Windows 10 (and 7) Built-In MD5 Checksum Calculator

I recently paved my main development workstation after it started misbehaving (slow start up, some applications not opening consistently etc) and am trying to be careful about what I install on it going forward.

Previously I had all manner of applications, games (including Steam) and utilities installed and the chances of finding what was causing the problems was pretty remote. There could of course be multiple culprits.

Today I needed to install MySQL Workbench so I headed off to download it and noticed the MD5 checksum beneath the link. Now, I don’t always check these and maybe this is why my workstation ended up in a bit of a mess. But with a view to keeping this system as clean as I can I decided to make a point going forward of checking these checksums when they are available.

Online Tool of the Month: .NET Fiddle

I frequently find myself spinning up Visual Studio to create a simple Console Application just to hack out a small piece of functionality. In an attempt to not adversely affect the code I’m actually working on or having to step through the application to the required point, I create a simple project to quickly try things out.

Book Review (of sorts): The Complete Software Developer’s Career Guide – John Sonmez

I’ve been following John Sonmez via his Simple Programmer site for a few years now and have found his approach to be very refreshing. He doesn’t go down the ‘warm and fuzzy – it will all be fine’ road, oh no!

John has a no BS approach which leaves you in no doubt that if you want to succeed in your career as a Software Developer (or anything come to think of it) then it will take hard work and dedication on your part – it won’t just happen.

Now, we all read technical books (or blogs) on a pretty regular basis in an effort to keep up with the ever changing world of technology, but what about those softer skills? Would you really buy a general ‘self help’ book? I mean, Software Developers are special right!?

I have previously read John’s first book, Soft Skills, which I found very enlightening, so when I received an email from John asking if I wanted to read a preview of his new book, The Complete Software Developer’s Career Guide, I hit the reply button straight away. [John contacted a number of his subscribers with the same request – I’m not special in that regard 😉 ].

Stackify Prefix – first thoughts

Listening to one of my favorite podcast (.Net Rocks) I heard a plug for the Stackify Prefix tool which claims to help the developer fix problems before anyone else sees them – a bold claim. Well as I am currently working on a greenfield development project I decided to give is a whirl – it’s free after all so why not.

Now I was not expecting to find too much wrong with the application and thankfully I was right – but I was getting errors.

Why don’t users "read the manual"?

In a previous post I had a little rant about some reviews I’d received from users of the FillLPG Android application. This was as a result of a handful of 1 star reviews from users who I believe had missed the point of the app.

You see, the application itself is just a portal into the FillLPG website – a website I do not control. The data provided by the website is maintained by a community of users who use the site and the app to add new stations, remove stations and update prices.

The problem is that users of the app have a place to sound off and express their displeasure – the Google Play Store. By leaving a 1 star review and the most basic of justifications for it (see previous rant) they get it off their chest and move on.