Codeguru Update eNewsletter - March 25th, 2008

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CodeGuru Newsletter
March 25, 2008
http://www.CodeGuru.com

This newsletter is part of the Developer.com, EarthWeb, and internet.com networks.
Jupitermedia Corporation

___________________________ Sponsors ________________________________
Internet.com eBook Library
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TOPICS:

--> Editorial
--> Recently Published Books

--> New on CodeGuru: 
        ==> APIs
                - Facebook Application Development
        ==> Controls
                - Edit Control with Icon and Background Text
        ==> C# Syntax
                - Parsing Is Easy: Base C Sharp Classes and Expressions Calculator
        ==> Networking
                - Clients that Find Servers in a Windows Network Domain (TCP/IP, Mailslot)
        ==> Services
                - Client Application Services: Getting Started
        ==> Video
                - Code Analysis in Visual Studio 2008

--> Discussion Groups -- HOT Threads 
        - Heap (VC++)
        - how to compare two image using C language (C)
        - Basic multithreading in windows forms (C#)

--> Highlighted new articles on Developer.com 
        1. Using Vertical and Horizontal Table Structures in Oracle
        2. Exposing a Database as a Web Service
        3. The Google Collections Library

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Comments from the Editor
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Evans Data Corporation does a number of IT industry surveys that often focus on the developer market. While I don't always agree with the results of their surveys, I do always find the statistics interesting. On March 4th, Evans Data released a users choice database survey. In this survey, respondents were asked to rate features such as performance, scalability, security, durability, quality of data modeling tools, and more. The results from asking over 1400 people worldwide were interesting.

The databases covered in the survey were IBM's DB2, Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL, PostgreSQL, Sybase Adaptive Server, and Oracle 10g or later. These are all larger, enterprise databases rather than desktop databases. What is interesting in this latest database survey from Evans is that one database seemed to take the top position in all but two categories.

This would seem to indicate that users of this database are generally more satisfied than those of the other databases. Which database is this? Simply put, Oracle was the top database in almost all categories. In second place for overall satisfaction was IBM's DB2, followed by Microsoft SQL Server in third.

One of the most highly rated statistics for databases was performance. In the performance category, Oracle again had the best rankings followed by IBM DB2. SQL Server, however, fell to sixth position.

One of the areas where Microsoft SQL Server stood better than most of the competition was in the quality of the data modeling tools. While Oracle still took the top spot, Microsoft SQL Server managed to place as the runner up. Microsoft SQL Server actually tied Oracle for the top spot when it came to opinions regarding support for XML.

When looking at the overall data on enterprise level databases, one thing stands out. While Oracle may have the overall highest scores for satisfaction, all of the databases scored well overall. As such, I believe it is safe to assume that competition in the database market is going to continue to be strong for the foreseeable future!

Until next week...

Brad!
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Bradley L. Jones
www.CodeGuru.com
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Recently Published Books
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For those of you keeping up by reading books. The following are just a few of the new books that have been recently released. If you've read any of these, feel free to write a review to be posted on CodeGuru. See the submission guidelines at:

http://www.codeguru.com/review-guidelines.php

--> The SharePoint Shepherd.s Guide for End Users
      By Robert Bogue for AvailTek
      378 pages for $34.99
      http://www.lulu.com/content/2071084
      Over 116 SharePoint tasks presented in an easy-to-follow manner.

--> Programming Microsoft Robotics Studio
      By Sara Morgan for Microsoft Press
      270 pages for $34.99
      http://books.internet.com/books/0735624321

--> Beginning VB 2008
      By Christian Gross for Apress
      420 pages for $39.99
      http://books.internet.com/books/1590599381

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New & Updated Articles on CodeGuru
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Following are short descriptions of new articles on CodeGuru. If you are interested in submitting your own article for inclusion on the site, then you will find guidelines located at

http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,fka1,909i,jorm,i5r0

This week's CodeGuru posts:

==> APIs

- Facebook Application Development
    By aleksisa
Learn how to build a sophisticated Facebook application that interacts with Facebook users and with SQL Server database articles.
http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,3l1l,hlg2,jorm,i5r0

==> Controls

- Edit Control with Icon and Background Text
    By Marius Bancila
Explore an edit control that can display an icon and a prompt text on the background (when the edit control has no text).
http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,lysi,dshi,jorm,i5r0

==> C# Syntax

- Parsing Is Easy: Base C Sharp Classes and Expressions Calculator
    By AlexNek
Learn about parsing, and creating classes and expressions.
http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,8geo,mb5n,jorm,i5r0

==> Networking

- Clients that Find Servers in a Windows Network Domain (TCP/IP, Mailslot)
    By Ciro Sisman Pereira
Learn how to use a mailslot to broadcast information over a network.
http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,qiw,bd9t,jorm,i5r0

==> Services

- Client Application Services: Getting Started
    By Vikas Goyal
Client Application Services simplifies the access to ASP.NET Application Services and thus helps in managing the user information, authentication, and authorization at a common place for both web and Windows Applications.
http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,gy41,69c9,jorm,i5r0

==> Video

- Code Analysis in Visual Studio 2008
    By Paul Hacker
Discover how to do code analysis in both a web-based and a desktop application using Visual Studio 2008.
http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,3joe,86tn,jorm,i5r0

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Discussion Groups
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Check out the CodeGuru discussion forums at:

http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,bcr8,cx5j,jorm,i5r0

Forums include Visual C++, General C++, Visual Basic, Java, General Technology, C#, ASP.NET, XML, Help Wanted, and much, much, more!

... HOT THREADS ...

Some of the current threads with the most activity are:

==> Heap (VC++)
        http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,217o,jo3t,jorm,i5r0

==> How to compare two image using C language (C)
        http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,4hbv,lqtb,jorm,i5r0

==> Basic multithreading in windows forms (C#)
        http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,asiu,6s5d,jorm,i5r0

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New Articles on Developer.com
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Below are some of the new articles that have been posted to Developer.com (http://www.developer.com).

1. Using Vertical and Horizontal Table Structures in Oracle
     By Vlad Kofman -
Compare different ways to persist data in a database table. A vertical data layout is one option to consider, as is horizontal tables. Decide which is best for you.
http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,4ng7,jp2n,jorm,i5r0

2. Exposing a Database as a Web Service
     By Deepal Jayasinghe -
Gain a good understanding on how to expose databases as a Web Service using Axis2.
http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,24xz,6q0m,jorm,i5r0

3. The Google Collections Library
     By Dick Wall -
The Google collections library has the potential to both increase your productivity and significantly clean up your code. Take a look at what it can do for you!
http://nl.internet.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=1,3vmu,1,8shw,cgmn,jorm,i5r0

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