XSL-FO to PDF, MathML, Virtual PC, and MSIs
First off many thanks to Digvijay for his comment, it was well appreciated. I'm not to clever at replying to comments, only to happy to help. You may have noticed that there was a noticable gap in time between some posts, the reason for this was two fold... I've started back with studying for the MCPD - Windows and my home computer died a death; I try not to post in my blog at work.
Here are some links to some interesting things....
XSL-FO to PDF: This is a small tool (client and server .NET based api are available) that lets you create PDF's from XSL-FO files. I've been trying to convice my company to develop a web service that would allow anyone in the company to create PDF files, they liked the idea but the project was put on hold as there were no components that formatted XML to PDF, most were Office Documents or Printer drivers (not really suitable for a server). This component handles XML to PDF via XSL-FO format and also handles the new XML format of Office. There is a free client based utility, which is rather handy.
http://www.alt-soft.com/
MathML: this is an XML language that lets you write mathematical formulas for display in web pages. For any mechanical or structural engineers out there MathCAD fully supports MathML
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MathML
http://www.integretechpub.com/zed/ (free MathML editor and I.E. browser addin here)
Virtual PC 2007: So my computer died, RIP, and I'm needing to buy a new computer and specifically one with 4Gb of RAM. Phoned the shop and talked through a spec and was annoyed to find out that 32bit operating systems only support 3Gb of RAM. 32bit Vista might say it supports 4Gb of RAM but it doesn't really as some memory is lost in maintaining memory mapping. So in order to get the 4Gb of RAM (I'm actually wanting 8Gb) I needed to go for a 64bit version of Vista which means all my 32bit applications won't work; a-n-n-o-y-i-n-g.
Then I found out Microsoft are offering Virtual PC 2007 for free as one of a number of work arounds to this problem and everything didn't seem so bad now. With 64bit Vista running as the main OS and a virtual PC running a host 32bit Windows XP Pro OS, taken from the deceased, then there will a 64bit and 32bit OS on one machine, I can develop using new and old technology.... in theory it sounds great but need to see how well it works out.... but at least I can go up to the 8Gb of RAM!!!
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=04D26402-3199-48A3-AFA2-2DC0B40A73B6&displaylang=en
I'd recommend you getting a copy of this, although you will need a fairly decent machine.
MSIs: Orca is a small tool that lets you view the internals of an MSI. Unfortunately in order to get it you need to download a 300Mb CD. This is, of course, unless you visit the blog of Brent Norris.... cheers mate.
http://www.brentnorris.net/blog/?p=319
Thanks for reading folks... I appreciate it, and don't be annoyed if you don't get a reply to your comments. If your looking for my help in anyway then please check out the MSDN forums, I spend time there answering questions and if I don't get around to it, someone else there will.