Channel 9 - Discussions by Doctor Who

Tech Off - Getting started with TFS Express 2012

Doctor Who — Sat, 09 Mar 2013 16:05:25 GMT

I've been working with Visual SourceSafe for longer than I care to remember. I'm trying to get started using Team Foundation Server Express 2012. Where can I get some quick, get up to speed tutorials/videos/etc.?

Tech Off - Got some questions about TFS Express 2012

Doctor Who — Sat, 09 Mar 2013 05:01:48 GMT

@gduncan411: Thank you very much for this great information. ANd I love podcasts, so I'm going to subscribe to your TFS Podcasts right away, thanks!

Tech Off - Got some questions about TFS Express 2012

Doctor Who — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 22:13:55 GMT

@gduncan411: WOW, just took a look at Brian Keller's blog post you linked to on the Hyper-V demos and VM's. I don't have the necessary hardware here at home, and unfortunately don't have it at work, either. Heck, we're still limping along with Windows 2003 R2 Server.

Tech Off - Got some questions about TFS Express 2012

Doctor Who — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 22:03:20 GMT

@gduncan411: Thank you for such a thorough reply! We don't use SharePoint at work now, so we wouldn't loose anything there. However, the thing the guys really talked about at last night's .NET meeting, was the reporting features of TFS 2012. If TFS Express 2012 doesn't have reporting, then it does seem as though I'd be missing a very important feature. That's unfortunate. So then, what I get "out of the box" with TFS Express, is version control and agile planning features, correct? I already have SQL Server 2008 Express (or perhaps it's SQL Server 2008 R2 Express) on my desktop, but I don't believe it's the default instance, as I also have SQL Server 2008 Developer Edition, which is the default instance. Does TFS Express require that it's database be in the default instance?

Personally, I am really favoring installing a local instance. Sorry, I'm just more comfortable with a local instance. However, with TFS in the Cloud, how is one's source code treated? For example, I believe with Git (which I have no experience with) one's source code is open to everyone to see and modify, unless you pay for private storage on Git. Is that the way it is with TFS in the Cloud?

Tech Off - Got some questions about TFS Express 2012

Doctor Who — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 21:13:23 GMT

At work we've been using Visual SourceSafe since the late 90's. It was good, for it's day, but that day has past. Last night I attended our local .NET user group where a presentation was given on Team Foundation Server 2012. I am impressed with the product and would like to give it a try, but I'm also impressed with the shear scope of TFS 2012; much more is involved than was with the old venerable VSS. So, I'd like to give it a try at home. Now, at home I don't have Active Directory. It's just a simple peer-to-peer network/workgroup. They guys at last night's meeting said that there was a TFS for workgroups. However, when I looked into it, it looks to me as though TFS for Workgroups must be installed on a 32-bit OS; I don't have one anymore. So doing some more Binging I found that there's a TFS Express 2012 and it does work on both 32-bit and 64-bit OS's, so I thought maybe I could give that a try. I'm downloading it even as I type this.

So here's some questions. Does TFS Express 2012 work with regular Visual Studio 2012, or does it only work with the various Visual Studio Express SKUs? Second, how different is TFS Express compared with the regular TFS? Will I get a good idea what TFS is like, using the Express version? Can I put TFS 2012 Express on my Windows 8 Pro desktop, and access it from my Windows 8 laptop?

Coffeehouse - Is there a separate SkyDrive app for the desktop version of Windows 8?

Doctor Who — Sun, 27 Jan 2013 21:53:22 GMT

Alright, @magicalclick and @Sven, I've just downloaded the separate SkyDrive app for the desktop version of Windows 8. Seems to work fine.

I wonder though, with SkyDrive on the Metro side and on the desktop side, how do they do together? For example, yesterday when I downloaded the SkyDrive app for the desktop I went through the process of setting up what folders I wanted synced with the SkyDrive cloud and all, and I got to wondering, did I make the same choices when I did this for the Metro version?

Coffeehouse - Is there a separate SkyDrive app for the desktop version of Windows 8?

Doctor Who — Sat, 26 Jan 2013 16:22:08 GMT

@Sven Groot: But I thought that Windows Essentials came with Windows 8? Or am I thinking of something different; maybe it's their security software I'm thinking of.

Coffeehouse - Windows 8 and older versions of IE

Doctor Who — Sat, 26 Jan 2013 16:20:11 GMT

2 days ago, figuerres wrote
*snip*
why ? is there a problem he has with IE10 ? is there a web site he can not view in IE10 ?
if we knew more we might have a way to fix the problem for him.

From my son's point of view, there is a problem with IE10. There's a problem with IE9 for that matter, from his point of view. You see what he wants is to have between 40 and 50 or more tabs automatically open whenever he gets into IE. He's found that IE9 restricts the number of tabs he can have opened at once to something less than 40 (I think it is). Certainly IE10 restricts the number to something less than 40. I typically have 1 to 3 tabs open at once. Sometimes when I'm in a hurry I might open up to about 10, but that's it, and that's not for long. My son, on the other hand, always has a boat load of tabs open in IE. IE8 gives him that flexibility.

Coffeehouse - What difficulties might I run into, doing development on my laptop, while commuting?

Doctor Who — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 23:18:25 GMT

@BitFlipper: I have just gotten off of a chat with Sony tech support, and have determined that my laptop does support SLAT.

Coffeehouse - What difficulties might I run into, doing development on my laptop, while commuting?

Doctor Who — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 22:47:25 GMT

Several of you have mentioned the possibility of my encountering problems with the bus reacting to road conditions. I hadn't thought about that. There's at least 1 place where that can be a problem, because the bus crosses railroad tracks. I think I'll give it a try and see how it goes, but this might not work at all for me. Certainly a train ride would be better, but that's not practical for my commute.

Coffeehouse - What difficulties might I run into, doing development on my laptop, while commuting?

Doctor Who — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 22:44:47 GMT

@GoddersUK: I'd never thought of the possibility of others looking over my shoulder to see what I'm doing. And since I tend to ride in the first seat, then I guess I'm inviting people to peek.

Coffeehouse - What difficulties might I run into, doing development on my laptop, while commuting?

Doctor Who — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 22:42:05 GMT

@BitFlipper: I've never heard of Second Level Address Translation. I have no idea if my new laptop supports that or not. Thanks for the info, I guess I'll have to look into it.

Coffeehouse - Windows 8 and older versions of IE

Doctor Who — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 22:35:47 GMT

2 days ago, Sven Groot wrote
Not in any supported fashion. And any unsupported hack that might conceivably allow you to do it will inevitably hose your system in some way, since IE is a rather important component of the OS.
Why do you want to do this? If it's for testing purposes, I recommend using a VM.

I don't want to do this, my son does. He's looking at buying a new laptop, with Windows 8, but he wants to go to IE8.

Coffeehouse - Is there a separate SkyDrive app for the desktop version of Windows 8?

Doctor Who — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 22:33:56 GMT

In December I purchased a Sony Vaio Series E laptop. It came with Windows 8 and it was touch enabled. However, it had a problem and I had to flatten the machine and start it over again, with Sony's technical support. But before I did that it seems to me, if memory serves, that there was a separate SkyDrive app for the desktop side of Windows 8. I know that there's a SkyDrive app on the Metro side, and I've used it, but I depended upon seeing my SkyDrive folder in what I think is now called File Viewer, in Windows 8 desktop. It isn't there, now.

So, I want to know, am I correct in thinking that there's a separate SkyDrive app for the desktop side of Windows 8? And if so, where is it?

Coffeehouse - What difficulties might I run into, doing development on my laptop, while commuting?

Doctor Who — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 16:24:41 GMT

WOW, I didn't realize how much I left out, when I asked my question. Let me fill in more details.

The Windows Phone development I want to do is for myself, only. I do work as a professional software engineer, but where I work there's no chance of doing any mobile development for the foreseeable future. However, I want to get into this on my own, I have some ideas for apps I want to get into the Marketplace. i.e.: this is all on my initiative. So syncing with others isn't an issue. Source control is incumbent upon me.

Coffeehouse - Windows 8 and older versions of IE

Doctor Who — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 16:17:24 GMT

Is it possible to downgrade Internet Explorer from version 10 to something like 9 or 8, in Windows 8?

Coffeehouse - What difficulties might I run into, doing development on my laptop, while commuting?

Doctor Who — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 00:45:21 GMT

I've had an idea for a Windows Phone app for a long time, but finding the time to work on it hasn't been easy, due to long commutes. A month ago I got a new laptop, because I was going on a business trip and needed a way of being able to reach work, in the event I had to. Now I wondering, how about doing development on my laptop, while I'm commuting? (I ride a bus; long rides.) Now, there's times when that's not convenient, due to the fact that I had several transfers that are only a few minutes apart, but there's other things that might be possible. The only thing I'm concerned about is not having Internet access. If I try this, what problems might I encounter, and how might I be able to either fix it or live with it?

Coffeehouse - How do I rename my Windows 8 laptop, and trusting a PC?

Doctor Who — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 01:46:47 GMT

My new Sony Vaio got royally messed up. I had to reset it and am having to restart everything, reinstall all the apps I'd already installed, basically waste my New Years Day on stuff that shouldn't have happened in the first place, but oh well, that's the way it is.

When the reset process was done it prompted me to name my laptop. I thought I was pressing the backspace button, but instead I pressed the enter button. Now my laptop is named VAIO, which isn't want I want it named. However, now Windows 8 has "trusted" my PC and added it to my Microsoft ID. I really do not understand this whole "trusting a PC" stuff, with Windows 8 and my Microsoft ID. In particular, if I now rename my laptop, what happens with respect to "trusting" my PC and my Microsoft ID?

Coffeehouse - I've had major problems with my new Sony Vaio laptop

Doctor Who — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 01:38:00 GMT

@vesuvius: I've done the reset, per Sony's recommendations. Starting over from the get-go. Oh well, now I get to spend New Year's Day installing software!

Coffeehouse - I've had major problems with my new Sony Vaio laptop

Doctor Who — Mon, 31 Dec 2012 16:24:47 GMT

@vesuvius: Is the reset you refer to the same thing as the push-reset that JoshRoss mentioned?

Coffeehouse - I've had major problems with my new Sony Vaio laptop

Doctor Who — Mon, 31 Dec 2012 13:43:53 GMT

3 hours ago, JoshRoss wrote
Push-Button Reset.

I haven't year of push-button reset, so thank you for pointing me to that. I've checked out the website, but it looks to me as though it's only for WindowsRT, not Windows 8. Am I wrong about that?

Coffeehouse - I've had major problems with my new Sony Vaio laptop

Doctor Who — Mon, 31 Dec 2012 13:43:05 GMT

6 hours ago, cheong wrote
Kaspersky has a historical record of not doing clean uninstall. The Sony support guys probably know that too, but since the support calls are recorded, that won't tell you about that in phone calls. This is due to the fact that most antivirus are not updated by Windows Installer, so if a major update is happening in between, the code for current application components and the uninstaller won't match. And this is especially bad for Kaspersky because many of their components rooted deep in system level.
My advice for these kind of "preloaded trial antivirus" software is that, either you decide to run through the trial period and upgrade it to paid version, or just uninstall it on the first time you turn the PC on so the uninstall can happen before any major update is applied. This will save you a lot of pain later.
If you've not done full system recovery yet, you may try your luck to contact them (need to try your luck because you're using trial version, not a paid one.).
Anyway I always (note that not "almost always", just "always") wipe the drive clean and reinstall Windows from scratch whenever I need to buy branded PC. Others here also do that not for no reason.

Really? That's very interesting, about Kaspersky having a poor uninstall record. I suppose that Sony puts Kaspersky onto their new systems and most users just stay with whatever came with the system.

Coffeehouse - I've had major problems with my new Sony Vaio laptop

Doctor Who — Mon, 31 Dec 2012 05:19:59 GMT

On December 1st I purchased my first Windows 8 device, a Sony Vaio laptop. I was going to VS Live! in Orlando this month, and I needed something so that I could get remote access to computers and servers at work, if the need arose. It would have been nice to have gotten a Microsoft Surface Pro, but since they're not due until January, and I needed something in December, I decided to go with the Sony Vaio. Besides, I'd seen Sony Vaio's being used by people on MSDN's Channel 9, so I thought that would be a great choice. So, that's what I went with. It worked well for me in Orlando, so it seemed to be a good choice.

One of the pre-loaded applications that came with it was Kaspersky's 2013 Anti-virus suite. Naturally, it was a trial version, and the trial was about to run out. This evening I uninstalled it. After I uninstalled it, Windows Defender wanted to go on, but my PC rebooted; I figured I could make certain it went on after it rebooted. Besides that, I have Bitdefender, which I was going to install. However, the first thing I noticed when it rebooted is the mouse wasn't working at all. Next I noticed that the keyboard wasn't working at all. And the keypad wasn't working. Because the Sony Vaio is a touch enabled device I was able to use the on-screen keyboard, but as all of you know that's OK, if you don't really have a lot of typing to do, but of course I do.

So I got online to go into a chat session with Sony's technical support. They had me download and install the touchpad device driver. I did so, but apparently Sony's website doesn't work too well with IE10 Metro, because once I got onto the website to download the touchpad driver, it hung up with my session with Sony tech support. Anyway, I downloaded and installed it, which required a reboot. I did that, and got back onto Sony's tech support to chat with someone else. With the second Sony technician I found that the touchpad wasn't working, even after installing the driver. He had to do a system restore to the last good checkpoint, which was done on December 26. Naturally the restore requires a reboot, which I did.

Once my laptop came back up, I tried it again, but found that mouse, keyboard and track pad weren't working, so at this point I decided to call Sony technical support. Once I got them on the phone, and they had me go to desktop mode it was then I noticed an alert box from the restore telling me that the restore had failed. That my C: drive may, in fact, be corrupt. This is a brand new PC, less than a month old! I have a bad hard drive already? What's that say about the quality of Sony products? The tech support guy had me get into a Vaio Care utility, which I did, and see what was happening there. Interestingly enough the arrow keys did work here, as well as the return key, because I was able to select different things and press the enter key. But no matter what else happened, once I logged into Windows the mouse, keyboard and mouse pad/touchpad didn't work at all. What the Sony tech support guy then told me sunk my heart. He said that the only thing I could do, at this point, was to do a complete system recovery; loose everything that I had and all programs I've installed. At this point I have personal things on there and photos, but I also have Visual Studio 2010 and 2012 installed, as well as Telerik controls and other development software. And I've installed MS Office. This represents a great deal of work and time, on my part. I do not look forward to doing this and starting all over again.

Of course I asked what could have caused this. The tech guy speculates that once I uninstalled Kaspersky, some virus that it was holding back, suddenly became active and was preventing any and all access to mouse, keyboard and touchpad. I suppose that's possible; sort of makes sense, but why wouldn't Kaspersky have quarantined any viruses it came across? Or when I uninstalled Kaspersky and it was "holding a virus back" why didn't it ask me what I wanted it to do with things that it had quarantined? Before I got Bitdefender I had GFI's VIPRE software, and when I uninstalled VIPRE, it asked me what I wanted it to do with all of the items it had found and quarantined. Honestly, that's what I would expect from any anti-virus software that one is uninstalling; that it ask the user if they want to delete it, leave it quarantined or something else. To just allow any and all viruses to run free, after being uninstalled, is not at all in the public's interest, to say the least.

I don't know if there was a virus on my Sony Vaio or not, but this whole experience has really turned me off of Sony Vaio's and Kaspersky. I believe it is still under the 30 day warranty with Best Buy (where I purchased it), and so tomorrow I'm very interested in considering something else. I want a touch enabled device, running Windows 8, and this Vaio I have is an i7 with a 1 TB HD. It cost me about $1000. Given those specs, what else would you suggest that's similar, please? (And I hope it doesn't come with Kaspersky.)

Tech Off - Getting error 805a0193 after resetting my phone

Doctor Who — Tue, 13 Nov 2012 04:04:18 GMT

I had to reset my HTC Trophy phone. After activating it again with Verizon I tried to download an app. It failed with error 805a0193. I tried another app and got the same error.

How do I fix this and get my phone working again?

Tech Off - Is there any way of listing all of the apps I've got on my WP7?

Doctor Who — Tue, 13 Nov 2012 03:04:38 GMT

@BitFlipper: Thank you, that is exactly what I want!