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  • Kscope 2014 Preview: Data Modeling and Moving Meditation with Kent Graziano

    - by OTN ArchBeat
    Those attending ODTUG's Kscope event in Seattle, June 22-26, will spend several days up to their eyeballs in technical sessions by more than 200 experts in a variety of specialties and Oracle technologies. Oracle ACE Director Kent Graziano is one of those experts, with a focus on business intelligence and data warehouse architecture. But in addition to the two data modeling sessions he'll present, Kent will for the fourth year in a row lead Kscope early risers in daily sessions in Chi Gung, Chinese martial art that Kent describes as "moving mediation." Want to learn more about Kent's Kscope 2014 data modeling sessions and how Chi Gung can help you get a great start on your day? Check out this video interview. Connect with Kent Gaziano Watch more interviews with Kscope 2014 session presenters.

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  • Kent .Net/SqlServer User Group – Upcoming events

    - by Dave Ballantyne
    At the Kent user group we have two upcoming events.  Both are to be held at F-Keys Training suite http://f-keys.co.uk/ in Rochester, Kent. If you haven’t attended before please note the location here. 14-June Is your code S.O.L.I.D ? Nathan Gloyn Everybody keeps on about SOLID principles but what are they? and why should you care? This session is an introduction to SOLID and I'll aim to walk through each principle telling you about that principle and then show how a code base can be refactored using the principles to make your life easier, Come the end of the session you should have a basic understanding of the principle, why to use it and how using it can improve your code. Building composite applications with OpenRasta 3 Sebastien Lambla A wave of change is coming to Web development on .NET. Packaging technologies are bringing dependency management to .NET for the first time, streamlining development workflow and creating new possibilities for deployment and administration. The sky's the limit, and in this session we'll explore how open frameworks can help us leverage composition for the web. Register here for this event http://www.eventbrite.com/event/1643797643 05-July Tony Rogerson Achieving a throughput of 1.5Terabytes or over 92,000 8Kbyte of 100% random reads per second on kit costing less that 2.5K, and of course what to do with it! The session will focus on commodity kit and how it can be used within business to provide massive performance benefits at little cost. End to End Report Creation and Management using SQL Server Reporting Services  Chris Testa-O'NeillThis session will walk through the authoring, management and delivery of reports with a focus on the new features of Reporting Services 2008 R2. At the end of this session you will understand how to create a report in the new report designer. Be aware of the Report management options available and the delivery mechanisms that can be used to deliver reports. Register here for this event http://www.eventbrite.com/event/1643805667 Hope to see you at one or other ( or even both if you are that way inclined).

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  • 2011 PASS Board Applicants: Rob Farley

    - by andyleonard
    Introduction I am interviewing 2011 PASS Board Nominee Applicants. As listed on the PASS Board Elections site the applicants are: Rob Farley Geoff Hiten Adam Jorgensen Denise McInerney Sri Sridharan Kendal Van Dyke I'm asking everyone the same questions and blogging the responses in the order received. Rob Farley is first up: Interview With Rob Farley 1. What's your day job? I run LobsterPot Solutions out of Adelaide, Australia. We're a SQL & BI consultancy, and were the first Microsoft Partner...(read more)

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  • @CodeStock 2012 Review: Rob Gillen ( @argodev ) - Anatomy of a Buffer Overflow Attack

    Anatomy of a Buffer Overflow AttackSpeaker: Rob GillenTwitter: @argodevBlog: rob.gillenfamily.net Honestly, this talk was over my head due to my lack of knowledge of low level programming, and I think that most of the other attendees would agree. However I did get the basic concepts that we was trying to get across. Fortunately most high level programming languages handle most of the low level concerns regarding preventing buffer overflow attacks. What I got from this talk was to validate all input data from external sources.

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  • @CodeStock 2012 Review: Rob Gillen ( @argodev ) - Anatomy of a Buffer Overflow Attack

    Anatomy of a Buffer Overflow AttackSpeaker: Rob GillenTwitter: @argodevBlog: rob.gillenfamily.net Honestly, this talk was over my head due to my lack of knowledge of low level programming, and I think that most of the other attendees would agree. However I did get the basic concepts that we was trying to get across. Fortunately most high level programming languages handle most of the low level concerns regarding preventing buffer overflow attacks. What I got from this talk was to validate all input data from external sources.

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  • Rob Blackwell on interoperability and Azure

    - by Eric Nelson
    At QCon in March we had a sample Azure application implemented in both Java and Ruby to demonstrate that the Windows Azure Platform is not just about .NET. The following is an interesting interview with Rob Blackwell, the R&D director of the partner who implemented the application. UK Interoperability Team Interviews Rob Blackwell, R&D Director at Active Web Solutions. Is Microsoft taking interoperability seriously? Yes. In the past, I think Microsoft has, quite rightly come in for criticism, but architects and developers should look at this again. The Interoperability Bridges site (http://www.interoperabilitybridges.com/ ) shows a wide range of projects that allow interoperability from Java, Ruby and PHP for example. The Windows Azure platform has been architected with interoperable APIs in mind. It's straightforward to access the various storage facilities from just about any language or platform. Azure compute is capable of running more than just C# applications! Why is interoperability important to you? My company provides consultancy and bespoke development services. We're a Microsoft Gold Partner, but we live in the real world where companies have a mix of technologies provided by a variety of vendors. When developing an enterprise software solution, you rarely have a completely blank canvas. We often see integration scenarios where we need to exchange data with legacy systems. It's not unusual to see modern Silverlight applications being built on top of Java or Mainframe based back ends. Could you give us some examples of where interoperability has been important for your projects? We developed an innovative Sea Safety system for the RNLI Lifeboats here in the UK. Commercial Fishing is one of the most dangerous professions and we helped developed the MOB Guardian System which uses satellite technology and man overboard devices to raise the alarm when a fisherman gets into trouble. The solution is implemented in .NET running on Windows, but without interoperable standards, it would have been impossible to communicate with the satellite gateway technology. For more information, please see the case study: http://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Case_Study_Detail.aspx?CaseStudyID=4000005892 More recently, we were asked to build a web site to accompany the QCon 2010 conference in London to help demonstrate and promote interoperability. We built the site using Java and Restlet and hosted it in Windows Azure Compute. The site accepts feedback from visitors and all the data is stored in Windows Azure Storage. We also ported the application to Ruby on Rails for demonstration purposes. Visitors to the stand were surprised that this was even possible. Why should Java developers be interested in Windows Azure? Windows Azure Storage consists of Blobs, Queues and Tables. The storage is scalable, durable, secure and cost-effective. Using the WindowsAzure4j library, it's easy to use, and takes just a few lines of code. If you are writing an application with large data storage requirements, or you want an offsite backup, it makes a lot of sense. Running Java applications in Azure Compute is straightforward with tools like the Tomcat Solution Accelerator (http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/winazuretomcat )and AzureRunMe (http://azurerunme.codeplex.com/ ). The Windows Azure AppFabric Service Bus can also be used to connect heterogeneous systems running on different networks and in different data centres. How can The Service Bus be considered an interoperability solution? I think that the Windows Azure AppFabric Service Bus is one of Microsoft’s best kept secrets. Think of it as “a globally scalable application plumbing kit in the sky”. If you have used Enterprise Service Buses before, you’ll be familiar with the concept. Applications can connect to the service bus to securely exchange data – these can be point to point or multicast links. With the AppFabric Service Bus, the applications can exist anywhere that has access to the Internet and the connections can traverse firewalls. This makes it easy to extend or scale your application or reach out to other networks and technologies. For example, let’s say you have a SQL Server database running on premises and you want to expose the data to a Java application running in the cloud. You could set up a point to point Service Bus connection and use JDBC. Traditionally this would have been difficult or impossible without punching holes in firewalls and compromising security. Rob Blackwell is R&D Director at Active Web Solutions, www.aws.net , a Microsoft Gold Partner specialising in leading edge software solutions. He is an occasional writer and conference speaker and blogs at www.robblackwell.org.uk Related Links: UK Azure Online Community – join today. UK Windows Azure Site Start working with Windows Azure

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  • NDC2010: Rob Conery I cant hear you, there is an ORM in my ear

    In this session Rob Conery tried to show of the new Shiny toy NoSQL in as many forms as possible, discussing the pros and and some cons. He based much of the talk on his experiences with building TekPub and the requirements they had around that. He tried to illustrate that this wasnt a magical [...]...Did you know that DotNetSlackers also publishes .net articles written by top known .net Authors? We already have over 80 articles in several categories including Silverlight. Take a look: here.

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  • Edinburgh this Thurs (25th) - Rob Carrol talks about how to build a high performance, scalable repor

    - by tonyrogerson
    Scottish Area SQL Server User Group Meeting, Edinburgh - Thursday 25th March An evening of SQL Server 2008 Reporting Services Scalability and Performance with Rob Carrol, see how to build a high performance, scalable reporting platform and the tuning techniques required to ensure that report performance remains optimal as your platform grows. Pizza and drinks will be provided! Register at http://www.sqlserverfaq.com/events/221/SQL-Server-2008-Reporting-Services-Scalability-and-Performance.aspx...(read more)

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  • SQLPeople Interviews - Jamie Thomson and Rob Farley

    - by andyleonard
    Introduction Late last year I announced an exciting new endeavor called SQLPeople . At the end of 2010 I announced the 2010 SQLPeople Person of the Year . Interviews I'm pleased to announce the first two interviews have been posted. They are with my friend and co-SSIS-professional Jamie Thomson and Rob Farley , someone I had the pleasure of meeting in person at the PASS Summit 2010. I plan to post two or three interviews each week for the forseeable future. Conclusion SQLPeople is just one of the...(read more)

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  • What kind of code would Kent Beck avoid unit testing?

    - by tieTYT
    I've been watching a few of the Is TDD Dead? talks on youtube, and one of the things that surprised me is Kent Beck seems to acknowledge that there are just some kinds of programs that aren't worth unit testing. For example, right here DHH says that Kent Beck is ... very happy to say "Well, TDD doesn't fit in this case, I'm just going to bail" It's frustrating to me that Kent Beck seems to acknowledge this, but nobody asks him to elaborate on it or give concrete examples. I'd like to know the situations where Kent Beck thinks TDD is a bad fit. Nobody can read his mind or speak for him, but I'm hoping he's been transparent enough through his books/tweets/whatever for someone to be able to answer. I'm not necessarily going to take what he says as gospel, but it would be useful to know that the times I've tried TDD and it just felt impossible/useless are situations that he would have bailed on it himself. Or, if it turned out he would have tested that code it'd suggest to me that I was approaching the process very wrong. I also think it would be enlightening to understand why he would bail on such projects. My opinion on why this is not a duplicate of "When is it appropriate to not unit test?" After skimming those answers I'm not satisfied. For example, look at UncleBob's answer. He doesn't even acknowledge that such a situation exists. I really think there's value in understanding Kent Beck's position, not just a general, "What's your opinion?" type of question. After all, he's the father of TDD.

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  • Linq to SQL and concurrency with Rob Conery repository pattern

    - by David Hall
    I have implemented a DAL using Rob Conery's spin on the repository pattern (from the MVC Storefront project) where I map database objects to domain objects using Linq and use Linq to SQL to actually get the data. This is all working wonderfully giving me the full control over the shape of my domain objects that I want, but I have hit a problem with concurrency that I thought I'd ask about here. I have concurrency working but the solution feels like it might be wrong (just one of those gitchy feelings). The basic pattern is: private MyDataContext _datacontext private Table _tasks; public Repository(MyDataContext datacontext) { _dataContext = datacontext; } public void GetTasks() { _tasks = from t in _dataContext.Tasks; return from t in _tasks select new Domain.Task { Name = t.Name, Id = t.TaskId, Description = t.Description }; } public void SaveTask(Domain.Task task) { Task dbTask = null; // Logic for new tasks omitted... dbTask = (from t in _tasks where t.TaskId == task.Id select t).SingleOrDefault(); dbTask.Description = task.Description, dbTask.Name = task.Name, _dataContext.SubmitChanges(); } So with that implementation I've lost concurrency tracking because of the mapping to the domain task. I get it back by storing the private Table which is my datacontext list of tasks at the time of getting the original task. I then update the tasks from this stored Table and save what I've updated This is working - I get change conflict exceptions raised when there are concurrency violations, just as I want. However, it just screams to me that I've missed a trick. Is there a better way of doing this? I've looked at the .Attach method on the datacontext but that appears to require storing the original version in a similar way to what I'm already doing. I also know that I could avoid all this by doing away with the domain objects and letting the Linq to SQL generated objects all the way up my stack - but I dislike that just as much as I dislike the way I'm handling concurrency.

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  • Asp.Net MVC - Rob Conery's LazyList - Count() or Count

    - by Adam
    I'm trying to create an html table for order logs for customers. A customer is defined as (I've left out a lot of stuff): public class Customer { public LazyList<Order> Orders { get; set; } } The LazyList is set when fetching a Customer: public Customer GetCustomer(int custID) { Customer c = ... c.Orders = new LazyList<Order>(_repository.GetOrders().ByOrderID(custID)); return c; } The order log model: public class OrderLogTableModel { public OrderLogTableModel(LazyList<Order> orders) { Orders = orders; Page = 0; PageSize = 25; } public LazyList<Order> Orders { get; set; } public int Page { get; set; } public int PageSize { get; set; } } and I pass in the customer.Orders after loading a customer. Now the log i'm trying to make, looks something like: <table> <tbody> <% int rowCount = ViewData.Model.Orders.Count(); int innerRows = rowCount - (ViewData.Model.Page * ViewData.Model.PageSize); foreach (Order order in ViewData.Model.Orders.OrderByDescending(x => x.StartDateTime) .Take(innerRows).OrderBy(x => x.StartDateTime) .Take(ViewData.Model.PageSize)) { %> <tr> <td> <%= order.ID %> </td> </tr> <% } %> </tbody> </table> Which works fine. But the problem is evaluating ViewData.Model.Orders.Count() literally takes about 10 minutes. I've tried with the ViewData.Model.Orders.Count property instead, and the results are the same - takes forever. I've also tried calling _repository.GetOrders().ByCustomerID(custID).Count() directly from the view and that executes perfectly within a few ms. Can anybody see any reason why using the LazyList to get a simple count would take so long? It seems like its trying to iterate through the list when getting a simple count.

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  • An MCM exam, Rob? Really?

    - by Rob Farley
    I took the SQL 2008 MCM Knowledge exam while in Seattle for the PASS Summit ten days ago. I wasn’t planning to do it, but I got persuaded to try. I was meaning to write this post to explain myself before the result came out, but it seems I didn’t get typing quickly enough. Those of you who know me will know I’m a big fan of certification, to a point. I’ve been involved with Microsoft Learning to help create exams. I’ve kept my certifications current since I first took an exam back in 1998, sitting many in beta, across quite a variety of topics. I’ve probably become quite good at them – I know I’ve definitely passed some that I really should’ve failed. I’ve also written that I don’t think exams are worth studying for. (That’s probably not entirely true, but it depends on your motivation. If you’re doing learning, I would encourage you to focus on what you need to know to do your job better. That will help you pass an exam – but the two skills are very different. I can coach someone on how to pass an exam, but that’s a different kind of teaching when compared to coaching someone about how to do a job. For example, the real world includes a lot of “it depends”, where you develop a feel for what the influencing factors might be. In an exam, its better to be able to know some of the “Don’t use this technology if XYZ is true” concepts better.) As for the Microsoft Certified Master certification… I’m not opposed to the idea of having the MCM (or in the future, MCSM) cert. But the barrier to entry feels quite high for me. When it was first introduced, the nearest testing centres to me were in Kuala Lumpur and Manila. Now there’s one in Perth, but that’s still a big effort. I know there are options in the US – such as one about an hour’s drive away from downtown Seattle, but it all just seems too hard. Plus, these exams are more expensive, and all up – I wasn’t sure I wanted to try them, particularly with the fact that I don’t like to study. I used to study for exams. It would drive my wife crazy. I’d have some exam scheduled for some time in the future (like the time I had two booked for two consecutive days at TechEd Australia 2005), and I’d make sure I was ready. Every waking moment would be spent pouring over exam material, and it wasn’t healthy. I got shaken out of that, though, when I ended up taking four exams in those two days in 2005 and passed them all. I also worked out that if I had a Second Shot available, then failing wasn’t a bad thing at all. Even without Second Shot, I’m much more okay about failing. But even just trying an MCM exam is a big effort. I wouldn’t want to fail one of them. Plus there’s the illusion to maintain. People have told me for a long time that I should just take the MCM exams – that I’d pass no problem. I’ve never been so sure. It was almost becoming a pride-point. Perhaps I should fail just to demonstrate that I can fail these things. Anyway – boB Taylor (@sqlboBT) persuaded me to try the SQL 2008 MCM Knowledge exam at the PASS Summit. They set up a testing centre in one of the room there, so it wasn’t out of my way at all. I had to squeeze it in between other commitments, and I certainly didn’t have time to even see what was on the syllabus, let alone study. In fact, I was so exhausted from the week that I fell asleep at least once (just for a moment though) during the actual exam. Perhaps the questions need more jokes, I’m not sure. I knew if I failed, then I might disappoint some people, but that I wouldn’t’ve spent a great deal of effort in trying to pass. On the other hand, if I did pass I’d then be under pressure to investigate the MCM Lab exam, which can be taken remotely (therefore, a much smaller amount of effort to make happen). In some ways, passing could end up just putting a bunch more pressure on me. Oh, and I did.

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  • An MCM exam, Rob? Really?

    - by Rob Farley
    I took the SQL 2008 MCM Knowledge exam while in Seattle for the PASS Summit ten days ago. I wasn’t planning to do it, but I got persuaded to try. I was meaning to write this post to explain myself before the result came out, but it seems I didn’t get typing quickly enough. Those of you who know me will know I’m a big fan of certification, to a point. I’ve been involved with Microsoft Learning to help create exams. I’ve kept my certifications current since I first took an exam back in 1998, sitting many in beta, across quite a variety of topics. I’ve probably become quite good at them – I know I’ve definitely passed some that I really should’ve failed. I’ve also written that I don’t think exams are worth studying for. (That’s probably not entirely true, but it depends on your motivation. If you’re doing learning, I would encourage you to focus on what you need to know to do your job better. That will help you pass an exam – but the two skills are very different. I can coach someone on how to pass an exam, but that’s a different kind of teaching when compared to coaching someone about how to do a job. For example, the real world includes a lot of “it depends”, where you develop a feel for what the influencing factors might be. In an exam, its better to be able to know some of the “Don’t use this technology if XYZ is true” concepts better.) As for the Microsoft Certified Master certification… I’m not opposed to the idea of having the MCM (or in the future, MCSM) cert. But the barrier to entry feels quite high for me. When it was first introduced, the nearest testing centres to me were in Kuala Lumpur and Manila. Now there’s one in Perth, but that’s still a big effort. I know there are options in the US – such as one about an hour’s drive away from downtown Seattle, but it all just seems too hard. Plus, these exams are more expensive, and all up – I wasn’t sure I wanted to try them, particularly with the fact that I don’t like to study. I used to study for exams. It would drive my wife crazy. I’d have some exam scheduled for some time in the future (like the time I had two booked for two consecutive days at TechEd Australia 2005), and I’d make sure I was ready. Every waking moment would be spent pouring over exam material, and it wasn’t healthy. I got shaken out of that, though, when I ended up taking four exams in those two days in 2005 and passed them all. I also worked out that if I had a Second Shot available, then failing wasn’t a bad thing at all. Even without Second Shot, I’m much more okay about failing. But even just trying an MCM exam is a big effort. I wouldn’t want to fail one of them. Plus there’s the illusion to maintain. People have told me for a long time that I should just take the MCM exams – that I’d pass no problem. I’ve never been so sure. It was almost becoming a pride-point. Perhaps I should fail just to demonstrate that I can fail these things. Anyway – boB Taylor (@sqlboBT) persuaded me to try the SQL 2008 MCM Knowledge exam at the PASS Summit. They set up a testing centre in one of the room there, so it wasn’t out of my way at all. I had to squeeze it in between other commitments, and I certainly didn’t have time to even see what was on the syllabus, let alone study. In fact, I was so exhausted from the week that I fell asleep at least once (just for a moment though) during the actual exam. Perhaps the questions need more jokes, I’m not sure. I knew if I failed, then I might disappoint some people, but that I wouldn’t’ve spent a great deal of effort in trying to pass. On the other hand, if I did pass I’d then be under pressure to investigate the MCM Lab exam, which can be taken remotely (therefore, a much smaller amount of effort to make happen). In some ways, passing could end up just putting a bunch more pressure on me. Oh, and I did.

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  • PASS Summit Feedback

    - by Rob Farley
    PASS Feedback came in last week. I also saw my dentist for some fillings... At the PASS Summit this year, I delivered a couple of regular sessions and a Lightning Talk. People told me they enjoyed it, but when the rankings came out, they showed that I didn’t score particularly well. Brent Ozar was keen to discuss it with me. Brent: PASS speaker feedback is out. You did two sessions and a Lightning Talk. How did you go? Rob: Not so well actually, thanks for asking. Brent: Ha! Sorry. Of course you know that's why I wanted to discuss this with you. I was in one of your sessions at SQLBits in the UK a month before PASS, and I thought you rocked. You've got a really good and distinctive delivery style.  Then I noticed your talks were ranked in the bottom quarter of the Summit ratings and wanted to discuss it. Rob: Yeah, I know. You did ask me if we could do this...  I should explain – my presentation style is not the stereotypical IT conference one. I throw in jokes, and try to engage the audience thoroughly. I find many talks amazingly dry, and I guess I try to buck that trend. I also run training courses, and find that I get a lot of feedback from people thanking me for keeping things interesting. That said, I also get feedback criticising me for my style, and that’s basically what’s happened here. For the rest of this discussion, let’s focus on my talk about the Incredible Shrinking Execution Plan, which I considered to be my main talk. Brent: I thought that session title was the very best one at the entire Summit, and I had it on my recommended sessions list.  In four words, you managed to sum up the topic and your sense of humor.  I read that and immediately thought, "People need to be in this session," and then it didn't score well.  Tell me about your scores. Rob: The questions on the feedback form covered the usefulness of the information, the speaker’s presentation skills, their knowledge of the subject, how well the session was described, the amount of time allocated, and the quality of the presentation materials. Brent: Presentation materials? But you don’t do slides.  Did they rate your thong? Rob: No-one saw my flip-flops in this talk, Brent. I created a script in Management Studio, and published that afterwards, but I think people will have scored that question based on the lack of slides. I wasn’t expecting to do particularly well on that one. That was the only section that didn’t have 5/5 as the most popular score. Brent: See, that sucks, because cookbook-style scripts are often some of my favorites.  Adam Machanic's Service Broker workbench series helped me immensely when I was prepping for the MCM.  As an attendee, I'd rather have a commented script than a slide deck.  So how did you rank so low? Rob: When I look at the scores that you got (based on your blog post), you got very few scores below 3 – people that felt strong enough about your talk to post a negative score. In my scores, between 5% and 10% were below 3 (except on the question about whether I knew my stuff – I guess I came as knowledgeable). Brent: Wow – so quite a few people really didn’t like your talk then? Rob: Yeah. Mind you, based on the comments, some people really loved it. I’d like to think that there would be a certain portion of the room who may have rated the talk as one of the best of the conference. Some of my comments included “amazing!”, “Best presentation so far!”, “Wow, best session yet”, “fantastic” and “Outstanding!”. I think lots of talks can be “Great”, but not so many talks can be “Outstanding” without the word losing its meaning. One wrote “Pretty amazing presentation, considering it was completely extemporaneous.” Brent: Extemporaneous, eh? Rob: Yeah. I guess they don’t realise how much preparation goes into coming across as unprepared. In many ways it’s much easier to give a written speech than to deliver a presentation without slides as a prompt. Brent: That delivery style, the really relaxed, casual, college-professor approach was one of the things I really liked about your presentation at SQLbits.  As somebody who presents a lot, I "get" it - I know how hard it is to come off as relaxed and comfortable with your own material.  It's like improv done by jazz players and comedians - if you've never tried it, you don't realize how hard it is.  People also don't realize how hard it is to make a tough subject fun. Rob: Yeah well... There will be people writing comments on this post that say I wasn't trying to make the subject fun, and that I was making it all about me. Sometimes the style works, sometimes it doesn't. Most of the comments mentioned the fact that I tell jokes, some in a nice way, but some not so much (and it wasn't just a PASS thing - that's the mix of feedback I generally get). One comment at PASS was: “great stand up comedian - not what I'm looking for at pass”, and there were certainly a few that said “too many jokes”. I’m not trying to do stand-up – jokes are my way of engaging with the audience while I demonstrate some of the amazing things that the Query Optimizer can do if you write your queries the right way. Some people didn’t think it was technical enough, but I’ve also had some people tell me that the concepts I’m explaining are deep and profound. Brent: To me, that's a hallmark of a great explanation - when someone says, "But of course it has to work that way - how could it work any other way?  It seems so simple and logical."  Well, sure it does when it's explained correctly, but now pick up any number of thick SQL Server books and try to understand the Redundant Joins concept.  I guarantee it'll take more than 45 minutes. Rob: Some people in my audiences realise that, but definitely not everyone. There's only so much you can tell someone that something is profound. Generally it's something that they either have an epiphany on or not. I like to lull my audience into knowing what's going on, and do something that surprises them. Gain their trust, build a rapport, and then show them the deeper truth of what just happened. Brent: So you've learned your lesson about presentation scores, right?  From here on out, you're going to be dry, humorless, and all your presentations will consist of you reading bullet points off the screen. Rob: No Brent, I’m not. I'm also not going to suggest that most presentations at PASS are like that. No-one tries to present like that. There's a big space to occupy between what "dry and humourless" and me. My difference is to focus on the relationship I have with the crowd, rather than focussing on delivering the perfect session. I want to see people smiling and know they're relaxed. I think most presenters focus on the material, which is completely reasonable and safe. I remember once hearing someone talking about product creation. They talked about mediocrity. They said that one of the worst things that people can ever say about your product is that it’s “good”. What you want is for 10% of the world to love it enough to want to buy it. If 10% the world gave me a dollar, I’d have more money than I could ever use (assuming it wasn’t the SAME dollar they were giving me I guess). Brent: It's the Raving Fans theory.  It's better to have a small number of raving customers than a large number of almost-but-not-really customers who don't care that much about your product or service.  I know exactly how you feel - when I got survey feedback from my Quest video presentation when I was dressed up in a Richard Simmons costume, some of the attendees said I was unprofessional and distracting.  Some of the attendees couldn't get enough and Photoshopped all kinds of stuff into the screen captures.  On a whole, I probably didn't score that well, and I'm fine with that.  It sucks to look at the scores though - do those lower scores bother you? Rob: Of course they do. It hurts deeply. I open myself up and give presentations in a very personal way. All presenters do that, and we all feel the pain of negative feedback. I hate coming 146th & 162nd out of 185, but have to acknowledge that many sessions did worse still. Plus, once I feel the wounds have healed, I’ll be able to remember that there are people in the world that rave about my presentation style, and figure that people will hopefully talk about me. One day maybe those people that don’t like my presentation style will stay away and I might be able to score better. You don’t pay to hear country music if you prefer western... Lots of people find chili too spicy, but it’s still a popular food. Brent: But don’t you want to appeal to everyone? Rob: I do, but I don’t want to be lukewarm as in Revelation 3:16. I’d rather disgust and be discussed. Well, maybe not ‘disgust’, but I don’t want to conform. Conformity just isn’t the same any more. I’m not sure I’ve ever been one to do that. I try not to offend, but definitely like to be different. Brent: Count me among your raving fans, sir.  Where can we see you next? Rob: Considering I live in Adelaide in Australia, I’m not about to appear at anyone’s local SQL Saturday. I’m still trying to plan which events I’ll get to in 2011. I’ve submitted abstracts for TechEd North America, but won’t hold my breath. I’m also considering the SQLBits conferences in the UK in April, PASS in October, and I’m sure I’ll do some LiveMeeting presentations for user groups. Online, people download some of my recent SQLBits presentations at http://bit.ly/RFSarg and http://bit.ly/Simplification though. And they can download a 5-minute MP3 of my Lightning Talk at http://www.lobsterpot.com.au/files/Collation.mp3, in which I try to explain the idea behind collation, using thongs as an example. Brent: I was in the audience for http://bit.ly/RFSarg. That was a great presentation. Rob: Thanks, Brent. Now where’s my dollar?

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  • How do I stop Python install on Mac OS X from putting things in my home directory?

    - by Rob
    Hi, I'm trying to install Python from source on my Mac. (OS X 10.6.2, Python-2.6.5.tar.bz2) I've done this before and it was easy, but for some reason, this time after ./configure, and make, the sudo make install puts things some things in my home directory instead of in /usr/local/... where I expect. The .py files are okay, but not the .so files... RobsMac Python-2.6.5 $ sudo make install [...] /usr/bin/install -c -m 644 ./Lib/anydbm.py /usr/local/lib/python2.6 /usr/bin/install -c -m 644 ./Lib/ast.py /usr/local/lib/python2.6 /usr/bin/install -c -m 644 ./Lib/asynchat.py /usr/local/lib/python2.6 [...] running build_scripts running install_lib creating /Users/rob/Library/Python creating /Users/rob/Library/Python/2.6 creating /Users/rob/Library/Python/2.6/site-packages copying build/lib.macosx-10.4-x86_64-2.6/_AE.so - /Users/rob/Library/ Python/2.6/site-packages copying build/lib.macosx-10.4-x86_64-2.6/_AH.so - /Users/rob/Library/ Python/2.6/site-packages copying build/lib.macosx-10.4-x86_64-2.6/_App.so - /Users/rob/Library/ Python/2.6/site-packages [...] Later, this causes imports that require those .so files to fail. For example... RobsMac Python-2.6.5 $ python Python 2.6.5 (r265:79063, Apr 28 2010, 13:40:18) [GCC 4.2.1 (Apple Inc. build 5646) (dot 1)] on darwin Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information. >>> import zlib Traceback (most recent call last):     File "", line 1, in ImportError: No module named zlib Any ideas what is wrong? thanks, Rob

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  • Two network adapters on Ubuntu Server 9.10 - Can't have both working at once?

    - by Rob
    I'm trying to set up two network adapters in Ubuntu (server edition) 9.10. One for the public internet, the other a private LAN. During the install, I was asked to pick a primary network adapter (eth0 or eth1). I chose eth0, gave the installer the details listed below in the contents of /etc/network/interfaces, and carried on. I've been using this adapter with these setting for the last few days, and every thing's been fine. Today, I decide it's time to set up the local adapter. I edit the /etc/network/interfaces to add the details for eth1 (see below), and restart networking with sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart. After this, attempting to ping the machine using it's external IP address fails, but I can ping it's local IP address. If I bring eth1 down using sudo ifdown eth1, I can successfully ping the machine via it's external IP address again (but obviously not it's internal IP address). Bringing eth1 back up returns us to the original problem state: external IP not working, internal IP working. Here's my /etc/network/interfaces (I've removed the external IP information, but these settings are unchanged from when it worked) rob@rhea:~$ cat /etc/network/interfaces # This file describes the network interfaces available on your system # and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5). # The loopback network interface auto lo iface lo inet loopback # The primary (public) network interface auto eth0 iface eth0 inet static address xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx netmask xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx network xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx broadcast xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx gateway xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx # The secondary (private) network interface auto eth1 iface eth1 inet static address 192.168.99.4 netmask 255.255.255.0 network 192.168.99.0 broadcast 192.168.99.255 gateway 192.168.99.254 I then do this: rob@rhea:~$ sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart * Reconfiguring network interfaces... [ OK ] rob@rhea:~$ sudo ifup eth0 ifup: interface eth0 already configured rob@rhea:~$ sudo ifup eth1 ifup: interface eth1 already configured Then, from another machine: C:\Documents and Settings\Rob>ping [external ip] Pinging [external ip] with 32 bytes of data: Request timed out. Request timed out. Request timed out. Request timed out. Ping statistics for [external ip]: Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 0, Lost = 4 (100% loss), Back on the Ubuntu server in question: rob@rhea:~$ sudo ifdown eth1 ... and again on the other machine: C:\Documents and Settings\Rob>ping [external ip] Pinging [external ip] with 32 bytes of data: Reply from [external ip]: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=63 Reply from [external ip]: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=63 Reply from [external ip]: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=63 Reply from [external ip]: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=63 Ping statistics for [external ip]: Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss), Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds: Minimum = 0ms, Maximum = 0ms, Average = 0ms So... what am I doing wrong?

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  • How to use URLClassLoader to load a *.class file?

    - by DeletedAccount
    I'm playing around with Reflection and I thought I'd make something which loads a class and prints the names of all fields in the class. I've made a small hello world type of class to have something to inspect: kent@rat:~/eclipsews/SmallExample/bin$ ls IndependentClass.class kent@rat:~/eclipsews/SmallExample/bin$ java IndependentClass Hello! Goodbye! kent@rat:~/eclipsews/SmallExample/bin$ pwd /home/kent/eclipsews/SmallExample/bin kent@rat:~/eclipsews/SmallExample/bin$ Based on the above I draw two conclusions: It exists at /home/kent/eclipsews/SmallExample/bin/IndependentClass.class It works! (So it must be a proper .class-file which can be loaded by a class loader) Then the code which is to use Reflection: (Line which causes an exception is marked) import java.lang.reflect.Field; import java.net.MalformedURLException; import java.net.URL; import java.net.URLClassLoader; public class InspectClass { @SuppressWarnings("unchecked") public static void main(String[] args) throws ClassNotFoundException, MalformedURLException { URL classUrl; classUrl = new URL("file:///home/kent/eclipsews/SmallExample/bin/IndependentClass.class"); URL[] classUrls = { classUrl }; URLClassLoader ucl = new URLClassLoader(classUrls); Class c = ucl.loadClass("IndependentClass"); // LINE 14 for(Field f: c.getDeclaredFields()) { System.out.println("Field name" + f.getName()); } } } But when I run it I get: Exception in thread "main" java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: IndependentClass at java.net.URLClassLoader$1.run(URLClassLoader.java:200) at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method) at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(URLClassLoader.java:188) at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:306) at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:251) at InspectClass.main(InspectClass.java:14) My questions: What am I doing wrong above? How do I fix it? Is there a way to load several class files and iterate over them?

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  • Windows 7 search not finding files

    - by Rob Nicholson
    Can anyone please explain this quirk in Windows 7 search (not a big fan of it - preferred XP method or least both). With Outlook, you sometimes have to find and delete your OST file. It resides in the user's profile folder. How come searching the entire C: drive for *.ost files works - they are in c:\Users\rob.nicholson\appdata somewhere but starting the search from c:\Users\rob.nicholson fails to find the files??? Cheers, Rob.

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  • simulate backspace key with java.awt.Robot

    - by Tyler
    There seems to be an issue simulating the backspace key with java.awt.Robot. This thread seems to confirm this but it does not propose a solution. This works: Robot rob = new Robot(); rob.keyPress(KeyEvent.VK_A); rob.keyRelease(KeyEvent.VK_A); This doesn't: Robot rob = new Robot(); rob.keyPress(KeyEvent.VK_BACK_SPACE); rob.keyRelease(KeyEvent.VK_BACK_SPACE); Any ideas? Thanks!

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  • Collation errors in business

    - by Rob Farley
    At the PASS Summit last month, I did a set (Lightning Talk) about collation, and in particular, the difference between the “English” spoken by people from the US, Australia and the UK. One of the examples I gave was that in the US drivers might stop for gas, whereas in Australia, they just open the window a little. This is what’s known as a paraprosdokian, where you suddenly realise you misunderstood the first part of the sentence, based on what was said in the second. My current favourite is Emo Phillip’s line “I like to play chess with old men in the park, but it can be hard to find thirty-two of them.” Essentially, this a collation error, one that good comedians can get mileage from. Unfortunately, collation is at its worst when we have a computer comparing two things in different collations. They might look the same, and sound the same, but if one of the things is in SQL English, and the other one is in Windows English, the poor database server (with no sense of humour) will get suspicious of developers (who all have senses of humour, obviously), and declare a collation error, worried that it might not realise some nuance of the language. One example is the common scenario of a case-sensitive collation and a case-insensitive one. One may think that “Rob” and “rob” are the same, but the other might not. Clearly one of them is my name, and the other is a verb which means to steal (people called “Nick” have the same problem, of course), but I have no idea whether “Rob” and “rob” should be considered the same or not – it depends on the collation. I told a lie before – collation isn’t at its worst in the computer world, because the computer has the sense to complain about the collation issue. People don’t. People will say something, with their own understanding of what they mean. Other people will listen, and apply their own collation to it. I remember when someone was asking me about a situation which had annoyed me. They asked if I was ‘pissed’, and I said yes. I meant that I was annoyed, but they were asking if I’d been drinking. It took a moment for us to realise the misunderstanding. In business, the problem is escalated. A business user may explain something in a particular way, using terminology that they understand, but using words that mean something else to a technical person. I remember a situation with a checkbox on a form (back in VB6 days from memory). It was used to indicate that something was approved, and indicated whether a particular database field should store True or False – nothing more. However, the client understood it to mean that an entire workflow system would be implemented, with different users have permission to approve items and more. The project manager I’d just taken over from clearly hadn’t appreciated that, and I faced a situation of explaining the misunderstanding to the client. Lots of fun... Collation errors aren’t just a database setting that you can ignore. You need to remember that Americans speak a different type of English to Aussies and Poms, and techies speak a different language to their clients.

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  • Remote file access.

    - by Rob Rob
    Hi, We're needing to provide remote (read/write) access to a number of files on our network to several users (some technical, some non-technical) who will be running Windows. The non technical users will need to be able to access their files in an easy to use manner. From previous experience, we could do this with: (some sort of) VPN SSH and something like Dokan (i've only previously done this on linux with sshfs) WebDav FTP VPN and SSH access are more open that we need at present, so I'm leaning towards webdav, however I only have limited experience of it (setting up an SVN server several years ago), but my understanding is that users can access it through windows explorer. FTP I haven't had much experience of, as I've always used SFTP via ssh - but i'd imagine we could make this work in a similar way to ssh. So my question is - have I missed any obvious candidates for this task, or if webdav is (or isn't) suitable what are the security implications of using it for this (obviously https will be used for the transfers, etc). Thanks, Rob.

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  • Free Webinar - Using Enterprise Data Integration Dashboards

    - by andyleonard
    Join Kent Bradshaw and me as we present Using Enterprise Data Integration Dashboards Tuesday 11 Dec 2012 at 10:00 AM ET! If data is the life of the modern organization, data integration is the heart of an enterprise. Data circulation is vital. Data integration dashboards provide enterprise ETL (Extract, Transform, and Load) teams near-real-time status supported with historical performance analysis. Join Linchpins Kent Bradshaw and Andy Leonard as they demonstrate and discuss the benefits of data...(read more)

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  • How Can I Install LibreOffice Base?

    - by Rob
    Useful info: I have tried running sudo dpkg --configure -a and sudo apt-get install -f with no result. I am running Kubuntu 11.10 (the updater is far too unreliable to ever be trusted with performing a version upgrade) The rest of LibreOffice seems to work fine (apart from an annoying bug where tooltips are shown as black text on black background...) I have need to use LibreOffice Base to complete a mail merge document. However, I noticed it's not installed. When I go to install it however... rob@hydrogen:~$ sudo apt-get install libreoffice-base [sudo] password for rob: Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable distribution that some required packages have not yet been created or been moved out of Incoming. The following information may help to resolve the situation: The following packages have unmet dependencies. libreoffice-base : Depends: libreoffice-core (= 1:3.4.4-0ubuntu1) but it is not going to be installed Depends: libreoffice-base-core (= 1:3.4.4-0ubuntu1) but it is not going to be installed Depends: libreoffice-java-common (>= 1:3.4.4~) but it is not going to be installed Suggests: libmyodbc but it is not going to be installed or odbc-postgresql but it is not going to be installed or libsqliteodbc but it is not going to be installed or tdsodbc but it is not going to be installed or mdbtools but it is not going to be installed Suggests: libreoffice-gcj but it is not installable Suggests: libreoffice-report-builder but it is not going to be installed E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages. I'm bemused as to which packages it seems to think I have held. As far as I'm aware, Kubuntu doesn't give you the option to hold packages... So, how do I get out of this dependency hell?

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  • Developer’s Life – Every Developer is a Superman

    - by Pinal Dave
    I enjoyed comparing developers to Spiderman so much, that I have decided to continue the trend and encourage some of my favorite people (developers) with another favorite superhero – Superman.  Superman is probably the most famous superhero – and one of the most inspiring. Everyone has their own favorite, but Superman has been the longest enduring of all comic book characters.  Clark Kent has inspired multiple movie series, TV shows, books, cartoons, and costumes.  Superman’s enduring popularity has been attributed to his superhuman strength, integrity, dedication to good, and his humility in keeping his identity a secret. So how are developers like Superman? Well, read on my list of reasons. Secret Identities They have secret identities.  I’m not saying that all developers wear thick glasses and go by an alias like “Clark Kent.”  But developers certainly work in the background, making sure everything runs smoothly, often without recognition.  Like Superman, when they have done their job right, no one knows they were there. Working Alone You don’t have to work alone.  Superman doesn’t have a sidekick like Robin or Bat Girl, but he is a major player in the Justice League.  Developers have amazing skills, and they shouldn’t be afraid to unite those skills to solve some of the world’s major problems (like slow networks). Daily Inspiration Developers are inspiring.  Clark Kent works at The Daily Planet, Metropolis’ newspaper, which is lucky because he can keep some of the publicity Superman inspires under wraps.  Developers might go unnoticed sometimes, but when people hear about some of the tasks they accomplish on a daily basis, it inspires awe. Discover Your Superpowers You have to discover your superpowers.  Clark Kent didn’t just wake up one morning with the full understanding that he could fly, leap tall buildings in a single bound, and was stronger than a speeding locomotive.  He slowly discovered these powers (after a few comic book-worthy misunderstandings!).  Developers are always learning and growing as well.  You probably won’t wake up with super powers, either, but years of practice and continuing education can get you close. Every Day is a New Day The story continues.  The Superman comic books are still being printed, and have been in print since 1938.  There have been two TV series, (one, Smallville, was on TV for ten seasons) and multiple cartoon adaptations.  There have been multiple movies, with many different actors.  A new reboot came out last year, and another is set to premier in 2016.   So, developers, when you are having a bad day or a problem seems unsolvable – remember, the story will continue!  There is always tomorrow. I hope you are all enjoying reading about developers-as-superheroes as much as I am enjoying writing about them.  Please tell me how else developers are like Superheroes in the comments – especially if you know any developers who are faster than a speeding bullet and can leap tall buildings in a single bound. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com)Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL Tagged: Developer, Superhero

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