WIT Followup in TFS

So how does a busy person keep track of work they have delegated out to people? One way is to build a query in TFS to keep track of the work items you have created and assigned out to other people.

To create a new query in TFS right mouse click on the Work Items folder in Team Explorer. The query we want is simple, you just set the Activated By = @Me.

@Me is a macro in the WIQL syntax. TFS queries use a syntax called WIQL (work item query language). You can find a nice WIQL reference guide here http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb130155(VS.80).aspx.

If anyone knows how to use the query to auto subscribe me to change alerts post a comment!

Long user-agent string breaks Fidelity NetBenefits/eWorkplace

I came upon an issue recently that I thought I would share with you in hopes that it will prevent some headaches in the future.

I recently lost my ability to login to eWorkplace and NetBenefits.  I tried several URLs netbenefits.com, 401k.com, eworkplaceservices.fidelity.com etc. all of which resulted in the following message that appeared before any login dialog.

“Unavailable

 Sorry.  This page is currently not available.  Our technicians are at work updating this section and will restore service as soon as possible.”

After a lengthy troubleshooting process I was able to determine the cause of the error message was due to the length of the User-Agent string.

 The User-Agent string is what a browser sends to a server so the server can determine what browser you are using, operating system etc.  Here is a sample User-Agent string.

 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; SV1; .NET CLR 1.1.4322; .NET CLR 1.0.3705; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.0.04506.30; MS-RTC LM 8; MS-RTC S; .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648; .NET CLR 3.5.21022; .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; InfoPath.1)

 I was finally able to reach someone knowledgeable of the problem at Fidelity Electronic Support who informed me the User-Agent string could not exceed 256 characters.  They were aware of the problem and a fix was on their to do list but with a very low priority.

Fortunately, it is easy to shorten the length of the User-Agent string.  Simply delete one of the string values located here in the registry HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\5.0\User Agent\Post Platform.

Unfortunately, if you delete one of these values you can break something else.  For example, if you delete MS-RTC LM 8 from my sample User-Agent string you will break Live Meeting 8 since that is a value Live Meeting looks for in the User-Agent string. 

As you can see it’s a bit of a catch 22!

Here is a MSDN article I found that explains User-Agent strings in more detail.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms537503.aspx

Import XML to SQL 2005 Using SSIS

I ran into a problem at work when trying to import an XML document to SQL 2005.  The XML Source in SSIS was splitting my XML document into several outputs.  This article helped me figure out how to join them back together again.

http://blogs.msdn.com/mattm/archive/2007/12/11/using-xml-source.aspx

Metered Internet

I’ve found some news articles that scare me. According to several articles that can be found by searching for “metered internet” on Google some ISPs are going to start not only charging you for the speed of your internet connection but the amount of data in which you can download in a month. Some of the plans mentioned in the articles have a 5gb cap with a $1 per gb charge if you exceed the cap.

Folks, this is bad, real bad. 5gb or whatever the cap is (40gb is the highest cap I’ve seen mentioned) will go by real quick. The ISPs say that subscribers downloading illegal music or movies from file sharing services is clogging their network and that any legitimate browsing would be far below the caps. This simply is not true. There are several things that an average user can do legally and not excessively that could cause them to go over the caps I’ve seen mentioned. They include but are not limited to VOIP services like Vonage, watching TV shows online from networks such as ABC, downloading music and renting movies from iTunes, watching YouTube, telecommuters that dial into their corporate VPN…I can go on for hours.

This could completely kill innovation on the web. Movie downloads seem to be a viable delivery method for media in the next few years. Netflix recently announced a box you can hook to your TV and watch movies that are downloaded from the net. Apple of course has Apple TV and recently added a feature that allows you to rent movies from iTunes. If the internet is metered your $4 iTunes movie rental could turn into almost $10 once you add on the $1 per gb ISPs want to charge.

What makes this worse is they not only count downloads against your cap but uploads. TCP/IP which is the protocol used on the internet has overhead. When you download a file, your computer is constantly sending acknowledgement packets to the sender of the data to confirm you got the packets they sent. This means that a 1mb file might cause .25mb to be uploaded so you would be charged for 1.25mb instead of 1mb.

Another major issue is you’ll be charged for ads. When you visit a page and all of those ad videos start playing that will count against your monthly cap too. This is absolutely insane!

There has to be a better way to maintain network integrity without metering internet access. I would almost rather see ISPs shaping traffic for certain programs like file sharing software than putting caps on downloads.

The Cuckoo’s Egg

I started reading a book last night called The Cuckoo’s Egg by Cliff Stoll.  I’m not a huge reader but this book peaked my interest. 

It is a true story about a regular guy that was sent on a quest by his management at UC Berkeley to determine the cause of a $0.75 difference between two accounting reports for some mainframes.  This is not exactly the type of job that would interest even an intern programmer but Cliff set off to find the problem. 

During his research he uncovered a spy ring that was using Berkeley’s mainframes to gain access to milnet (which was a military network back in the early days of the Internet) that was backed by drugs and the KGB.

I’m only 1/4 of the way in but this book is already one of my favorites.  I recommend every IT person read this book.  It definitely helps you think about the importance of security since the hacker gained access to all of this through a trivial GNU Emacs bug.

First Real Post

First, welcome to my blog.  This is one of those things that I have been putting off for years.  I work in the information technology field so it was becoming a bit embarrasing that I hadn’t joined the 21st century! 

I make no promises other than this site will be my spot to hopefully post some information that will at some point be useful to someone.  I primarily think that I will post about interesting technology issues that I come across at work and how to resolve them…Hey what good would any site be without some information that a brainless programmer can google and find!  So yes, I am contributing to the world of brainless programmers!

On the same note since I make no promises about this site I’m sure you’ll have to endure the occasional rant.  Please bear with me I promise I won’t do it often!

Hello World! (Part II)

I see wordpress created a lovely first blog post for me…I think since I’m a programmer and every good programmer starts learning a new technology by a “Hello World” application I’ll leave it

Hello world!

Welcome to WordPress.com. This is your first post. Edit or delete it and start blogging!