Almost! But not quite. I'll remain an Adidas guy for now; but I absolutely love the "Chalk" commercial with Lebron James. It's just a nice, feel-good clip; and they did a great job taking advantage of Lebron's famous ritual of tossing chalk in the air before each game.
Every time I see it, I get just a little swell of emotion. I like commercials that are inspiring, featuring athletes that are even more inspiring. Great job, Nike.
In this post, we hear from Definition 6 (the home of my first web programming gig) on how blogs can work for your organization; and they use the Obama campaign as a prime example of how successful they can be.
http://blog.definition6.com/blog/definition-6/0/0/the-power-of-blogs
I agree. Times are changing, and I believe that blogs will be around for a long time. You'd be amazed at the people you can reach by having a blog; I know this because I'm surprised every week when I get wonderful comments from people I don't know. The Internet is a powerful force, man.
This Sunday message comes from something I learned in my church music group. This weekend, I have the honor of singing with a special church choir I auditioned for a few months ago called "Chords of Faith". We'll be performing at the Festival of the Nativity. Last night we had an excellent practice in preparation for it, and something interesting happened that I'd like to share with you.
When we practiced the songs, it was clear that we were getting all of the notes right - but the conductors were still a little displeased. It sounded like we were going through the motions, and with no emotion. We agreed; we were so focused on getting the notes right that we forgot to sing with convention. We were able to refocused, we stopped trying to get notes right, and we started singing like we believed it. The difference was incredible, and we all saw the vision of how we should perform this weekend.
As I think about that experience, I can't help but wonder what other aspects of my life need the same fine tuning. Am I just going to church, or is there a purpose for me going to church. Anybody can dress up, drive to a chapel and sit for three hours, right? But what are we doing to make going to church an experience that makes a difference in our life.
If you're a boss, who do you give a promotion to; someone who just shows up, does his job and goes home ... or someone who you believe is going to offer something special to improve your department or company? Maybe I'm only "expected" to fix bugs in the software ... but is that where I stop, or can I dig deeper and really find solutions to help my clients? Anybody can give birth to a child, but what does it mean to be a real mother or father ... whatever it is, I'm sure it's more than just providing food and shelter?
In the LDS Church, we always say that you need to "magnify your calling", but I think it takes much more effort to do so. After learning a song, it doesn't take much more effort to sing it with feeling - in our choir's case, it was a simple reminder and decision to do. So whenever your caught going through the motions, think about something small you can do to refocus and make your music more beautiful ... whatever your music happens to be.
My brother, Sebastian, created his own theme for iGoogle - featuring a picture of all of our teenaged kids. It actually pays homage to a picture they took when they were much younger ... all wearing shades. If I find it, I'll post it!
It's not available yet, but it should be approved in about 2 weeks or so.
http://www.google.com/ig?skin=http://www.twinpros.com/iGoogle/theme.xml
Needless to say, I'm very excited about the NBA season finally starting. There are so many interesting stories to watch for this year, along with more exciting players to see than I can remember. But without further ado ... here is my first installment of NBA Notes for this year:
- Being a web programmer, I have to mention this first ... the new NBA website is sensational! The design matches their brand much better than before, and the layout does a great job of not getting in the way of the content (scores, stats, news, and all the info that NBA enthusiasts come to get!) The only problem I've seen is that the scores are not as up-to-date as other sources are; perhaps this can be fixed later by replacing their Flash components with Silverlight apps (he,he). Anyway, nice job, NBA (or whoever actually built the site.)
- I'm very pleased about my Lakers. As most of America knows, having Bynum back is huge. And now that Kobe has a league MVP under his belt, he seems more focused than ever to work towards another ring (and become a Finals MVP!) I'm very happy.
- How 'bout the Hawks, eh?!! So far I'm impressed with how they're able to win games in the 4th quarter and/or on the road - two things they didn't do well last year. And out of all the games they've played so far, I've been the most pleased with how they played in their first loss against the Celtics. Without their star player J-smooth, they were only a "desperate, fade-away, luck shot by Pierce" away from winning against the champs in the Garden. Yes, folks, the Hawks are for real this year.
- It was weird hearing that coach PJ of the OKC Thunder was fired last night, after I just finished watching them on ESPN last night. That being said, he looked more like a college coach (like when he was coaching Setan Hall) than a NBA coach. But I was still sorry to hear the bad news, he's one of the good guys in basketball; perhaps one of the TV networks will pick him up, he's a great analyst.
- I have a co-worker that thinks the Spurs will not make the playoffs this year. He honestly thinks that their are 8 teams better than them in the West. My opinion is that he's crazy ... or he is? If the playoffs started today, the Spurs would be the 8th seed, with Dallas and Golden State close behind. Everytime he mentions it, I keep telling him it's a 82 game season and that's early; but I have to admit he's making a compelling argument. In the end, my money's on Coach Pop and Mr. Fundamental that they'll find a way.
- If you're into basketball AND into the internet, you'll like what SLAM Magazine is doing. In addition to their website, they have a Twitter page and a MySpace page. I'm not much into MySpace yet, but I do know that every night their Twitter page is very active; I even got a reply from them on one of my tweets!
Visual Studio 2008 has a whole bunch of features in it that I never use, or have had the time to learn; but there are some features that all developers will find very useful. In Stephen Walther's post on the topic, he provides us with 10 of them ... 5 of which I knew about already - but the other features are good, too.
Essential Visual Studio Tips & Tricks that Every Developer Should Know
By participating in beta exams, you have the opportunity to provide the Microsoft Certification program with feedback about exam content. Having participated in the development process of these exams (including 71-564 below!), I know they depend on the contributions of experienced IT professionals and developers to improve and maintain the value of Microsoft certifications. But hurry fast, these spots don't last long.
Exam 71-564: Pro: Designing and Developing ASP.NET Applications Using the Microsoft® .NET Framework 3.5
Exam 71-565: Pro: Designing and Developing Enterprise Applications Using the Microsoft® .NET Framework 3.5
Being a web programmer is blessing ... and a curse. A blessing ... because I have the knowhow to create any type of website for anyone, including myself. A curse ... because I'm never satisfied.
When I decided to start, I found this great blog solution called BlogEngine.NET, which has a set of blog designs (themes) that you can download and start using immediately. After hours of picking and choosing, I chose the Curiously Green theme; but after a few weeks, I knew that I'd have to create my own theme (you see? never satisfied!)
After 5 short months of blogging here, this site has officially been upgraded. Let me know what you think. And though there will be minor tweaks happening all the time, here's the rundown of the major revisions I made (in case you're interested):
BlogEngine.NET Upgrade
I've upgraded the BlogEngine.NET software from version 1.3.x to 1.4.5.0. This not only takes care of bugs from the previous version, but it allows me to post more types of content from other websites (i.e. videos, mp3s, etc.) I basically gave my site a tune-up under the hood.
New Site Design
Aside from wanting a cleaner looking site, I also wanted it to load faster - which meant a lot less images. So I found a great design by Andreas Viklund on oswd.org called 1024px that only used 3 images total and looked decent. And judging by the name, you can conclude that you need a screen that at least 1024 pixels wide; if you don't, it's time for you to get a new monitor. I then modified it a bit to make it my own, and then converted it to a BlogEngine.NET theme. I just need to find another picture; I've abused this picture of me in the orange shirt.
Updates by E-mail, too
I also made subscribing to my blog more prominent and easier to use by adding more tools from Feedburner (what I use for managing my RSS feed.) In addition to adding my blog to a reader, you can also sign-up to get each post sent straight to your email.
Social Bookmarking
I found a great tool called AddThis where you can create social bookmarks. If you look at the bottom-left of each post, there's an icon that allows you to bookmark that post to your favorite social page (i.e. MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, etc.) There's even an e-mail option for it, too. It's a little buggy still (the mouseover doesn't work when there's a quote in the title); but lately, I've been a Facebook junkie, so I'll be using this quite a bit myself.
Popups you'll like
Another tool I found called Apture gives me the ability to add informative and helpful popups to my content. For example, all of my links to Wikipedia (like this one!) now have a book icon that you can mouse over and get a popup with the definition in it . This will give you the ability to view videos, hear mp3s, watch Powerpoint presentations, and a bunch of other things all within a convenient popup without having to leave the site. However, I am still debating whether or not to keep it, so your feedback would be appreciated.
That's all for now. Thanks for everyone that visits on a regular basis and sends feedback via comments or private messages. I hope you enjoy the changes.
I am a fortunate man. I have a wonderful wife, wonderful kids, great job, and I have a testimony of the gospel. But as fortunate as I am, my family and I have not had the perfect life. As many of you have, we've gone through some hard times - negative economy has affected, too. Along with that, we're in a constant battle of trials from other people - even from those that we believed were our friends. And I hate to even say this ... I find it interesting that most of our grief has to do with fellow church members.
With that in mind, I've been thinking a lot about Matthew 7:15-23 that talks about wolves in sheep's clothing. It initially refers to false prophets, but upon further reading you find that this applies to anyone that portrays themselves as righteous but has other motives. The ones that preach for money are easy to spot; but there are many other wolves to watch out for that I feel are much worse. I think anyone who justifies not being nice to people in the name of magnifying their church calling can be classified as a wolf. Or someone that only starts being nice to you because they want something, or when you're no longer useful they stop talking to you. Or parents that treat their children lovingly in public, but ugly and cruel in private.
I wish I could provide specific examples, it would make the point I'm trying to make much clearer; but I believe it would be inappropriate for this post. If you want those examples, send me an e-mail. But what I will say is that I believe that a wolf is anyone that places anything in priority above any person, and the ones that are in sheep's clothing are those that do so in the name of doing the Lord's work - which for me means anyone in church. I believe this is the meaning of verses 22 & 23. Christ's love is unconditional; and if we're going to return to Him, we have to be like Him. And there will be many church members that will be surprised in the end how far from the Lord's will they really were.
I've learned again this week that the ends don't justify the means. Heavenly Father won't care that you conducted the best church choir, paid the most tithing, taught the best Sunday School class, baptized the most converts on your mission, or anything of the sort. The Lord's gonna want to know how you treated those around you and if you were there for them, especially your family. I'll end with the words of President Uchtdorf that sums it up best:
"Brethren, when we stand before the Lord to be judged, will He look upon the positions we have held in the world or even in the Church? Do you suppose that titles we have had other than "husband", "father", or "priesthood holder" will mean much to Him? Do you think He will care how packed our schedule was or how many important meetings we attended? Do you suppose that our success in filling our days with appointments will serve as an excuse for failure to spend time with our wife and family?
"The Lord judges so very differently from the way we do. He is pleased with the noble servant, not with the self-serving noble."
So keep an eye out for those wolves ... and don't become one, either.
So I've decided to change the design of this blog site. And instead of using another one of the "out of the box" themes that comes with BlogEngine.Net (the software I use to maintain this site); I've decided to "outside of the box". Of course, that doesn't mean that I'm creating a "look and feel" of my own. Been there, done that ... I'm not very good at it! I'm going to do what I do best - I'm going use someone else's web design and use it for my purposes.
In this case, I'll simply take an existing web design and convert to a BlogEngine.Net theme. While finding out the instructions on how to do that (since this is my first time), I came across a website that many of you may want to check out ... Open Source Web Design. It has over 2000 free web designs that you can download; and it looks like all you have to do is give props to those that created it at the bottom of the page. Turns out, the theme that I'm using right now (called Curiously Green) came from this resource.
Though I may not be good at web designs, I do know good designs when I see them. The ones I like the best are clean, easy on the eyes, and use screen space effectively. This site contains designs that match this criteria. Enjoy!
The MSDN Developer Conference is coming to a city near you (hopefully!) And it's only $99.00!
http://www.msdndevcon.com/pages/start.aspx
It'll be in Atlanta on December 16, 2008.
http://www.msdndevcon.com/pages/Atlanta.aspx
Wow!!!!
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032553
I agree it was time for a new logo for the .NET Framework; just not sure I'm exactly in love this one. It's better than the one they had before, so it'll work. However, I thought they did a good job with the new website redesign. All in all, it'll be nice for .NET to have a fresh new look for a while.
http://www.microsoft.com/net/
I am not a comic or cartoon fan, per se; but I do have a favorite of each. My favorite comic, of course, is Dilbert; I can totally relate to that guy when it comes to office politics (not when it comes to his personal life.)
My favorite cartoon is not even on TV. His name is Strong Bad, and the dude is absolutely hilarious to me!! I'm not going to try to explain to you who is and why he has the name of Strong Bad - it is a very painful process; I'll just say that either you'll get him or you won't (like my wife!) Anyway, the storyline is that he answers real e-mails from people (sometimes even outside the country), usually accompanied by some mischief! I usually check in about every other month or so, and I noticed that he is celebrating e-mail #200.
You da man, SB!
We .NET developers find ourselves at an interesting crossroad today, which can be summed up by a question: when should I take the plung and learn Silverlight/WPF/XAML? If you're like me, this decision may depend on whether or not we have the need to use it - like clients asking for it. If you do, the next thing you'll need is the confidence that Silverlight/WPF/XAML can handle the needs that business applications present to us. There are two schools of thought on whether or not this is true. Some say no; all of the colleagues I hang with, including Rocky Lhotka, say yes.
If you're like me, you don't have a current business need to learn Silverlight/WPF/XAML. Despite that, I'm still going to everything I can to learn it well. In my opinion, and many others that I respect, Silverlight/WPF/XAML is the future of UI development. Many believe that in about 5-10 years it will be take over as WinForms and WebForms. As Rocky explains in his post, once you get past the learning curve the UI development is much more productive.
To assist me in my commitment to learn Silverlight, I've volunteered to do a Silverlight presentation in about 3 weeks. The best way to learn anything is to teach it; so I'm very much looking forward to it. If I can get through this presentation, I know I will comfortable enough with Silverlight to start using it on a regular basis. My hope is that I'll also find new ways to use Silverlight, along with using it as a regular part of my freelance projects. Once I do that, I should be ready for primetime consultant work with future clients that my ask for it.