Comments for Drewcorp Coding and Technology

Comment on PC vs Console Gaming by amclean

amclean — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 09:24:05 +0000

My apologies, I’m not sure where the message may have gone. Of course you may post a translated part of my blog. Thank you for asking. And hello from Canada!

Comment on Ribbon Interface by cd

cd — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 00:05:59 +0000

It’s the lack of customization that kills me. If I want to move a button from here to there, I cannot. If I want to hide a button I never use, I cannot. The most devastating thing is the inability to add my own tools. In Excel 2003, I hid the Standard and Formatting toolbars, and replaced them with two bars (one on top, and one on the left) with an entire suite of tools specifically designed buy our team to drive our spreadsheets with a bare minimum of clicks.

That’s gone now. It’s not that I can’t find how to do normal Excel stuff (but that is a LOT harder, and always has more clicks than before), and it’s not that I’m resistant to change (I don’t use menus all that much anyway). But cutting off my superuser tools for the convenience of some novice users – that’s what switched me back to Excel 2003. Sure, I can use the QAT, but that is limited in size. There is not enough room on there to do what we need.

I’ve always been a huge Microsoft fan – but they abandoned me now, and I can’t be supportive until they let me customize my interface again, like I have for so many years.

Comment on Nagging “Get Started With Office Live” Won’t Go Away In Office 2007 by Al

Al — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 23:21:59 +0000

The fixit doesn’t exist

Comment on Uninstalling Microsoft Office Activation Assistant by computer repair birmingham

computer repair birmingham — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 19:50:26 +0000

i just wipe the OS as soon as I get a new system. A lot easier and rooms all the bloat ware the vendors install.

Comment on Why ColdFusion Is So Great With Databases by Ben

Ben — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 16:09:21 +0000

Yes, I believe dickbob is correct. I’ve experienced SQL injections with some old code that I had not added cfqueryparam. Mainly you’ve got to be sure to include cfqueryparam on all character fields. But, I don’t take any chances anymore, I use cfqueryparam on all insert, updates & selects when referring to a form value. Also, I stopped using cfinsert and cfupdate years ago. I don’t even remember exactly why, but, I’ve found it’s best to write out the SQL code, if nothing else it puts one on a path to much more advanced db filtering by learning SQL.

Btw, I enjoyed the post from someone who has written both PHP and CFML. Could never understand why CFML hasn’t become more popular, I’ve been using it since vers. 2. The reason always given is the cost, but if, as I believe to be true, that you can develop faster with CFML, it would seem that it wouldn’t take much time to make up the upfront costs.

Comment on The Long-Awaited Return of Adventure Games by scotty

scotty — Fri, 28 May 2010 17:58:22 +0000

King’s Quest is one of the greatest game series ever.

Comment on PC vs Console Gaming by Sprueche

Sprueche — Wed, 19 May 2010 19:11:55 +0000

Hello from Germany! May i quote a post a translated part of your blog with a link to you? I’ve tried to contact you for the topic PC vs Console Gaming | Drewcorp Coding and Technology, but i got no answer, please reply when you have a moment, thanks, Sprueche

Comment on How To Remove “Encrypted Archive” Context Menu For UPEK Biometrics From “My Computer” by amclean

amclean — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 05:44:18 +0000

No problem.

Comment on How To Remove “Encrypted Archive” Context Menu For UPEK Biometrics From “My Computer” by Hello

Hello — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 14:17:50 +0000

Thanks man – great help.

Comment on Form Submit Var Doesn’t Exist When You Use Enter Key To Submit Form by dcolumbus

dcolumbus — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 19:47:23 +0000

Instead of checking for FORM.Submit, create a hidden field with an ID of “pageMode” (or something similar) and a value of “process” (or something similar) … then, once the page has submited, check for:

Make sense? That way, when you submit the form, you’re looking for a variable within the form that was submitted, not the form submission itself.

Comment on Putting Windows Live Messenger Back In The System Tray In Windows 7 by Andy

Andy — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 00:25:22 +0000

Thanks for this useful tip! We’d love if you shared more tips and tricks at http://www.facebook.com/windowscanada

Keep up the great posts!

Andy
Windows Canada

Comment on How To Remove “Encrypted Archive” Context Menu For UPEK Biometrics by How To Remove “Encrypted Archive” Context Menu For UPEK Biometrics From “My Computer” | Drewcorp Coding and Technology

Tue, 12 Jan 2010 20:19:33 +0000

[...] I wrote recently about some correspondence I had with UPEK support to remove the “Encrypted Archive” menu items from the context menu of the whole file system. I thought it was a bit of a nuisance and wanted it removed, so UPEK immediately provided me with a registry key to delete that would solve my problem. [...]

Comment on Ribbon Interface by amclean

amclean — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 20:59:24 +0000

That’s fair I suppose.

There should be an option to revert to the old menu style at the very least. But for the average user (those who don’t use the advanced functions) I think the ribbon is probably great.

Would be nice to be able to customize the ribbon too – though I haven’t found it necessary due to the resolution of my monitors.

Comment on Ribbon Interface by Jake Munson

Jake Munson — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 20:53:28 +0000

I agree, it’s good to innovate away from old conventions, when necessary. But is the ribbon bar an innovation? I think that’s debatable. You said you never have to wonder where things are, but I often can’t find options that I used to know where to find. Not simple things like text formatting, but things in Outlook like “Edit Message”, or freeze panes in Excel. Maybe it’s just me, but I had a hard time finding those and other infrequently used options. They don’t really fit well into the categories that Microsoft chose for the tabs, so they just had to stick them somewhere. Admittedly, the same problem exists for drop down menus, but at least with the old way I knew were things were.

I guess my biggest beef is that the ribbon is so freaking large, and that you can’t customize it as well as the old toolbars.

Comment on Ribbon Interface by amclean

amclean — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 19:00:21 +0000

I just found the ribbon more intuitive than the dropdowns were. I never had to wonder what menu it was under – it was just so logical I couldn’t possibly complain about it.

Sure, every program since the beginning of time has had the same top drop-down menu, and I often subscribe to the “don’t reinvent the wheel” mentality, but without rethinking some things, there’s no innovation.

I think what it comes down to is three decades of old-style menus engrained in peoples’ minds, and the overall resistance to change.

I, too would trim down the menu bar to streamline it, but I still find the ribbon to be cleaner and far less visually jarring than the old-school toolbars.

Comment on Ribbon Interface by Jake Munson

Jake Munson — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 15:21:11 +0000

For me it’s a matter of two things, screen space and conventions. Ever since I started using computers so many years ago, programs have put functions into menus across the top of the app. Even going back to DOS days, it was that way (with the interface driven DOS apps like wordperfect, not command line stuff). I don’t use toolbars very much. In a default Word install, I always spend a few minutes removing all the crap from the toolbars, and stripping my interface down to one toolbar and the menu bar. With the ribbon, I can’t do that. It takes up about three toolbars worth of vertical screen space, and it doesn’t really show me more than I had before. Each tab of the ribbon only has a handful of options available by default, and you can’t really customize it very well (at least not to the level I’d be comfortable with). So to find the options I need, I still have to click around in the Ribbon (just like clicking around in drop down menus), so for me it’s not an enhancement. It’s just a different way to do the same thing, and it’s not an improved way.

I don’t hate the ribbon, I’ve gotten used to it. I just don’t see it as better than what we had before. Why fix what’s not broken?

Comment on No Red Ring Of Death For My Launch Xbox 360 Console by thespeaker

thespeaker — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 03:38:54 +0000

I had my console that I got from launch day till a few months ago, but now I’ve had to get two replacements. It’s weird, but I’ve gotten it replaced for free both times.

Comment on The Search For Work Continues by amclean

amclean — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 20:48:43 +0000

First of all, HUGE thanks to everyone who’s responded so helpfully. My name has been passed on by you my readers (thanks always to ColdFusionBloggers) to various companies (sadly all of them in the U.S.A. which at the moment I am unable to qualify for due to citizenship constraints – I’m Canadian).
Secondly, you’re probably right – PHP does seem to be the mainstream choice. I will see what I can do in that regard but my PHP experience is more limited and it seems hard enough finding CF work I’m “experienced” enough for.
And lastly, you’re absolutely right – now is a great time to post more on CF and Web Dev. I suppose all I need is a pet project. Most of the neat stuff I learn is by accident alone in the process of creating something. Now to think of something to create…

Comment on The Search For Work Continues by felix

felix — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 23:15:06 +0000

Do you have to work in ColdFusion? Do you mind working in different technologies say PHP? I’ve got a feeling you might find finding PHP jobs easier, you can do that temporarily until you find a CF role.

All the best with your job hunting.

Comment on The Search For Work Continues by Dan Wilson

Dan Wilson — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 23:00:34 +0000

I should think this would be the ideal time to post more on ColdFusion and Web Development. It seems like you have the time and it seems like the posting would show your capabilities and such to prospective employers.

Take some time to learn a framework, or learn CF9 or something else and blog it. I should think this would go a longer way towards finding a new IT job versus just going blog-silent.

Comment on SQL UNION by shag

shag — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 04:13:51 +0000

if you need to know which is which, you can add ‘usera’ as source and userb as source to each of your queries.

Comment on SQL UNION by Raul Riera

Raul Riera — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 00:42:59 +0000

That works on SQL, but doing it in a QoQ will not remove the duplicates.. I sent that bug to Adobe today…

Comment on Job Searching by Matt

Matt — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:02:35 +0000

I wish I didn’t have to read this as it definitely hurts to hear fellow ColdFusion developers suffering. Have you looked in to TEKSystems (or similar) to use their clients for the time being?

I am curious to find out what other programming languages you may know aside from CFML. It is of my personal belief that if you can grasp the core concepts of object-oriented programming, there merely remains a small learning curve for familiarizing yourself with a new programming language’s syntax and libraries. Once that is accomplished, the rest becomes second nature.

Honestly, though, try, try, try to focus on the positive side of having downtime. You now have an opportunity to learn a new skill, programming language, or technique (ColdSpring anyone?) to complement your current knowledge. According to your “About” page you say you got in to programming by reverse engineering Java code. That is no simple task. It takes a certain type of mind and way of thinking that very few people possess.

If you do decide to learn something new, here are a few of my all time favorites not in any particular order:

Groovy
Grails
Java
Flex 4/ActionScript 3/AIR
XSLT
XML
UML (or “mind mapping” with XMind (or similar) if you want to crawl before you walk)

And last but not least, be sure you do any and all of this on a Mac!

Technology is not going anywhere anytime soon. Just make sure you stay current and, if time permits, contribute to the community any way you can. Good luck and stay positive!

Comment on Job Searching by amclean

amclean — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 02:33:37 +0000

I would say I’m glad I’m not the only one, but that would just be mean – and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

Thanks for the encouragement. Hope things are looking up next year for us all.

Comment on Job Searching by Russ Johnson

Russ Johnson — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 02:02:31 +0000

I know the feeling! I have only billed just over 100 hours since March. Local jobs here have disappeared as well unless you want to code Java or .NET all day. Sorry, not me!

Im now at the point where Im going to have to take a job out of town away from my family just to keep the bills paid.

Good luck with your search, hopefully something will pan out sooner than later.