Thursday, June 26, 2008

Ask me a question - I'll try to find the answer.

This morning I reached an old Hanselminutes (Number 115) sub-titled "Finding Passion for Software". Now I've not finished listening to this yet, but something about the early topics in the conversation made me want to post.

I hang in the DevExpress "IDE Tools" Forums (way more that my wife would like) helping anyone who wanders in with a question.

But it occurs to me that when learning a new Tech of any kind, sometimes there'll be a question or 2 that seem like the answer should be really obvious and so people decide not to ask for fear of looking foolish.

This is a great shame.

I want to make one thing abundantly clear...

...There is no such thing as a stupid question, only stupid answers (which btw you should tell me about, it's the only way I'll learn :P)
...I'm happy to help - Do you have a question regarding CodeRush, RefactorPro or the Black Magic that is the DXCore?

Seriously.. ask me....

Do you want to know...
...How to make a template to do X?
...How to add a "Selection Embedding" to CodeRush?
...What the F*** is a "Selection Embedding"? :P
...How to write a plugin to do X? (<- I really like this question. The last few times it was asked, I replied with fully functional example. I usually throw them up on The Community Plugin Site)
...Why doesn't X work?
...Is X a bug or am I just not understanding the idea behind Y?
...How do I write a Refactoring of my own?
...What is a Refactoring anyway?
...What is a "Code" Item?
...Can I create those too?
...How does "Code" Items differ from "Refactor" Items on that clever SmartTag menu thingy?
...What SmartTag Menu thingy? What the F** are you talking about?
...Are you doing drugs you sound a little insane? (Only Alcohol and Caffeine btw )
...What is a StringProvider?
...What is a TextCommand?
...What is a Field? (In the CodeRush sense)
...How many Experimental plugins are you playing with? (I have projects started for at least 8)

There are many questions you can ask. Like I said *none* of them are stupid.

Ok perhaps there is.... if you say "How do I write a plugin to do X?" without replacing *X*, then yeah, that's stupid. :P
But it takes that level of question to reach "Stupid"

The best place to ask me a question by far, is in one of the DevExpress "IDE Tools" Forums, but I will accept questions in the comments here or you can email me at RoryBecker[at]Gmail[dot]com.

I work 9-5 GMT(BST at the moment) and so can be a little slow to answer during this time but I'll try anyway.

Don't think that because you're a CodeRush/RefactorPro/DXCore newbie, that this is a bad thing.

Newbies are cool! They challange me to re-explore the stuff I thought I already knew. It's always worth doing that as more often than not I discover something I didn't know before. After all the IDE Tools are a moving target because DevExpress keep making them better :)

So go ahead..... Ask me a question. :)


4 comments:

hINTModuleState said...

can you help me here please :
http://community.devexpress.com/forums/p/71407/243373.aspx#243373

?

I'm a beginner..

Rory said...

Hi hINTModuleState

As I indicated, for installation related problems, I think your best bet is to contact support@devexpress.com

The forums are typically manned by customers like me. Support will have access to additional resources more suited to determining what might have gone wrong... sounds like an old install might have some how mixed with a new one.

However without access to the original code it's hard to say.

Give them a try ... I hear they're pretty good :)

Anonymous said...

Was referred to you by
https://www.devexpress.com/issue=S130885

1. Do you agree?
2. Have downloaded plugin and will eval, but I'm guessing your stuff is a lot more heavyweight and method specirfic than I'm looking for

Rory said...

Hi Ruben. I am in the process of tidying up some of that lder code and moving it into the new Community Plugin Site (http://code.google.com/p/dxcorecommunityplugins/)

MoveIt is first on my list. Some of the functionality now duplicates DevExpress' code and will be removed, but the MoveCodeUp and MoveCodeDown actions will remain.

Let me know how you get on with MoveIt as it stands. I will publish a blog entry when I have more info... Or you can contact me directly if you have ideas as to where this should go and what it is missing (RoryBecker@Gmail.com)