I have two workstations at my office and I thought it would be nice to use one monitor, one keyboard and one mouse to switch between my two powerhouse computers: a Xeon 16-core MacPro and another 16-core Xeon HP Z800 computer.

Many months, and hours, have gone by using this contraption and I can say that I don’t think I would do this again unless I really had to.

The problem, which I found out seems to be a Windows issue, is that as soon as the computer locks out the user, it attempts to re-query for the monitor and if you happen to be on the other workstation, which is what usually happens if you have the security settings turned on, then the PC gets all freaked out.

You select the PC on the KVM and viola! … the PC is no longer viewable. When this happens to me, I have to use Remote Desktop to log into the PC and reboot it.

After a couple incidents, I learned quickly, not to have the computer lock me out while I am not logged in. It’s okay though to lock the computer or log out while you have the PC selected, just don’t do it while you are on the other computer.

There were a couple of posts on the Microsoft support site, stating that you need an Active KVM and not a passive one, which is what I have, but for my setup, no one makes an Active KVM that supports dual DVI (MS Support Site Thread).

My Mac on the other hand doesn’t seem to be suffering the same problem the PC has. Hopefully, Microsoft will fix this.

I finally bought myself a PS3 and I … Love … It!

The only games I have left for the Xbox is Halo and Gears of War. The only reason why I haven’t sold off the beige game console is because of GOW.

Now that I have the PS3… which has been a couple of weeks now, I haven’t turned on the Xbox.

You can declare the following for Visual Studio builds and the functions are overridden with templated versions that are secure:
#ifdef _MSC_VER
#define _CRT_SECURE_CPP_OVERLOAD_STANDARD_NAMES 1
#endif

This is useful if you have a C++ cross platform file where you don’t want to create macros to have one function for the Mac and the other version for Windows.

Here is a regex string I used in TextWrangler to search and replace paths in a Xcode project file… you know, the one that is inside the .xcodeproj bundle…

Search string:
\.\./\.\./development/.+/mac/macos_10\.4/dylib/

Replace with:
Whatever you like…

Oh, and if that wasn’t enough….

Now for those who are new here, or who don’t already know, I work in software development. These days, almost all types of development require some form of team work, except for the poor guys who used to work at 3D Realms that were expected to code like they were living in the 90’s.

Splitting work between team members who have the same skill set is an difficult task. The reason being is that most developers tend to have a different style of programming between one another. So when one developer encounters another developers code, they may break “Rule 0″ from the “C++ Coding Standards : Rules, Guidelines, and Best Practices” book, written by Herb Shutter and Andrei Alexandrescu.

Rule 0: Don’t sweat the small stuff
Wow! This rule is so simple… so powerful… So, why is it so hard to live by?

My guess is that for many developers perusing through code, the setup and layout of the code makes it easy, or hard, to read. So, if you are used to prefixing your pointer variables with a lower-case p and someone on your team is using plain words to describe the variable, I can understand how it hurts trying to read someone else’s code that may or may not jive with your brain. Comfy code formatting is like the cozy blue blanket for developers… Stop sucking your thumb!

Dev’ies are willing to spend the time, and shamefully submit code, that is may only be different by a couple of spaces or tabs. I will admit that I have broken this rule myself… with a big grin on my face while I’m committing such offense, but in the few cases where I have done this, it has been with code that has had it’s ownership transferred to me and I have authoritative rights to do with it as I please So there!

Now back to team-work…

Working with other team members can be tough since it means we have to give up a part of ourselves to work with others and sometimes compromise our workflow so that everyone is happy and that no one feels negated.

Likewise, the ‘OTHERS’ have to give a little to receive a little… but remember that they can’t read your mind, so, you too have to let them know how you feel and respectfully tell them your ideas. I’m not suggesting that you have a Jerry Springer like meeting where people show how they feel deep down inside when you altered their code or comments and start flinging chairs at each other. Save that for TV where you can get paid for doing that!

I’m suggesting that if something doesn’t jive, let your team know, but think before you speak… Ask yourself, was there a good reason that developer took out your code or changed your comments or decided to change the spacing? You may be surprised with the answer. And if the answer is in violation of Rule 0, then smack them over the head with official “Offenses to Coding” baseball bat! It’s both fun and theraputic

Till next time, happy batting… I mean… Happy Coding!

So, I wanted to spend a few minutes browsing some of my favorite sites. Something I haven’t done in 8 months being inundated with C++ work.

So, I figure that I can only handle maybe 20 minutes of this smell before I get too sick, being that my office is right next to the room that is getting worked on.

Well, guess what. I just discovered today, that stepwise.com is down. Where have I been? I felt sad. I actually liked that site, and now, it’s gone.

Goodbye stepwise.com. I loved you like a distant relative.

Thinking about this, if you don’t take the time to think about the comments, there is a good chance that the code below/next to/above the comments wasn’t well thought out either.