Got Samsung Update for Windows Phone 7

Posted by Valeriu Caraulean in wp7 on August 5, 2011

I’ve been looking how people are getting it. But after my adventures with the latest update from Microsoft I have not been rushing getting it, just waiting quietly for delivery. It  came today.

Before installing it phone’s components where at:

  • OS version: 7.0.7392.0
  • Firmware revision number: 2424.10.10.6
  • Hardware revision number: 3.15.0.4
  • Radio software version: 2424.10.10.6
  • Radio hardware version: 0.0.0.800
  • Bootloader version: 4.10.1.9
  • Chip SOC version: 0.36.2.0

After installation (27 minutes, including backup of ~7Gb of data) I’ve got next components updated:

  • Firmware revision number: 2424.11.2.3
  • Radio software version: 2424.11.2.2
  • Bootloader version: 5.2.1.4

Works ok. Oh, the only visible change: it changed my “wallpaper” – instead of the old prison of Annecy, I got the some sand dunes. Mmm, a good reason to visit Annecy this weekend I think…

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Why Java always feels unnatural to Windows?

Posted by Valeriu Caraulean in General on July 3, 2011

I’m looking now at Java’s update application that wants to offer me latest version of it:

  • the progress dialog has fonts remembering about the times of Windows 95
  • it’s impossible to move the dialog window
  • clicking on close button has no effect on it neither
  • after freezing 30 seconds or so it gives me a message box that I’ve cancelled operation and shows a URL with ~30 characters that I can’t click.

Pathetic experience.

I’m not about Java on servers and in the Enterprise, nor about the language. Why the Windows runtime/installers cannot be polished enough so that when it happens to meet the user face-to-face he wouldn’t run scared?

I have had similar “unnatural” feelings when I’ve started using FreeMind, a mind mapping software. It’s the only Java application I remember on my PCs. It works and gets job done. But it looks awful.

Anybody have a good example of any Java application that looks OK in Windows?

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While packing for vacation, Kindle shouldn’t be forgotten

Posted by Valeriu Caraulean in General on June 23, 2011

Loaded fresh stuff from Amazon:

Waiting in the queue, if previous items will be done or I’ll get bored by book about investments:

And have yet to finish the Leadership and Self-Deception: Getting out of the Box, a great reading so far…

I hope it will be enough to keep myself entertained and get some new things to explore…

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Integration of Caliburn.Micro and Telerik’s Silverlight controls

Posted by Valeriu Caraulean in Community, Silverlight, Tools on June 5, 2011

I’ve wrote already about how to use Telerik’s RadTabControl with Caliburn.Micro and profit from Caliburn’s conventions. That post is still getting considerable attention in my blog and also there are people are asking in Caliburn’s discussion list about such kind of integration. So, I’ve decided to spend some of my time and provide a more coherent experience in this domain. Rob Eisenberg suggested to create a dedicated project for it and, why not, to create a NuGet package. That sounded very interesting for me as it would allow me to scratch another itch – the NuGet package manager. We’ve been using it in our projects with great success but I have never explored the part with creation and publication of packages.

How do you get it

Caliburn.Micro.Telerik source code on GitHub. Feel free to pull the code & use only parts you need. There are two main classes, you can copy&paste them in your projects. If you want to contribute, I’d appreciate a push request with new conventions, better code samples or bug fixes. Report issues if you’ve found any…

Caliburn.Micro.Telerik as a NuGet package. “Add  Library Package Reference …” from Visual Studio & start using it. My package has a dependency on Caliburn.Micro.1.1.0 so you can just reference it and Caliburn will be pulled in automatically.

What’s in

First of all, conventions. I’ve put inside conventions we’ve been using in our projects and plan to add more. So far there are conventions for:

  • RadTabControl
  • RadBusyIndicator
  • RadDateTimePicker (affects also RadTimePicker and RadDatePicker)

Then you have a basic implementation of IWindowManager, the RadWindowManager class. Nothing fancy, pretty basic stuff. And I plan to extend it to offer also an unified interface to Telerik’s custom dialogs like Confirm, Alert and Prompt.

And third, there are two sample projects, one showing how to use conventions and other makes use of RadWindowManager.

How to use conventions

Add a line in your Bootstrapper’s Configure() method to enable conventions:

public class AppBootstrapper : Bootstrapper<IShell>
{
   protected override voidConfigure() {
        // …

        TelerikConventions.Install();
    }

Check it out and let me know if you found it useful or how it’s possible to make it better…

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Quick tip: Configure TeamCity 6.5 to run a personal build when you’ve committed to a branch

Posted by Valeriu Caraulean in Tools on May 31, 2011

This feature is well enough to upgrade your TeamCity to latest 6.5. Of course, if you’re using a DVCS (Git or Mercurial) and use feature branches. As feature branches can be active for a longer time and last few dozens of commits, you want to plug that branch into your Continous Integration process. That’s for sure…

Feature description by JetBrains:

Remote run on changes in DVCSs branches: New build trigger added that watches for commits into Git or Mercurial branches and adds personal build to the build queue when commit detected.

It took me some time to find how it can be enabled. Finally found it in documentation. The trick is – it’s a build trigger. Just add a new trigger, called Branch Remote Run Trigger and enable it.

You can specify a pattern that will be used to select which branches will be picked up.  I’ve specified “*” because I wanted that every branch to be continuously built & tested.

But you you have really long-living branches I would suggest a separate build for it however…

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Quick tip: if Git can’t find your global config…

Posted by Valeriu Caraulean in Tools on May 25, 2011

If you’ve put (or want to put) your .gitconfig in your home directory (C:\Users\username\) and git cannot find it you may try to add a user variable called HOME and set it to %USERPROFILE%.

See screenshot for details:

image

Useful commands:

git config --global -l
git config --global –e

First will show your global configuration file, second will try open it to edit.

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New day, new adventures – Samsung Omnia 7 and 7392 update for WP7

Posted by Valeriu Caraulean in wp7 on May 18, 2011

I’ve been glad to see that Microsoft started again rolling out the 7392 update for Omnia 7. We, geeks, are loving updates. It gets us more stability and new features. And bugs, sometimes…

The 7392 is a minor one, it should fix some issues with security certificates. It’s not critical, but you’ll have to install it in order to get all next updates.

When MS announced that he resumes rolling this update they also mentioned that “a small number of people … might have trouble …”. By Murphy’s law I’ve landed in that small group that’s having troubles. How it was:

  • Zune said it has an update for my phone.
  • Zune is trying to install update but can’t move past “rebooting” stage. No probs, Microsoft warned about it an provided a workaround.
  • Installed the tool from Samsung, following instructions how to enter the phone in Download Mode.
  • The phone is not entering in Download Mode, so Samsung’s tool cannot update the firmware so then Zune can install 7392 update.
  • The only option to be tried is, as suggested by the tool and MS’s guide, is to contact Samsung Service Center.

After googling around I’ve found that Omnia 7 phones with bootloader version 4.10.1.9 cannot enter in Download Mode by pressing VOLUMEUP + CAMERA keys. It’s disabled in this version.

Looking further I’ve found that I have 2 options to get this update (and, consequently all next updates that will be rolled from now on):

  • Contact Samsung’s Service Center. The recommended way. This probably will mean that you have to send your phone somewhere in order to get it serviced. Will call them to see how much time will take that, but looks it’s not an option for me.
  • Tweak the hardware to enter Download Mode. The phones that can’t enter this mode by with known key combination can be forced to to it using a special (modified) PC connection cable or a Mini-USB dongle attached to the phone. Search Ebay for “Samsung Galaxy S Download Mode USB jig”, you’ll get the idea. 8$ + shipping. Plugging in this dongle will set the phone to Download Mode and you’ll be able to run Samsung’s utility to update the phone. Or you’ll be able to flash a new ROM for device. See Omnia 7 wiki on xds-developers for details about phone and flashing.

Second options isn’t a recommended way to do it. You can kill your phone. Do it at your own risk. But most probably that’s what I’ll be trying to do, because I don’t have any willing to send my phone to a service center even for few days let alone for few weeks.

Update 01/06/2011:

As I’ve received today the USB jig that I’ve mentioned earlier, this is the follow up.

Switched phone off, plugged in the jig & wait for Download Mode to appear on the screen, pulled it out then connected to the PC. Samsung’s tool detected the phone and offered to update my firmware. Less than a minute later it congratulates with a successful update and rebooted the phone.

After reboot Zune started and offered to install the 7.0.7392 update. Accepted.

It passed successfully the glorious “rebooting” stage and after doing the backup my phone was successfully updated to latest Windows Phone OS. Now waiting for Mango…

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My ASP.NET MVC action plan; starting today…

Posted by Valeriu Caraulean in ASP.NET MVC on May 16, 2011

While reviewing my current skills I’ve found (again) that my professional career is seriously lacking experience in Web Development. I’ve been too much in WinForms/WPF/Silverlight camp for user-facing technologies. While I’ve been using IIS to host WCF, writing HTML for mgithub site and having some other Web-related knowledge/skills; I’m seriously lacking experience in real Web development. 

It’s time to get  more consistent knowledge in this area. How I’m planning it:

  • Get an introduction to MVC 3. I’ll be watching the “ASP.NET MVC 3 Training” course that is conveniently offered for free by Microsoft and Pluralsight.
  • Dissect one real MVC3 app. Most probably it will be the RacoonBlog by Ayende and co. Will scratch yet another itch here, my RavenDB interest. I’m really curious to see also how RavenDB works in real-world applications.
  • Contribute to an OSS project. That will be easy. There are plenty of OSS projects that are accepting contributions and will be happy to receive a bug fix or new feature. Probably it will be the FunnelWeb blog engine. When I asked  @paulstovell if his blog is notifying by email about new comments, he said “@vcaraulean not yet, but feel free to send us a pull request”. I will probably consider it as an invitation…

No advanced JavaScript at this stage, no Ruby…

The goal is to become confident with ASP.NET programming model, be able to easily read & write code and use the new Razor syntax. Timeline – 3-4 weeks of my spare time and weekends…

Any references to great learning resources are welcome. Also, will appreciate any links to projects worth studying and that will help learning.

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Me developer–“I’m done”; me designer–“wait a minute…”

Posted by Valeriu Caraulean in Design, Development on May 6, 2011

As most of developers working in a small teams or projects I have to work on UI. Should it be a new screen, complete feature with some UI interactions or just a fix of some font/alignment/style issues.

When you’re in “developer mode” criteria for “done” is more or less precise: tests are green, code is OK and metrics (if you have some) are acceptable.

Then I have to do some UI work and when I wear my Designer hat it gets difficult to define “done” criteria. We can easily appreciate “functional” quality of one particular screen. But it’s Design and Usability values are more difficult to formalize. You can check some UI Guidelines, you can show your work to a stakeholder or client. They both will say it’s OK. Then you’re improving it by grouping better screen’s content. They again say “it’s OK”. You’re checking alignments, highlight frequently used commands and do subtle color changes to application’s color set. And again, “it’s OK”.

Is it better than before? Definitely. Is it done? Well … If you’re at your “it’s good enough” point, you probably will stop. Until next time…

To some degree, this tendency towards perfection it’s applicable to development too. A developer can (almost) infinitely polish, optimize & refactor existing code. The code will be better. Will it be observable by final user? Less likely (unless it’s a performance issue). And this is the difference with designer’s work: any change will potentially be appreciated by end-user.

That’s why I think that impact of Design and Usability on any software product is more important that it’s internal beauty.

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Continuous Delivery

Posted by Valeriu Caraulean in Uncategorized on May 6, 2011

What is Continuous Delivery? For me so far it is:

From the blog post mentioned earlier:

… if your codebase uses the big ball of mud pattern …

Quite popular pattern, I would say…

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