Zoominfo is a website that exposes a database of companies and people. Zoominfo builds this database automatically by software that crawls the web and extracts structured data from unstructured web pages (for example, "about" pages in company websites and press releases) using natural language processing algorithms.
A while ago, I posted a little satirical "press release" about me, the CTO of pashabitz.com, purchasing a burekas from "sammy burekas".
A couple of weeks ago zoominfo's crawler reached that "press release" and now I am listed as the "chief technology officer of pashabitz.com".

Just a reminder of how hard it is to code anything related to AI.
Computers just can't get a joke.

As I've mentioned, I left Clarizen a couple of months ago.
Now about the new thing:
I joined a new startup company - Semingo.
During the past year I got certain that what I want to do right now is develop ideas "from scratch" in a startup environment. So when Sagie, who is one of the founders of Semingo and my friend from the army days invited me to join - it was a perfect fit.
The idea we're working on is very exciting and the people on the team are very bright.
Oren and Tomer are also blogging from a few feet away (and more bloggers coming soon!!).
We've only just started but it's been a lot of fun already.
About the product: all I can say right now is that it's related to social networks (just because that's what the press release says) and it's as cool as ice (before global warming). Don't worry, we're planning to release soon, so you'll be able to use it in no time (touch wood) - stay tuned!

Flash:



Mitch:



And yours truly:

ASP.NET provides an easy way to write custom http handlers. You simply implement the IHttpHandler interface and register your handler in the "web.config" section under system.web like this:

<httpHandlers>
  <add verb="*" path="*.my_extension" type="MyHanlders.Handler, MyHandlers" />
</httpHandlers>

This registers a class named Handler to handle requests to URLs with extension ".my_extension".
You still need to let the web server know about this extension, and configure it to pass processing of files with this extension to ASP.NET.

To do it in IIS7, add the following to your web.config, under the "configuration" section:

<system.webServer>
  <handlers>
    <add name="handler_name" path="*.my_extension" verb="*" modules="IsapiModule" scriptProcessor="%windir%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\aspnet_isapi.dll" resourceType="Unspecified" />
  </handlers>
</system.webServer>

I couldn't find this all in one place, so, here's how you enable developing and debugging an asp.net app under IIS7 on Vista:

1 Install windows features in "turn windows features on or off". You need these things (which are not installed by default):
Under "web management tools":
a. IIS metabase and IIS 6 configuration compatibility
b. IIS management console
Under "Application Development Features":
a. ASP.NET
Under "Common Http Features" - check everything.



2 Open the web application project in VS, go to proprties, under "Web":
 2.1 Select "Use IIS Web Server".
 2.2 Click "Create Virtual Dir" (this actualy creates an application, not virtual directory on IIS 7).
3 Open IIS manager:
 3.1 Make sure the default web site is started.
 3.2 Select your application:
  3.2.1 Click "basic settings...", choose under "Application Pool" the option "classic .Net AppPool"
  3.2.2 Under "authentication" enable "anonymous authentication"
  3.2.3 If you use windows/forms/passport authentication in your asp.net app. - you need additional configuration.
4 In VS set your startup page (right click on desired page in solution explorer)
5. Run

Note: debugging still shouldn't work at this point, only "start without debug".
Note 2: many places say that you must run VS as administrator (not the default way under Vista), but for me it seems to work when running not as admin as well.

To enable debugging:
1. Install this hotfix. Download here.
Now debugging should work also.


Related on pashabitz.com: SSL in ASP.NET - part I | SSL in ASP.NET - part II.