Windows Live Writer

My first post from windows live writer.  This is suppose to make blogging easier.  So we’ll see. 

 

http://download.live.com/writer

 

Update:  Adding plug-ins are cool.  I’ve added a code snippet, and this is what it looks like for formatting:

   1: foreach(bar b in foo) {

   2:  b.SayHello();

   3: }

And this is what the Code Snippet window looks like:

You can copy and paste images from the clipboard (as I just did), and this makes blogging awesome. 

 

So 2 cool tools today!

How to Resize a VMWare Disk

I use VMWare, and one problem is that the default save being 16gb often runs out of space. After googling for an easy method for increasing the size, I've found several solutions involving using Linux boot CDs, tools etc. This is how I did it:

First, use the VMWare command*:

C:\Program Files (x86)\VMWare\VMWare Workstation\vmware-vdiskmanager -x 32Gb "x:\Dir\DiskFileName.vmdk"

Or where ever your VMWare workstation is installed
This will increase it to 32gb

Then go to http://www.partition-tool.com/personal.htm and you can use their free version to increase the primary drive.

the free version only supports 32bit OS, so if your vm is 64, you might look at mounting the linux iso at www.sysresccd.org to increase the partition.

Hope that helps.

* one thing to note, I read somewhere that you should not have any snapshots of the drive sitting out there. Also, back everything up first before trying (I made full clones, just in case).

A nifty program...

Here is a very nifty site for formatting code for HTML:
http://www.manoli.net/csharpformat/

what makes this really good, is that you can nest the css into the document, so for sites where you can't link the css, you can still use it.

I use the output of this for our internal wiki with sql.

Here is a screenshot of the output : (unfortunately, blogger is overriding the css)



So, hopefully someone can tellme how to override the css in blogger, so that it works. However, for the Sharepoint Wiki that we use, it's great.
And the source is available, so that you can fix some of those bugs, such as no space after a -- causes the comment to not be formatted.

remote webservice debugging

I was given this link by a friend, that shows how to enable the debuging forms for webservices in an app: http://geekswithblogs.net/juang/archive/2005/11/28/61437.aspx

All you have to do is add:

<configuration>
    <system.web>
    <webServices>
        <protocols>
            <add name="HttpGet"/>
            <add name="HttpPost"/>
        </protocols>
    </webServices>
    </system.web>
</configuration>

to your web.config and now you can call the webservice from a different machine and get the test form. Now you don't have to have fiddler installed on your servers to view info.

Vista USB Drive Annoyances and a Solution

I'm not sure if it's Vista64, VMWare, Maxtor, or something else entirely, but over the past 9 months, I've had an working, not working issue with the "Safely Remove Hardware".

I run VMWare workstation on my External Maxtor Turbo edition Drives. They run all my development tools in xp. And my base os of course is Vista 64 Business edition. Well, depending on the version number of VMWare, for a while, I was always able to Safely remove the drives after shutting down all of my vms and exiting the program. However, a couple weeks ago, I installed an update to VMWare as well as SP1 to Vista. Oh, and I added a docking station to the mix as well.

Now it seems that I can't ever safely remove the drive. To remedy the situation, I closed down all the programs I had open, killed tasks but to no avail, it still doesn't work. The only way to remove it is to shutdown the computer.

Are there alternatives out there? Appearently there are. I found a nifty program called USB Safely Remove at http://safelyremove.com/ and their program actually does what Microsoft should have offered in the beginning. It tells you what programs are running against the drive if it's unable to remove the hardware. That is a really nice feature.

What I also like about it, is that it hides itself in the task bar, replacing the windows remove icon, so I don't have to run a separate program. The interface is a lot cleaner, and fewer clicks to find what devices I want to remove.

With the program, I was able to find that my Maxtor drive had a process using it with different admin level that what's current running has access to the drive. And that's why I'm not able to remove it. My other USB devices show up fine and can be removed without a problem. And I don't end up with the generic "This device is in use" message. I actually get something kind of handy.

Here is a link to their usage guide. http://safelyremove.com/scr_guide.htm

Another thing that I like, is that they have a ton of options. You can force a device to shutdown. And you can even build command line scripts! You can change icons for each of your devices, hide or show devices in the list, and it tells you how many are currently hidden. The interface is intuitive and clean. They also appear to be updating every month or two, so you know the developers love there program, and are constantly trying to improve it (that means a lot to a fellow developer like me).

So, if you find yourself often getting the can't remove device now, use this program. You'll be able to figure out what is causing the lock on the drive, and be able to remove it quickly.

It's pretty inexpensive, and it will save you a ton of headaches if you swap out a lot of usb devices. You can download it for free and get a 30 day trial.

Team Foundation Server 2008

I have a fresh install of Windows Server 2k3, just installed Sql Server 2k5 and Sql Server SP2. I'm getting ready to install Team Foundation Server 2008.

And then I get the ubiquitous error: 320000


The Commandline '"C:\...\TFRSConfig.exe" /setup /install /s "servername" /u "NT Authority\NetworkService" /buildInIdentity /l "1033" /verify /ignoreExistingIISArtifacts /instancename "MSSQLSERVER" /appPoolName "ReportServer" /reportServerUri "http://localhost/ReportServer" /reportManagerUri "http://localhost/Reports" /h "servername"' returned non-zero value: -2147022676.

I've seen other sites with this, tried the click retry 4 to 8000 times, and nothing. I finally killed the install. Then I remembered, when I was installing Sql Server and IIS i had switch a flag for some other error I was getting in IIS:

The fix was to go to open IIS, right click on Web Sites, select properties, select service tab, then check Run WWW service in IIS 5.0 isolation mode.

Figuring that there wasn't much else I could do, I unchecked that field, and went back through the TFS install.

What do you know? It worked. (oh and I had to restart IIS).

So, at least I've gotten it installed. Now to play with it.

1 old and 1 new feature of Gmail.

Official Gmail Blog: 2 hidden ways to get more from your Gmail address

I just found on the GMail Blog two neat features you can do with your gmail addresss. One I've known about for years, and that is using a period in your email address. so example@gmail.com is the same as ex.amp.le@gmail.com, and you can use that to figure out where spam is coming from, if you place the period in different places of your email. That's of limited use, unless you want to be spiffy any have a period separating words in the email address. The other item that I didn't know about and was really interesting was using the + in your email. So you can send email to exampl+orders@gmail.com. Then create a filter for the +orders and have all your orders labeled. I've started using +spam, +orders, etc. I then know if someone starts to sell my email address to other companies, I can just start blocking the +.

I use this with my google domain email, and it works great!