Geeky Stuff

Chuck Norris and Silverlight Facts

Frank La Vigne — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 00:52:00 GMT

Inspired by Chuck Norris and SharePoint: here’s Chuck Norris and Silverlight.

Silverlight’s original codename was CN/E or Chuck Norris Everywhere.
Even when Silverlight throws an AG_Unkown_Error, Chuck Norris knows what caused the problem.
Chuck Norris not only codes XAML by hand, he does it while fighting off ninjas, terrorists, and kung fu masters.
Even when you use hardware acceleration, Chuck Norris’ fists are still too fast to see them coming.
Chuck Norris chooses to put his files in isolated storage to protect you from him.
Chuck Norris didn’t have to wait until version 4 to get Commanding support
Chuck Norris doesn’t have to ask for permission to use your web cam.
Chuck Norris has to run in out of browser mode. No browser can contain him.
There’s actually only one timeline that matters: Chuck Norris’.
Chuck Norris isn’t afraid to use Expression Blend. Expression Blend is afraid of being used by Chuck Norris.
Chuck Norris doesn’t refactor to MVVM. MVVM refactors to Chuck Norris.
In addition to COM Interop, Silverlight 4 now sports Roundhouse Kick Mode.

If you think of any more, let me know via Twitter. (@tableteer)

Technorati Tags: Chuck Norris,Silverlight,Fun,Humor,Geek Humor

Airships Rebooted

Frank La Vigne — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 00:33:00 GMT

The Mail Online has a story about airships possibly making a comeback, but these aren’t your grandfather’s blimps.

Standing 98ft taller than Canary Wharf, packing 330,000 cubic metres of hydrogen gas and capable of lifting 396 tonnes, the Aircruise concept features penthouse apartments, bars and even dizzying glass viewing floors.
Aircruise was created as the antithesis of a hurried, crowded passenger jet. London-based design and innovation company Seymourpowell wanted to rethink transport - on the premise 'slow is the new fast'. It could ferry 100 people from London to New York in a leisurely 37 hours as opposed to the seven it takes now by airplane.

Penthouse apartments? That sure beats sitting in a fetal position for hours on end.

I want to live in one of these things! :)

Check out this video to get a better idea of what they’ve got planned.

Technorati Tags: Blimp,AirCruise,Cool,Future

Pi Day Hits the Big Time

Frank La Vigne — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 00:05:00 GMT

Today is Pi-Day (3 – 14) and even Google is marking the occasion.

Yeah, it’s like a geeky version of, well, I can’t really think of a good comparison.

Facts About Chuck Norris and SharePoint

Frank La Vigne — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 01:32:00 GMT

You may know about chucknorrisfacts.com and how tough he is, but did you know he’s into SharePoint?

Chuck Norris never starts an Approval workflow in SharePoint. Chuck doesn’t need approval.
Chuck Norris’s favorite SharePoint site theme is Cardinal. Chuck enjoys the color Red.
Chuck Norris can modify SharePoint’s application.master in a supportable manner.
Chuck Norris doesn’t have a SharePoint Disaster Recovery Plan. He doesn’t recover data, only hostages.
Chuck Norris can upgrade SharePoint In-Place. (and it will actually work)
Putting Chuck Norris in the SharePoint Visitors group is futile. Chuck always has Full Control.
Chuck Norris doesn’t prepare for SharePoint 2010. SharePoint 2010 prepares for him.
Microsoft asked Chuck Norris to sign an NDA about SharePoint 2010. Chuck Norris asked Microsoft to sign a Living Will.
In SharePoint 2010, the Farm Administrators group is being renamed to ‘Chuck’s Group’.
Chuck Norris isn’t afraid to customize, one look and SharePoint runs at peak performance

Read the full list at Blair’s blog.

Technorati Tags: Chuck Norris,SharePoint

Mike Swanson on MIX10

Frank La Vigne — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 16:50:00 GMT

Mike Swanson has a blog post on the MIX10 conference taking place next week. Here are some of the highlights:

Windows Phone 7 Series – Honestly, it was tough to keep this one under wraps, especially with something this exciting. If you haven’t watched the Mobile World Congress keynote with Steve Ballmer, Joe Belfiore, and Andy Lees yet, go do that first. It’s a great introduction.
We have 12 Windows Phone sessions, and while we haven’t revealed the real titles and descriptions yet, know that MIX10 is the best place to learn how to build applications and games for Windows Phone 7 Series. You’ll be introduced to the development platform and we’ll show you how to use the tools. Best of all, attendees will receive exclusive free developer support.
To stay in-the-loop on Windows Phone 7 Series-related information, be sure to follow @ckindel on Twitter.
Channel 9 Live – Similar to PDC09, Nic Fillingham (@nicfill) and crew are planning to broadcast live content during most of MIX10. Watch the 10-minute Countdown to MIX10: Let’s do it Live for the details and follow @ch9live on Twitter.

Keynoters:

Back by popular demand is Bill Buxton, recently honored as one of BusinessWeek’s World’s Most Influential Designers. Bill was a favorite at MIX09, and we received a lot of positive attendee feedback about how accessible Bill was in the hallways between sessions. Well, Bill loved it just as much, and he’s excited to be back again this year.
MIX veteran, Scott Guthrie, returns to the stage as one of our highest-rated keynote speakers. I’ve been working with Scott and his team on keynotes and demos for the past few months, and I have to say that I’m excited about what he has to show this year. Well, I’m excited every year, but MIX10 feels special. Be sure to watch Bill and Scott in the MIX09 day 1 keynote.
The astute among you may remember MIX10 keynoter, Joe Belfiore, and his Beyond the Browser general session from MIX06 (the first year of the conference). He’s back this year, and as the Corporate Vice President of Windows Phone Program Management, you can probably guess what he’s going to talk about.
Last, but certainly not least, is Dean Hachamovitch, another MIX veteran and General Manager of Internet Explorer. You can watch Dean in last year’s MIX09 day 2 keynote. To get a sense of what his team has been up to, watch the PDC09 day 2 keynote with Steven Sinofsky, and jump to 39:34.

I’ll be in MD, but my head will be in Vegas next week. ;)

Technorati Tags: MIX10,Windows Phone 7,WP7

Code Bubbles

Frank La Vigne — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 13:08:00 GMT

A researcher at Brown came up with an interesting twist on the UX of typical IDEs (integrated development environments.

IDEs haven’t really changed radically since the early 2000s.

Sure, there have been updates, upgrades, and enhancements, but no one has done anything radically new in a long time.

So, how long before Visual Studio has a view like this? ;)

CapArea.NET Silverlight SIG News

Frank La Vigne — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:29:00 GMT

In case you're wonder WTH happened to the Silverlight SIG in January and February: you may have heard the good news: I'm a dad now!

You may not have heard the bad news: I seriously injured my shoulder in January.

Meetings will resume March 31.

In fact, I’ll be doing a Deep Dive talk on Silverlight 4. [add to calendar]

If you can't wait until March 31 to get your Silverlight fix, keep a close eye on the goings on next week at MIX10. Due to circumstances beyond my control, I won’t be able to make it this year. :(

Congratulations to Leonard Van Lowe!

Congratulations are in order to the Leonard Van Lowe (@lvanlowe), the new vice-president of the SIG.

He's a local Silverlight expert and all around great guy. He'll be there to help run the group and make sure I am no longer a single point of failure.

Sponsors!

We're looking for sponsors to help support the group. Seriously, we need sponsors. Our pizza fund is in jeopardy.

see more dog and puppy pictures

I'll bring cake to a meeting in the near future to celebrate the publication of my Silverlight 4 book, but unless more sponsors step up, that'll be all the food we'll get for a while. Contact us for details. (frank@franksworld.com or scott@caparea.net)

There are a lot of great things coming down the pipe this year: Windows Phone 7, Silverlight 4, etc..

Here's to a great 2010, even if we have to start it in March. ;)

Technorati Tags: Silverlight,SilverlightDC,Pizza

Links from Bing Maps Silverlight Talk at N3UG

Frank La Vigne — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:06:00 GMT

Thanks to everyone who attended my Bing Maps & Silverlight talk the other night at the North Jersey .NET User Group.

It was good to be home, even if just virtually.

As promised here are some links I mentioned in my talk.

IP to Location – free IP to LatLong service
Download the Bing Maps Silverlight Control
Bing Maps Silverlight Edition
Interactive SDK
Bing Maps Developer Portal – this is where you’ll get an API key
Cake-O-Rama Locations – basic mapping sample from my book
Delivery Application – advanced sample from my book with geocoding, reverse geocoding and routing
Twitter Map – see who’s tweeting what and where

Paul (@moon) was kind enough to record the session on video and post it to his site, so you can relive the entire experience. ;)

Technorati Tags: Silverlight,Bing Maps,Bing,Mapping,GeoLocation

Sadly, Not Going to MIX10

Frank La Vigne — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:53:00 GMT

Despite my best efforts, MIX10 was just not in the cards for me. I think the hardest part of not going will be telling the dogs: I think they were looking forward to the buffets.

see more dog and puppy pictures

While I may be stuck in Maryland, my head will be in Vegas next week. I’ll keep a close watch on all the live video feeds, recorded sessions and breaking news coming out next week.

Technorati Tags: MIX10,Windows Phone 7,Silverlight

Embeddable CapArea.NET Silverlight Meeting Widget

Frank La Vigne — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 21:18:00 GMT

I’ve made some updates to the meeting detail widget for the CapArea.NET Silverlight SIG.

If you’d like to place it on your site, simply use the following code:

   1: <iframe src="http://www.franksworld.com/silverlight/meeting/"    2:         frameborder="0"    3:         style="border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; width: 492px; height: 290px; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px">   4:     <br />   5: </iframe>   6:  

If you’re feeling really industrious, here’s the data file I am using for the both this and the countdown widget:

http://www.franksworld.com/Silverlight/Meeting/ClientBin/MeetingData.xml

Keep in mind that I may replace this with a WCF service and this endpoint might change.

Technorati Tags: Silverlight,SilverlightDC,Widget