Notes to self: If you get this error on your javascript console:
"Uncaught SyntaxError: Unexpected token ILLEGAL"
The first thing to try, is that if you are passing a string as a parameter, put it single quotes.
This drained me for an hour.
Friday, 30 December 2011
Sunday, 11 December 2011
I have an application that not only has the Icefaces Ajax push, but certain elements require a client side refresh. I had a heck of a time trying to make the meta refresh tag work.
Tried a whole pile of stuff, then I realized that the tag should be in template and not on the xhtml page. Worked like a charm.
I thought that I would put this up for others who struggle with this and Google is of little help. So if your meta refresh tag doesn't work, put it in the template.
Thursday, 13 October 2011
It looks like Microsoft is desperate for developers to make apps for the Mango phone. I am a registered Microsoft developer, and I just received the email printed below. (They want $99 from me to develop apps. Amazon just waived the $99 fee for developers to develop on the Android phone). Here is the email: Mango for everyone Vol 14 | October, 20
It’s been a very exciting couple of weeks in the world of Windows Phone! Over the past two weeks, we have seen an incredible amount of activity surrounding the launch of Windows Phone 7.5 (formerly Mango). It’s actually been somewhat surreal in some ways because people are paying attention to this release and actually think it’s downright cool!
So what exactly did we announce over the past few weeks? I’m glad you asked! The major announcements included:
The Release of Windows Phone 7.5 by carriers to end consumers: Microsoft has begun delivery of the Windows Phone 7.5 update to Windows Phone users by carriers. To find out when your carrier will be ready to send out the update to you, there is a handy little web page here that gives you the status of the update relating to your carrier.
Introducing the Mango App Challenge: Developers, do we have an awesome deal for you. We have introduced a promotion called the Mango App Challenge that in essence will give you a new phone (up to 300 total for the entire promotion) if you build 2 new, quality Windows Phone 7.5 apps (or games). Interested? Then start your PC and begin coding, because the promotion ends on December 15th, 2011!
The Introduction of the Web-Based Marketplace: Last week the web-based version of the Windows Phone Marketplace was launched. This is great because it allows you and potential end users to find and purchase apps you’ve built onto their phones using a non-Zune experience. It’s also great for providing a way for potential users to see your apps that don’t even have the Zune software on their machines.
Windows Phone SDK 7.1 Launches: Also last week, we launched the go-live version of the developer tools for Windows Phone 7.5 and you can download the tools here for free . Even if you’ve built Windows Phone 7 apps already, it’s a good idea for you take a look at your app and update them to take advantage of the Windows Phone 7.5 features that were previously unavailable.
The Marketplace Expands by 19 Countries: When Windows Phone 7 launched, the Marketplace supported 16 countries. With the update of the Marketplace, we have included 19 new countries making it easier for your apps to reach an even larger audience.
In-App Advertising: In the past it was difficult to collect the revenue from in-app advertising using Microsoft’s Advertising Framework as it required you to provide a US non-PO box address for US tax regulations. That requirement is no longer required for Canadian developers using the Microsoft Advertising solution . This gives you a really great new option for monetizing your creations on Windows Phone.
A Change to the Bulk App Policy: One of the things that Microsoft is committed to is providing the end consumer with the best possible experience to find, download and enjoy apps and games. To ensure that experience remains extremely enjoyable, we have made some changes to our bulk app policies . In a nutshell, app publishers will be able to submit up to 10 apps in a day for certification. Likewise, publishers will limited to publishing 10 apps in a single day as well.
That’s just some of the cool stuff that’s been happening on the Windows Phone front. Excited? We certainly hope you are! So since you’re excited (and maybe have a couple of great ideas for apps that you want to build and get a free phone out of it), how do you start? Below are some steps that can get you from idea to published app!
GO DO's:
Download the Windows Phone SDK 7.1 . All the tools you need to start building apps and games are here.
Read the Microsoft Canada Windows Phone Development resource page . This page contains links to everything you need to start learning how to build amazing app and game experiences on Windows Phone.
Register as a developer on the Marketplace. Once you’ve developed your app, you’ll need to submit it to the Marketplace for certification and publication which requires you to be registered on the Marketplace (it’s a $99 annual subscription).
Build a second app or game, and submit both of your new apps/games to the Mango App Challenge !
Paul Laberge
Developer Advisor, Microsoft Canada Inc.
Wednesday, 28 September 2011
Above is a screen shot of the new CNN beta video player. The reason that you don't see any video (yet) is because I got a screen shot of it while the video was loading. It was slow.But slow loading is not my issue today. The issue is an all black screen. I have been using my laptop on the balcony all week long outdoors, and when you have an all black screen outdoors, it acts more like mirror than an all white background on a web page.
More and more people are viewing web pages on mobile devices while outdoors. It you want them to have a good User Experience, you will not use an all black screen like CNN is doing -- unless you want your web page to be used for a make-up mirror.
And yeah -- I know ... I know .... this blog is an all black screen. My excuse is that I used a Google template and this was the only one that fit my theme.
Sunday, 25 September 2011
When programming in Java, I like java.util.GregorianCalendar a lot. It makes date and time manipulation easy peasy. For example, I have an application where I have to get the current datetime and add twenty minutes. It happens in a couple of lines:GregorianCalendar gc = (GregorianCalendar) GregorianCalendar.getInstance();
gc.set(GregorianCalendar.MINUTE, +20);
Piece of cake. But when I wanted to take the manipulated time and cache it back to the database (mysql), I was stymied for a moment. The database field was a datetime entity, and for a few minutes I wondered how to convert Gregorian Calendar to DateTime.
I didn't realize the relationship between DateTime and TimeStamp, so it took me a few minutes longer to figure out. The piece of code that eventually worked was:
GregorianCalendar gc = (GregorianCalendar) GregorianCalendar.getInstance();
gc.set(GregorianCalendar.MINUTE, +20);
java.sql.Timestamp javaSqlTS = new java.sql.Timestamp(gc.getTimeInMillis());
Hope this helps someone Googling how to convert Gregorian Calendar into DateTime for SQL.
Saturday, 24 September 2011
One of the reasons that computer gaming is so popular and addictive, is that it offers some real excitement in the boring moments of a person's life. If one has a normal life, it can get pretty mundane. Playing a computer game stimulates the production of brain chemicals like dopamine and other endorphins like adrenaline. One can get used to the chemical rush produced by playing video games.So computer games will push the envelope further and further to produce larger highs and more excitement for their players (and line their pockets with the profits). The ultimate computer game is casino gambling, but that has negative social connotations and it is dangerous in the fact that the odds are stacked against the player and one can lose all of your money.
Video games will get more and more realistic, until they cross the line into reality. We have already seen that with foursquare.com. However foursquare is too much reality in the fact that it misses the instant gratification of say a computer game.
So the new genre of computer games will ultimately combine reality, excitement, suspense, competition and a bit of gambling thrown in. That is the ultimate formula. I think that I have a recipe. Thank goodness that I am a coder.
Wednesday, 21 September 2011
I just spent several hours pulling out my hair trying to escape the ampersand character in an .aspx URL with parameters. The URL was a third party URL which needed to be encoded. I was working in JSP, JavaScript, XHTML, JSF, and JSTL. It went something like this:
www.mydomain.com/login.aspx?name=Username&Password=password&accountNo=AcctNo
I constructed the string and tried to escape it with a "\". Of course, I quickly realized that it was illegal. There are only a few things that work with that escape character.
Then I tried the '& amp;' thing. That didn't work.
Then I tried the '% 26' thing. That didn't work.
I imported the URLEncoder and fed the string into that. It didn't work.
I tried using the URI constructor with the 5 input elements. I have more than 5 inputs and it kept throwing a path exception. Nothing seemed to work.
I tried most things and they didn't work.
What finally worked was the \u0026 thing.
In the JSP the URL looks like this:
String url = "www.mydomain.com/login.aspx?name=Username\u0026Password=password\u0026accountNo=AcctNo";
Hope this helps somebody.
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