Hey DUDES - apologies - 5 Months (to the day) non-Blogging ... well time I made an effort ... ;-)

As some people know I'm a big Microsoft Head an also have some SAP Data Migration Skills , yesterday I asked a fellow SAP ABAP Consultant (Nick White) for bit or a 'Reference' or an 'Endorsement' - he came up with the following (which looks well formed XML) :-

" Mark Dicken : short and straight to the point."

 

"Mark is to SAP Data Migration as the Pope is to Catholics."

 

Mark Dicken

Cleansing, Mapping, Migration & Validation

He's fast, he's right, he works

 

"I was an old tired piece of legacy data until I used new and improved Mark Dicken . In under one month I was Cleansed, Mapped, Migrated, Validated and available. I've become productive again; I feel like I have a new lease of life."

- Genuine testimonial from an HR Master Record.

 

There is a young lad called Dicken,

With Legacy Data his pulse does quicken,

As fast as a flash,

And for reasonable cash,

He'll do a Data Migration.

I was impressed (not put it throught XmlSPY yet) !!!

Comments ...?

 

 

Hi All,

Slightly Off Topic - Can anyone help me? - Wanted: Has Anyone Got A Toshiba Restore Disk For a "Toshiba Satellite Pro 6100", a copy or .ISO image would be great

This is my old laptop I wish to pass down for my Daughter, the Original CD is in England (I think!!!)

Licences are not an issue, because I got with I purchased of the Laptop :-)

I hoping that with an Irish  'Developer Community' now with like 60+ subscribers that someone could be of help.

Using the Original MSDN DVD's, I've tried loading XP Pro, XP Home and for some reason it loads but runs like a DOG, I've even tried downloading the drivers from Toshiba and loading them ALL on ... I simply give up :-( ... I must be loosing my touch

If you can help then please drop an line in the comments

(With 770Mb or RAM and 30GBof Disk Space, I'm sure odd educational game will be getting loaded!!!)

Regards

Mark Dicken

 

18-November-2004 - Currently Available and Seeking Contract Opportunities.

(for more details check out http://www.MarkDicken.com )

Below is a summary of my online CV:-

High Level Summary :-

14 Years Work Experience, both support and development. SAP Data Migration, SAP Data Cleansing, Pro-Active Data Validation Microsoft Dot Net Developer, Visual Studio .NET 2003 ADO.NET, Data Migration, Data Cleansing, Manipulation and Mapping. VB.NET, ADO.NET, ASP.NET, Winforms, Webforms. N-Tier, OOP, OOD, C#, XML Web Services, SOAP. SQL Server 2000, Stored Procedures, VBA, VB, NT/Win2K Security. Works exceptionally well individually whilst also being a team player.

Worked For (Summary) :-

ÿ SAP Consultancy Deliotte & Touche & IHA – Dublin , Ireland ÿ SAP Consultancy Axon Global Solutions & TFL – London , UK ÿ SAP Consultancy Atos-Origin ‘Middle East ’ & SABIC – Saudi Arabia   ÿ BT Directory Sol’s ÿ GUS / Argos (SAP ABAP Training) ÿ Caledonian Life ÿ Moneygator.com ÿ Printrader.com ÿ Princeton Financial ÿ New Flag Asset/M ÿ Moto ÿ Banco Santander ÿ Deutsche Bank ... and more companies previous to these!

(for more details check out http://www.MarkDicken.com  or my local developers.ie article   click here ! )

Regards

Mark Dicken

 

The MSDN Social Event last night in Dublin was great.

My first official (and Free) MSDN T-Shirt.

Picture taken on 'Microsoft USB Camera' given at Initial  INETA  meetup last month.

This Monday (22nd) in Central Dublin we have a presentation by Eamon O’Tuathail about The Web Services Standards Stack And .NET Web Service Enhancements (WSE 2.0)  at The Stephen's Green Hotel Dublin , see everyone there - don't forget to register !!!

Regards

Mark Dicken

 

Thankyou Microsoft , after getting accepted for the Microsoft ISV Program I was initially told it should take 2 to 3 weeks for my MSDN DVD's to arrive.

I was told that the whole process can take as long as 6 weeks by another developer on developers.ie

Therefore I well pleased when they ARRIVED 15 DAYS EARLY !!!! (great!)

I've rebuilt the laptop with the latest and greatest offerings and digging deep into the new stuff - cheers (plenty to keep me busy now) :-)

... I may shout about bad things but prefer to shout twice as loud about good things

Good News: FREE Wireless Access in Dublin Airport ... BAD News: Flight Delayed In  DUBLIN Airport (thanks Ryanair)

 

Waiting for a plane due to delays :-( I was very surprised to find out that in DUBLIN Airport you can currently get FREE Wireless (Details Here )

Thought it does go onto say "These facilities will be available free of charge to you and other users of the airports for a limited time.These facilities will be available free of charge to you and other users of the airports for a limited time." ...

REF: Delays - 'cheers Ryanair '... although I did get time to download some ASP.NET starter-kits

Regards

Mark Dicken

 

I’m trying to be organised (multiple website) with one machine.

Firstly as a developer there are differences between IIS (version 5) that comes with Windows XP verses IIS (Version 6) which comes with Windows Server 2003 , the biggest difference (apart from the extra speed and security features) is that you can only have 1 real website on IIS5 verses many sites on IIS6

In XP you can have ‘Virtual Folders’ but they are not the same, … OK so you can go into IIS and manually set the single website root directory backwards and forwards but that can be a pain.

So after getting a shiny new laptop its time for me to get organised, I basically started hacking around, got into problems, tried this, tried that (the usual) and finally wangled it (sorted!)

So here goes a simple explanation of setting up (multiple website) with on one machine.

I've placed it in an  ARTICLE  because with the screen shots, it is quite long - ( Click Here ) to see the article

... I can now get my head down to some proper ASP.NET programming :-)

Regards

Mark Dicken

 

Great News (for me !) I've been accepted into the Microsoft® Empower Program for ISVs  

I've splashed out on a new laptop and fully prepared to get overwhelmed with DVD's and CD's.

Thanks to a certain person in the Developer and Platform Evangelism (DPE) group for assisting the 'application' jump from the Reject to Accept box.

With the winter now starting to kick in, I'll have the oppertunity to finish off some .NET projects!

Regards

Mark Dicken

 

Hey, Microsoft Ireand are having a FULL day event in Dublin:-

Microsoft Technet Security & MSDN Day (Featuring guest speaker Eric Rudder )

Date: Wednesday, November 3rd 2004, Time: 10am-6pm+
Location: Media Lab Europe , Sugar House Lane, Bellevue, Dublin 8. [ location ]
To Register: Click Here

Speakers Include :-

• Eric Rudder , - Microsoft Senior Vice President of Servers and Tools ( his blog )
• Paula Kiernan , Senior Consultant at Ward Solutions
• Nick Grattan , Microsoft Regional Director  for Ireland & Technical Director of Software Paths Limited

Main Agenda:-

10.00am – 11.30am Approaches to Fighting Spam in an Exchange Environment

11.45am – 1.00pm Managing a Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Network

2.00pm - 3.pm Eric Rudder Examines the Future Landscape of Microsoft's Servers and Tools

3.00-6:00 - Prepare to Unleash Your Web Site's Potential with ASP.NET 2.0

6.00 Developer Social

I'll be there along with other developers including members from the Irish .NET Developers Alliance and looking forward to a really great full day event.

 

.

The Microsoft Ireland Developer and Platform Evangelism (DPE) Team  hosted a great ISV Evening Event in Dublin on October 26th; we had a great presentation and discussion on SOA (Service Orientated Architecture)  by . - Many thanks to Microsoft   for putting on a great event at the U2’s Clarence Hotel at the lively Temple Bar

We all left with our ISV Community Days - Connected Systems Technical Resource Kit - CD-Rom, which nicely includes:-

• Microsoft Visual Studio.NET 2003
• Microsoft .NET Framework version 1.1
• Web Services Enhancements for Microsoft .NET version 2.0 (WSE 2.0)
• Microsoft BizTalk Server 2004
• and more...

It will be great to see more events like these in the near future …

For new people trying to learn SOA (Service Orientated Architecture) I found this Webcast quite amusing:-  here   It goes on for like 1Hr 10 Minutes+ but spells it out simply. (quiet funny also!!!)

Also, I've just noticed that the .Net Architecture Center have catagorised a good list of previously recorded webcasts at http://msdn.microsoft.com/architecture/community/webcasts/default.aspx

Plenty of SOA for me to check out :-)

Hi all, this is a standard 'Hello World' standard test / introduction message. I am a Computer Consultant with mostly Microsoft Skills in a variety of MS Technologies.

My main site is http://www.MarkDicken.com  - which will be updated in the next few weeks.

I'm a big fan of trying to utilise the latest and greatest Microsoft Technologies with whatever business solutions I'm working within.

I mostly work as an independent consultant and have worked 'throughout the whole of the UK', Saudi Arabia, Italy, Switzerland and Ireland.

Currently I'm in Ireland and will be looking for another contract around 18th November  2004.

Main Interests are:-

• Microsoft.NET
• ASP.NET
• VB.NET
• Winforms , Webforms , XML , OOP and OOD
• SQL Server 2000 (with Stored Procedures)
• . NET Application Blocks (I do love them) [the Blue-Bricks]
• MS Access (all versions)
• Legacy to SAP Data Migration and Data Cleansing
• plus more etc etc

I'm bit of a Webcast Junkie ... I see it as an opportunity to sit back and learn.

My email address is   and do free to drop me a line.

I've got a few business ideas in the pipeline and will obviously be using the Latest and Greatest Technologies from Microsoft to both serve the business needs whilst also create a Microsoft Showcase Solution.

Recently applied for the Microsoft ISV Empower Program

Recently discovered SOA ( Service Oriented Architecture) and trying to get my head around it.

...As said my first Blog!

Regards

Mark Dicken - Microsoft .NET Consultant

http://www.MarkDicken.com

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