Reddybrek.com

Dragnet Systems is looking to hire a new Tech Support Developer

Filed under General , work

Dragnet Systems is looking to hire a talented .Net developer for a new tech support role. This is a new role in the company that aims to help reduce the level of support that the top tier developers have to give. Full training of all the in-house tools will be provided but you must have the basics so that you can hit the ground running. The main requirements are:

• ASP.Net (C#) and XML skills are a must.
• Fluent T-SQL skills and a totally proficient at using MS SQL Server 2005.
• Good JavaScript knowledge including jQuery
• Classic ASP knowledge an advantage.
• Knowledge of ASP.NET MVC and Entity Framework would be a plus

If you are interested or know someone who might be why not get in touch? Check out the careers page for more information - http://www.dragnet-systems.ie/Careers

Need to do a word count from a Word, Excel, HTML, XML or PDF file?

Filed under General , work

I had to send on a word count to a customer recently. Nothing new there. Client's ask for word counts all the time, especially if they are getting content translated. Usually I copy the text into Word document and do a word count from there but this was proving too time consuming.

A quick search online and I stumbled onto a small program called 'Count Anything'. It's a free program for Windows users that allows you to drag any supported file onto it and it lets you know the number of words and characters in the document. Very handy!

I love finding programs like this. If you know of any other neat little programs you use day to day let me know.

A little Spring cleaning! RichardReddy.ie gets a new lick of paint.

Filed under General

I've been very bust over the last few weeks working on some interesting MVC 3 projects but one of the things I was meaning to get around to was redoing my own RichardReddy.ie website. I had let the domain just sit there for about 12months but thankfully I had some time over the weekend to get a simple 'CV' style site up and running.

I will be launching another 2 personal sites very soon to highlight my mobile work. I've been having a great time developing for Windows Phone and I'm hoping to make some more apps for the phone very soon so having a website/portal showcasing my work makes sense. All going well these should be live before the end of March.

New posts on the way!

Filed under Blog , General

Wow, it's been ages since my last post here. I've been super busy with some new exciting work over at Dragnet Systems lately which is coming to an end shortly giving me more time to post some new articles.

Over the coming weeks I'll post some articles explaining how to get the most from MVC3 for real world scenarios. A lot of my work at the moment focuses on MVC3 with Entity Framework Code First, Twitter's BootStrap and jQuery to build amazing web apps for businesses.

I've also been taking the time to learn how to setup my MVC projects to use dependency injection so that my code is much neater and tidier. It took ages to get my head around it initially but it's starting to pay off now which is great.

So there you have it. I'm still here and there will be more new posts very soon :)

How to fix WebResource.axd JavaScript errors appearing when using asp.net routing

Filed under C# , General

I had an issue with one of our asp.net 4.0 websites recently. The site was using web forms, routing and had .net validation controls in use. Everything worked great until I used the validation controls and discovered that I was getting 2 JavaScript errors on every page that used these controls.

I spent ages looking for a solution because I was looking for the wrong thing! I thought that the issue was to do with the .net runtime but it's actually to do with the routing side of things. What you need to do is tell .net to ignore the .axd files so that the JavaScript being referenced in the HTML will actually return a valid page.

Thankfully the fix couldn't be easier. In your global.asax file make sure you include an ignore rule for any axd files that your project might create. For example:

void Application_Start(object sender, EventArgs e) 
    {
        // Code that runs on application startup
        RegisterRoutes(RouteTable.Routes);
    }

    public static void RegisterRoutes(RouteCollection routes)
    {
        routes.Ignore("{resource}.axd/{*pathInfo}");
        // your page routes here
    }

NETGEAR WNDR3700 dropping wifi issues using Eircom broadband modem

Filed under General

[Feb 14, 2011] No soon had I posted about having wonderful hassle free internet then the blasted thing gave me all sorts of trouble again! This time I have a solution but you're not going to like it :) I bought a second hand netgear adsl2+ modem to use instead of the Eircom router. I noticed on the eircom router that it was dropping access to the attached Netgear router. I reckon I had a dodgy unit as using this new netgear router is amazing. No dropped wifi. No issues loading pages. Just smooth fast broadband! For those wondering about setting up a different router on Eircom you will need to use the User: eircom and Password: broadband1 to access the service. Most modern routers will auto detect all the other techno bits. Phew, it's been a long journey but it's definitely worth it.

[Jan 29, 2011] Ok, finally got this working! I now have DoS protection and SIP ALG back on but QoS still off. My MTU size is set to 1453 and, most importantly, I turned the firewall off on my ISP router as this was giving me hassle when in use with this Netgear router. Everything is now working great. Hopefully this post will help others who end up having problems with this router and their wifi dropping!

[Jan 25, 2001] Looks like I'm still having problems with the router dropping my wifi. I have turned off QoS options and DoS protection along with disabling SIP ALG. Hopefully this will do the trick as I'm running out of options to turn off! The router might be fast but it's useless if it keeps dropping the signal with zero feedback as to why :(

I recently purchased a new dual band Netgear wndr3700 for my house as I wanted something with a bit more oompf than the standard telecom company router (a company called Eircom). The main reason I picked up this new router was that I didn't want slower, older, wireless b/g devices slowing down my wireless n devices which I was using more and more for streaming to my tv.

For the first few weeks everything was ok but as I started to use this router more I noticed that web pages would randomly fail to load for me. It quickly became a huge irritation as browsing the web became a huge chore!

After reading up on the Netgear forums I noticed that a lot of other people were having this issue also. Thankfully the suggestions there helped fix my problem.

So, what did I do? It was all down to the MTU (Maximum Transmit Unit) setting on my Netgear router. By default the router had set this value to 1500 but anything above 1492 would cause massive drop outs with my modem. Setting the value to 1492 has worked a charm for me and if you have a similar issue I would recommend you try this quick trick to get things working smoothly again.

I did come across a pretty good tool called TCP Optimizer that would allow you test your maximum MTU setting for your modem. You can download the file from http://www.speedguide.net/downloads.php.

HTML5 and CSS3 round up for February on Stuff4Designers.com

Filed under General , web technologies

Just a quick note to say that I have a new post up on stuff4designers.com featuring a round up of some great HTML5 and CSS3 examples for February 2011. If you want to checkout what other people are getting up to with this new tech go check it out.

If you're working on your own cool HTML5 or CSS3 demo please let me know and I'll include you in next months post.

Stuff4Designers.com is now live and ready to inspire you

Filed under General , websites

I've been really busy over the last few months planning some really cool new projects that I'd like to launch during the year. As a side effect my own blog hasn't been updated as much as I'd have liked. Fear not though as I have some new posts that I'm currently working on that should be online shortly (fingers crossed!).

One new side project I have just launched is Stuff4Designers.com, a website dedicated to bringing you the best web resources and inspiration for web designers from around the interwebs. Rebecca FitzGerald-Smith is co-owner with me on this site.

Go check it out and if you have any design ideas or showcases be sure to let us know!

JouJouJewels.com handmade and designer pearl jewellery site launches

Filed under General , Online Stores , websites

Well it's been a long time coming but JouJouJewels.com has finally launched! For the past two years my über talented girlfriend, Rebecca FitzGerald Smith, has been busy sourcing and making handmade pearl jewellery. Last Christmas she was selling to friends and families but this year she wanted to go all out and setup an online store.

Rebecca works with me in Dragnet Systems and even though we make online stores for a living it was interesting to see how much work and effort goes into making a store when it's for yourself. To say that you can be your own worst critic would be an understatement! Rebecca has poured her heart and soul into this project and I think the end results are outstanding.

Everything from the website design to the store technology was handled by Rebecca. Attention to detail was given to everything on the site, from the logo down to the little basket icons. I know I'm going to be biased when I say that it is a fantastic website but I'm really proud of all her hard work and just wanted to wish her all the best with this new venture.

With Christmas just around the corner perhaps you could find the perfect gift over on the store for someone you know. Even though shipping on the site is for UK and Ireland initially, JouJouJewels.com will ship worldwide upon request.

Hertz4Ryanair.com get's a new update offering even more choice for customers

Filed under C# , General , work

I've been extremely busy the past few months working on a new version of Hertz4Ryanair.com that will be rolling out to all European countries very soon. This new version of the website includes many new additions including:

• New Hertz Advantage branded area
• Dual Hertz/Advantage pricing screen
• Updated languages for Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian, Dutch and Swedish
• Improved admin area with charting controls, export to excel options, full control over when to display dual pricing, etc.

I'm also very excited about this project because it is the first project that I've worked on which sits on multiple servers for both the web servers and database servers. The raw power of the server setup is huge and I am very curious to see how it handles all of the traffic from launching in 26 countries.

The work never stops though and once this project is finished and live there are some new exciting changes coming to our online store software that will be launching in the early part of next year for customers so stay tuned!