and I'll get a few percent kickback on your purchases (and you won't get charged
anything extra). Canadian readers can use this link:
Amazon.ca
.Welcome to the Larkware Web site! There's quite a bit of material here; in response to several suggestions, I've created this page as a way to help new readers understand what's going on around here. Feel free to email me with questions or suggestions for improvement.
I'm Mike Gunderloy. I've been messing around with computers since around 1975 (or 1970 if you count DigiComp). I've been making a living off them (for some value of "making a living") since 1992. If you want some of the gory details, you can download my CV (Microsoft Word format). I've written a raft of books (some of which are linked from the Larkware home page), a batch of software (some of which is included in the Microsoft Office box, among other places), and far too many articles. I used to do the whole consulting-and-conference circuit, but I chucked that in 1999 and went to live in the country and raise kids and chickens. I like to run a pretty transparent operation here, so if something isn't clear please do ask.
Every weekday I pull together whatever strikes me as interesting to software developers and others of similar bent and organize it as The Daily Grind. You can read this on the Larkware home page, or subscribe to it as an RSS feed (more on RSS feeds here). The Daily Grind tends to reflect my own expertise and interests, which means it's usually .NET-centric, but I strike out from there into other areas as the spirit moves me. I welcome suggestions and links from readers; if you see something on the Internet of interest, by all means let me know about it so I can tell the other 10,000 people reading the Daily Grind.
You'll also find software reviews and briefings here. The difference is simple: a review is based on software that I actually installed on one of my computers and played with, and a briefing is based on what a vendor told me on the phone, perhaps with a Web demo of the software. So, with a review there's a better chance that I'll actually find things wrong with the software.
I'm the one who chooses what software to review. Readers and vendors are free to suggest software for review, but it's my choice. At any given time, I have much more software on hand that I can possibly look at in any depth. Given that software come in faster than I can review it, when I establish that something isn't up to my standards, I don't spend any further time on it. I'd rather go on to something else that offers high value to readers. If you think of rating things on a 1 to 5 star scale, I shoot for 3-plus stars in anything that I actually bother to review here.
I do not accept any monetary compensation from vendors for reviews published here. However, as is standard industry practice, many vendors do send along complimentary licenses for their products; in some cases this represents a substantial value. Vendors never get to see a review before it is published, nor do they get to dictate what goes into (or gets left out of) a review.
When I run an article (Daily Grind, Review, or anything else) on the Larkware home page, its title will be hyperlinked to a standalone version of the same article. You can use that hyperlink to find it in the future, even after it has scrolled off the home page. You're more than welcome to link to any part of the Larkware site that you want, and to quote me anywhere - just please do give the quotes proper attribution and a link back.
When I link to a book, it's normally at the book's page at Amazon.com, via an
affiliate link. If you buy the book via this link, I make a pittance. You may
well be able to find a better price elsewhere if you shop around. That's fine
with me, though every little pittance helps. If you'd like to help even more,
just do your general shopping via this link: Amazon.com
I sell sponsorship space on the Daily Grind to help defray the costs of running the Larkware site. I generally approve of the sponsors' products and do reserve the right to refuse messages that I think are misleading or inappropriate, but the sponsorship messages are paid advertising that I do not write. I encourage you to read the sponsor messages and check out their products if they sound interesting to you. You can find out more about sponsorships here.
I don't have a dedicated search utility built into this site. That's because Google crawls this site all the time, so it's just as easy to let them carry the load. To limit your searches to Larkware, use the site: modifier in Google. For example, to search for pages featuring Longhorn, use this Google search:
I cast a wide net, and I am interested in many more technologies than I can understand in depth at any given time. So it's entirely possible that I spend time with a product, like it, build a few toy projects, endorse it - and miss some glaring flaw. Or I read a book, it makes perfect sense to me, I think it's a great way to learn about a technology, and someone who's actually an expert e-mails me to tell me the guy who wrote it is an incompetent jerk. That's one reason I make comment pages available for every page on Larkware: if anyone has additional input on a product or book I've reviewed, I'd love to have it. Just click on the "n comments" graphic at the end of an article to leave feedback of your own or to see the feedback that others have left. I reserve the right to remove comments that I feel are inappropriate (such as spam), though I almost never exercise that right.