Fusion Log Viewer

Otherwise known as the Assembly Binding Log Viewer.  If you are using .NET Reflection to dynamically load Assemblies, you might encounter the following exception from time to time:

{“Unable to load one or more of the requested types. Retrieve the LoaderExceptions property for more information.”}

Fear not – although it took me a while to figure this one out – but its ok, you can thank me later =)

Google Notebook

So with this recent discovery and hype about Chrome, I decided to check out the other Google applications.  And thats when I discovered Notebook.  What a nifty little idea!  Keep your notes online and they travel with you where every you go.  So this post is to let people like me who don’t know anythign about Google’s nifty little Notebook and what you can do with it.

How to use it? Well just sign into Google’s notebook at www.google.com/notebook and start using it.

There are a couple of ways you can take full advantage of it though.  The most nifty way is to download the Firefox browser extension and have the notebook travel to whereever you surf.  Here is a screen shot of how you can simply drag and drop contents into the notebook:

Just drag&drop or type in your notebook

 

Or you use some other browser, such as Chrome (suprisingly Notebook does not add-on for Chrome yet), just add the Notebook Bookmarklet to your bookmarks.

[Update]
I created this post a while ago, but never posted it.  Anyway, am posting it as is – with a small update!  I also recently started using Google Tasks.  It’s an add-in to Gmail web client.  The nifty thing about this one is you can take any email and quickly create a task related to it.  Lovely.  Now only if Gmail IMAP would support this.  Then my tasks will travel everywhere with me.

Google Chrome

Here comes Google Chrome.  Initially I have to admit I was very sceptical about it – I figured it was just another web browser, they are all the same after all, IE, Firefox, Flock, Safari etc.  

But chrome is different.  Just starting it up for the first time you’ll see how lightweight it really is. Lighting quick.  Plus it has developer tools built into it. I have yet to spot a CSS editor in it, but I figure its not far away since there is already a Javascript editor included.  

I would urge anyone to try it.  For once now it is not Microsoft setting the bechmark.  It has loads of neat features, that just work, elegantly.  Also for tryhard-wannabe-techies like me who really want to know whats under the hood and don’t really want to read about the standard marketing bullshit about how the browser is faster, more secure, blah, blah… have a look at this comic book illustration.  It certainly sold me.

P.S> It doesn’t have a spell checker though, so if I have spelling mistakes which I am confident that I do, then it is Google’s fault.

Cambodia and Thailand..

Ok so I have recently been on short and quick trip to Cambodia and Thailand.  And I have got to say, I am very much taken by the history, culture and people of Cambodia.  The recent history of the nation is dark and grim.  I learnt that an entire generation was wiped out in a so-called cultural revolution in the most inhuman way.  It is something very hard to fathom, I hardly noticed many old people around the city.  And before that the country was invaded by foreigners (plural), and so its people have known nothing but war for a long time.  But my heart goes out to the common people. To me they seemed strong willed and determined to make it through and unadulterated despite all that surrounds them, inspirational stuff.  What they need the most is simply a fair go.

The place is certainly not for the faint hearted, and yet so many western tourists come there primarily since it is so cheap..  But I could never get used to it.  Sure there are plenty of nice hotels to stay in and air-conditioned buses and taxis to take you around, but how do you get used to being surrounded by 8-to-10 year old kids trying to sell you a book or a souvenir or a t-shirt for five dollars?  And when you say you don’t need it now, they make you promise the only way a child knows how to, that when you do, you’ll buy form them.  I could never get used to this because these children should be playing soccer in the fields and learning maths in schools at those hours of the day.  Not trying to earn a living.  How can anyone holiday in the midst of such realities.

I met a guy in one of the temples I was visiting who started showing us around.  And when we asked him what he would charge, he said he will accept anything we offer. He needs the money so he can pay his teacher and go to school.  The teachers charge a daily rate.  He is learning history and English.  Who can blame the teachers though, the measly salary that they get paid is not enough.  I learnt later that they charge about 1 or 2 dollars a day per student.

I felt compelled to do something, to understand the root cause, but the problems seemed insurmountable to even begin to comprehend.

There is also another side to Cambodia why tourist flock there, and that is for its temples.  Will document this later..

The name, the legacy ..

… photo courtesy of a good friend ..

P.S. I don’t own this franchise btw.

SSIS, .NET and a small license fee..

Well then, as it seems, the so called SQL Server Integration Services can provide very good integration.. but at a very modest price … of course says Microsoft.

Recently I went through a painful discovery that you cannot invoke a local SSIS package and command it to execute it on a specific SSIS Server. In fact you cannot command an SSIS package to execute on a specific SSIS server at all. This in itself I think is a rather big limitation of SSIS. Subsequently, that package will only execute locally, and of course, you will then need Integration Services installed, which costs money.

So in a distributed architecture where ther is physical separation between your servers (web, database, reporting, SSIS), then to achieve integration with SSIS would cost you a arm and a leg.

And surely many articles and posts that I have read suggest to use a remote component or web service to invoke packages that stored on the SSIS server, but that entirely defeats the purpose of a distributed architecture because it would require a web server or .NET application on an SSIS server. Ridiculous.

Imagine this. You have a .NET / ASP.NET application that generates and executes a query on a SQL database million miles away. And now imagine you are required to have SQL Server installed on every client that is running that application. You’d be dumbfounded. So why is it so different with Integration Services?

So simply, SQL Integration Services does not integrate very well in distributed architectures. Ironical. They should call it SQL Distributed Services.

P.S. For the benefit of anyone who’d like to know – You cannot execute a SSIS package from your .NET application using ManagedDTS unless:

1. Your .NET app is on the same box as integration server, or

2. You have enough bling to install integration server wherever your .net app runs, or

3. You have no objection to installing and running a remote component or web service in your integration server.

Of course you can use agent jobs or command line, but they won’t be ‘managed’ in your .NET app.

P.S.S. There are some misleading posts on the internet that suggest you can get away with just having the SQL Server client tools installed. This is incorrect – don’t waste your time trying this, I already did.

140 Million to save zero lives – still no cure.

Having suffered Bronchitis myself (although I think thats what the doctor said), I found this interesting bit of news article that tells a tale of a fundraiser, the cause, and the ridiculous sum to find a cure for Bronchitis.

And just the other day I was humoring a friend that enough is not being done to find cures for diseases, in particular the one I was suffering. For a race that has discovered how to split atoms and subsequently the nuclear bomb, it seemed completely incomprehensible. But I stand corrected (though I wish I wasn’t – I mean, c’on, 140M for Bronchitis!). It is evident that we are equally capable of investing in saving lives as we are of taking lives.

Way Too Much Raised For Bronchitis Research

First Blog – First Post!

Hello Word.

This is my first blog. My intention at the moment is just to record aspects of my experiences here. I imagine this will mainly cover the technology that I work with. Lets see, I want to see how it evolves.

For those that have ended up here because I forced them to and are wondering what the hell is a Sphenoid, well the Sphenoid allegedly is the most important bone in our bodies and just by the angle it sits in has enabled our race to evolve.

I am pretty sure that my Sphenoid bone has tilted at least by a millionth of a degree in the last 10 odd years.