Really interesting interview with Joel Spolsky here (downloadable).

When queried on the future of ReSharper, Valentin Kipiatkov had this to say...

“The nest major release will be for VS 2005 and will be released approx. at the same time as VS 2005. It will support C# 2.0 and more intelligent features as well as improve existing ones. That's true that we are working on our own ide at the same time.“

Valentin Kipiatkov
Chief Scientist, Vice President of Product Development
JetBrains, Inc

This is from an email I got today. It certainly strikes a chord with me, I hope it does with you as well - assuming you are South African / African, if not then you may just as well move along to the next post...

Mr X had just been retrenched from a high flying job, and now he set out hoping to bounce back into the job market.  He started the day early having set his alarm clock (MADE IN JAPAN) for 6 a.m. While his coffee pot (MADE IN CHINA) was perking, he shaved with his electric razor (MADE IN HONG KONG). He put on a dress shirt (MADE IN ENGLAND), designer jeans (MADE IN THE USA) and tennis shoes (MADE IN KOREA).
 
After cooking his breakfast on his new electric cooker (MADE IN INDIA), he sat down with his calculator (MADE IN MEXICO) to see how much he could spend today. After setting his watch (MADE IN TAIWAN) to the radio (MADE IN JAPAN), he got in his car (MADE IN GERMANY) and continued his search for a good paying SOUTH AFRICAN JOB.
 
At the end of yet another discouraging and fruitless day, Tebogo decided to relax for a while. He sat on his leather couch (MADE IN CANADA) reading a best-seller novel (PUBLISHED IN USA).  After a while he wanted to refresh himself. He put on his sandals (MADE IN BRAZIL) poured himself a glass of wine (MADE IN FRANCE) and turned on his TV (MADE IN INDONESIA), and then wondered why he can't find a GOOD PAYING JOB... in SOUTH AFRICA.
 
There is real value in buying South African. Buying African products create jobs in Africa for Africans. Let's support our economies; let's buy African products!  Begin at home. Buy South African!
 

Since getting a tablet pc I quickly came to realise that they are, without doubt, the future of mobile computing. This belief is re-enforced when I come across articles like this:

Tablets Forced on Schoolgirls
“We've frequently debated the value of tablet PCs here at eWEEK.com. Thus far, their success in the marketplace has been somewhat limited. But according to a local paper here in Baltimore, a private school is doing its part to boost demand for tablets by forcing the parents of students in grades 7 through 12 to supply their children with them.”

GhostDoc is a really useful plugin that automatically generates your XML comments for you. Take an example:

public static bool UpdateSystemConfiguration(string keyWord, string configValue)  {}

Just a quick right click, select “Document this“ from the context menu and hey presto...

/// <summary>

/// Updates the system configuration.

/// </summary>

/// <param name="keyWord">Key word.</param>

/// <param name="configValue">Config value.</param>

/// <returns></returns>

public static bool UpdateSystemConfiguration(string keyWord, string configValue)  {}

 

Sweet.

The JHB blogger dinner last night was awesome, I think everyone who was there had a great time - I know I did! I met some of the 'newer' bloggers that I was keen to put a face to, it was also great to finally meet Senkwe (the man, the myth, the guy you can almost make out in the corner). He went through a lot of effort listing the blogs of a lot of the people that were there last night, but i am feeling pretty drained this morning so i will take the easy way out and just link to his blog entry.

During the course of the dinner I  thought of a ton of things i want to blog about, very few of which I can remember now. So, if i told you i would put a link up to something and i don't please just remind me...I know I was supposed to mention GhostDoc & ReSharper. Hmm. I know there was more than that...oh yes, the place i bought my tablet.

That's all i can think of right now. Maybe tomorrow will be less cloudy.

 

 

It's Not Just Usability

By Joel Spolsky
Monday, September 06, 2004

This is a very interesting and forward looking article on social interfaces and the future of interface design - written in Joel's typically irreverent style that makes reading his work as entertaining as it is informative.

Favourite quote: “Indeed one of the best ways to deflect attacks is to make it look like they're succeeding. It's the software equivalent of playing dead.”

Since we don't have any sponsors for cool gifts for the blogger dinner (that i know of!), I have decided I may as well put something together myself. In view of the SA bandwidth problems, what i thought would be nice is if i made DVD copies of my collection of the DotNet Rocks! internet audio talk shows (all 78 episodes). If anyone who is attending the dinner would like a copy then please add a comment to this entry so that i know how many copies to burn.

[Update: Thanks for the money/drinks offers, but i can see them both landing me in trouble :-P. If you want to 'swap' for a blank DVD that would be cool, otherwise forgetaboudit].

Communications Minister Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri announced today that as of 1 February next year, value added network service (VANS) providers will be allowed to carry voice using any protocol.

More info here.

The way I see it you get two categories of people in any development team. You have the techie/developer types and you get the management types. Here is a simple test to help you figure out which category you fall into:

 

• When a techie/developer type looks at something and it does not make sense to them, their first reaction is to think: "I need to study this more and figure it out."
• When a management type looks at something and it does not make sense to them, their first reaction is to think: "This must be wrong".