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StevenMcD.Net

Recent Posts

• Improve your server Garbage Collection Performance

  Posted: 07 Apr 2009 at 22:12 by StevenMcD

  I came across a little known config of ASP.Net applications. We all know about the built-in Garbage Collection system that the .Net Framework uses to recycle “dead” or unused objects from memory and recycle the space. By default the Garbage Collector is set to “Workstation” Mode. That means the Garbage collector will be efficient on [...]

• Setting Priorities

  Posted: 06 Apr 2009 at 08:19 by StevenMcD

  Interesting weekend I must say. Decided to get some food from a well known shopping chain and I got some nasty food poisoning. So I sat on Sunday feeling very very sorry for myself. My wife took very good care of me! But on Sunday afternoon my wife and I decided to play some World of [...]

• C#: Casting a variable with “as”

  Posted: 04 Mar 2009 at 12:19 by StevenMcD

  I encountered some interesting code today. I got some clarification on it on StackOverFlow.com and its pretty interesting! My Question: I’ve recently started working with JSON and the ExtJs framework and I’ve come across the following code in an example. we retrieve the information from the frontend using this: object updatedConfig = JavaScriptConvert.DeserializeObject(Request["dataForm"]); Then in the example they do the [...]

• Being in “The Zone”

  Posted: 03 Mar 2009 at 09:02 by StevenMcD

  A co-worker forwarded this to me this morning and now I’ve learnt from it so I’ll share it! This piece was taken from Joel Spolsky’s entry at: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000068.html We all know that knowledge workers work best by getting into “flow”, also known as being “in the zone”, where they are fully concentrated on their work and [...]

• Save a Lion!

  Posted: 24 Feb 2009 at 20:21 by StevenMcD

  This caught my attention today. In 4 days, if Sanwild.org do not raise enough funds, 3 prides of Rescue Lions will be put down. These Lions have been rescued by SanWild for various reasons and due to prolonged human interaction they cannot be released into the wild. Please check out the following website and make [...]

• Chase Software: My new home

  Posted: 12 Feb 2009 at 11:42 by StevenMcD

  As most people know, I haven’t been happy in my current position for a long time. I have written posts about this ( http://www.stevenmcd.net/2008/10/how-ive-almost-destroyed-my-career/ ) and how I’ve tried to work through it using positive thinking. (Post 1, Post 2, Post 3) However, no matter how hard I tried, I still felt the need for a [...]

• My Nerdmag BlackBerry entry

  Posted: 10 Feb 2009 at 12:51 by StevenMcD

  This is my entry for the Nerdmag.co.za BlackBerry competition: Dear Editor(s), Let’s talk about my favourite features: 1) I can receive my mail on my 8310 and delegate it to other people immediately 2) I can use it as a GPS for finding cool treasures and stuffs, cause I’m manly you know. 3) I can upload lots of photos of [...]

• C#: back2basics Stack & Heap

  Posted: 04 Feb 2009 at 22:01 by StevenMcD

  Previous Entries: back2basics Intro back2basics Types I apologize for the delay between posts, personal matters played a major role in this. I’m not going to go into the depths of explaining exactly what the Stack and the Heap is, for that you can use your friend Google. This article will revolve around when the Stack and when the Heap [...]

• Trivium: Throes of Perdition Premier

  Posted: 28 Jan 2009 at 06:14 by StevenMcD

  I got an email from RoadRunner records this morning linking to the new Trivium music video for “Throes of Perdition” off their latest album Shogun. I am a huge Trivium fan and I love the video. Its taken a while to get this video out as I remember a blogpost by them stating they started [...]

• Tiger Woods walks on water

  Posted: 28 Jan 2009 at 05:45 by StevenMcD

  Well done to EA for this fine little piece of CGI.

• C#: back2basics Types

  Posted: 28 Jan 2009 at 04:30 by StevenMcD

  We are going on onto Types in this post so if you’re not sure about whats going on in: Namespaces General Class Structure Method Structure then please check out those links for an explaination on those. Pre-Defined Types: C# has 15 predefined types. Now a type is obviously a structure that houses the value of a variable. Of the 15 predefined [...]

• Comedy: Don Packett Returns

  Posted: 27 Jan 2009 at 14:00 by StevenMcD

  This guy is seriously climbing up my favourite comedian ladder and fast. Finally put my finger on his style. Take the sex humor of Dane Cook style and cross that with Billy Connely’s random subject hoping and you have Don’s humor style. I absolutely love it. I seriously need to try get down to Melville [...]

• C#: back2basics Intro

  Posted: 26 Jan 2009 at 05:30 by StevenMcD

  Recently I’ve felt the basics of .Net slipping away from me. So I have decided to do a beginners series on .Net and C#. This will also benefit people with little or no .Net experience. The main purpose of this series is not to break new ground at all but remind ourselves of some basics. [...]

• Britney ripped off: Womanizer

  Posted: 23 Jan 2009 at 10:46 by StevenMcD

  Everybody knows I am very far from being a Britney Spears fan. Generally her music all revolves around the same thing with very little depth. However, I never seem to get sick of people mocking her music and her videos. Watching the Gravedigger video by Dave Matthews Band I spotted this little gem. Being a [...]

• Bike Hero

  Posted: 23 Jan 2009 at 05:45 by StevenMcD

  I am an avid Guitar Hero fan and this was just brilliant! Thanks a million for the link Gareth! I would honestly love to know how long it took them to get this right. They should’ve done this to Stillborn by Black Label Society though Would’ve been funny to see that.

• Seether Breakdown Video

  Posted: 22 Jan 2009 at 14:54 by StevenMcD

  I love Seether and I remember watching them when they were still Saron Gas. Music video is awesome, enjoy!

• Gary Vaynerchuk: Stop crying and crush it!

  Posted: 22 Jan 2009 at 07:03 by StevenMcD

  Since my mate Gavin introduced me to this guy I’ve been addicted to watching his vids. He imparts such a sense of energy and sheer awesomeness that when I finish watching one of his vids I wanna just “crush” everything around me. Nothing he says is revolutionary, but its just so pertinent that you have [...]

• Telemarketers: How to deal with them

  Posted: 15 Jan 2009 at 21:06 by StevenMcD

  This has got to be the funniest thing I’ve heard in a while. You know those annoying telemarketers who call you continously and never want to take no for an answer? Here’s how one American guy deals with them, this is something I’m just dying to try out! Enjoy!

• ASP.Net MVC: Moving from Webforms

  Posted: 15 Jan 2009 at 21:00 by StevenMcD

  Lucky for me, I had made the move to a MVC framework last year. Ruby on Rails was a very interesting learning curve I must admit but I really enjoyed it. However for people moving from traditional webforms, be it PHP, HTML, ASP or ASP.Net it is a rather large move. The whole concept of [...]

• Comedy: Pablo Francisco

  Posted: 15 Jan 2009 at 11:25 by StevenMcD

  I remember watching this guy a few years ago. He is absolutely amazing, and he can imitate the “movie preview guy” voice so damn well. You have got to watch this! Enjoy! BTW: This video is safe for work and/or public enviroments, not bad language or anything.