Prince2 Foundation Exam Success

Last week I went on PRINCE2 training in Sydney, I found it pretty interesting all in all at the end of which I took the PRINCE2 foundation exam and passed.

C# - yield

The yield keyword was introduced with C# 2.0.

Here is some further reading;

• from C# reference -yield (C# Reference)
  
• from stackoverflow - C# - Proper Use of yield return?
• from stackoverflow - What does “yield break;” do in C#?
• from stackoverflow - Yield keyword value added?
• from C# in Depth - Sample Chapter 6 - Implementing iterators the easy way

Visual Studio 2008 Shortcuts

Following on from earlier post - Visual Studio Keyboard Shortcuts

CTRL W S - Solution Explorer
CTRL W L - Server Explorer
CTRL W E - Error Explorer
CTRL W X - Tool Box
CTRL W O - Output Window

CTRL D I - Immediate Window
CTRL D C - Call Stack
CTRL D W - Watch Window

CTRL E F - Format Selection
CTRL E \ - Delete white space
CTRL E S - View white space
CTRL E C - comment selection
CTRL E U - uncomment selection

CTRL U - To Lower
CTRL Shift U - To Upper

CTRL + \ D - Code Definition Window
CTRL + \ M - Team Explorer

CTRL ALT B - Breakpoints window
CTRL ALT ↓ - Files Open List

Firefox Add-Ons

• Adblock Plus
• CodeBurner for Firebug (Extends Firebug with reference material for HTML and CSS)
• ColorZilla (Advanced Eyedropper, ColorPicker, Page Zoomer and other colorful goodies)
• CoLT (Makes it easy to copy link text and locations)
• Delicious Bookmarks
• Dictionary Search
• FiddlerHook
• FireBug
• FireFTP
• LeechBlock
• Shorten URL
• Tab Preview
• Web Developer
• YSLow
  

Useful Utility programs

A good place to start would be Scott Hanselman's 2009 Ultimate Developer and Power Users Tool List for Windows.

This is my list from 18 months ago - Utility Programs, Tools, Add-Ins plus other stuff.

Updated list.

• Ninite - Pick from a big list of utility programs ninite will go get them all for you, install them and make sure the crapware toolbars and ebay links are not installed. Reviewed on HowToGeek.com.

• Unlocker Assistant - When you try and delete something and you get the file locked message, the Unlocker Assistant will pop up, giving you the option to unlock the files and perform your delete. Download from here
  

• DiffMerge -is an application to visually compare and merge files for Windows, Mac OS X and Unix. Download from here
  
  • If using DiffMerge with Subversion, the following settings can be used to 'Diff' and 'Merge'
    
    Diff Viewer
    

    C:\Program Files\SourceGear\DiffMerge\DiffMerge.exe /t1=%bname /t2=%yname %base %mine

    
    Merge
    

    C:\Program Files\SourceGear\DiffMerge\DiffMerge.exe /m /r=%merged /t1=%yname /t2=%bname /t3=%tname /c=%mname %mine %base %theirs

• Sysinternals Suite - Has many useful tools including


• AutoRuns - This utility shows you what programs are configured to run during system bootup or login. Download from here.


• BgInfo - is a little tool that displays a load of your system information as a bmp on your desktop. More information from here




• Daemon Tools - Mount iso image
  

• Regular Expression Workbench - a utility that lets you experiment with .NET regular expressions.

• SqlScripter - simple, low-cost tool for quickly exporting data
  


• Foxit - a pdf reader
  


• Paint.Net - a free image and photo editing software for computers that run Windows
  

• CCleaner - removes unused files from your system.

• Driver Max - find updates for your drivers, also backup and restore them.

• LinqPad - A great way to learn LINQ.
  

• Microsoft Security Essentials - its a virus checker, and its free, reviewed here
  

• Moo0 System Monitor - An easy way to monitor your computer’s system resource usage. Reviewed here.
  

• MWSnap - free screen capture software
  

• Reflector - If you dont know about reflector, you probably dont need it.
  

• Secunia Personal Software Inspector - Scans your machine to find out of date software that you are using, this could have security implications for you. Is covered in this article from HowToGeek.com
  

• VHD Resizer - Heres a how to from Serverfault.com.
  

• DBAN - Boot and Nuke - DBAN will automatically and completely delete the contents of any hard disk that it can detect, which makes it an appropriate utility for bulk or emergency data destruction.

Some random HowToGeek Links

• How To Keep Your Windows PC Updated
  
• Command Line Hack for: "Terminal Server Has Exceeded the Maximum Number of Allowed Connections"
• Disable Fast User Switching on Windows XP
• Dual Monitors: Use a Different Wallpaper on Each Desktop
• Enhance Productivity With Extensions For Windows
• Find Domain Information the Easy Way with Win32Whois
• Find Out What Keywords are Bringing Visitors to Your Site with Google Analytics
• Find Out Which Articles Are Most Popular on Your Site With Google Analytics
• Geek Reviews: Monitor And Benchmark Your PC with PC Wizard
• Prevent Annoying Websites From Messing With the Right-Click Menu in Firefox
• Spice Up that Boring about:blank Page in Firefox
• Understand Words Using DictionarySearch
• Add "Open with Notepad" to the Context Menu for All Files

What is WCF?

• What is WCF?
• Writing the WCF Hello World App
• Writing your first WCF client
• Host a WCF Service in IIS 7 & Windows 2008 - The right way
  
• Dot Net Rocks TV - Keith Elder Demystifies WCF
  

Certified Scrum Master

Last month I attended a certified Scrum Master course facilitated by Kane Mar

It was a two day course well run and enoyable, at the end of which after taking the Scrum Master exam I can now call myself a Certified Scrum Master. A bit of a grandiose title maybe but I feel the knowledge learnt was definetly worthwhile.

To output special characters not on your keyboard.

To output special characters that arent on your keyboard you can use the number key pad and the ALT key

For example ALT 0235 will output ë

To find the number you can use the Character Map application;

Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Character Map

A whole lot of Linq

A blog post on Linq 2 Sql performance from Jeff Atwood

A whole load of linq posts from Bill Wagner' s blog

1. Exploring LINQ: Part 1 of N
2. LINQ Exploration 2
3. LINQ Exploration
4. The next LINQ installment
5. Another LINQ investigation item
6. Yet Another LINQ entry
7. I gotta have more LINQ content
8. More LINQ Investigation
9. Ordering LINQ results
10. Grouping LINQ results
11. LINQ Samples: Part 11
12. LINQ Samples: Part 12
13. Where you at item, where you at?
14. More LINQ: boolean tests on sequences
15. More LINQ: Aggregation operators
16. Miscellaneous LINQ methods
17. Deferred vs. Immediate query
18. Join Together
19. Linq to SQL (the technology previously known as DLinq)
20. DLINQ 2: Where clauses and database queries
21. LinqToSql: Translating C# to SQL
22. DLinq queries: Mathematics functions
23. LinqToSql: Joins
24. Linq2SQL: Group By Order By, and why I prefer C# To T-SQL
25. LINQ 2 SQL Set Operations
26. Paging output with Linq2SQL
27. LINQ to SQL Optimistic Concurrency: How LINQ to SQL behaves
28. More LINQ 2 SQL (finally)