The Braun Blog

This is a classic…

One of the first things that I noticed when learning how to develop sidebar gadgets was that the code behind them was a combination of HTML and JavaScript.  The biggest problem is that it was JavaScript, something that I am not well versed in.  I looked through several samples and tried some different samples and pretty much have learned the basics of what I need to know, but some of the commands still require me to reference the web or Google certain topics.

I developed a gadget to display specific weather data from my weather station and leveraged what I learned about JavaScript to use XMLHTTP.   It worked fine unto a couple days ago when the gadget stopped responding and couldn’t connect to the datasource even though I can do some from a browser.  From what I can tell, I must be hitting some sort of connection limit, or I have an object that is not being nulled out.  I did change my code to use synchronous processing on the XMLHTTP object, and that seemed to work, but the gadget will sometimes lock up the whole sidebar.  Now, that is a nice bug!

So … not a big fan of JavaScript, but making it work.  I do like the error handling against what is available using VBScript.  Needless to say, it would be nice if gadgets supported C# or VB.NET natively instead of requiring some type of COM access.

Things I Overheard While Talking to Myself by Alan Alda Read more about this title…

Good book from the famous actor who played Hawkeye Pierce on the TV hit M.A.S.H.

Today wraps up the 2007 Minnesota State Fair.  Attending the State Fair was a tradition in my family as well as my wife’s.  We typically go two or three times every year to eat, browse the booths, and take in the sights, sounds, and smells that the Minnesota Great Get-Together has to offer.

We usually try to get there by 8 AM to beat the rush and ease our way into things. Ter likes to start the morning off with a foot-long hot dog with mustard, while I slowly get into the day with a more breakfast-like food of mini-donuts.

We stopped by for a visit at the WCCO Radio booth just in time for the Don Shelby Show with his trusty sidekick, Jeff McKinney (“The McSkinney”).  Don is famous in these parts as being a longtime anchor over at WCCO-TV, the CBS affiliate here in Minneapolis.  Jeff is famous for his perfected radio voice and trusted newsman.

I usually listen to them on the drive home, but it was enjoyable to see them in person and watch their interactions.  It’s not as much about being a news radio show, as it seemed like you were watching a real conversation from the sidelines.

I was looking at my past State Fair photos and realized that I actually had my picture with Don Shelby back at the 2005 State Fair.  He was a nice guy!

And what visit wouldn’t be complete without a visit to our very own Minnesota State Fair brick?  Yep, that’s right.  We have a brick.  We’re card-carrying members of the State Fair Foundation.  I guess not really card-carrying, maybe brick-bearing members instead.  Nonetheless, we own a personalized piece of Minnesota State Fair history.  Two visits a year definitely isn’t enough.

Just thought I would offer up the templates that I created for making new Windows Live Writer plugins. 

Download the VSI file, then double-click to install.  The new project templates will be available in the list when you create a new Visual Studio project.  These project templates are for C# only.

Enjoy!