Hey, I still have a blog! Nearly forgotten 🙂

And what I'll use it for? You figured out, loosy advertising…

Most of my readers (are there any? :)) know that I'm involved with Agile development methodologies a lot. Therefore came up the question what tools do I and you suggest for using to commit yourself to Agile and related methodologies. Here is my list (a bit .NET biased):

• TFS (What else? :))
• Greenhopper – http://www.atlassian.com/software/greenhopper
• Crucible – http://www.atlassian.com/software/crucible/
• JIRA – http://www.atlassian.com/software/jira/
• Trac – http://trac.edgewall.org/
• TeamCity – http://www.jetbrains.com/teamcity/
• YouTrack – http://www.jetbrains.com/youtrack/
• Selenium – http://seleniumhq.org/
• White – http://white.codeplex.com/
• CruiseControl.NET – http://confluence.public.thoughtworks.org/display/CCNET/Welcome+to+CruiseControl.NET
• TestDriven.NET – http://www.testdriven.net/
• ReSharper – http://www.jetbrains.com/resharper/
• Hawkeye – http://www.acorns.com.au/projects/hawkeye/
• Snoop – http://snoopwpf.codeplex.com/
• NMock – http://www.nmock.org/
• Moq – http://code.google.com/p/moq/
• Pex & Moles – http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/pex/
• RhinoMock – http://www.ayende.com/projects/rhino-mocks.aspx
• Sound recording, live meeting & recording, skype sharing & recording, video conferencing, etc – everything that helps supporting geo- and TZ-diversity
• Of course cork board, post-its, pins, marker pens, etc

What is on your list?

How do you enhance your (agile?) workload? What tools do you think I missed but is a gem itself?

A side-question: are you more of a FOSS supporter or you don't mind paying for the tools if you get priority support, continuous dependable updates, etc. when the question is your IDE/development process tool support?

Did you know, that a GC can be forced in Visual Studio .NET?

Two options exists for it, depending on whether you changed the default key-bindings. If you press 'Ctrl+Alt+Shift+F12' with the built-in key-binding, it executes the Tools.ForceGC command. If this binding is unavailable, you still have the option to run it using nothing else than the good old find window. Press Ctrl+/ or click into the quick find window, and enter '>Tools.ForceGC'.

Long time no see for this blog. And how could it go forward other than a job advertisment? I promise I'll write up some more interesting stuff in the future, but for now the only thing I have in mind is this:

NET library, GUI and framework developer (ref no: 77193)
 
Position Description

We are seeking an enthusiastic committed and productive .NET C# developer of reusable WPF library components and applications for our highly demanding business clients and other developers. Primarily we will be developing .NET/WPF components and applications in a small team but working closely with developers and business clients throughout the bank. This will be a system that eventually replaces existing application shells and frameworks and allows integration of development efforts across multiple desktop applications.
 
There will be substantial challenges including bridging old application frameworks into the new framework while providing a clean efficient API for new modules. Aspects of layout, persistence, inter component communication (while maintaining component integrity), multiple desktop integration (across multiple machines), integration testing and remote administration will need to be considered. Our clients are spread throughout the bank and the challenge is to make our systems flexible enough to be used by multiple teams while meeting their exacting standards.

You would be able to work in a development team that is considered one of strongest in Budapest. You would have the opportunity to work in a team with extremely clever people and enjoy the complexity of the job. Here each day is a new challenge with endless learning possibilities.
 
To summarize – you would understand what it takes to create a great UI and be passionate about doing this.
 
Skills Required

• Strong fundamental technology skills (OO design, threading)
• Solid .NET C# experience.
• WPF, Silverlight or Winforms experience.
• Knowledge of SDLC best practice
• Ability to converse with other .NET developers on complicated technical requirements
• Have an interest and aptitude for technology
• Can adapt to a dynamic and multifaceted environment where business and technical skills are intermingled
• Good verbal and written communication skills in English

 
Skills Desired

• Deep knowledge of at least 1 UI component suite (Infragistics/Syncfusion/DevExpress)
• Proven ability to deliver high-quality software working in multi-person  / multi-region teams
• Focus on User Experience

 
The candidate may choose to work in London or in Budapest. Please let me know whether you are interested!

I finished some of my projects:

• participated in http://www.telesport.hu – got 'International Site of the year' award from Sitecore (company: Hungarian Television)
• created http://videotar.mtv.hu, which was shortlisted for 'Best TV on the web' award at I. Creative WebVideo competition (no awards were given) (company: Hungarian Television)
• created http://apps.facebook.com/babylook for creating, publishing, attaching, sending, etc. your future baby's face (company: Merck)
• created http://apps.facebook.com/cokeclubnaptar for receiving and sending calendar events about Coke Club in Siofok, Hungary (company: Coca Cola)
• and many more internal and/or non-disclosable (:() external projects

And some new technologies appeared on the horizon to work with (among the existing ones) on some very fascinating projects:

• Google Wave
• Software as a Service
• Cloud APIs
• Domain Specific Languages
• Continuous Integration
• Team Foundation Server

After trying to tie the delicious into the blogroll, the only success was having each entry displayed as a blogpost – which cluttered everything, and pushed down more meaningful posts on the main page for http://dotneteers.net and http://petersm.dotneteers.net. The solution was using Aghy's method to embed the javascript roll for delicious into the sidebar here. So – no more links from months ago section in 'What kept me busy recently', if you are still interested in links, follow them on http://delicious.com/MountGellert.

Links (from february…)

Another short(?) list of links, still from February:

• Christian Helle's Blog: ListView Extended Styles in .NETCF
• http://www.nihilogic.dk/labs/canvas_sheet/HTML5_Canvas_Cheat_Sheet.png
• How to: Handle Screen Rotation
• Visualizing the Windows Mobile Virtual Memory Monster
• Alternate way to select ASP.NET server controls using jQuery
• Best job advertisment ever
• Deploying .NET Compact Framework 2.0 Applications with .cab and .msi Files
• Security, GPS and Resolution Awareness Tools
• Step by Step: Tips, Tricks, and Techniques for Debugging .NET Compact Framework Applications
• How to Soft Reset a Device programatically
• Using custom fonts on windows mobile devices
• The Crisis of Credit Visualized on Vimeo

Projects currently involved in are using…

Don't wait to hear names of clients here – just technology 🙂

In the meanwhile, list of technologies involved in projects are opening to an even wider platform (yeah, gaming):

• Windows Media Player
• Windows Media Center
• Wii
• PSP
• Nintendo DSi
• PS3
• XBOX360

I try to keep this up as a series, let's give it a try – you probably know my older series like this or this or even saw this live. And of course don't forget this. So after a long round of various sites and formats, here we are again. New age, new format – I try to break it into sections.

Certification

• Another paper (next to being Ariba Certified Developer, and of course many MS related things) to be hang on the wall – yesterday I became V5.3 Certified Developer Level 1 for Sitecore.

Humbling

• I look around the local IT, and what I see? We have 'cubic beer', BPNT (btw – congrats for 2nd birthday:)), Architecture forum (long live the dead), Architecture Academy (not quite architecture and not quite academy), Hungarian User Groups (long live the dead), HUNSUG (hope that there will be some success with this), inetpub, and more (sry if left out, it was not accidentally :)). I have a dream that one day this IT Crowd will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all IT people are created equal, and there should be NO 10 different gatherings, groups, events, etc.". In my imaginary world people would drop their preconceptions and forget their affairs with other companies, and spend time together. These would mean a f.e. bimonthly full day gathering in a multiroomed place (think of a school), with many 'tracks' running parallel like one for startups and investors, other for IT Pros, again another for Architects, one for the Business Analyst kind, etc. Sponsoring would be no brainer – IT newspapers, hardware and software stores would be more than happy to spend time there. It may be called just ITHU – no fancy names. But I see this would be a dream for another looooong time.

Projects currently involved in are using…

Don't wait to hear names of clients here – just technology 🙂

• Windows Mobile 6.1; PhoneGap; BlackBerry
• Storing data and running services in S3 & Azure
• Silverlight video player
• Multiple facebook and iWiw applications
• Live Services

Links (from february…)

• YUI 2.7.0 Released » Yahoo! User Interface Blog
• Christian Helle's Blog: ListView Extended Styles in .NETCF
• http://www.nihilogic.dk/labs/canvas_sheet/HTML5_Canvas_Cheat_Sheet.png
• How to: Handle Screen Rotation
• Visualizing the Windows Mobile Virtual Memory Monster
• Alternate way to select ASP.NET server controls using jQuery
• Best job advertisment ever
• Deploying .NET Compact Framework 2.0 Applications with .cab and .msi Files
• Security, GPS and Resolution Awareness Tools
• Step by Step: Tips, Tricks, and Techniques for Debugging .NET Compact Framework Applications

Just drop it in your page before the </body> tag:

    <script language="javascript" type="text/javascript">
        var prm = Sys.WebForms.PageRequestManager.getInstance();

        prm.add_initializeRequest(InitializeRequest);
        prm.add_endRequest(EndRequest);

        var oldClass = "";
       
        function InitializeRequest(sender, args) {
            var postBackElement = $get(args._postBackElement.id);
            if (postBackElement != null) {
                postBackElement.disabled = true;
                oldClass = postBackElement.className;
                postBackElement.className = postBackElement.className + " disabled";
            }
        }
       
        function EndRequest(sender, args) {
            var sourceElement = $get(sender._postBackSettings.sourceElement.id);
            if (sourceElement != null) {
                sourceElement.disabled = false;
                sourceElement.className = oldClass;
            }
            oldClass = "";
        }
    </script>

And add this to your CSS (you may differentiate this among various tags like img.disabled for imagebuttons or input.disabled for textboxes etc.):

.disabled
{
    FILTER: alpha(opacity=70);
    BACKGROUND-COLOR: gray;
    opacity: 0.7
}

Just be carefull if you change the class of the element in question (that originated the ajax postback) to register a client script block to set oldClass to the new value as well, otherways it would be overwritten.

At one my clients occured the problem of all videos being played 3 times 3 times 3 times instead of just one.

After some investigation, it turned out, that for each request coming for a WMV file instead of an ASX file is returned. For example, for a request for http://stream/stream.wmv the following asx was generated:

<asx version="3.0">
  <title>Stream</title>
<entry>
    <title>www.stream.hu</title>
    <ref href="http://stream3/stream.wmv" />
    <author>Stream</author>
    <copyright>(c) 2008 stream</copyright>
  </entry><entry>
    <title>www.stream.hu</title>
    <ref href="http://stream1/stream.wmv" />
    <author>Stream</author>
    <copyright>(c) 2008 stream</copyright>
  </entry><entry>
    <title>www.stream.hu</title>
    <ref href="http://stream2/stream.wmv" />
    <author>Stream</author>
    <copyright>(c) 2008 stream</copyright>
  </entry>
</asx>

If you read the specification for the ASX file format, this should/may be rewritten as:

<ASX VERSION="3.0">
<TITLE>Stream</TITLE>
   <ENTRY>
   <TITLE>www.stream.hu</TITLE>
      <REF HREF="http://stream3/stream.wmv" />
      <REF HREF="http://stream1/stream.wmv" />
      <REF HREF="http://stream2/stream.wmv" />
      <AUTHOR>Stream</AUTHOR>
      <COPYRIGHT>(c) 2008 stream</COPYRIGHT>
   </ENTRY>
</ASX>

This would instead of playing the three items after each other just choose the first one, that responds in a timely fashion from the list. The day is saved, the roundrobin load balancing still works as it should, and nothing plays three times three times three times.