While it's only a minor annoyance, and has nothing to do with coding (at least directly) here's a classic example of software that works well and is quite successful for many applications, but in some instances those who wrote it weren't thinking.

I have about 6 years worth of Playboy magazine, ranging from 1988 to 1995 and I decided to try and unload them.  Many have big names in them like Drew Barrymore, Anna Nicole Smith, Pam Anderson, Jenny McCarthy and the like.  It seems obvious to me that someone else might be willing to buy them, and I'm not looking to make a fortune. 

Well eBay would seem the logical selling spot.  So I spent 2 hours posting 24 issues as a test run.  After a very short period of time, 3 had been purchased through "buy it now".  Eureka, right?  No.  eBay cancelled all of the auctions because I had placed them in the category for Playboys older than 1980.  To add to my frustration, I can't simply move them to the right category, I have to re-enter every one!

Well there's 4 hours (the original time, plus the time to re-list) shot in the ass and a few notches up for my blood pressure.  Fortunately I had the email addresses for the buy-it-now people and arranged to complete what I considered a fully valid transaction, even though the eBay rules seem to frown on it.

Well I then proceeded to relist all of the issues, this time in the right location. Of course I can't just do it right away, the new category is an "adult only" category (why is a 1979 Playboy ok, but 1981 is something we need to keep hidden?).  So I verify a credit card and hit the button that says I'm 18 (because a 16-year old wanting porn surely wouldn't lie!).  As a UI annoyance, I have to go back through the navigation to get where I want.

Well finally I get them all listed (5 hours later).  And after 3 days, not one bid.  Not one hit.  Hmm, maybe I'm not the only one who has trouble with this?  So I search for "Drew Barrymore Playboy".  Bang, I see another issue just like mine, it has about 15 bid and is up to $36, but is in another non "adult" category (magazine back issues if you're curious).  So as a test, I move mine.  in less than 30 minutes I've got 2 bids.  15 minutes after that eBay cancels my auction (and the other one in fairness).

So it seems I have a product that others want, yet eBay's system doesn't allow me to sell it.  I'm fine with listing it in an area for "adults", but the fact that it is obviously inaccessable to my customers (who by the way must pay with PayPal, so they'll have a damned credit card!) makes it impossible to find.  About as useful as putting it on a post-it not and stapling it to the tree in my front yard.

What do we learn from this (other than Chris has a boatload of Playboys he can't seem to get rid of)?  That even with hundreds of thousands of visitors a fantastic marketing team and a killer business idea , if you have a poor software implementation your customers will be unhappy, and you will lose money.

Anyone want a back issue of Playboy?

After reading Neil Cowburn's resolutions, I feel compelled to lay out my own:

1. I will learn better how hardware and data buses work by learning PIC programming
2. I will finish my Pocket Excel wrapper
3. I will resist the temptation to always start new projects when I have unfinished ones on my plate
4. I will overcome my loathing for web programming and try out ASP.NET
5. I will get off my lazy ass and learn how the DataSet class works

Of course I should add to that the fact that I need to place more effort into some project that provide me financial benefit, otherwise my wife is going to get a bit fed-up with me burning so much personal time.  Anyone need any small project help or side work done?  :)

So yesterday on my commute home I was thinking (it's an hour each way, so there's lots of time for it). 

Many developers have asked about getting the name of a control in the CF, and it's just not nicely exposed.  I thought, wouldn't it be nice to be able to get the name of a control if I have an instance of it (like in an event handler) or to be able to get an instance of a control if I know the string name? 

With a little work using reflection I came up with this (and for the record, reflection f'ing rocks!), which will be in the SDF release:

public class ControlEx
{
	public static Control GetControlByName(Control Parent, string Name)
	{
		FieldInfo info = Parent.GetType().GetField(Name,
			BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Instance |
			BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.IgnoreCase);

		if(info == null) return null;

		object o = info.GetValue(Parent);

		if(o == null) return null;

		return (Control)o;
	}

	public static string GetControlName(object SourceControl)
	{
		FieldInfo[] fi = ((Control)SourceControl).Parent.GetType().GetFields(BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Instance |
			BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.IgnoreCase);

		foreach(FieldInfo f in fi)
		{
			if(f.GetValue(((Control)SourceControl).Parent).Equals(SourceControl))
				return f.Name;
		}

		return null;
	}
}

OpenNETCF now has over 21,000 downloads of source and binaries.  The most popular being the WinAPI and the Desktop Communications libraries. 

With so many downloads there have got to be some commercial apps out there using them.  Anyone know of any?  I'd love to see some of our work in action!

PocketPCDN has posted a pretty nice interview of Neil and I http://www.pocketpcdn.com/articles/interview4.html.