Aha.
In ASP.NET 1.1, you need to have a folder called aspnet_client\system_web\{.NET version} under a Web application's root in order for Javascript to work.
In ASP.NET 2.0, you don't. And in fact, on a server (like mine) where both versions are running side by side, having that folder causes Javascript to fail in some browsers on the ASP.NET 1.1 sites (like this one).
This means comments are working now.
But I'm still going to install Community Server, though I probably will keep Das Blog now. (For the record, I always thought it was a configuration error, not Das Blog's fault.)
I know I said I wouldn't get personal, but my mercenary instinct has overridden my privacy instinct. Allow me to present:
Here is what Anne wants for the holidays:
Mine
If you've read this far, you might also want to see my list:
I finally
bit the bullet and downloaded the Visual Studio 2005 CD images from Microsoft, and installed the latest runtime on my Web server.
Only one site broke: Hired Wrist, my dad's site, which I just now fixed. That's not bad. Usually upgrading hoses everything.
Hired Wrist broke (gracefully, I should point out; only the graphic headers were affected) because the released version of ASP.NET 2.0 handles page names slightly differently, which caused my resource-based graphics handling to fail. Resources, apparently, are now case-sensitive. Oops.
I've just spent the past four and a half hours trying, and failing, to get Microsoft SharePoint installed and running.
I think the .NET 2.0 Beta runtime on my main server is screwing things up. I think this because, for example, other people have gotten SharePoint running without a problem, and my Das Blog difficulties only seem to affect this server. (I got Das Blog running on a laptop—which doesn't have .NET 2.0 on it—just fine.)
Why doesn't stuff just work?
I'm all ready to start testing two open-source prouducts that are built for .NET 2.0, which was released about two weeks ago. I can't yet because I don't have the final version of .NET 2.0 yet; I still have the final beta, and these open-source projects won't run on the beta.
My company subscribes to Microsoft Development Network, which gives us just about everything they sell, plus all the beta-test versions. They also have a site from which we can download anything we haven't received yet.
So today, when I finally have some time to play with the new stuff, their download site is down. And we haven't received the DVDs yet (they're due in about two weeks). So I can't do much of anything that I wanted to do today.
Fooey.
From Molly Ivins' column today:
One of our better political commentators, Tom Tomorrow, has boiled down our entire current political debate to one question: "Are they stupid, or are they lying?"
Trivia: The last time it was this cold[1] on my commute to work was February 18th.
When cold fronts move across Chicago in November, we get slammed. Saturday's daily maximum at Chicago O'Hare was 18.3°C (66°F), and the daily minimum Monday morning was -2.2°C (28°F). In Chicago, this constitutes a gradual decline.
Yesterday, the heat gave up and went to Miami, leaving us, this morning, shivering our timbers at -13.3°C (8°F), which even I call cold.
At least the sun is out.
Keep your eye on Chicago weather and the the view out Inner Drive's office window to understand my pain.
[1] -9.4°C (15°F); in February it was -11.6°C (11°F).
About every five years I learn something about my craft. This is an average; the last seismic shift happened in 2002, but the one before it happened in 1995.
It's happening again. This time, I'm learning how my craft gets in the way of my business.
For the past three years (since the last time a two-by-four hit me) I've worked on the Inner Drive Extensible Architecture™, a comprehensive framework on which Inner Drive can build marketable applications. It's a masterpiece, in the way a fine, ornate table would demonstrate the competence of a 17th-century carpenter.
It turns out, I missed the advent of steam.
See, other people have already done it, and they're giving away their code. So over the past few weeks I have slowly come to realize that there is no point continuing this effort in the same way.
This demonstrates a constant, historic tension in business software: Build or Buy. Build something exactly the way you want, or buy something that's close enough.
Open source software, like Das Blog and DotNetNuke, makes this choice even more stark. Can one countenance spending 600 development hours on creating something that has half the features of something anyone can download for free?
More on this later, as I refactor the IDEA to extend, rather than duplicate, the mass of free stuff out there.
Dan Savage's Op-Ed today (reg.req.) asks a reasonable question:
If the Republicans can propose a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, why can't the Democrats propose a right to privacy amendment? Making this implicit right explicit would forever end the debate about whether there is a right to privacy. And the debate over the bill would force Republicans who opposed it to explain why they don't think Americans deserve a right to privacy - which would alienate not only moderates, but also those libertarian, small-government conservatives who survive only in isolated pockets on the Eastern Seaboard and the American West.
Thanks to Angela Riccetti for this one.