Paul Ballard's Weblog

Archive for the ‘Suggested Links’ Category

Those of you (both of you) who read my earlier posts about Smart Clients are probably wondering why I would be attending Microsoft’s new Web 2.0 conference, Mix ’06. At first I thought of it a bit as going “behind enemy lines” but now I realize that this is EXACTLY where a smart client fan should be.

I just finished watching the keynote which started with a rumpled looking monologue from Bill G. on the changing world of software. Afterwards we were treated to a demo of MySpace.com. The really amazing aspects of the MySpace story seemed to go completely over the heads of most of the attendees but involved the reduction of CPU load from 85% to 27% across their server farm which they were also able to reduce from more than 240 servers to 150. All of this from simply moving to ASP.NET 2.0 and SQL Server 2005. Pretty awesome measures from the number 2 visited site in the world. At the end of their presentation they demoed a concept that they called their “Off the Browser” experience in which they used a SideBar gadget in Windows Vista to provide access to a user’s MySpace site including a running slideshow of images. Of course that “Off the Browser” experience was via a smart client application.

During the second demo, a rep from the BBC showed off their truly amazing video on demand features available via the browser. Sure enough they also included an “Off the browser” experience using Vista to download videos and then stream them to a Media Center or XBox 360.

The last part of the keynote was mostly Tim O’Reilly trying to work the term “Web 2.0″ into every other sentence followed by Bill Gates assuring the audience that they can use other tools besides Microsoft’s to do web development, but why would they want to. As the conference continues, I’ll be on the lookout for more Smart Client based information that I can share with my readers (again, both of you). In the meantime, lets all be like Tim and try to work “Off The Browser” into our daily vocabulary!

One of the more “fun” things I got to do while Editor for TheServerSide.NET was to help publicize The Code Room, an online TV show that puts developers under pressure to use Microsoft’s latest technologies to solve business problems.  Caught somewhere between documentary and marketing fluff, it’s always fun and this episode looks to be no different.

The first episode starred a few friends of mine, Chris Menegay, Scott Bellware, and Tracy Sawyer but the biggest topic of discussion seemed to be the superhot host, Jessi Knapp.  Chris, Scott, and Tracy were given the task of developing a web based user interface to an online ordering system before their laptop battery died.  Unfortunately, they failed.  The second episode put several Windows Mobile developers into a fishbowl room at a busy Seattle mall to build a Smartphone based application with a SQL Server backend.  They were successful but sadly Jessi was missing from episode 2.

This episode centers on security and pits black hats against white hats in a battle to control a Las Vegas casino’s player system and thereby millions of dollars.  And I’m happy to say that Jessi is back sporting a new ‘Do and seductively using phrases like “SQL Injection” and “Brute Force”.

Check out The Code Room: Breaking Into Las Vegas  

I am pleased to announce that I will be speaking at two major conferences this year in addition to my regular round of User Group presentations. 

VSLive Toronto Threading in Windows Forms Paul Ballard, Rochester Consulting Partnership, Inc. 4:30 p.m. Windows Forms programming poses some unique threading hurdles. Many of those have been overcome in .NET 2.0 with the introduction of the BackgroundWorker component. In this session we’ll look at how to use the BGW to keep your user interface responsive as well as other threading tricks to ensure that your applications make the most of today’s powerful processors. Click-Once Deployment: Beyond the Basics Paul Ballard, Rochester Consulting Partnership, Inc. 2 p.m. Click-Once deployment gives developers the opportunity to use the web as a means to deploy custom Windows applications. But what’s actually happening when you publish an application via the web? And what happens when the user installs and runs the application? This session will look beyond the demos at the files generated via the “Publish” wizards, how .NET applications deployed on the web can be run and installed, and how Code Access Security makes this type of deployment safe.

A friend sent me this link for a new conference designed for those of us who just don’t get modern development methodologies.  Get your tickets now for Waterfall 2006.

For those of you lacking a sense of satire, note the conference date!

Well, it’s all over now.  I’ve officially resigned my position as Editor of TheServerSide.NET.  It was a great experience and I’m glad I had the opportunity to work on the site.  I’ve learned a lot about what it takes to provide consistent quality content and how that sometimes conflicts with the equally reasonable requirement to make money and sell ad space.  Balancing those two objectives while walking the tightrope of my MVP NDA was often a bit tricky, but overall it’s been a great experience.  Now it’s time for me to move on and make room for some new blood to re-invogorate the site.  For those of you who visited TSS.NET in the past year or so, I thank you very much.

I am very honored to have been chosen to receive the Microsoft MVP Award (Visual DeveloperVisual Basic) again this year.  I look forward to this being a great year and have lots of community based projects planned.  So… <Watch This Space>

Recently Calvin Austin joined Richard Grimes in some unwarranted, and virtually factless .NET bashing.  Okay, so I could pick apart his lame-ass assertions, but other smarter people than I have already done that.  Check out Dino Chiesa’s Official Response, or Jon Box’s Blog, or for an even more technology agnostic point of view check out Michele Leroux Bustamante’s Blog.  What concerns me is the lack of responsibility both on the part of the author and on the part of JDJ.

While Mr. Austins’ comments are marked as an editorial, there seems to be not only a lack of fact checking but a complete disregard for any facts.  Instead we get obvious lies meant only to drum up readership for JDJ and set the blogsphere aflame with righteous indignation.  But then what?  Will we see an apology from Mr. Austin for his pitiful attempt to make a name for himself after leaving Sun?  Will JDJ retract the article from the web and print an apology in it’s next issue.  Of course not!  After all, it’s an editorial.

At what point did “editorializing” release a publication or author from the laws against libel?  Call me crazy, but I thought an editorial was supposed to be an opinion based on an interpretation of the facts.  The interpretation could be completely nuts but the facts should be relatively absolute.  In those cases an editorial opinion can lead to a thoughful debate that will help everybody involved, regarless of which side of the interpretation they decide to agree with.  But if the editorial opinion is based on lies, there can’t be a real debate.  What has been a well respected form of journalism is devolved to just a bunch of shouting and noise in hopes of selling a few more issues.

What can we do about it?  Probably not much.  But after Dr. Dobbs, a magazine I had always respected, let Richard Grimes publish what was obviously misleading information I quit reading it.  My monthly subscription now goes directly into the garbage and when the subscription is over I won’t bother renewing it.  I don’t subscribe to JDJ so I can’t unsubscribe to that.  So here is my recommendation.

I think article authors should boycott the Sys-Con publications until JDJ retracts the editorial.  I’ve written articles for .NETDJ and I know it makes us all look bad to be included with this type of irresponsible journalism.  Somebody has to demand better not only from publications like JDJ and Sys-Con but from the authors themselves.  Let those of us who strive for some sort of integrity lead Sys-Con into doing the right thing.  If you’re with me, use the comments link.

I wasn’t always the .NET fanatic that I am today.  In fact, before learning about .NET I spent a few years in the Unix/Java/Netscape world working on websites that are still in production today.  But before that even, I spent the first 10 years of my career working in OS/2. 

I started out working as a contract programmer for Kodak writing xBase programs using tools like FoxPro and dBase III Plus in DOS.  Ah, those were the days.  When EGA screens were everywhere and my heart thumped at the site of my brand new IBM PS/2 Model 70 A/21.  A screaming Intel processor running as much as 21 Mhz!  I believe it had the full loudout on memory, a whopping 1 Megabyte (only 640K of it usable by DOS).  Shortly after joining on at Kodak though I would get the opportunity that would  launch my fledgling programming career when I was sent to training on a brand new language for developing a new type of application called a Graphical User Interrface.  The language was called Easel and the compiler alone cost $26,000.  It was a very verbose language with syntax similar to this (if memory serves):

visible enabled red graphical region Fred
   size 100 100
   position 10 10
   (etc. etc.)

It had all sorts of other fun syntax like “touchability of” which equates to enabled in modern languages or “resumable block” for creating subprocesses.  After working with the language for about a year or so I got the opportunity of a lifetime, and went to work for Interactive Images, the company that made Easel as a developer on their commercial GUI interface to the IBM Profs email system.  I was 23 years old then and I absolutely loved my job, my coworkers, and the technology.  I couldn’t believe I got to do what I did and got paid for it (although not much).

That was when I first saw OS/2 in it’s early stages with release 1.1.  About this time is also when Windows 1.0 came out but nobody took it too seriously, after all it wasn’t business oriented.   Well, during those years of working with Easel both for Easel Corporation (formerly Interactive Images) and then when I struck out on my own as a consultant I got to see OS/2 evolve into the premier preemptive multi-tasking platform for PCs.  OS/2 however was too far ahead of its time which turned out to be its undoing.  The memory requirements for OS/2 were huge at the time (laughable now) requiring as much as 8 Megs.  Back then memory was a huge constraint on PCs and so only businesses could afford the investment in 8 Megs.  Windows on the other hand had much smaller requirements and as people started buying PCs for home use, Windows spread like wildfire. 

I stopped using OS/2 when the Internet caught on but many of my old clients went on to do new development with Easel and OS/2 well into the 2000s.  When I asked one client why they still use OS/2 they said “Because OS/2 doesn’t  get viruses!”  In fact, OS/2 is still rock solid as an operating system on the computers it was meant to run on.  But time marches on and so IBM has pounded down the last coffin nail for OS/2.  With that I not only say goodbye to an operating system, but the horse I rode in on. 

Former Easel-ites of Note
There have been several former Easel employees who have gone on to work with other companies and do some pretty great things.  Here is a list of the ones I know of and their titles back when I knew them.  If you are reading this and you too once worked for Easel, drop me a comment and I’ll add your name and info.

R. Douglas Kahn, President
John McDonough, VP of Finance
Steve Sayre, VP of Marketing
Bob Gleason, VP of Sales
Tom Bilotta, VP of Development
Dave Panos, Easel Product Manager
Chris Brookins
Diane Hall, Development Mgr (my ex-Boss and a very cool lady)
Katina Engle (Node 1 of my 3 Node Umbilical System)
Doug Gibson (Node 2 of my 3 Node Umbilical System)
John Gurman

I attended the Dallas Geek Dinner this past Monday night here in Dallas (the bustling metropolis of Grapevine actually).  Although turnout was light, it was a lot of fun and I’m looking forward to the next one.  Next time though, we should play poker for MSDN Universal IDs.