The Wiert Corner – irregular stream of stuff

Jeroen W. Pluimers on .NET, C#, Delphi, databases, and personal interests

  • My badges

    Mastodon

  • Twitter Updates

  • My Flickr Stream

    20140508-Delphi-2007--Project-Options--Cannot-Edit-Application-Title-HelpFile-Icon-Theming20140430-Fiddler-Filter-Actions-Button-Run-Filterset-now20140424-VMware-Fusion-6.0.3.-no-reclaimable
    More Photos

  • Pages

  • All categories

  • Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

    Join 1,839 other subscribers

Archive for the ‘Development’ Category

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »

On Epsilon, MachineEpsilon, and relative differences – via: I was wondering, that what is the closest value to the Zero floating point can have – G+

Posted by jpluimers on 2015/10/07

A long time ago, there was an interesting discussion here: I was wondering, that what is the closest value to the Zero floating point can have.

Recently I needed to do some calculations on series where getting close to zero could become a problem.

  • Math seems to have an Epsilon of 1E-12.
  • Sytem.Types has Epsilon of 1E-30 and Epsilon2 of 1E-40.
  • XE4+ FMX has IsEssentiallyZero and IsNotEssentiallyZero for Single values.

In practice it depends a lot on what you are doing. Sometimes absolute Epsilons are best, but at other times relative difference is much more applicable.

Then there is also a Machine Epsilon: a way to derive an Epsilon from a data type that works in all languages and platforms.

–jeroen

Posted in .NET, Algorithms, C, C#, C++, Delphi, Development, Floating point handling, Software Development | 1 Comment »

Get the path to the most recent msbuild.exe from the registry.

Posted by jpluimers on 2015/10/06

Get the path to the most recent msbuild.exe from the registry:


@echo off
:: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/328017/path-to-msbuild
:: http://www.csharp411.com/where-to-find-msbuild-exe/
:: http://timrayburn.net/blog/visual-studio-2013-and-msbuild/
:: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/visualstudio/archive/2013/07/24/msbuild-is-now-part-of-visual-studio.aspx
setlocal
:vswhereModernTry
:: https://github.com/Microsoft/vswhere/wiki/Find-MSBuild
:: Normal output example of `vswhere -legacy -latest -property installationPath` has no trailing back-slash:
:: `C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 14.0\`
for /f "usebackq tokens=*" %%i in (`vswhere -latest -products * -requires Microsoft.Component.MSBuild -property installationPath`) do (
set InstallDir=%%i
)
:: without ENABLEEXTENSIONS, %InstallDir% is only available outside the above loop.
for %%v in (15.0, 14.0) do (
if exist "%InstallDir%\MSBuild\%%v\Bin\MSBuild.exe" (
set msBuildExe="%InstallDir%\MSBuild\%%v\Bin\MSBuild.exe"
goto :finish
)
)
:manualTry
:: order of the versions is important: get the most recent one
for %%v in (14.0, 12.0, 4.0, 3.5, 2.0) do (
for /f "usebackq tokens=2* delims= " %%c in (`reg query "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSBuild\ToolsVersions\%%v" /v MSBuildToolsPath`) do (
set msBuildExe="%%dMSBuild.exe"
goto :finish
)
)
:vswhereLegacyTry
:: -legacy is not compatible with -products or -requires
:: note there is no Visual Studio 13.0 (just like there is no Office 13.0) likely because USA superstition.
:: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Visual_Studio#History
:: msbuild was introduced in Visual Studio 8.0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MSBuild#History
:: Legacy output example of `vswhere -legacy -latest -property installationPath` has trailing back-slash:
:: `C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 14.0\`
for /f "usebackq tokens=*" %%i in (`vswhere -legacy -latest -property installationPath`) do (
set InstallDir=%%i
)
:: without ENABLEEXTENSIONS, %InstallDir% is only available outside the above loop.
for %%v in (14.0, 12.0, 11.0, 10.0, 9.0, 8.0) do (
if exist "%InstallDir%MSBuild\%%v\Bin\MSBuild.exe" (
set msBuildExe="%InstallDir%MSBuild\%%v\Bin\MSBuild.exe"
goto :finish
)
)
:: nothing found
:finish
endlocal & if not [%msBuildExe%]==[] if exist %msBuildExe% ( echo %msBuildExe% )

view raw

get-msbuildExe-path.bat

hosted with ❤ by GitHub


for /f "usebackq tokens=*" %%c in (`"%~dp0get-msbuildExe-path.bat"`) do (
call %%c %*
)

view raw

run-msbuild.bat

hosted with ❤ by GitHub

With help from:

Note

This needs adoption for Visual Studio 2017 (15.0) and up; see the comments at the above gist:

lextm commented on Mar 9, 2017 • 

Note that 15.0 (in VS2017) no longer registers itself at this registry key location, so this trick won’t simply work. vswhere is now recommended to locate MSBuild 15,

https://github.com/Microsoft/vswhere

n9 commented on May 17, 2017

Be sure to call vswhere -products * to get standalone installation of BuildTools. (See Microsoft/vswhere#61.)

–jeroen

Posted in .NET, .NET 2.0, .NET 3.0, .NET 3.5, .NET 4.0, .NET 4.5, C#, C# 2.0, C# 3.0, C# 4.0, C# 5.0, C# 6 (Roslyn), Delphi, Delphi 10 Seattle, Delphi 2007, Delphi 2009, Delphi 2010, Delphi XE, Delphi XE2, Delphi XE3, Delphi XE4, Delphi XE5, Delphi XE6, Delphi XE7, Delphi XE8, Development, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

NUnit XSD for verification and XML to HTML conversion

Posted by jpluimers on 2015/10/01

Of course NUnit will emit NUnit compatible XML, but other tools do too.

To verify if such XML is indeed compliant to the NUnit standard, there is an XML Schema for it which – at the time of writing – the latest version was here:

http://www.nunit.org/docs/2.6.4/files/Results.xsd

Many CI tools map the resulting XML into some form of output. To get HTML output, XSLT is a logical choice, but there are other means too. Here are a few links to get started converting the output:

–jeroen

Posted in Agile, Development, Software Development, Unit Testing | Leave a Comment »

Visual Studio: Zoom Out when ReSharper has captured Ctrl+Shift+,

Posted by jpluimers on 2015/09/30

ReSharper has a whole set of nice keyboard shortcuts, which includes Ctrl + Shift + , for View Recent Edits.

This overwrites the Zoom Out half of the default Visual Studio zoom keyboard shortcuts (thanks Carlos Muñoz):

Ctrl + Shift + . to zoom in and Ctrl + Shift + , to zoom out.

They don’t keep an alternative for Zoom Out, and unlike most tools I know that allow for zooming, there is no keyboard accessible menu entry for Zoom Out in Visual Studio.

So you have to use your mouse to go in the lower left of your editor window in order to Zoom Out (thanks ashteele for putting that in an SO question):

Zoom percentage in the lower left of your Visual Studio editor Window

Or you can reconfigure the old shortcut (thanks Aaron Ransley):

through Tools -> Options -> Environment -> Keyboard and map “View.ZoomIn” and “View.ZoomOut“

–jeroen

Posted in .NET, Development, Software Development, Visual Studio 11, Visual Studio 2010, Visual Studio 2013, Visual Studio 2014, Visual Studio and tools | Leave a Comment »

Why Your Code Is So Hard to Understand – via CodeProject

Posted by jpluimers on 2015/09/29

Below are the captions, read the full article as it is very well written.

Why your code is hard to understand

  • Problem #1, Overly Complex Mental Models
  • Problem #2, Poor Translation of Semantic Models into Code
    • Class Structure and Names
    • Variable, Parameter and Method Names
    • Single Responsibility Principle (SRP)
    • Appropriate Comments
    • Problem #3, Not Enough Chunking
  • Problem #4, Obscured Usage
  • Problem #5, No Clear Path Between the Different Models
  • Problem #6, Inventing Algorithms

–jeroen

via: Why Your Code Is So Hard to Understand – CodeProject.

Posted in .NET, Delphi, Development, Software Development, Web Development | 5 Comments »

Unless you write an installer with the right manifest, don’t include Installer, Update, Upgrade, Setup, … in your EXE name

Posted by jpluimers on 2015/09/28

I’ve seen this question coming up a few times, and bumped into this at a client recently: the UAC dialog coming up when debugging a 32-bit executable.

This is caused (more details below) by Installer Detection Technology introduced in Windows Vista (with UAC) and tightened in more modern Windows versions.

The solution is to either:

  • not include Installer, Patch, Update, Upgrade, Setup, … in your EXE name
  • provide a correct manifest to your EXE (getting this right can be hard)
  • don’t use x86 as platform target

For software you don’t have source code for, you can alter the manifest with a requestedExecutionLevel element: Fixing the way Vista Auto-detects Installers – Ben’s Writing.

A few links on Installer Detection Technology in Windows:

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in .NET, .NET 1.x, .NET 2.0, .NET 3.0, .NET 3.5, .NET 4.0, .NET 4.5, .NET CF, C#, C# 1.0, C# 2.0, C# 3.0, C# 4.0, C# 5.0, C# 6 (Roslyn), Delphi, Delphi 10 Seattle, Delphi 2, Delphi 2005, Delphi 2006, Delphi 2007, Delphi 2009, Delphi 2010, Delphi 3, Delphi 4, Delphi 5, Delphi 6, Delphi 7, Delphi XE, Delphi XE2, Delphi XE3, Delphi XE4, Delphi XE5, Delphi XE6, Delphi XE7, Delphi XE8, Development, RemObjects C#, Software Development | 1 Comment »

A while ago Allen Bauer commented on the working theory of Nullable in Delphi

Posted by jpluimers on 2015/09/25

I missed this last May, but revisiting some old G+ posts I saw Allen Bauer commenting:

Current working theory of Nullable<T>.

Nullable<T> = record
...
property Value: T read FValue; default;
...
end;

Using the default directive to “hoist” the operators of “T”. Currently the default directive only works for array properties by “hoisting” the ‘[]’ operator. Marking a non-array property with default will make the containing type behave as that type.

This, coupled with some intrinsic compiler knowledge of the Nullable<T> type will make Nullable<T> work without any addition of keywords or other standard functions or procedures.

Using the “default” directive on a non-array property will work for any type, except for having the null-propagation semantics.

When considering language features, I try and not only make it work for the intended purpose, but also broaden reach of any supporting feature. In the above scenario, even user-defined operators on “T” will be properly hoisted and used.

So hopefully, one day there will me more than Nullable<T> in Spring.pas which has been around for quite a while now..

–jeroen

Source: Delphi’s New Feature Desired: Nullable Types and Null Propagation Nullable…

Posted in Delphi, Development, Software Development | 5 Comments »

windows – Find out whether an environment variable contains a substring – Stack Overflow

Posted by jpluimers on 2015/09/25

Very smart case insensitive way answered by jeb:

if NOT "%foo%"=="%foo:bar=%" echo FOUND

–jeroen

via windows – Find out whether an environment variable contains a substring – Stack Overflow.

Posted in Batch-Files, Console (command prompt window), Development, Power User, Scripting, Software Development, Windows | Leave a Comment »

Workaround for Delphi 2010 error Fatal : F2084 Internal Error: AV00434055-RA37CCB72-0

Posted by jpluimers on 2015/09/24

Often in Delphi 2010, you can get an error like this:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Embarcadero\RAD Studio\7.0\Bin\CodeGear.Delphi.Targets(136,3): error : C:\Users\Developer\Versioned\Spring4D\Source\Base\Reflection\Spring.Reflection.pas(1647) Fatal
: F2084 Internal Error: AV00434055-RA37CCB72-0

There is a very simple workaround:

  1. If you are in the IDE: quit the IDE
  2. Delete all .dcu files the project generates
  3. If you were in the IDE: restart the IDE and reload the project
  4. Compile the project again

Note:

Sometimes it pays off back-porting to Delphi 2010: the generated executables are a lot smaller than more recent Delphi versions which can make a huge differenec when uploading many versions of bootstrap binaries to a version control system.

–jeroen

Posted in Delphi, Delphi 2010, Development, F2084, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

Syntax highlighting

Posted by jpluimers on 2015/09/23

Visual Studio 2013 syntax highlighting: watch the closing curly brace.

 Console.WriteLine(“URL IS : http://localhost/:{0}”, portnumber);

–jeroen

20141211-Syntax-Highlighting

Posted in .NET, C#, C# 2.0, C# 3.0, C# 4.0, C# 5.0, Development, Software Development, Visual Studio 2013, Visual Studio and tools | Leave a Comment »

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »