It just keeps getting easier...

I have just started playing around with Visual Studio 2008, but I can see that life as I know it is going to change...it is going to be getting easier.

For all of you non-programmers in the audience, it is not so much HOW you get to a solution, it's who can get there in the fewest lines of code. This new feature of VS2008 should help...

In earlier versions of .NET if we wanted to 'protect' some code against cast exceptions we used a 'TRY..CATCH...FINALLY' block to do it. So that meant that we read in the information from say a textbox, tried to do a conversion to an Integer (or some other number data type) and then crossed our fingers and hoped that a exception didn't occur because we could not go back and let a user change their entry.

We have used validation (see the 10 commandments of programming...just kidding, I will post those later), but where is the fun in that...remember the fewer lines of code, the better.

Enter the Int32.TryParse command (you can change the Int32 to another data type if you prefer). You can grab the data, do a type check and if there is an error take care of the error in an IF...THEN block all with a couple lines of code. Take that Framework 1.1!

Update On Software For The Future

From Tech Republic there is a "Tech Sanity Check: Is Twitter the most important development on the web in 2008" report. It is quite interesting and worth a read. If you have to register for Tech Republic it could be worth the time as a resource for other computer and office application information.

While we are at it you might want to check out Jaiku and/or friendfeed both of which have a potential place in the communication world ahead.

While we are at it I want to also recommend EverNote as a replacement to OneNote (Microsoft). I have use OneNote for 5 years however EverNote is beginning to do things that I have always wanted a "note pad" to do and it is available to me online as well as offline. Currently it is in Beta and most likely will cost when it comes out of Beta. At the moment I have about 10 invitations left to send to anyone who would like to try it. Write me at theapsguy@gmail.com and if you are one of the first 10 I will send you an invite. I have installed EverNote on my laptop, my desktop and on a USB drive and can also use in via the Internet.

Blogs of Note

I do a great deal of looking at other blogs as part of a research tool and I find that a good RSS reader is part of the necessity when doing this. I have been using Google's Reader now for about 2 years and I really think it is great. Prior to the Google Reader I have used tools that download blog headlines into Outlook however this is not good when using a computer that is not your own. I have also used a number of readers that you download to your computer however when traveling if I do not have that computer with me I am not able to keep the thread going very easily and again if not using a personal computer this doesn't do me any good either. In using Google's reader I have my list wherever I go and if I am using my laptop versus my desktop I have everything I need at any time. I believe that this works very well.

And while we are in this Cloud Computing thing you should check out Google for a home page away from home.

Speaking of Blogs, go to Microsoft and search "blogs" and you will find a great number of blogs being posted by the developing teams for one piece of software or another. I was out today looking for something on Word and found Ryan Christiansen's blog on  Microsoft Word Support Topics and it is quite good. These blogger's do not post on a continual basis so using a RSS reader is a great idea.

WOW - check out Skydrive at Windows Live - this is beginning to look like something very neat. Put up files for synchronizing using various computers, linking to friends (so they can check it out) and online storage. I will write more on this later.

New Ring Tones....

Have you ever noticed that when someone's cell phone rings in a crowded area, everybody grabs for their cell phone because they are all using the same crummy default ring tone that comes with the phone?

I know that you could contact your cell provider and download one of theirs for a couple of months for only a small fee, but what if you want more variety? What if you want 'Darth Vader's Imperial march' to play when your mother-in-law calls (don't laugh it's better than the Oompah-Loompa song that plays when my mother-in-law calls)? Or maybe you have kids like mine and you want to use 'My Chemical Romance's - Teenagers' refrain when call to ask for more money or a ride somewhere (I won't add a link because it has questionable words, but look at the lyrics if you have teenagers)?

If you never want to be confused again as to whose cell phone is ringing try www.Myxer.com for a large selection of free ring tones and wallpapers for you phone. They even give you the ability to create your own ring tones from sounds that you may already have on you computer, or to edit tones that have already been uploaded to their web site.

As I mentioned for the most part, anything that you download from this site is free (there will be a price listed before you download if they are not). The ring tones will be  sent to you via text message so your phone will need to be able to receive texts.

Now the downside...sometimes the ring tones take a while to be sent to your phone and sometimes they never make it. Also, they quality is not all that hot, but remember what I said above....the ring tones are FREE!! So have some patience and if the quality is bad, try making some yourself.

Any way you choose to do it, at least you will know that when you hear Monty Python's "Message for you Sir!" that it's your phone....so answer it.

Thursday

Just some short news for Thursday, May 22, 2008. Twitter received 15 million in Venture Capital however they are going to have to use some of it to eliminate the uptime hassles.

Google Sites is now open to everyone who has a Google log in and I understand that. It looks quite interesting and putting up a site is real easy. Go to http://sites.google.com and log in and you are on the way. I recommend you play the video on the site first to get an idea of what to do.

More to follow..

Office Newsletters & Other Information

We are looking forward to providing some tips and tricks here for software including Microsoft Office, Adobe and many other applications as well as "Tech Stuff". However in the beginning I would like to mention one great service that Microsoft does provide and that is their newsletters. They only publish about once per month (for each one you select) and you can Op In and Op Out - your choice.

The only requirement is that you have a Passport profile and to get this you just need to sign up for a Hotmail email address and that is not a problem. Go to MSN and click on the Hotmail link on the top of the page and it will take you to the sign up page. Over the years I have discovered that it works for many GOOD reasons and if you use Outlook email you can have your Hotmail email pulled directly into your Outlook.

This months issue of Microsoft Inside Office Newsletter carries many tips about Keyboard Shortcuts, Mail merge and Office 2007. It is generally a quick read and who knows, you might pick up something that will make you an "Office Application Guru".