Saturday, January 31, 2004

Friday, January 30, 2004

A programmer is born!

Last night I had a mountain of work to do, and was actually inspired to do it. I started writing this C# console application that handles sending emails once it is called from a stored procedure. I know, I know, the words are english, but is he saying anything. (If you are a programmer, the answer is yes, if not...sorry) So on the train home I started laying out the structure of my application on my handy dandy sony viao laptop. When I got home, I wanted to just kind of keep the flow going. But the little boy wanted some attention. So he got some, what we did was combine our interesting. So what we ended up with was the little boy writing his first try catch statement in C#. Not bad for a three year old. try { } catch(Exception e) { writeError(e.Message); } Now before you start stating you astonishment, let me explain how his first programmer session when. Trav, which one is the "T", good, now which one is the "R", no that was a "E", which one is the "R", very good you did it. So it took us about 15 minutes to write our try catch statement. But we did do it, and we did it together. I put comments in the code of the application starting the date that the little boy had written his first snippet of code.

Thursday, January 29, 2004

Jason Mraz : Waiting for my Rocket to Come

So the other day we got the Jason Mraz album "Waiting for my Rocket to Come". The only song I had really heard from the album is "You and I both". This was poppy and had a beautiful acoustic ring of a up and coming Signer song writer. So we got it. I listened to this album over and over again today. I couldn't stop. Mraz has to be one of the best lyricist to come around in a long time.

There some song on this album that you will just finding yourself singing along by the second verse. (to the horror of my co-workers). I was amazed at the diversity on this album. I expected acoustic pop, and I got that, but I also got funky groove, regae moves and outstanding lyrics and one of the best new voices to come to rock in a while. Songs like "Curbside Prophet," have the great feel, of classic J. Love, with some Nashville funk thrown in. While "I'll Do Anything" has an amazing reggae beat, with smooth lyrics flowing in to a melodic chorus, while avoiding lyrical cliches`that would of been easy to fall into. I think the song "The Remedy" will be the next song that gets radio play from this album. It has that pop rock feel, with out feeling like a teen bopper hit. It's obvious from this album that Mraz influences are many and diverse. Which for me is really nice to hear.

The other thing that impress me is Mraz website, someone was smart enough to figure out you have to give some music away to sell it. There are seven mp3s for the download. But I'm telling you that after listening to those songs you are going to want the album.

Tuesday, January 27, 2004

Session Variables in C# how to use them and win

So I have been hitting my head against the wall with Session variables in C#. For instance, you can see a variable by just calling it and giving it a value.  Session["myValue"] = value Which is kind of like working in VB.NET. However when you go to read values from there it is a different beast all together. This comes from the fact that Session variables are actually objects and can be set to just about anything. So if I am going to read a value out of the Session variable it looks something like this: Response.Write(Session["myValue"].ToString()); Okay, now so far this isn't to bad, but what VB and VB.NET programmers are not use to, is have to initate the Session that you are going to use later. For example you have a Session variable that only gets a value if a event happens. If that even happens you don't initate the variable. Later in your code you have a condition statement that checks against the value in your Session variable. In VB you can do this all day not, and if there value is empty (ie you didn't initate the Session variable)  it returns an empty or null value. However in C# you get an error stating that the Object has not be set.

So this got me, jumpin up and down flustered. Then Ed told me the secret to it all, and I will now share it with you. (Though I figured you have guessed it by now) Initate all of your Session variables in the Session_Start function in your Global.asax. This way they are always initated and if you run conditional statements against them you can get an empty or null value.

Happy Coding

Monday, January 26, 2004

Mr. Rodriguez, you have my attention.

Yesterday afternoon, I was kind of restless, so I drove over to the local music store. While I was there I walked around a little bit and a tried a couple of guitars. Mostly feeling smart, because so far mine at home sounded much better then the ones I played. (And mine is less then half of the cost of the ones in this store) I walked over and played a couple of classical guitars.

I love the sound of nylon strings. There is a warmth to the tone, that I find so wonderful to listen to and to play. Anyhow, I pick up this acoustic classical, with a cutaway body so that you can reach high in the fret scale. I just strummed an E chord and all of the sudden, my ears said 'that sounded good, do it again!'. So I do, again my ears go, 'do that again!'. So I must of sat there played that beautiful guitar for close to 20 minutes. So by this time, I am in love, ready to take it up to the man behind the counter and ... put it on layway (what? You know you have to do that too!).

So I find the little card thingy that is the price tag and look. Once I regain consciousness... I looked at it again. $1,600.00 ... On Sale. So of course I put it back really gingerly, holding my breath until it is back in the guitar stand. Come to find out it is a Rodriguez C Cutaway. If I listen to the tale from the website, it is a handcrafted guitar made from the trees that Mr. Rodriguez grandfather planted many years ago.

Well, short story long, the guitar got to stay at the music shop. I got to come home and complain. I mean, I have a family to support, bills to pay, I can't talk myself in to buying something like that! That thing cost more than our rent (Though not by much). Though I have talked to the guy at the music shop and he says I can come back to visit, just as long as it's not to often.

Sunday, January 25, 2004

Weekends?

How come weekends seem to go by so fast? There never seem to be enough time to get everything done.