My name is Jeff Blake, and I am a .NET software consultant based out of South Florida.
I have been writing code since my first experience with BASIC on an apple II when I was a kid.
Ever since the very first aggravating/exhilarating moments, I've been held captive by the idea
of writing code to express ideas that I had. I continue to be an ardent enthusiast on just about
any technology I can get my hands on long enough to tinker with.
I've written code on Windows, Linux and Apple Operating Systems over the years, and
programmed in many languages subsequently. I used to be a FOSS zealot until my first
moment using the Visual Studio .NET IDE (Intellicrack converted me from day one). And after I
took a sip of the Kool-Aid, I found it to be fairly addictive! I've written many desktop apps, but I
have to admit I have a passion for developing web apps. At this point, I'm going on 13 years
of programming in JavaScript, and it's only gotten better as time has passed. Most of the DOM
idiosyncrasies have been ironed out with newer versions of browsers and JavaScript libraries like
jQuery.
I started writing AJAX apps using the XmlHttpRequest object, then ICallbackEventHandlers,
and progressed through the many incremental offerings Microsoft has released for AJAX,
including ASP.NET AJAX, JavaScript web service proxies, and the AjaxControlToolkit. The
progression of technologies like ASP.NET MVC and WCF Services in conjunction with the
adoption of external offerings like jQuery make these interesting times to live in indeed.
I'm always trying to expand my knowledge of developing software, whether it be best practices,
Test Driven Design, Agile methodologies, Design Patterns, optimization, fluent interfaces, code
generation, or other assorted concepts. Each new topic can have the effect of changing how you
think about coding, and sometimes can drastically improve your code and development practices.
I'm a technology evangelist and believe strongly in developers communicating and sharing ideas
and code on a frequent basis. I think it's nearly impossible to keep up with the Joneses on
all of the technology advancements going on, and it's amazing how fast you can get up to speed
by checking out what other people are doing in the community rather than just reading books and
experimenting with various ideas you have. That's probably one of the main reasons that blogs have quickly
replaced books as my main learning resource nowadays.
I started this blog as a way to share ideas and code with my fellow developers and contribute back to the
community. I hope I do a good job of it. ;)