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A new company, Fortify Software, has recently launched its products into the marketplace. Fortify's solutions help developers secure their program code both during development and during runtime. The company's source code analysis software uses 540+ program coding rules to seek out security-related coding errors in code written in C, C++, and Java. Fortify's runtime analysis looks for security problems in active application. The products support Windows, Linux, and Solaris platforms, and will become ...

Update: There is a second post concerning the development of my base form here. This is a draft version of of what I will be using as a base Windows Form for inheritance. At the moment, it provides the following additional functionality: Automatic garbage collection and an event when the system is in a low memory state. An event when the system display characteristics change. An event when the system time is changed (by other than normal progression). An optional fade in/fade out effect with design ...

New .NET Community project idea. I would like to design an airport scheduling system (ASS) that would tracking the maintenance of an airplane and the flight plan to see what city will need a plane ready to go when an aircraft needs maintenance, ahead of time. I am guessing this procedure is pretty calculable and could lower delay times dramatically. If you were waiting for me at the airport, sorry, but I am guessing with the brain power in Redmond this week, we could prevent this from happening again. ...

Update: A C# version of this base exception class is posted here. This is an update to my previous post about a custom base exception class. I spent some time in the interim reviewing the Microsoft Exception Management Application Block code and added some of the features that I found there. Reassuringly, most of my design features matched and in some cases exceeded theirs. Here is a listing of changes since that earlier version: Added custom properties for the Windows Identity and an Additional ...

While talking to Amy about the promotion of the .NET Book Club, I thought of printing up bookmarks. Well Michelle, my wife in 5 weeks, is doing web design for a custom printing shop. So the order is in and I will have 1000 of them before the MVP Summit. I will also be giving Amy some for the Connections conference. Here is what they look like. ...

Update 1: I have posted a new version of the code given below. The comments in this post still apply, but the code has been revised and expanded. Update 2: A C# version of this base exception class is posted here. Now it is time to get serious with some code. This is the first element of my exception handling --- the custom base exception class. Here is an updated list of blog entries which address exceptions to standard design. I will refer to some of these further on below. Brad Abrams, Exceptions ...

XML usage when and where in dotNet Classes with fields or properties that hold XML: If a class has a field or property that is an XML document or fragment, it should provide mechanisms for manipulating the property as both a string and as an XmlReader. Methods that accept XML input or return XML as output: Methods that accept or return XML should favor returning XmlReader or XPathNavigator unless the user is expected to be able to edit the XML data, in which case XmlDocument should be used. Converting ...

What does Object-Oriented Design Mean to You? Here is an article from Robert Bogue (Robert.Bogue@CroweChizek.c... Good perview on how to look at Object Oriented. http://www.developer.com/de... ...

Since I am building a reference application, I need to set a few design criteria to start off the process. I expect these will evolve somewhat over time, but time is what I have. Therefore I will build a large, detailed list with the hope that I will eventually get to everything. I am trying to design a robust application without mentioning anything that it does. Just what is a robust application? In a perfect world, it would solve the user's problem immediately, completely, and without error. The ...

You heard me, my friends. I am now completely contaminated. I'm more tainted than a bovine with mad-cow disease. 'Nix that. I'm more tainted than a syphilitic prostituting leper. 'Nix that. I'm more tainted than a syphilitic, prostituting, leprous walking hamburger patty. That's right, THAT tainted. (Dear John Doe, if you are offended by my use of the phrase “syphilitic, prostituting, leprous walking hamburger patty” then I apologize dearly. Obviously, no offense was meant by it. If you ...

Dan Knight of Low End Mac (great site) has just written an article arguing that Apple should create an iPDA, with some of the features of their old Newton line. I disagree. I think Apple has already created their iPDA -- the iPOD. The iPOD can do what most people bought PDAs to do a few years ago: calendar, contacts, notes. It even has some time wasting games, ability to transport files/data, and of course music. Now you can surf the web, check email, etc on modern PDAs, but how good is this experience? ...

1. Design and Architecture get a boost in .NET, the gang of four design patterns book source code now available in C#, I even have a PDF copy of a book on design patterns in C#, but i guess the original one is the best: http://www.dofactory.com/Pa... The second resource, is some thing that I wish i get my hands on but I guess have to wait a long time before I do that, the worlds meanest number crunching desktop PC's: http://www.go-l.com/desktop... 3. Lastly ...

I finally got it!  So far I really like it.  It is a clamshell design that is only a tiny bit bigger than my old phone, but it is also a Palm.  It is really a big step for me who never even owned a PDA.  I am learning all about syncing and beaming.  It is so much easier to deal with all the phone numbers that people have. Now I just need to really clean up my Outlook!  I will report back after using it for a couple weeks, but so far, so good.

The world has started to rely increasingly on software that is becoming more and more complex. Today software is everywhere - part of every system or machine that we use in daily life. Software Quality and Reliability have become an important concern of the software industry. While improved and formal software development processes help avoid more and more defects, a large number of defects are still left in software. In one of history's well-known bugs, the entire long distance of AT&T was down ...

Wow... This set actually rocks! I have never owned a wireless keyboard or mouse that I actually liked. The design was always flawed in some way. This one is almost perfect. I really like the soft wrist rest (yeah yeah, you aren't suppose to use one when you type, whateva). Also, it gives you the comfort of the Microsoft Office keyboards, without as much bulk. The mouse is completely amazing. One of the features the site actually talks about it the comfort for both right and left handed people. I ...

Don't you ever stop for a moment to think why on earth do you have to do so many different things in so many dialects to build what it is supposed to be a simple application? Code C# on the server sideCode ASP on the design sideCode HTML on the UI sideCode Javascript on the client sideCode SQL on the data sideCode XML on the service side Wouldn't it be good if we could do all of that in one and only one way? I know of one company that will not do that, for their motto is to divide and conquer. I ...

While many of you know sites like this or the now departed Interface Hall of Shame (static mirror here) which target generic bad UI design. Too few developers really think about their specific user audience. And fewer developers still actually talk to their end users. As UI designers and software developers we owe it two our end users to understand them. Often great, well thought out software can be crippled by seemingly small UI blunders. Case in point: Children's game/educational software. A lot ...

Me & another collegue of mine are dicsussing & implementing lot of ways by which we could improve the perf of our web app. At one instance we could really get good performance with the use of Output caching of our asp.net pages :)Just out of curiosity (ofcourse we knew that we are having an unnecessary roundtrip because of a Response.Redirect) hence decided about perf testing the app with Server.Transfer()!what was a boon became a bane. On further investigation we could conclude that the ...

Don Box made an insightful post clarifying some of his statements that have been warped out of context as of late. I totally agree with Don on this one. SOA does not mean the end of Objects. While Services are wonderful and can be pretty powerful in a large, distributed application, they can be overkill for a smaller project. If you're going to plant some small flowers in a flowerbed, you would not (at least if you are somewhat sane) plant those flowers using a large Bobcat. The problem I see with ...

Ok, big pressure now. I've got a forum to spill all my random thoughts, insightful notions, and technical mumbo-jumbo.... so what shall we talk about, hmmm? First off who the heck am I? Well, I'm not this guy, or this guy, or this guy. I'm this guy..... Ok, gotcha with that last one then? Well, it seems my name is common enough that I blend in and Google has as hard time picking the real me out. If you search hard enough you can find a few links to old technical groups I've contributed random bits ...

Wow, I don't think that I have ever had an issue of VSM that was as “thought provoking” as this one. First up: Special Issue 2003 or 1983 by Mark Nelson of Seattle... So, Mark points out some problems with his experience with what seems to be architects. First off, I'd have to say that everyone should question any sentence with the word “architecture” in it - I know I do. For those who understand what architecture and design principles are truly about, I'm sure you know what ...

There was a discussion on one of the internal aliases about abiding astute design patterns, particularly when it comes to memory management. I thought this would be of interest of those of you who haven’t fallen into the habit of deterministically finalizing your objects when they’re no longer needed. One of the strengths of the Common Language Runtime (CLR) is its memory management abilities. It spawns garbage collection threads that clean up all of the objects that are no longer in ...

Keith Pleas talks about a few VB issues in a recent blog post. He points out that most VB developers are RAD-centric and C# developers are code-centric. I agree with this 100%...and I know Microsoft does, too. He also mentions the move of old VB6 developers to .NET: “...return of the VB programmer who glued together a bunch of stuff...” I think that this is the essence of VB. And, I also think this is why VB has so many problems gaining respect among users of more complex languages. Let's ...

Now, it would not hurt all you developers to take a look at some of the articles in this issue of the New York Times Magazine - Design 2003. It is full of some great insight into design and inspiration - and everybody needs that in their world! (You can easily sign up for free online access if you don't have it already.) ...

Well, I just got around to writing my first Longhorn application and I forgot how great it feels to be researching such new technology. I didn't want to do the typical Hello World application so I set off to see if I could come close to emulating the Mac “Candy Blue” interface look. First I started with a basic xaml file with one table in it: <Window xmlns="http://schemas.micro... xmlns:def="Definition" def:Class="Application1.Win... def:CodeBehind="Window1.xam... ...

There is a great article on MSDN about building distributed applications in .NET. It's a six parter, mainly focused on using a service-oriented architecture. It is definitely not light reading, especially considering it is around 228 printed pages long. From what I can tell, it goes into great detail when dealing with the architecture of the system. The article even covers issues with legacy systems and application maintenance/deployment. I will try to post a little better review of the article once ...

using System;using System.Collections; public class Person{ private string name; private int age; private string location; private ArrayList interesets; public string Name { get { return this.name; } } public int Age { get { return this.age; } } public string Location { get { return this.location; } } public ArrayList Interests { get { return this.interests; } } public Person(string name, int age, string location) { this.name = name; this.age = age; this.location = location; }} public class Startup{ ...

Metric = FormulaTest Coverage = Number of units (KLOC/FP) tested / total size of the systemNumber of tests per unit size = Number of test cases per KLOC/FPAcceptance criteria tested = Acceptance criteria tested / total acceptance criteriaDefects per size = Defects detected / system sizeTest cost (in %) = Cost of testing / total cost *100Cost to locate defect = Cost of testing / the number of defects locatedAchieving Budget = Actual cost of testing / Budgeted cost of testingDefects detected in testing ...

1. Customer satisfaction index (Quality ultimately is measured in terms of customer satisfaction.) Surveyed before product delivery and after product delivery (and on-going on a periodic basis, using standard questionnaires) Number of system enhancement requests per year Number of maintenance fix requests per year User friendliness: call volume to customer service hotline User friendliness: training time per new user Number of product recalls or fix releases (software vendors) Number of production ...

Optical DSPs promise tera-ops performance Startup Lenslet Labs has demonstrated an optically based digital signal processing engine (ODSPE) that has the potential to take DSPs from the current giga-operations-per-second (Gops) limit to tera operations per second (Tops) by 2005, the company announced at the inaugural Communications Design Conference in San Jose last week. http://www.eetimes.com/stor... Lenslet site: http://www.lenslet.com/inde... Here is my admired praise to (32) ...

Rob Howard – Membership, Role Management and Security in ASP.NET Whidbey Blog: http://weblogs.asp.net/rhoward and http://www.rob-howard.net Forms Authentication 1.0 Solves a common problem developers had with their web apps Most popular Internet auth. Technique No ugly/confusing dialog boxes Custom authentication uses HTML UI Use credentials collected on page Posted back to the server Page obtains credentials issues auth. Ticket ASP.NET Forms Authentication APIs APIs for creating authentication ...

Second day keynote …. In the beginning, there was a video of attendees. The most exciting part was Donny Mack and Asli talking about Indigo being the stuff in your watches to make them glow. They were shown in their shades and holding their little dog! Quite groovy guys! Notes on Eric Rudder Keynote: What Microsoft hears from you: Don’t make me rewrite everything! Moving code from development to production is too hard Give me more code samples … in my favorite language Help me make ...

Keynote today - Bill G -- excellent. First sightings of Longhorn, Avalon, Indigo, etc. Interesting infrastructure change - we've had wireless network connectivity pretty much anywhere in the conference grounds, but not this morning...not in the big keynote hall. We're all assuming this is by design - I guess they don't want people (A) taping into their wireless network on which they're running the demos (although it's running whimpy-WEP), or (B) blogging, posting, or otherwise leaking the info about ...

ASP.NET Whidbey Themes Developer productivity Reduce ASP.NET V1-V2 lines of code by 2/3rds Enable rich scenarios not easily possible today Administration and Management Easiest platform to manage and administer Totally Extensible Platform Replace/extend all built-in features + services Customize for any enterprise environment Performance and scalability The world’s fastest web application server Runs on a 64-bit server ASP.NET 2.0 Developer Stack New ASP.NET Building block APIs Membership. ...

Microsoft Word and Visual Studio have one very cool feature in common -- squiggly underlining of errors. As of richedit 3.0 (distributed with Windows 2000 and higher, possibly also with ME) we can get these in the RichTextBox. Actually, we can get a lot more underline styles than that... Underlining Once again we are going to have to communicate with the underlying richedit control. This time we need to set the character format, so we'll need to add some extra stuff to our class: + Code to interface ...