http://blog.jameshiggs.com James Higgs's Blog Wed, 17 Dec 2008 18:06:26 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en I was recently asked to give some advice about getting started with writing. Which is ironic, because I have struggled to get started myself. What I have done is to read and seek a lot of advice, and so that's what I passed on. Here it is, for what it's ... http://blog.jameshiggs.com/2008/12/17/creative-writing/ This is the text of a customer service email we received complaing about... well you see if you can figure it out. The original 'spelling', 'punctuation' and 'capitalization' have been retained. sorry to bother you but every time i try and log in i have to download popup blockers! someone is ... http://blog.jameshiggs.com/2008/10/14/customer-services/ In the project I'm working on at the moment, we have a requirement to call some REST services using .NET#'s built-in System.Net.HttpWebRequest class. The calls will eventually be over SSL using a properly issued certificate when we go live, but for testing we've been using a self-signed certificate. When you navigate ... http://blog.jameshiggs.com/2008/05/01/c-how-to-accept-an-invalid-ssl-certificate-programmatically/ Joel Spolsky has a long article on the subject of the IE team's decision to prioritise standards over compatibility in IE8. While he cheekily claims not to be taking any sides, it's pretty clear he's with the pragmatists. So am I. http://blog.jameshiggs.com/2008/03/17/spolsky-on-ie8-and-standards/ Jason Fried has a post reporting on various phrases and words that show up in 37signals' internal Campfire discussions. One report I'd like to see is how many times the word 'smug' appeared. That'd be one hell of a big report. http://blog.jameshiggs.com/2008/03/13/37-smug-nals/ I am the greatest. The iPhone said so: (Click for larger version And I didn't Photoshop it, either. http://blog.jameshiggs.com/2008/03/07/its-official/ Now this is very exciting. (Click for larger version) I predict that the iPhone SDK will be seen as a watershed in the history of computing, as important as the the first PC. For the first time, proper mobile computing will be a reality. I can't wait to get started developing my ... http://blog.jameshiggs.com/2008/03/06/iphone-development/ I'm sad to see that Dare Obasanjo has decided to stop blogging. Among other things, I've found his coverage of the REST vs. WS-* debate very useful. It was Dare who first brought RSS and blogging to my attention through his MSDN Magazine article Building a Desktop News Aggregator. The ... http://blog.jameshiggs.com/2008/03/06/dare-obasanjo-stops-blogging/ Oh dear. It looked for a while as though Microsoft was going to make the right decision on compatibility vs. standards compliance in IE8. But they've reversed their decision now. Why? The Microsoft Interoperability Principles. I pointed out the reasons that their original approach was the right one a few weeks ... http://blog.jameshiggs.com/2008/03/04/microsoft-screw-the-pooch-again/ I was wondering this morning why Penguin always print Karen Blixen (Isak Dinesen) when Isak Dinesen was a pen name. This is not their normal practice with other authors with pen names. For example, they don't print Eric Arthur Blair (George Orwell) or Mary Ann Evans (George Eliot). I still don't ... http://blog.jameshiggs.com/2008/02/29/pen-name-confusion/