Wooden Barrel Puzzle

A New Category for my Collections of Puzzles

I have been a collector for puzzles. I just love sitting in the corner with a puzzling away with a sign that said “LEAVE ME ALONE”. So today my wife decided to buy me eight new puzzles to add to my collections. She bought me four mini wire puzzles and four wooden interlocking puzzles.

So I figure, why not post my collections of puzzles on my blog and here is the first blog post for my new Puzzles category. Of course, I will be busy for a few days solving those puzzles but when I get the chance, I will post pictures of my collections.

yeah~

Google Public DNS

I am currently a OpenDNS user. OpenDNS has block out a lot of dangerous sites / advertisement sites for me. I have no intention whatsoever to switch to Google Public DNS at the moment.

What is Google Public DNS? Google Public DNS is a free, global Domain Name System (DNS) resolution service, that you can use as an alternative to your current DNS provider. To try it out: Configure your network settings to use the IP addresses 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 as your DNS servers or Read our configuration instructions. If you decide to try Google Public DNS, your client programs will perform all DNS lookups using Google Public DNS.

Why does DNS matter? The DNS protocol is an important part of the web’s infrastructure, serving as the Internet’s phone book: every time you visit a website, your computer performs a DNS lookup. Complex pages often require multiple DNS lookups before they start loading, so your computer may be performing hundreds of lookups a day.

Why should you try Google Public DNS? By using Google Public DNS you can: Speed up your browsing experience. Improve your security. Get the results you expect with absolutely no redirection.

Ajax MutuallyExclusiveCheckboxExtender inside Gridview

In this Scenario, I have a gridview that has two checkbox fields and a comment field. Image Below. The checkboxes need to be mutually exclusive and still gives the user the ability to uncheck them. So the radio button control is out of the question because it would need more code to uncheck a radio button.

.aspx

</code>

<asp:GridView runat="server" ID="gvComments" AutoGenerateColumns="false" DataKeyNames="ID" >

 <Columns>
 <asp:TemplateField HeaderText="Strength">
 <ItemTemplate>
 <asp:CheckBox runat="server" ID="ckbStrength" />
 <cc1:MutuallyExclusiveCheckBoxExtender runat="server" ID="mecbeStrength" Key="chkSAI" TargetControlID="ckbStrength" />
 </ItemTemplate>
 </asp:TemplateField>

 <asp:BoundField Headertext="Common Comments (Optional)" ItemStyle-Wrap="false" DataField="Comment" ItemStyle-HorizontalAlign="Center"/>

 <asp:TemplateField HeaderText="Areas for Improvements" HeaderStyle-Width="10px" ItemStyle-VerticalAlign="Middle" ItemStyle-HorizontalAlign="Center">
 <ItemTemplate>
 <asp:CheckBox runat="server" ID="ckbAI" />
 <cc1:MutuallyExclusiveCheckBoxExtender runat="server" ID="mecbeAI" Key="chkSAI" TargetControlID="ckbAI" />
 </ItemTemplate>
 </asp:TemplateField>
 </Columns>

</asp:GridView>

<code>

.aspx.vb

Protected Sub gvComments_RowDataBound(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.Web.UI.WebControls.GridViewRowEventArgs) Handles gvComments.RowDataBound

 If e.Row.RowType <> DataControlRowType.DataRow Then Exit Sub

 'Declare mutuallyExclusiveCheckboxExtender variable
 Dim rowView As DataRowView = e.Row.DataItem
 Dim mecbeStrength, mecbeAI As AjaxControlToolkit.MutuallyExclusiveCheckBoxExtender
 'Assign controls to variable
 mecbeStrength = e.Row.FindControl("mecbeStrength")
 mecbeAI = e.Row.FindControl("mecbeAI")
 'Assign key+DataItemIndex to control
 mecbeStrength.Key = "chkSAI" & e.Row.DataItemIndex
 mecbeAI.Key = "chkSAI" & e.Row.DataItemIndex

 End Sub

asp:Literal Control

asp:Literal Reserves a location on the Web page to display static text.

• EnableViewState: A Boolean property signaling whether the control persists its view state (and the view state of any child controls it contains) to the requesting client. The default value is true.

• ID: A string value identifying the control on the page.

• Mode: A value that specifies how the content in the Literal control is rendered on the requesting client. The legal mode values include PassThrough, Encode, and Transform. PassThrough is the default value, as it passes through the text to the client. The Encode option converts the text into an HTML-encoded string before passing it to the client. Transform depends on the type of markup used, as it removes any elements not supported by the requesting client.

• Text: The caption displayed in the Literal control. This text is passed directly to the browser page when rendered by ASP.NET.

• Visible: A Boolean property signaling whether the control is displayed on the page when it is rendered. The default value is true.

Example:
I needed to turn the Static text from the literal control into a link that opens up a popup page. By using Literal instead of linkbutton, I prevented the postback that you normally get with linkbutton.

<asp:Literal runat="server" ID="literal" />

Code: The Code passes two variables to the literal link.

Public Sub Literal()
Dim x, y As Integer
x = ViewState("Activity")
y = ViewState("EditID")

Display a simple link:
literal.Text = "<a href='Log_CredsReqPopup.aspx?MiscCredID=" & x & "&RequestID=" & y & "'target='_blank'>Optional SLO</a>"

Display a simple link with onclick:
literal.Text = "<a href=""#"" onclick=""window.open('Log_CredsReqPopup.aspx?MiscCredID=" & ViewState("Activity") & "&RequestID=" & ViewState("EditID") & "','Log_CredsReqPopup','scrollbars=yes,width=400,height=650,resizable=no')"">Optional SLO</a>"

Display a button:
literal.text = "<input type='button' text='Optional SLO' onclick=""window.open('Log_CredsReqPopup.aspx?MiscCredID=" & ViewState("Activity") & "&RequestID=" & ViewState("EditID") & "','Log_CredsReqPopup','scrollbars=yes,width=400,height=650,resizable=no')"">"

End Sub

aspx popup window

There are many ways to call a popup window from aspx. I only post the ones I have used. If you have used other ways. Please feel free to contribute. Thanks.

Sorry for the lack of explanations, as I am still learning myself.

Dim PopUpScript As String

PopUpScript = “javascript: window.open(‘Popup.aspx?’,'popupage’,’scrollbars=yes,width=790,height=510,resizable=no,left=10′)”

ScriptManager.RegisterStartupScript(Me, Me.GetType(), “PopUpScript”, PopUpScript, True)

To pass a variable ID to the next page, I use:

PopUpScript = “javascript: window.open(‘Popup.aspx?ID=1′,’popupage’,’scrollbars=yes,width=790,height=510,resizable=no,left=10′)”

2nd Method

Protected Sub lnkbutton_Click(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles lnkbutton.Click

lnkbutton.Attributes.Add(“onclick”, “window.open(‘http://www.yahoo.com’,'null’,'height=768, width=1024,status= no, resizable=yes, scrollbars=yes, toolbar=no,location=no,menubar=no ‘);”)
End Sub

System.DateTime in ASP.NET

DateTime.Now;	10/20/2009 6:33:57 PM
DateTime.Now.ToString();	10/20/2009 6:33:57 PM
DateTime.Now.ToShortTimeString()	6:33 PM
DateTime.Now.ToShortDateString()	10/20/2009
DateTime.Now.ToLongTimeString()	6:33:57 PM
DateTime.Now.ToLongDateString()	Tuesday, October 20, 2009

DateTime.Now.ToString(“d”)	10/20/2009
DateTime.Now.ToString(“D”)	Tuesday, October 20, 2009
DateTime.Now.ToString(“f”)	Tuesday, October 20, 2009 6:33 PM
DateTime.Now.ToString(“F”)	Tuesday, October 20, 2009 6:33:57 PM
DateTime.Now.ToString(“g”)	10/20/2009 6:33 PM
DateTime.Now.ToString(“G”)	10/20/2009 6:33:57 PM
DateTime.Now.ToString(“m”)	October 20
DateTime.Now.ToString(“r”)	Tue, 20 Oct 2009 18:33:57 GMT
DateTime.Now.ToString(“s”)	2009-10-20T18:33:57
DateTime.Now.ToString(“t”)	6:33 PM
DateTime.Now.ToString(“T”)	6:33:57 PM
DateTime.Now.ToString(“u”)	2009-10-20 18:33:57Z
DateTime.Now.ToString(“U”)	Tuesday, October 20, 2009 10:33:57 PM
DateTime.Now.ToString(“y”)	October, 2009
DateTime.Now.ToString(“dddd, MMMM dd yyyy”)	Tuesday, October 20 2009
DateTime.Now.ToString(“ddd, MMM d “‘”yy”)	Tue, Oct 20 ‘09
DateTime.Now.ToString(“dddd, MMMM dd”)	Tuesday, October 20
DateTime.Now.ToString(“M/yy”)	10/09
DateTime.Now.ToString(“dd-MM-yy”)	20-10-09

Source: csharpfriends

OpenDNS

I stumbleupon OpenDNS.com and decided to give a try. Sign-up is necessary if you want to track your history. Three simple steps to get you up and running. Now, I have it setup on my home-network. Below shows a bit of my my settings and statistics.

I like how easy it is to filter contents and view the history with graphs. OpenDNS even allows you filter out individual website. Shortcut is another cool feature, which is like a safety net for when you are typing in the dark and you misspell .com to .cmo. In the case you misspell, OpenDNS will still redirect you to the right site but you must have the entries in there to correct your common mistakes.

1. Change the DNS in your router

208.67.222.222
208.67.220.220

2. Sign-up for an account (Optional)
3. Login to manage your account (Optional)

Content Filtering

Categories

Statistics

Create Shortcuts

ASP.NET Login Control

Build your own SSD Storage Drive

With the Flexi-Drive S2S we introduce a flexible adjustable memory solution.

Simply insert the desired number of SDHC cards (max. 6) into the Flexi-Drive’s slots. The card’s individual memory capacities merge into one and are available as a single drive then.

Benefit from this flexible, convenient memory solution that can be used as a normal 2.5″ SATA HDD providing the advantages of a SSD: no noise emission, low power consumption and shock resistance.

Features:
• Fast modular SSD storage solution
• Memory size flexibly adaptable via SDHC memory cards (SLC/MLC)
• SATA interface (SATA I and II)
• 2.5″ format
• Zero noise emission, low power consumption, shock resistance
• No drivers or software required

Specifications:
• Use up to 6 SDHC cards as RAID0
• 6 slots for SDHC cards (4-32 GB)
• Supports SDHC cards only
• Flexible memory capacity
• Dimensions: 70 mm x 100 mm x 9 mm (W x L x H)

product page