David Grey's Blog

Laying on the Style!

David — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 09:54:50 GMT

The .NET development landscape is awash with some fantastic tools. Visual Studio itself includes a wide range of powerful tools but there are some great free and commercial third-party tools available, including some from Microsoft themselves. One I added...(read more)

Give voice to your suggestions and tell us what you think

David — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 19:50:30 GMT

When I get the chance I listen to a broad range of IT-related podcasts. Just recently I've been catching up on some of Scott Hanselman's Hanselminutes podcasts. In one of the recent episodes I was intrigued to hear about User Voice , an online...(read more)

The future is Red...

David — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 08:38:01 GMT

I learnt yesterday that Lutz Roeder, who produces the Reflector tool for .NET, has decided that it is time to move on to other things and is ceasing further development on Reflector. If you're a serious .NET developer then you'll already know...(read more)

Take care of yourself, take care of the environment

David — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 22:04:08 GMT

I came across an interesting post on Green Blog yesterday which postulated that the reason why most people don't care about the environment is because they don't care about themselves. It went on to suggest that they also don't take responsibility...(read more)

Towards Carbon Neutral Computing

David — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 19:34:19 GMT

For many years now software companies have been engaged in the practice of dogfooding , actively using their own products to convey their confidence in them. I was interested to read yesterday that the UK Government is dogfooding its own IT carbon reduction...(read more)

Where did my day go? Oh, wait... I've been trying to copy files with MSBuild

David — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 18:10:54 GMT

I've spent most of my day today trying to copy some files from one location to another using MSBuild. This is something I've done plenty of times before, but in this case I was trying to do something other than just copy an entire directory of...(read more)

The ethics of economic success?

David — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 20:46:10 GMT

Modern business, at least in the Western economies, is predicated on continued economic growth and returns for shareholders which often results in the the ability to generate profits being viewed as the only indicator of success. I may be odd, but I've...(read more)

Firefox, please let me make my own decisions

David — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 20:49:54 GMT

I finally got around to downloading and installing Firefox 3 today and on first inspection it does some to have a better look and feel and some nice improvement over version 2. One thing I wasn't impressed with though was the installation process...(read more)

McConnell on Software Professionalism

David — Wed, 28 May 2008 11:21:00 GMT

It's half term holidays which is giving me a break from my normally hectic schedule for some much needed family time. It's also a good opportunity to catch up on some reading and I've just finished reading Steve McConnell's Professional...(read more)

The World is Going Green

David — Fri, 23 May 2008 16:29:01 GMT

Not in the environmental sense unfortunately but in the literal sense. Why so? I had reason to be doing a lot of web surfing yesterday and couldn't help noticing how many of the sites had logos, buttons, graphics and images in various shades of green...(read more)

A Noteworthy Day

David — Thu, 22 May 2008 07:38:03 GMT

Around 7:50am today something unusual and noteworthy occurred. The issue of Peak Oil got an airing on Radio 4's Today programme. Many people are unaware of or unwilling to talk about Peak Oil, the point at which the world's oil supplies start...(read more)

Powerdown Energy Saving Software - new version released

David — Mon, 12 May 2008 19:22:29 GMT

I am delighted to announce that we have today released an updated version of our Powerdown Energy Saving Software for Windows systems. Powerdown helps you reduce carbon emissions, minimise energy use and maximise cost savings by controlling the power...(read more)

Vista SP1 installation failing with file permission errors

David — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 18:52:20 GMT

One of my colleagues asked me today if I had any experience of installing Service Pack 1 on a 64-bit Vista machine. He is having great difficulty getting it to install; about half-way through the process the installation fails with a file permissions...(read more)

We're not addicted - we can stop any time we like

David — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 12:51:44 GMT

In some ways the current strike at the Grangemouth Oil Refinery provides an interesting insight into how ordinary individuals will deal with peak oil and the future lack of oil supplies. The refinery is only scheduled to be shut for two days yet the public...(read more)

A Sad Loss

David — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 19:39:56 GMT

I was deeply saddened today to hear of the passing of Humphrey Lyttelton, renowned jazz trumpeter and broadcaster. I've spent many happy hours listening to Humph on the radio, primarily in his role as chairman of I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue...(read more)