Wow...this is a bargain. I've used OneTime for a year or so now (started with 2005 version) and have been happy with it.  Well now they are giving the 5-user small team edition for $5.00 (normally $495) in social experiment and all proceeds go to the Red Cross.  Can't go wrong with this deal.  This deal ends Feb 24th.

I ran in to a bug today in regards to a ClickOnce app I've developed for a client.  I inherited a website that was partially completed when I has hired on by my client.  I developed a ClickOnce app for them (actually two different apps) along with completing and enhancing the website.  Portions of the website run with an SSL Certificate (through HTTPS), the certificate was purchased long before I came into the picture. 

The ClickOnce client app is launched from within a secured area of the website.  Everything worked fine, until someone browsed in through a different sub-domain.  Specifically the Certificate is for www.blahblahblah.com where as the client where we received an error came in through http://blahblahblah.com (without the www).  The certificate is not a wildcard certificate so if I had browsed to that page I would have recieved a Security Alert message box with the message:

The name on the security certificate is invalid or does not match the name of the site.

Well while browsing it's simple enough to click yes to proceed, however you don't get that option and are simply presented with the Cannot Start Application dialog.

Clicking on Details gives a ton of information on the exception that occurred.  Looking down I see the following:

--- Inner Exception ---
  System.Security.Authentication.AuthenticationException
  - The remote certificate is invalid according to the validation procedure.

So I can see that this is related to the Security Alert given above.  After doing some digging, it appears that this is an acknowledged bug with .NET 2.0.  While this isn't quite the same scenario that I ran into, it looks to be similar enough to possibly be the same cause.

I'm not that versed on SSL and security issues in 2.0, so my speculation may be incorrect.  The client was happy enough to be sure to include the www and I can always redirect so it wasn't that big of an issue, but thought it was interesting enough to share.

A bit off-topic, but I'm always striving to improve my business, my personal life, and my spiritual relationship.  I ran across the Clean Sweep Program which is a checklist of 100 items, when completed, gives you complete personal freedom (at least according to the author).  I took the assesment and scored a grand 34 out of 100.....I have a ways to go and a lot of things to improve on.   

Some seem quite simple to do (make your bed every morning) and I suppose once you complete those, it will give a small bit of satisfaction that may not otherwise be obtainable.  Others, could take a lifetime to achieve completely (if ever), though making strides towards those goals would be a worthwhile pursuit in it's own right.  Anyway, this provides an interesting look into yourself.

Just discovered this today (yes I'm a bit behind, version 1.0 was release July 25, 2005..)....I had some legacy INI files that needed parsing and I've got a general class that I use normally in cases like this that handles all my INI needs.  Generally it works fine as it simply wraps the API.  I found recently that with .NET 2.0 (at least that's all I've tried with) there is a issue with reading an INI that resides on a networked drive.  Needless to say, I needed to do just that.  After a brief look I came across NINI, a nice tool that not only handles INI, but also XML configuration files, Registry,  .NET configuration files, and command line parameters.  The INI functionality at least was written without the use of API, so it runs just fine reading the INI across the network.  I haven't looked any deeper into the other files it can handle, but I've got a few uses for this library already.  Wish I would have discovered this one long ago.

http://nini.sourceforge.net/

Here's a handy tool to extract files from a MSI install file.  There has been a few times when I've wanted to either see what was in a MSI, other times when I only needed one or two files, and/or I needed the file in a custom location other than the install directory.  Well now I can with this tool....not something I'd use everyday, but handy to have in my toolbox for those special occasions.

Less MSIérables: A tool to Extract the contents of an .msi File

I've been doing the consulting thing for about 5 years now and I’ve started to notice that over the last 6 months or so I’ve been looking at my time that I spend in a completely different fashion. 

For example, last night my furnace broke.  Normally this is something I can fix myself being somewhat handy (in fact the problem with it this time is something I most likely could fix).  However, while debating whether to cancel my appointments for the morning (at least) and get to work on the furnace I realized that by trying to perform the work myself, saving myself a service fee for a repairman to come out, it was actually more expensive than just bringing in a serviceman and going to work.  With the billable hours, I would make more than what it was going to save me to do the repair myself.

Another example, a few months back I’m sitting in the dentist office waiting to be taken in for my appointment.  They were running behind and I ended up sitting there for 30 minutes or so past my appointment time.  The thought running through my mind was “This appointment is costing me X.XX amount, plus the extra 30 minutes of billable time.”

I guess now that I’m working for myself, billing by the hour, I’m more aware of where my time goes and I make a conscious effort to minimize wasted time. 

Where have I been that I haven't run into this before.  I recently wanted a compact yet secure password management tool that would ideally run from my thumb drive.  Found KeePass, a very slick package.  While I haven't delved deep into the full power of this tool.  It does exactly what I need.  It's quick, runs from my thumb drive and looks to be plenty secure enough and extensible enough to grow with me in the future.  One less thing I need to write for myself!!