http://spiroville.com/blog Mon, 07 Dec 2009 18:16:03 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en I don't know if The Fog of War is the best documentary ever made but it is definitely one of the most intriguing. It works on so many levels. As an historical document of the cold war it is a fascinating look behind the curtain. As a philosophical ... http://spiroville.com/blog/2009/11/24/the-fog-of-war/ My previous post spent over 600 words knocking down the Exception Handling Block, but version 3 and higher does have one nice feature: WCF Exception Shielding.  This allows exceptions received by a WCF service to be mapped to Fault Contracts. Exception shielding is important in order to hide internal implementation details ... http://spiroville.com/blog/2009/07/07/exception-shielding/ Lately, I've been thinking about exceptions vs. error codes. As usual, Joel On Software has a couple of well thought out posts on the topic. The first post makes the point that exceptions "create too many possible exit points for a function". The second post, Making Wrong ... http://spiroville.com/blog/2009/05/17/exception-handling-block-enterprise-library/ Scrubs wrapped up what looks to be its final season with a really good 1 hour finale.  The last 2 seasons have been hit and miss and rarely hit the incredible highs of previous years but it was nice to see Scrubs rescued by ABC so it could end its ... http://spiroville.com/blog/2009/05/12/farewell-scrubs/ Sarasoda was "the sparkling citrus cooler for adults" (as the ad says) that had a minimal alcohol content.  It was mainly available in the 80's and I"m not sure if it was specific to Canada or if it was widely available. It was expensive for the time -- I seem ... http://spiroville.com/blog/2009/02/01/foods-i-miss-2/ I got my new copy of QuickTax in the mail the other day. No, I didn't pay for it.  I didn't even ask for it! In a previous post, I wrote about why I wouldn't be using QuickTax any longer. It seems that Intuit has decided to mail out physical CDs of ... http://spiroville.com/blog/2009/01/29/nice-try-quicktax/ Number one in a series (?) of "foods that I wish I could still eat". Maybe I'm watching too much Food TV or something? For the first installation, we honor the late great cereal: Crispy Wheats 'N Raisins.  For those of you who don't remember, Crispy Wheats 'N Raisins launched in ... http://spiroville.com/blog/2009/01/10/foods-i-miss-1/ A few days ago I got an email from QuickTax announcing: "QuickTax, more value now with 8 returns".  Of course, they forgot to mention that they totally ripped everyone off last year when they reduced the number of returns from 5 down to 2.  Now they increase the number of ... http://spiroville.com/blog/2008/12/16/not-so-fast-quicktax/ No, not the mint.  CSI started it's 9th season last week with a great conclusion to last years Warrick cliffhanger.  It is nice to see William Petersen getting some credit after 8 years (for example, here and here).  Despite the character's introverted nature, his portrayal of Grissom has been the heart ... http://spiroville.com/blog/2008/10/14/csi-after-eight/ Heather Mallick's September 5th column (now removed) caused quite the backlash against her and the CBC.  Initially the CBC stood behind the hatchet job article.  On September 25th, the CBC Ombudsman, Vince Carlin, issued his review of the matter. He agrees that the article offers little facts to back up ... http://spiroville.com/blog/2008/10/03/a-feeble-breeze/