NUnitGenAddIn

Here's a Visual Studio.NET add-in for generating NUnit unit tests

Vista Beta 2

Windows Vista Beta 2 has been released. I'm downloading it now.

If it looks stable enough then I'll consider reloading my workstation with it (Time to live dangerously!)

WinFX, Office 2007, Threat Modelling Tool, SharePoint v3

• WinFX Beta 2 (with a GoLive license, so you can use it in production now)
• Office 2007 Beta 2
• Threat Analysis and Modelling Tool v2.0 RC1
• Microsoft Windows SDK for Beta 2 (Vista) includes prefast support
• Windows SharePoint Services V3: SDK
• SharePoint Server 2007: SDK

Poppa Bill

Today just after 4pm, my grandfather "Poppa Bill" passed away. It is a really sad day, though in a sense there is a sense of relief that he doesn't have to struggle with his health anymore.

One thing to hang on to is that we will meet again one day in Heaven. Tonight as we put the kids to bed, we thought about some of the things he would now be able to do again that he hadn't for a long time because of poor health - including running around, eating donuts and meat pies! (Poppa had diabetes)

He had a most remarkable life, and I will miss him a lot.

Thanks Poppa.

Using Annotations to Reduce C/C++ Code Defects

Michael Howard blogs about using the Standard Annotation Language to improve static code analysis and find more bugs (including security bugs) in your C and C++ source code. I've filed a bug to see if these annotations can be added to the Mozilla source code.

Google Notebook

I've been using Microsoft OneNote for a few years now, and find it quite useful for storing all sorts of useful things. We're also using it at home as a way of recording recipes too, instead of having countless slips of scrap paper flying around. Now along comes Google Notebook - a free web-based service that sounds like a pretty similar idea. It only works for Firefox (and IE) at the moment.

Domain-Specific Language Tools: Model-Driven Development of .NET Enterprise Applications

I heard Susan Entwisle present at CodeCampOz this year, and it was quite an interesting presentation. Slightly more "academic" or "big-picture" than some of the other talks, but fascinating nonetheless.

To be honest, I'm still not certain that we could make very much use of these kinds of tools with the kind of projects we work on, but it is an interesting field to keep an eye on.

Prioritizing Web Usability: Jakob Nielsen's new book

Haven't read it yet, but we should be getting a copy soon. Jakob knows his stuff, and his earlier book Prioritizing Web Usability (Voices That Matter) is one of the standard references on the subject.

Extension progress

I'm pleased to say that we finally have some really good progress on the house extension.

Paul (our builder) hurt his back just after the slab was poured, so he's only just been able to return to work. As you can see, we have had a bit of rain lately so it a bit on the muddy side now.

It's all looking really good though, and it is great to finally be able to walk around and get a sense of the space and size of all the rooms.

Consolas Font Pack

The Microsoft Consolas Font Family is a set of highly legible fonts designed for ClearType.

I've blogged previously about how I enabled ClearType because it should improve productivity. I've left it on at home with the LCD monitors, but I reverted back to the standard fonts on the CRT monitors at work as it was just too fuzzy to work with.

Unless you're using ClearType on a suitable monitor, I wouldn't bother with these fonts. They don't look that great on my CRTs. I'll give them a try at home though.

Diarist

Diarist - A nice PocketPC application for writing blog posts.

TUGZip

The built-in unzip in Windows XP is nice to have, but for some reason it runs extremely slowly if the zip has more than a few files in it. I'm trying out "TUGZip" as it also integrates with Windows Explorer and looks like it is a bit snappier in the performance stakes. It's also freeware.

Monitoring ASP.NET Apps using MOM 2005

The ISTS Unit here at UniSA have begun using MOM to monitor our Windows Servers. I'm interested in whether creating management packs for our ASP.NET applications would help with monitoring and getting early warning of potential problems.

Here is some light reading to get up to speed:

• Call MOM: Instrument and Monitor Your ASP.NET Apps Using WMI and MOM 2005 - MSDN Magazine, September 2005
• Monitor Your .NET Applications with Microsoft Operations Manager 2005
• MOM 2005 Management Pack Development Guide