Invalid resx File Windows XP Only

Wednesday, May 24th, 2017

Invalid resx File in C# .NET Solution on Windows XP Only

If a c# application you've developed that targets the .NET Framework version 4.0 crashes on Windows XP but does NOT crash on Windows Vista through Windows 10, it is most likely due to an embedded resource issue (in one of the .resx files in the solution).  Upon opening the solution of my problematic program in Visual Studio 2010 on Windows XP, I received an error similar to the following:

Invalid resx file. Command completed successfully. Could not load type...

I fixed the issue by deleting one of my icon (.ico) files from the solution that was 256 x 256 pixels and replaced it with the same icon with a size of 255 x 255 pixels.  While a 256 x 256 pixel icon file is perfectly valid in newer versions of Windows, the maximum size of an .ico file can only be 255 x 255 on Windows XP x86 SP3.  I still target XP machines since I have a Netbook with it that will always be running XP.

Network Manager Applet NOT Showing in MATE Desktop Taskbar Ubuntu

Saturday, February 13th, 2016

Network Manager Applet NOT Showing in MATE Desktop

If you install the MATE desktop environment on Ubuntu, your Network Manager icon may not show up in the taskbar as shown below:

Without the Network Manager icon showing, you will have a hard time managing and connecting to WIFI networks.  To get it to show up, you will need to edit the following file using nano:

sudo nano /etc/xdg/autostart/nm-applet.desktop

Look for the below line:

AutostartCondition=GNOME3 unless-session gnome

And comment it out like so:

#AutostartCondition=GNOME3 unless-session gnome

Save the file using "Ctrl + O", and then exit nano using "Ctrl + X".  Restart your computer.  The network icon will show up again as shown below:

Note, the actual icon will vary based on the selected MATE desktop theme.  The screenshots above show the icon used in the LUNA theme.