Disqus - Latest Comments for Paul Watson

Re: My own Columbian

Paul Watson — Wed, 07 Sep 2005 18:28:00 -0000

Officially the project is for a year but it will more than likely get refunded at that point and I will stay on. I think 2 to 3 years is a fair estimate.

Re: Desktop widgets

Paul Watson — Sat, 10 Sep 2005 23:19:00 -0000

Thanks for the tip.

Re: Oh dash it

Paul Watson — Wed, 21 Sep 2005 20:00:00 -0000

You would think so but the rest of the paragraph shows that the only spider-like part of the "moravec" are its legs.

Having read further into the book though I have found half a dozen more mistakes. I think Simmons had this book typed out in a rush.

Re: Karmic design

Paul Watson — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 12:54:00 -0000

I'll post links to both when they are live.

Re: I like Cameras, hello

Paul Watson — Wed, 28 Sep 2005 20:22:00 -0000

By any chance are you using Bloglines, Mike? Bloglines has been flaky of late, it also only updated my ilikecameras feed today. Long after the feed was updated.

Re: Here’s Chucky!

Paul Watson — Sun, 06 Nov 2005 21:40:00 -0000

Toy Story I enjoyed but you can keep Chucky well away from this horror-hating boy.

Re: On being drunk and doing things

Paul Watson — Fri, 16 Dec 2005 12:20:00 -0000

haha no, not that bad.

Re: Resolve resolved

Paul Watson — Fri, 16 Dec 2005 14:24:00 -0000

Indeed not. It is us men who are the clueless ones :)

Re: Advertisers on coke

Paul Watson — Thu, 05 Jan 2006 15:54:00 -0000

An aurora of polar bears. How nice, thanks Derek.

Though a sleuth of bears sounds grand too.

Re: Execute, not save

Paul Watson — Thu, 12 Jan 2006 12:46:00 -0000

That sounds similar to what we are doing though the "automated upgrade procedure of our own creation that extracts code and table changes from the development database and prepares scripts that can update production databases" is the tougher bit.

Enterprise Manager was the MMC snap-in that managed SQL Server 2000.

Re: Execute, not save

Paul Watson — Fri, 13 Jan 2006 14:56:00 -0000

I should have realised you were being sarcastic :-D

As for Query Analyzer I really wish SQL2005 came with it. It has always been handy to have a fast, lightweight query app. At least QA from SQL2000 works fine against SQL2005 dbs.

Re: Mr. Anonymous

Paul Watson — Fri, 13 Jan 2006 15:12:00 -0000

I sure did octavo. It was my first development job. Why do you ask?

Re: Towels

Paul Watson — Mon, 16 Jan 2006 18:51:00 -0000

Thanks for lowering the tone, WellBoy :P

Though maybe this is why we have face-towels... hmmmm.

Re: Before the comma

Paul Watson — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 17:26:00 -0000

Possibly but after awhile I will become blind to commas preceding the value just as I am now blind to commas after the value.

Re: Before the comma

Paul Watson — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 18:10:00 -0000

That is the likely explanation Colin but I'd hope the SQL team came to that coding style after some thought rather than just one coders preference.

Anybody know if I can change the templates in Management Studio?

Re: Least of all

Paul Watson — Thu, 19 Jan 2006 23:59:00 -0000

You are right mounirra, that is the literal meaning. But if you take it further, the unintended meaning, it seems to say that the other items may be lesser. I don't believe most people who use this saying mean that though.

Re: FeedLounge first impressions

Paul Watson — Sun, 22 Jan 2006 19:31:00 -0000

Well I think there is a market for premium aggregators and while my first impressions of FeedLounge are not good I do think it can become worth the money.

Re: Login

Paul Watson — Wed, 25 Jan 2006 18:11:00 -0000

Yup, good point Derek. There is integration between Writeboard and Basecamp and there is a bit between Basecamp and Backpack (I think) but it could be taken up a level as you say.

Re: Nano sized bite of the forbidden fruit

Paul Watson — Sat, 28 Jan 2006 01:01:00 -0000

I am pretty sure I clicked Update and not Restore but it was my first time so I might have made a mistake. Next time there is an update I'll see if it was the software or my finger slipping.

And what do you mean by the "Real" video iPod?

Re: GMail me

Paul Watson — Wed, 08 Feb 2006 18:48:00 -0000

Thanks for the endorsement, Mike.

Re: Driven to text

Paul Watson — Sat, 11 Feb 2006 12:51:00 -0000

Well they aren't a 99.999% uptime host. But I am happy with them, especially since they moved to the new colo. Davie has not been down in ages.

Best thing to do is check out the status log (http://status.textdrive.com/) and judge for yourself. some of their servers seem to have more problems than others.

Re: Canon EOS 30D

Paul Watson — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 14:00:00 -0000

Absolutely true, David. The crazy thing is these are professional cameras. They cost upwards of $1300 and are used by enthusiasts and pros, not the general public. No one who buys a 30D is fooled by the button or thinks it is a great feature.

Re: Canon EOS 30D

Paul Watson — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 14:20:00 -0000

Oh shit, sorry David Adams Johnson of 28 Laguna Way, Cape Town, South Africa (telephone number +2721 555 6942.) I'll be sure to refer to you as Octopussy from now on.

Re: Canon EOS 30D

Paul Watson — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 14:31:00 -0000

I am building up some seriously bad karma here, aren't I? I'd better watch my ride home tonight. Any strange lights in my mirrors and I am diving into the bushes.

Re: The evolutionary knot

Paul Watson — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 19:17:00 -0000

hehe, nice one Stone. Glad I am not the only one who has thought of this. You know what they say, great minds think alike, and fools seldom differ.

Re: JSON and E4X, a path

Paul Watson — Thu, 02 Mar 2006 15:41:00 -0000

Though it is one of the least controversial proposals I have seen in years. All the players like XML and E4X does it in a way most people like.

Re: Man breasts

Paul Watson — Fri, 03 Mar 2006 17:23:00 -0000

Wow, I never knew that. I take it the incident rate is less than women?

Re: Fodie

Paul Watson — Tue, 07 Mar 2006 19:55:00 -0000

A fodie is a photo.

As for shots that is a pretty typical term from photographers too. I'll often say I got the shot or can I see your shots. I am OK with that one. I'll try not to use it around you though ;)

Re: 114235577101304742

Paul Watson — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 21:07:00 -0000

I'd give you 5 bucks for it just so that I can start publishing that photo of you in the red shirt looking like you own the place. It'd be great at the Pinelands reunion next year. I'll send it in abstentia and say "Love to be there but look where I am and tell me you'd rather be where you are."

Re: Crazy 8s

Paul Watson — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 22:53:00 -0000

Hey! I bought those Cats for 50 bucks down at Cape Town train station. Best buy of my life ;)

Re: Nymph to Eve

Paul Watson — Mon, 27 Mar 2006 17:06:00 -0000

Oh, good old Scope. I do remember it though not enough to go around naming models in it.

I always thought the Red Nose day issues were the funniest things.

Re: ExecuteScalar and null

Paul Watson — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 10:38:00 -0000

Thanks for the explanation Nish. I do have to disagree though and say that "as string" should return exactly what ".ToString()" does. The concept is identical. Convert X to string. If Microsoft have implemented it two different ways then that is a mistake.

Re: ExecuteScalar and null

Paul Watson — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 14:02:00 -0000

"as string" returns a null when "ToString" returns the value from the database. To me that is a broken implementation.

How can "as string" returning a null be considered consistent behaviour? It is loosing data.

Re: Checking for “null” Guids

Paul Watson — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 15:26:00 -0000

hehe. Though techies tend to pronounce Guid as "goo-id". A Guid is a Globally Unique Identifier. It is a way of getting a 32 character ID that nobody else on the planet should duplicate.

Re: ExecuteScalar and null

Paul Watson — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 10:33:00 -0000

It isn't a Guid. The Value of a SqlParam is a basic Object. I doubt the as operator specifically inspects SqlParams to check what DbType they are.

"as int" and "as string" work fine even when the SqlParam.Value is holding a bigint or a bit or a char. It just doesn't work for uniqueIdentifier which says to me there is a problem in there somewhere.

Re: Quitting coke

Paul Watson — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 10:34:00 -0000

Rooibos you mean? It is from South Africa originally and I can't stand the stuff. I am not a fan of herbal teas and rooibos is one of the worst :)

Thanks though.

Re: Testing both ways

Paul Watson — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 13:20:00 -0000

Good point Steve.

I think though throwing an exception when no rows were affected gives better information to the caller than just silently continuining as if a row was affected. The caller can then choose what to do with that info.

Re: Ziki digilife aggregator

Paul Watson — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 14:48:00 -0000

haha. I rather like the bold colour scheme. Never though neon green would work with soft blue and hard black.

Re: All time artists

Paul Watson — Fri, 21 Apr 2006 16:59:00 -0000

You jump too fast tiny grasshopper. My google foo is strong and both I have found and tried before. Both failed the ninja tests I put before them.

Thanks though as I see they have been updated and address the issues I had with them before. Maybe this time around they will work without hassle.

Re: Fiesta time

Paul Watson — Wed, 26 Apr 2006 20:10:00 -0000

I am an idiot. I tell you I bought the red one but I fail to tell you which car is the red one. The one with the sun-roof is the red one. So red and a sun-roof. Woohoo!

A sun-roof in Ireland. Great idea eh?