Comment Feed for AndyC

Re: Dean Hachamovitch: IE9 - Questions and Answers

AndyC — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 10:59:21 GMT

Excellent video, really interesting to hear from Dean again. Not sure if I answered my own question or if Charles did, but good answer all the same. Now off to download PP7 and give it a try!

posted by AndyC

Re: Life at Microsoft: The truth revealed...again!

AndyC — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:34:41 GMT

Very funny. Episode 1 can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N24TWrtlJEU

posted by AndyC

Re: Graphics improvements in WPF 4

AndyC — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 08:18:30 GMT

Ironically the demos actually work better when it cuts back to the main camera and you can see it on the screen behind you guys. Whilst screencaps are better if you're showing code samples which need to be readable, I think it's overkill for the "here's a resizing purple box" type of thing.

Got to be said though, this stuff looks very useful. I can see it being very helpful at improving performance in a lot of scenarios.

posted by AndyC

Re: Hanselminutes on 9 - Why Aren't There More WinForms Talks with Rocky Lhotka

AndyC — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 14:11:16 GMT

I think the point is you can't do the "video in a button" demo purely with the VS2008 visual designer, you have to use either code or, more likely, XAML. Quite how that is relevant to creating LOB apps is beyond me though. And ultimately, while it might require a smidgen of XAML knowledge (or Blend) to put video on a button in WPF, try doing the same thign in WinForms, even with a huge amount of code.

posted by AndyC

Re: Hanselminutes on 9 - Why Aren't There More WinForms Talks with Rocky Lhotka

AndyC — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 08:28:19 GMT

WPF has a steep learning curve, for sure, but I think it's wrong to dismiss it as being a 'web style' tool just because XAML looks vaguely HTML like. And yes it's a little encumbered by the fact the VS designer is a bit limited (though pretty close to parity with the WinForms designer I'd say). However once you've taken the time to learn it, WPF walks all over WinForms in terms of being able to create UI for an application and going back to writing for WinForms feels horribly cumbersome.

posted by AndyC

Re: XAML in .NET 4

AndyC — Thu, 21 May 2009 21:44:49 GMT

Very cool. My last project was an Excel app that presented data using WPF using a custom UI specified in loose XAML files. Was very pleased with the result, but have to admit that it was flakier than I'd have liked if given bad markup (I lost count of how many times I had to go delete x:Class!) The new XAML APIs look ideal for that sort of scenario, so I'll definitely be checking them out.

posted by AndyC

Re: Dave Probert: Inside Windows 7 - User Mode Scheduler (UMS)

AndyC — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 14:32:41 GMT

Facinating. The UMS stuff is very interesting and you can never have enough of Dave Probert talking about the Windows kernel design.

posted by AndyC

Re: Designing the Windows 7 Taskbar

AndyC — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 23:29:23 GMT

Well, for one thing, if the taskbar buttons were any smaller it'd be really awkward to use with a touch sensitive screen. As it is they're about finger sized, making selecting them easy. The split buttons would probably also have been awkward in the scenario as they are too small to use usefully.

posted by AndyC

Re: Mike Klucher: XNA Framework games running on Zune

AndyC — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 12:41:29 GMT

Oooh, this is just so cool. Can't wait to have a play with it.

posted by AndyC

Re: Andy Ayers: Understanding the Phoenix Compiler Framework

AndyC — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 15:39:59 GMT

The raising an executable to IR sounds very interesting. Presumably this could allow you to migrate executables to another CPU architecture (much like Rosetta in MacOS) if that ever became an issue for Windows.

posted by AndyC

Re: Channel9 Team : Spam Video Filter Beta

AndyC — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 13:17:34 GMT

hehe, brilliant.

posted by AndyC

Re: So long, Adam Kinney...

AndyC — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 10:56:03 GMT

Good luck on figuring out what it is you're now supposed to be doing, Adam! Sure you'll enjoy it anyway.

posted by AndyC

Re: The Challenges of Application Compatibility

AndyC — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 13:38:04 GMT

JoshRoss wrote:

I would like to nominate HP printer driver installers.

Seconded.

To anyone from HP who may be reading, installing a printer should NOT give me an error if:

1) I'm using RunAs
2) I'm using Remote Desktop
3) I don't have 32 bit colour depth selected. I mean WTF is that all about? How can an installer be that broken?

posted by AndyC

Re: UAC - What. How. Why.

AndyC — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 09:55:44 GMT

Sven Groot wrote:

The Power Users group is deprecated, the only reasons it's still there is for (wait for it) backwards compatibility (even says so in the group's description). You shouldn't be using it.

Oh, I know that. It's just that putting someone in the Power Users group does at least allow them to share folders, albeit after jumping through a few hoops.

There should be a cleaner way to delegate that right, I just can't figure out what it is.

posted by AndyC

Re: UAC - What. How. Why.

AndyC — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 21:22:06 GMT

Ok, you asked, so I'll tell you the one UAC issue that is bugging me right now: File sharing.

On XP members of both Power Users and Administrators can share folders on the network. The same appears to be true on Vista, but only if you create a custom MMC snap-in, as the 'Share...' context menu item insists that you must elevate to a full Administrator account (both with and without the wizard). Is there any workaround for delegating the right to share folders to standard users, or at least to make the experience a little less odd for members of the Power User group?

The other (minor) annoyance is the way Journal bugs you to elevate to add the printer driver every time you start it until you finally let it. Grrr.

Overall though, the UAC implementation is really well done and I'd congratulate everyone who worked on it as you've done a great job of making my job (a sys admin) a whole lot easier!

posted by AndyC

Re: Adam Carter and Mike Adams on Managed Services

AndyC — Wed, 10 Jan 2007 16:13:45 GMT

Very interesting video. Having been involved in rolling out a similar environment without granting developers full administrative rights, it's certainly interesting to see how Microsoft deal with things.

posted by AndyC

Re: Scott Field: How secure is Vista, really? - Part II

AndyC — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 13:03:22 GMT

SecretSoftware wrote:

MS should have moved the WinKernel from Ring0 to Ring1 in that onion. PatchGuard can then secure Ring1 Code. This way you get rid of the impracticality of securing code with same priviliage level that exist in Vista.

Nice idea, but it would have broken every bit of virtualisation software out there. It is the way they are going by introducing low-level virtualisation support and a hypervisor though.

posted by AndyC

Re: London Niners: Tour, Drinks and Debate

AndyC — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 14:25:15 GMT

Well nobody sounded even remotely like what I'd have imagined (well except Charles obviously), but cool video nonetheless. Could probably do the weekend of the 28th/29th too, assuming it's nowhere too remote.

posted by AndyC

Re: Rory Blyth: The Exit Interview

AndyC — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 03:07:19 GMT

O fit. Emotion = me other rorty's "exit" interview or Beer (Not 28) Greet news Rory, you mother".

posted by AndyC

Re: Seventeen Minutes With Bill

AndyC — Tue, 21 Feb 2006 11:32:42 GMT

Mia'cova wrote:

Being his first Channel 9 interview, I figure he'll be reading the comments like the rest of us. (And a nice interview too).

Actually, it's his second. You can watch his first Channel 9 video here.

posted by AndyC

Re: Virtualization

AndyC — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 06:06:17 GMT

AIM48 wrote:

I don't understnad if I have hardware that has a 5% utilization rate then just add more apps to this server instance itself - instead of loping off another x percent for the virtualization software to run an entire new instance of the OS?

Imagine you're running Exchange and a web server on the same machine. If a patch comes out for Exchange that requires a reboot, you have to take down the web server unnecessarily.

With virtual servers, you can keep separate applications in separate VMs, thus improving availability. Plus you know with absolute certainty that the Exchange patch won't break the web server since they are running on separate (albeit virtual) machines.

Virtualization is very, very cool indeed!

posted by AndyC

Re: Virtualization

AndyC — Tue, 14 Feb 2006 23:40:29 GMT

Fantastic video. Everything from Assembly to Managed code, how much cooler can you be?

posted by AndyC

Re: Office 12 - Word to PDF File Translation

AndyC — Mon, 30 Jan 2006 23:44:10 GMT

Printing to PDF is easy (there are already free solutions), the problem is that you lose a lot of information that way (hyperlinks, document flow etc) - this is something that can only really be added by native PDF support at the application level.

PDF support in Vista would be great, not sure we'll see it though (sadly)

posted by AndyC

Re: Sean Alexander (and others) - Windows Vista Sidebar and Gadgets

AndyC — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 14:16:28 GMT

jsrfc58 wrote:

Don't you mean Konfabulator was a glint in Steve Jobs eye? That "widget" project was released in February 2003. When did the Longhorn pre-beta come out?

Well, Paul Thurrott had screenshots of the sidebar as far back as November 2002. Make of that what you will...

posted by AndyC

Re: Sean Alexander (and others) - Windows Vista Sidebar and Gadgets

AndyC — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 10:32:20 GMT

You realise, of course, that the sidebar and gadgets were seen in the Longhorn pre-beta long before Apple's Dashboard was even a glint in Steve Jobs eye...

posted by AndyC