.NETified

Visual Studio 2008 has a lot of great new features to make programmers lives easier. There are several new code editing improvements made. Scott Guthrie touches on a few of these; Transparent Intellisense, VB Intellisense Filtering, VB LINQ Intellisense, Organize C# Using Statements. He also has talked about Javascript Intellisense and CSS Style Intellisense.

All the new features are making the 2008 release quite exciting. I think this is more anticipated than the 2005 release for me.

For those of you who don’t know, I have quit Landscape Structures. I’ll be starting a new position at Thomson Corporation this Monday as a Developer.

I really have no gripes about Landscape Structures. It’s a great company to work for, and I enjoyed my time there. It’s just time for me to move on and further my career.

I was having a debate with myself on whether to buy an iPhone or not. This would mean breaking my current T-Mobile contract, and spending a ridiculous $500 on a phone. I like T-Mobile, but the iPhone looks just way too cool. Then I came across this article “Ten Things You Should Know Before You Buy An iPhone”. That made me decide to forget about the iPhone.

I still needed a new phone, so I was just going to get something cheap and basic. My one requirement was it needed to be able to play MP3’s as ring tones. I remembered a friend talking about a Pocket PC phone he had purchased, so I called him up and asked him what features it has, and how he liked it. Basically, there wasn’t anything the phone couldn’t do. I still didn’t want to spend all that money, even though they’re are good $200 cheaper than the iPhone. I’d like to have some of the features like Internet and outlook/exchange syncing, but I didn’t want to pay for the monthly Internet service. So, I went to the store to pick up a new phone. I started talking to the salesman about the Pocket PC phones, mainly the T-Mobile Wing by HTC, and found out that it has wireless. This means, free Internet as long as I’m near a wireless. Well, that sold me.
I picked up a Wing, and went on my way.

After having a Pocket PC, I don’t know how I could live without it. It’s basically Windows on my phone (Windows Mobile to be exact). It has my calendar, tasks, email, full Internet browser, search, messenger, Google maps, games, music, MS Office (Word/Excel/PowerPoint), pretty much anything I could ever want. It’s touch screen with a stylus, and I even have my overclocked. My friend said his can be a little flaky at times. I haven’t had a single issue yet with mine though. He’s running Windows Mobile 5 and I have 6, so maybe that makes the difference.

Overall, I’m very pleased with my Windows Mobile phone. I don’t regret not jumping on the iLife bandwagon one bit. Some of those “missing features” the previously mentioned article I referred to, I have taken for granted because they seem so common place. I definitely recommend using a Windows Mobile phone.

I don’t think I’ll ever need what the iPhone offers. Although, when Apple releases an iPod with the same interface and screen as the iPhone, I’ll be the first one in line to purchase one.