Coding
IE6 border not showing
Submitted by pwnell on Tue, 11/17/2009 - 22:02I hate IE6. I hate IE. But especially IE6, since it plays magic tricks on you when you want to apply borders in some scenarios. Thanks to this link I fixed the issue.
Hard to spot bugs
Submitted by pwnell on Sun, 08/02/2009 - 11:08It took me a full 10 minutes to track down this stupid bug. It is not intuitive. I guess it is the penalty one pays for terseness:
vCostEntry.getCost().put(vDBField, Utils.makeProperString(vExportToExcel).equals("DISCOUNT")?((int)Utils.getDouble(vRawAmount)):GetIntFromFormattedCurrency(vRawAmount));
Some definitions to explain above:
public Map<String, Integer> getCost() {
return mCost;
MDAC, Collation and UAC
Submitted by pwnell on Mon, 07/27/2009 - 19:29I have been struggling on and off with EasyFrom DBConvert converting a Paradox 4 database to MySQL. I would get this error intermittently:
[800A0CB3] Object or provider is not capable of performing requested operation.
Subtle bugs in Java
Submitted by pwnell on Sun, 07/26/2009 - 22:50I recently uncovered a bug that troubled me for about 30 minutes. This bug was introduced in the Javaconfig framework, as I was extending support for more overloaded methods by "copying the pattern". But it proved that in this case, following a pattern does not always work.
Inductive reasoning states that if element 1 is the same as 2 and 3 and 4 and ... n, element n+1 will most probably be the same as well. However inductive reasoning is rather evil when writing software as it is not mathematically sound.
Microsoft may suck, but for development they rock.
Submitted by pwnell on Fri, 04/03/2009 - 13:15Compare this official documentation on the exit value of a process for Java:
with Microsoft's:
I am sorry but Java still lags waaaay behind Microsoft when it comes to good API documentation and development support.
I HATE Microsoft Access
Submitted by pwnell on Tue, 02/03/2009 - 22:08Tonight I spent 3 hours trying to get a simple, basic SQL query to work in Microsoft Access 2003. The SQL query runs perfectly in Microsoft SQL Server 2005, however when run through the VB code in Access via the DAO layer it kept on failing with a syntax error. Obviously the error message did not point out the cause of the error. Since the SQL was perfectly valid and not complex, I was baffled.
Here is the basic query I had written:
Frustrations
Submitted by pwnell on Mon, 03/31/2008 - 14:54So you do some DBA work and one day realised that the worst has come true - the replication is just so broken you have to start all over. Usually there is always some kind of ground level when working with computers. If a program is badly broken try reinstalling it. If that does not work try reinstalling the OS maybe. If that does not work buy a new computer etc.
I had this situation on a system I am playing DBA on. Slony-I was badly broken so I had to restart from scratch. My ground zero was to drop the database and start over... But... what if you can't???
Negative measure of productivity
Submitted by pwnell on Fri, 03/14/2008 - 02:54This is happening even today, but still so true...
ASP.NET, Global.asax, Application_Error and "lost" Session
Submitted by pwnell on Tue, 08/21/2007 - 14:37I recently ran into a weird issue with ASP.NET. In my Global.asax file I have a handler for Application_Error to display a standard error page. However, in the Master Page (the handler transfers to an error page that inherits from a custom master page), I read the session state to show a global status.
Parallels 3 for Mac and Java 1.6
Submitted by pwnell on Fri, 06/08/2007 - 18:00If you run a Swing application under Parallels for Mac v3.0, and are using Java 1.6 and your direct draw extension is enabled you will find the application never draws (render) it's canvas.
It is not a bug in your code - just turn off all graphics acceleration in XP.
