The new SlapDev.com is being born. It is going to be an online community for .NET Developers with a forums. I will also be posting development related articles on there. And, my blog is moving to SlapDev.com: http://slapdev.com/blogs/an_mcsd_from_wisconsin/default.aspx

My introduction to computers started when I was about 3 years old with an Apple IIe. We had a few games over the years: Ghost Busters, Alf, Spy Hunter, and a few others. If you ever think you can't trust a 3 year old with puting a DVD into the player, just think about a 3 year old being able to switch 5.25 inch floppy disks in an Apple IIe. We actually got the Apple IIe in like '84 or '85, it was used when we got it.

My first PC (when I was about 13) with Windows 3.1 was actually my dads. It was an IBM 486-SX 33Mhz with 4MB RAM and a 20MB Hard drive. We later got a Compaq 166Mhz Pentium w/ MMX with 48MB Ram (when I was about 16). There were a few things I did in those days:

1. Those were the days of dialing in to the local BBS (Aarrgghh!! BBS run by Victor Loberger) and playing text based games, chating and sharing files over FidoNet
2. QBasic, VB for DOS, VB3, VB4, VB6 and a little C/C++ programming.
3. Exploring DOS and Windows (even acidentally hosing the system, so my Dad had to reinstall DOS and Win3.1, man he wasn't happy when I did that)
4. Playing with web page design with HTML and JavaScript when it became more popular.

The first four programs I wrote (in order of creation):

1. A text based Star Trek adventure game written in QBasic, with sounds and some really simple graphics.
2. A Program Manager program for DOS in QBasic. It allowed you to use the mouse and was event driven (this was before I was introduced to VB and the event driven programming model it brings). It allowed you to setup keyboard shortcuts to start programs or you could click a button on the screen to run a program; the shortcuts were stored in a text file.
3. The Unknown World written in QBasic, was a top down view, Zelda style, role playing game. It had colorfull graphics and used some pretty neat graphics tricks for a QBasic program.
4. Tele-Chat written in VB for DOS, was a program that allowed two computers to call each other with a modem and the users could chat with each other using text. I even had a good start at implementing a file transfer feature.

In my early days of programming, I learned/used VB-DOS, VB3, VB4, VB6 and C/C++. I started with QBasic and VB becuase there was more documentation and help sites for those languages on the internet in the mid to late 90's. If there was more documentation and help sites on C/C++, Assembly and/or Java (I wish there was back then) I would have learned one or more of those languages instead of QBasic and VB.

Well, there you go, now you have a pretty good summary of my introduction to computers and programming. As you can see I have a strong background (from the beginning) with VB.

1. I posted a couple days ago that non-MSDN subscribers can get Visual Studio 2005 Beta 2 for FREE from http://msdn.microsoft.com/getthebetas/.
2. The MSDN Events Resource DVD that will be given out at the Spring MSDN Events will have Visual Studio 2005 Beta 2 on it.
3. Of course, I can't forget, all MSDN Subscribers can download or order Visual Studio 2005 Beta 2.
4. And finally if you live in Wisconsin; I heard a couple days ago that the WI-INETA Executive Commitee is working with Microsoft to give out Beta 2 to all the attendees of the May 10th meeting. And they are planning on having a Code Fest for Beta 2 later in May. It's not set in stone yet, but the Code Fest may be 3-4 hours either on a weeknight or possibly a Saturday.

I think it's awesome that Microsoft has been giving away Beta's of Visual Studio (Whidbey) 2005. If you haven't migrated from VC++, VB6 or any other language to .NET then you must check out the new features .NET 2.0 will be adding on top of what was in .NET 1.x.

As I have been saying for two years, since I first dove deep into .NET, I think this is the greatest development platform to come.

At the next WI-INETA meeting, on May 10th, Matthew Deiters will be speaking on Design Patterns in .NET. I'm sure it'll be a great presentation like they always are. I encourage all .NET developers no matter what skill level you are, to join the user group and attend the meetings. You will learn alot. After all, membership is FREE!!

I've been playing around the last couple of days with creating an application with a Plugin based architecture. It's alot easier with .NET than it sounds. I don't have any examples or articles to post on here yet, but I'm working on something I hope to have up here in the next week or so.

On another note, the traffic of my site is using about 1GB of bandwidth per month now (consistantly the last two months). That's the most my site has ever used, I'm going to have to upgrade my hosting account soon. :) Apparently someone reads my blog.

You can order a copy of Visual Studio 2005 Beta 2 for FREE!!

Just go here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/getthebetas/

In March 2005, Hitachi demonstrated their perpendicular recording technology. This method of storing data on hard drives allows for an awesome amount of data in a small space. Hitachi demonstrated a storage density of 230 gigabits per square inch. Hitachi expects to see products ship at 230 gigabits per square inch in 2007. With this they'll be able to store 20 Gigabytes instead of 6 Gigabytes on the one-inch Microdrives, and up to one terabyte on the 3.5inch hard drives.Yeah I know I'm thinking it too, Why not now?? I want one.

As you can see in the picture to the right, the perpendicular storage method of bits on the disk really allows for more of them to be crammed in the same amount of surface area. The disk has to be a little thicker, as you can see in the picture.

Well click the link below for more information on Hitachi's new Perpendicular Recording technology. Oh, yeah, don't forget to watch the “Get Perpendicular“ animation. It has dancing bits that are singing to the music. It kind of reminds me of that cartoon video in Jurasic Park that describes how they were able to bring back dinosaurs from thier DNA.

Go disco bits, it's your birthday! You gotta get perpendicular!“

Source: http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/research/recording_head/pr/index.html

Do you wanna learn a little of OS Kernel architecture? He doesn't just talk about the WinNT Kernel, he's does some comparisons between the WinNT Kernel and the UNIX Kernel. This is awesome stuff!

http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=54612