Ahh the bleeding edge

Just Rambling

Can someone explain to me what drove me to uninstall the November VS2005 and SQL Server 2005 bits that were running all of my ADO.NET 2.0 demos perfectly well, and replace them with Feb CTP bits? Two days before I have to do a presentation that requires those demos? I’m not the bungee jumping type…really!

update: just to test my nerves a little, the new sql server bits wouldn’t install. Said I didn’t have the minimum config. I finally discovered that somehow it forgot about some of it’s RAM. I thought maybe the virtual DVD ROM was responsible but even disabling all of the drives didn’t help.

Finally I took the box apart and pulled the ram chips out and put them back in and started up. Now I was down to 256. I moved them around and got the beep beep beep (you know – moved them into bad spots) so I put them back in the original positions , restarted and my memory was back and my install went fine.

Over now to my compaq evo laptop which I use to demo whidbey stuff since I have to start updating that now, too. I haven’t used it in november. I couldn’t remember the password! Finally I got in as admin and changed the user password so that it matches my other computers. Oh lordy lord. What a fun night. 🙂



http://www.AcehAid.org

Consolidating Mike G

Community Cheerleading

Mike Gunderloy, one of the most prolific technical writers on the planet, has been doing reviews and columns for ADT for quite a long time. Mike is now going to do the reviews on his own larkware blog and you have probably already seen them. He has also done something that I think he totally deserves to be able to do and I have waited a few weeks to see what I thought of it. And I think it’s totally fine. He has sponsors on his Daily Grind blog posts. This is not the gross sponsorshop that a number of “a-list” bloggers recently did by contracting to find something to say about one particular totally unknown company in their posts periodically. I really did not like that one bit.

But having totally relevant companies subtly added at the end of the Daily Grind’s works for me. Mike works pretty hard on that feed and it is full of relevant and interesting information every single day. I also much prefer having the reviews come to me. I’m not one to go looking on a website every day to see what’s new.

How he finds time to explore so much software and so many books to do these reviews is beyond me.

I do look forward to Mike airing more of his opinion[ated :-)] pieces on the blog. I think he does a great job of keeping many of us in line!

http://www.AcehAid.org

User Group Leaders – PLEASE steal this idea

Ineta

I got this idea from attending and speaking at GUVSM meetings in Montreal and have been doing it at Vermont.NET since October of last year. I prepare a powerpoint deck of what’s going on in the area, upcoming events. other things people should know (eg. Microsoft’s 2nd chance certification which I will put in my march deck). I run the deck as a slideshow when people are arriving and getting settled. THen at the start of the meeting, I use the deck as talking points to let everyone know what’s going on so I don’t forget anything. Any links, etc that are in the deck, are also on my user group website so people don’t have to take notes from it.

Here is the deck from our March meeting. http://vtdotnet.org/docs/vtdotnet_mar_05.ppt

Feel free to steal this idea!

http://www.AcehAid.org

Powder day, but…

Vermont

hmmm – about a foot of brand new snow, blue sky, beautiful sunny morning but it is only FOUR degrees out! Aaargh. I am just finally getting over 3 weeks of cold/flu/bug thing and can’t afford to get sick again with upcoming travel…. Maybe it will warm up later. I don’t need to get the virgin pow that badly. There’s always untouched stuff to find off the beaten path anyway….

http://www.AcehAid.org

simple html web designers – where are they?

Just Rambling

Why is it not possible to find someone who is able to make simple changes in Frontpage to websites and knows how to FTP them, has a “good eye” (RISD diploma is unecessary) and doesn’t charge $80/hr? This is a $25/hour job, don’t you think? It’s pretty basic. Some simple html. I’m always frustrated by this. When people ask me “oh do you do websites?” and I know they just want something easy and don’t want to pay a lot of money. I can’t afford to do these favors too much anymore.Where does one go? Where does one send these people, my friends, my family, to someone who can be trusted to take good care of them?

http://www.AcehAid.org