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EARLib: Zero Config ORM Tool for php/MySQL

Well, I originally was going to write a php script that examined the mysql database and produced php classes with crud functionality for the tables but then I got to working on it and realized I can go one step further. Why write the classes to file when you can just dynamically load everything at run time (and cache it once it’s loaded). So here it is, an ORM for php/MySQL that requires no configuration (apart from mysql connection information), and provides most of the features of the more heavy-weight ORM libraries. It’s page is here.

Trash the Language Toolbar Once and For All

I hate that thing… No matter how many times I hide it, it always finds a reason to come back. In fact, on one of my machines it comes back depending on which program you hover over in the task bar, so crap is always moving around. Make it gone for good! Run:

regsvr32 /u msutb.dll

You may need to reboot for it to take.

PHP Schema Generator

So here’s an interesting project. This is a spaghetti-mess of php code that produces a very simple DAL by reverse engineering a mysql database. All you have to do is pass it the connection information and database name and it will read in all of the tables and their field types producing a simplistic but complete data access layer for every table in that database.
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AMD a Conteder Again?

I used to be the biggest AMD fanboy. Back in the K6 days when AMD cheaps were slowly eeking up to their Intel counterparts, I jumped on board. The next few years there was fierce competition at the top-end with AMD and Intel constantly exchanging the ‘Fastest Desktop Chip’ trophy. Through the Athlon days AMD chips were almost always solidly in the lead in the oh-so-important speed-per-dollar benchmark. Their chips were enthusiasts’ dreams; cheap, fast, and highly overclockable. Those were the golden days of AMD.

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Stop It With Your Face

So I’m a fairly good skier by now. I’ve been out over a dozen time this year. I fly down the blacks at our little local resort, jumping the moguls and cutting ice like butter. They caught me last night. After a great night without even a hint of a fall on the slope back to the lodge I hit hard.
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Simple PHP Twitter Search API

Really I just wanted an excuse to make something with ‘Twit’ in the title. Anyway… it searches tweets. Using it right up there at the top of my page. Nothing earth shattering but much more easy to use and straightforward than the most of what I’ve seen out there. Article here.

SubSonic: A Kiss Followed by a Kick in the Crotch

I’ve really been enjoying SubSonic for both Web and WinForms .NET development. From a speed and ease point of view it is a fantastic tool. Yes, nHibernate or LLBLGen is a better fit for larger, more complicated projects, and straight up Linq to SQL or straight SQL for absolutely trivial stuff however SubSonic is just right for the medium sized bangers which are the majority of projects I’m working on.

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AX Form Performance: It’s the Auto-Arrange, Stupid

Now that TSI is running somewhat-kinda-almost smoothly there’s been a bit more focus on the speedy-ness of some of their forms. I was tackling one especially egregious time-sink one day and after having trimmed as much fat from the data retrieval and behind the scenes calculations as I could, I tossed it into the code profiler again. The biggest culprit? A simple little textbox.
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C’mon MS, It’s Been 7 YEARS!

Part of my job now-days involves jetting off to exotic locales, mingling with dignitaries, and overthrowing third world despots. Thus is the life of a software consultant. Naw… really, I get to convert a bunch of old C++/Powerbuilder programs to C#/.NET. Some of this stuff this is old, grody, and knee deep in the Win32 innards. I was certainly hoping that large swaths of that junk would have a nice, managed, simple to use replacement. I mean, the .NET framework has been out there for almost seven years. You’d think something as simple as connecting to a network printer wouldn’t require three structs, two UInt pointers, and a few lines of buffer allocation code. But nope… It actually takes fewer lines of code to write the thing in legacy C++ and that’s discarding the miles of extern and helper-class declarations.

Lookee There, It’s Blank Again

Every other year… I spend a year updating my blog fairly religiously (ok, a few months), then the next year I swoop in and erase it. Well, we’re blank again…