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February 2007 - Posts

Wednesday, February 28, 2007 6:32 AM

:) What are the only three fruits native to North America?

Answer: Blueberries, cranberries, and Concord grapes. Source: The 365 amazing trivia facts calendar for 2007
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
Wednesday, February 28, 2007 6:31 AM

SYSK 297: Condense JavaScript Code for Faster Download

Did you notice that Microsoft AJAX library JavaScript files come packaged as release and debug files; e.g. MicrosoftAjax.js and MicrosoftAjax.debug, MicrosoftAjaxWebForms.js and MicrosoftAjaxWebForms.debug.js, etc? One of the differences is that the release
Posted by irenak | 2 Comments
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Tuesday, February 27, 2007 5:30 AM

:) Which American state was the first to officially abolish slavery?

Answer: Vermont, in 1777, in its constitution. Source: The 365 amazing trivia facts calendar for 2007
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
Tuesday, February 27, 2007 5:27 AM

SYSK 296: MSI Inventory tool

Do you want to see a list of products installed on your computer? What about a list of orphaned components? How about shared components? You can get this information for products that were installed using Microsoft Windows Installer technology (.msi)
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments

Attachment(s): msiinv.zip
Monday, February 26, 2007 5:11 AM

:) Wreaths made of what vegetable were awarded to victorious athletes at the Nemean games in ancient Greece?

Answer: Fresh wild celery (at that time known as parsley). Both, celery and parsley, were called selinon by the ancient Greeks. Source: The 365 amazing trivia facts calendar for 2007
Posted by irenak | 4 Comments
Monday, February 26, 2007 5:10 AM

SYSK 295: Difference between password handling in SQL 2000 and SQL 2005

Did you know that in SQL Server 2000, the engine used to maintain two copies/versions of each SQL Server login password. One contained the actual password supplied by the user, and the second one was the password converted by SQL Server to all uppercase
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
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Friday, February 23, 2007 5:18 AM

:) Why Tundra flowers are mostly white or yellow?

Answer: Tundra flowers are pollinated mostly by flies (too cold for bees), and since, unlike bees, flies cannot distinguish colors, the flowers do not need to be so colorful… Source: Biggest Ever Book of Questions & Answers
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
Friday, February 23, 2007 5:17 AM

SYSK 294: Surf Internet Anonymously

If you use Internet, chances are, your surfing habits and your overall Internet activity has been tracked and recorded by the web sites you’ve visited (including search engines) and your Internet service provider. Moreover, there is plethora of spyware,
Posted by irenak | 3 Comments
Thursday, February 22, 2007 5:18 AM

:) Who was the first king to be called “the Great”?

Answer: Alexander III, the king of Macedonia (356-323 BC) who overthrew the Persian Empire. Source: The 365 amazing trivia facts calendar for 2007
Posted by irenak | 1 Comments
Thursday, February 22, 2007 5:17 AM

SYSK 293: Business Rules – Easy, Flexible, Decoupled

From what I see, in this version, Microsoft Windows Workflow Foundation doesn’t allow you to author and use business rules without a link to an activity or a workflow… Also, the types of rules you can create are somewhat limited… After spending some time
Posted by irenak | 5 Comments
Wednesday, February 21, 2007 6:53 AM

:) In real-estate shorthand, what does the acronym FDR represent?

Answer: Formal Dining Room. Source: The 365 amazing trivia facts calendar for 2007
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
Wednesday, February 21, 2007 6:52 AM

SYSK 292: Assembly in GAC != Assembly in Add References .NET tab

Some think that .NET tab in Add References dialog shows shared assemblies residing in global assembly cache (GAC). This is incorrect. The assembly list in that tab comes from assemblies found in a few folders, not GAC; and the folders themselves are listed
Posted by irenak | 1 Comments
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Tuesday, February 20, 2007 5:19 AM

:) What was the original name of the Bank of America?

Answer: The Bank of Italy. It was started in San Francisco in 1904 by Amadeo Giannini, the son of Italian immigrants, who changed its name to Bank of America in 1928. Source: The 365 amazing trivia facts calendar for 2007
Posted by irenak | 1 Comments
Tuesday, February 20, 2007 5:18 AM

SYSK 291: SQL 2005 SP 2 is Available and Comes with Good News About Licensing Costs

With SQL Server 2005 SP2 released to the web on Feb. 19, 2007, SQL Server Enterprise Edition customers, and I quote, “only need to purchase one license per physical processor regardless of the number of virtually deployed instances. “ In other words,
Posted by irenak | 1 Comments
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Monday, February 19, 2007 7:03 AM

:) How did enthusiasts come to be called buffs – as in sports buffs, opera buffs, and computer buffs?

Answer: From the buff-colored coats once worn by New York City volunteer firemen who became known as fire buffs. Source: The 365 amazing trivia facts calendar for 2007
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
Monday, February 19, 2007 7:02 AM

SYSK 290: ASP.NET AJAX -- $get vs. $find

Microsoft ASP.NET AJAX comes with a new method for getting a reference to an object representing an element on the page, e.g. input control, button, etc. -- $get . However, you might notice that there is another function that appears to do same thing
Posted by irenak | 3 Comments
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Friday, February 16, 2007 5:11 AM

:) What country requires judges to wear wigs?

Answer: In Great Britain judges still wear wigs maintaining an old tradition going back to 18 th century. The judge’s robe and the wig serve as an indication that the judge is the courtroom as a representative of law of the land and not as a private person…
Posted by irenak | 1 Comments
Friday, February 16, 2007 5:10 AM

SYSK 289: Want to Have a Choice of Running an XBAP Application in a Standalone Mode Using the Same Project File?

If this title is totally confusing to you, you may want to check out one of my previous posts XBAP Introduction … Based on same concept described in How to use the latest version of Visual Studio and build your project targeting earlier version of .NET
Posted by irenak | 1 Comments
Thursday, February 15, 2007 5:13 AM

:) Why are many Arctic shrubs evergreen?

Answer: There are only a few summer months at the Arctic suitable for the plants to photosynthesize and make their food. So, Arctic plants have adapted by keeping on the leaves formed in late summer, protected by dead leaves formed earlier in the year,
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
Thursday, February 15, 2007 5:11 AM

SYSK 288: Callbacks vs. Delegates Explained…

I’ve come across a number of write-ups some of which are conflicting each other when it comes to callbacks and delegates… So, I decided to create this post, which is my understanding of callbacks and delegates as applicable to .NET developers. First,
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
Wednesday, February 14, 2007 6:22 AM

:) How much time per day does the average giraffe spend sleeping?

Answer: About 20 minutes, normally standing up, and usually for about 5 minutes or so at a time. Source: The 365 amazing trivia facts calendar for 2007
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
Wednesday, February 14, 2007 6:21 AM

SYSK 287: Custom C#/VB (CLR) Types Used in SQL Server

Did you know that you can use custom CLR types in Microsoft SQL Server by adding [ Serializable , Microsoft.SqlServer.Server. SqlUserDefinedType ] attribute? And, yes, you can implement and use methods – see Microsoft.SqlServer.Server. SqlMethod attribute…
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
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Tuesday, February 13, 2007 5:12 AM

:) What’s the difference between heat and temperature?

Answer: Heat is the combined energy of all moving molecules. Temperature is a measure of how fast the molecules are moving. Source: Biggest Ever Book of Questions & Answers (excellent, in my opinion, book for kids and adults)
Posted by irenak | 2 Comments
Tuesday, February 13, 2007 5:10 AM

SYSK 286: What Does a Web Service Proxy Look Like on a Client Side?

AJAX.NET makes it extremely simple to call a web service from a client using JavaScript… But if you’re having problems, it helps to understand what your web service proxy looks like… For example, if you have the following web service: using System; using
Posted by irenak | 1 Comments
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Monday, February 12, 2007 5:27 AM

:) What is the lowest denomination of paper currency ever issued by the U.S. government?

Answer: 3 cents. During the Civil War, when people were hoarding coins for their metallic value or melting them down to make ammunition, the U.S. Bureau of Engraving and Printing started issuing postage-stamp-size “fractional currency” in 3, 5, 10, 25,
Posted by irenak | 1 Comments
Monday, February 12, 2007 5:25 AM

SYSK 285: Is JavaScript an Object Oriented Programming Language?

First, let’s agree on a definition of object oriented programming. It is generally agreed that “software objects” share two characteristics: they all have state and behavior (similar to real-life objects). Behavior is implemented through methods (a.k.a.
Posted by irenak | 4 Comments
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Friday, February 09, 2007 5:12 AM

SYSK 284: Calculating WeekOfYear in C# Using 1 Line of Code Without Referencing Microsoft.VisualBasic.dll

What week number (1 through 53) does January 6 th 2008 belong to using the standard US calendar with Sunday being the first day of the week? If you answered ‘1’, that’s incorrect – since Jan. 01, 2008 starts on a Tuesday, Jan. 06 th falls on Sunday and
Posted by irenak | 2 Comments
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Thursday, February 08, 2007 5:11 AM

SYSK 283: Use Caution When Using ‘Short’ Data Type in Enumerated Types

Consider the following innocent looking code: [System.Runtime.Serialization. DataContract ] public enum TestEnum : short { [System.Runtime.Serialization. EnumMember ] Undefined = 0, [System.Runtime.Serialization. EnumMember ] TestType1 = 1, [System.Runtime.Serialization.
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Wednesday, February 07, 2007 6:26 AM

SYSK 282: How JSON is Making Your Code Cleaner

Say, you have to pass in a large number of data elements into a web service (to me, more than 5 is “many”). You have a few options – pass them as individual parameters, put them all into one custom serializable class (e.g. MyMethodRequest object), pass
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
Tuesday, February 06, 2007 5:07 AM

SYSK 281: Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF): The Missing LinkButton

To my surprise, System.Windows.Controls does not have LinkButton! Perhaps Windows forms shouldn’t use links? But since my UI design team insisted on having them, I’ve created my own LinkButton (code below)… As always – use at your own risk… this code
Posted by irenak | 5 Comments
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Monday, February 05, 2007 4:47 AM

SYSK 280: ControlChars in C# Without Using Microsoft.VisualBasic Assembly

Microsoft.VisualBasic namespace has a handy class, ControlChars, with the following public fields: Back, Cr, CrLf, FormFeed, Lf, NewLine, NullChar, Quote, Tab, VerticalTab. After seeing some C# developers use it just for the simplicity of code like this:
Posted by irenak | 4 Comments
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Friday, February 02, 2007 8:14 AM

SYSK 279: What’s New in the World of Database Tuning?

Did you know that SQL 2005 Database Engine Tuning Advisor (replacement for SQL 2000 Index Tuning Wizard) can do its analysis using production server’s hardware configuration information, metadata and statistics, but perform the actual tuning on a test
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Thursday, February 01, 2007 5:03 AM

SYSK 278: How-To Use Windows Live Search on Your SharePoint Site

I just came across an excellent post by Ian Morrish that gives simple step-by-step instructions (with images!) on how to integrate with Windows Live search. First, download the SDK and create an application ID at http://search.msn.com/developer/default.aspx?FORM=PDDD2
Posted by irenak | 0 Comments
 
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