The warning prompt; the last ditch effort to make a user aware of an action they are about to take. Yet over the years we, as developers, have thrown up so many warnings, cautions, and advisories, that users really do not take notice. So how do you secure an application button from inadvertent clicking? […]
A recent need at work was to find a way for assist users in data entry tasks so as to help eliminate common data entry mistakes (transposition, wrong data, etc..). Although copying and pasting was the first thought, we eventually decided to use drag and drop technology.
The scenario is something like this; we get […]
His vector graphics Javascript library is one of the easiest to work with and now Walter has surpassed himself with the easiest Tooltip / Help bubble javascript library.
I first used Walter’s Work with my Javascript AJAX testing application where his vector graphics module made client-side charting a piece of cake. Recently when I was […]
Database triggers are a great thing, and using them to create an audit trail is pretty simple. Yet when you want to pass some custom values to the triggers, like user name when you are using a single DB login for your application, things get tricky.
In the process of building a robust audit trail for […]
ASP.NET has a nice Impersonation feature that allows server-based web applications to use alternate credentials to perform network activities. Unfortunately, it does not extend into Windows “thick” clients; until now.
My scenario was to read an Excel file from a local and/or shared folder with one set of credentials, and then a Sql Server with a […]
The Yahoo User Interface libraries are now at version 2.3.0 with six new features.
* Rich Text Editor
* Base CSS
* YUILoader
* ImageLoader
* ColorPicker
* YUI Test Utility
* Skins
I am […]
With our application go-live scheduled for this Monday, I am entering a retrospective mood on everything that we have accomplished, and the hurdles that hurt us. Although scope-creep is always the most painful hurdle, I would place the implementation model of Microsoft’s AJAX.NET as a solid second place pain in my butt.
With AJAX technologies […]
It comes as no surprise that Visual Basic frequently breaks away from traditional programming semantics, but the “AndAlso” short circuit conditional simply does not make sense.
For those not familiar with the short circuited conditional, it is a syntax where you can have two conditionals in an IF statement, and if the first conditional fails, the […]
Although I love technology, and find fun and challenge almost anywhere; I have to admit, my current project is repetitive drudgery of SQL changes, retest, fix, ad nauseum. Yet there is a light at the end of the tunnel, I just hope it is not a train.
As a creator of business applications, I always need to be cognizant of how a user interacts with my applications, and even more so when the application is being ported from an older version. In the world of browser development, matching the keyboard shortcuts that users have come to rely on in window based […]