Many of his posts are related to the internals of .NET, and several caught my eye. I haven’t had a chance to read them yet, but they’re going on my “to do” list:

• The Stack is An Implementation Detail, Part One
• The Stack is An Implementation Detail, Part Two
• The Truth about Value Types

Of course, if I’d been paying closer attention to Jeff Atwood, I would already know about Eric Lippert.

Prolific blogger Mary Jo Foley, who writes the essential “All About Microsoft” blog, reports on the potential future of Microsoft Surface, the multi-touch display technology Microsoft introduced several years ago. Specifically, she discusses how it might be adapted to a tablet device:

Microsoft user interface researcher Bill Buxton told the Globe and Mail that he expects Microsoft to be offering three years from now a tablet device that will be like a slimmed-down mini Surface.

That sounds all well and good… except for the three years part.

Har har. She then goes on to describe her own (favorable) experience with the iPad.

I’ve used and continue to use my 16 GB iPad with 3G and wifi a lot. (In spite of AT&T’s overly pricey 3G data plans, I’m glad I got one with both, as wifi hotspots are still few and far between in many places.)I toss it into my purse when I am going out for a few hours and don’t want to pack up my laptop and lug it with me. I use it to surf the Web, check my mail, read books using the Kindle app, keep up with Twitter (via the Osfoora Twitter client, which I still like a lot more than Twitter’s own iPad client or other alternatives).

Not exactly a money quote, but read the whole thing if you’re considering taking the iPad plunge and want the Windows perspective.

This post was inspired by this discussion.

Looks like I’m going to have to change the margins on the blog to show code snippets better.

Some info on Soft Sight:

Soft Sight has developed a sophisticated software capability for automatically rendering stitch patterns from custom designs uploaded to its website. Soft Sight’s innovative and patented automation systems enable an end-user’s embroidery artwork to be uploaded and embroidery designs to be instantly previewed and modified online. This drives its ability to provide high-quality custom embroidered products in low quantities at low prices.

Very cool! Can’t wait to see this.

This works in both Internet Explorer and Firefox.

Yesterday, I saw a great blog title, “Dennis the Peasant”, a reference to Monty Python and the Holy Grail. “Dennis, there’s some lovely filth down here!”

So anyway, blog name. Suggestions?

You’re welcome!

What follows is some of the advice he offers to improve your effectiveness and efficiency.

Email Advice

1. Don’t check email in the morning
2. If you respond, they will respond
3. “If you are the fastest responder to a problem, you will get all the problems. Don’t put energy into things you don’t want more of”
4. Use blogging instead of email.
5. Don’t use email for writing a book. 5 paragraphs is too long.
6. Have a separate inbox for mail you’re cc’d on. It’s less important. Likely not urgent or an action item.
7. GTD folders:
   1. @Action
   2. @Blog
   3. @Podcast
   4. @Read
   5. @Reply
   6. @Waiting/Follow Up

(At one point, he says, “Now I can Google . . . with Bing . . .” LOL.)

Focus Techniques

• Use personal Scrum sprints
• Use the Pomodoro Technique: using an egg timer, do only one thing for 25 minutes. Keep track of your own internal interruptions, which allows you to introspect, to be aware of what you’re doing.
• Limit yourself to a single “news” (as in NEWS) feed. If 9-11 happens again, you’ll hear about it.
• Use aggregators: engadget, boingboing, lifehacker. [Ed: and Reflective Perspective]

Finding the Leaks

1. RescueTime will automatically track your behavior (websites mostly) and give you graphs of all the time you’ve wasted. Cool.

Organization Tools

• 43 Folders. Straight out of GTD. Read the book.
• Sync to paper. DIY Planner, Hipster PDA, PocketMod.
• Evernote. Take a picture with your phone, sync to Evernote, search for text in the pictures later.
• Remember The Milk. “The best replacement for todo.txt” That’s a major endorsement.

Summary

• Audit & sort your sources
• Schedule work sprints
• Turn off distractions
• How are you triaging your inbox?
• Consider you personal toolbox

Nice job, Scott. Thanks for the tips.

The single App.config file works pretty well for simple stuff, but at some point it gets unwieldy and you want to separate the configuration into separate files. For example. log4net and Spring.NET both provide mechanisms for using external config files. In a normal deployment scenario (e.g. a console application), it just works.

Often, trouble arises when combining these external configuration files with a Windows service deployment. The built-in configuration classes seem to locate the main config file well enough, but the external files cannot be located. They are attempted to be loaded from %SystemRoot%\System32. Why? This is the location of the net command, which is the host process for the service. I suspect the implementers of the external configuration files refer to the CurrentDirectory of the process, instead of the file location of the executable module.

You can fix the problem by setting the CurrentDirectory of the process:

<!–
{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg\lang1024\noproof1252\uc1 \deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0\fprq1 Envy Code R VS;}}{\colortbl;??\red0\green0\blue0;\red227\green213\blue193;\red64\green0\blue128;\red1\green0\blue1;\red46\green83\blue209;\red48\green95\blue182;\red37\green146\blue65;\red163\green21\blue21;}??\fs24 \cb2\highlight2 \cf3 var\cf0 \cf4 process\cf0 \cf5 =\cf0 \cf6 Process\cf5 .\cf4 GetCurrentProcess\cf0 ();\par ?? \cf3 if\cf0 (\cf4 process\cf5 .\cf4 MainModule\cf0 \cf5 !=\cf0 \cf3 null\cf0 )\par ?? \{\par ?? \cf3 string\cf0 \cf4 newFilePath\cf0 \cf5 =\cf0 \cf4 process\cf5 .\cf4 MainModule\cf5 .\cf4 FileName\cf5 .\cf4 Substring\cf0 (\cf7 0\cf0 ,\par ?? \cf4 process\cf5 .\cf4 MainModule\cf5 .\cf4 FileName\cf5 .\cf4 LastIndexOf\cf0 (\cf8 @”\\”\cf0 ));\par ?? \cf6 Directory\cf5 .\cf4 SetCurrentDirectory\cf0 (\cf4 newFilePath\cf0 );\par ?? \}}
–>

If you like, you can put this code into the OnStart method of your service. But you might need the info before that. In that case, put the code as early as possible.

Credit goes to Jose Joye, who posted this idea back in 2005.