U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) recently granted Microsoft a patent on a “personalized version” of the sudo command with GUI. Sudo is a command that has been in use since 1980′s or even before by Unix and other operating systems to allow running other commands with elevated privileges. For one, why would Microsoft try to patent something like this? Secondly, does USPTO grant patents on anything you ask them for?

We are witnessing a time in the history of technology when there is more free (open source or otherwise) software available than anyone ever cares to know, and it’s increasing at a higher rate than anyone can even keep track of. For any application that one can conceivably imagine, chances are that there is a free alternative out there. Why in the world then a company such as Microsoft would patent tiny things such as sudo commands, especially when they “borrowed” the original idea from elsewhere anyway? On one hand we see companies like Google releasing entire programming languages into open source, and on the other hand companies like Microsoft acquiring patents on simple sudo commands… we live in truly amazing times don’t we!

Groklaw has much more detailed information on this story. You can also find the original Microsoft patent at the USPTO here.

Developer Express and Microsoft provide a new version of CodeRush licensed exclusively for C# developers working in Visual Studio. The new product is called CodeRush Xpress, and it includes a slew of useful features to boost your productivity under Visual Studio.

You can download CodeRush Xpress here.

The latest beta version of FxCop 1.36 was recently made available for download. This new version includes various features and fixes that include:

• 200+ bug fixes that reduce noise, missing analysis and rule crashes
• Support for analyzing anonymous methods and lambda expressions
• New option for skipping analysis over tool generated code
• Better support for C++/CLI and the Compact Framework
• Language ‘friendly’ API names in the UI and resolutions
• New globalization, design and usage rules
• Performance improvements that cut analysis by 2x and use half as much memory
• Documentation that is now available on MSDN

FxCop is an excellent free static code analysis tool from Microsoft that checks .NET managed code assemblies for conformance to Microsoft’s .NET Framework Design Guidelines.

To alleviate some of the pain, Microsoft finally came up with a Windows Installer Cleanup Utility, that can be used to remove all references to a given application from your system. This utility just saved me a few hours worth of work when Installer refused to uninstall a given application from my system so that I could install a newer version. Without this utility I would have had to go through and search my registry for all references to the application and remove them by manually hand. Then, if I was lucky, I would be allowed to install the newer version of the application. With this utility I removed the application from my system in seconds and painlessly installed the newer version after that.

After the popularity of Logo (Turtle Graphics) in the 80′s, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has once again come up with a new programming language for kids called Scratch. Scratch teaches kids skills necessary to become future technology professionals, such as creative thinking, clear communication, systematic analysis, iterative design, and continuous learning, while they create fun and interesting projects such as interactive stories, graphic animations, games, music, and art. Projects created with Scratch can be shared on the web with others.

In addition to home, Scratch can be used by schools, museums, community centers, or other group settings. While the tool is intended for 8 to 16-year olds, with some adult help it can definitely be used by younger children.

Scratch is available for both Windows and Mac platforms, and is available as a free download.

Since database are usually designed in development environments, migrating changes over to other environments (e.g. QA and production) is not a trivial task.  This is because SQL Server does not have any built-in tools to compare database schemas. 

There are quite a few third-party tools that would make your life easier, most notably, Red Gate’s SQL Compare (reasonably priced around $300).

At times, buying a commercial tool is not really an option, so one must resort to googling for free tools.  There are three such tools that I am aware of:

1. SQLDBDiff by SQLDBTools
   A very decent tool that comes in both freeware and shareware versions.  Freeware version is not badly crippled; only advanced features such as multi-database comparison, data content comparison, etc. are disabled.

2. Database Schema Comparison Utility
   This is a Code Project article that comes with C# source code of a schema comparison utility.  The utility itself is pretty bare-bone, but gets the job done.
3. StarInix Free Database Compare 2.0
   I have not used this tool, but from the advertised feature list, it looks pretty good.  Most notably, in addition to SQL Server, this tool works with Access and MySQL databases.

The very first thing I noticed on Live Spaces was a huge banner ad across the top of my live space home page. I thought I would be able to customize my space and either get rid of it, or move it to the bottom where it’s less distracting. Sure enough I can remove the ad, but only if I sign up for MSN Premium (read $$$).

Has Microsoft not already learnt that distracting advertising does not work? If they haven’t then when will they?

This tool is purely intelligent and simply amazing. With tools such as this there simply is no excuse for developers whose code looks all black and blue to not add some green for free!

Checkout this GhostDoc PDC demo video on Channel9.