Writing
Articles
Essays on thinking clearly, working for yourself, and doing real work while AI rewrites the rules. Two decades of them.
A Geek’s Checkbook Register
I hate balancing a checkbook, so I automated it with ClearCheckBook.com and its CheckBot texting feature -- log transactions by SMS, no spreadsheet required.
2007.10.17Read →Auto-Insert Attribute Quotes in HTML
A quick Visual Studio tip: enable automatic attribute-value quotes when typing HTML in the ASPX editor, so you stop typing them by hand.
2007.10.12Read →Map a Drive in .NET and PowerShell
Quick code snippets for mapping, checking, and deleting a network drive at runtime, shown both in .NET (System.Diagnostics.Process) and PowerShell.
2007.10.12Read →The Ergonomic Consultant
A consultant's survival kit for bad client desks: the Natural Ergonomic keyboard, a wired mouse, a laptop riser, and tricks for scoring a decent chair.
2007.10.12Read →A Sandbox/Test Server Is a Sandbox For A Reason
Why every service provider needs a sandbox environment that actually mirrors production -- and what happens to your code (and trust) when it doesn't.
2007.10.06Read →Watermarking Images in ASP.NET with an HttpHandler
How to watermark JPG, PNG, GIF, and BMP images on the fly in ASP.NET using a simple HttpHandler, with working C# code you can drop in today.
2007.09.18Read →Belkin is Gangster
A short, tongue-in-cheek post noting that Belkin's corporate headquarters is located right in Compton, California - which is objectively gangster.
2007.09.14Read →Automated Form Posting with .NET / ASP.NET’s CURL
How to use .NET's HttpWebRequest to post form data to a site with no API, capturing headers with Fiddler to automate an SMS-sending web form.
2007.09.13Read →Google AdWords & Discover Card
Google AdWords wouldn't accept my Discover Card back in 2007. Here's the payment rant, Google's canned response, and why it still bugged me.
2007.09.11Read →Simulating Bandwidth in Web Applications
Net Limiter lets you throttle your own connection to 56k so you can actually feel how your AJAX, Flash, or Silverlight app performs for slow users.
2007.09.10Read →SubSonic on GoDaddy Shared Hosting
SubSonic throws a SecurityException on GoDaddy's medium-trust hosting because of trace logging calls - comment out these lines and recompile to fix it.
2007.09.10Read →Texting/SMS Your Mobile Phone From .NET (or any other technology)
A running list of carrier email-to-SMS gateways and third-party services for sending text messages from .NET or any code, plus which ones to trust.
2007.09.10Read →