Getting Logi Info Studio To Play Nice With Git & CI/CD

A look at some basic limitations with Logi Analytics' IDE

Posted on August 28, 2016 in Coding #git #logi-analytics #ci-cd #team-city

In recent weeks I've become intimately acquainted with Logi Analytics' IDE, called Logi Info Studio. I haven't yet used it enough to have a strong sense of Logi's platform as a whole, but there are definitely two aspects of developing with Info Studio which I've found outmoded: it is neither terribly source control friendly nor very well suited for continuous integration/deployment environments. [Read More]

Installing SSL Certificates On Webfaction

A Guide For N00bs

Posted on May 19, 2016 in Recommendations #webfaction #web-hosting #ssl

Like so many other things, getting your site running over HTTPS is easy… once you know how. If you’ve never done it before, well, it’s not necessarily a straight shot from A to B. Here I describe exactly how to quickly and easily get the S into HTTPS for a site hosted on Webfaction - my preferred web host. Much of this information probably applies to other web hosts as well - but no promises there. [Read More]

New SqlConnection() Hangs When IIS Express Has Been Idle

And an entire day is lost trying to debug it

Posted on April 11, 2016 in Hacks #iis #sql #visual-studio #bug

About a week ago I was happily working away on an ASP.NET Web API project when I noticed something fishy happening. And by “fishy”, I mean incredibly, unbelievably, stupendously frustrating. When initially loaded, the application worked fine. Start the project, execute a command from Postman, get results. But after running for 8 or 10 minutes, results would suddenly stop coming back. It didn’t take long to figure out where it was failing, however why it was failing was another matter entirely. [Read More]

WordPress, you're FIRED!

I'm taking my things and moving to Hugo.

Posted on April 5, 2016 in Recommendations #wordpress #hugo #favorite-posts #blogging

I like a great many things about WordPress. It’s easy to set up. There is an overwhelming community behind it, chock full of free themes and plugins. There’s a nifty mobile app. It has a built-in commenting system. Really, for the most part, it’s great. That said, there is one thing about WordPress I’ve never particularly enjoyed. And, unfortunately, it’s something that’s rather essential to, you know, a blogging platform... [Read More]

GitHub Desktop Removing Credential Settings When Loaded

(There's a fix for that!)

Posted on March 30, 2016 in Hacks #github #git

Just the other day, git started to continuously prompt me to re-enter my GitHub credentials, despite the fact that I had repeatedly cached my credentials. Why, GitHub, why are you bothering me with this, I pondered. Turns out, GitHub desktop runs a ‘configuration sanitizer’ when it starts up because GitHub has “seen significant issues in the past with other Git clients adding invalid/bad configuration values”. Makes sense. I have, in fact, seen that happen in the past. [Read More]

XML Comment Outlining In Visual Studio 2015 'Fixed'

Introducing SquishyVS

Posted on March 17, 2016 in Hacks #csharp #visual-studio

When I look at a class file, I will frequently collapse it down to its method signatures. Maybe I want to scan the file for a particular method. Maybe I want to get an overview of what functionality the class contains. Could be any number of reasons. Ultimately it’s a quick way to minimize the noise and isolate what I really want to see. In a C# class file, the noisiest bits - easily - are the XML comments that decorate everything from the class itself to all its containing methods and properties. [Read More]

How To Remove Ads From The Skype Windows App

A Public Service Announcement

Posted on August 8, 2015 in Hacks #skype

Buy ten bucks worth of Skype credit. That’s it. Problem solved. Sure, there are tons of “free” ways to get around the ads, but all the ones I tried or read about either broke some of Skype’s functionality or blocked the ads without removing the box that contains the ads: you’re left with a large, awkward, and almost empty placeholder area that says, simply, “advertisement”. Close, but no cigar. The only reason I’m writing up this post is because it wasn’t at all clear to me whether buying a small amount of Skype credit would - in fact - remove the ads from the app. [Read More]