Threads

By the way, I am running on Windows XP Pro, so I do meet the requirements to use the other classes within System.Web. Also, I have uninstalled VS2003 Ent and even uninstalled the 1.1 Framework and reinstalled both, but it still doesn't show.

Yes, that was the first thing I did. Even trying to just go at it by giving a fully qualified name didn't work. Plus, they should still show in the Object Browser.

Maybe it is something I am doing wrong, but all the classes that are suppose to be in System.Web don't appear to be available for me. I uninstalled VS2002 and installed VS2003 Enterprise, but I doubt that would have anything to do with it. Even in the Object Browser, System.Web only contains: AspNetHostingPermission AspNetHostingPermissionAttribute AspNetHOstingPermissionLevel For the record, I am creating a windows forms application, but I have been able to use the other classes available in System.Web before (at least from work on VS2002). Anyone have any ideas?

Now that I started using Regular Expressions in .NET, I can't seem to stop. I had always used Instr, Mid, etc. in VB6 to parse complex HTML, but now I find myself trying to use Regular Expressions constantly. Sometimes even when I just need to get one bit of info from a datastream that I KNOW would be faster using SubString and IndexOf in .NET. What's worse is that when I need to do maintenance on an old VB6 program that uses complex parsing, I think about trying out the Regular Expressions library that I can use in VB6 to convert the whole parsing engine, although it isn't as powerful as the .NET implementation. I know the first step to recovery is to admit that I have a problem.

These are great. Thanks for the info, everyone. :)

Nerseus, the game you talk about in #3 wouldn't happen to be CounterStrike, would it?

3. A Windows Service that will run at a specific time each day. It will retrieve information from a database, and dump it to a flat file, then encrypt the data using an encryption scheme I haven't decided upon yet (probably TDEA or possibly just DES since the value of the data would be worthless after a week or so). Then it will automatically upload the file to a client FTP site. With all this "fun" stuff going on, my only salvation is that my soccer league is starting up again in a couple weeks. Too bad my girlfriend doesn't like computers or soccer.

1. Optimizing an application written in ASP that interfaces with an Oracle database using OO4O. Whoever designed the original code should be shot. In some cases they are making multiple calls to the database on a single page simply because they have never heard of Joins. With upwards of 75 Agents doing searches on the database concurrently, this means horrible performance. 2. Designing a .NET component that will be utilized through ASP.net to get shipping rates for all the major shipping companies for use in shopping carts. It utilizes XML, WebRequests, and in some cases TDEA. It will later be updated to allow tracking information to be retrieved from the vendor so it can be presented to the customer without them ever having to leave the site.

Using Regular Expressions sure is easier than the other methods I was using before. I'm now able to parse the page with ease and I don't have to worry about little things changing on the page like the background color of cells in a table since I can use pattern matching. I don't notice a slowdown once it is compiled (Derek was definitely right about it being at least twice as fast). Anyway, thanks again.

Thank you, Nerseus. That was very very helpful. I'll use your example also to compare the regular expression -vs- other method speeds in VB 6 as well. Since the purpose of this is usually to parse HTML pages that I've downloaded into the application, the regular expressions may be much more easily maintained. When it is a time critical part, then I may return back to my old methods depending on what the tests show me. Thanks again for all your help.

Does anyone know of any sites that compare the use of Regular Expressions versus the Instr and Mid$ functions when extracting data? I know how to use Instr and Mid$ quite well already and I know with Regular Expressions it is possible to extract data as well (and give me more power since I can use more pattern matching), but I am curious what kind of performance hit I may take if I start using Regular Expressions instead. Any help would be appreciated :) Thanks.

That is a good sample, divil. Thanks

It doesn't sound like you need a Windows Service exactly because you want it to pull out of your Outlook? Will the program actually interact with Outlook, or do you really mean it will connect to Exchange and pull the emails from there? If it has to interact with the Outlook program itself, then a Windows Service is probably not the best option since the user will have to be logged in and running Outlook. Do you mean it will come from Exchange?

I don't know... I kept clicking on the topics and randomly it would say a Database error has occurred and an email was sent to the Administrator. The odd thing is that I could look myself up and other people from the Who's Online section, but when I looked up you (Robby) it had the error. Then I saw Bob Schwarz, Sr. was online and 5 minutes later everything was working fine. I tried to post the error here when it first happened (It kept happening when I was clicking on General in the .NET section and on your profile when I was going to message you), but it wouldnt let me post either because of the same database problem. Weird.

It sounds as if you are just trying to use it to display information rather than pulling data from a database. If this is the case, then perhaps the ListView control would be better suited for your needs.

Good work getting it back up, Bob Schwarz, Sr. That was pretty fast (only 10 minutes). I thought my account and all the posts were lost. heh

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnvssamp/html/vbcs_OwnerDrawnMenus.asp There is a good example from Microsoft that uses different fonts and owner-drawn images.

I've had the same problem you to. Even with VB6 the Minimize/Restore would free a couple megs. .NET definitely takes a lot more RAM too. In fact, an app I recoded for .NET takes about 10 megs more RAM just to start it. It's definitely a hog. Hopefully someone can suggest some things.

What OS are you running? How much RAM do you have?

Thanks, wyrd. This is what I was looking for today.

I can definitely see how doing contractual work can be stressful if you are at the end of one contract and don't have another one lined up yet. And you're right, one must weigh the benefits in with what the job is all about. I'm lucky because I dont have to do the same thing every day, and the money isn't bad at all. Get to go to conferences (one coming up next month in Vegas for 4 days), and do pretty much what I want. I think I got lucky though... I'm not sure how other companies are really run since I haven't really had much experience because I have only worked at 2 places my entire life. It sure would suck leaving here for a bigger paying job and finding myself in a dead end doing boring work with people I dont even like. Thanks for your input guys.

Wow, that is quite interesting stuff on there. Seems we all like our screens big too according to some of the other stats available on there. heh It doesn't break it down by hour to see when the most activity is, but it is still very cool. Thanks for the info. Here is one of the things it said: On average 20 percent of the daily visits are made before 8:01. Based on the number of visitors of 154 today so far, today your site may have 743 page views (+/- 47). Hmmmm, not sure what Time Zone that is in though. Thanks again

One reason I sometimes design a GUI first is that if I'm doing a special project for a client, I am trying to win the approval to move forward with the project... A good looking GUI can sometimes go further than the technical information for a client that doesn't know a floppy disk from a hard disk. There is no specified way it must be done where I work (plus I am in charge of other programmers), but it seems everyone I have talked to likes to at least have the basic GUI designed so they know what they are shooting for. For smaller projects especially, it seems to be a good way to show what the requirements are and what kind of information is needed at what steps. There have been cases where I went ahead and designed some of the back-bone code to do the work of a program because we weren't sure where the project was going yet... I knew the back-end code I could use no matter what direction the project went, so I coded the C++ wrappers, and the VB classes, and all that before moving ahead. A week later it turned out to be easier than we thought it would be since we went away from the idea that the client would be able to write their own scripts using Javascript/VBScript and moved to an interface where the input was controlled. Anyway.... I'm rambling again. heh

Maybe I am just not seeing it but is there a way to see when the board is most active? Like a graph showing how many posts per hour there are for a 24 hour period or something? It would be interesting to see when most of the posts are being done.

For the people out there that have jobs related to the computer, how often do you switch companies or hunt for new opportunities? Some say that is the easiest way to move up and try new things unless you get really lucky at a company with a lot of opportunities and different projects to try, but I'm curious as to your views? I'm 23 years old and I have been at the same company for 3 years now. I've moved up enough to be in charge of a team of programmers / admins, which is cool, but sometimes I wonder if I'm holding myself back by not exploring more options available to me. Prior to the company I am at now, I worked at a different company for 3 years (ever since I was 17 still in High School).