We managed to make it from Ontario down to Florida to view the night time launch of the space shuttle Discovery. At first, we didn’t think we would see it, but a few weather and technical delays pushed the launch right to the start of our vacation. Here’s a shot of Discovery shortly after launch: This photo was taken in Titusville, beside Space View ......

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If you have or are part of a project on CodePlex, you know how annoying the TFS login screen is every time you start Visual Studio 2008. This really got to me. So much so that I sat down to figure out how to get Windows 7 to remember this. Open the Control Panel, then click on User Accounts and Family Safety. Then click on the Credential Manager. Once ......

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This month I have been working hard at providing XNA support for the Micro Framework. Sometimes I wonder how I get myself into these things. I entered another contest, Dream, Build, Play, where you or a team write a game for some cool prizes. When I was reading through the XNA documentation and I was thinking that the paradigm of writing games fits ......

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I have added another release to the Grommet Library (an extension to the .NET Micro Framework). This release adds default comparers to OrderBy and ThenBy to allow the use of the orderby C# keyword. The code sample from the previous post can now be simplified with the orderby keyword: var feedsToUpdate = from feed in feedList orderby ((RssFeed)feed).LastUpdate ......

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To be honest, I haven’t been working on my entry to the Dare to Dream Different Challenge lately. I was distracted by a comment on my blog by Jens Kühner correcting my post where I stated that Linq was not possible without generics. Well, that got me searching, and I could only find proof implementations of Linq without generics, but not a full implementation ......

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I have been busily working away at building infrastructure for the Dare to Dream Difference Challenge. Since my last post, I have finished the hardware prototype, although I still need a cabinet. The project now consists of a Device Solutions Tahoe II development board, an XBee Series 2 module, an AR1010 FM Receiver, an LM4832N audio amplifier, and ......

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After a week of coding, I now have the first signs of a bedside clock! The first milestone of my project was to get the XBee network stack up and running where I would have a desktop computer and an embedded device talk to one another. To reduce the risk of getting both devices talking I wanted to have the exact same code run on the desktop and the ......

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My kit arrived on Friday for the Dare to Dream Different Challenge. Very very cool. The only minor disappointment was that the supplied XBee modules were Series 1. Fortunately, I had a few 2.5 modules laying around from a past project that I upgraded to ZB. Fortunately for me, Michael Schwarz created a library that contains code to talk to 2.5 and later ......

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Now I am officially in round 2. I didn’t realize I had to fill out some forms to make sure that I met the contest rules. Fortunately, that is all behind me now, and my development board is on it’s way. Which doesn’t give us contestants a lot of time. Round 2 ends March 31, 2009, which is a little over 2 months away. I plan to blog about my progress. ......

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Wow! I was accepted into Round 2 of the Dare to Dream Different Challenge by winning Round 1. Round 1 consisted of making a proposal of what your dream device would be and telling a little about yourself. My dream device is a bedside digital assistant. It is much more than an alarm clock (although it will have that feature). Through the use of RSS feeds, ......

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At PDC 2008, there was a booth for Windows Sensors & Location Platform (more here). I was lucky enough to snag one of the free development kits. I’m running the Windows 7 build from the PDC, and it is very stable. I haven’t any problems with it so far. The main reason for me to use Windows 7 for for this API. Setting up the dev kit was really easy. ......

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I just got back from the Toronto Code Camp. I attended Bruce Johnson’s “Binding Objects in ASP.NET 2.0” and “Introduction to the .NET Enterprise Library 2.0” (Bruce covered for Bill Dunlop who couldn’t make it). After lunch, I caught Shaun Hayward’s “Professional Look-and-Feel using Infragistics”, ......

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I'm a member of the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum. One of the cool benefits of being a member is the membership flight in a vintage aircraft. This weekend I went on a 1/2 hour flight on a Beech E18S Expeditor. I really enjoyed the intimate nature of this small transport plane. I listened as pilots worked their way through the checklist and watched ......

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After months of my cheap Abacus SPOT watch constantly resetting, I found this on the internet: http://forum.spotstop.com/s... I'll reproduce the post here (thanks a million, Kas) in case the page disappears: “If your watch re-sets when you shake it try this:1. Open your watch by removing the 4 screws on the back. Then geta flat ......

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Rob pointed me to this great deal at TigerDirect.ca for a Abacus SPOT watch for $30. I wouldn't spend $150 for one of these things, but at $30, I couldn't resist. I've been able to play with it for just over a day, and I must say, it is really cool. I would love to be able to push my own content and code to it, but no SDK as of yet. When I was waiting ......

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