I’m a convert. I used to be a die-hard IE user. I even stuck to my guns for a long time before switching from IE6 to IE7 (I’m not using tabbed browsing if FireFox invented it). But, as I moved to a new company and started working on a consumer-oriented site (the majority of which still use IE) but with html and Ajax (don’t get me started on Microsoft’s server-side Web strategy, 3.5 and Ajax.net be damned) I really wasn’t interested in using Microsoft for anything. Of course, it’s what I know so I ended up grudgingly building the site in .Net (originally sticking with 2.0 but upping it to 3.5 to support some .Net controls).
So, I’m doing my best here to balance the best of both worlds. I’m using master pages (they are pretty sweet) but not using server-side controls (except for Telerik) if I can help it.
In order to get from point A to B without having to invent it all again, I decided to use the jQuery JS library. It’s a great library and gets better with age. When you use a single line of code to update an entire layout or use it for XML (as some stalwarts like to point out, it’s not an XML parser but dammit, it’s an HTML parser so guess what? They’re related.), you’ll be sold.
I upgraded recently, or rather, started an upgrade, to a new version, 1.3 so I could get some speed benefits but also so I could use v1.6rc5 of the UI plugin. That sucker’s got some beautiful controls (and they’re not server-side!!). Thing is, after happy tapping out a dialog form and testing it out (successfully) in FireFox 3, that little storm cloud on my shoulder that warns me of coming dangers whispered, “Try it in IE…” I said, naw, but then it struck me with lightning so I tried it.
“Invalid argument. Line 23,102,203 of your huge codebase.” Another informational Microsoft alert.
I put it through the debugger which wasn’t much help. Oh, I found the code where the error was but it was a normal bit of code that worked for everything else. After much banging against many walls, I finally decide to post to the Google groups for the UI development. I hate posting there because Google seems to offer up a way for people to get your e-mail address (really? Do ya have to?) that, despite a reCaptcha gate still resulted in me getting tons of spam on a gmail account I NEVER use for anything else. I’m so glad my paranoia told me to use that address rather than my main account.
Anyhow, as I’m going through this long drawn out affair of describing the issue and throwing blocks of HTML, CSS, and JS up there I just happen to write, “I’m using the XHTML 1.1 dtd on this site.” Gotta love me being thorough. I say, what if I switch it to 1.0 transitional?
I do and BAM, it works just fine. In fact, the original issue that made this come up (the dialog was all of 20 pixels high despite a declaration of 500px high in the JS) was also gone.
Then I remembered. IE7 may be MORE modern than IE6 (can you believe 25% of people out there browsing now still use that old piece of crap that shipped with Windows Me and 2000?) but it’s definitely not up with the standards. FF3 is. And, IE8 is supposed to be (downloaded that sucker but I want to set up a VM slice to try it out…) but that’s still a little ways off (I used to install beta software left and right and still do but with MIcrosoft, I’ve taken a new approach: I wait for at least 3 months if not 6 months and if that SP you know is going to come out is announced, I might even wait for that). Microsoft’s beta testing program (read: product launches) has gotten out of hand.
So, though I must support IE7 (and the fact that they released that sucker with Vista means it’s not going anywhere until Vista’s lifecycle is done in five or more years), I do so with the utmost scorn. Sure, I still use IE7 for personal use (it’s still my default…FF3 takes too long to load thanks to Microsoft, I’m sure) but when I want a stable browser to browse with (did I mention my IE7 crashes and hangs randomly now?) I’m sticking with FF3. That new engine is super fast and it supports something Microsoft throws in as a bonus: standards!
What’s the lesson today? The lesson is, when you’re hammering your head against your desk because some CSS or JS isn’t working right in IE7 or 6, consider using the transitional dtd with them. You might solve all your problems with a single DOCTYPE declaration!
kn
Here’s one that always took me some time to figure out (until I broke down and just ran a search against the file structure to find it).
You know when you right-click on “Stored Procedures” to create a new stored procedure and you age the hieroglyphics version of a stored procedure template from deep in the minds of a Microsoft engineer? You decide you want to change it and you go through Microsoft’s instructions telling you to go to View > Template Explorer then dig into the Stored Procedure group. You do that and you find that Create Procedure (New Menu) template which you change. Then you try it again and it doesn’t work.
Then you take a stab and some logic and feel this has got to be it. You go into Documents and Settings > Application Data for your profile, then:
Microsoft\Microsoft SQL Server\90\Tools\Shell\Templates\Sql\Stored Procedure
And you’re like, score! I found you. You make your changes, save it and go back into SMS only to not see your changes reflected in the New Stored Procedure command (I think it only affects the File > New). Dammit. Now what?
The net won’t tell you, everything points to the same thing I mentioned above. Then you do a file search like I did and lo and behold, you find Microsoft’s hidden pile of gold:
Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\90\Tools\Binn\VSShell\Common7\IDE\sqlworkbenchprojectitems\Sql\Stored Procedure
You make the change to the same file (has the exact same name) and BAM. You’re done.
Same goes for any other template. It would seem the IDE gets its own “profile” or something.
Anway, you’re welcome. Go get some cake or something. You deserve it.
Seeing as I was going to be writing up a bunch of tidbits on Web dev (gotta put all this crap somewhere, my brain’s full), I thought, hey, wouldn’t it be great to put up another blog? Well, here she is…ain’t she a shake-n-bake beaut?
Anyhow, enjoy the tidbits…might throw in more than tidbits once in a while but I’m looking at installing more RAM in my head so we’ll see.
I’m migrating a couple of entries from my main blog here so look down for some older stuff!
kn
Everyone seems to be excited about something? Is it post-MLK day afterglow? Oh I get it, we’ve got a new guy in the White House and there’s something about his skin color that’s making people talk. 
Kidding aside, I can’t say I’ve ever felt racism in my day (keep in mind being a dork and being ostracized for that reason is a different story) so, as I told my wife, the excitement about today is more about having a well-spoken and (hopefully) intelligent president in office to represent us in the world as well as to help get this out of control country back on track. I understand and appreciate the importance of Barack Obama being sworn into office but color me a realist in the fact that I’m looking beyond the race factor. Though I admit there’s a certain karma at work when a black president is being sworn in a day after a holiday remembering one of the best representatives of the civil rights movement.
I have high hopes and look forward to the next 100 days as well as the next two years. Every president tries to accomplish something relatively big early in office and every president also happens to screw something notable up in the early days of their tenure as well. With my high hopes, I’m expecting the “something big” to be something other than bailing out industries that screwed themselves with their sloth and stupidity and the “something notable” to be that they picked the wrong color for the dinner ware.
Still, you have to admit, despite all the gloom and doom of the (it’s now official, right?) recession, President Obama is acting like a glimmer of light (yes, I see the irony) in a period of darkness. It may not be enough to save jobs (that comes with better business sense and better foresight) but hopefully the optimism will capture enough hearts to kick start the economy (the world economy).
Look on the plus side, he can actually speak and will likely not spit on every other country in this world when trying to get stuff done. We might actually be able to do stuff in the world and you might actually see the economy perk up just because of that alone.
So, here’s to the new president and his new government. Don’t screw it up and keep that security tight…don’t want the “moral” minority doing something rash that could end this ride too early.
kn
I’ve always loved the Onion but I barely read it anymore. Someone forwarded me a link (I guess they finally caught up with the 20th Century and went video!) to something fucking hilarious. According to the Onion, Apple has invented the MacBook Wheel. Classic.
Best parts:
- Predictive sentence technology
- “Everything is just a couple hundred clicks away…”
- “Steve Jobs: People who use keyboards are “standing in the way of human progress”"
- Hummingbird battery: 19 minutes of power!
- “It’ll be 4oz lighter due to a lack of screen, hard drive, or wheel”
- And…”Sudoku killer will kill either 1, 4 or 9 victims next”
Unbelieveable.
kn
