Juixe Techknow

If you want to use a greater than sign (>) in an XML document you need to escape it. I once had to meticulously look over a 120 MB xml file that was generating a parsing exception, the cause of the exception, a greater than sign. Escape the following characters they are intended as xml/html content.

<	&#60;
> 	&#62;
& 	&#38;

Let me also mention some common characters that I escape when working with HTML.

©     ©     Copyright
            Space
&#60;      &lt;       <
&#62;      &gt;       >
&#38;      &amp;      &

This piece of code, simple as it is, took me a long while to develop. I am not well versed in Visual Basic and yet needed to find the default printer. I searched in a 1000+ page book, all over the internet, and after a lot of trial and error got it working. This Visual Basic script code block returns the default printer:

' Returns the default printer
Function GetDefaultPrinter()
   Set WshShell = WSCript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
   sRegVal = "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows "
   sRegVal = sRegVal & "NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\Device"
   sDefault = ""

   sDefault = WshShell.RegRead(sRegVal)
   sDefault = Left(sDefault, InStr(sDefault, ",") - 1)

   GetDefaultPrinter = sDefault
End Function

Currently my favorite IDE is Eclipse 3.1.0. For this inaugural Eclipse Tool Tip, I will just mention a time saver of a feature. When creating a new JavaBean, start by defining the attributes. Once this is done, go to Source > Generate setters and getters. This will open a wizard to allow you to select the attributes which you will generate setter and getter methods. This feature will save you minutes of repetitive ‘cut and paste’ programming.

Technology is ever changing. At least every decade there is a new paradigm shift, every five years a new programming language, every year a new framework, and every day a new Open Source project, design pattern, and/or new jargon. It seems that as a Software Engineer you must have the memory of an elephant. Because my iPod has more memory than me I am using the blog to remember code that I have written just as a one-shot. This space will collect code snippets that I find useful, yet not important enough for me to spare precious brain cells.