Misc

Organizing Your Work With OneNote Page Templates

Tim Murphy — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:15:39 GMT

If you have seen the Windows Phone commercial where the father is in the grocery store with the shopping list in OneNote you have gotten you first taste of the flexibility that can be had with OneNote. I like most consultants have a lot of fires going and once and I am finding that the templates in OneNote are helping me to get a handle on the different projects and tasks I need to track.

I started using OneNote to do simply what its name suggests: take and organize notes. Lately though I am finding ways that it can help to centralize things that I had been using multiple applications to accomplish. Having them all in one place, as with most things makes it easier to not miss something.

You may find using the tasks feature of Outlook works well for you, but I found that I was in and out of my email so fast that I ignored the tasks. As simple To Do List template in OneNote seems to be the solution for me since I spend so much time documenting projects. As an alternative you can use the Prioritized To Do List shown below or the Project To Do List which gives you a list per project.

When starting a project at a new client Project Overview is a great way to organize your thought and make sure that you cover all the essentials. While I am just starting to use it this template is quickly proving its worth.

Of course if you don’t find a template that fits your needs you can create your own templates. Start with one of the standards and edit it. Then click Save Current Page As A Template. This is great especially for customizing templates like the project overview to suit you needs.

There are many other features to this tool for you to explore. Add to everything above that it is a write once, maintain anywhere product and I can easily access my notes from any browser or even my Windows Phone. Life is getting just a little better.

del.icio.us Tags: OneNote,ToDo,Task Management,Windows Phone,Office

Ways To Pass Time On Window Phone – TouchDevelop

Tim Murphy — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 14:29:46 GMT

A co-worker was showing me an in phone scripting environment on the iPhone and I knew I had seen one mentioned for the Windows Phone before. TouchDevelop is an app from Microsoft Research that allows you to create small applications that do a wide variety of operations including using most of the capabilities of the device. So could this be a fun way for us geeks to waste some time while waiting for our oil to be change or a table to open up at your favorite restaurant?

So what does this language look like? The structure for TouchDevelop applications is broken into three sections: actions, data and events.

Actions are essentially procedures and can be run independently from the user interface as long as they are not marked private. One action can also execute another action using the “code” section of “expressions” UI.

Variables that are defined in the Data section. They are global to the application and are persistent by default. The variable types include not only basic structures like strings, but also more complex system constructs like JSON, playlist and camera objects. This isn’t where all of your variables reside as many variables are automatically generated when you create assignment expressions.

The events that can be handled are somewhat limited but are appropriate for the phone. As with some of the specialized data types the events are based around the different sensors and services of the phone.

Now the syntax is a little strange compared to most of the languages that I have used in the past. It is very plain English which can throw you when you are used to more terse programming languages. You have to get used to the concept of a “wall” instead of console which uses syntax like the example below.

var1->post to wall

You also aren’t going to get a WYSIWYG experience with the TouchDevelop environment. You will have to create your own visual controls through code. It reminds me of righting for the Win16 API in C++, only with less built in UI abilities. If you get to this point then you probably want to start by copying an application that already has methods to generate buttons, text boxes and other controls.

Just to give you a flavor of the environment there are a number of screenshots below.

In the end it is a bit of a mind bending challenge to learn to develop with TouchDevelop, but getting out of your comfort zone is always a good thing. Enjoy.

del.icio.us Tags: WP7,Windows Phone 7,development,TouchDevelop,script languages,scripting

2011 Year In Review

Tim Murphy — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 22:06:43 GMT

2011 has been an amazing year in which I ended up working on an exciting number of projects. SharePoint has continued to be the hottest requested technology that I deal with. At the same time Windows Phone 7 has put Microsoft back in the mobile market and I will be finishing off the year additionally writing for this platform. At the same time the old standards of WinForms and ASP.NET have not left our market space. Ultimately, the IT market is still on fire and I am looking forward to great things next year.

On another front, it was a great year for the Chicago Information Technology Architects Group that saw presentations on Functional Programming, Onion Architecture, SOLID, Scalable Internet Solutions, ORM Frameworks, Mobile Architecture, and Enterprise Architecture. Our numbers have grown which has made the discussions in our meetings much more interesting. I am looking forward to even more growth and more exciting topics in our third year.

PSC Group also continues to grow as I have now passed two years with this terrific group of IT Professionals. I have been spending a fair amount of time interviewing perspective employees and helping to get new business opportunities started. It really makes me glad to be part of this organization with amazing projects filled with top notch people.

In all, 2012 is looking like it is going to be very exciting. The biggest challenge, as with all previous years, will be keeping up. Here is hoping all of you have a great new year.

del.icio.us Tags: Year End Review,Chicago Information Technology Architects Group,Windows Phone 7,WP7,CITAG,PSC Group

TweetMeme Button or Template Plug-In for WLW

Tim Murphy — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 20:06:57 GMT

In my search for a way to allow readers to tweet post that I put on GWB I have come across the TweetMeme plug-in for Windows Live Writer. It automatically puts a twitter button at either the top or bottom of your post depending on how you configure it.

It comes with a warning that it does not work with blog servers that strip out script from posts which I made me afraid it was going to make it incompatible with GWB. This turned out to be the case so I figured we would need either an upgrade to the GWB platform or writing my own WLW plug-in.

In comes the Template plug-in. This allows you to have standardized content that you can insert with a couple of clicks via the interface below.

This solved the problem (sort of). It required that I remove the standard javascript that is defined by Twitter’s button page. In the end I am hoping for an update to our Subtext implementation to incorporate features like Facebook, Twitter, Reddit and G+, but this should help us until that comes along.

Update:

It looks like this was all useless since it seems that the buttons are in GWB. I didn’t think I saw them before. Either it is recent or I am blind.

del.icio.us Tags: Twitter,TweetMeme,GWB,WLW,Windows Live Writer,Geeks With Blogs,plug-ins

Adding Tweet Button To GWB Post

Tim Murphy — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 19:10:46 GMT

I have wanted to have a Tweet button on my individual posts for a short while. So here is a test to see if the Twitter code for their button con work on Geeks With Blogs site via Windows Live Writer.

del.icio.us Tags: Twitter,Tweet blog

SkyDrive and Consumer Cloud Services

Tim Murphy — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 17:19:44 GMT

Paul Thurrrott recently posted an article on the future of SkyDrive and I was asked what I thought about its future by @UserCommunity. So let’s take a look.

The breakdown from Microsoft that Paul described I believe is an accurate representation of users and usages. While I can’t say that I leverage SkyDrive to the extent that it was meant to be I do enjoy having OneNote hosted their and being able to consult and edit it from the desktop, web and Windows Phone.

Taking that one step further is the Midwest Geeks group which started as the community of Microsoft related user groups in our region uses SkyDrive groups and shares calendars and documents. This collaboration aspect isn’t new in itself, but having it connected with the rest of your cloud assets makes life easier.

Another recent usage of this type of cloud service is storing your personal music files in order to get that same universal access. This is a scenario that has some arguments for and against. On the one hand own once and listen anywhere is great, but the on the other hand the bandwidth cost becomes a giant downside. This is especially the case since most carriers are now doing away with unlimited data packages.

Ultimately I see this type of resource growing an evolving at a phenomenal rate over the next few years as we continue to become more mobile. Having multiple players such as SkyDrive and iCloud will only help to give us more options. Only time will tell where we end up next.

del.icio.us Tags: SkyDrive,Cloud Services,Paul Thurrott,UserCommunity

GWB Influencer

Tim Murphy — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 06:53:14 GMT

I was pleasantly surprised to find out this week that I am now part of the Geeks With Blogs Influencers program. It is hard to believe that it has been 5 1/2 years since I started blogging here. It has always been a great community and it is great to be able to show off how much I appreciate having this soapbox here to share ideas. I look forward to being here a lot longer. Finally, thanks to Jeff and the crew for keeping the lights on and continued improvements.

del.icio.us Tags: GWB,Geeks With Blogs,Influencers

Microsoft Is Dead, Long Live SalesForce?

Tim Murphy — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 06:32:09 GMT

A number of people returned from the recent Dreamforce conference. One told me that this is now the largest IT conference. This information was followed up with the statement that Microsoft is missing the boat and will soon go the way of Novell. This got me to thinking. Does this statement hold any water?

Any large company definitely has the possibility getting tunnel vision. Microsoft is not immune to these issues. But is it possible that their culture might could as an anti-virus.

There is one thing that Microsoft has shown that they can do well time after time. They may not be the first to the game, but they are very good at learning from what other companies invent. Can you say Office, Internet Explorer. They weren’t the first to have a word processor or browser, but that didn’t stop them dominating the market.

Given their history I think there is a good chance that Microsoft will learn from any advantage SalesForce may have and eventually accelerate past them. Of course we will all have to watch and see.

del.icio.us Tags: Microsoft,SalesForce,Dreamforce,innovation

This Developers Life Podcast

Tim Murphy — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 22:27:30 GMT

This Developers Life is a podcast put out by Scott Hanselman and Rob Conery. In the most recent episode there were a couple of things that really struck me.

The fist was on motivation. Why is it that we keep spending every free hour keeping up with the latest technologies and techniques? Personally, I have always enjoyed the satisfaction of solving problems with technology. Hey, if you aren’t one to join sports then you need some sort of challenge. Of course getting to play with new toys like Windows Phone 7 is fun too.

The second was getting a DBA’s perspective. Why is it that they give so many of us a hard time. Is it really that what we develop threatens their ability to do their jobs? I have always found that showing that you understand their priorities and that you aren’t a complete idiot when it comes to database design goes a long way.

If you want a podcast that can really make you think I would highly recommend This Developers Life.

del.icio.us Tags: Rob Connery,Scott Hanselman,This Developers Life

Memories Of The Past While Learning The Future

Tim Murphy — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 08:29:15 GMT

The last couple of weeks I have been working through some proof of concepts for Windows Phone 7. While working through one exercise I had a flashback. The book I was reading mentioned how you needed to code your application to have the smallest possible memory and and processing speed footprint. Suddenly I was back in high school with my Tandy hand-held computer which had a single line of text screen and a whopping 1K of memory. Talk about limitations.

So what else can you learn from developing in such environment constraints. I think we could all benefit from spending some time doing code where we really have to think about how we are putting it together. We would have developers who produce much tighter and well performing code as they carry those skills back to desktop and web development. Maybe these devices should be required learning in our college classes. Any thoughts?

del.icio.us Tags: Windows Phone 7,programming,best practices,flashback,learning,development