function fileSizeToString(size) {
    var suffix = ["B", "KB", "MB", "GB"];

    var place = Math.floor(Math.log(size) / Math.log(1024));
    var fileSize = Math.round(size / Math.pow(1024, place));

    return (fileSize + suffix[place]);
};

As you can see this is a relatively simple function, and really boils down to two lines of code. The first line

var place = Math.floor(Math.log(size) / Math.log(1024));

determines which suffix will be used. While the second line

var fileSize = Math.round(size / Math.pow(1024, place));

calculates the file size, which is typically measured in units of 1024.

In my case I only needed to support up to gigabyte file sizes, but the function could easily be modified to support larger sizes.

Happy Coding!

The past week has been all about design. I’ve been reading one of my favorite books again, Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture. Recently, I’ve been thinking about ways to create a web service layer over fine-grained API.  In order to reduce the number of remote calls from client applications over a distributed network, I’ve been revisiting the Remote Façade pattern, which allows you to create a coarse-grained interface over a fine-grained API. Additionally, you may also find the article on Data Transfer Objects useful.

Here are a few more articles that I read:

Software components: Coarse-grained versus fine-grained

Data Transfer Object

Domain Objects Caching Pattern for .NET

Yes you should definitely be able to run a 64-bit virtual machine on a 32-bit host like Windows XP. There are a couple of caveats, which include:

1. The virtual machine software must support 64-bit guests. That is, VMware Player must support 64-bit guests, which it does. You should use the latest version (3.0 as of this article) to be sure you get support for Windows 2008 R2. See the release notes for more information.
2. The CPU on the machine must support 64-bit instructions. In the case of Intel based CPUs, EMT64.
3. The CPU must support Virtualization Technology. Again, for Intel CPUs this is the VT extensions.
4. VT must be enabled. This is often accomplished via the Bios.

Those are the perquisites for running 64-bit guests, like Windows 2008 R2, on a 32-bit host. You can check if your CPU supports 64-bit instructions and virtualization technology using CPU-Z, or the VMware shared utilities. VMware also provides additional information in this knowledge base article.

• MySpace
• Stack Overflow
• Plenty Of Fish
• ThePort

One issue that seems to always be raised is the cost of Microsoft’s SQL Server, especially as one begins to scale out. If your strategy is to scale up by purchasing bigger hardware, then the cost may be fine, but as you begin to scale out, the costs can go significantly higher. So, for a start-up, who more than likely has very little money, this is not going to be a viable option.

Microsoft has attempted to address this issue by creating the BizSpark program, where a startup can use their software virtually free of charge for up to three years. At the end of the program you would pay a small fee, and purchase the production licenses for software that you will continue to use. The assumption that seems to be made here is that after the three year period a company will be generating enough revenue to afford the licenses. This is a step in the right direction, but after the three year period you still have to potentially fork out a large sum of money. 

Given theses choices I can understand why most startups shy away from using the Microsoft stack. However, I’ve been looking at it more seriously, and I’m wondering if you could replace the more costly pieces of the stack with another suitable option, then would it become more attractive. Specifically, what if you could replaced SQL Server with another open source database, like MySQL or PostgreSQL? It seems that these products have mature .NET support, so I can’t see why they wouldn’t be great choices to replace SQL Server. ThePort indicates a similar strategy as they begin to look at scaling their application.

However robust the cluster is, we’ve concluded that we will eventually have to move to a sharded architecture with MySQL. MS SQL licensing fees makes both continuing to enhance the cluster and scaling out to multiple machines prohibitive.

Additionally, you have the express versions of Visual Studio, which are more than capable. When combined with other open source tools like NAnt, Subversion, NUnit, and CruiseControl.net, I think you a have viable development platform for almost any application.

Obviously, I’m coming from a position that lacks the experience implementing such a solution, but as I begin to review potential options for new projects, this is one that I would have to seriously consider.

Here are a few resources for further reading on the subject:

• MySpace Architecture
• Stack Overflow Architecture
• Plenty Of Fish Architecture
• ThePort Architecture
• Scaling Up vs. Scaling Out: Hidden Costs
• MVC, Cloud Scale & Deployment
• Migrating to Postgresql with my friend NHibernate
• Is ASP.NET good enough for startup’s
• Six recommendations for starting a startup with ASP.NET
• Why we chose ASP.NET to run our startup
• How Microsoft BizSpark Is Doing With Startups
• Microsoft Startup Zone

I would love to hear opinions on this.

This was my first time upgrading my MacBook Pro, which is a mid-2009 Unibody edition. The process was very easy, except for the fact that I didn’t have a Torx screw driver, which is needed for the hard drive, but thank God for New York City, and the 24 hour Best Buy not too far from me. Where else can you go at 12 midnight to purchase a screw driver kit? Anyway, below are the steps I took to upgrade the hard drive. I’ve also included a few screen shots to serve as guidance.

In preparation you will need to do the following:

• Download and install Carbon Copy Cloner. Also, please show your support by donating to this incredible useful tool.
• Read ifixit for instructions on removing the hard drive for your particular model.
• Before proceeding, it is wise to create a backup of your current drive. I didn’t do this, but it’s probably best to do, just in case something goes wrong.

To upgrade the hard drive I did the following:

1. Format the new disk drive

• Connect the new drive, via enclosure, to the machine.
• Open Disk Utility, which can be found under the Applications->Utilities folder.
• Select the new drive, and click the Erase tab.
• Select “Mac OS Extended (Journaled)” as the format, and give the drive a name.
• Click “Erase“.

2. Repair permissions on the current drive

• From Disk Utility, select your current hard drive.
• Click “Repair Permissions“.

3. Clone the current hard drive to the new drive

• Open Carbon Copy Cloner, which should have been installed to the Applications folder.
• Select your current hard drive as the “Source Disk” and the new drive as the “Target Disk“.
• Select “Backup Everything” for “Cloning Options“.
• I left “Delete items that don’t exist on the source” unchecked.
• Verify that it says “This item will be bootable“.
• Click “Clone“.
• (Optional) After the drive has been cloned. I went back to Disc Utility, selected the new drive and click “Repair Permissions“.

4. Boot to the new drive to ensure that it works

• Reboot the machine, immediately holding down the “Option” key.
• The “Startup Manager” screen will appear.
• Select the external drive as the boot drive.

Note: This may be a slow process. At least I found it a little painful.

5. Replace the old drive with the new one

After verifying that the clone copy works, remove the old hard drive and install the new drive.

I hope you find this helpful. Have fun!

public string GetBizTalkInstallationFolder()
{
    string biztalkFolder = String.Empty;

    using (RegistryKey biztalkKey = Registry.LocalMachine.OpenSubKey("SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\BizTalk Server\\3.0"))
    {
        biztalkFolder = biztalkKey.GetValue("InstallPath", String.Empty).ToString();
    }

    return biztalkFolder;
}

After spending sometime researching hosting providers, it came down to two: Slicehost and Linode. While it was pretty much a toss up, I ended up choosing Linode, because I thought their pricing/feature combination was slightly better. The setup process was fairly smooth . However, it took me longer to get my blog up and running, because I struggled to get MovabeType working with Nginx, and Plack. I would love to hear from folks who have gotten this working. I finally abandoned it and went with my previous setup using Apache. So, my blog is finally up, running on Ubuntu thanks to the great library of documentation that Linode provides to help in configuring various Linux packages.