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Open source's usability challenge

The iPhone has been out for a year, and known about in detail for considerably longer. Yet the very latest crop of state-of-the-art Windows Mobile phones, clearly designed as head-on competitors to that phone, miss the mark by miles. Read more »

Build an AIR application for your website

Adobe AIR brings web technologies to the desktop through the integration of the Webkit rendering engine in a Flash-style desktop-based runtime. AIR applications running on HTML, CSS and Javascript can interact with the local file system, manipulate local SQL databases and even use AJAX on any domain. Read more »

First impressions of ASP.NET's MVC framework

Find out why you may want to use Microsoft's Model View Controller (MVC) framework instead of Web Forms. Read more »

More New SQL Server 2008 Features

Microsoft updates SQL Server on a pretty regular basis. Its newest version, SQL Server 2008, includes some new features not found in older versions. Here's a list of some of them. Read more »

Taking on Twitter with open source software

One service that seemed to come out of nowhere and get instant buy-in from influential digerati around the Web was Identica, an open source microblogging alternative from Montreal resident Evan Prodromou, who in 2003 had co-founded Wikitravel. Read more »

HTML 5 Editor Ian Hickson discusses features, pain points, adoption rate, and more

In this interview, HTML 5 Editor Ian Hickson discusses his favourite features, the features he thinks might be most contentious, the pain points he expects HTML 5 will address, and much more. He also talks about what he would change in the original HTML spec if he could go back in time. Read more »

Questions your interviewer doesn't want to hear

Curious about the number of vacation days you'll get or your chances for climbing the corporate ladder? Good questions, but the initial interview is not the time or place to ask. Read more »

Take a stance on virtual machine time sync

The seemingly inevitable trend towards virtualisation brings one important point to Windows administrators: time settings. Make a decision on how to approach VM time early on before it bites you. Read more »

Reduce application coupling with the Java Message System

Did you know that too much coupling -- which, in development terms, is a measure of how dependent two entities are upon each other -- can make your enterprise software hard to manage? Learn how the Java Message Service (JMS) can help reduce dependencies between applications. Read more »

50 significant moments from internet history

We take you through 50 defining moments of the internet. Read more »

Get started with Web vector graphics

At the Web Directions South conference in Sydney, Dmitry Baranovskiy presented "Web Vector Graphics", giving an overview of the models available for creating vector graphics on the Web and tools to make them render correctly in all browsers. Read more »

Microsoft unveils the F# programming language

This article kicks the tyres on the September 2008 Community Technology Preview of F#. Read this brief overview of the programming language's features and environment. Read more »

Help! My SQL Server Log File is too big!

Overgrown transactional log files can turn into real problems if they are not handled properly. This article discusses the perils of not handling SQL Server log growth properly, and what can be done to correct the problems. Read more »

Avoid problems when redirecting via drop-down lists

One of the most important skills a developer needs is the ability to debug and fix problematic code whether it is their own or another developer's handiwork. This article shows how to solve a problem involving redirection and drop-down lists. Read more »

How start-ups can survive

Here we go again: Another boom, another bust. But we've learned something from the last time, haven't we? Read more »

Enabling the Windows Server Backup feature in Windows Server 2008

Windows Server 2008 replaces NTBackup with a new tool called Windows Server Backup. Be prepared for a learning curve. Read more »

Evaluate volatile keyword and synchronisation in Java

If you need to control access to certain pieces of data in a class when writing multithreaded applications, see how you can use the volatile keyword to get a similar effect as using the synchronised keyword. Read more »

Consider these Linux file management alternatives

This article introduces Linux file management alternatives: Gentoo, Krusader, and Midnight Commander. Here are the basics about each if you want to try something different. Read more »

Move SQL Tuning Sets between Oracle instances

SQL Tuning Sets (STS) capture the workload of an Oracle instance. Starting in Oracle 10g Release 2, these tuning sets can be transported from one instance to another to facilitate testing. Read more »

Send email alerts when errors are written to the event log

It is common for applications to write to the Windows Event Log when errors occur or a warning is issued, and with the advent of the .NET Framework, Microsoft has provided developers with built-in functionality to read and write data to or from the event log. Read more »

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  • Staff XP stays on life support for longer

    This week's Roundup looks at Microsoft's decision to extend the life of Windows XP, the release of Microsoft Surface SDK, Firefox's new Geode plug-in, Yahoo's new tool -- Smush It and more. Read more »

    -- posted by Staff

  • Chris Duckett The good and truly awful celluloid depictions of computers

    Ever wonder why your lawyer uncle leaves the room whenever you turn over to Boston Legal? Or why your forensic science cousin can't stand crime drama? You know the answer: it’s the horrid trivialisation and dumbing down of an occupation to make it appear entertaining. Sometimes it is so unbelievable that it actually hurts and yelling at the screen is the only outlet. Read more »

    -- posted by Chris Duckett

  • Brendon Chase Apple's iPhone engineers to tour Sydney, Melbourne

    Aussie developers will be able to get up close and personal with some of the iPhone engineers in November to learn how to build applications for the platform. Read more »

    -- posted by Brendon Chase

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