Category: web

How to: “Kick It” or “Shout It” from Google Reader

Posted on | by Alvin A. | 1 Comment on How to: “Kick It” or “Shout It” from Google Reader

Lifehacker has a couple of articles about adding “Send To” shortcuts to Google Reader:

Evernote also published a “how to” of their own today, and I showed DZone readers how to push items to DZone’s queue yesterday.

Here’s how you can send stories to DotNetKicks or DotNetShoutout…

Open Google Reader and click on Settings (upper right), select the ‘Send To’ tab. Then just click the ‘Create a Custom Link’ button and enter this info:

Name: DotNetKicks
Url: http://www.dotnetkicks.com/submit/?url=${url}&title=${title}
Icon: http://www.dotnetkicks.com/favicon.ico

Name: DotNetShoutout
Url: http://dotnetshoutout.com/Submit?url=${url}&title=${title}
Icon: http://dotnetshoutout.com/Assets/Images/fav.ico

Enjoy!

Google Chrome FAIL

Posted on | by Alvin A. | 20 Comments on Google Chrome FAIL

EDIT (2008-09-04 09:09) – Thanks to a tip from a commenter, I added the “no-sandbox” switch to my Chrome shortcut, and it’s now working for me.

EDIT (2008-09-02 08:35) – I uninstalled and re-installed via an elevated command prompt. Still the same results. Fail Folder.

This is all I see for any web page I try to open in Google Chrome. It appeared to install without a hitch.

Google Chrome FAIL

“Aw, Snap! Something went wrong while displaying this webpage. To continue, press Reload or go to another page.”

I dub thee “Google Fail Folder”:

Fail Folder

Anyone else see this problem? I’m running Vista 32-bit. I’ve already tried running the app as admin with no luck.

My Dev Kit

Posted on | by Alvin A. | 4 Comments on My Dev Kit

 

With a nod to John Lam and Shawn Wildermuth for the inspiration, here is a rundown of the things I use on a daily basis to develop software. This includes hardware, software and online resources.image

 

Hardware

Personal Desktop
  • Dell Dimension e521
  • AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+
  • 4GB PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM
  • Radeon HD 4850 512MB GDDR3 Video Card
  • System HDD – 300GB Seagate Barracuda SATAII Drive
  • Data/Media HDD – SATAII RAID1 Mirrored Set of 750GB WD Drives
  • Creative Fatal1ty 1010 Mouse
  • 20” Widescreen Dell LCD
Work Laptop
  • IBM/Lenovo ThinkPad T60 15”
  • Intel Core Duo T2500 / 2GHz CPU
  • 2GB RAM
  • ATI Mobility Radeon X1400
  • 100GB 7200rpm HDD
  • Logitech Cordless TrackMan Optical
  • 2nd Monitor: ViewSonic 19” Widescreen LCD

 

Operating System and Productivity Tools

image

I run Windows Vista Business (32-bit) on my machines. I don’t currently run Vista Sidebar or any launcher/toolbar applications. I have been getting along well by simply organizing the folders in my Start Menu and putting the items I use frequently in my Favorite Programs section.

Firefox 3 is my default browser, but I’m thinking of giving IE8 Beta 2 a shot at daily use. I have it installed, and it looks quite promising. My must-have Firefox extensions include Adblock Plus, Blank Canvas Gmail Signatures, Download Helper, FFClickOnce, Foxmarks Bookmark Synchronizer and Greasemonkey.

At the office, I use Outlook 2007 for email, contacts, calendar and tasks. I am beginning to use OneNote 2007 for meeting notes and other task organization & mind mapping activities. Outside of my day job, my email and contacts are in Gmail. I use both Presdo and Upcoming for calendar / scheduling.

I use Windows Live Writer to post to my WordPress blog. It’s simply the best blogging tool for Windows, with tons of great plug-ins available.

MediaMonkey is my media management tool of choice. It’s great for maintaining large MP3 libraries and podcast subscriptions.

I am giving Sysinternals Desktops 1.0 a try to manage multiple desktops on my laptop. I tried another tool a few months ago, but docking/undocking with the second monitor was freaking it out. So far so good with Desktops 1.0.

 

Developer Tools

I use both Visual Studio 2005 Team Developer SP1 and Visual Studio 2008 Team Developer SP1 using a custom vssettings file I created on Ryan Lanciaux’ Visual Studio Theme Generator online tool. My must-have Visual Studio plug-ins are ReSharper 4.0, GhostDoc and StyleCop. My company uses TFS for feature/bug tracking and source control, MSUnit for unit testing, and CruiseControl.NET for our continuous and daily builds.

My text editor of choice is Notepad++, and I use Paint.NET for all my image editing needs. BeyondCompare is fantastic for comparing files & folders. My group uses it for code reviews as well.

Here is a quick rundown of some other handy tools to keep around, most of which I use quite frequently:

 

The Cloud

 

How About You?

That’s enough about me. Let’s hear what you use on a daily basis to make yourself a more productive developer.