How was 2008 for me and Questpond ?

How was 2008 for me ?I think if i have prospered on a personal level then its on 2008. Here are some of the achievements i made on personal front :-
My AcheivementsReleased project management interview questionsReleased Excel,Word Questions and Answers
Released Architecture Interview questions
Established QuestPond formally by launching .NEt architecture videos and .NET project videos
Tied up with 4 bookshops ( its less but atleast i started) to sell Questpond product
Written around 100 articles across all major microsoft sites
My own brother now looks after my marketing work , so was able to hire my brother :-) .
In all Microsoft websites my articles where published this was a big leap for questpond and me.
Found my backup partner Mr Guru who will help me in writing and recording. I am sure he is not good than but the best.
Regrets and Failures
Comparative with 2007 i have given more time for my family but i want to give more this year.
Worked on some videos like Enterprise blocks but that did not give me much output and visibility. if had invested somewhere else should have made more out of it.
Did not write much books this year due to video work.
Have not made any international expansion on personal front.
Not revised .NET Interview question book still.

Future plans
Revising .NET interview 5 the edition
SharePoint video
WCF.WPF,WWF and LINQ video series
OOPS video
Interview Question on SharePoint , Oracle , Web designing
Finally i am nothing with out you readers , who take pain in hearing my videos and reading my articles/books. Thanks a lot from my heart to you guys....With out you readers this guy is nothing.

.NET Architecture Videos available in Offline

Dear Viewers,
Now ".NET Architecture Videos" DVD available at following Shops

COMPUTER BOOK SHOP (Central, Fort )Call @ +91-22-22070989/6356, 66317922/23/24.E-mail: - cbs@vsnl.com

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VARSHA BOOK CENTER (Neavi Mumbai Vashi )Call @ +91-2227896049/27897079/27894475.Email: - varshabook@yahoo.com, varshabook@gmail.com

Regards
Questpond

Love unreal

Was tired played unreal for two hours the old version tempest...awesome god like and did good

Lot of Action happening in life

For past four months lot of action happening in life. Some of the activities are below
Launched QuestpondVD.com
16 hours of action pack videos on Enterprise application blocks
20 hours of cool videos on .NET projects which shows completing a invoicing and accounting project end to end , in object oriented fashion , three tier , implementing design pattern etc etc
20 Hours of cool video on Design pattern and UML. Currently design pattern i have made for both C# and JAVA

and lot more...

Catch it all on www.questpond.com ;-) lets see where life takes me...

On personal front diwali is on. Blasted lot of crackers , my Choti is afraid of it. She grips me when i crack crackers and i like it. Renovated my small office of questpond. Planning to go to a resort this week for four days. by the way this week i was continously drinking and my wife has named me bewda ;-). For the coming month my target of drinking has been put down to One large CAN of beer every month and FUEL every twice month....heheheh mens are mens. Brother has joined my business and i feel homely now running the business :-).....My target for the coming year on personal front is to drink with DAD when i go to Nepal. Drinking with him is the most enjoyable moment of my life.

Released Combo pack

It was a tiresome weekend. Released UML videos. Was not getting what name i should put named it Combo pack ( UML + Design patterns ). I am sure you will enjoy it. I have put some free videos so that you can see what the quality is.

yojnE (Enjoy)

http://www.questpond.com/FreeDesign1.htm

501 Attack patterns by hackers

Ok here's something four hours video on 501 ways a hacker can attack your website

http://www.questpond.com/501attack%20pattern.htm

Design pattern videos..

Tired but feeling great
Complete three hours design pattern video i am sure you will enjoy it
http://www.questpond.com/FreeDesign1.htm

Was nominated for MVP but....

By the way i am just updating my post i am MVP now....So no hard feelings

Below is a email which i got from indiamvp@microsoft.com . The first time i read this email i felt like yes i want to be MVP. There was some form i filled up and sent the same. After some day some one called me asked , heres the conversation
The guy from Microsoft :- Hi Shiv this is XXXXX from Microsoft. Can we talk
Me - Yes please
The guy from Microsoft :- Well this is in regard to the MVP program.
Me ( Puri chati phul gayi ) :- Yes yes please go ahead :-)
Lot of blah blah but now lets come to the main point
The guy from Microsoft :- So you only write books but aren't you specialized in some particular technology.
Me - Nope i write books so that developer gets job and i think thats the best way to serve a society.
Guy from Microsoft :- I am not sure where i can really fit you in. Let me see it. Thanks and bye

Yes , i know i will not be selected for MVP as i have written only books which help people get jobs or books for common people and developers. I am sure i will not be considered for this. Not specialized in a subject , but hey specialized in delivering something which can fetch bread and butter for a developer who is jobless....My target is not MVP but i think Microsoft should consider it.

Now comes the second thing in my mind when a developer gets a job and he says thanks in email is more worth than the MVP degree , isn't it freinds.
==============================================
Hi Shiv,
I would like to introduce you to the Microsoft MVP Program.
Microsoft recognizes and awards technical experts who contribute regularly to the community. The MVP Award is given in recognition of a recipient's technical expertise, spirit of community, and their willingness to help their peers by providing reliable and accurate information about Microsoft products & technologies. An MVP is a person with a passion for technology. For more details of the program, please check www.microsoft.com/india/mvp.

Said on Feb true on July

http://computerauthor.blogspot.com/2008/02/rupee-appreciation-what-does-it-say-for.html

If you guys remember i had blogged about rupee appreciation and slow down in the month of Feb. I am sure every body must be feeling it for real now.

In many IT companies the rise is now maximum 20 %. Some mid scale IT companies have given only 5% rise. Joining Non IT is one way of thinking. Here are some facts which you can look at. The IT boom is like bubble and burst. So one bubble comes then a burst and then next.

Here are some bubbles which have come in the past

Y2k
Dot COM
And now outsourcing.....

So relax guys hold on your breath for max 1 and half year and everything will be on track.....
Bet me i have blogged now and you will see it come true within 1 and half year.

Presario C700

Uffff its almost 9 hours of struggle i have managed to enable my mic on this note book. Here what happened

Bought a new laptop Presario C700 model. Ok HP has designed the hardware in such a way that it works only with vista properly. So my headphone did not function. The only thing i knew was to get the proper driver so that my head phone is dedected in c700.

Aftr 8 hours of search this worked for me http://www.sendspace.com/file/x2zqg0

Installed it , its a unsigned driver , i was ready for the risk after 8 hours of work.

Recorded three patterns back to back Watch them on http://www.questpond.com

When something works after 9 hours of struggle its just tastes sweet honey....

Architecture Interview.....Still alive

I am sure it will help you.A small gift to my technical freinds.....

Factory patterns

Hosted by eSnips

Trip to Nepal

Trip to Nepal

Forgot to post about my nepal trip which happened 4 months back. I had written about it but did not post in my blog here's it.Those two weeks where one of best days of my life. Visiting my native place after almost 4 years was like visiting heaven.

12 th April and 13 th April -- Boarded the flight from Mumbai domestic airport to Delhi. I knew about the taxi men and rickshaw guys how they cut for a hefty sum. So we caught a rick from there to Dhaula Kuan(negotiated 50 rs maximum). This is the the place from where all buses go to any part of delhi. From Dhaula Kuan caught a bus to Anand Vihar. From there caught a bus to Gauri phanta. One night journey crossing from Bareily and takes you to the border. So 13th morning i was at my Indian border house.

14th -- Just roamed here and there with Mr lalu (brother) who stays near to my house. Maoist where winning the election with majority votes so politics was the talk of the town. Every one is saying 'Nayo Nepal' the way we said some times back 'Shining India'. Still there is a long way to go for the maoist.

15,16 17 th -- Morning took a bike to go my dad's village Ratoli which is in Doti. Travelled approx 250 Km (Dandaildhera,Gaira , Doti ) from Dhangadi to Doti it was rocking.....Village tea , fish , wine everything was awesome. Met my gradparents , watched the sethi river, ate nice village food. It was a great experience.


18 th Back to border of nepal and 23st again boarded a flight from delhi to mumbai.

Back to mumbai , traffic ,pollution , career, writing and what not....Looks like we are all going far away from mother nature. Will again visit Nepal soon.

Raking in Amazon UK

Amazon ranking does not signify how my books sell. I think my .NET sells more than JAVA for what ever reason Amazon shows Java more than .NET. A glimpse of my book rankings on Amazon.

1 - J2EE
92 - .NET
34 - SQL Server
33 - Software testing

Release plan of books for this year

My rough plan for this year.

Excel Questions and Answers 50 days 3/24/2008 5/30/2008
Architecture Interview Questions 40 days 6/2/2008 7/25/2008
Web designer Interview Questions 50 days 7/28/2008 10/3/2008
Oracle Interview questions 50 days 10/6/2008 12/12/2008
Data mining Warehousing interview Questions 50 days 12/15/2008 2/20/2009
Software IT Interview Questions 40 days 2/23/2009 4/17/2009
Java Interview Questions ( Updated Version ) 15 days 4/20/2009 5/8/2009
.NET Interview Questions ( Updated Version ) 10 days 5/11/2009 5/22/2009
Testing Interview Question ( Updated Version) 10 days 5/25/2009 6/5/2009

Glimpse of the my new EXCEL book

You can view my EXCEL book on the below link. Still working on it completed 50 pages and hope to complete the same in the coming month.
http://www.geocities.com/excelquestpond/Index.htm

Free hardcopies from me

Hi all. I get complimentary copies now and then from my publisher. They are just getting accumulated in my office. If any one interested please call Mr Khadak for the same at 9867153695. He is a nice guy please speak with him in Hindi. Second you need to travel yourself to my writing office ( located in Mulund Mumbai) to collect the same.
We have .NET , Project management and networking interview books currently.

Happy job hunting....

Quote by Thomas Lauren Friedman

Just came across a quote by an American journalist Thomas Lauren Friedman
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Friedman .
"When we were young kids growing up in America, we were Told to eat our vegetables at dinner and not leave them. Mothers said, think of the starving children in India And finish the dinner.'
And now I tell my children: 'Finish your homework. Think of the children in India Who would make you starve, if you don’t.’?”My comment on this. Well its business and not about starving. I think india was definetly not starving before outsourcing and after outsourcing. The companies outsource because of good IT talent and reasonable labour rate. I am sure no one comes to India to donate money. Indian software companies are also listed on NASDAQ and also provide jobs to US citizens. I can understand the recruitment rate is not so good as compared to Indians in a company , but i am sure it will rise. They pay heavy taxes to US Goverment and etc etc.
I think i will amend that statement.

"When we were young kids growing up in America, we were Told to eat our vegetables at dinner and not leave them. Mothers said, think about how Indians do not waste food.'
And now I tell my children: 'Finish your homework and be competitive like Indians?”

Farewell to my guru Mr.Thamaka Nadan

Sad news that Mr. Thamaka Nadan is no more. A senior whom i worked with when i was a fresher. He was at that time the Chief Arch of DELL App. I always admired him for his technical qualities. But more than that i admired him as a good , caring and very nice senior. Just wanted to pay a tribute to my guru by remembering one of the incidence which changed my life and especially made me clear about the role a architecture has to play:-

I was assigned on a project which had approx 40 team members with core developer of 35 and the rest manager. Mr Nadan governed projects so he was not directly involved with the team. We had a design phase of 4 months. The output of the same was highly complicated , sophisticated technical document. Our project architecture gave the team members the document and bad part was none of us knew UML. Even my UML knowledge was not to that par. So i just went to the project architecture and gave my view i am not able to grasp what the document is speaking. He blasted , what kind of technical people i have on the project ?. People who do not know UML should be rolled off. That was a bad sign for me. It was a big project i did not wanted to be left out. Some how Mr Nadan came to know about the same. He called me at my desk and told me to come to his cabin. He took the document and made me understand the same with simple flow chart , pseudo-code and block diagrams. In a minute i had everything what i need to start. He told me that come on a Saturday and i will take your 1 hour lecture of UML. I understood crisp and clear what the document said. Till today the UML he taught i have not forgotten. I got the best developer award in the project after one year. Till today no one knew Mr. Nadan had explained me the same with simple pseudo code or else i would have never coded my module.
He told me one thing whats the use of UML if your developer does not understand it. The most important thing a architecture should know is what the language the developer understands and talk in the same language......

This is the biggest lesson i learnt from you , hats off and my tribute to my guru.

Excel FAQ for office...Can not stop writing....

On my new project EXCEL FAQ for Office. Hope to make a small place in the hearts of accountants , financial and brokerage firms. Alive , still writing .....
Common Formulas
How to find average of a given set of results?
How do we concatenate in excel?
Investment, loan and Interest calculation
How can we calculate compounding interest in excel?
How do we calculate future and present value for series of cash flow?
To achieve 61051 INR after 5 yrs at 10% interest rate what should be the yearly investment amount?
How do we calculate number of years for given rate of interest and loan value?
How do we calculate rate of interest?
Deprecation
How do we calculate straight line depreciation?
What is double declining depreciation?
How do we calculate depreciation using ‘sum of year digit’?
How can we calculate depreciation for a certain time period?

.NET 4th edition question snapshot

Ok , i was not away just busy with one other launch. Launching my 4th edition on mid of april. Here are the questions. But please do not ask when it can be launched as it completely depends on Bpb. Added extra question for Ajax, reporting services, 3.5 , asp.net 2.0 and lot more....
Basic .NET Framework
What is an IL?
What is a CLR?
What is CTS?
What is a CLS (Common Language Specification)?
What is a Managed Code?
What is a Assembly?
What are the different types of Assembly?
What is NameSpace?
What is Difference between NameSpace and Assembly?
If you want to view an Assembly how do you go about it?
What is Manifest?
Where is version information stored of an assembly?
Is versioning applicable to private assemblies?
What is GAC?
what is the concept of strong names?
How to add and remove an assembly from GAC?
What is Delay signing?
What is garbage collection?
Can we force garbage collector to run?
What is reflection?
What are different types of JIT?
What are Value types and Reference types?
What is concept of Boxing and Unboxing ?
What is the difference between VB.NET and C#?
what is the difference between System exceptions and Application exceptions?
What is CODE Access security?
What is a satellite assembly?
How to prevent my .NET DLL to be decompiled?
what is the difference between Convert.toString and .toString () method?
What is Native Image Generator (Ngen.exe)?
If we have two version of same assembly in GAC how do we make a choice?
What is CodeDom?

.NET Interoperability
How can we use COM Components in .NET?
We have developed the COM wrapper do we have to still register the COM?
How can we use .NET components in COM?
How can we make Windows API calls in .NET?
When we use windows API in .NET is it managed or unmanaged code?
What is COM?
What is Reference counting in COM?
Can you describe IUKNOWN interface in short?
Can you explain what DCOM is?
How do we create DCOM object in VB6?
How to implement DTC in .NET?
How many types of Transactions are there in COM + .NET?
How do you do object pooling in .NET?
What are types of compatibility in VB6?
What is equivalent for regsvr32 exe in .NET?

Threading
What is Multi-tasking?
What is Multi-threading?
What is a Thread?
Did VB6 support multi-threading?
Can we have multiple threads in one App domain?
Which namespace has threading?
What does Address Of operator do in background?
How can you reference current thread of the method?
what is Thread.Sleep () in threading?
How can we make a thread sleep for infinite period?
What is Suspend and Resume in Threading?
What the way to stop a long running thread?
How do I debug thread?
What is Thread.Join () in threading?
What are Daemon threads and how can a thread be created as Daemon?
How is shared data managed in threading?
Can we use events with threading?
How can we know a state of a thread?
What is use of Interlocked class ?
What is a monitor object?
What are wait handles?
What is ManualResetEvent and AutoResetEvent?
What is Reader Writer Locks?
How can you avoid deadlock in threading?
What is the difference between thread and process?

Remoting and Webservices
What is an application domain?
What is .NET Remoting?
Which class does the remote object has to inherit?
what are two different types of remote object creation mode in .NET ?
Describe in detail Basic of SAO architecture of Remoting?
What are the situations you will use singleton architecture in remoting?
What is fundamental of published or precreated objects in Remoting?
What are the ways in which client can create object on server in CAO model?
Are CAO stateful in nature?
To create objects in CAO with ‘new’ keyword what should be done?
Is it a good design practice to distribute the implementation to Remoting Client?
What are LeaseTime, SponsorshipTime, RenewonCallTime and LeaseManagerPollTime?
Which config file has all the supported channels/protocol?
How can you specify remoting parameters using Config files?
Can Non-Default constructors be used with Single Call SAO?
How can we call methods in remoting asynchronously?
What is Asynchronous One-Way Calls?
What is marshalling and what are different kinds of marshalling?
What is ObjRef object in remoting?
What is a Web Service?
What is UDDI?
What is DISCO?
What is WSDL?
What the different phase/steps of acquiring a proxy object in Web service?
What the different phase/steps of acquiring a proxy object in Web service?
What is file extension of Web services?
Which attribute is used in order that the method can be used as WebService?
What are the steps to create a web service and consume it?
Do webservice have state?

Caching Concepts
What is an application object?
what is the difference between Cache object and application object?
How can get access to cache object?
What are dependencies in cache and types of dependencies?
Can you show a simple code showing file dependency in cache?
What is Cache Callback in Cache?
What is scavenging?
What are different types of caching using cache object of ASP.NET?
How can you cache different version of same page using ASP.NET cache object?
How will implement Page Fragment Caching?
Can you compare ASP.NET sessions with classic ASP?
Which are the various modes of storing ASP.NET session?
Is Session_End event supported in all session modes?
What are the steps to configure StateServer Mode?
What are the steps to configure SQLServer mode?
Where do you specify session state mode in ASP.NET?
What are the other ways you can maintain state?
What are benefits and Limitation of using Hidden fields?
What is ViewState?
Does the performance for viewstate vary according to User controls?
What are benefits and Limitation of using Viewstate for state management?
How can you use Hidden frames to cache client data ?
What are benefits and limitations of using Hidden frames?
What are benefits and limitations of using Cookies?
What is Query String and What are benefits and limitations of using Query Strings?
What is Absolute and Sliding expiration?
What is cross page posting?
How do we access viewstate value of this page in the next page ?
Can we post and access view state in another application?
What is SQL Cache Dependency in ASP.NET 2.0?
How do we enable SQL Cache Dependency in ASP.NET 2.0?
What is Post Cache substitution?
Why do we need methods to be static for Post Cache substitution?

OOPS
What is Object Oriented Programming?
What is a Class?
What is an Object?
What is the relation between Classes and Objects?
What are different properties provided by Object-oriented systems?
How can we achieve inheritance in VB.NET?
what are abstract classes?
What is a Interface?
What is difference between abstract classes and interfaces?
What is a delegate?
What are Events?
Do events have return type?
Can events have access modifiers?
Can we have shared events?
what is shadowing?
What is the difference between Shadowing and Overriding?
what is the difference between delegate and events?
If we inherit a class do the private variables also get inherited?
What is the different accessibility levels defined in .NET?
Can you prevent a class from overriding?
what is the use of “Must inherit” keyword in VB.NET?
Do interface have accessibility modifier?
What are similarities between Class and structure?
What is the difference between Class and structure’s?
What does virtual keyword mean?
What are shared (VB.NET)/Static(C#) variables?
What is Dispose method in .NET?
What is the use of “Overrides” and “Overridable” keywords?
Where are all .NET Collection classes located?
What is ArrayList?
What is a HashTable?
What are queues and stacks?
What is ENUM?
What is nested Classes?
What is Operator overloading in .NET?
For the below code which constructor will fire first?
What is the significance of Finalize method in .NET?
How can we suppress a finalize method?
What is the use of DISPOSE method?
How do I force the Dispose method to be called automatically, as clients can forget to call Dispose method?
In what instances you will declare a constructor to be private?
Can we have different access modifiers on get/set methods of a property ?
If we write a goto or a return statement in try and catch block will the finally block execute?
What is Indexer?
Can we have static indexer in C#?
Can two catch blocks be executed?
What is the difference between System.String and System.StringBuilder classes?

ASP.NET
What’ is the sequence in which ASP.NET events are processed?
In which event are the controls fully loaded?
How can we identify that the Page is Post Back?
How does ASP.NET maintain state in between subsequent request?
What is event bubbling?
How do we assign page specific attributes?
How do we ensure viewstate is not tampered?
What is the use of @ Register directives?
What is the use of Smart Navigation property?
What is AppSetting Section in “Web.Config” file?
Where is View State information stored?
what is the use of @ Output Cache directive in ASP.NET?
How can we create custom controls in ASP.NET?
How many types of validation controls are provided by ASP.NET?
Can you explain “AutoPostBack”?
How can you enable automatic paging in Data Grid?
What is the use of “GLOBAL.ASAX” file?
What is the difference between “Web.config” and “Machine.Config”?
What is a SESSION and APPLICATION object?
What is the difference between ‘Server.Transfer’ and ‘response. Redirect’ ?
What is the difference between Authentication and authorization?
what is impersonation in ASP.NET?
Can you explain in brief how the ASP.NET authentication process works?
What are the various ways of authentication techniques in ASP.NET?
How does authorization work in ASP.NET?
What is difference between Data grid, Datalist, and repeater?
From performance point of view, how do they rate?
What is the method to customize columns in Data Grid?
How can we format data inside Data Grid?
How to decide on the design consideration to take a Data grid, data list, or repeater?
Difference between ASP and ASP.NET?
What are major events in GLOBAL.ASAX file?
What order they are triggered?
Do session use cookies?
How can we force all the validation control to run?
How can we check if all the validation control are valid and proper?
If client side validation is enabled in your Web page, does that mean server side code is not run.?
Which JavaScript file is referenced for validating the validators at the client side?
How to disable client side script in validators?
How can I show the entire validation error message in a message box on the client side?
You find that one of your validations is very complicated and does not fit in any of the validators, what will you do?
What exactly happens when ASPX page is requested from a browser?
How can we kill a user session?
How do you upload a file in ASP.NET?
How do I send email message from ASP.NET?
What are different IIS isolation levels?
ASP used STA threading model, what is the threading model used for ASP.NET.?
What is the use of <%@ page aspcompat=true %> attribute?
Explain the differences between Server-side and Client-side code?
Can you explain Forms authentication in detail?
How do I sign out in forms authentication?
If cookies are not enabled at browser end does form Authentication work?
How to use a checkbox in a data grid?
What are the steps to create a windows service in VB.NET?
What is the difference between “Web farms” and “Web garden”?
How do we configure “Web Garden”?
What is the main difference between Grid layout and Flow Layout?
What’s the difference between trace and debug in ASP.NET?
How do you enable tracing in on an ASP.NET page?
Which namespace is needed to implement debug and trace ?
Can you explain the concept of trace listener?
What are trace switches?

NET Architecture
What are design patterns?
What is the difference between Factory and Abstract Factory Patterns?
What is MVC pattern?
How can we implement singleton pattern in .NET?
How do you implement prototype pattern in .NET?
What are the situations you will use a Web Service and Remoting in projects?
Can you give a practical implementation of FAÇADE patterns?
How can we implement observer pattern in .NET?
What is three-tier architecture?
Have you ever worked with Microsoft Application Blocks, if yes then which?
What is Service Oriented architecture?
What are different ways you can pass data between tiers?
What is Windows DNA architecture?
What is aspect oriented programming?

ADO.NET
What is the namespace in which .NET has the data functionality class?
Can you give an overview of ADO.NET architecture?
What are the two fundamental objects in ADO.NET?
What is difference between dataset and data reader?
What are major difference between classic ADO and ADO.NET?
What is the use of connection object?
What is the use of command objects?
What is the use of data adapter?
What are basic methods of Data adapter?
What is Dataset object?
What are the various objects in Dataset?
How can we connect to Microsoft Access, FoxPro, and Oracle etc?
How do we connect to SQL SERVER, which namespace do we use?
How do we use stored procedure in ADO.NET and how do we provide parameters to the stored procedures?
How can we force the connection object to close after my data reader is closed?
I want to force the data reader to return only schema of the data store rather than data.?
How can we fine-tune the command object when we are expecting a single row?
Which is the best place to store connection string in .NET projects?
What are the steps involved to fill a dataset?
What are the various methods provided by the dataset object to generate XML?
How can we save all data from dataset?
How can we check that some changes have been made to dataset since it was loaded?
How can we add/remove row is in “Data Table” object of “Dataset”?
What is basic use of “Data View”?
What is the difference between “Dataset” and “Data Reader” ?
How can we load multiple tables in a Dataset?
How can we add relation between tables in a Dataset?
What is the use of Command Builder?
What’s difference between “Optimistic” and “Pessimistic” locking ?
How many ways are there to implement locking in ADO.NET?
How can we perform transactions in .NET?
What is difference between Dataset? Clone and Dataset. Copy?
Can you explain the difference between an ADO.NET Dataset and an ADO Record set?
Explain in detail the fundamental of connection pooling?
What is Maximum Pool Size in ADO.NET Connection String?
How to enable and disable connection pooling?
What extra features does ADO.Net 2.0 have ?

SQL SERVER
What is normalization? What are different types of normalization?
What is denormalization?
What is a candidate key?
What are the different types of joins? What is the difference between them?
What are indexes? What is the difference between clustered and nonclustered indexes?
How can you increase SQL performance?
What is the use of OLAP?
What is a measure in OLAP?
What are dimensions in OLAP?
What are levels in dimensions?
What are fact tables and dimension tables in OLAP?
What is DTS?
What is fill factor ?
What is RAID and how does it work?
What is the difference between DELETE TABLE and TRUNCATE TABLE commands?
If locking is not implemented, what issues can occur?
What are different transaction levels in SQL SERVER?
What are the different locks in SQL SERVER?
Can we suggest locking hints to SQL SERVER?
What is LOCK escalation?
What are the different ways of moving data between databases in SQL Server?
What are advantages of SQL 2000 over SQl 7.0?
What is the difference between a HAVING CLAUSE and a WHERE CLAUSE?
What is the difference between UNION and UNION ALL SQL syntax?
How can you raise custom errors from stored procedure?
what is ACID fundamental? What are transactions in SQL SERVER?
What is DBCC?
What is the purpose of Replication?
What are the different types of replication supported by SQL SERVER?
What is BCP utility in SQL SERVER?
What are the different types of triggers in SQl SERVER?
If we have multiple AFTER Triggers on table how can we define the sequence of the triggers?
What is SQL injection?
What is the difference between Stored Procedure (SP) and User Defined Function (UDF)?

UML
What is UML?
How many types of diagrams are there in UML?
What are advantages of using UML?
What is the sequence of UML diagrams in project?
Give a small brief explanation of all Elements in activity diagrams?
Explain Different elements of a collaboration diagram?
Explain all parts of a deployment diagram?
Describe the various components in sequence diagrams?
What are the elements in State Chart diagrams?
Describe different elements in Static Chart diagrams?
Explain the different elements of a Use Case?

Project Management

What is project management?
Is spending in IT projects constant through out the project?
Who is a stakeholder?
Can you explain project life cycle?
Are risk constant through out the project?
Can you explain different software development life cycles?
What is triple constraint triangle in project management?
What is a project baseline?
What is effort variance?
How is normally a project management plan document organized?
How do you estimate a project?
What is CAR (Causal Analysis and Resolution)?
What is DAR (Decision Analysis and Resolution)?
What is a fish bone diagram?
What is Pareto principle?
How do you handle change request?
What is internal change request?
What is difference between SITP and UTP in testing?
Which software have you used for project management?
What are the metrics followed in project management?
People in your project do not peform , what will you do?
What is black box testing and White box testing?
What is the difference between Unit testing, Assembly testing and Regression testing?
What is V model in testing?
How do you start a project?
How did you do resource allocations?
How will you do code reviews?
What is CMMI?
What are the five levels in CMMI?
What is continuous and staged representation?
What is SIX sigma?
What are DMAIC and DMADV?
What are the various roles in Six Sigma implementation?
What are function points?
What are the different types of elementary process in FPA?
What are the different elements in Functions points?
Can you explain in GSC and VAF in function points?
What are unadjusted function points and how is it calculated?
Can you explain steps in function points?
What is the FP per day in your current company?
Do you know Use Case points?
What is COCOMO I, COCOMOII and COCOMOIII?
What is SMC approach of estimation?
How do you estimate maintenance project and change requests?

XML
What is XML?
What is the version information in XML?
What is ROOT element in XML?
If XML does not have closing tag will it work?
Is XML case sensitive?
What is the difference between XML and HTML?
Is XML meant to replace HTML?
Can you explain why your project needed XML?
What is DTD (Document Type Definition)?
What is well formed XML?
What is a valid XML?
What is CDATA section in XML?
What is CSS?
What is XSL?
What is element and attributes in XML?
Which are the namespaces in .NET used for XML?
What are the standard ways of parsing XML document?
In What scenarios will you use a DOM parser and SAX parser?
How was XML handled during COM times?
What is the main difference between MSML and .NET Framework XML classes?
What are the core functionalities in XML .NET framework? Can you explain in detail those functionalities?
What is XSLT?
Define XPATH?
What is the concept of XPOINTER?
What is an XMLReader Class?
What is XMLTextReader?
How do we access attributes using “XmlReader”?
Explain simple Walk through of XmlReader?
What does XmlValidatingReader class do?

Localization/Globalization

What is Unicode & Why was it introduced?
Does .NET support UNICODE and how do you know it supports?
What is the difference between localization and globalization?
What architecture decisions you should consider while planning for international software’s?
How do we get the current culture of the environment in windows and ASP.NET?
Which are the important namespaces during localization and globalization?
What are resource files and how do we generate resource files?
Can resource file be in any other format other than resx extensions?
How is resource files actually used in project?
How can we use Culture Auto in project?
What are satellite assemblies?
How do we generate Satellite assemblies?
What is AL.EXE and RESGEN.EXE?
What is the use of resource manager class?
What precautions do we need to take while deploying satellite assemblies?
Can we get a strongly typed resource class rather than using resource manager?
Can you explain the fundamentals of “GetGlobalResourceObject” and “GetLocalResourceObject” functions?
Can we sign a satellite assembly?
Can you explain collation sequence in sql server?
How do we define collation sequence for database and tables?
Can we change the order in a select query with a specified collation sequence?
Can you list best practices for globalization and localization?
Why is the culture set to the current thread?

Windows Communication Foundation
What are the important principles of SOA (Service oriented Architecture)?
What are ends, contract, address, and bindings?
Which specifications does WCF follow?
What are the main components of WCF?
Explain how Ends, Contract, Address, and Bindings are done in WCF?
what is a service class?
what is a service contract, operation contract and Data Contract?
what are the various ways of hosting a WCF service?
How do we host a WCF service in IIS?
what are the advantages of hosting WCF Services in IIS as compared to self-hosting?
what are the major differences between services and Web services?
What is the difference WCF and Web services?
What are different bindings supported by WCF?
Which are the various programming approaches for WCF?
What is one-way operation?
Can you explain duplex contracts in WCF?
How can we host a service on two different protocols on a single server?
How can we use MSMQ bindings in WCF?
Can you explain transactions in WCF?
What different transaction isolation levels provided in WCF?
Can we do transactions using MSMQ?
Can we have two-way communications in MSMQ?
What are Volatile queues?
What are Dead letter queues?
What is a poison message?

Windows Presentation Framework
What is WPF?
What is XAML?
What are dependency properties?
Are XAML file compiled or built on runtime?
Can you explain how we can separate code and XAML?
How can we access XAML objects in behind code?
What kind of documents are supported in WPF?

Windows workflow foundation
What is Windows Workflow Foundation?
What is a Workflow?
What are different types of Workflow in Windows Workflow foundation?
when should we use a sequential workflow and when should we use state machines?
How do we create workflows using designer?
How do we specify conditions in Work flow?
How do you handle exceptions in workflow?
What is the use of XOML files.
How can we pass parameters to workflow?

ATLAS-AJAX
What problem does Ajax solve?
What is Ajax?
What is the fundamental behind Ajax?
What is JSON?
How do we use XMLHttpRequest object in JavaScript?
How do we do asynchronous processing using Ajax?
What are the various states in XMLHttpRequest and how do we check the same?
How can we get response text?
How can we send request to the server using the XMLHttpRequest component?
How do we pass parameters to the server?
How can we create a class in JavaScript using Atlas?
How do we do inheritance-using Atlas?
How do we define interfaces using Atlas?
How do we reference HTML controls using Atlas?
Can you explain Scriptmanager control in Ajax?
Can you explain Enablepartialrendering and UpdatePanel control in Ajax?
Can you explain the concept of triggers in ‘UpdatePanel’ control?
Can you explain the ‘UpdateProgress’ component?
How can you do validations in Ajax?
How do we do exception handling in Ajax?
How do we consume web service in Atlas?
How can we consume data directly in web services?

Reports
How do we access crystal reports in .NET?
What are the various components in crystal reports?
What basic steps are needed to display a simple report in crystal?
Can crystal reports be published as a web service?
How do we invoke the crystal report web service?
How do we add formulas using crystal reports?
How do we pass parameters to crystal reports?
How do we export from crystal reports?
How do we print to printer using crystal?
How do we generate cross tab reports?
How can we do grouping in crystal?
Can you explain three-pass reporting which crystal report uses?
Can you explain reporting services architecture?
We have two IIS application ‘Reports’ and ‘Reportserver’ what do they do ?
Can you explain Report definition language (RDL) file in reporting services?
What is the basic process of making a report in reporting services?
How can we consume reports in ASP.NET?
Can you explain the difference between private and shared data sources?
How does reports caching in reporting services work ?
What are the major differences between Crystal and SQL reporting services?

ASP.NET 2.0

What improvements are provided in ASP.NET 2.0?
How does ASP.NET 2.0 eliminate tedious coding?
How do we encrypt web.config files in ASP.NET 2.0 ?
With the above technique can you encrypt everything in the web.config file?
In .NET 1.X how was the encryption implemented for config files?
Can you explain membership and role providers in ASP.Net 2.0?
What kind of security web controls are introduced in ASP.NET 2.0?
Can you explain master pages concept in ASP.NET?
what is the concept of Web parts?
What are the different components of the web part framework?
What are partial classes in ASP.NET ?
Can you explain generics in .NET ?
Can you explain the concept of generic collection?

How to
How do you send a email using ASP.NET ?
How did you deployment and setup in ASP.NET ?

.NET 3.5
Define LINQ ?
We already have common data access model what is special about LINQ?
How can you make entity classes from the table itself ?
How can we transform LINQ to objects ?
How to transform LINQ to ADO.NET ?
How to transform LINQ to SQL ?
How to transform LINQ to XML ?
How to transform LINQ to entities ?
Can you explain Delegate Instantiation?
Can you explain Anonymous methods ?
What is Yield in LINQ ?
Can you explain Lambda Expressions ?
What are Instance methods and Extension methods ?
What are Anonymous types ?
Revision of Simple Query syntax for LINQ ?
What is silver light?

Rupee appreciation What does it say for Indian IT jobs.

Rupee appreciation What does it say for Indian IT jobs.

From 2003 to 2007 the Rs appreciated from 48 to 43.....Hmmm 4 years for such a margin was ok. But this time the rupee in a few months downsized to 39 and is stable there for a long time. From my perspective big IT companies with huge margins will sustain this appreciation. Its possible that job cut off's can be part of sustainance. For smaller and medium companies it
can be wash out also. The margins on which they operate are small with rupee appreciating it can worsen further.

I ( and i hope many seniors in IT industry know about those phases ) had witnessed two such falls one in y2k and the other during dot com. The question in this down turn will be not about jobs but about expectation. Today an indian IT professional has been habituated and pampered to 20 to 40 percent rise with bonus. Will he accept 10 to 15 percent rise with bonus cuts ?.

So this year for IT will be all about consolidation.One thing very much possible is that this appreciation can be oppurtunities for countries like Philipiness because of
reasonable man power.

So what does it mean for small people like us who work in the IT industry :-

• If possible think about joining good Non-IT firms. I have already done that.
• Do not be on bench.
• Keep yourself prepared mentally for variable bonus cuts.
• If you are working for IT companies be mentally prepared for cuts and low salary rises. Where an IT professional was getting 30 to 40 percent rise , expect only 10 to 15 percent. Remember life is not about always green but also about struggle.
• If you are in training industry try to get away from it they are hit the most. When cost cutting comes trainings are the most affected.
• Be a part of project which has good financial returns. Not a simple part but a important part of the project. Company should value your existence in the project.
• Do not shy away in cross questioning your end customer onsite are they thinking of cut off.
  If you are fresher looking for job try Non-IT firms for this year. Who knows what will be in store ?.
• If you have taken loan on the current hefty pay try to talk to your seniors to understand what is the companies move for this global recession and slow down. Will it affect the company profits in any way ?.
• If you are senior who is aware of the cut please give signals to the people below regarding the same.
• Every rise falls and every fall rises some times or later rises. So this is a temproray phase it will come and go.
• If you beleive in yourself you do not need to take any thing of the above seriously.

Fast one hour writing.

Wrote one complete chapter on crystal reports for my 4 th edition .NET interview

below is the snippet for the same.
Chapter - Crystal Reports
How do we access crystal reports in .NET?
What are the various components in crystal reports?
What basic steps are needed to display a simple report in crystal?
Can crystal reports be published as a web service?
How do we invoke the crystal report web service?
How do we add formulas using crystal reports?
How do we pass parameters to crystal reports?
How do we export from crystal reports?
How do we print to printer using crystal?
How do we generate cross tab reports?
How can we do grouping in crystal?
Can you explain three-pass reporting which crystal report uses?

Move a bit every day and the destination will be reached.....Walking , still writing , still alive....

Added some extra questions on Ajax

Busy updating my 4 th edition on .NEt Interview questions. Below are the list of new questions added to Ajax.
ATLAS-AJAX

What problem does Ajax solve?

What is Ajax?

What is the fundamental behind Ajax?

What is JSON?

How do we use XMLHttpRequest object in JavaScript?

How do we do asynchronous processing using Ajax?

What are the various states in XMLHttpRequest and how do we check the same?

How can we get response text?

How can we send request to the server using the XMLHttpRequest component?

How do we pass parameters to the server?

How can we create a class in JavaScript using Atlas?

How do we do inheritance-using Atlas?

How do we define interfaces using Atlas?

How do we reference HTML controls using Atlas?

Can you explain Scriptmanager control in Ajax?

Can you explain Enablepartialrendering and UpdatePanel control in Ajax?

Can you explain the concept of triggers in ‘UpdatePanel’ control?

Can you explain the ‘UpdateProgress’ component?

How can you do validations in Ajax?

How do we do exception handling in Ajax?

How do we consume web service in Atlas?

How can we consume data directly in web services?

Excel In Hindi

On my Hindi book. Excel in Hindi. It will exclusive formulas for office people which can make there work easy.

Architecture Interview Questions on the way.....

UML
Can you explain use case diagrams?
Can you explain primary and secondary actors?
How does a simple use case look like?
Can you explain ‘Extend’ and ‘Include’ in use cases?
Can you explain class diagrams?
How do we represent private, public and protected in class diagrams?
what does associations in a class diagram mean?
Can you explain aggregation and composition in class diagrams?
What are composite structure diagram and reflexive association in class diagrams?
Can you explain business entity and service class?
Can you explain System entity and service class?
Can you explain generalization and specialization?
Can you explain object diagrams in UML?
Can you explain sequence diagrams?
Can you explain collaboration diagrams ?
Can you explain activity diagrams?
What is state chart diagram?
Can you explain stereotypes in UML?
Can you explain package diagrams?

......Boom.

Plan rejection of starting a IT news paper

Ok, I was thinking of venturing in to something new :- IT news paper. We did a market study for two month.I had about 2 days of full meeting with my internal team , regarding should we start the IT news paper or not. We rejected the idea of not starting IT news paper. Here are some points why we concluded the same , who knows can be useful to you :-

• If you start a news paper you need to bear the printing cost for atleast 6 months if its a weekly new paper. This is because till you do not get advertisements news paper sales are your only earning.
• Indian shopkeeper takes 25 % of the news paper cost while the distrubuter takes 10 %.
• IT news papers are not sales constant. What i mean is Indiatimes will have a constant sales. But a IT news papers sales can vary depending on that issues content. So sometimes you can sell really high and some times really low.
• You need to make sure you write and meet your issue dead lines....So constant work.
• Need to keep 3 months rolling money in the market.
• Most of the current IT news papers ( Weekly) do not sell more than 2000 copies monthly. I think they mostly survive of ads. But i think giving Ads in IT websites are more better than hard copy new papers. I really do not think that the companies must be giving huge money for placing those ads.
• I really doubt people will buy news paper to read technical....Google gives you more than that free of cost and better articles.

Plan Drop....Plan Drop.....Will continue with my books and concentrate more on data generation for technical people.

Bye Vijay.....

If i write about somebody in my blog...I really mean by it. I worked with this guy Vijay who was from lancesoft for almost a year. He was a machine.The farewell party was awesome. Always helping others, was in the core modules....One thing which i found about him was , he was never tired.....He was consistent.

I will really miss you around.....Lets not say farewell....Who knows we meet again.

Software Architecture Interview Questions

On my new book Software Architecture Interview Questions
The story continues .... What is Activity diagram , What is sequence diagrams , can you explain design patterns , Whats the difference between abstract factory and factory pattern......

Software Testing Printed by Infinity Press

You can get my Software Testing now in US market through Infinity press.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Software-Testing-Computer-Science-Koirala/dp/1934015245/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1199267670&sr=8-1

Things are moving in life......