Installing WP7.1 Mango

Go an invite to participate and update my dev phone to WP7.1 Mango.

Guess what!!! I am installing it as we speak :) another couple of minutes and i should have my HTC Mozart running Mango

:) I am supposed to be a good boy and not start putting stuff on the net... guess what... who has the time :)

Deutsch Slydr 1.0 now in WP7 Marketplace

Just got a notification of Deutsch Slydr app's publication on marketplace.

Finally :)

We next due for marketplace submission
* French Slydr (hopefully in the next few hours)
* v1.4 for English Slydr (or sliding keyboard) will change logo to Slydr
* v1.1 for German Slydr (mainly bug fixes)

Hermit

WP7 Deutsch Slydr 1.0

Hello All,

German Slydr 1.0 which is based on Sliding Keyboard 1.3 is currently undergoing testing in WP7 Marketplace. The app contains German dictionary.
The 1.3 features include:
* Auto insert of first match when sliding is complete (when you lift your finger)
* Ability to correct the entry.
* Manual Edit of entered text (using microsoft keyboard)
* Copy to Clipboard for sharing with other apps.

The app should be out later on today.

Others in pipeline include French Slydr, Spanish Slydr and Italian Slyder.

WP7 sliding keyboard v1.2 Published

Hello All,

Sliding Keyboard v1.2 has been published to marketplace finally.

It contains a better word matching algorithm that should fine better results for tracing.
Default tracing speed is Normal. It you have issues with word matches please try changing the speed to Slow or to fast and that should change the results you get substantially.

I will try to put 1.4 out to marketplace today. It contains various fixes and the ability to remember previous usage. There is also an option for broad search which allows for non precise swipe start (though it becomes slower as it searches 4 / 6 times more data).

Please remember Sliding Keyboard only contains English (American / British Dictionary).

WP7 sliding keyboard

Hello All,
I am the person who has been working on the standalone Sliding Keyboard app available on WP7 marketplace.

I agree that v1.0 was pretty awful. It was a proof of concept on my part. I did not force any one of pay for it and trial mode was enabled. If however you did pay, thank you - I dont have a single penny / cent out of it yet.

Being called Swype ripoff hurts though it certainly is true. I first used swype on WinMo 6.5 and it was brilliant. Unfortunately nothing like that is available on WP7 Marketplace. In current iteration, 3rd party keyboards are not allowed. I wanted to write something that worked like Swype.

I am however improving the app as much as i can.
v1.1 changed to algorithm to provide better matches. v1.1 also provided ability to auto insert on comma, fullstop or space.

v1.2 has been in testing since last Friday and it includes a much better algorithm for work matching. That update also contains the ability to automatically insert the first match. The user can then change it by selecting correct entry from list or can cancel the last entry by pressing X.
v1.2 also added updated dictionary (both British and American)

Since then i have further improved the app but since v1.2 has not gone live, i cannot submit v1.3/v1.4 for testing.
v1.3 / v1.4 stores existing matches so it builds a list as you use it and next time it detects same input, it uses existing match. It also provides ability to allow for broad match (uses neighbouring characters to ensure a broad search is executed, this allows for a non precise slide action). The broad search does make it slower as it searches for matches in at least 4 times more data. when broad search is off, the start of swipe determines that search range and is therefore faster.

In v1.5 (which will happen in next version not current v1.3 / v1.4), i will add ability to add user additions to list.

I would like to thank many of you who have provided me with useful pointers.
1) v1.0 dictionary was limited.
2) Auto insert / auto space.

Any suggestions are most welcome.

Regards,

Hermit

Beware of Halfords sale - HotUKDeals Forum

Beware of Halfords sale - HotUKDeals Forum: "Last week i was looking for bike carriers on halfords and i found a high mount 3 bike carrier for £ 56.

Earyly today morning i get an email informing me about 50% sale on all items including bike carriers. I check the item in question and guess what. they modified the details to have retail price to £ 89 and sale price to be £ 56.

What's the point of having a sale if the price remains the same."

mounting skydrive in windows home server

two days back i finally removed vista from my workstation at home and converted it to become a home server. I was interested in taking some backups to sky drive.

Good search came up with Gladinet which supports mounting cloud based storage and skydrive is one of them (though most people complain about whs not being supported)

Well i installed Gladinet and on running it i got a Port 80 in use error. Which look up suggested that IIS is the culprit (ofcourse WHS exposes itself through web interface too). Opened IIS, modified default website to consume 8008 instead of 80 and that was all.

Gladinet started up jut fine, connected it up to skydrive and copied 10 gigs worth of pictures :)

Intelligent design vs. Evolution

You would have imagined that the place for Intelligent design would be in a schools Religous Education curriculum. Oh well some of the rather stupidly religious and blank minded members of Dover Area School in Pennsylvania, USA changed the rules and made it compulsory for the students to be taught about ID before being taught about Evolution (in a Biology class).

A few days back I even read about Vatican saying that ID had its place in christian explaination of the world and that it should not be taken as a science. I agree there are lot of religions and how far would the board go... accomodate a chapter for each religions version of ID !!! oh well thats a thought... but there's no place for it in Biology class...
In the latest battle, a federal judge said Tuesday that 'Intelligent design is a religious alternative masquerading as a scientific theory and cannot be mentioned in biology classes in a Pennsylvania public school district'

Complete Catalog at Microsoft E-Learning

List of courses at Microsoft E-Learning. A lot of these are free ones. Have a look

Oracle coming out with Express edition

A few weeks back I read in VSJ magazine that Oracle was coming out with Oracle Developer Tools for Oracle 10g database which would sort of enable use of .net framework in Oracle.

I logged into OTN and I had a sniff around. Over the last few years MSDE which is the stripped down SQL Desktop Engine has gained a lot of support and market because even though it's limited functionality, it still can do lot of shit. The new version of SQL Server is also coming out with new MSDE christined SQL Server 2005 Express Edition. What I saw on OTN surprised me. Oracle wants a piece of it too.

The release 2 supports .net framework 1.0 and above and you can write stored procedures and probably functions using .net. It creates PL/SQL wrappers for the .net code and when called it loads CLR as a seperate process and uses LPC to communicate with CLR. That would sort of do the job but maybe take a little longer. The fact that thats all you can do with .net is the limiting factor.

Even IBM who I consider proponents of Java support .net framework 1.1 in there DB2 UDB 8.2 or something like that. They like Oracle allow only Stored Proc and UDFs using .net languages. The CLR is again hosted in a seperate process.

I think SQL 2005 has the most extensive implementation out there supporting, Stored Procs, UDFs, UDTs, Triggers etc.

Free e-learning courses from microsoft

I came across these when I was browsing sql developer center yesterday. There are some great e-learning courses for free for the next 6 months on microsoft learning.

For SQL 2005 click here

For Visual studio 2005 & .net 2.0 click here

Currently I am going through SQL 2005 course. It's alright so far. Give it a go.
Good luck coding.

BrowserCaps and other Browser Testing/Detection Resources

BrowserCaps for ASP.NET machine.config / web.config

Over the last few weeks I have been looking around the net, to find someway, to modify the useragent of IE 7 beta. It would just crash on asp.net application sighting a error converting 7.0b of the user-agent.
Finally today's search lead me to the above site which looks promising.. I will modify the web.config and add new browsers to browscap section.. hopefully it will work.

iPod Nano

I was just reading how easily they get scratched on The Register. I have seen earlier iPods look absolutely horrendous (due to scratching)... Looks like the 4th Gen Nano's just about the same.

Anyways... I agree apple's fantastic when it comes to design.... Though they are crap when it comes to making it. Oh well the fanboys... Or rather the geeks who just like to show that they are so bloody hip deserve to get slapped... not by be but by the company itself... Hold on.. they already are...

I think everybody should do something... Buy the Nano's and keep them with the rest of the trophies.... Maybe one day sell it off to antics... Oh shit... It just got scratched on the way to the blimey shop...

Rich Dad, Poor Dad

I am just on verge of finishing this book Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert T. Kiyosaki. It's a great book. To the point and very right...
I have always been a believer of 'Show me the Money' (from Jerry Maguire) and I have a plan formulating in my brain. I am broke (as he says broke is temporary)... got married last month didn't I %>) but I will keep the advice in mind.

I have also decided to pursue a marketing course at some point. We shall see how that goes.

I have also decided that I am done investing in gadgets. I think it's time for real assets rather than stupid computers and bikes and pocket pcs and shite. Only time will tell.

The Road Not Taken - Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

------------------------------------------

I was going through a book called Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert T. Kiyosaki and i came across The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost. I think I remember it from my school days but it was nice to read it again. It's more inspiring now then it was back then.

The Apple Product Cycle

I have been following the The Apple Product Cycle for a while and this description just hit the nail... it's so funny and to the point... I bet the poor bastard who wrote this, has been getting hate mail all day long ever since he wrote this.

Adding Custom Search using IE 7 beta

Its like somebody read my mind... a few days back i was whining about not being able to search Google.co.uk... i like search Pages with UK and about not being able to add other Search providers... I just noticed on IE blog they have given a registry script by which you can add custom search options.
They have shown using msdn search as a part of IE... that is top thinking...
i am going to add that and Google UK search.
Here is post from IE Team

And here is my version of script based on their post.

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\SearchScopes\MSDN]
"DisplayName"="MSDN Library"
"URL"="http://search.microsoft.com/search/results.aspx?qu=%s&View=msdn"

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\SearchScopes\Google.co.uk]
"DisplayName"="Google UK"
"URL"="http://www.google.co.uk/search?sourceid=ie7&rls=com.microsoft:en-US&ie=utf8&oe=utf8&q=%s"

Absolutely fantastic

First Look at Internet Explorer 7 Beta 1

After a bit of messing around... I downloaded IE 7... there was a surprise to start with it was only about 10 megs for a change... though I haven't worried about file sizes for a long long time.



Once downloaded, I created a System Restore point as I have in past, installed Alpha / Beta software and managed to completely shaft my systems... :) so I wasn't in a mood to reinstall all the shit all over again...

Installation of IE 7 beta was pretty fast... It first needed a genuine windows authentication check ... Oh well it's PC at work.. too bad if it's not licensed... here we go... no nasty surprises... it all went smoothly and IE got to backing up the files and installing itself.... after about 2 minutes I was prompted to finish and reboot the box...
It took a minute to set up personalised shortcuts etc and it was show time...

The main window is slightly modified... I am still getting used to the Menu options being a part of each tab rather than being at the top most level.
There's a search tab on the top right... and it provides the user with a simple way to query the few search engines





There's been a big fuss about toolbars from Yahoo and Google etc not working. As you can see they are working just fine... Don't know what the fuss is all about... Though I have to admit, I pretty much update my software now and again.. it's possible that the people who have had problems probably had old versions...



To open a new tab you click the empty square right most tab. if you are browsing the web and would like to open the link in a tab its pretty hand... right click and just select Open in New Tab



Closing in slightly inconvenient... you have to right click the tab and click Close. Or you can click the X at the right hand side of the Tab Control.

Off late there's been a lot of phishing scams and browsers have been come under fire for not having anti phishing checks etc. IE beta incorporates a Anti Phishing Filter. M$ maintains a black list of sorts and has the option for user submission.





As far as stability is concerned I think it's been okay so far... Though on a colleagues computer its been crashing every now and again... Keep your fingers crossed.

IE 7 is also RSS aware as you might already know... If a page contains RSS the icon lights up (changes to orange) and you can have a look at the RSS feed.



I will update the post when I have more to comment on it. Have fun

Ebuyer Hard Drive Hard Plastic IDE Caddy With 2 Fan + Lock

Ebuyer Hard Drive Hard Plastic IDE Caddy With 2 Fan + Lock

I would rate this as one of my best ever purchases. I am sick and tired of my machines going down and when they do... i have to go through the nightmare of swapping hard drives to get the data.. This has just made my life so bloody easy.

All i have to do is switch the pc off and pull the caddy out and shove it in the second pc... and off it goes... i have access to my files... couldn't be easier (well it can... but i would need hot swap functionality)... for 3 and half quid..... i can live without it for now.... 5 star ratings from me

The Code Project - Smart Alarm using OpenNetCF and C# for SmartPhone (Windows Mobile 2003) - .NET Compact Framework

The Code Project - Smart Alarm using OpenNetCF and C# for SmartPhone (Windows Mobile 2003) - .NET Compact Framework.

The folks are code project just moved my arcticles from un-edited user submissions to .net >> .net CF >> Applications section after editing it.

In 3 days and 960+ hits i think it its not too bad (though it could just be the title). Would love for more feedback though i only had one comment (OpenNetCF not OpenCFNet) and one rating 4 of 5.... C'mon people...