PHP: String StartsWith / EndsWith

In case you need the PHP equivalent to the .NET String.StartsWith and String.EndsWith, here they are:

public static function StringStartsWith($string, $search) {
 $ret = false;
 if (strlen($string) >= strlen($search)) {
  $ret = (substr($string, 0, strlen($search)) == $search);
 }
 return $ret;
}

public static function StringEndsWith($string, $search) {
 $string = strrev($string);
 $search = strrev($search);
 return Utils::StringStartsWith($string,$search);
}

Hope it helps :)

Select Multiple Emails in GMail / Google Apps Mail

I found it quite annoying when there were a lot of emails that I needed to delete in GMail. Turns out you can select multiple emails by checking the first item in the list, pressing the shift key and checking the last item in the list - hey presto :)

MSSQL ISDATE - Is It?

Another is it type one from MSSQL, but this time ISDATE. SQLServerCentral.com article by Kameswari Aravindh very kindly makes us aware that ISDATE('1973') returns a true response. So long as the number is between 1753 and 9999, it's a valid year and therefore a valid date.

Bear it in mind!! ;)

Kinect Not Exclusive to Microsoft

Quite an interesting article about the makers of Kinect cleverly not giving Microsoft exclusivity to the device! Will be very interesting to see what is going to happen...

Eclipse: Exclude SVN Folders in Project Explorer

If you like me you don't use the SVN tools that are built into Eclipse and you wan to exclude the .svn or _svn folders from the project explorer, do the following:

1. Right click the project root node > Build Path > Configure Build Path...
2. Click the Excluded node on the tree in the Properties pop-up and click Edit...
3. Click to Add... an exclusion pattern
4. Type in _svn/** and click OK
5. Do the same and this time add **/_svn/**
6. Click OK in Properties pop-up
7. Sorted!

Obviously I have used _ in the example. Swap that for a . if needed ;)

Android: Remove Words From Dictionary

Just a quicky and quite an obvious one really, but in case you need to remove unwanted words from your android custom dictionary, do the following:

Go to Settings > Language & Keyboard > Touch Input > User Dictionary

Press the Menu button and choose Delete. You'll then be shown the same list with a delete button on the right. Select the words to be deleted and click OK when you're done.

Happy days :)

Rant: VB.NET and IIf

Yes - another rant about VB. I really do dislike it the more I use it and I've been using it for too long! This time it's IIf that's getting on my wick!

Why can't VB have the "normal" inline If like real programming languages
x = (a == b ? 1 : 2) and not this stupid IIf function?

The problem I have (and I'm sure everybody else who VBs has), is that IIf is a function and therefore evaluates it's parameters first. Which then means this:

x = IIf(String.IsNullOrEmpty(textbox.Text), Nothing, Double.Parse(textbox.Text))

fails and has to be changed to this:

x = Nothing
If Not String.IsNullOrEmpty(textbox.Text) Then
    x = Double.Parse(textbox.Text)
End If

OK, I know I can change it round a bit to make fit one line a bit more, but that's not the point. Come on MS, give us a real inline if...

Grrr!!