MacSaber – Why? Just because.

OK, admittedly this article isn’t much good if you don’t have a MacBook. But if you do you have to try this. The program is called MacSaber, and it turns your humble laptop into the devastatingly accurate weapon of the Jedi knights. How you ask? Simple.

Most modern laptops (including all MacBook and MacBook Pro models) are equipped with a sensor which can detect sudden movements (SMS), and protect components like hard drives from damage. Well, since there’s a sensor, there must be a way to tie into it; and Ian Anthony has done just that.

And for those of you who don’t have a MacBook yet, this is just one more reason to get one.

Microsoft quietly launches .NET 3.0

With much less fanfare than the previous version Microsoft released the latest version of the .NET framework earlier this month at the TechEd Europe developers conference in Barcelona. The reason for the low-key launch? This release is a renamed, repackaged version of .NET Framework 2.0 with the new Windows Presentation Foundations (WPF, formerly XAML), Windows Workflow Foundation (WWF) and a few other features of the Windows Vista feature set we’ve been waiting on for some time.

This new feature set has been known to the community under many names, and when rumours of .NET 3.0 started to circulate they seemed to have come out of nowhere. Once it was explained that this version is really an extension of .NET Fx 2.0 many of the tensions began to subside.

Any application which compiles and runs against .NET 2.0 will run with .NET 3.0, so feel free to add in these new features, but don’t fret. This won’t be as significant an upgrade as the 1.1-2.0 transition.

For more detailed info, check out the .NET Framework site, and the .NET 3.0 Framework community site.

ASP.NET Ajax: Intellisenseless

Scott Guthrie recently posted a bit of a resolution for an issue that has appeared in Visual Studio 2005 for people using the new AJAX (Atlas) components. If you’ve been trying this package out, and have noticed some intellisense missing, have a look at the entry listed below. There are two quick workarounds to put in place, either of which will clear up the problem until VS2005 SP1 ships.

View the Original Post Here

Thanks Scott!

Google Analytics

The big G is at it again… one of their new tools: Google Analytics. This is Google’s solution for webmasters that joins together not only site statistics, graphs and reporting but also provides the ability to plan and track milestones relating to traffic and referrals.

Analytics also integrates with Google’s AdWords to provide a method of accurately tracking click-thru’s and other statistics vital to the ad campaigns.

Now for those of you who are saying that this is yet another piece of Google’s ever growing arsenal of world conquering capabilities you’re probably right. But hey, it works well and the code it uses on your website to track the hits doesn’t leave any ugly banners or images. And did I mention that it’s free?

Give it a shot. I did, and it’s here to stay (at least until they decide to charge for it!).

Off the wall ideas – Halfbakery.com

Ever have a time when you were sitting around with a few friends, and came up with some cockamamie scheme to make money or save the rainforest or just get a few laughs? Well those times are here again, all day every day over at halfbakery.

The bakesperson and a crew of many regulars discuss such important topics as:

So pull out your half-baked ideas, and join the discussion. Maybe just maybe you’ll find some creative inspiration here!

What was I thinking?!

There was a nasty surprise waiting for me when I woke up this morning (dreadfully early for a Saturday on account of work — but thats another story). It took me a while to notice, but the awning that we got as a gift this past summer was overturned on the deck. Immediately I thought about how naive I was to think it would be OK to leave it out there, but I didn’t think much of it (and I couldn’t really see it because the sun hadn’t come up yet).

Later in the morning I got a better look, and realized the extent of the damage. You can see under the table one of the legs not pointing the same direction as the others. Add to that the two very large holes in the awning cover itself and I’m not overly optimistic about our ability to fix this.

kdmurray.blog