey Version???
March 25, 2005 @ 6:08 pm

A couple of customers were complaining today that there are no Whidbey versions of some of our software. Last I checked Whidbey is at least a half year (if not more like a year) from shipping, yet some people already treat it as a product.

9 comments

Using Tooltips for useful information in WinForms Lists
March 23, 2005 @ 4:07 am

Use a tooltip to create quick lookups of content in lists to avoid having to navigate the list selection. A quick summary view can save you a few clicks and make your work more efficient.

It’s official – Web Connection 4.65 has been released
March 22, 2005 @ 4:05 am

Here's a bit of background on the latest Web Connection release that provides a lot more detail on the why's of some of the new features and how they are implemented.

3 comments

Installing a new Hard Disk
March 20, 2005 @ 4:25 am

Ah, the joy of hardware installations. I'm going through a new harddisk installation and it's a huge time sink even though the process went very painlessly this time around. The good news is, as always after a reinstall the machine is much more responsive now!

1 comment

What happened to NewsGator?
March 20, 2005 @ 3:24 am

The NewsGator Outlook plug-in seems to have vanished from the Newsgator Web site. Looks like the corporate Nazis have taken over and decreed that NewsGator will deal purely in Services. Forget it I'm not game - services are evil.

6 comments

Some updates coming in Web Connection 4.65 in a few days
March 16, 2005 @ 4:50 pm

Version 4.65 of Web Connection is on its way. Here are a few new features and enhancements that you can look forward to.

A simple GhostScript PS to PDF C++ DLL wrapper
March 16, 2005 @ 3:46 pm

Here is a simple Win32 DLL C++ wrapper function for converting PostScript files to PDF using GhostScript.

14 comments

Help Builder online .NET Assembly Importer Demo updated
March 15, 2005 @ 1:49 am

I've updated the Help Builder .NET assembly importer demo that allows you to upload a .NET assembly and let Help Builder document it for you. The end result is a Zip file to you with a CHM file and HTML pages for the documentation.

1 comment

Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
March 15, 2005 @ 12:36 am

Why oh why do consumer software utilities not run on server? Well we all know why: Greed. And because they can get away with this shit in the Enterprise market that will pay 10 times as much as consumer products for basically the same core functionality...

16 comments

Need some C++ help: Linker can't find a function in my source
March 13, 2005 @ 8:55 pm

I could use some help from somebody a little more familiar with C++ than I am. Specifically I have a problem with linking a project that has a couple of source files and is not recognizing some of my functions I've added to the original library treating them as externals.

6 comments

.NET Language Wars? Nah, we need Language Detente!
March 12, 2005 @ 10:20 pm

There's too much controversy about which language is the better language C# or VB.NET. Each and every one of us probably has a preference one way or the other but that doesn't mean we can't use each others code. .NET makes it easy enough to share code in different languages and the languages feature sets are close enough that nobody needs to feel 'left behind' much less abandoned by Microsoft.

3 comments

Music Match pisses me off yet again - time to look for another player
March 12, 2005 @ 9:31 pm

I'm fed up with MusicMatch which I've been using for a while now. Huge resource usage and something is screwed up with the damn thing that sucks the CPU dry while playing music. To top it off most players do a horrible job getting music down to my IPod. Whine, whine...

156 comments

And the Whidbey SmartPhone Saga continues with the February CTP
March 12, 2005 @ 3:58 am

I was hoping the February CTP would finally allow me to build SmartDevice applications so I can start working on my DevTeach session but this version seems to make the issues I was having with the November and December CTPs even worse not even getting the form designer to come up.

1 comment

Help Builder is sucking my will to live...
March 12, 2005 @ 3:34 am

Well, it seems that way. I’ve been getting lots of great feedback and I’m constantly finding a few more tweaks to add and improve the Help Builder Interface. But man is it sucking time at the moment. Today I shot myself in the foot with some operator error steps in uploading the wrong version of the software to the server. Talk about maintenance nightmare...

Making the case for a slimmed down .NET
March 11, 2005 @ 1:40 am

Richard Grimes' farewell to .NET article sparked a boatload of negative commentary that buried much of the valid commentary made. I tend to agree on a number of his points particularily in regards to the the size of the .NET framework. Here's why...

13 comments

Are you a Microsoft MVP? Get a FREE copy of West Wind Html Help Builder
March 09, 2005 @ 3:55 am

Yup if you are an MVP drop me a line and I'll pass on a free copy of Help Builder to you. No strings, no signup - I just ask for feedback. Time to start documenting your code and architecture and applications? Maybe this can be an incentive...

6 comments

Help Builder 4.05 improves .NET support
March 07, 2005 @ 6:17 pm

Help Builder 4.05 was supposed to be a very minor update. Instead user feedback of the last few days inspired a number of fixes and improvements that amount to a fairly significant update. Here are some additional details and a behind the scenes look.

1 comment

Finding the .NET Framework Path
March 07, 2005 @ 12:49 am

It's ridiculous what you have to go through just to find the .NET framework installation path. Here's the approach I use, by checking teh registry for some ASP.NET keys that provide the needed info, if available and using a brute force approach if it's not.

14 comments

Web Browser Control Flicker
March 06, 2005 @ 4:36 pm

Getting the Web Browser Control to not flicker and handle Editing with dialogs popping up to save changes takes some work. Here is a dirty solution for Visual FoxPro that works.

6 comments

IsFinal and IsSealed in Reflection
March 03, 2005 @ 6:24 pm

When parsing through methods with Reflection in a number of cases it turns out that both IsVirtual and IsSealed are set at the same time?

1 comment

Retrieving only Declared Interfaces with .NET
March 03, 2005 @ 6:01 am

Using Reflection, try and retrieve only the declared Interfaces of a type. By declared I mean only those implemented by the type, not interfaces Inherited. Reflection makes retrieval of types and interfaces very easy with the GetInterfaces() method. Unfortunately GetInterfaces() doesn’t provide a lot of flexibility in what gets retrieved.

5 comments

Fixing Internet Exploer - should we care? I think so...
March 01, 2005 @ 3:24 am

There's more to Internet Explorer than we often think about. IE won't go away even if another browser stole the market completely - embedded IE is driving a lot of the software you use today and there are not a lot of reasonable alternatives.

8 comments

Working with Universal Time Values and the Database
March 01, 2005 @ 2:02 am

Thinking out aloud about handling DateTime values for a multi-location application.

5 comments