This is a somewhat wide subject, so the QnA was inappropriate. I am working on some games and apps, and they need to talk to some MySQL servers and/or Azure resources, and so I need some connection strings. Usually I've made internal tools, where having the connection strings in code or in a XML or Json -file, was unproblematic. Now I'm having the issue that APK's are basically Zip-files, and .net executables are de-compilable. My first solution is to setup an intermediary web service to keep the connection strings unavailable from the app. But I can't help but think that I'm missing something here. Also, an extra middle-man webserver, increase the possible bottle-necks and failure points What are this community's thoughts on the subject? Thanks for your time!

Background I'm working with a special type of "offline files"/"File sync"-system, and need to compare a users files on his/her computer en on the file server. The place I'm working at, was tricked by a Microsoft rep back in 2011, to use a system that works kind of like OneDrive. The user have their files on their laptop, and when connected to the organization's network, the files are synched with the file server The situation Now that they are migrating to Windows 10, and actual OneDrive, I've discovered a problem: the files aren't always synched. The process is now to run a set of tools on the users' computers,to check for errors, and if there is, (and there's plenty of errors), the user need to confirm which file is the correct one. The problem I've been testing WinMerge, and similar programs, but they are mostly garbage for the use I need them for. I need flexibility, meaning that i need complex filtering options, (e.g. folder names to increase processing speed), but also the options to look at files in different manners, (hashes of files, metadata, or byte-for-byte). THis could actually be done in powershell pretty "easily", however, the user will have to interact with this in a meaningfull and friendly way, so an interface is therefore needed, which allows for sorting, opening selected files, copying, copy to third party location, copy to same location with a pre/su-fix. Options to reduce timeconsumption, (quick mode which only checks metadata, or hashmode, which is in the middle, or slow mode byte-for-byte) My solution (thus far) Create this as a C# program, with a nice interface, (I've made the interface, and it's actually very nice), I've tested some simple file comparisons, but I need you guys' input. Am I doing this right or is there a piece of software that I haven't found yet?? Thanks for all input :-)

Ilove XML, but 300'000 rows, in a single file, times out the application

60MB and 300'000++ rows

I just got handed a challange: Create a program to knead stellar data into something visual. I know this is redundant, as the tools already exist, but I'm between jobs and need something to do. So I have access to the data, which is a HUGE csv file. said CSV dataset keeps crashing, excel and access, so I need some local, "portable"/deployable and free database technology. Since I want some scalability, and decleared datatypes, using a CSV file isn't feasable. My first thought is a sql server, but they're not real user friendly if I want to distribute the software. Anyone have any suggestions? Please explain the benefits of the technology and not just name thibgs Thanks!

I think that might be illegal in most countries in the world, but I can sympathize with you :cool:

This could have more uses than military, (though that's definitely a valid use). I could see the same kind of algorithm being used to analyze structural fatigue in bridges and other infrastructure, that is resource-intensive to detect by observation. First thing that pops into my head is how a prototype could be made with a Kinect 2 secondly, it's not that unrealistic to do. If you got the chops, you could write up a proposal and apply for funding for something like this. It is the kind of thing grad-students do, or what the guys at "Microsoft Research" do. You sir/ma'am, should tinker with this. It has great potential :-)

Damn, that's a fun one

I'm trying to think good thoughts while doing a little project, and I started to think about what my dream project would be. I would probably not thrive in a 10-person team, on a 50-person project, doing some piece of industrial software for an oil company, so it would have to be somewhat limited in scope. My dream project would be something to help the teacher and students in the classroom, actually use their computers for learning and not just note-taking and cute learning games. (Here in Norway laptops are standard equipment for 8th graders and above; though nobody actually uses a tenth the potential a computer has). What are you guys' dream projects?

I wish I could spend more time with the users. And the couple of times I have been by, it's like they are in presence of a god, (I'm not kidding, you'd think they had seen magic each time I've brought a new iteration of the program), they keep telling me "this is great" and "you do what you feel is the best", so I'm tempted to make it as a console application just to get some actual feedback. What do you do when nobody has any idea of what they want except in terms of functionality, (and they keep tagging on new requirements)? :confused:

Well, that depends on what kind of person you are, and the personality of your teacher/professor. In your situation I would name it something like: - Yet To Be Named - Function over Form - The Unnamed Application - [Insert name here] or - MyTIB (acronym) = My Teacher Is the Best The best way to name something is either using an acronym: - YP3 or YPPP = Your Personal Podcast Player - FREE = Financial Records Enterprise Edition - STEEL = Software To Extract and Evaluate Lists - WINDS = Windows and Internet Networked Development Software or just describe your software: - Free Website Creator - Your Budget Personal Edition - Personal Notes and Reminders - Your Personal PodCast Player There are also tons of name generators out the on the web, and you could also look up in a dictionary and find a word like "Avalanche", that is just a word and does nothing except identifying your application Good luck!

Part of this mess is that I keep getting "oh, and could we get this feature"-messages. This all started as just a more "visual" way record information. Also the Excel approach lead to a few situations where a day's or week's worth of records were deleted, having a UI that is "layer 8 proof" is simple enough, tacking on a lot of "stuff", though simple in a website, in desktop development, it's maybe not more difficult, but it isn't the same thing. I'm basically doing this as a favor, so time isn't critical. or I wouldn't be asking questions, but rather just make a messy program, and do an "update" after having re-done it in some other way. Since my field of expertise is mostly web-related, the methodology of desktop application development isn't something I've really studied. And so MVVM isn't something I've seen as anything more than the separation of the UI dev team and back-end functionality dev team, and therefore not something a single programmer should focus on, (I might have to spend some time on the Microsoft Virtual Academy or similar). I have been trying to get feedback on sample layouts and I've requested drawings of what they envision, but it is kinda like that The Outmeal comic about web-design: How a web design goes to hell. I think I'll redo it all, and make it more MVVM, or at least move everything away from the "code behind", so I make it usable regardless of how I do the UI in the end.

But isn't this what modern UI design, (not to be confused with Modern UI), is going towards? What would be the alternative to jumping around, opening and closing different windows? And "Forms" are dead ;P

This is both a specific question about my quandary and a "philosophical" discussion about making a switch mid-project. Background I'm working on a project with lots of different UI "screens"/Windows, and it's getting ridiculous to open and close the windows, as the user moves to earlier "screens". I am however a month into the project, (a few hours every week, as this is a side-project), so I'm afraid I might have to re-design and re-code too much to do the switch. (I'm sorry to say that I haven't used pages before, so I know nothing of the time it would take). The basic requirements This is a customer tracking program for a car-wash facility. It needs first a login "screen", which either leads directly to the "user" landing "screen", or brings up options to either open the admin "screen" or the "user" "screen". Admin is just a single "screen", that has information about the users and options, nothing complex. the "user landing screen" is a "hub" leading to "screens" doing things like: Adding new customers Product search Reserving a timeslot Reporting incidents Perform a transaction Looking up costumer information and more... with every "screen", by necessity, having multiple it's own sub-"screens". So far At this point I have 7 windows, some that are on top of others, and some that replaces others. The actual code is divided around willy-nilly, (I'll have to do a clean-up before I'm releasing it). I have had some end-user tests, and it seems that it's a little bit confusing where to go, though I wasn't told that it was confusing. I had plenty of negative constructive feedback on other things, so I think they might be used to fumbling about, (Excel sheets was the previous "system" they had). However, I saw the fumbling about, and it irritated me, that I designed something that's inefficient. The Quandary Should I change it to a page-design or keep it as it is? In general, should anybody change something like this in the middle of a project? Please discuss, I'm not looking for some specific solution, but rather advice

Do VbScript even exist anymore? I always saw it as the "slightly more retarded" cousin of JavaScript :P

mikepwilson wrote:

PHP is a godawful mess, and C# is tightly platform specific.

Yes, PHP is a mess, but I like it, (I had to learn it, and I found it fantastic after a while), though nowadays I believe a "from scratch" re-writing of PHP in it's entirety might be in order. C# is no longer Windows exclusive, due to Mono, and if I understand the news coming from Microsoft, C# will get a "native" compiler, making it much more flexible. I have had a look at it, just to help my friend with some of the concepts, but I don't see the attraction. I feel this joke I heard:

Two programmers are standing at a bar talking shop, when a teen swagers over, and join the conversation. He asks the two older programmers what languages they are using. One of the guys answers: "I do OS development, mostly in C++". The other Guy answers: "I mostly do enterprise applications development in C#", The kid then says: "Coool, I myself program in Py...". In the Police report, the kid fell 14 times against the two programmers' fists.

-Sums up my attitude towards Python. But hey, arguing over programming languages, (and IDE's, text editors, code formatting, etc,), is sometimes like arguing politics :P -Frank

A friend of mine has started his journey to become a programmer. His class is learning Python, and I mus wonder, Why Python? I want him to have a look at C-like languages in-stead, (for when he's finished with his current course), but he is adamant that his teacher must be correct in saying that Python is what the programmers need today, to be hireable. I am a big fan of C# and PHP, and I see little in Python that makes them comparable, (granted I haven't used much time with Python), But I can't see it even begin to compete with the big ones, (The C-like languages). But am I wrong? The real question is really: are there really any big differences between the top 15 or 20 most popular programming languages? -frank

If you are working on a big project with a GUI, 10 custom libraries, with scores of classes and a hundred methods, you can't program in a text editor. Intellisense is very useful, but sometimes I turn it off, so not to get distracted. I do all my web-stuff in PHP, then notepad can be used, if one uses many separate files, but I rely on Notepad++ to work efficiently with PHP. A good .net programmer should be able to make a WPF application in Notepad, though I've only done so in a classroom setting. Anyone swearing to a simple text editor for professional .net development are wasting a lot of brainpower

A Firefox add-on called Greasemonkey, (it can take scripts to to pretty amazing things), allow you to block sites,on google searches, (it hides them from you by manipulating what is being redered by Firefox), it also adds a neat "Block" button next to a search result to quickly add sites that bother you. Google used to have a "block"-list, that Google+ -users could add domains to, they removed it, (probably, many companies wanting to lure you in with 'search-term generated page titles', complained, and Google probably yielded, as a block-function, somewhat conflicts with the spirit of "Ad-Words" service) So there are ways, but google should make tools available to the users to manipulate the results you get. The Google AI, is good, but it's also, as all AI, a complete idiot, (search for something related to music a few times, and all your 'C#'-searches, will give you music-related results in stead of C# programming resources) But the core of the problem is less the google-results in themselves, and more the laziness of askers as wells as answerers on "ask"-forums. (regular and functioning forums, delete meaningless questions or answers). We, as the holders of the information, must be better and kinder in the sharing of it! -Frank

It's about the problem, and less specific. If my Google-fu or manual-skimming don't work, I ask. It is when I cannot search effectively through Google, (without disabling sites), because of questions, that the issue arise. I use this site a lot, and a Norwegian forum page. Else my Google-fu is my problem-solving tool! If there were more constructive answers to "stupid"/noob questions, this would never arise as an issue as it is starting to become now.