The Old New Thing

March 2008 - The Old New Thing

You can drag multiple virtual objects, you know

March 31, 2008 Mar 31, 2008 03/31/08
Raymond Chen
A customer wanted to know how they could find out the directory that the user dropped a file onto. As we already noted, users can drop files onto things other than directories, so the question itself comes with incorrect hidden assumptions. This is another one of those cases where you have to ask the customer, "What are you really trying to ...

The most academically elite team in college basketball, in quest for their first conference win in 21 years

March 28, 2008 Mar 28, 2008 03/28/08
Raymond Chen
Quantum Hoops is a new documentary which follows the college basketball program at the California Institute of Technology through its 2007–2008 season. The school is regularly honored as one of the finest academic colleges in the United States. Their basketball team, on the other hand, is not as well-honored. It has won two conference ...

Microspeak: Newplacement

March 28, 2008 Mar 28, 2008 03/28/08
Raymond Chen
When talking about why people buy computers, there are two broad categories, "replacement computers" (those which replace an older machine being retired) and "new placement computers" (those which do not). Now, sure, you have to call them something, but "new placements" sounds kind of markety. Then again, I felt the same way about using "...

Meet Deltalina, the star of Delta's new in-flight safety video

March 27, 2008 Mar 27, 2008 03/27/08
Raymond Chen
Who knew that in-flight safety videos could be so popular? Introduced to the world on the Delta blog, the latest Delta in-flight safety video has generated quite a buzz around the Internet. Well, more accurately, the buzz surrounds the video's star, flight attendant Katherine Lee, known to her drooling fans as Deltalina, with secondary ...

Why do structures get tag names even if there is a typedef?

March 27, 2008 Mar 27, 2008 03/27/08
Raymond Chen
As we noted last time, structure tags are different from the typedef name as a historical artifact of earlier versions of the C language. But what about just leaving out the name entirely? One problem with this approach is that it becomes impossible to make a forward reference to this structure because it has no name. For example, if you ...

We hope you enjoyed this bus tour of Charles de Gaulle International Airport

March 26, 2008 Mar 26, 2008 03/26/08
Raymond Chen
My trip to Lisbon entailed a connection in Paris at Charles de Gaulle International Airport. So now, I've technically been to France, but since I never left the airport, I don't think it really counts. (When I mentioned to one of my colleagues that I paid a brief visit to his native country, he replied, "I hope it went okay." Off my confused ...

Why are structure names different from their typedef names?

March 26, 2008 Mar 26, 2008 03/26/08
Raymond Chen
In Windows header files, many structures are declared like this: Why is the structure name different from typedef name? This is a holdover from very early versions of the C language where structure tags, union tags, and typedefs were kept in the same namespace. Consequently, you couldn't say typedef struct XYZ { ... } XYZ;. At the open ...

Happy Waffle Day! And other holidays named after food

March 25, 2008 Mar 25, 2008 03/25/08
Raymond Chen
Today is Waffle Day in Sweden, and the reason why today of all days is Waffle Day I find quite amusing. March 25th is the Feast of The Annunciation according to the Catholic Church calendar, the day on which the archangel Gabriel announced to Mary that she would conceive a child, the Son of God. Why March 25th? The date was arrived at by the ...

What's the difference between int and INT, long and LONG, etc?

March 25, 2008 Mar 25, 2008 03/25/08
Raymond Chen
When you go through Windows header files, you'll see types with names INT, LONG, CHAR, and so on. What's the difference between these types and the uncapitalized ones? Well, there isn't one any more. What follows is an educated guess as to the story behind these types. The application binary interface for an operating system needs to be ...