Transitioning into a new role

I wanted to let everyone know that follows this blog that I am going to be making a transition into a new role. I have been working in development for over 5 years now and it has been a very rewarding and challenging career. For my new role I will be changing direction a little bit and working in the software security field. I feel that this will help challenge me in other areas that I have yet to be challenged with. I feel that in order to stay competitive in an ever-changing industry we must change our paths/roles in order to stay competitive, dynamic, and on-top of our game. I have heard too many-a-story of the classic worker that works in a particular role/position for too long and gets burnt out or bored with their work. If you are one of these types of people I challenge you to change your path/role and seek out something more challenging as it will lead you to new heights and expand your skill set.

I will still be blogging at http://joshua-clark.blogspot.com/ but I will be creating a new blog site designed specically for security-related topics as the core focus of my work will be in software security I will be writing about trends, tips & tricks, how-to's, and the do's & don'ts that are specific to software security. You can follow the link in the top right or just click the new link below:

http://security-dude.blogspot.com/

MIX 2011 - Keynotes Live

Great keynotes by ScottGu, ScottHanselman, and IE team, MIX is amazing conference and always amazes me.

Great job guys!

http://live.visitmix.com/

Staying Thin Being IT Software Consultant

Here are some tips and tricks for staying thin sitting on your butt everyday being a IT Software Consultant. I have consulting for over 5 years and my job mostly consists of sitting on my bum all day typing emails, code, word docs, excel docs, etc. and this makes me seriously non-active. All I do is slam on the keyboard and don't use any of my other body parts which makes my occupation' activity directly related to my gut. So I have been working on this new dieting plan that in conjunction with a moderate workout plan has been helping me lose weight. At the end of last year, I was about 212 lbs. I am not 190, and it has only been 3 months which I'm pretty happy about. Take a look at my plan and see if can work for you:

Morning: 1 Cup Black Coffee w/2 Tsp of Sugar - 30 calories w/caffeine to keep my metabolism up = 30
Mid-Morning: 1 Cup/Danon's Greek Yogurt w/Organic Raspberry Preserves (1 Tbsp)  - 120 cal
Lunch: 1 Can Tuna and as much spicy brown mustard or reg mustard as you want/1 string cheese/1 pkg of whole almonds - 120 + 60 + 100 = 280
Mid-Afternoon: Orange, 1 String Cheese, 1 Pkg Whole Almonds, 1 Cup Black Coffee w/2 Tsp of Sugar : 60 + 60 + 70 + 100 + 30 = 320
Dinner/After work:Chicken Breast/Pork Tenderloin Serving w/Veggies - 500 calories
Post Workout: 1 Scoop of Gold Standard Natural Whey Protein w/2 Tsp of Benefiber (Orange) and 1 Cup of Organic Fat-free Milk: 120 + 30 + 90 = 240


Total Calories: 30 + 120 + 280 + 320 + 500 + 240 = 1480
Estimated Normal Calorie Burn: 2000 - (25 yrs, 5'9, 175 lbs) - this is where I want to be, weight wise
Net Loss: 520
Workout: 650 calorie burn (use Treadmill calories burn counter based on weight)


Total Net Loss Per Day: 650 + 520 = 1170


For every 3500 calories that you burn, you estimated 1 lbs. of fat loss. Try it out ,  it has worked for me, I have lost 22 lbs over 3 months time. 


I hope this helps and good luck!

Oracle Variable Syntax for TOAD tool - tip

I have been working extensively with TOAD for Oracle on a current project and have just found something that I have been looking for, variable syntax for TOAD. If you are lucky and get to develop on SQL Server, you have it easy, like I once did. Now, Oracle is a pain-in-the-butt, hardcore. If you need to ever run Oracle SQL in TOAD, here is an easy tip for the variable syntax. Use your standard SQL code like following:

If you are in TOAD, then when you execute this you should get a popup like the following:

Pretty cool, huh?

Hope this helps!

ASP.NET Best Practices

I have been looking for a good bulleted list of ASP.NET best practices and I found some pretty site ASP.NET Best Practices . I have been meaning to create my own from my own experience and projects but I felt that some people that do read my blog may benefit now until at least I come up with my own. Here you go.

http://jsprunger.com/asp-net-webforms-best-practices/

ASP.NET Compilation Model Overview

I have been looking to write a good blog on this for a while and found an awesome deep-dive into the ASP.NET compilation model overview. I recommend this for all ASP.NET developers. It will give you all a great overview of the technology.

Rick Strahl's ASP.NET Compilation Overview

Verizon finally gets IPhone!

Verizon finally gets the iPhone, thank goodness!