Excellent article on CAPTCHA's effectiveness

Jeff at Coding Horror wrote a very good article on CAPTCHA's effectiveness.

CAPTCHA is an acronym for Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart invented at Carnegie Mellon University and named as an homage to Alan Turing.

According to Jeff Atwood's tests in the article mentioned above, just a simple, even static CAPTCHA stopped over 99% of the comment SPAM. A pain to be sure, but a way of life nowadays.

I do not get many comments, if any, but CAPTCHAS are on for his same reasons. I do have to battle the scourge of SPAM in a couple of Wikis I work with daily, where CAPTCHA's are not a good solution (for an open Wiki). It is not fun to keep these idiots at bay.

Mary Joe on Longhorn, Vista and VFPx

Mary Jo Foley comments on Windows Vista and Longhorn ("Forget Vista. Long live Longhorn client!"), adding some comments on SednaX/VFPX project at the bottom:

The “SednaX”/VFPX project in the Visual FoxPro world is one prominent example. “Sedna” is the code name for a set of technologies due out from Microsoft in 2007 that will make Visual FoxPro 9.0 interoperable with application components created by using Visual Studio 2005, the .NET Framework 2.0, Office 2007 and SQL Server 2005.

Visual FoxPro X (VFPX), formerly known as SednaX, is a set of open-source add-ons for Visual FoxPro under development by the VFP community. VFPX is not a Microsoft-backed project, but seems to have Microsoft’s blessing (at least an unofficial one, as it is hosted on the GotDotNet Code Gallery site.

The VFPX initiative, born in October 2005, is more than 800 members strong. Members are working on a variety of components that will complement VFP 9.0. The components are set to be released under the terms of the Microsoft Shared Source license.

The are some innacuracies: "As every longhorn fan knows microsoft cancelled the longhorn project and started the new os ‘Windows Vista,’ said RayM". This is not exactly so, as Longhorn was the working codename for the project, which client part was later renamed to the marketing name of Windows Vista.

Besides this small issue, it is always refreshing to see VFP commented on the mainstream media as it justly deserves.

Tag: Visual FoxPro

Space Shuttle launch seen from high flying plane

Amazing photo of a Space Shuttle launch seen from the ISS!

[Update]: Turns out the photos were from some high-flying research plane, but beautiful nonetheless.

(Via Garrett)

Senator Nelson vs Harris debate

I saw yesterday's debate for Florida Senator between the incumbent, Bill Nelson and Katherine Harris.

I don't have a clue as to why would Senator Nelson even agree to one debate. She is trailing in the polls by over 25%. Her performance was pathetic. Not one original thought, all her responses were canned and taken out of the White House playbook.

The surprising point was that they even agreed in some of the issues. Senator Nelson is a middle of the road, somewhat conservative Democrat with a good record as Senator, Insurance Commissioner and Shuttle astronaut before that. Harris claim to fame is as Fla. Secretary of State during the 2000 election where she decided to close the reccount early and send the election results out (eventually to the Supreme Court) with the results we all know.

Great coverage of Southwest Fox 2006

Unfortunately I missed the 2006 SouthWest Fox Conference this year but there is a great deal of information from the onsite reporters for the always excellent UTCoverage (including photos), to several conference speakers that have commented, all of them in a very positive way. Here are Doug Hennig's, Rick Borup's and Rick Schummer's comments for your enjoyment.

It was, by all accounts. a great conference. I'm sorry I couldn't attend.

Tag: Visual FoxPro

FoxPro Community Lifetime Achievement 2006 Award goes to Doug Hennig!

Doug Hennig [MVP] gets the Visual FoxPro Community Lifetime Achievement Award. It was given an short while ago by Ken Levy [MS] at the Southwest Fox Conference today.

Doug Henning, a long-time Fox Developer and MVP, is really deserving of it. Way to go Doug!

Tag: Visual FoxPro

Why you can't close on Pocket PCs

Excellent post by Mike Calligaro at the MS Windows Mobile Team on why the "X" button on does not really close the app.

You may agree with their design decision or not, but it is refreshing to see somebody from a big company explain whay they do products the way they do.

(Via Andrew McNeill)

Earthquake at Rick's house!

Rick Strahl reccounts his experience at the Hawaii earthquake yesterday morning. 7:15 AM on a Sunday, sound asleep, then this roar and then the shaking starts.

Mind you, the epicenter was on the Big Island, and he lives in Maui (90 miles away). Luckily nothing bad happenned to his house. Just the bears got scared, that's all.

Stay well my friend.

Visual FoxPro -Sedna - October 2006 CTP released

Microsoft released Sedna's October 2006 Community Technology Preview (CTP) today.

Go get it here and give it a spin.

[Update]: Craig S. Boyd and Bo Durban have worked out an issue with installing SP2.

Tag: Visual FoxPro

FS2004 amazing videos

A few videos made by the MS FS2004 wonderful user community, showcasing the work of very talented scenery designers and airplane creators. Relax and enjoy! (and yes, your FS9 can look this good too).

Cool video featuring Brazil
The new Dornier DO-27 in the also newly released Portland Scenery
The Chase (B&W)

Finding SQL injection vulnerabilities with Google

This is a very interesting post about someone finding SQL injection vulnerabilities with Google.

His result is that 11.3% of sites from the initial population of URL's he tested are vulnerable, which is way too high.

This is from SPIDynamics, a web apps security company, creators of WebInspect, and a company from which I have received training.

(Via Bruce Schneier)

The risks of dying with your passwords

Interesting story on the risks of dying without telling anyone your computer passwords.

Taking passwords to the grave

New free Compression Library for Visual FoxPro!

Craig S. Boyd [MVP] has published a free Compression Library to create and read ZIP files and compress strings directly from FoxPro.

This is a great alternative to commercial programs ike Dynazip and others.

Well done Craig!

Tag: Visual FoxPro

Received 2007 MVP Award!

I am honored to have received the 2007 Microsoft MVP Award today.

I have received this award continuously since 2001 for my contributions to the Visual FoxPro community.

I can be found online usually on the Microsoft Newsgroups (Spanish and English), MDSN Forums, and the Universal Thread.

Thank you Microsoft for this honor.