Painted Desert – Arckaringa South Australia

One of the most famous places in Australian outback is the painted desert. Which consists of different beautiful landscapes which was formed millions years ago while it way covered by water when it was under the sea. Since these attractions are in remote locations for some of us it will be difficult to find them. I agree some of the attractions are in the guide books but I assure you they are not that easy to find when you are on your own without any phone facilities or mobile data connections to browse maps. So for people who are interested in visiting these places I hope this article will help them to locate some of the attractions. Remember to cache your GPS or maps before you leave town or simply buy a detailed map.

All these places are accessible through unsealed / dirt roads and it is always better if you have an AWD or a 4WD. But if you are travelling in dry whether and if you are cautious you will be able to visit all of them in a 2WD as well. Few other things to remember when going to outback places are mentioned in my other post.

The Breakaways

The breakaways has colourful small hills which are broken away from Stuart Range, hence their name “The Breakaways”

You will not miss the road to the lookout since you need to turn right just before the Dingo fence when you travel from Coober Pedy to Oodnadatta. There will also be road signs for this.

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Dingo Fence

Dingo fence or Dog fence is holding the title of longest man made object in the world having a length of 5614 kms. This runs from Surfaces Paradise in Queensland to Bight in near Western Australia border. This was put up to protect the live stock on the south side of the country from the northern predators.

You can have a look into this if you travel about 15 kms from Cobber Pedy to Oodnadatta.

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Painted Desert

Painted desert lookout is also giving you a great view onto the vivid coloured mountains. There is a walk of about 15-20 minutes after parking your car. The way is marked in a nature friendly manner by collecting stones to make up arrows as seen in my photos. Some parts of the walk is bit challenging so if you do not like walking or afraid of heights or slopes best is to wait in the car.

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On your way to these you will encounter other interesting natures creations as well.

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Samsung Galaxy S2 not Connecting to Kies

Last week I spent few hours to figure out why Samsung Galaxy S2 was not connecting to Samsung Kies through USB cable. I could browse phone contents using Windows Explorer, transfer files, music and photos, even I could use Kies Air but Kies on my computer kept on ignoring the phone. It always displayed connecting but never got connected.

To resolve the connection problem several times I used the connection troubleshooter which comes with Kies, reinstalled Kies, updated Kies, restarted phone and computer but had no success. Then suddenly I figured this was happening because the phone is in wrong connection mode. By some application or setting the USB connection mode was set to Camera (PTP). Because of this Kies could not connect with the phone. To correct the connection problem simply I had to change the connection mode to Media Device (MTP).

This can be done by accessing the notification area.

Select Media device (MTP) to correctly connect to Kies.

Quarry Road Lookout – Beetaloo South Australia

If you are travelling in Beetaloo and also if you are enjoying the views of nature a good place to visit is Quarry road lookout. Quarry road it self is having some good views in your way. If you have sometime to spend there is a table and chair for you to sit down and have some food. Another good thing is you do not have to walk, you can park your car right in the lookout and enjoy.

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Things to Remember when Travelling in Outback and Remote Places

I thought to share with you few things to remember while travelling in remote places. I know most of you are aware of these but thought to put a post since most of us forgets these even though we know these.

• Always take sufficient amount of drinking water to survive for about 2 days.
• Always take sufficient food supplies to survive for about 2 days.
• Before starting your trip check your spare tyre.
• Before leaving each town check your fuel level and calculate the fuel required to reach your next town.
• Check for the fuel station opening and closing times of the town you are planning to visit.
• Get a fly mask or at least carry some water in a bottle to use on face to escape the fly attack while in outback.
• If you are not 100% familiarized with your vehicle do not speed too much.
• Always watch for animals.
• Take a blanket or two to keep you warm in case the unforeseen happen.
• If you are taking any medication do not forget to take medicine.
• It is always better to have a first aid kit while you are travelling.
• If you have knowledge to repair then a tool kit will be handy.

I know there are many more things, so feel free to comment.

Hope these helps.

Automatically Sizing Excel Columns

Today while trying to do some formatting on Excel using .Net I came up with an error.

One of the things I tried is to make Excel columns automatically size according to the content having on them. As all of you might know we can get this done in Excel by simply double clicking on the column’s right margin. While doing this in code I got the following exception.

ExcelSheet.get_Range("A1", "E10")' threw an exception of type 'System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException'
base {System.Runtime.InteropServices.ExternalException}: {"Exception from HRESULT: 0x800401A8"}

The code involved in generating this error is as below.

1. (ExcelSheet.get_Range("A1", "E10")).EntireColumn.AutoFit();

 

Later I found the reason for this error. Error will occur when we use AutoFit () on empty cells. Because initially I did not have anything in my excel sheet I kept on getting this. So to overcome this error use the same code to auto fit the cell contents simply after the cells are populated with values.

If you cannot get AutoFit () to work the reason might be the same thing. make sure the cells you apply auto fit have some values on them.

The best thing is to use AutoFit () after all data are entered into Excel sheet.

Dynamically Creating Computed Columns in SQL

If you are into programming you should have definitely worked with calculated fields in SQL. But for others I will briefly explain what they are.

Calculated columns are columns which depend on other columns. It gets its value by calculating which can involve values of other columns. The calculation formula is the only thing stored in the column.

So each time the column is referenced the calculation is done. But if you use the keyword “persisted” while creating the column then the values will be kept in the table. Whenever a referenced value is updated the computed column is also automatically updated to highlight the change. Also by using persisted you can index a computed column.

You can create a table with persisted computed column as follows.

1. CREATE TABLE Customer
2. (
3. CustomerId INT IDENTITY(1, 1) NOT NULL,
4. CustomerFirstName NVARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
5. CustomerLastName NVARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
6. CustomerFullName AS CustomerFirstName + ' ' + CustomerLastName PERSISTED
7. )

One thing to remember is that you cannot directly insert values to a computed column.

I think you got a basic idea of computed columns. Now I would like to show how to create a computed column dynamically. For example think that you need to add a computed column to a table using a stored procedure. It is not a big deal.

I need to insert a TotalOrder column to the table named FoodOrder.

1. CREATE TABLE FoodOrder
2. (
3. OrderId INT IDENTITY(1, 1) NOT NULL,
4. OrderDate SMALLDATETIME NULL,
5. CustomerName NVARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
6. TotalStarter INT NULL,
7. TotalMainCourse INT NULL,
8. TotalSoftBevarage INT NULL,
9. TotalLiquer INT NULL,
10. TotalDessert INT NULL
11. )

This can be done using the following query.

1. DECLARE @sExecuteCommand VARCHAR(250), --Keepa the command to be executed.
2. @sColumns VARCHAR(150) --Keeps the columns to be included in the formula.
3.  
4. SET @sColumns = 'TotalStarter+TotalMainCourse+TotalSoftBevarage+TotalLiquer+TotalDessert+'
5. SET @sExecuteCommand = 'ALTER TABLE FoodOrder ADD TotalOrder AS ' + SUBSTRING(@sColumns, 1, LEN(@sColumns)-1) -- Creating the computed column.
6. EXEC (@sExecuteCommand)

Note that a cursor or a loop can be easily used to populate the variable “sColumns” with the columns required for the formula.

Hope this helps.

UPDATE with JOIN

If you need to update data of a table (DestinationTable) with data of another table (SourceTable) there are 3 ways you can get this done in SQL.

Method 1

This is the most common and simple way with using a sub query.

1. UPDATE DestinationTable SET DestinationColumn =
2.     (SELECT ValueColumn FROM SourceTable WHERE DestinationTable.MappingColumn = SourceTable.MappingColumn)

 

Method 2

This users the most common FROM clause to join the two tables as shown below.

1. UPDATE DestinationTable SET DestinationColumn = SourceTable.ValueColumn
2. FROM SourceTable
3. WHERE DestinationTable.MappingColumn = SourceTable.MappingColumn

 

Method 3

Last method mentioned below uses the join clause to join both the tables to make the update happen properly.

1. UPDATE DestinationTable SET DestinationColumn = SourceTable.ValueColumn
2. FROM DestinationTable
3. INNER JOIN SourceTable ON DestinationTable.MappingColumn = SourceTable.MappingColumn

 

Hope these helps.

Naracoorte Caves – Naracoorte South Australia

If you are a cave lover, there are many places Australia has to offer. Out of them one of the best is Naracoorte caves in South Australia. Inside the caves you will be able to see lime stones which took about 200 million years to form.

Stalactites – Are the ones hanging from above. Because they form from water dripping from above they tend to get points on them.

 

Stalagmites – Are formed on floor and start growing up with time.

Columns – Are formed by one stalactite and stalagmite connecting after so many years.

 

It is good idea to plan and visit the caves bit early since you need time to have a look into the caves. They normally close at 5PM and the last tour starts around 4PM.

There is a visitor information centre in the Wonambi Fossil Centre so you can find out the interesting places in Naracoorte Caves National Park. Wet cave is a free attraction. When you purchase a ticket for a tour to visit Alexandra cave you will get free admittance to the Fossil enter and the miniature man made zoo.

Pram accessibility is not there when visiting caves, also you need to take care of your young children because they might need lot of assistance from you when inside the caves. Also supervise your children frequently since some of the Stalactites and Stalagmites are fragile and if they break one then thy may be destroying millions of years of natures’ work.

Car parking is free and plenty of sitting areas are there. Toilet facilities are there also is a restaurant so you can buy food if you need.

Address : Naracoorte Caves National Park, PO Box 134, Naracoorte SA 5271.

Phone : (+61 8) 8762 2340

EMail : naracoortecaves@sa.gov.au

Web : http://www.environment.sa.gov.au/naracoorte/Home

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Deep Creek Conservation Park, South Australia

If you would love to enjoy scenery and wild life, a place you should definitely visit is Deep Creek conservation park in South Australia. It is located at the southern tip of the Fleurieu Peninsula.

It is always better to have a 4WD or an AWD but with a 2WD also in good weather you will be able to do most of the tracks without any major problems.

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Rocking Horse – Gumeracha South Australia

When you come to South Australia another good place you should visit is the Rocking Horse at Gumeracha. There you will find a huge wooden rocking horse to which you can climb after paying few dollars. You can also watch the birds kept there and do not forget the Toy Factory nearby to do some shopping which has a good collection of gifts.

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If any one interested visiting below are the contact details. But do not try to rock the horse.

Address
The Toy Factory,
Adelaide-Mannum Road,
Gumeracha, SA 5233,
South Australia,
Australia.

Telephone
(08) 8389 1085

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Developing iPhone and Android Applications using C# .Net

Being a .Net developer did you think how great if you could develop applications for most popular mobile device platforms like iPhone and Android with the .Net skills you already have. If you were thinking like me then the wait is over.

Now with Mono you can create cross platform applications using your .Net framework skills. Mono is a software platform using which you can develop applications which runs on iPhones, Android devices, iPads and iPod Touches.

As per the Mono site, “The Mono Project is an open development initiative sponsored by Novell to develop an open source, UNIX version of the Microsoft .NET development platform.” If you are wondering about the name Mono, it is 'monkey' in Spanish.

You can try Mono for free by downloading the trial by going to the trial link. The good thing is after installing Mono you can use the more familiar Visual Studio to do the development using the available Mono templates.

Whispering Wall – Williamstown South Australia

Barossa Dam or whispering wall in Williamstown is not a place you should miss in your visit to South Australia. From the outer look it is just a dam created in Barossa Reservoir. But the magic starts after you send a friend to the other side of the dam and speak.

You and your friend will be able to talk as you two are near each other. The sound is very clear hence the name you can whisper and that will be heard by a person who is in the other side of the dam.

I was said that when the dam was built the lead engineer used to listen to the workers using this amazing facility to get to know what they are talking about him. Also it seems a later attempt to build a similar dam following the same design and material failed to demonstrate the whisper ability. So this is a unique dam you will not find elsewhere.

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