I know the answer (it's 42)
A blog on coding, .NET, .NET Compact Framework and life in general....
It's is easy to claim that the world won't get destroyed today
The clock is ticking and the Large Hadron Collider in Cern is going to get switched on today...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 09/09/2008
Obsession with desktop continues
This is my new office setup. I have been pushing around a lot of code lately and felt I needed more...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 08/21/2008
Back to Basic: Using a System.Threading.Interlocked is a great idea
I just saw some code which actually takes a lock to do a simple set operation. This is bad because...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 08/18/2008
String equality
akutz has one of the most detailed post on string interning and equality comparison performance...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 07/21/2008
Writing exception handlers as separate methods may prove to be a good idea
Let us consider a scenario where you catch some exception and in the exception handler do some...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 07/10/2008
Microsoft Roundtable
Our conference rooms have been fitted with this really weird looking device (click to enlarge). I...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 07/09/2008
Do namespace using directives affect Assembly Loading?
The simple answer is no, the inquisitive reader can read on :) Close to 2 year back I had posted...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 07/08/2008
Auto generating Code Review Email for TFS
We use a small command line tool called crmail to auto-generate code review email from shelveset. I...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 07/07/2008
How does the .NET CF handle null reference
What happens when we have code as bellow class B { public virtual void Virt(){...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 07/04/2008
C# generates virtual calls to non-virtual methods as well
Sometime back I had posted about a case where non-virtual calls are used for virtual methods and...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 07/03/2008
Baby smash
What is the common thing between every programmer dad/mom? The moment they get onto a new UI...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 06/19/2008
Stylecop has been released
Microsoft released the internal tool StyleCop to public under the fancy yet boring name of Microsoft...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 05/24/2008
Building Scriptable Applications by hosting JScript
If you have played around with large applications, I'm sure you have been intrigued how they have...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 05/22/2008
Model, View, Controller
These days the whole world is abuzz with the Model, View, Controller (MVC) architecture. This is not...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 05/20/2008
You need to be careful about how you use count in for-loops
Lets consider the following code MyCollection myCol = new MyCollection(); myCol.AddRange(new int[] {...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 05/17/2008
Alternatives to XML
Though not as much as the Jeff Atwood I don't like overuse of XML as well. In our last project we...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 05/13/2008
What is the similarity between Windows and Textile Industry
...they both use threads and fibers :) Most people are aware of processes and threads. Windows...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 05/13/2008
My workstation layout
Our team just moved to a new building in Microsoft India campus. A lot of people were going around...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 05/06/2008
Moving blogs to https://geekgyan.blogspot.com/
It's been a drag maintaining two blogs for some time now. So going forward I'll shift to...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 05/04/2008
Forcing a Garbage Collection is not a good idea
Someone asked on a DL about when to force a GC using GC.Collect. This has been answered by...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 05/01/2008
Ensuring only one instance of an application can be run and then breaking that approach
A question posted on a DL was as follows "I have an application that allows only one instance on the...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 05/01/2008
Trivia: How does CLR create an OutOfMemoryException
When the system goes out of memory a OutOfMemoryException is thrown. Similarly for stack...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 04/30/2008
When does the .NET Compact Framework Garbage Collector run
Other than the exact when part this post applies equally for the desktop portion. Disclaimer: This...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 04/29/2008
Which end of the egg do you crack. Putting it differently, what is your Endianess
Few people seem to know that the word Endianess comes from Gullivers travels. In Gulliver's travel...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 04/17/2008
International Mother Language Day is back and being celebrated with a lunar eclipse
For starters it doesn't include C++ or C#, even though your mom codes in it :) ... A lot of people...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 02/21/2008
Linked on the msdn forum for all the wrong reasons
Someone saw a message in their Team Foundation Server history which was "Edited by God" and asked...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 02/05/2008
African music anyone?
For the last couple of days a vast majority of the movie that I'm seeing is somehow landing in...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 02/04/2008
Variable Parameter passing in C#
Sometime back I posted about variable parameters in Ruby. C# also supports methods that accepts...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 01/23/2008
The differences between int[,] and int[][]
A friend asked me the differences between the two. Here goes the answer int[,] This represents a two...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 01/18/2008
Expanding and compressing in Ruby Method calls
One of the things I didn't like in Ruby at all is the support for method overloading. You have no...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 01/16/2008
Learn a new dynamic or functional language every year
Specially for folks using the C* languages (C/C++/C#) and Java it's very important to learn...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 01/15/2008
Bar Charts on the console
I work on the UI action recorder and it has a strict performance requirement. The tool dumps the...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 12/14/2007
Support for range in programming languages
The .NET platform and the languages on top of it have limited or no support for range of values....
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 12/14/2007
Fun Windows Home Server site
Windows Home Server team has a nice light-hearted site up at https://www.stayathomeserver.com/. All...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 12/05/2007
Ravenous Bugblatter beast on Indian roads
From the HitchHiker's Guide to the Galaxy. "The Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal is a creature...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 11/30/2007
Newbie Question: How do I figure out the inheritance chain of a type
I got this question from someone just starting out on the .NET platform. He is used to hit F12 (go...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 11/30/2007
How do you name your computer
Windows gives examples of "Kitchen Computer" or "Mary's Computer" for setting the name of a computer...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 11/29/2007
Woohoo - Rosario November CTP is out...
...and I can finally talk about what I'm working on for the last so many months. First things first,...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 11/28/2007
True object oriented language
Today I was spreading the goodness of Ruby and why I love it so much (and you can expect multiple...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 11/22/2007
All programming languages evolve towards Lisp
In an internal DL people were debating what all should be included in the next version of C#. One of...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 11/21/2007
Lack of Aspect Oriented Programming support in .NET
I was preparing for a presentation on Aspect Oriented Programming and I started re-looking for the...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 11/20/2007
The WOW factor in software
I care a lot about the nice nifty features that takes a software from being just a good software to...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 11/19/2007
Don't forget to lock your Computer
So Amit pointed me to this post on Coding Horror (I didn't get time to read any of the feeds for the...
Author: Abhinaba Basu [MSFT] Date: 11/15/2007