tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699Thu, 29 Apr 2010 00:58:30 +0000Thoughts and babbling about software development. Visual Basic, .NET platform, web, etc.http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/noreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)Blogger120125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-6321142475062914748Thu, 29 Apr 2010 00:58:00 +00002010-04-28T21:58:30.369-03:00As I have posted earlier, this blog will be moving to a new address. It should redirect automatically to the new address from May 1st, 2010.http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/04/this-blog-will-be-moving.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-9101681139625542180Wed, 31 Mar 2010 15:24:00 +00002010-03-31T12:24:14.359-03:00Recently I've came across a strange behavior that took me some thinking to work around. As you may know, my language of choice has been VB for as long as I can remember. However, I, like any good developer, can work just as good in C#. Really, it's no biggie. Anyway, what I'm talking about here is dynamic type resolution. For instance let's say we have the following VB program: Module Programhttp://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/03/where-c-fails-vb-delivers.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-7787084979862045558Mon, 15 Mar 2010 02:36:00 +00002010-03-14T23:36:06.329-03:00It's almost 11:30 pm, March 14th, 2010 when I've got an email from one of the many newsletters I subscribe. The subject of the email was simply "Puppy", and that belies its true content, that for me was kind of a shock. Joel is retiring from blogging. I don't know if any of you know but I've began this site, this little corner in the Internet, because of Joel. I've reading his columns, his http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/03/today-is-sad-day.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-1260728846945442126Thu, 04 Mar 2010 02:21:00 +00002010-03-03T23:21:31.696-03:00Yesterday I restarted working on an Oulook Add-in I'm cooking up for Office 2007 that I began developing in VS2010 Beta 2, and I got pissed when the code that was running quite well, simply gave me compiler errors. Well apparently there were some changes from Beta 2 to RC 1 regarding the development of Office add-ins. The main problem, for me, was that the class http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/03/vsto-differences-in-vs2010-rc1.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-4142368962051704691Wed, 03 Mar 2010 12:58:00 +00002010-03-03T09:58:21.651-03:00A couple days ago I've written about the error I was getting when building an Windows Mobile control with design time capabilities. What I forgot to write about was the solution for the problem: The problem occurred because in one of my classes was inheriting from a ReadOnlyCollection and this is not supported by the genasm. As it's stated in this Microsoft Forum Thread. So to work around thishttp://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/03/building-asmmeta-follow-up.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-7122632350457477696Thu, 25 Feb 2010 03:42:00 +00002010-02-25T00:59:53.793-03:00I've found in a russian site the meaning of all those colors I've posted about yesterday. Here they are: Color#Description 0 COLOR_ALERT Obsolete. 1 COLOR_ACCENTTEXT Obsolete. 2 COLOR_CALOFFHOURS Obsolete. 3 COLOR_CALONHOURS Obsolete. 4 COLOR_TODAYTEXT Today screen text color. 5 COLOR_STARTICONBACKGROUND Base color for title bar and soft keys Obs.:Windows Mobile 6 Professional and http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/02/discoveries-in-windows-mobile-part-3.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-5646656071859542614Wed, 24 Feb 2010 04:21:00 +00002010-02-24T01:21:27.985-03:00After removing every possible color information from the WM65, I started adding some color to see what affected what. The first element I tried was placing back the SHColor value in the [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Color] registry key. I didn't have enough time today to play with the colors, so I simply put back the default base color from WM65, which are: FF,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,DDhttp://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/02/discoveries-in-windows-mobile-part-2.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-1108289635288185996Tue, 23 Feb 2010 04:45:00 +00002010-02-23T01:45:41.983-03:00Currently I'm in the developing a new personal project a Theme Creator for Windows Mobile. Yes I know there are a lot out there, but I'm doing this more because the fun of it rather than the product itself. And in the mean time, trying to discover a few things in the Windows Mobile platform. But on with the discoveries. The first thing I wanted to know was what was a WM6.5 without any theme, http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/02/discoveries-in-windows-mobile.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-7819403713708853826Mon, 15 Feb 2010 01:47:00 +00002010-02-15T00:18:25.153-02:00Today I was working with some Windows Mobile project and that required me to add some XMTA files and everything was working just fine until I add a new XMTA file. When I hit the build button, the build failed with the following message: There was an error finalizing type . Object reference not set to an instance of an object. I've spent the last hour searching over the Net to ind a solution. http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/02/build-asmmeta-failing-because-its.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-9137284770214257024Fri, 05 Feb 2010 22:49:00 +00002010-02-05T20:58:37.117-02:00If you ever use any of the MSBuild Community Tasks (MSBCT) when building a project in any of the Visual Studio version since 2005, you may have noticed that when you first load a project that uses this tasks, a Security Warning Dialog is displayed.Although it occurs only once or twice, it can be very annoying if you handle several projects.So, reading the page on MSDN, I've added the MSBCT as http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/02/using-msbuild-community-tasks.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-6987169914561509472Wed, 03 Feb 2010 17:56:00 +00002010-02-03T16:06:22.063-02:00I know it's old news but it's never too much to add emphasis on this:Thou SHALL NOT shadow properties or methods.And heres why.Consider the following classes:Class Class1 Property BaseProperty = " Base Property " Overridable Property OverridableProperty = " Overridable Property "End ClassClass Class2 Inherits Class1 Shadows Property BaseProperty = " Shadow Property " Overrides http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/02/why-shadowing-properties-and-methods-is.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-2576504747880273862Tue, 02 Feb 2010 21:25:00 +00002010-02-02T19:31:02.125-02:00Today I've got news that blogger will no longer support publishing posts over FTP, which I use to publish my little corner in the web.Adding to this the fact that I'm starting my own start up company, in a couple of weeks this blog and site will be in a brand new home.http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/02/this-blog-and-site-will-soon-be-moving.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-5613641990742995575Mon, 11 Jan 2010 09:26:00 +00002010-01-11T08:20:54.713-02:00Most of the time when I need to get inspiration about how to do something, I turn to the inner bits and bolts of .NET Framework, because I think that there are a few hundred men-years worth of code there, and it does have some insights.But, some times...I was just looking into the Dictionary<TKey, TValue> class when I came across this little bit of code:public virtual void GetObjectData(http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/01/net-framework-is-surprise-box.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-687218659689250723Sun, 10 Jan 2010 03:56:00 +00002010-01-10T02:22:59.808-02:00I know, I know, it's old news. After all IIS7 came out with Vista a couple years back, and with it came the possibility of having multiple virtual FTP servers in the same IIS.But until now I had no idea of this, because, in all honesty, I skipped Windows Vista altogether. I didn't installed it in my box. Went straight from XP to Windows 7.As I have some time in my hands, and after a complete http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/01/iis7-virtual-ftp-servers-problems-and.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-5027370565330351380Sat, 09 Jan 2010 10:28:00 +00002010-01-09T09:55:54.516-02:00Two days ago I've got a faulty HDD that was making my computer slow to a craw. Well, I didn't know it back then and I thought it was simply a case of much needed reformat.After a couple of hours battling the Windows 7 install, I discovered the faulty HDD, and as it was an old 60GB that was lingering with no vital data whatsoever, I simply plug it off and the installation went in its merry http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/01/windows-experience-index.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-7693340831890241050Tue, 05 Jan 2010 10:30:00 +00002010-01-05T08:33:31.219-02:00I've just received an update email from Microsoft about the Vista Icon bug I have reported.Even though this bug has been lurking in .NET Framework ever since version 2.0, and that I have provided them with a fixed version of their own code, the status was changed to "Won't Fix"What the heck?!http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/01/im-perplexed.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-3818040866687985520Mon, 04 Jan 2010 11:17:00 +00002010-01-04T20:31:38.979-02:00As I have posted earlier, the .NET Framework has a problem with the 256x256 PNG icons that were introduced with Windows Vista.I posted a bug report on Microsoft Connect explaining my findings and pointing them to my blog. They kindly mailed me earlier today that they were able to reproduce the behavior and are redirecting to the appropriated team.I hope this time they will fix it, as I have done http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/01/vista-icons-in-net.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-387915979068626203Sun, 03 Jan 2010 14:36:00 +00002010-01-03T12:49:34.927-02:00As reported by several people, the TypeConverter base class is broken. The IsValid function ALWAYS returns true, unless overridden by a derived class.I understand that changing the behavior of the IsValid function would be a breaking change, but as the TypeConverter base class DOES NOT KNOW IF A VALUE IS VALID OR NOT, it should always return FALSE!!That's the most logical approach. I believe thathttp://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/01/message-to-microsoft.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-724260968997650951Sun, 03 Jan 2010 14:17:00 +00002010-01-03T12:17:39.350-02:00Well, sort of.I was browsing the Connect site and got a glimpse of this reported bug.Digging a bit in the Framework I discovered that EVERY TypeConverter based class that does not override the IsValid function will always return TRUE.The bug resides in the base TypeConverter class that has the following code:public virtual bool IsValid(ITypeDescriptorContext context, object value){ return truehttp://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/01/typeconverter-class-is-broken.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-836176848522079220Sat, 02 Jan 2010 08:44:00 +00002010-01-02T07:02:38.587-02:00I was implementing an special INotifyCollectionChanged when I needed to know if the instance had event handlers attached.After a little bit of searching, I took a page out of the ObservableCollecion(Of T) in order to do it.In order to detect if YOUR class has event handlers attached, you need to create a Custom Event. Something like this:Private __MyEventHandler as EventHandler Public Custom http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2010/01/eventhandlers-in-vb-how-to-pass-them.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-1307978175414289941Fri, 01 Jan 2010 01:56:00 +00002009-12-31T23:59:28.738-02:00http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2009/12/happy-new-year.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-3936499616056060170Thu, 31 Dec 2009 00:31:00 +00002009-12-30T22:42:54.083-02:00Although I'm a veteran when it come to software development, I'm kinda old-fashioned when it comes to text editors.Yep! I kinda like the plain old Notepad! With all its (lack of) features.But even I have to admit that Notepad++ is a very good software when it comes to editing text files.Right at the download page there are instructions on how to replace the stock notepad, with the Notepad++.What http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2009/12/replacing-notepad-with-notepad.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-2875863087551087390Wed, 30 Dec 2009 14:33:00 +00002009-12-30T12:35:42.697-02:00If you ever needed to create a BAT file a little more complex and got stuck at some point, I'd recommend a site named DosTips. They have tons of tips and BAT code snippets to use and get inspired by.http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2009/12/tips-are-always-good.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-3968170831075497831Mon, 28 Dec 2009 04:05:00 +00002010-01-01T22:40:58.646-02:00Once more I find myself needing to use icons in .NET.A quick search in Google shows a plethora of questions and workarounds to use icons in .NET. From simple calls to Win32 API to a whole library written from scratch.Let's say you have the following code:Dim ico As New Icon("file.ico", 16, 16)That would load an 16x16 icon from the specified "file.ico", and if you use this icon, chances are that http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2009/12/icons-in-net-why-is-so-difficult.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19732699.post-3701071395775864253Fri, 25 Dec 2009 04:34:00 +00002009-12-25T02:36:15.363-02:00http://pjondevelopment.50webs.com/blog/2009/12/happy-holidays.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Paulo Santos)0