You've reached the internet home of Chris Sells, who has a long history as a contributing member of the Windows developer community. He enjoys long walks on the beach and various computer technologies.
Monday, Feb 16, 2004, 9:53 AM
Is Autonomic Computing Real?
Of course, I love the idea: software that fixes its own problems. However, it sounds like something from science fiction requiring machines with human-like intelligense monitoring and fixing themselves. Has anyone used IBM's autonomic computing toolkit? Does it work?
Monday, Feb 16, 2004, 9:48 AM
Physics Prof. Doesn't Even Pretend to Be Normal
There are two kinds of geeks:
- Geeks that try to hide it
- Geeks that embrace it
Since it became obvious very early to me that geeks of the #2 sort find it nearly impossible to get girls, I learned in college to hide my geekness in mixed company (mostly : ). For example, I absolutely have to have a cell phone small enough for my front pocket because the Batman utility belt look just doesn't say "breed with me."
On the other hand, geeks of the #2 sort are the ones that keep a Star Trek convention going every weekend of the year somewhere on the planet, fill comic book conventions and, apparently, teach physics based on why Krypton just *had* to explode. You gotta respect someone that's willing to embrace their true inner self to the point of risking their ability to even practice contributing to the genepool...
Monday, Feb 16, 2004, 9:31 AM in .NET
Whidbey Beta Schedule
If you care about Longhorn, start first with Whidbey. According to Scott Guthrie, the first Whidbey beta will be available in June.
[via Kent Sharkey]
Monday, Feb 16, 2004, 9:25 AM
How Anon Delegates Are Implemented in Whidbey
IanG posts a nice treatment of how anonymous delegates are actually implemented in C# Whidbey, which has interesting consequences on what you can do with them. Bottom line: they work how you'd want them to.
On a side note, I've loving this blog thing. I used to have to wade through tons of noise on mailing lists and newsgroup or meet up with my DevelopMentor colleagues at some conference to get this kind of nugget. Now, because blog software is so cheap and easy and my friends are hopelessly wordy, I can listen to the signal only and spend the rest of the day with my family.
Monday, Feb 16, 2004, 9:14 AM
Akimbo: The Internet Television Network
Here.
At Demo, Robert finds Akimbo, which marries a Personal Video Recorder to the video content currently being produced for the Internet. For those Internet programs that haven't already done so, I assume that they'll be adding commercials, but right now, this is what cable used to be before they started charging me a monthly rate to watch ads. I don't know anything about pricing and I'd like to be able to try it out on my PC first w/o any extra hardware, but Akimbo seems like the next logical step of turning any TV into a view on a/v content, whether it's live or cached, broadcast or downloaded.
The final step, I think, is to be able to consume any of my cached a/v from any PC/TV in my house, whether the a/v is cached manually by ripping a CD or DVD or whether it's cached automatically via a hunk of PVR software running on a server. Can I do that today w/o spending thousands of dollars? Is the XBox Media Center Extender the answer?
Sunday, Feb 15, 2004, 7:03 PM in .NET
Smart Client Language Translation in Longhorn
Jason Nadal builds a useful smart client application in Longhorn for language translation. It's a simple front-end to a web service, but it's the first real custom app for Longhorn I've seen that doesn't have to do with demonstrating or building for the platform.
Saturday, Feb 14, 2004, 11:56 AM
Authors Posting Reviews: Tsk, Tsk, Tsk
Here.
As I've always suspected, authors are posting their own reviews on Amazon. It's that anon thing -- gets you ever time. Of course, they justify their actions because anonymous folks get to say bad things about their books and they need to defend themselves (the other side of the anon coin).
For the record (although how can you really trust a statement like this?), I never post reviews on my own books and I always put my name on any review or feedback I give of any kind. I do shamelessly ask for reviews when I get emails about my book, but at least I'm open about it. : )
Friday, Feb 13, 2004, 5:39 PM
Ebooks: Neither E, Nor Books
As a computer boy and a producer of words in a row (and a frustrated novelist), I found Cory Doctorow's thoughts on eBooks specifically and copyright in general to be very interesting. Don't know that I agree, but what fun is it to only consume content with which you agree? That's why I always listen to Rush when I can. : )
Friday, Feb 13, 2004, 5:04 PM in .NET
Avalon Resizable Panels with Splitter Bars
Here.
Nathan Dunlap and Jonathan Russ work together as designer and coder to build splitting bars in Avalon:
"Boy was I happy when he got back to me with a really simple solution that I have found is really easy to reuse in a lot of scenarios. I love experiences that really show me that the designer/developer split is going to be really graceful. It's pretty cool when the design can start with me mocking up something and handing it off to the developer who can then build logic into it. It's even better when the developer logic isn't so intertwined with my styles and layout that I can hardly touch it without breaking something. This way I get to use my design skills at the prototype stages and early skeletal stages, and I also get to get my hands dirty in the real code at the fit and finish stages. All you designers who have spent hours refining your designs only to have your designs mangled when they get implemented in real code... your day is coming."
BTW, if it seems like a list a lot of community Avalon pieces on my site, it's because there's a lot of community activity in Avalon. If you're doing WinFS or Indigo work and I'm not seeing it, please let me know!
Friday, Feb 13, 2004, 11:16 AM
How to Make an App. as Both GUI and Console?
Developer building tools always want to know how to make an app that works well as both a console and a GUI. Junfeng describes two interesting techniques, one used by VS.NET and one used by ildasm. I've done the VS.NET technique myself before and it works well, although the details can get a bit hairly. I haven't yet built an app where twiddling the bits with editbin is necessary, but hey, whatever makes you happy. : )
Friday, Feb 13, 2004, 9:43 AM
NASA Learns Lesson from Mars Spirit Rover
Check out this movie to see what NASA learns via an external view of the Mars Spirit Rover collecting rock samples on Mars. Follow up information available here.
[via Stuart Celarier]
Friday, Feb 13, 2004, 9:09 AM in .NET
A Man Named "Stuart Longhorn"
Ironically, his page is filled with bugs...
[via Stuart Celarier, the real Longhorn Stuart]
Friday, Feb 13, 2004, 9:03 AM in .NET
Ian on Zooming XAML
Ian Griffiths posts the beginnings of a XAML editor (it supports squares and elipses and saving, but not loading XAML, so no source yet). Especially interesting, however, is how he handles zooming. He wrote an explanation with source on that bit.
BTW, if you haven't figured it out yet, Ian is quite the Avalon boy. If you're into such things, you should subscribe to his blog.
Thursday, Feb 12, 2004, 5:16 PM
Say "Bye" to Rory @ Portland Nerd Dinner Tonight
For most of you, Rory's not going anywhere, as I'm sure he'll keep starting flame wars and drawing terrible cartoons. However, for those of us in the Portland area, tonight will be his last nerd dinner, as he's heading out to the east coast. Come and say goodbye and touch him one last time...
Thursday, Feb 12, 2004, 4:36 PM in .NET
Bezier Spline Designer using Avalon
Here. This looks *very* cool. Can't *wait* to see the source code. Hurry up, Nikhil! So long as it compiles and runs, we'll be forgiving. : )