Kevin Dente's Blog

The AlphaImageLoader filter, which is used for rendering transparent PNGs in IE, seems to play some funny games with URLs. I'm running into a problem with a URL that contains a “+” sign. I'm using the JavaScript encodeURIComponent function, which converts the “+” into a %2B. However, for some reason when the HTTP request gets spit of the other end of the filter, it gets converted back into a + character (as shown by ieHttpHeaders), and ends up munged on the other end in ASP.NET. Other encoded characters, like spaces (%20) work fine. If I use a regular IMG tag instead of the filter, it works fine (except, of course, no transparency).

After mucking around in the badness that is the IE favorites system, I'm lefting wondering if there's hope for the future. Will IE use WinFS in Longhorn for storing favorites? Will we finally get searchable metadata for favorites? For the most part of I've given up on using favorites, relying on my googability for re-finding sites when I need them. Generally this works - until I realize that the only key words for identifying the site are too generic to be useful in Google. Then I long for superior bookmark system of that technical tour-de-force Netscape 2.0.

Edmunds.com sent a reporter in undercover to work as a car sales person, and wrote a story about it. Interesting stuff.

Am I the only one that has issues with the way web.config is implemented in ASP.NET web apps and web services? The idea of a central, extensible XML config file that automatically detects changes is a great one. But the fact that ASP.NET restarts the application any time the file changes - isn't that a little heavy handed? I realize that it tries to handle the restart as gracefully as possible, spinning up a new instance of the application while allowing the old one to die out after it processes any pending requests. But restarting the application has a couple of nasty effects - namely, the application loses its cache and in-memory session state. In my case, the web service that I work on stores a bunch of data in cache that can be expensive to fetch. Dumping the cache can have a significant performance impact as the server rebuilds it.

Don Box is writing his samples in VB these days. Atonement for his PDC transgressions?

I predict that Avalon will be a smashing success with developers. Why? Because XAML is so darn fun to say. Zaml. Just kind of rolls off the tongue, doesn't it? Coupled with its partner in crime - BAML - it's got a one-two punch that just can't miss. Way more fun to say than SVG. Or XUL. Yep, best technology name since SCSI.

From Tim Sneath's blog entry about new C# features in Whidbey

All I can say is - wow. ScottGu has already answered all of my questions. Unbelievably cool. Gee, who needs the PDC? Just kidding. Even cooler is that the answers to just about all of the questions are “yes, we're doing that”. They seem to be addressing pretty much every limitation that I've encountered doing server control development. Did I mention wow?