Thanksgiving Day Discount Special 25% on All 9Rays' Products

9Rays.Net has launched a Thanksgiving Day discount program that brings members of development usergroups a special 25% discount on all their products. This offer, which will be available only for a limited time (November 18th - 30th, 2007), considerably reduces the acquisition cost for the industry's next generation tools for .Net software lifetime management, code protection and optimization of .NET software, security & cryptography components and Windows.Forms/Asp.Net controls. The offer is open to all members of development usergroups. The coupon code: thanksgivingday.

Since 2001, 9Rays.Net has been at the forefront in providing .NET, VCL, and ActiveX components. Today, many industry professionals use 9Rays.Net components in their development cycle. The products are reliable, easy to use and up-to-date. They help developers build more secure .NET Framework-based applications, facilitate research and improve IT productivity. Six 9Rays' products - Spices.Net Suite, Spices.Obfuscator, Spices.Decompiler, FlyGrid.Net, FlyTreeView for Asp.Net, CryptoSharp- are available for download from the company's web site (www.9rays.net).

• Spices.Net Suite is an all-in-one suite of the components that enable developers to protect their .NET assemblies, decompile/disassemble to 6 languages, research assembly members relationships and structure of .NET assemblies, optimize and document code. Programming in Microsoft's .NET Framework gives developers extra opportunities to realize their ideas with an extensive set of features.
• Spices.Obfuscator is a .NET code protection tool that offers developers many advanced and patent pending technologies to protect their .NET code and intellectual properties. The obfuscator rebuilds .NET assemblies to the new format that it is impossible to disassemble, decompile, and impossible to understand. Spices.Obfuscator is distributed as a standalone product or as a part of Spices.Net Suite.
• Spices.Decompiler enables developers to decompile/disassemble .NET assemblies from MSIL binary format to well-formed and optimized source code. Six languages are available, such as MSIL, C#, VB.NET, Delphi.Net J# and managed C++. Spices.Decompiler is distributed as a standalone product or as a part of Spices.Net Suite.
• FlyGrid.Net delivers a fast, highly-customizable Tree/Grid for Windows.Forms in only 340 Kb. Unlike larger Windows.Forms DataGrid tools, FlyGrid.Net offers complete database interface management in .NET 1.0, 1.1 and 2.0 along with flexibility and fast performance. For example, FlyGrid.Net can add 100,000 nodes in 0.2 seconds!
• FlyTreeView for ASP.NET is an advanced treeview solution built exclusively for ASP.NET 2.0, using its modern features and technologies. The control provides developers with the most powerful solution for the presentation of hierarchical data on the web. FlyTreeView for ASP.NET 2.0 features cross-browser support, client-side scripting model, unlimited drag-and-drop capabilities, dynamic populate, check boxes, radio buttons, context menu, unlimited style and behavior customization.
• CryptoSharp a security library offering a complete package of encryption tools to .NET developers.

For additional information on the 9Rays products, please visit www.9rays.net or contact the marketing manager at (877) 9RAYSNET / (877) 972-9763.

About 9Rays.Net, Inc:
Founded in 2001, 9Rays.Net is a developer and software lifetime management tools company specializing in .Net. With a Blue Chip customer base of over 100 government, enterprise, and independent software developers. 9Rays.Net prides itself on providing its customers with the most innovative and secure solutions available on the market today.

Their flagship products include (among others): Spices.Net Suite, Spices.Obfuscator, Spices.Decompiler, FlyGrid.Net, FlyTreeView for Asp.Net and CryptoSharp. 9Rays.Net is a Microsoft Partner Program member, a Visual Studio Industry Partner (VSIP) and a Borland Technology Partner. The company's office is located in Alexandria, USA. For more information, please call (877) 9RAYSNET / (877) 972-9763 or visit www.9rays.net.

Source: PRWeb

lynda.com Announces Release of Ruby on Rails Beyond the Basics

lynda.com, the leader in self-paced digital media and design training, today introduced Ruby on Rails Beyond the Basics.

In this sequel to the popular Ruby on Rails Essential Training, expert instructor Kevin Skoglund teaches comprehensive techniques for web developers who already feel comfortable with the fundamentals of Ruby and the Rails MVC framework. This training will help developers move toward creating full-featured Ruby on Rails applications. Kevin begins by explaining how to update software and projects to the latest versions. He then demonstrates alternative ways to interact with Ruby and your Rails applications and teaches the intermediate aspects of the Ruby language. Kevin provides step-by-step instructions for creating a custom blog and content management application. He uses this practical example to show how to work with database migrations, how to get more from ActiveRecord and avoid common pitfalls, how to create flexible controllers and views, and how to improve performance, security, and code management. Exercise files accompany the tutorials.

"This is the perfect resource for anyone developing a real website in Ruby on Rails," says Lynda Weinman, CEO of lynda.com. "It covers not only in-depth programming concepts, but also the 'care and feeding' tips you'll need to efficiently maintain your Ruby on Rails development and production environments."

Anyone with an internet connection can access Ruby on Rails Beyond the Basics by subscribing to lynda.com's Online Training Library®. A separate CD-ROM version of Ruby on Rails Beyond the Basics is planned later this month.

Subscriptions to the lynda.com Online Training Library® start at $25 a month, and provide access to over 22,000 movie tutorials covering more than 320 technology career tools, software applications, and techniques. Subscribers can access any of the computer-based training courses at their convenience. Multi-user subscriptions are also available for companies and institutions seeking to provide education and training to groups.

For free online samples of Ruby on Rails Beyond the Basics and more detailed product information, please visit http://movielibrary.lynda.com/html/modPage.asp?ID=395

To arrange to view the full training title, please contact megan@lynda.com.

For more information on lynda.com products, please visit http://www.lynda.com/ or call 1-888-335-9632.

About lynda.com
Since 1997, lynda.com has provided education and technical training solutions for designers, computer graphics specialists, digital media users, and computer owners. lynda.com products include web-based training, instructional books, CD- and DVD-based video training, self-paced online learning, and events for creative designers, instructors, students, and hobbyists. lynda.com specializes in teaching fundamental design and graphics principles along with the latest computer software, digital media technologies, and techniques.

About Kevin Skoglund
Kevin Skoglund is the owner of Pixel & Press (http://www.pixelandpress.com/) , a web development company specializing in application development using Ruby on Rails, PHP, SQL, HTML, and CSS. Pixel & Press web clients include lynda.com, Flashforward, An Event Apart, Google, The American Institute of Architects (AIA) New York, and Aidan Bradley Photography. Kevin began creating websites in 2001. He has been using PHP and MySQL to develop web applications since 2003, and started using Ruby on Rails in 2005. He also maintains a blog for web developers at http://www.nullislove.com/

Source: PRWeb

Android $10 Million Developer Challenge

Cool apps that surprise and delight mobile users, built by developers like you, will be a huge part of the Android vision. To support you in your efforts, Google has launched the Android Developer Challenge, which will provide $10 million in awards -- no strings attached -- for great mobile apps built on the Android platform.

The challenge will broken up into two parts. In part I, the 50 most promising entries received by March 3 will each receive a $25,000 award to fund further development. Those selected will then be eligible for even greater recognition via ten $275,000 awards and ten $100,000 awards.

For more information, visit the Android Developer Challenge website.

Building an Android Application

Dan Morrill builds a simple application on the Android platform.

Android APIs

This video provides an overview series on the Android platform. In this segment, Mike gives an overview of a few of the APIs available on the platform.

Android Application Lifecycle

This video an overview series on the Android platform. In this segment, Mike explains the application and process lifecycle as a user navigates through different applications.

Android Architecture Overview

This video provides an overview series on the Android platform. In this segment, Mike gives an overview of the system architecture.

Android SDK has arrived!

Google has released the Android SDK today! Today, we learned that Android is a Java platform running on Linux 2.6.

From a brief look at the SDK, the Android platform includes:

• Media player
• OpenGL
• OS level access
• Web Browser
• Built-in sql server (SQLite)
• Location based services
• Mapping component
• Mobile device optimized user interface components
• And much more....

In the video below, Sergey Brin and Steve Horowitz discuss the availability of the SDK, that it will be open source in the future, and demo applications on the Android platform.

What is Python?

Python is an interpreted programming language created by Guido van Rossum in 1990. Python is fully dynamically typed and uses automatic memory management; it is thus similar to Perl, Ruby, Scheme, Smalltalk, and Tcl. Python is developed as an open source project, managed by the non-profit Python Software Foundation.

Philosophy
Python is a multi-paradigm language. This means that, rather than forcing coders to adopt one particular style of coding, it permits several. Object orientation, structured programming, functional programming, aspect-oriented programming, and more recently, design by contract are all supported. Python is dynamically type-checked and uses garbage collection for memory management. An important feature of Python is dynamic name resolution, which binds method and variable names during program execution.

While offering choice in coding methodology, Python's designers reject exuberant syntax, such as in Perl, in favor of a sparser, less cluttered one. As with Perl, Python's developers expressly promote a particular "culture" or ideology based on what they want the language to be, favoring language forms they see as "beautiful", "explicit" and "simple". For the most part, Perl and Python users differ in their interpretation of these terms and how they are best implemented (see TIMTOWTDI and PythonPhilosophy).

Another important goal of the Python developers is making Python fun to use. This is reflected in the origin of the name (after the television series Monty Python's Flying Circus), in the common practice of using Monty Python references in example code, and in an occasionally playful approach to tutorials and reference materials.

Python is sometimes referred to as a "scripting language". In practice, it is used as a dynamic programming language for both application development and occasional scripting. Python has been used to develop many large software projects such as the Zope application server and the Mnet and BitTorrent file sharing systems. It is also extensively used by Google.

Another important goal of the language is ease of extensibility. New built-in modules are easily written in C or C++. Python can also be used as an extension language for existing modules and applications that need a programmable interface.

Though the design of Python is somewhat hostile to functional programming and the Lisp tradition, there are significant parallels between the philosophy of Python and that of minimalist Lisp-family languages such as Scheme. Many past Lisp programmers have found Python appealing for this reason.

History
Python was created in the early 1990s by Guido van Rossum at CWI in the Netherlands as a successor of the ABC programming language. Guido is Python's principal author, although it includes many contributions from others. Guido's continuing central role in deciding the direction of Python is jokingly acknowledged by referring to him as its Benevolent Dictator for Life (BDFL).

The last version released from CWI was Python 1.2. In 1995, Guido continued his work on Python at the Corporation for National Research Initiatives (CNRI) in Reston, Virginia where he released several versions of the software. Python 1.6 was the last of the versions released by CNRI. In 2000, Guido and the Python core development team moved to BeOpen.com to form the BeOpen PythonLabs team. Python 2.0 was the first and only release from BeOpen.com.

Python had been available under a free software license, but the license was incompatible with the GNU General Public License (GPL). Following the release of Python 1.6, and after Guido van Rossum left CNRI to work with commercial software developers, it became clear that the ability to use Python with software available under the GPL was very desirable. CNRI and the Free Software Foundation (FSF) interacted to develop enabling wording changes to the Python license which would make Python's license GPL-compatible. That year, Guido was awarded the FSF Award for the Advancement of Free Software.

Python 1.6.1 is essentially the same as Python 1.6, with a few minor bug fixes, and with the new GPL-compatible license. Python 2.1 also includes this new license and is a derivative work of Python 1.6.1, as well as of Python 2.0. Current versions of the license are called the Python Software Foundation License.

After Python 2.0 was released by BeOpen.com, Guido van Rossum and the other PythonLabs developers joined Digital Creations. All intellectual property added from this point on, starting with Python 2.1 and its alpha and beta releases, is owned by the Python Software Foundation (PSF), a non-profit organization modeled after the Apache Software Foundation.

This is from The Wikipedia which is published under the GNU Free Documentation License.

What is ASP?

Active Server Pages (ASP) is Microsoft's server-side technology for dynamically-generated web pages that is marketed as an add-on to Internet Information Services (IIS).

Programming ASP websites is made easier by various built-in objects. Each object corresponds to a group of frequently-used functionality useful for creating dynamic web pages. In ASP 3.0 there are six such built-in objects: Application, ASPError, Request, Response, Server and Session. Session, for example, is a cookie-based session object that maintains variables from page to page. Application Center Test is also available for load testing.

Most ASP pages are written in VBScript, but any other Active Scripting engine can be selected instead by using the @Language directive. JScript (Microsoft's implementation of ECMAScript) is the other language that is usually available. PerlScript (Perl) and others are available as third-party installable Active Scripting engines.

Versions
ASP has gone through four major releases:

• ASP 1.0 (distributed with IIS 3.0) in December 1996
• ASP 2.0 (distributed with IIS 4.0) in September 1997
• ASP 3.0 (distributed with IIS 5.0) in November 2000
• ASP.NET (part of the Microsoft .NET platform) in January 2002 (the pre-.NET versions are currently referred to as "classic" ASP)
• ASP.NET version 2.0 (released on November 7th, 2005).

ASP.NET introduced the ability to replace in-HTML scripting with full-fledged support for .NET languages such as Visual Basic .NET and C#. In-page scripting can still be used (and is fully supported), but now pages can use VB.NET and C# classes to generate pages instead of code in HTML pages.

This terminology explanation is from The Wikipedia which is published under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Assertions in Java

Assertion facility is added in J2SE 1.4. In order to support this facility J2SE 1.4 added the keyword assert to the language, and AssertionError class. An assertion checks a boolean-typed expression that must be true during program runtime execution. The assertion facility can be enabled or disable at runtime.

Declaring Assertion
Assertion statements have two forms as given below

assert expression;

assert expression1 : expression2;

The first form is simple form of assertion, while second form takes another expression. In both of the form boolean expression represents condition that must be evaluate to true runtime.

If the condition evaluates to false and assertions are enabled, AssertionError will be thrown at runtime.

Some examples that use simple assertion form are as follows.

assert value > 5;

assert accontBalance > 0;

assert isStatusEnabled();

The expression that has to be asserted runtime must be boolean value. In third example isStatusEnabled() must return boolean value. If condition evaluates to true, execution continues normally, otherwise the AssertionError is thrown.

Following program uses simple form of assertion

//AssertionDemo.java

Class AssertionDemo {

Public static
void main(String args[]) {

System.out.println( withdrawMoney(1000,500) );

System.out.println( withdrawMoney(1000,2000) );

}

public double withdrawMoney(double
balance , double amount) {

assert balance >= amount;

return balance – amount;

}

}

In above given example, main method calls withdrawMoney method with balance and amount as arguments. The withdrawMoney method has a assert statement that checks whether the balance is grater than or equal to amount to be withdrawn. In first call the method will execute without any exception, but in second call it AssertionError is thrown if the assertion is enabled at runtime.

Enable/Disable Assertions
By default assertion are not enabled, but compiler complains if assert is used as an identifier or label. The following command will compile AssertionDemo with assertion enabled.

javac –source 1.4 AssertionDemo.java

The resulting AssertionDemo class file will contain assertion code.

By default assertion are disabled in Java runtime environment. The argument –eanbleassertion or –ea will enables assertion, while –disableassertion or –da will disable assertions at runtime.

The following command will run AssertionDemo with assertion enabled.

Java –ea AssertionDemo

or

Java –enableassertion AssertionDemo

Second form of Assertion

The second form of assertion takes another expression as an argument.

The syntax is,

assert expression1 : expression2;

where expression1 is the condition and must evaluate to true at runtime.

This statement is equivalent to

assert expression1 : throw new AssertionError(expression2);

Note: AssertionError is unchecked exception, because it is inherited from Error class.

Here, expression2 must evaluate to some value.

By default AssertionError doesn’t provide useful message so this form can be helpful to display some informative message to the user.

Rahim Vindhani
Application Develper [Application Development & Webservices]
IBM Global Services, pune, India
email: rahim.vindhani@gmail.com
web: http://www.rahim.co.nr/

Disaster Recovery for Microsoft SQL Server 2005

Learn about expanded SQL Server 2005 database mirroring capabilities from EMC's Chad Sakac, senior practice manager for databases and messaging. And see how EMC RecoverPoint solutions—with consistency technology, compression, and continuous data replication—can help your SQL Server 2005 environment survive a total site disaster.

SQL Server Disk Optimization

Since the release of SQL Server 2005, companies have been investing heavily in SQL Server for their business-critical applications. DBAs are now challenged with supporting ever-growing datasets and making efficient use of allocated disk space in both production and enterprise storage environments. Yet DBAs seldom have a clear picture of their data storage and therefore cannot determine whether they are getting a worthwhile return on their storage investment or if an out-of-disk situation is looming.

In this presentation, Kevin will address these challenges and explore methodologies to help you efficiently use allocated disk space for enterprise storage and production environments.

Lynda.com Announces Release of ColdFusion 8 Beyond the Basics

Lynda.com, the leader in self-paced digital media and design training, today introduced ColdFusion 8 Beyond the Basics.

ColdFusion 8 Beyond the Basics demonstrates how to utilize ColdFusion 8 to its full potential, from setting up a project to using ColdFusion Components and sessions in a shopping cart application. Instructor David Gassner leaves no stone unturned as he teaches advanced techniques, including how to use ColdFusion 8 with Flash forms and PDFs, create presentations with imported audio and video, and work with XML files. Exercise files accompany the tutorials.

"David Gassner's introductory tutorials for ColdFusion 8 have been very well received, and we know developers will be thrilled to have his guidance as they learn the advanced capabilities that can power real-world web applications," says Lynda Weinman, CEO of lynda.com. "In particular, the chapters on Flash, PDF, and AJAX integration demonstrate the scope of what can be done by capable hands in this version of ColdFusion."

Anyone with an internet connection can access ColdFusion 8 Beyond the Basics by subscribing to lynda.com's Online Training Library®. A separate CD-ROM version of ColdFusion 8 Beyond the Basics is planned later this month.

Subscriptions to the lynda.com Online Training Library® start at $25 a month, and provide access to over 22,000 movie tutorials covering more than 320 technology career tools, software applications, and techniques. Subscribers can access any of the computer-based training courses at their convenience. Multi-user subscriptions are also available for companies and institutions seeking to provide education and training to groups.

For free online samples of ColdFusion 8 Beyond the Basics and more detailed product information, please visit http://movielibrary.lynda.com/html/modPage.asp?ID=432

For more information on lynda.com products, please visit http://www.lynda.com/ or call 1-888-335-9632.

About lynda.com
Since 1997, lynda.com has provided education and technical training solutions for designers, computer graphics specialists, digital media users, and computer owners. lynda.com products include web-based training, instructional books, CD- and DVD-based video training, self-paced online learning, and events for creative designers, instructors, students, and hobbyists. lynda.com specializes in teaching fundamental design and graphics principles along with the latest computer software, digital media technologies, and techniques.

About David Gassner
David Gassner is the president of Bardo Technical Services, an Adobe Solutions Network Training Provider. He holds Adobe developer certifications in ColdFusion, Flash, and Dreamweaver, in addition to Flex. David has been a regular speaker at Macromedia conferences and a contributor to ColdFusion Journal and XML Journal, where he has assisted many developers with the integration of Adobe's ColdFusion with Java, XML, and other development technologies.

Source: PRWeb

Google Announces Gphone...I mean Android

After a lot of rumors and speculation, Google has finally announced the Gphone...I mean Android. Instead of announcing a new phone device, they announced Android, an open and comprehensive platform for mobile devices.

There aren't a lot of details yet. Google has stated it will be Linux based. It will require a minimum 200 MHz ARM 9 processor.

The Android SDK will be available November 12th.

The following video from Google provides more information on Android.

Become a PHP Expert in One Week With SitePoint's Guide

Over 20 million web sites prove that PHP is the most universally adopted web programming language on the planet. However, moving from a beginner's level to more advanced PHP development is often a difficult transition … or was, until today.

Online media company SitePoint (sitepoint.com) today announced the release of a new resource for learning object oriented programming with PHP.

Its latest book, The PHP Anthology: 101 Essential Tips, Tricks & Hacks, 2nd Edition, saves time, and eliminates the frustration of completing PHP tasks, with a comprehensive collection of ready-to-use solutions.

Its question-and-answer format lets you learn by example as you work through its impressive PHP solutions, and the copy-and-paste code takes the stress out of getting your web applications off the ground.

This book makes it easy to:

• Manage errors gracefully.
• Build functional forms, tables, and SEO-friendly URLs.
• Reduce load time with client- and server-side caching.
• Produce and utilize web services with XML.
• Secure your site using access control systems.
• Easily work with files, emails, and images.
• And so much more...

The PHP Anthology: 101 Essential Tips, Tricks & Hacks, 2nd Edition proves that you that you don't need a computer science degree to take advantage of the powerful features of PHP.

The PHP Anthology is available at Amazon.com.

About SitePoint

SitePoint specializes in publishing fun, practical, and easy-to-understand content for web professionals. Its popular online magazine, blogs, newsletters, and print books teach best practices to web developers and designers worldwide. http://www.sitepoint.com

SitePoint also runs the #1 Marketplace on the Web for buying and selling web sites, blogs, and forums. http://www.sitepoint.com/marketplace/

Source: PRWeb

The Office + Geeks = The IT Room

What do you get if you take The Office and add Geeks? The IT Room. The IT Room webisodes start November 11.

Take a sneak peak at The IT Room below.

What is XQuery?

XQuery is a query language (with some programming language features) that is designed to query collections of XML data. It is semantically similar to SQL.

XQuery 1.0 is being developed by the XML Query working group of the W3C. The work is closely coordinated with the development of XSLT 2.0 by the XSL Working Group; the two groups share responsibility for XPath 2.0, which is a subset of XQuery 1.0. XQuery 1.0 became a W3C Candidate Recommendation on November 3, 2005.

Features

XQuery provides the means to extract and manipulate data from XML documents or any data source that can be viewed as XML, such as relational databases or office documents.

XQuery uses XPath expression syntax to address specific parts of an XML document. It supplements this with a SQL-like FLWOR expression for performing joins. The FLWOR expression is named after its five clauses: FOR, LET, WHERE, ORDER BY, RETURN.

The language also provides syntax allowing new XML documents to be constructed. Where the element and attribute names are known in advance, an XML-like syntax can be used; in other cases, expressions referred to as dynamic node constructors are available. All these constructs are defined as expressions within the language, and can be arbitrarily nested.

The language is based on a tree-structured model of the information content of an XML document, containing seven kinds of node: document nodes, elements, attributes, text nodes, comments, processing instructions, and namespaces.

The type system of the language models all values as sequences (a singleton value is considered to be a sequence of length one). The items in a sequence can either be nodes or atomic values. Atomic values may be integers, strings, booleans, and so on: the full list of types is based on the primitive types defined in XML Schema.

XQuery 1.0 does not include features for updating XML documents or databases. It also lacks full text search capability. These features are both under active development for a subsequent version of the language.

This tutorial is from The Wikipedia which is published under the GNU Free Documentation License.

How to Survive Your 9-to-5

Are you frustrated with your job and would like to quit? Your boss and that co-worker really suck but you need the money, right? If you feel stuck in the daily grind, use these tips to start survive the daily grind and be happier after work.