Category: Geeky/Programming

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Geeky/Programming

Using Windows 8 Consumer Preview on an Active Directory Corporate Domain

I have been using Windows 8 for a while now, here and there, the developer preview, on the tablet I got at build. Pretty cool, rough around the edges. I was really waiting for the next iteration.

Last week the Windows 8 Consumer Preview was released. My computer at work was getting “crufty” so I decided to install Windows 8 on it fresh and see what I could see.

Well, first off, if you run Windows 8, you can associate your login account with a Windows Live Id Microsoft account. This is pretty cool for a couple of reasons. Most services on the OS then automatically know who you are, and second, your settings and Windows Store apps will sync between devices.

But what happens on domain? I was as curious as I could be as the info out there is/was sparse as of now from what I could see. So I set up the machine fresh on Windows 8. Logged in as my Microsoft account and got into the OS. Once on the corp network, got it on the domain, as normal, and then I could log in with my domain account. Great.

But then what? Do I lose all the cool Microsoft account stuff? Well, it depends. What you can do is go to the new “Settings” in Metro land on the machine and find the account stuff, you can then associate your Microsoft account with your Domain account. This is pretty cool. Then your settings on your domain machines (if you have multiple) will sync, but you still get the domain stuff of the corporate network. I have two Microsoft accounts anyways (One for personal, one for work – MSDN, etc, etc).

There is one article out there that tells admins how to restrict the Windows Store on domain, or at least they will be able to, so I am guessing most things will be configurable or restrictable by domain admins and group policy, but at least there is some cohesiveness between Microsoft account and Domain account now. Good stuff. More to come on my Windows 8 Experience, as I am and will be putting it through its paces.

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Business Intelligence Geeky/Programming

Yamanalysis: Analyzing Yammer and Using PowerPivot on MySQL

I have blogged before about we use Yammer. Some interesting data can be gleaned from the usage of Yammer. One thing though is that the data and usage stats are limited in the Yammer area, but you can get all the data and take a look at things. I ran into Yamanalysis and decided to give it a try.

After getting Ruby, Rails, MySQL, curl/curb, GraphViz, IBM WordCloud and whatever else configured, I finally got it working. (FYI – MySQL 5.0 – you need to run the config wizard as administrator on Windows 7 or it just hangs at the end).

Pretty cool data and analysis from a higher level. Of course after getting everything working, I wanted to hit the data with PowerPivot. This sounds like an easy feat, but yet seemed to be a complicated task.

I first got the ODBC connector 5.1 for MySQL (Since PowerPivot doesn’t natively connect to MySQL,and 5.1 since that is the only one I could find reliably and get to work.), and set up an ODBC source. Tests fine.

In PowerPivot, I would run through the wizard and it would get architecture mismatches, and catastrophic failures, trying to test the connection. Ignoring that and moving forward, running a query would just hang on import forever. I tried different DSN’s, User/System DSNs, etc, to no avail.

What I ended up doing was firing up my local Microsoft SQL instance, and creating a linked server through a system DSN to the MySQL instance, then I could query the data fine from SQL. I opened up PowerPivot, connected to SQL local and then ran the query to MySQL and it work. What a workaround, what a hack, but at least I can hit the data in PowerPivot locally, which was my goal here.

Of course I could take what Yamanalysis is doing and dump to SQL, or do something similar in C# and dump to SQL, that might be a project for another day.

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Geeky/Programming Product Reviews

Windows Phone 7 App Gap




I am pretty into tech and gadgets, all kinds, mobile too. I have an iPhone (I’ve had all since 2G), Android (had a few, Dell Streak, Atrix 4g, now a Samsung Galaxy 4G), and Windows Phone (Samsung Focus WP7). People ask me about the differences between apps and devices and OS’s. Big thing with WP7 (which the OS is great), is the “App Gap”. I went through my iPhone and looked at the important apps, minus games, I use, and if there are equivalents on WP7. I downloaded them, etc, but made a list of ones that aren’t there yet. (interesting enough, I took notes for this post on OneNote from my WP7 device)




Apps Missing

  • Cisco VPN (yes, it’s a service, but it’s not really there on WP7)
  • Disqus – has api http://disqus.com/api/docs/
  • Flipboard
  • Google Plus
  • Hipporemote
  • Intonow
  • LogMeIn
  • Mint
  • Oink
  • Pandora
  • Path
  • PayPal
  • Posterous – has api http://posterous.com/api
  • PS express
  • Skype
  • Sportacular

Apps There But Not Official or Website only

  • Instagram (instacam)
  • Untappd (website)
  • Pinterest (Pinspiration)
  • YouTube (it is native but MSFT made and mobile website wrapper)
  • Tumblr (not free 3rd party)
  • LinkedIn (3rd party app)
  • Google Voice (GoVoice, GV for Windows Phone, etc)
  • Digg (Digg7, Digg Reader, etc)
  • Dropbox (some readers, etc)
  • Google Authenticator (some 3rd party apps)
  • Google Latitude (some crappy 3rd party apps)
  • Google Reader/reeder (some crappy 3rd party apps)
  • RDP Client – some 3rd party clients
  • VNC Client – 3rd party clients
  • TFS Clients – couple 3rd party clients
  • Google Translate – some 3rd party apps, Microsoft Translator, etc

As you can see, pretty big list. Many of the 3rd party apps just don’t cut it. Even some of the apps that are there, they just don’t compare to iOS or Android. Microsoft needs to overcome this App Gap to gain and/or stay relevant, in my eyes.

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Geeky/Programming Life

Cool Things I Have Been Doing On the Computer Lately

In the past couple of months, weeks, whatever (time flies) I have been doing some pretty cool things on the computer, in a wide range of areas. Just want to get them down on paper (you know what I mean)…

1. Yammer – working hard on growing Yammer community, external networks, just getting engagement and showing the benefits. It’s fun.

2. Kinect – did some Kinect hacking. On my own then with the group, got some cool stuff to show. It is crazy how easy it is to get something up and running with Kinect and the SDK. I see this stuff taking off in the coming months/years.

3. Azure – dorking around with Azure, looking at what it can and can’t do, what it could do well, how it would fit in with everything.

4. SQL 2012/Power View – been playing around with SQL 2012 since “Denali”, but now its got an official launch date (March 7th) and things are getting real. Power View demos online, trying to figure out how SQL 2012 is going to fit into our infrastructure and just learning as much as I can about it.

5. Ruby – been getting into Ruby and Ruby on Rails on my Mac, git, sqlite3, heroku, etc. Trying to learn more things that just the .NET ecosystem.

6. Ubuntu – same here, set up a VM, been trying to use it consistently, trying to get the other viewpoints from Windows and Mac and where things are at. Keep up with the joneses so to speak.

7. Android – I picked up a Samsung Galaxy (Verizon 4G) a few weeks ago and have been using it. I still love my iPhone, but getting more into Android. Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) is a pretty good OS, there are still quirks, but its better. Verizon sucks around where I live btw.

8. Google+/Picasa Web Albums – been getting this into my photo workflow, for sharing and backup. Liking it so far.

9. SharePoint 2010/FAST – been researching and reading FAST server like crazy trying to see how it will fit in with a potential project. I think it could be amazing. more to come.

10. SMS – been playing around with different frameworks, and seeing how they compare, trying things out. Using Voice and SMS is all the rage these days. (Hall and Oates thing anyone?)

Bonus: Nothing with computers, but I have been really getting into brewing beer/homebrewing. I think we have made 5 batches now, and the ones I have tasted so far are really good. It is a fun hobby and breaks up the constant technology I am involved in. More to come here too.

And much much more. Time is limited, time to post is limited. Getting out there and doing cool things is fun, and sharing them is fun too. Gotta find the right balance. I hope everyone is having a cool 2012 so far.

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Business Intelligence Geeky/Programming

Emergency Broadcast: Cursors in SQL are Bad.

Emergency Broadcast:

Last week, I stumbled across a “legacy” system. Small system, few tables, few stored procs, few web pages that let users manage it. The main table had about 40k rows in it, nothing huge. This system gets used sparingly.

Reports of the main page of the system taking 5+ minutes to load, or just timing out. Really? Dug through the code and lo and behold. A cursor.

Looping through 500+ items, and running 8 or so queries in each iteration. The queries were very similar:

SELECT some stuff INTO Cursor

WHILE LOOPING THROUGH CURSOR

SELECT STUFF 1

SELECT STUFF 2

..

..

END

I ended up re-writing the query to just grab all the data and did some case statement in the SELECT. They query went from 5+ minutes to less than 1 second.

Yes, CURSORs are bad. Avoid them. Rewrite your SQL. It amazes me that with all the good info out there on the web around SQL that people still write CURSORs in their queries. I asked the DBA to look at all procs on all systems and find all the CURSORs so we can root them out once and for all.

End of Emergency Broadcast

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Geeky/Programming

Sites and Services Hacked: Use a Password Manager

With the recent hack on Zappos.com where usernames and “cryptographically encoded” (not encrypted?) passwords were taken, it’s time to take warning. Other sites have gotten hacked in the past years as well, and there are ones you don’t even know about. It is kind of scary.

I, like many have been guilty of using same passwords for different services, throwaway services, etc. My most important services I used different passwords, but no more. I have been using 1Password for a couple years to store passwords, but now I am taking it to the next level. I went through the majority of the services and changed password and created a randomly generated password in 1Password. Yes it is a pain in the butt to have to look up password or whatever, but I think at this point, the best password is one you don’t even know.

1Password syncs across iOS, Android, all browser extensions, Mac and Windows, so it suits me well. Even after a few days I am getting used to the new workflow with any passwords I might have to look up or auto login to. All I know is the security and authorization on the net has to improve, it shouldn’t be this tough.

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Geeky/Programming

iPhone 4S Blue Pixel Line Problem.. Fixed!

Friday as I was leaving work, I noticed a small 1 pixel line vertically directly in the middle of my iPhone 4S that I just activated about 1.5 weeks earlier. WTF? Thought something was on my glasses, rebooted, restored, etc, etc, still was there. Wasn’t a software issue, definitely hardware. Brought it directly to the Apple Store and the took a look and said, yep, we will replace it no questions asked. Something definitely wrong. Not sure what causes it, I saw something about some board inverter deal on some forum, but nothing concrete.

Let’s just hope it doesn’t happen again 🙂

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Geeky/Programming

Office 365 and Windows Live Messenger Not Working? Here's The Fix:

Earlier this summer, I moved from Google Apps to Office 365. I really don’t use Windows Live Messenger for personal IM, but log in every once in a while, also Xbox 360 can login. I noticed on live.com when I hit it, the web messenger continually tried to login. Also my Xbox and WLM on my PC wouldn’t login (error code 8100037b). What gives?

Well, I figured it might have had something to do with Office 365 and Lync Online, and I was right. I had to go into Office 365, Admin, under Lync, General Settings, and disable external communication settings. After 12+ hours I could then log into Windows Live Messenger. Kind of a mess if your org might be using Windows Live for IM and then moving to Office 365. Of course your Lync could federate out to WLM, but still, not being able to log in could be a pain

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Geeky/Programming

VS 11 Experience

Today I decided to give it a go and install VS 11 Developer Preview (off the USB key I got from BUILD) onto my production machine. Whoa, Steve, that could be risky!!

Yeah, it could, but sometimes you need to live life on the edge. As much as a geek can.

There aren’t a ton of options when installing. The installer looks.. “beautiful” compare to other Visual Studio installers. It installed a few things, then reboot, then some more, then it was done. Easy. But of course, it installed SQL Express (Denali CTP3) which I really didn’t want to install since I already have 2008 R2 developer on my machine. Maybe in the advanced install I could have disabled it, but I didn’t dig through it all. Anyways, I just turned the service off and set it to manual start.

VS 11 is nice. Seems faster. Cleaner. Crisper. I LOVE the code clone feature. Found some good info there. I like the new TFS design (the work items, etc look nicer – almost a fat client version of the new TFS server and TFS azure experience).

The big app we work on compiled and ran, which was good. I didn’t try .NET 4.5 yet, that might be for another day. One thing that does stink about the dev preview is that you lose all your add ons. The VS productivity tools are baked in (at least some? I didnt try them all). But things like Resharper, etc aren’t there so you might be “missing” some things you are used to.

The solution file of the project changed on me, since I opened up a VS 2010 sln file. It added some comments and rearranged some things, but after I closed VS 11 and saved everything, I opened in VS 2010 and it still worked. Checked into source control and other devs with just VS 2010 opened it and it worked, etc. So MSFT wasn’t lying.. backward compatible!

Excited to dig into it more and for the future versions.

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Geeky/Programming

Quick Thoughts from //build/

Was at the Microsoft //build/ conference. Like other conferences, you usually get your mind blown and information overload. No difference here. Excited about all the new announcements. Getting used to the new Samsung Win8 tablet they gave out. Once again Microsoft is going to change the game for developers, for good or bad. But most skills will translate. Windows 8 is very early. I can see potential. There will be metro style apps, and desktop (or “pro”) apps. Eventually users will clamor for Metro apps. The tablet is nice, a little big, fan runs all the time. Haven’t even scratched the surface. You can try to compare to iPad but they aren’t the same class of device. This tablet is a PC. iPad is a tablet. Looking forward to digging into .NET 4.5 (even though it wont be supported on XP). Looking forward to learning WinRT and Metro. Want to do more with OData and I think it can give some quick wins (Did you know that is the only way to query data from Metro?)

A lot more will come out in the coming months, and hopefully most if not all of the FUD will subside. I am excited again though as a “Microsoft” guy (even though I’m an “Apple” guy too! 🙂 ) .. I can see convergence with Phone and PC, Cloud/Azure. Exciting Times.

I probably will have a more detailed post on things later, maybe not though 🙂