Channel 9 - Discussions by brussell

Coffeehouse - Implementing a 28-hour day

brussell — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 21:21:21 GMT

SlackmasterK wrote:

Technically speaking, one day is 23 hours, 56 minutes, 2 seconds, ~400ms. Why not go with this technically-correct number instead? It even eliminates the necessity for leap day.

How would removing 4 minutes from each day remove the need for an extra day to be added every four years?

Tech Off - DateTime.Day problem in C++.NET

brussell — Mon, 07 Nov 2005 18:18:43 GMT

Just realized I was in Release build and wasn't using the variable anywhere yet so it was being optimized away.

I have switched my code to: String* sDate = dt.ToString( "yyyyMMdd" );

Thanks!

Tech Off - DateTime.Day problem in C++.NET

brussell — Mon, 07 Nov 2005 18:07:19 GMT

Yeah, I realized that.
Month and date should be double digit always.
I am looking to get 20051107.

That doesn't change the problem I am having with the date.

Tech Off - DateTime.Day problem in C++.NET

brussell — Mon, 07 Nov 2005 17:49:41 GMT

I am trying to get the current date in the format of YearMonthDay (2005117) in C++.NET.

I have tried all sorts of ways, but can't get the date on it.

I have tried to take dt.Year and concat dt.Month and dt.Day, but end up with 200511.

I have tried taking the int dt.Day and pass it into an array of string versions of dates.
The command window gives me a good value, but string pointer it is returning to is bad.

The last thing I just tried was

            DateTime dt = DateTime::Now;
            String* delimStr = S"/";
            Char delimiter[] = delimStr->ToCharArray();

            String* saDate[] = dt.ToShortDateString()->Split( delimiter );
            String* sDate = saDate[2];
            sDate = String::Concat( sDate, saDate[0] );
            sDate = String::Concat( sDate, saDate[1] );

and that gets me 200511 also.

Any ideas? This doesn't make any sense.
Year and month work fine, but no matter what, I can't get a date...

Tech Off - .BATs in C++.NET

brussell — Mon, 07 Nov 2005 15:46:19 GMT

How do I run my .bat from my C++.NET program?

I thought I had done this before, but I don't remember how.

Tech Off - Table columns move

brussell — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 19:05:00 GMT

W3bbo wrote:

brussell wrote:I am having a problem with my site.
It is writtin in ASP.NET.

I have a table that has three rows.
The top row is for a header, the bottom for a footer.
Those each have one column.

The middle row has two columns.
The left one is for a menubar.
It is supposed to be set to a width of 170 pixels and not move.
The right one is the content for that page.

BURN THE HERETIC!

Saw that coming.

Tech Off - Table columns move

brussell — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 18:40:07 GMT

Well, that looks better, thanks.

The problem with that is it puts the right column right against the menubar in the left column.

But I can use CellPadding to put a little space back in.

Tech Off - Table columns move

brussell — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 17:17:43 GMT

I am having a problem with my site.
It is writtin in ASP.NET.

I have a table that has three rows.
The top row is for a header, the bottom for a footer.
Those each have one column.

The middle row has two columns.
The left one is for a menubar.
It is supposed to be set to a width of 170 pixels and not move.
The right one is the content for that page.

In Visual Studio, everything looks great.
In IE, on some pages, the left column expands based on the width of the browser.
The main page had looked fine in IE until I removed the last line of text (no tags, just text) from the right column of the middle row.
I put it back and the page was fine again.
I viewed source on both versions (with and without the line) and the only difference in code was the line...

I don't get what is going on. I don't want that cell to expand.

Can anyone please help?

Edit: and before anyone says it's a problem with IE, it happens in Firefox too.

Coffeehouse - Microsoft flips off its users

brussell — Tue, 18 Oct 2005 15:24:47 GMT

out180 wrote:

This drives me INSANE with my test bed. I can no longer test against specific patch levels because in order to run Windows Update I need to pass WGA but in order to pass WGA I need to activate Windows.

I, of course, just disable the add-in in order to continue my efforts but it is a load of crap in the end. I'm not proud of how I get the job done but it is all MS has left me with.

I guess I could just activate every test box I build. Yeah, in a week my XP activations would get bumped to phone activation and eventually the activation people would question what was going on. Actually, while I can't find it at the moment, MSDN docs recommend you not activate if you are using an OS install for testing less than 90 days. That's just peachy if you want an RTM, pure SP1 or SP2 machine. No fully up to date boxes, especially no non-critical patches. Not without activating / passing WGA..

Why not get a volume license install CD that lets you install for a whole company and doesn't require each computer to be activated?
That is what we have here so we don't have to worry about that for test machines and we can install as many times as we want on the test machines
To make it even faster and easier now, we install once as plain, then Ghost it and don't have to worry about installing it again anyway.

Coffeehouse - Quit locking threads

brussell — Thu, 13 Oct 2005 21:19:23 GMT

It looks to me like it was locked because it is almost a year old and was brought back to advertise a product and there are other, more current threads on the first page of Coffee House.

Coffeehouse - E-Books: Does Anybody Buy Them?

brussell — Thu, 29 Sep 2005 21:29:03 GMT

reedracer wrote:

If a book is available as an ebook, I prefer that format. Followed by audion and plain old paper. I have an H2210 Pocket PC. I can read it anywhere, do not need a light to read in bed, can keep track of time very easily, and can annotate or bookmark anything in context. I prefer Microsoft reader over the rest, as well.

Same with me.
I have also been checking e-books out from the library.

Coffeehouse - Authors Guild sues Google

brussell — Wed, 21 Sep 2005 19:18:03 GMT

harumscarum wrote:

How many of you actually read ebooks? I can not stand reading books off the PC.

I read eBooks on my PPC all the time. In the last couple years, a majority of what I have read has probably been eBooks.

I prefer MSN Reader, but have found Adobe Reader 2.0 isn't that bad.
It let's me check out eBooks from the county library without actually making a trip there.
Also don't have to worry about late fees because the eBook just expires.

Coffeehouse - Decrypting strings

brussell — Wed, 21 Sep 2005 19:00:43 GMT

Maurits wrote:

I'm sure there is. Can you post the string?

Depending on the kind of encryption, and the kind of the data, there are various tricks that can be tried.

Brute-force works surprisingly often. It helps if you have a zombie army at your beck and call, too. (I mean, I would assume.)

It is a home made encryption and I'm hoping it isn't easy to decrypt.

Coffeehouse - itunes 5 crashes machines

brussell — Wed, 21 Sep 2005 18:57:41 GMT

I have used iTunes on multiple machines, one with Embedded C++ and a bunch other developer stuff with no problems.

Coffeehouse - Decrypting strings

brussell — Wed, 21 Sep 2005 18:53:55 GMT

harumscarum wrote:

google?

I have been trying all sorts of searches on google and haven't come up with anything yet.

Coffeehouse - Decrypting strings

brussell — Wed, 21 Sep 2005 18:52:45 GMT

Manip wrote:

No; there is no such thing as magic.

I can hope (Well, for testing I can hope there is. For releasing software, I hope there isn't)

Coffeehouse - Decrypting strings

brussell — Wed, 21 Sep 2005 18:44:31 GMT

Is there a program that takes an encrypted string and tries to find a way to decrypt it?

Coffeehouse - Whatever happened to this?

brussell — Tue, 20 Sep 2005 18:31:05 GMT

When I played with one, I could never get it to work that well.
Cool idea though.

Tech Off - Virtual PC & Vista

brussell — Tue, 20 Sep 2005 15:07:32 GMT

I had Vista running on VPC.
I found these steps to do it:

When you get to the “Install Windows” screen, press Shift+F10 to open a command prompt. Type DISKPART at the prompt and use the following commands.

select disk 0
create partition primary
select volume 1
format fs=ntfs label="vista"

After this I typed EXIT to leave the utility, reset the VPC, and started the installation again.

Tech Off - DLLImport in C++

brussell — Mon, 19 Sep 2005 21:17:03 GMT

Sven Groot wrote:

Why not just use the old fashioned way with LoadLibrary and GetProcAddress?

Because this was the first way I found. Not any real reason.

Found the solution.
I can name the function whatever I want. So I just named them differently.
Thanks though!

namespace dbBld91
{
    using namespace System::Runtime::InteropServices;
    [DllImport("dbBuilder91.dll", EntryPoint = "BuildASCII")]
    extern "C" void BuildASCII91( int iType );
}
namespace dbBld90
{
    using namespace System::Runtime::InteropServices;
    [DllImport("dbBuilder90.dll", EntryPoint = "BuildASCII")]
    extern "C" void BuildASCII90( int iType );
}
namespace dbBld80
{
    using namespace System::Runtime::InteropServices;
    [DllImport("dbBuilder80.dll", EntryPoint = "BuildASCII")]
    extern "C" void BuildASCII80( int iType );
}

I can rewrite that to be:
namespace dbBld
{
    using namespace System::Runtime::InteropServices;
    [DllImport("dbBuilder91.dll", EntryPoint = "BuildASCII")]
    extern "C" void BuildASCII91( int iType );

    [DllImport("dbBuilder90.dll", EntryPoint = "BuildASCII")]
    extern "C" void BuildASCII90( int iType );

    [DllImport("dbBuilder80.dll", EntryPoint = "BuildASCII")]
    extern "C" void BuildASCII80( int iType );
}

Tech Off - DLLImport in C++

brussell — Mon, 19 Sep 2005 21:04:45 GMT

I have a utility that I am writing in C++.NET.
I wrote three MFC DLLs.

I am trying to inlude and use the DLLs in the utility.

namespace dbBld91
{
    using namespace System::Runtime::InteropServices;
    [DllImport("dbBuilder91.dll", EntryPoint = "BuildASCII")]
    extern "C" void BuildASCII( int iType );
}
namespace dbBld90
{
    using namespace System::Runtime::InteropServices;
    [DllImport("dbBuilder90.dll", EntryPoint = "BuildASCII")]
    extern "C" void BuildASCII( int iType );
}
namespace dbBld80
{
    using namespace System::Runtime::InteropServices;
    [DllImport("dbBuilder80.dll", EntryPoint = "BuildASCII")]
    extern "C" void BuildASCII( int iType );
}

namespace SymbolDatabaseGenerator
{
    ...
    dbBld91::BuildASCII( iVendor );
    ...
}

No matter what namespace I tell it to call BuildASCII() from, it uses the DLL that is imported last (currently dbBld80).

Any ideas how to fix this? I need to use all the DLLs.

Coffeehouse - Hotmail Sent Items

brussell — Mon, 19 Sep 2005 20:41:12 GMT

Some of the reasons I use Outlook instead of the web interface.

Coffeehouse - Typing Speed

brussell — Fri, 16 Sep 2005 22:09:19 GMT

With Dvorak, I am getting 15 WPM with 93% accuracy.
With QWERTY, I am getting 50 WPM with 98% accuracy.

I used to be much faster on QWERTY than I am now that I have been using Dvorak for the last week or so.

Tech Off - Using MFC and .NET

brussell — Fri, 16 Sep 2005 18:26:59 GMT

I was doing everything right except I forgot to put the function into the .def....

Works now, thanks

Tech Off - Using MFC and .NET

brussell — Fri, 16 Sep 2005 17:20:33 GMT

I have figured out how to DllImport in my C++.NET program but I am having problems figuring out how to extern my MFC function from a dll so the C++.NET program can see it.

Any ideas?

I have
public: void BuildASCII( CString sPath )
in the MFC DLL that needs to be used in the .NET program.

I have
[DllImport("dbBuilder.dll", EntryPoint = "BuildASCII", CharSet = Unicode)]
    void BuildASCII( System::String* sPath );

...
private: System::Void btnStartBuild_Click(System::Object * sender, System::EventArgs * e)
             {
                 BuildASCII( "./" );
             }
in the .NET.

Edit:
In the DLL's .h, I have:
extern "C"
{
    void BuildASCII( CString sPath );
}

I get this error in the .NET program:
An unhandled exception of type 'System.EntryPointNotFoundException' occurred in Symbol Database Generator.exe

Additional information: Unable to find an entry point named BuildASCII in DLL dbBuilder.dll.