Scottless

Extension of the Microsoft AJAX javascript library

Scottless — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 19:05:26 GMT

There are too many standards, frameworks, APIs, applications designed for the same purpose but use different approaches to achieve the goal. In this post I'm gonna put together an implementation and a client-side reference.

Microsoft has released a great AJAX client-side javascript library. Unfortunately it lacks the implementation and doesn't duplicate the server-side API. Ruben Buniatyan took the first step to extend it with a Sys.Crypto and Sys.Text namespaces. I think this guy did a great job in defining basic interfaces and their implementation. I would like to take this chance and contribute some code of mine to it.

SHA256. I ported Angel Martin's and Paul Johnson's original code into Sys.Crypto namespace. Use it just the way you wound use MD5 class from the Ruben's extension:

    var sha256 = Sys.Crypto.SHA256.create();
    var digest = sha256.computeHash(Sys.Text.Encoding.UTF8.getBytes("message digest"))));

My implementation is available for download here.

PBKDF2. Password-Based Key Derivation Function 2. Original code by Pervez Anandam. I created an implementation derived from Sys.Crypto.HashAlgorithm, but there's a twist. The execution of the code may take significant time which may result is browser hanging if executed synchronously. To avoid this situation the execution is takes place asynchronously so computeHash function returns at once.

function completedCallback(hash, context) {
    display_message2("My derived key is: " + utilsByteArrayToHex(hash));
}

function progressCallback(percentage, context) {
    display_message2("Computed " + percentage + "%");
}

    var f = Sys.Crypto.PBKDF2.create();
    f.set_hashSize(256);
    f.set_salt(Sys.Text.Encoding.UTF8.getBytes("my salt"));
    f.set_interationCount(1000);

    f.set_completedCallback(completedCallback);
    f.set_progressCallback(progressCallback);
    f.computeHash(Sys.Text.Encoding.UTF8.getBytes("Oleg Ignat"));

The code is available for download here.

I would like to enphasis that you need to download Ruben's extension in order to use my code. If you happen to find bugs don't hesitate to let me know.

Getting Married in Vancouver

Scottless — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 21:45:13 GMT

I got Married in Vancouver myself. I know that it's quite a bit of a headache to choose between the options and put them together in a smooth sequence to build a perfect day. I think this post would be useful for those who intend to wed in Vancouver.

What are the requirements? Obviously there are some things common in all cases.

Marriage license. Yeah, you need one. In order to wed in BC you must apply for a marriage license. It's a simple procedure and takes approximately 10 minutes and $100 CAD at the Vital Statistics office in Vancouver. Anyone can get it for you, just make sure she's got picture IDs of the groom and bride. The license is valid for 3 months.

Marriage commissioner or a priest. It's up to you to decide whether you want to go social or spiritual way but one way or another you have to pick a government representative to back your wedding up with a law. The registry is available online. The ceremony costs $75 CAD. If you decide to wed at her place it's gonna cost you additional $55 CAD. If you decide to take her our then you'll cover her gas expenses. Good thing - you can take her wherever you feel, including your place, top of the Grouse Mountain, a boat, etc.

Wedding Rings. Guys, there's no requirement for wedding rings, but if you want use them, the best place to go shopping is Pacific Centre or Metropolis in Metrotown. I would advice you to get plain yellow golden rings. Thinner for the ride and thicker for the groom.

Limo. You can't go without a limo for sure. One of the best rates and people you will find at Pearl Limo Service. Stretch sidan 8 seats ~ $115 CAD / hour (including GST). Don't get the wedding package there, get the limo only.

Restaurant. This is also an important part of the night. You may pick to spend it on the boar, but this option mostly applies to 60+ people. If you have less, then even better - you may reserve an Observatory on the Grouse Mountain. They have terrific view and high prices. Among the options I would recommend Cactus Club on Burrard.

Ceremony place. Yet again, this is totally up to you, I'm here to give advises only. If you wish to go with church - there's a nice place on Burrard - Christ Cathedral. You way do it in Stanley Park, Kitsilano beach, Grouse mountain, Queen Elizabeth Park, etc. They all have pavilions in case of the rain as well as open space.

First night. I would recommend a nice waterfront hotel like Pan Pacific. Tell them that you're just married and they will suggest nice options plus a little present from the hotel.

Photo/Video service. This part should be played by your friends. Don't get commencial professionals to do it for you. They're nuts! Prices go as high as $4000. You don't need that. Get 2 photo and 2 video cameras. Ask your friends to take pictures and shoot video for you. Make sure you use high quality equipment. Period.

And of cause, you need lots of champagne in limo, restaurant, ceremony and hotel. Don't forget your vows.

Let someone else plan your day. Man, are you serios? Are you filthy rich or something? The price range is $3000 - $10000 CAD. Ok, you're the boss. There are nice wedding packages from Viva Las Wedding. Never used them myself but the options are quite impressive.

Have a great wedding!

I got married

Scottless — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 04:19:41 GMT

Yeah, it finally happened. I joined the club. The ceremony took place on September 21, 2008 in Vancouver, BC, Canada.

Later on I will give you the insight on the details but for now I would simply share the compilation. Enjoy!

<a href="http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?vid=2fc6d9c1-0844-4823-b940-ddb828791a0f" target="_new" title="My Wedding">Video: My Wedding</a>

Free C# Proxy Tunneller

Scottless — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 17:21:57 GMT

Back at university I was facing a horrible network restriction - HTTP proxy. I was unable to use any services that required direct connection to the server. I overcame this problem with a tiny proxy tuneller that started a local server on my machine and sent HTTP CONNECT request to the proxy server to attach the external server to the other end of the pipe. A week ago a friend of mine asked me for this app again because he's got this headache on his campus.

There are tons of commercial tunnellers that allow you to monitor the traffic, create schedules, set permissions and plenty of other useless stuff when all you need is a tunnell itself. The app I wrote has 5 small classes and does it's job very good. It's time to reveal this software to the world. Feel free to download:

If you know what XML is and know how to deal with app.config files you may skip the following chapter. I'd like to take a minute to explain to the newbies how to modify the application configuration.

This is the configuration file ScottlessTunneller.exe.config:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<configuration>
  
  <configSections>
    <section name="Tunnels" type="ScottlessTunneller.Config.ConfigurationSectionHandler, ScottlessTunneller" />
  </configSections>

  <Tunnels>
    <TunnelConfig>
      <Name>Give this tunnel a distinct name (e.g. Gmail POP3)</Name>
      <InternalPort>A port on your machine you'd like to be the front-end of the tunnell</InternalPort>
      <ExternalHost>Host name of the server in the world you wish to create a tunnell to</ExternalHost>
      <ExternalPort>The port on the server</ExternalPort>
      <ProxyHost>Host name of your proxy server</ProxyHost>
      <ProxyPort>Port your proxy server is listening at</ProxyPort>
      <ProxyUsername>(optional)Username you use for authentication</ProxyUsername>
      <ProxyPassword>(optional)Your password</ProxyPassword>
    </TunnelConfig>
  </Tunnels>
</configuration>

When you feel like one service is not enough you may add another service like this:

   <Tunnels>
    <TunnelConfig>
      <Name>Service 1</Name>
      <InternalPort>10021</InternalPort>
      <ExternalHost>yahoo.com</ExternalHost>
      <ExternalPort>21</ExternalPort>
      <ProxyHost>proxy.com</ProxyHost>
      <ProxyPort>3128</ProxyPort>
      <ProxyUsername></ProxyUsername>
      <ProxyPassword></ProxyPassword>
    </TunnelConfig>
    <TunnelConfig>
      <Name>Service 2</Name>
      <InternalPort>10022</InternalPort>
      <ExternalHost>google.com</ExternalHost>
      <ExternalPort>22</ExternalPort>
      <ProxyHost>proxy.com</ProxyHost>
      <ProxyPort>3128</ProxyPort>
      <ProxyUsername></ProxyUsername>
      <ProxyPassword></ProxyPassword>
    </TunnelConfig>
  </Tunnels>

NOTE: All InternalPort-s of the TunnelConfig-s must be different. If you specify the same internal port the app will fail to create two listening sockets at the same port.

Enjoy your free tunneller!

I wish I could stop hating Apple

Scottless — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 06:02:55 GMT

This time I narrowed down my attention to iPhone 3G and App Store. Just as I expected - two pieces of shit.

Before buying a well advertised "Apple iPhone from Apple" consider the following - it has almost the same software and hardware as iTouch plus GSM unit, GPS, Bluetooth and Camera. With additional hardware comes physical shape increase and additional software which leads to susceptible speed reduction.

A few months ago I bought iTouch and was surprised with it's usability and features. A month ago I became an iPhone owner and demanded the refund the next day after the purchase. It didn't give me nothing new but locked me into the contract with wireless carrier, set up a new requirement for my pockets and the recharging frequency.

Anyway this story is not completely about this particular crap. I'd like to emphasis the reduced usability and increased amount of bugs Apple has brought into this world with the release of Apple App Store. 3rd party developers got the ability to sell their own software via iTunes. Pretty neat, huh? Let me tell you about GTS World Racing game.

It's the best approximation of Need For Speed for iPhone which costs $7.99 + taxes. I bought it and installed seamlessly. Clicked the icon and started playing. The first think that freaked me out was steering. Guys, you need to bend over your iPhone to accelerate and band it back to break. Did you use brains seriously? How am I supposed to watch the car when the iPhone screen is stearing at the floor? Was it really that hard to put a few transparent buttons on the screen? Anyway, it took me a day to adapt to this way of driving. As soon as I started to progress the most interesting things began to occur.

I reached the 11th track in 30 minutes and succesfully completed it. As soon as I reached the finish line the game hang. iPhone stopped responding to the famous "home" button. I had to restart iPhone. After reboot I started the game again and guess what - it didn't save my progress.

A few days later the curioucity took over me and I started playing again. As soon as I finished the 6th track you'll never guess what happened - the game hang. Gosh! Not again. It didn't save my progress this time as well. My frustration was growing...

Being a honest community member I went to the iTunes App Store to post a game review. For some reason this weird piece of web application asked me for my iTunes password to post a comment. Ok. I typed the review and gave it 2 stars as opposed to 5 marked by default. I deliberately typed no f-words and expressed a nice attitude in the comment then I clicked "Preview" because they don't have "Post" button there. Here's a stupid question to you guys - why would I like to review a plain text again? Just post it for God sake! "Not so fast" they told me - "You have to type your nick name". Alright, I typed mine there and upon another "Preview" click they told me that my nickname is taken! What? Where is the logics? I have a unique Apple ID which was confirmed by the password and now they tell me that there's someone else with my nickname dangling around comments? Man! This takes more time and efforts than it should! I typed another nickname there which was the only one I could come up with at that moment, previewed my post and posted it. Then just out of curioucity I went to find my comment in the reviews. Guess what - it's not there! There are only positive feedbacks. I didn't find any problem reports, crashes, "I hate you", etc. This makes me think that Apple is filtering out negative comments in order to sell more software!

You may have my conclusion for free Apple - stop blaming Microsoft for its bugs - take a look at your own crap.

WM6.1 Screen Alignment Problem Solution

Scottless — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 07:58:42 GMT

Wow... It's been quite a while since my last post on this blog. Confession time has come. I was doing my ordinary stuff as in working, traveling, having the time of my life...

Just a few days ago I came across the post on Eten Users forum that touches the deepst desires and the most intimate passion of all E-Ten G500 owners. It brings WM6.1 to G500! The idea was so crazy that I decided to give it a shot. Guess what - the update worked but then a nasty showstopper took place..

My update progressed up till the first WM6.1 setup page - Screen Alignment. The cross popped up asking me to tap on it 6 times in different places on the screen. Well, what can be simpler someone might think... Guess what, I failed more than 15 times. Then it hit me - there's a software workaround. With absolutely non-working hardward or even totally absent screen one can easily step over this problem and fix it in future. Here's how...

You need WM Registry Editor. You may use one bundled with Visual Studio 2005 / 2008, Mobile Registyr Editor or any other just make sure that it's running on your desktop. Hook up your PDA to your computer and let Active Sync connect to the device. Now you start your registry editor and connect to the newly patched WM6.1 gadget. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\DEVICEMAP\TOUCH key and modify the MaxCalError (calibration error barrier value) from 7 (default) to say 2000. Tap the last 5 times on the screen and enjoy your new interface.

Now it's time to adjust your calibrated data to make sure you can use your device properly. Here's a similar post on XDA developers forum. All you need to do now is to modify your CalibrationData value in the same registry key with "495,634 132,248 126,1010 858,1010 858,240" which stand for an average calibration data collected in 5 attempts.

CAUTION: If your device has a different calibration values than the posted above then it would stop loading at all. Think twice before updating CalibrationData and do it at your own risk.

If you did screw up your WM6.1 instance and device doesn't boot anymore - don't panic. You'll be just fine. Do a physical hard reset:

Press Power Button and Reset Button together and release them at the same time.
Immediately before device starts to reboot, press and hold End Call Button for approximately 15 seconds until the "Erase all data and loads defaults ?" screen appears. Click Yes.

Now you can give it another shot to patch your G500. Hope this helps anyone just as it worked for me.

Business trip to Redmond

Scottless — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 03:16:57 GMT

I just got back from a business trip to Redmond. My primary objective was to see my team, to meet my skip-managers and to talk to my manager. I successfully accomplished my mission and even exceeded it. We went out 3 times in 2 days. We had a team lunch, a few folks joined me to go to Seattle for a little drink and we had a cross-team building bowling activity on the day of my departure. I tend to think I had the brightest journey among all MCDC folks . No doubts SNAC team is the best!

My impressions are very diverse. On one hand I see a tremendous boost option in moving to US. You can participate the meetings in person, you can find an advice as fast as walk in someone's office. You can make an impact with your opinion. On the other hand you can't survive in US without a car. Seattle is much bigger than Vancouver but it's also a way dirtier. I love walking but you can't walk in Seattle. Don't know about the night life though but from my tiny experience I learned that Vancouver is much more active at night.

I guess I need to see Puget Sound a couple more times to develop a solid opinion on business/life balance. My trip pictures are posted here.

MCDC is dressing up

Scottless — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 07:12:44 GMT

Due to an accident I've been away quite awhile. But now I'm back fully equipped to carry on an important missing of keep you on the same page with the life over here.

To cut the long story short, this post is dedicated to the new building Microsoft has prepared for employees in Richmond. It's awesome. No kidding. It's very stylish, warm colors, open space, comfortable furniture, new offices, new conference rooms and a lot more. Basically Microsoft Canada Development Centre (which stands for MCDC) has 4 buildings but 2 of them are under construction yet. When the last builder leaves the area, MCDC will be capable of housing 300+ talanted boys and girls who wish to make the difference.

Freshly squeezed part of the building #3 has 3 conference rooms: Grouse, Whistler and Blackcomb. The guy suggested these names was awarded with $25 from Bread Garden.

Offices in new area are intended for seniors. I don't know how senior you have to be to get one of them. I suppose you need to have at least a couple of reports. Most of the offices are currently vacant.

Now we got official Microsoft reception with a big corporate title above ladies heads, soft furniture in the lobby and free candies.

I should probably stop talking and start sharing photos. Enjoy.

Vancouver snowboarding

Scottless — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 08:03:00 GMT

As I already mentioned a thousand times, Vancouver is an amazing area. It combines the worm downtown and pretty cold mountain tops where one can completely satisfy his winter sport needs.

There are a few places in the hood to go snowboarding to - Cypress, Grouse and Seymour mountains and Whistler village. The last place looks like an Alpine village with hotels, shops and restaurants. You don't go there for a day, you'd better stay there for a week. The only obstacle is 120 miles distance from downtown Vancouver.

I like Cypress. It's close, nice, convenient and affordable. It's the second weekend I spend there snowboarding. I ain't made up my mind about buying all the equipment so I just rent it. The whole package of the board, boots, pants, jacket, helmet and day pass costs $149 CAD. Note, no gloves and goggles included. You might wanna buy those two up there for an extra $60 CAD.

The terrain is amazing. There are a few slopes - the bunny slopes, green, blue and black. They are 300, 1200 and 1500 meters long correspondingly. I prefere green slope because. It's safe for me. If you're just a beginner you should start with the bunny and gradually grow up to the black.

There's a bus going from downtown to the Cypress hills and 7 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. on the weekends. Anyway you can learn about this in details on the web site.

I put a few pictures of my recent snowboarding session here. They're taken with my cell phone 'cuz I didn't want to waste my camera so the quality is crappy.

Shut up Apple!

Scottless — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 07:52:41 GMT

I just watched the January '08 Steve Jobs keynote where Apple CEO puts Microsoft on blast with a bunch of st*pid PC-Mac ads and Apple TV. WTH Steve? Didn't your mama tell you not to smoke pot anymore? Let me figure out once and for all why Apple sucks.

Approach

Apple puts the strees on the product look and feel in time when Microsoft enriches the products with features. Apple's consumers are simple users. They don't know much about computers. They think a nice icon can solve the problem. Apple take already implemented feature from Microsoft and give a new look and feel. Take a look at the Leopard time machine. It's nothing but a system backup implemented in Windows XP!

Apple would rather charge you for an additional icon than give you something free. I bought iTouch with 1.1.2 firmware. Now they release 1.1.3 with all iPhone apps including Mail, Maps, etc. If I and a bunch of other folks, who bought the gadgets before this January, wish to have these apps, we must pay $20 for an upgrade, thought we paid even more for the devices! You won't get an extra dime ouf of my pocket Steve! I'm gonna be jailbraking my iTouch forever!

I'm pretty sick of the falks thinking Mac OS is something extraordinary and stable as opposed to Vista. It is stable because it's simple! You can't put an apple computer into a domain! There's nothing like Microsoft Exchage server in Apple world! Apple's security is totally unix - no multiple group policies, no access controls... Do you know why there are too few viruses and volnurabilities in the Mac OS? Because nobody gives a shit about it! It covers a small group of people in the world. Microsoft has over 70% OS share in the world! That's why it is the main objects for all the world hackers.

What about games? What is the Apple's share in the game industry? How many games are released for Apple? It's nothing in comparison to Microsoft! A real gamer would never pay $2200 for the Mac to be unable to upgrade it when the time comes.

Now try to write an Apple app. These's no documentation on the web. You don't even know where to start. Microsoft has all the documentation in one place - MSDN. The docs are public and free.

What about corporate and business solutions? Apple doesn't have a single! Microsoft has SQL Server, SharePoint, Exchange, Windows Server, etc. These products are being improved every release.

Hardware

I want to take this time out to clarify a huge gap in people's minds. Microsoft is solely a software vendor! It doesn't make hardware. Apple does! It controls the whole process from the physical manufacturing to the software deployment. It's silly to blame PCs because they are thick! It's st*pid to blame Microsoft because Acer laptops have bad heat control!

Freedom

Apple tries to keep you on the short hand. The music you purchase from iTunes can be played on iPod or Mac only! The DRM forbids music playback on any other player in the world! WTH? I bought this music! I own it! Why would a someone dictate me what to do with my property?! Besides iPod playes only MP3 and AAC. They decided not to support WMA.

You can't download anything on iPhone and iTouch except music. Now take a look at the Pocket PC - you can install applications on the fly! You can tune your WM-based device as much as you like. You can change the complete look and feel of it. And after all the modifications it will still be able to connect to the corporate network, Microsoft Exchange and other corporate services. When do you think iPhone will be capable of this huh?!

Conclusion

Apple is a pricy sh*t trying to take over the world by persuading blind people that a graphical interface is all they need. They sue everyone who thinks different! This is my personal oppinion that has nothing to do with my job, political insights and skin color.