XIU | 
Wow… that’s a nice control… oh did I mention… it’s FREE
Get it at: http://www.purecomponents.com/products/nicepanel/
Just finished the first 4 chapters for school, converted all the code to C# and well I have to admit that I used more patterns before then I realized.
One of the patterns that I don’t really like is the Singleton, well I have nothing against it, but if you start a new class with the singleton in mind you can use a static class instead, it’s easier to access Class.Method() instead of something like Class.Default.Method(), but if you have to convert an existing class it can be easier to make a singleton:
- Make constructor private so no other class can call it
- Keep a static field from the same type
- Use a static public property to access the field (and create it if it’s still null)
But I just love the Strategy in combination with a Factory. Use the strategy to build the class hierachy and then use the Factory to get an instance to them.
Just saw The Brothers Grimm yesterday. It was a *special* movie 
It’s about the 2 brothers Will and Jake, lots of “fairy tales” in it, if not with a certain twist to it 
Had its boring parts but it kept you going and made me laugh a few times.
Ending was not so great but good enough.
We have a new course at school this year, Design Patterns & Frameworks
I’ve been coding OO code for about 2 years now and I’ve been using some patterns without knowing it.
We had to buy the book Head First Design Patterns, just finished the book yesterday 
a 600+ pages book.
I enjoyed reading the book from the moment I opened it, it’s such a easy way to learn about patterns. Examples, crossword puzzles,…
If you want to enhance your OO skills I really recommend reading this book.
(Examples are all in java but you can also download the C# code on their website)
Just found a pretty cool program today.
It’s called MusicBrainz Tagger (Website)
The great thing about this program is that it uses an online dictionary (based on some sort of hashing) to detect the files.
It can set the MP3 tags but it can also rename/move the files.
Together with Album Art Fixer this can really clean up your music collection. (Art Fixer Website)
