When i was doing Classic ASP and PHP work for websites i didn’t really use anything more then GoLive or Dreamweaver and sometimes the ever handy Notepad. For the most part it was just the file management and the syntax highlighting i needed. Moving to .NET let me enter the world of IDEs outside of the classroom environment. I loved it, i learned a lot just by having intellisense show me options. It helped me explore a few things i never would have even known to try.
However, it also seems to have made me lazy. I just spent a good hour trying to figure out why my Linq to Sql classes i just set up weren’t working. I use the basic Add New -> Linq to Sql Classes and then just drag the tables i need and have it generate all the classes for me. EASY!
Well it turns out that this time it didn’t add the appropriate assembly to the webconfig. All that was missing was
<add assembly=”System.Data.Linq, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089″/>
In some ways Visual Studio was vastly increased my speed in pumping out a web application, in others it has stunted my knowledge. I never had to create some of the things it does for me so i probably don’t fully understand what it is doing. Understanding this means i should probably poke around more often and see what its doing automatically in case i ever need to do it by hand. Sheesh.
General .NET, Visual Studio
I love reading about random things sometimes. Browsing stackoverflow and clicking around i ended on a post about Fuzzy Text Searches that mentioned Levenshtein distance, and i jumped over to wikipedia to learn what the heck that is.
In information theory and computer science, the Levenshtein distance is a metric for measuring the amount of difference between two sequences
For example, the Levenshtein distance between “kitten” and “sitting” is 3, since the following three edits change one into the other, and there is no way to do it with fewer than three edits:
1. kitten → sitten (substitution of ’s’ for ‘k’
2. sitten → sittin (substitution of ‘i’ for ‘e’)
3. sittin → sitting (insert ‘g’ at the end).
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levenshtein_distance
NEAT! So something used in order to determine how similar/different two strings are, like a speller checker.
Turns out there is a www.levenshtein.net that shows explains it, has some demos, and explains how to impliment it. On the front page there is even a nice little matrix that showcases how it decides how ‘change’ count
Babbles
Never managed to get this message before. The geek in my squee’d a bit, i’m making zombies with my code! In reality something crashed and while visual studio was trying to clean up its resources it realized it couldn’t. Still, i laughed.
Braaaaaaiiins... are a sometimes food
Uncategorized
Just a quick way to determine if you should even move on to more detailed validation (is it a Visa?) before trying to charge the charge itself.
There is your fun fact for the month.
Uncategorized Fun Fact
If you’ve never had the pleasure of working jQuery, than you need to stop what you are doing and go check it out. Its a cool little JavaScript library that makes throwing some AJAX into your site a snap.
I’ve used jQuery Autocomplete before, and it generally looks something like this:
<script language=”javascript” >
$().ready(function() {
$(”.CLASSNAME”).autocomplete(JobTitles);
$(”#clear”).click(function() {
$(”:input”).unautocomplete();
});
});
</script>
Basically it takes my text box that i have set as class=”CLASSNAME” and in this example a javascript array called JOBTITLES and basically ’suggests’ values that match what they’ve type in so far. Very very handy tool.
I implemented it in a recent project where i was searching a list of names so people could easily search and select the name to add. I had this all wrapped up in an update panel that actually resides in a web user control and had multiple instances of it due to it being printed out in a repeated. Everything worked great….
Then i noticed after i signed up one of the names, my auto-complete broke, WTF? Turns out the update panel does a partial postback that breaks the jQuery. You can find out more information about that here and here.
So in the end i updated my code to look like this:
<script type=”text/javascript” language=”javascript” >
function pageLoad() {
$(”.CLASSNAME”).autocomplete(JOBTITLES);
$(”#clear”).click(function() {
$(”:input”).unautocomplete();
});
}
</script>
… and that did the trick!
Also found this article: $(document).ready() and pageLoad() are not the same!
General .NET, jQuery
Well i never blogged about the book, i never even finished the book. I get bored with lectures even when it comes from a crazy book! Instead I’ve been harassing a CSUN student i know to give me his class projects and futz with them. I find it kinda fun and i can’t wait to get to CSUN.
I’m lazy, deal with it
Looking for some small/short-term programming assignments to learn from? Well i found a few websites for you! Thanks to stackoverflow.com.
While i don’t seem to be able to use the Safari Book Online resource to read a book straight through, i find it really helpful for reference. Sometimes when i’m at work and i need some detailed knowledge about a subject i can load it up, select the book(s) i want that seem to meet my requirement, and then have at it. I find it easier to get ‘real’ knowledge quickly when i can’t trust some random search on Google.
Uncategorized
Wow 2nd blog post. That is +1 more posts that I’ve ever done in the last 6 years.
I really enjoy reading, but when it comes to tech books i don’t often pick them up. Those i do pick up i either skim or just find what i need and put it down again.
So i’m going to challenge myself to not only finish some sort of tech book but to read it carefully enough to write about it here. The book I’ve chosen is called “Head First Object-Oriented Analysis and Design“. Its geared towards people who get bored just reading a lot of technical stuff *raises hands*. Its pretty lame in some of its attempts. I was introduced to the ‘Head First’ book series because my dad had picked up a java version without realizing that it had lots of hand holding and pretty pictures. Its great for people who don’t know how things really work *raises hand again* rather then a programmer who knew C looking to learn some OOP concepts (like my dad).
A part of a page from the book "Head First Object-Oriented Analysis and Design", you can see why it might annoy the hell of someone looking for a reference manual or a technical how-to.
It creates little stories of programming projects trying to show you some good concepts and failures in an attempt to teach you some of the basic concepts. I’ved work with OOP concepts before. I’m currently using the PDSA Framework where everything is wrapped up in classes and objects. I *USE* it but i don’t understand it enough to even talk about it let alone start from the ground up. If i had to write my own i’d make a lot of mistakes that i probably wouldn’t have time to correct.
BTW i’m reading it through Safari Books Online because it allows me to skim/search various books without having to pay $50 - $75 bucks a pop. It also allows me to access them at home/work/school without having to lug around a big book. 
Babbles, Tech Book Challenge OOP, Sarfari Online, Tech Book Challege
If you can do something someone can’t do (or understand hows it done) you can come off as ’smart’. I’ve had people tell me ‘you’re so smart’, but i’m usually of the opinion that i can just do it better than them because they never tried to do it. (Oh yes, the name is angst-driven. Sorry about that).
So i’m ‘Smartest of the Stupid People’ and i’m going to try and post about intersting/new things i’ve learned while learning .NET and any tips and tricks i learned about Visual Studio. I know i can ‘do’ certain things in programming but i rarely really analyze what is it i’m doing and if i had to explain it i’ll probably sound pretty retarded.
So its a documention of my journey to becoming a ‘real’ programmer and forcing me to think about what i’m doing enough to even write about it. You probably won’t hear me babble on about advance concepts like Domain Driven Design, but you may here my bastardize trying to recap what i think interfaces are all about.
All in all i’m sure i’ll look back at this in a few years and laugh (or cry) and at least feel i got a little bit father than i was before.
As i side note. When i was about 15 i used this line as a tagline in a chatroom i used to run and people thought i was calling them stupid and nearly staged a revolt. Bah People.
Babbles Babbles
