Head-Slappers and Knee-Slappers

Recently I noticed that a component I have been working on was running slowly in its Release version. The only changes I had made recently were mostly calls to Debug.WriteLine() to get unit-testing information. When I figured out the problem, it reminded me of a term from my Psychology background (my degree in Psychology, not my therapy ;-) ) called the “Observer Effect.” The Observer Effect is a term in experimental research which basically says that while you are trying to observe something, the very act of observation might affect what you are trying to observe. Consider the following simple, albeit silly example : Hypothesis: Water freezes at zero degrees Celsius. Method of study: Stand in freezer holding small puddle of water in hand. Results: Water doesn’t freeze at zero degrees Celsius. Why? Because the method of observation (holding water in hand) prevents the water from freezing because the warmth of your hand (around 98.6F) warms the water sufficiently so that it doesn’t fre

I love creating tools that simplify a developers life and can save time. My intent with the next few blog entries will be to publicly step through the process of designing, creating, and using tools that I have named the "Fast and Filthy Add Ins for Visual Studio." "Fast and Filthy" is a play on the term "Quick and Dirty." These add ins will be Visual Studio add ins that will give a developer a fast and simple way to create prototypes for customers/management. I think this also has the potential for use by managers and even clients (more on this later). Taking Advantage of the Hierarchical Classes, controls, and data tend to be hierarchical in nature. Classes have properties and methods (which have parameters and a return value ). Controls contain collections of controls. Data tends to be hierarchical to some degree - Databases contains tables which can be related to other tables, tables contain fields, etc.. And then of course there's XML: hierarch

Sorry for the delay in blog entries - the lines for the bathroom at my house are way long. ;-) Seriously, I've been away a while, but I'm going to throw myself into blogging. I encourage you to stay tuned!