I've been looking the last few days on how to use .NET to post messages to NNTP.  My intentions are to create a NNTP posting plugin for NewsGator.  My research today left me with a good tutorial and code (in C#) on how to communicate with a NNTP server...however, whenever I attempt to post to my NNTP server it errors with a "503 - Command Not Recognized" message.  I'm just wondering if anyone has successfully been able to post items to a NNTP server with .NET, as well as, does anyone have any other good resources?  I realize they're are a few 3rd party NNTP components out there (IP* Works and Active Up) but since this would be a plugin for NewsGator, I couldn't be able to utilize those.  Any help would be appreciated.

Update: Randy (the author of the tutorial) just sent me some updated code.  In the Post() code, you shouldn't append the newsgroup, but rather just send a "POST" message.

It seems that Microsoft has decided the whole "MikeRoweSoft.com" incident that was publicised yesterday was bad publicity for them. (story)  It sounds like Microsoft will be settling the dispute so it will be fair to both parties.

After my post yesterday, I decided I should give NewsGator Online Services a try.  When I checked out the online demo, I was thuroughly impressed with the different services they offer. I figured that it wasn't going to cost a thing since they had a 14-day free trial, so I signed up right away.  Once in, I noticed some sluggish performance, but I wrote that off as "first day jitters" and the popularity & use. 

So, I continued only to start setting up my "Premium Content".  The short listing of these really didn't impress me, but I signed up for 5 comic strips ... well I actually did the technology first, but that was a bunch of crap.  I sure hope to see more premium content in the future.

After the premium content, I just started playing around with the "Web Edition" ... again, a bit slow but it has sped up tremendously in the last 24 hours.  I wasn't as impressed with this side of things.  I wish that we could have more control over things like:

• Time elapsed to retrieve new posts.
• Deletion of individual posts, not just everything in a folder ... this doesn't make much sense.

The "Custom Feeds" or rather, "search for this phrase in news/blogs" was something really cool, however it looks like it just uses some sites search functionality, so I got back a bunch of random things for the phrase "excentrics world".

I have yet to use the "POP Edition" or "Mobile Edition", but I rarely want to read my blogs at home or somewhere else.  Maybe tonight I'll check out the "POP Edition" to see if its any good...the "Mobile Edition" however will have to wait for someone else, unless I want to crack out my iPaq in about a year.

Overall impressions - its a very nice slick interface, and has very good potential.  I'm thinking the $5.95 for the Lite version may be a little steep, but if you used all the editions and had multiple computers (which I dont), it may be worth the money.  I guess the good thing is, if after 13 days I really don't like it, I can cancel my account and not get charged for anything.  What are your impressions?

Microsoft has decided to sue a 17 year old Canadian boy over the domain name MikeRoweSoft.com (story).  The boy's name is actually Mike Rowe, and he registered the domain name to host is personal website.  Back in Nov., he received an email from MS telling him to hand over the domain.  He later received another email stating they'd pay him $10 for it.  He was appalled by this and responded back that he'd sell it for $10,000.  Well, that didn't settle well, and just recently he received a nice large book on why he'd be handing over the domain name or be sued.

So, whats the moral?  Don't argue with big companies over domain names if it somewhat infringes on their company name or a product of theirs.  That company has the right to obtain the domain name without you receiving any profits from it.  The story states, however, that MS would not win this time, but only time will tell.

I finally got around to finishing up bugs & enhancements to my custom controls and released version 1.9 Beta to all of my Beta Testers.  I give a big THANK YOU to all of you who test my controls prior to a full release.  If you're interested in becoming a beta tester, just drop me a line. 

My schedule for a public release of 1.9 is set for February 1, 2004.  During these next 2 weeks I'm going to be spending some time on the design time functionality of all my controls, hoping to better the experience for everyone.

The day has come where I've been waiting for about a month...the release of NewsGator 2.0. As most of you know, this is a MS Outlook plugin that integrates seamlessly with Outlook...and I can say that v2.0 is even better than 1.3. The new "NewsPage" is a lot better and more streamlined...makes reading my feeds a ton easier.

I haven't checked out a new feature, Online Services, but they've got a 14 day trial, so I make take the plunge and see if its worth the $5 or $6 a month. Here is the changelog from 1.3 and screenshots from 2.0.

I've successfully built my 2 installers (one for 1.0 and 1.1 frameworks), and let me tell ya, NSIS is a pretty good install script creator. With NSIS, I was finally able to do what I wanted to do:

1. Give the user the option to not install to the GAC
2. Give the user the ability to choose what optional components they want installed.

All of this done without the headache of creating custom actions & trying to figure out how things work in the limited MSI Setup Packager within VS.NET. I definately suggest this free script creator as it is very, very nice, to all developers out there struggling with VS.NET's MSI Setup Installer.

The only problem I came across, was how to install stuff to the GAC, but Martin Webrant gave me a good pointer. I also built in support for detecting the .NET framework & its versions. If you're using NSIS, or want to get started and need some pointers for installing .NET assemblies, I'd love to give ya some help and give you some of my functions.

I've decided to abandon VS.NET's MSI package and venture out and try to use NSIS. After a bit of researching, trying different things, and searching the archives for examples, I've finally got my first install script for my custom controls. I'm starting to like NSIS, and the executable it builds for installation runs, installs, and uninstalls so much faster than the MSI that is produced from the Setup Projects. I'm still learning how to do some stuff, but if you've had some experience with installing .NET assemblies & using NSIS, drop me a line, I should would appreciate some help.

LEGO has released a press release stating that they will not be dropping the MINDSTORMS product line and that it was a misunderstanding about future product policies. Good, would have hated to see this product go away!

I decided to spend a little money to ensure that my controls source code is thuroughly safe on my home server. The other week I purchased a APC BR800 and it came in today. I tell ya what, this isn't a huge monster, but it does weigh a substantial amount. I hooked it up at work just to try it out, and with no problems at all, well except for getting the battery back in after you connect it, I had it up and running and connected to my laptop & monitor.

Without a monitor, it could support my laptop for about 80-90 minutes, but as soon as you hook that monitor up, it drops big time...down to 39 minutes...I never knew a monitor could draw so much energy. Good thing I let my monitors go to sleep after 10-20 min...saving a ton on electricity.

Anyways, I decided to give it a power outage to see what happens. Well, it started beeping and whala!, it kicked in and supplied power...nice. Now, I just hope things go just as smoothly when I hook it up to my server tonight. So, if you're looking for a good, semi inexpensive UPS system for you home, check out UniStorage as I got this one for $140 shipped, cheapest on the internet.