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• Testing for Adjacent Cells In a Multi-level Grid

  - by Steve

  I'm designing an algorithm to test whether cells on a grid are adjacent or not. The catch is that the cells are not on a flat grid. They are on a multi-level grid such as the one drawn below. Level 1 (Top Level) | - - - - - | | A | B | C | | - - - - - | | D | E | F | | - - - - - | | G | H | I | | - - - - - | Level 2 | -Block A- | -Block B- | | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | | - - - - - | - - - - - | | 4 | 5 | 6 | 4 | 5 | 6 | ... | - - - - - | - - - - - | | 7 | 8 | 9 | 7 | 8 | 9 | | - - - - - | - - - - - | | -Block D- | -Block E- | | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | | - - - - - | - - - - - | | 4 | 5 | 6 | 4 | 5 | 6 | ... | - - - - - | - - - - - | | 7 | 8 | 9 | 7 | 8 | 9 | | - - - - - | - - - - - | . . . . . . This diagram is simplified from my actual need but the concept is the same. There is a top level block with many cells within it (level 1). Each block is further subdivided into many more cells (level 2). Those cells are further subdivided into level 3, 4 and 5 for my project but let's just stick to two levels for this question. I'm receiving inputs for my function in the form of "A8, A9, B7, D3". That's a list of cell Ids where each cell Id has the format (level 1 id)(level 2 id). Let's start by comparing just 2 cells, A8 and A9. That's easy because they are in the same block. private static RelativePosition getRelativePositionInTheSameBlock(String v1, String v2) { RelativePosition relativePosition; if( v1-v2 == -1 ) { relativePosition = RelativePosition.LEFT_OF; } else if (v1-v2 == 1) { relativePosition = RelativePosition.RIGHT_OF; } else if (v1-v2 == -BLOCK_WIDTH) { relativePosition = RelativePosition.TOP_OF; } else if (v1-v2 == BLOCK_WIDTH) { relativePosition = RelativePosition.BOTTOM_OF; } else { relativePosition = RelativePosition.NOT_ADJACENT; } return relativePosition; } An A9 - B7 comparison could be done by checking if A is a multiple of BLOCK_WIDTH and whether B is (A-BLOCK_WIDTH+1). Either that or just check naively if the A/B pair is 3-1, 6-4 or 9-7 for better readability. For B7 - D3, they are not adjacent but D3 is adjacent to A9 so I can do a similar adjacency test as above. So getting away from the little details and focusing on the big picture. Is this really the best way to do it? Keeping in mind the following points: I actually have 5 levels not 2, so I could potentially get a list like "A8A1A, A8A1B, B1A2A, B1A2B". Adding a new cell to compare still requires me to compare all the other cells before it (seems like the best I could do for this step is O(n)) The cells aren't all 3x3 blocks, they're just that way for my example. They could be MxN blocks with different M and N for different levels. In my current implementation above, I have separate functions to check adjacency if the cells are in the same blocks, if they are in separate horizontally adjacent blocks or if they are in separate vertically adjacent blocks. That means I have to know the position of the two blocks at the current level before I call one of those functions for the layer below. Judging by the complexity of having to deal with mulitple functions for different edge cases at different levels and having 5 levels of nested if statements. I'm wondering if another design is more suitable. Perhaps a more recursive solution, use of other data structures, or perhaps map the entire multi-level grid to a single-level grid (my quick calculations gives me about 700,000+ atomic cell ids). Even if I go that route, mapping from multi-level to single level is a non-trivial task in itself.

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• how to populate the tables within xmlDataDocument.DataSet

  - by alex

  Hi all: I am working on a C# application that involves using XML schema file as databases for message definitions and XML file as databases for message data. I was following the example I found:http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.xml.xmldatadocument.dataset%28v=VS.100%29.aspx I wrote my own xsd and XML file. I used the same approach in the example, read the xsd file and then load the xml file. But I don't have any "Rows" created for my DataTable. I used debugger to step through my codes. When I am get my DataTable use xmlDataDocument.DataSet.Tables["name of the table"], the Rows property of that tables is 0. Does anybody know what might cause the DataSet tables not get populated after I loaded the xmlDataDocument with XML file? Here is a fragment of XSD file: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <xs:schema id="test" targetNamespace="http://tempuri.org/test.xsd" elementFormDefault="qualified" xmlns="http://tempuri.org/test.xsd" xmlns:mstns="http://tempuri.org/test.xsd" xmlns:xs="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" > <xs:element name="reboot_msg"> <xs:complexType> <xs:complexContent> <xs:extension base="header_s"> <xs:sequence> <xs:element name="que_name"> <xs:simpleType> <xs:restriction base="xs:string"> <xs:minLength value="4"/> <xs:maxLength value="8"/> </xs:restriction> </xs:simpleType> </xs:element> <xs:element name="priority" type="xs:unsignedShort"/> </xs:sequence> </xs:extension> </xs:complexContent> </xs:complexType> </xs:element> and here is a fragment of the XML file: <?xml version="1.0" standalone="yes"?> <test xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" > <reboot_msg> <message_length>16</message_length> <message_type>7</message_type> <message_sequence>0</message_sequence> <que_name>NONE</que_name> <priority>5</priority> </reboot_msg> It could be the XML and XSD file I created missed something. Please help. Thanks

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• What kind of string is this? What can I do in php to read it?

  - by kevin

  This is a string (see below, after the dashed line) in a database.inf file for a free program I downloaded that lists some websites. The file is plain text as you can see , but there is a string after it that looks base64 encoded (due to the end chars of ==). But b64_decoding it gives giberish. I wanted to decode it so I could add to the list of sites it had (the program lists a bunch of sites and data about them which I can read in the GUI) and to do that I need to decode this, add to it, and re-encode it. I think the program uses .net since I think the .net library was required on install, but I know nothing of the original source language. I am using php to figure out if there is a simple way to read this. I have tried using unpack, binhex, base_convert, etc as I suspect the file is binary at some level, but I am lost. Nothing illegal, just wanting to know what it is and if I can add a few things to it to make it more useful for me. here is the file - any ideas how to decode and recode this for playing with? Site List file size: 62139 db version: 13 generated: 2010-04-27 11:53:40 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• [c#] SoundPlayer.PlaySync stopping prematurely

  - by JeffE

  I want to play a wav file synchronously on the gui thread, but my call to PlaySync is returning early (and prematurely stopping playback). The wav file is 2-3 minutes. Here's what my code looks like: //in gui code (event handler) //play first audio file JE_SP.playSound("example1.wav"); //do a few other statements doSomethingUnrelated(); //play another audio file JE_SP.playSound("example2.wav"); //library method written by me, called in gui code, but located in another assembly public static int playSound(string wavFile, bool synchronous = true, bool debug = true, string logFile = "", int loadTimeout = FIVE_MINUTES_IN_MS) { SoundPlayer sp = new SoundPlayer(); sp.LoadTimeout = loadTimeout; sp.SoundLocation = wavFile; sp.Load(); switch (synchronous) { case true: sp.PlaySync(); break; case false: sp.Play(); break; } if (debug) { string writeMe = "JE_SP: \r\n\tSoundLocation = " + sp.SoundLocation + "\r\n\t" + "Synchronous = " + synchronous.ToString(); JE_Log.logMessage(writeMe); } sp.Dispose(); sp = null; return 0; } Some things I've thought of are the load timeout, and playing the audio on another thread and then manually 'freeze' the gui by forcing the gui thread to wait for the duration of the sound file. I tried lengthening the load timeout, but that did nothing. I'm not quite sure what the best way to get the duration of a wav file is without using code written by somebody who isn't me/Microsoft. I suppose this can be calculated since I know the file size, and all of the encoding properties (bitrate, sample rate, sample size, etc) are consistent across all files I intend to play. Can somebody elaborate on how to calculate the duration of a wav file using this info? That is, if nobody has an idea about why PlaySync is returning early. Of Note: I encountered a similar problem in VB 6 a while ago, but that was caused by a timeout, which I don't suspect to be a problem here. Shorter (< 1min) files seem to play fine, so I might decide to manually edit the longer files down, then play them separately with multiple calls.

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• Sending a file from memory (rather than disk) over HTTP using libcurl

  - by cinek1lol

  Hi! I would like to send pictures via a program written in C + +. - OK WinExec("C:\\curl\\curl.exe -H Expect: -F \"fileupload=@C:\\curl\\ok.jpg\" -F \"xml=yes\" -# \"http://www.imageshack.us/index.php\" -o data.txt -A \"Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1.1) Gecko/20061204 Firefox/2.0.0.1\" -e \"http://www.imageshack.us\"", NULL); It works, but I would like to send the pictures from pre-loaded carrier to a variable char (you know what I mean? First off, I load the pictures into a variable and then send the variable), cause now I have to specify the path of the picture on a disk. I wanted to write this program in c++ by using the curl library, not through exe. extension. I have also found such a program (which has been modified by me a bit) #include <stdio.h> #include <string.h> #include <iostream> #include <curl/curl.h> #include <curl/types.h> #include <curl/easy.h> int main(int argc, char *argv[]) { CURL *curl; CURLcode res; struct curl_httppost *formpost=NULL; struct curl_httppost *lastptr=NULL; struct curl_slist *headerlist=NULL; static const char buf[] = "Expect:"; curl_global_init(CURL_GLOBAL_ALL); /* Fill in the file upload field */ curl_formadd(&formpost, &lastptr, CURLFORM_COPYNAME, "send", CURLFORM_FILE, "nowy.jpg", CURLFORM_END); curl_formadd(&formpost, &lastptr, CURLFORM_COPYNAME, "nowy.jpg", CURLFORM_COPYCONTENTS, "nowy.jpg", CURLFORM_END); curl_formadd(&formpost, &lastptr, CURLFORM_COPYNAME, "submit", CURLFORM_COPYCONTENTS, "send", CURLFORM_END); curl = curl_easy_init(); headerlist = curl_slist_append(headerlist, buf); if(curl) { curl_easy_setopt(curl, CURLOPT_URL, "http://www.imageshack.us/index.php"); if ( (argc == 2) && (!strcmp(argv[1], "xml=yes")) ) curl_easy_setopt(curl, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, headerlist); curl_easy_setopt(curl, CURLOPT_HTTPPOST, formpost); res = curl_easy_perform(curl); curl_easy_cleanup(curl); curl_formfree(formpost); curl_slist_free_all (headerlist); } system("pause"); return 0; }

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• makecontext segfault?

  - by cdietschrun

  I am working on a homework assignment that will be due in the next semester. It requires us to implement our own context switching/thread library using the ucontext API. The professor provides code that does it, but before a thread returns, he manually does some work and calls an ISR that finds another thread to use and swapcontexts to it or if none are left, exits. The point of the assignment is to use the uc_link field of the context so that when it hits a return it takes care of the work. I've created a function (type void/void args) that just does the work the functions did before (clean up and then calls ISR). The professor said he wanted this. So all that's left is to do a makecontext somewhere along the way on the context in the uc_link field so that it runs my thread, right? Well, when I do makecontext on seemingly any combination of ucontext_t's and function, I get a segfault and gdb provides no help.. I can skip the makecontext and my program exist 'normally' when it hits a return in the threads I created because (presumably) the uc_link field is not properly setup (which is what I'm trying to do). I also can't find anything on why makecontext would segfault. Can anyone help? stack2.ss_sp = (void *)(malloc(STACKSIZE)); if(stack2.ss_sp == NULL){ printf("thread failed to get stack space\n"); exit(8); } stack2.ss_size = STACKSIZE; stack2.ss_flags = 0; if(getcontext(&main_context) == -1){ perror("getcontext in t_init, rtn_env"); exit(5); } //main_context.uc_stack = t_state[i].mystk; main_context.uc_stack = stack2; main_context.uc_link = 0; makecontext(&main_context, (void (*)(void))thread_rtn, 0); I've also tried just thread_rtn, &thread_rtn and other things. thread_rtn is declared as void thread_rtn(void). later, in each thread. run_env is of type ucontext_t: ... t_state[i].run_env.uc_link = &main_context;

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• Why is the page still caching even after the no-cache headers have been sent?

  - by Matthew Grasinger

  I've done a ton of research on this and have asked many people with help and still no success. Here are the details... I'm involved in developing a website that pulls data from various data files, combines them in a temp .csv file, and then is graphed using a popular graphing library: dygraphs. The bulk of the website is written in PHP. The parameters that determine the data that is graphed are stored in the users session, the .csv is named after the users session and available for download, and then the .csv file is written in a script that passes it to the dygraphs object. And we've found, even with the no-cache headers sent: header("Cache-Control: no-cache, must-revalidate"); header("Expires: Sat, 26 Jul 1997 05:00:00 GMT"); Many users experience in the middle of a session, (if enough different graphs are generated) the page displaying an older, static rendering of the page (data they had graphed earlier in the session) as if it were cached and loaded instead of getting a new request. It only gets weirder though: I've checked using developer tools in both Firefox and Chrome and both browsers are receiving the no-cache headers just fine; Even when the problem occurs if you view the page source, the source is the correct content (a table/legend is also dynamically created using php, the source shows the correct table, but what is rendered is older content); the page begins to render correctly until the graph is about to be display, and then shows the older content; the older content displays as if it were a completely static overlay--the cached graph does not have the same dynamic features (roll over data point display, zoom and pan, etc.) And it is as if the correct page were somewhere beneath it (the download button for the csv file moves depending on how large the table is. The older, static page does nothing if you click the download .csv button, but if you can manage to find the one in the page beneath it you can click and still download the .csv. The data in the .csv is correct) It is one of the strangest things I've seen in development thus far. Some other relevant facts are that all the problems I've personally experience occurred while I was using Chrome. Non of these symptoms have been reported by Firefox users. IE users have had the same problems (IE users are forced to use chrome frame). I'm at my wits end at this point. We've sent the php headers; we've tried setting the cache profile for php on IIS as "DisableCache" (or whatever); we've tried sending a random query string to the results page; we've tried all the appropriate meta tags--all with no success.

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• Command prompt in debug mode for Eclipse? (OpenCV + Eclipse + Win7)

  - by Tony

  I am a beginner for Eclipse. I now have Eclipse C/C++ IDE with OpenCV library running on Windows 7. So far it works after spending hours trying to get it running. But then I realize that Eclipse does not pop up a command prompt as VS2010 does while debugging. And moreover Eclipse's debug mode is just stuck in there and refuse to output anything. But if the code doesn't involve the OpenCV things it works again. Below is the code I use for testing. It captures images from webcam and output it to the screen. The infinite loop (until you press 'q') makes sure it constantly grabs new inputs from the camera. I browsed through the workspace and run the exe just compiled and it worked flawlessly. So I don't think there's anything wrong in the code (it's an example code anyway In brief, can I just pop up a command prompt window in debug mode? And why is Eclipse console stuck when the code involves some OpenCV functions? #include <stdio.h> #include <stdlib.h> #include <tchar.h> #include <cv.h> #include <cxcore.h> #include <highgui.h> #include <iostream> int _tmain(int argc, _TCHAR* argv[]) { CvCapture *capture = 0; IplImage *frame = 0; int key = 0; /* initialize camera */ capture = cvCaptureFromCAM( 0 ); /* always check */ if ( !capture ) { printf("Cannot open initialize webcam!\n"); return 1; } /* create a window for the video */ cvNamedWindow( "result", CV_WINDOW_AUTOSIZE ); while( key != 'q' ) { /* get a frame */ frame = cvQueryFrame( capture ); /* always check */ if( !frame ) break; /* display current frame */ cvShowImage( "result", frame ); /* exit if user press 'q' */ key = cvWaitKey( 1 ); } /* free memory */ cvDestroyWindow( "result" ); cvReleaseCapture( &capture ); return 0; }

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• database design help for game / user levels / progress

  - by sprugman

  Sorry this got long and all prose-y. I'm creating my first truly gamified web app and could use some help thinking about how to structure the data. The Set-up Users need to accomplish tasks in each of several categories before they can move up a level. I've got my Users, Tasks, and Categories tables, and a UserTasks table which joins the three. ("User 3 has added Task 42 in Category 8. Now they've completed it.") That's all fine and working wonderfully. The Challenge I'm not sure of the best way to track the progress in the individual categories toward each level. The "business" rules are: You have to achieve a certain number of points in each category to move up. If you get the number of points needed in Cat 8, but still have other work to do to complete the level, any new Cat 8 points count toward your overall score, but don't "roll over" into the next level. The number of Categories is small (five currently) and unlikely to change often, but by no means absolutely fixed. The number of points needed to level-up will vary per level, probably by a formula, or perhaps a lookup table. So the challenge is to track each user's progress toward the next level in each category. I've thought of a few potential approaches: Possible Solutions Add a column to the users table for each category and reset them all to zero each time a user levels-up. Have a separate UserProgress table with a row for each category for each user and the number of points they have. (Basically a Many-to-Many version of #1.) Add a userLevel column to the UserTasks table and use that to derive their progress with some kind of SUM statement. Their current level will be a simple int in the User table. Pros & Cons (1) seems like by far the most straightforward, but it's also the least flexible. Perhaps I could use a naming convention based on the category ids to help overcome some of that. (With code like "select cats; for each cat, get the value from Users.progress_{cat.id}.") It's also the one where I lose the most data -- I won't know which points counted toward leveling up. I don't have a need in mind for that, so maybe I don't care about that. (2) seems complicated: every time I add or subtract a user or a category, I have to maintain the other table. I foresee synchronization challenges. (3) Is somewhere in between -- cleaner than #2, but less intuitive than #1. In order to find out where a user is, I'd have mildly complex SQL like: SELECT categoryId, SUM(points) from UserTasks WHERE userId={user.id} & countsTowardLevel={user.level} groupBy categoryId Hmm... that doesn't seem so bad. I think I'm talking myself into #3 here, but would love any input, advice or other ideas.

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• Ajax posting to PHP

  - by JQonfused

  Hi guys, I'm testing a jQuery ajax post method on a local Apache 2.2 server with PHP 5.3 (totally new at this). Here are the files, all in the same folder. html body (jQuery library included in head): <form id="postForm" method="post"> <label for="name">Input Name</label> <input type="text" name="name" id="name" /><br /> <label for="age">Input Age</label> <input type="text" name="age" id="age" /><br /> <input type="submit" value="Submit" id="submitBtn" /> </form> <div id="resultDisplay"></div> <script src="queryRequest.js"></script> queryRequest.js $(document).ready(function(){ $('#s').focus(); $('#postForm').submit(function(){ var name = $('#name').val(); var age = $('#age').val(); var URL = "post.php"; $.ajax({ type:'POST', url: URL, datatype:'json', data:{'name': name ,'age': age}, success: function(data){ $('#resultDisplay').append("Value returned.<br />name: "+data.name+" age: "+data.age); }, error: function() { $('resultDisplay').append("ERROR!") } }); }); }); post.php <?php $name = $_POST['name']; $age = $_POST['age']; $return = array('name' => $name, 'age' => $age); echo json_encode($return); ?> After inputting the two fields and pressing 'Submit', the success method is called, text appended, but the values returned from ajax post are undefined. And then after less than a second, the text fields are emptied, and the text appended to the div is gone. Doesn't seem like it's a page refresh, though, since there's no empty page flash. What's going on here? I'm sure it's a silly mistake but Firebug isn't telling me anything.

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• Handling macro redefinition without modifying .h files ... C / C++ language

  - by user310119

  Background: Let assume that I have two header files a.h and b.h. a.h contains: #define VAR 1 b.h contains: #define VAR 2 Note: The name of both of the macro is same. Let say I have some file myFile.c which includes both of the header files i.e. a.h and b.h. When I try to access VAR, I get a redefinition error of VAR. In order to resolve this problem, I inserted #ifndef VAR statement in both a.h and b.h files to prevent this error. a.h file becomes #ifndef VAR #define VAR 1 #endif b.h file becomes #ifndef VAR #define VAR 2 #endif Note: The header file can contain multiple macros, not just one macro. Problem: Let's assume that a.h and b.h files are obtained from third party library. These files don't contain #ifndef VAR statement. I am not allowed to change their header files. Can I resolve macro 'VAR' redefinition error in myFile.c or myFile.cpp file which uses VAR macro? I know I #undef VAR can be used to undefine a macro VAR. How can I selectively include VAR later in my program? i.e. on line 10 of myFile.c code I should be able to refer to VAR definition from a.h file, on line 15 of my code I should be able to refer to VAR from b.h file and on line 18 again I should be able to refer to VAR from a.h file. In short, am I able to do macro polymorphism ? Given a name of header file, it should refer to macro definition present in that file. I thought of using namespace trick to resolve an issue. Define first header file in namespace first and second header file in namespace second. I tried defining two namespaces. First namespace contains #include a.h and second namespace contains b.h. However, namespace trick does not work with macro. When I tried to access firstns::VAR, compiler reports an error message. Can you please suggest some way?

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• (This is for a project, so yes it is homework) How would I finish this java code?

  - by user2924318

  The task is to create arrays using user input (which I was able to do), then for the second part, use a separate method to sort the array in ascending order then output it. I have gotten it to do everything I need except I don't know how I would get it to sort. The directions say to use a while loop from 0 to the length to find the minimum value then swap that with the 1st, but I don't know how to do this. This is what I have so far: public static void main(String[] args) { Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in); int storage = getNumDigits(in); if(storage == 0){ System.out.print("No digits to store? OK, goodbye!"); System.exit(0); } int []a = new int [storage]; a = getDigits(a, in); displayDigits(a); selectionSort(a); } private static int getNumDigits(Scanner inScanner) { System.out.print("Please enter the number of digits to be stored: "); int stored = inScanner.nextInt(); while(stored < 0){ System.out.println("ERROR! You must enter a non-negative number of digits!"); System.out.println(); System.out.print("Please enter the number of digits to be stored: "); stored = inScanner.nextInt(); } return stored; } private static int[] getDigits(int[] digits, Scanner inScanner) { int length = digits.length; int count = 0; int toBeStored = 0; while(count < length){ System.out.print("Enter integer " +count +": "); toBeStored = inScanner.nextInt(); digits[count] = toBeStored; count++; } return digits; } private static void displayDigits(int[] digits) { int len = digits.length; System.out.println(); System.out.println("Array before sorting:"); System.out.println("Number of digits in array: " +len); System.out.print("Digits in array: "); for(int cnt = 0; cnt < len-1; cnt++){ System.out.print(digits[cnt] + ", "); } System.out.println(digits[len-1]); } private static void selectionSort(int[] digits) { int l = digits.length; System.out.println(); System.out.println("Array after sorting:"); System.out.println("Number of digits in array: " +l); System.out.print("Digits in array: "); int index = 0; int value = digits[0]; int indVal = digits[index]; while(index < l){ indVal = digits[index]; if(indVal <= value){ indVal = value; digits[index] = value; index++; } else if(value < indVal){ index++; } System.out.print(value); //This is where I don't know what to do. } }

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• July 2013 Release of the Ajax Control Toolkit

  - by Stephen.Walther

  I’m super excited to announce the July 2013 release of the Ajax Control Toolkit. You can download the new version of the Ajax Control Toolkit from CodePlex (http://ajaxControlToolkit.CodePlex.com) or install the Ajax Control Toolkit from NuGet: With this release, we have completely rewritten the way the Ajax Control Toolkit combines, minifies, gzips, and caches JavaScript files. The goal of this release was to improve the performance of the Ajax Control Toolkit and make it easier to create custom Ajax Control Toolkit controls. Improving Ajax Control Toolkit Performance Previous releases of the Ajax Control Toolkit optimized performance for a single page but not multiple pages. When you visited each page in an app, the Ajax Control Toolkit would combine all of the JavaScript files required by the controls in the page into a new JavaScript file. So, even if every page in your app used the exact same controls, visitors would need to download a new combined Ajax Control Toolkit JavaScript file for each page visited. Downloading new scripts for each page that you visit does not lead to good performance. In general, you want to make as few requests for JavaScript files as possible and take maximum advantage of caching. For most apps, you would get much better performance if you could specify all of the Ajax Control Toolkit controls that you need for your entire app and create a single JavaScript file which could be used across your entire app. What a great idea! Introducing Control Bundles With this release of the Ajax Control Toolkit, we introduce the concept of Control Bundles. You define a Control Bundle to indicate the set of Ajax Control Toolkit controls that you want to use in your app. You define Control Bundles in a file located in the root of your application named AjaxControlToolkit.config. For example, the following AjaxControlToolkit.config file defines two Control Bundles: <ajaxControlToolkit> <controlBundles> <controlBundle> <control name="CalendarExtender" /> <control name="ComboBox" /> </controlBundle> <controlBundle name="CalendarBundle"> <control name="CalendarExtender"></control> </controlBundle> </controlBundles> </ajaxControlToolkit> The first Control Bundle in the file above does not have a name. When a Control Bundle does not have a name then it becomes the default Control Bundle for your entire application. The default Control Bundle is used by the ToolkitScriptManager by default. For example, the default Control Bundle is used when you declare the ToolkitScriptManager like this:  <ajaxToolkit:ToolkitScriptManager runat=”server” /> The default Control Bundle defined in the file above includes all of the scripts required for the CalendarExtender and ComboBox controls. All of the scripts required for both of these controls are combined, minified, gzipped, and cached automatically. The AjaxControlToolkit.config file above also defines a second Control Bundle with the name CalendarBundle. Here’s how you would use the CalendarBundle with the ToolkitScriptManager: <ajaxToolkit:ToolkitScriptManager runat="server"> <ControlBundles> <ajaxToolkit:ControlBundle Name="CalendarBundle" /> </ControlBundles> </ajaxToolkit:ToolkitScriptManager> In this case, only the JavaScript files required by the CalendarExtender control, and not the ComboBox, would be downloaded because the CalendarBundle lists only the CalendarExtender control. You can use multiple named control bundles with the ToolkitScriptManager and you will get all of the scripts from both bundles. Support for ControlBundles is a new feature of the ToolkitScriptManager that we introduced with this release. We extended the ToolkitScriptManager to support the Control Bundles that you can define in the AjaxControlToolkit.config file. Let me be explicit about the rules for Control Bundles: 1. If you do not create an AjaxControlToolkit.config file then the ToolkitScriptManager will download all of the JavaScript files required for all of the controls in the Ajax Control Toolkit. This is the easy but low performance option. 2. If you create an AjaxControlToolkit.config file and create a ControlBundle without a name then the ToolkitScriptManager uses that Control Bundle by default. For example, if you plan to use only the CalendarExtender and ComboBox controls in your application then you should create a default bundle that lists only these two controls. 3. If you create an AjaxControlToolkit.config file and create one or more named Control Bundles then you can use these named Control Bundles with the ToolkitScriptManager. For example, you might want to use different subsets of the Ajax Control Toolkit controls in different sections of your app. I should also mention that you can use the AjaxControlToolkit.config file with custom Ajax Control Toolkit controls – new controls that you write. For example, here is how you would register a set of custom controls from an assembly named MyAssembly: <ajaxControlToolkit> <controlBundles> <controlBundle name="CustomBundle"> <control name="MyAssembly.MyControl1" assembly="MyAssembly" /> <control name="MyAssembly.MyControl2" assembly="MyAssembly" /> </controlBundle> </ajaxControlToolkit> What about ASP.NET Bundling and Minification? The idea of Control Bundles is similar to the idea of Script Bundles used in ASP.NET Bundling and Minification. You might be wondering why we didn’t simply use Script Bundles with the Ajax Control Toolkit. There were several reasons. First, ASP.NET Bundling does not work with scripts embedded in an assembly. Because all of the scripts used by the Ajax Control Toolkit are embedded in the AjaxControlToolkit.dll assembly, ASP.NET Bundling was not an option. Second, Web Forms developers typically think at the level of controls and not at the level of individual scripts. We believe that it makes more sense for a Web Forms developer to specify the controls that they need in an app (CalendarExtender, ToggleButton) instead of the individual scripts that they need in an app (the 15 or so scripts required by the CalenderExtender). Finally, ASP.NET Bundling does not work with older versions of ASP.NET. The Ajax Control Toolkit needs to support ASP.NET 3.5, ASP.NET 4.0, and ASP.NET 4.5. Therefore, using ASP.NET Bundling was not an option. There is nothing wrong with using Control Bundles and Script Bundles side-by-side. The ASP.NET 4.0 and 4.5 ToolkitScriptManager supports both approaches to bundling scripts. Using the AjaxControlToolkit.CombineScriptsHandler Browsers cache JavaScript files by URL. For example, if you request the exact same JavaScript file from two different URLs then the exact same JavaScript file must be downloaded twice. However, if you request the same JavaScript file from the same URL more than once then it only needs to be downloaded once. With this release of the Ajax Control Toolkit, we have introduced a new HTTP Handler named the AjaxControlToolkit.CombineScriptsHandler. If you register this handler in your web.config file then the Ajax Control Toolkit can cache your JavaScript files for up to one year in the future automatically. You should register the handler in two places in your web.config file: in the <httpHandlers> section and the <system.webServer> section (don’t forget to register the handler for the AjaxFileUpload while you are there!). <httpHandlers> <add verb="*" path="AjaxFileUploadHandler.axd" type="AjaxControlToolkit.AjaxFileUploadHandler, AjaxControlToolkit" /> <add verb="*" path="CombineScriptsHandler.axd" type="AjaxControlToolkit.CombineScriptsHandler, AjaxControlToolkit" /> </httpHandlers> <system.webServer> <validation validateIntegratedModeConfiguration="false" /> <handlers> <add name="AjaxFileUploadHandler" verb="*" path="AjaxFileUploadHandler.axd" type="AjaxControlToolkit.AjaxFileUploadHandler, AjaxControlToolkit" /> <add name="CombineScriptsHandler" verb="*" path="CombineScriptsHandler.axd" type="AjaxControlToolkit.CombineScriptsHandler, AjaxControlToolkit" /> </handlers> <system.webServer> The handler is only used in release mode and not in debug mode. You can enable release mode in your web.config file like this: <compilation debug=”false”> You also can override the web.config setting with the ToolkitScriptManager like this: <act:ToolkitScriptManager ScriptMode=”Release” runat=”server”/> In release mode, scripts are combined, minified, gzipped, and cached with a far future cache header automatically. When the handler is not registered, scripts are requested from the page that contains the ToolkitScriptManager: When the handler is registered in the web.config file, scripts are requested from the handler: If you want the best performance, always register the handler. That way, the Ajax Control Toolkit can cache the bundled scripts across page requests with a far future cache header. If you don’t register the handler then a new JavaScript file must be downloaded whenever you travel to a new page. Dynamic Bundling and Minification Previous releases of the Ajax Control Toolkit used a Visual Studio build task to minify the JavaScript files used by the Ajax Control Toolkit controls. The disadvantage of this approach to minification is that it made it difficult to create custom Ajax Control Toolkit controls. Starting with this release of the Ajax Control Toolkit, we support dynamic minification. The JavaScript files in the Ajax Control Toolkit are minified at runtime instead of at build time. Scripts are minified only when in release mode. You can specify release mode with the web.config file or with the ToolkitScriptManager ScriptMode property. Because of this change, the Ajax Control Toolkit now depends on the Ajax Minifier. You must include a reference to AjaxMin.dll in your Visual Studio project or you cannot take advantage of runtime minification. If you install the Ajax Control Toolkit from NuGet then AjaxMin.dll is added to your project as a NuGet dependency automatically. If you download the Ajax Control Toolkit from CodePlex then the AjaxMin.dll is included in the download. This change means that you no longer need to do anything special to create a custom Ajax Control Toolkit. As an open source project, we hope more people will contribute to the Ajax Control Toolkit (Yes, I am looking at you.) We have been working hard on making it much easier to create new custom controls. More on this subject with the next release of the Ajax Control Toolkit. A Single Visual Studio Solution We also made substantial changes to the Visual Studio solution and projects used by the Ajax Control Toolkit with this release. This change will matter to you only if you need to work directly with the Ajax Control Toolkit source code. In previous releases of the Ajax Control Toolkit, we maintained separate solution and project files for ASP.NET 3.5, ASP.NET 4.0, and ASP.NET 4.5. Starting with this release, we now support a single Visual Studio 2012 solution that takes advantage of multi-targeting to build ASP.NET 3.5, ASP.NET 4.0, and ASP.NET 4.5 versions of the toolkit. This change means that you need Visual Studio 2012 to open the Ajax Control Toolkit project downloaded from CodePlex. For details on how we setup multi-targeting, please see Budi Adiono’s blog post: http://www.budiadiono.com/2013/07/25/visual-studio-2012-multi-targeting-framework-project/ Summary You can take advantage of this release of the Ajax Control Toolkit to significantly improve the performance of your website. You need to do two things: 1) You need to create an AjaxControlToolkit.config file which lists the controls used in your app and 2) You need to register the AjaxControlToolkit.CombineScriptsHandler in the web.config file. We made substantial changes to the Ajax Control Toolkit with this release. We think these changes will result in much better performance for multipage apps and make the process of building custom controls much easier. As always, we look forward to hearing your feedback.

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• 14+ Real Estate WordPress Themes

  - by Aditi

  If you are looking for a great WordPress real estate theme. Below is a list of some of the best wordpress real estate themes, so you can find one, which is the best suited for you and be at par with increasing industry demands in real estates business.We have covered only the best themes available. The Themes are flexible & can be used by anybody in real estate business. If you are realtor, agent, appraiser or realty these can be modified as per your use. Estate It is an immensely powerful and simple to manage business theme. It offers advanced SEO control, clean code and styling modification features. It has new “Properties” management facility when installed – proving it’s far more than just a WordPress theme. It offers flexible page templates, an advanced search facility that allows you to drill down into properties based on very specific criteria, Google Maps integration and smart property images management. It is a complete web solution. It also has IDX functionality due to dsIDXpress plugin integration, which allows multi-listing services. Price: $200 View Demo Download ElegantEstate It makes your WordPress blog into a full-feature real estate website. The theme makes browsing your listings easy, and adds special integration features for property info, photos, Google Maps and more. Help increase sales by establishing an elegant and professional online presence today. It has opera compatibility, Netscape compatibility, Safari compatibility, WordPress 3.0 compatibility. It comes with five color schemes, threaded comments, optional blog-style structure, Gravatar ready, firefox compatible, IE8 + IE7 + IE6 compatible, advertisement ready, widget ready sidebars, theme options page, custom thumbnail images, PSD files, valid XHTML + CSS, smooth table less design, ePanel theme options, page templates, complete localization and many more features. Price: $39 (Package includes more than 55 themes) View Demo Download Open House Open House is fully compatible with WordPress 3.0+ and a highly customizable Real Estate WordPress theme. It has Google Maps Integration with Street View. It has a professional look for Agents and Realtors both. It is best suited for all markets and countries with theme localization, translation and internationalization. It provides for English, Spanish and Portuguese language files in the Developer Package. It has custom scripts, which makes it easy to add/delete/modify listings. It also includes photo gallery with a lightbox effect, gorgeous photo fade animations and automatic Google Maps integration. The theme can be used as a single or multi-agent website with individual Agent-Realtor pages with listings and biography information, Agent photo uploader, financing calculator.There is Multi Category search for potential customers to locate the house they want. Price: $39.95 essential | $69.95 standard | $99.95 premium View Demo Download Residence Real Estate It is a WordPress 3.0+ compatible stunning real estate theme. It has a dynamic real estate framework management module for easy edit-delete-add more features options, which makes this theme super easy to customize to the market needs. It allows you to add your own labels and values in your own language and switch the theme to your own language with English and Spanish files included with the ability to add your own language. It offers Multi-Category search with breadcrumb filtered results, easy photo gallery management with drag-drop sorting of images. It allows you to build your own multi-category search section menu with custom labels-choices and unlimited dropdown menus. They have been presented in a professional module with search results in breadcrumb navigation. Price: $39.95 essential | $69.95 standard | $99.95 premium View Demo Download Smooth Smooth is a WordPress Real Estate theme. It is a complete theme, which comes with Multi Category Search, Google Maps Integration, Agent Photo and Logo uploader that offers a professional and extremely affordable solution for Realtors and Agents to showcase their properties with ease. You can add your listings with the extremely easy and flexible Dynamic Real Estate Framework, edit-add-modify-delete all features, labels and values within the WordPress administration and upload unlimited photos to your galleries with latest WordPress 3.0+ features. It is a complete solution for real estate sites. Price: $39.95 essential | $69.95 standard | $99.95 premium View Demo Download Homeowners It is another WordPress Real Estate theme, which is a fast loading optimized theme with Google Maps Integration, fully compatible with WordPress 3.0 features and all Real Estate markets. It has a professional clean look and it is full of features extremely easy to modify. It also provides for 12 new styles provided. English, Spanish and Portuguese language files are provided in the Developer Package. Homeowners WordPress Real Estate features custom scripts that make add/delete/modify listings an easy task with an included photo gallery with a lightbox effect and automatic Google Map integration with street view (New) Agents will have access only to their own listings and add the listing management for their account making this theme an ideal affordable solution for Realtors and Real Estate agencies. The theme can be used as a single or multi-agent website with individual Agent-Realtor pages with listings and biography information, Agent photo uploader, financing calculator. Multi category search has also been provided. Price: $39.95 essential | $69.95 standard | $99.95 premium View Demo Download Real Agent Real Estate This theme is a WordPress 3.0+ compatible clean grid based real estate theme. It has a dynamic real estate framework management module for easy edit-delete-add more features options. It is easy to customize according to market. It allows you to add your own labels and values in your own language switch the theme to your own language with English and Spanish files included with the ability to add your own language. Multi-Category search with breadcrumb filtered results, easy photo gallery management with drag-drop sorting of images. You can upload property photos in bulk with the native WordPress uploader and the new image editing and resizing options in WordPress 3.0+. The theme features 5 different color styles, blue, black, red, green and purple with professional layouts, logo and agent photo uploaders. This theme is best suited for individual or multiple agents both. Price: $39.95 essential | $69.95 standard | $99.95 premium View Demo Download Agent Press The AgentPress theme is an ideal solution for real estate agents. It offers multiple page templates that can be used to create a complete real estate website. You can create from single property templates to a custom homepage easily with it. It is compatible to WordPress 3.0 and 3.1. It has custom background/header, property template, 6 layout options, fixed width, threaded comments and many more features. Price: $99.95 View Demo Download Real Estate It is one of the best Real Estate themes. It offers single click auto install of the site, Allow user to pay & submit properties on your site, Multi-agent site with profiles, Strategically built real estate site with professional design, User dashboard to edit/renew their submissions, Auto generated Google Maps and Image Slideshows and many more unique features. Once the users search property as per their criteria, the properties are listed with all the necessary parameters that let them select the property of their choice. Users can also add the property to favorite so they can check the property later from their member area dashboard. Admin may display different sidebar on this page and add widgets of their choice. This theme is full of custom, dynamic widgets such as top agents, finance calculator, user login; advertise blocks, testimonials and so on. There is a property details page where users can see the actual property. The agent details is displayed with the full contact details and appropriate links so the visitor can get all info about the property being sold, seller and may contact them by filling out a simple form. The email will be sent directly to the person who listed the property. Price: $89.95 Single | $159.95 Developer View Demo Download Broker Real Estate It is also a WordPress 3.0+ compatible real estate theme. It has a featured property slideshow, dynamic real estate framework management module for easy edit-delete-add more features. You can add your own labels and values in your own language. It offers multi-category search with breadcrumb-filtered results, easy photo gallery management with drag-drop sorting of images. You can also build your own multi-category search section menu with custom labels-choices and unlimited dropdown menus. Price: $39.95 essential | $69.95 standard | $99.95 premium View Demo Download Decasa It has custom search panel that lets your user easily browse your properties by keyword search or category select drop downs. It offers the property exposé, which is a user-friendly overview over the most important details of each real estate object. You can easily add this data through a post settings meta box on the post edit screen. You can easily create a real estate image gallery. Its theme options panel makes it easy to make the basic theme settings. It supports the new WordPress post thumbnail feature. When uploading an image file the theme will automatically create all the necessary image size. You can also create your own custom menu easily and fast with drag and drop without touching any code. Price: 39 € View Demo Download RealtorPress A real estate premium WordPress theme from PremiumPress. Versatile WordPress Theme that can be used by individual agents or real estate companies. The theme allows you to easily add property listings via the custom backend admin area or import CSV spreadsheets. It features customisable search options, Google maps integration, real estate data custom field creator, image management tools and more. Price: $79 | Premium Collection: $259 (all PremiumPress themes) View Demo Download Related posts:21+ WordPress Photo Blog & Portfolio Themes 14+ WordPress Portfolio Themes Professional WordPress Business Themes

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• Upgrading Team Foundation Server 2008 to 2010

  - by Martin Hinshelwood

  I am sure you will have seen my posts on upgrading our internal Team Foundation Server from TFS2008 to TFS2010 Beta 2, RC and RTM, but what about a fresh upgrade of TFS2008 to TFS2010 using the RTM version of TFS. One of our clients is taking the plunge with TFS2010, so I have the job of doing the upgrade. It is sometimes very useful to have a team member that starts work when most of the Sydney workers are heading home as I can do the upgrade without impacting them. The down side is that if you have any blockers then you can be pretty sure that everyone that can deal with your problem is asleep I am starting with an existing blank installation of TFS 2010, but Adam Cogan let slip that he was the one that did the install so I thought it prudent to make sure that it was OK. Verifying Team Foundation Server 2010 We need to check that TFS 2010 has been installed correctly. First, check the Admin console and have a root about for any errors. Figure: Even the SQL Setup looks good. I don’t know how Adam did it! Backing up the Team Foundation Server 2008 Databases As we are moving from one server to another (recommended method) we will be taking a backup of our TFS2008 databases and resorting them to the SQL Server for the new TFS2010 Server. Do not just detach and reattach. This will cause problems with the version of the database. If you are running a test migration you just need to create a backup of the TFS 2008 databases, but if you are doing the live migration then you should stop IIS on the TFS 2008 server before you backup the databases. This will stop any inadvertent check-ins or changes to TFS 2008. Figure: Stop IIS before you take a backup to prevent any TFS 2008 changes being written to the database. It is good to leave a little time between taking the TFS 2008 server offline and commencing the upgrade as there is always one developer who has not finished and starts screaming. This time it was John Liu that needed 10 more minutes to make his changes and check-in, so I always give it 30 minutes and see if anyone screams. John Liu [SSW] said:   are you doing something to TFS :-O MrHinsh [SSW UK][VS ALM MVP] said:   I have stopped TFS 2008 as per my emails John Liu [SSW] said:   haven't finish check in @_@   can we have it for 10mins? :) MrHinsh [SSW UK][VS ALM MVP] said:   TFS 2008 has been started John Liu [SSW] said:   I love you! -IM conversation at TFS Upgrade +25 minutes After John confirmed that he had everything done I turned IIS off again and made a cup of tea. There were no more screams so the upgrade can continue. Figure: Backup all of the databases for TFS and include the Reporting Services, just in case.   Figure: Check that all the backups have been taken Once you have your backups, you need to copy them to your new TFS2010 server and restore them. This is a good way to proceed as if we have any problems, or just plain run out of time, then you just turn the TFS 2008 server back on and all you have lost is one upgrade day, and not 10 developer days. As per the rules, you should record the number of files and the total number of areas and iterations before the upgrade so you have something to compare to: TFS2008 File count: Type Count 1 1845 2 15770 Areas & Iterations: 139 You can use this to verify that the upgrade was successful. it should however be noted that the numbers in TFS 2010 will be bigger. This is due to some of the sorting out that TFS does during the upgrade process. Restore Team Foundation Server 2008 Databases Restoring the databases is much more time consuming than just attaching them as you need to do them one at a time. But you may be taking a backup of an operational database and need to restore all your databases to a particular point in time instead of to the latest. I am doing latest unless I encounter any problems. Figure: Restore each of the databases to either a latest or specific point in time.     Figure: Restore all of the required databases Now that all of your databases are restored you now need to upgrade them to Team Foundation Server 2010. Upgrade Team Foundation Server 2008 Databases This is probably the easiest part of the process. You need to call a fire and forget command that will go off to the database specified, find the TFS 2008 databases and upgrade them to 2010. During this process all of the 6 main TFS 2008 databases are merged into the TfsVersionControl database, upgraded and then the database is renamed to TFS_[CollectionName]. The rename is only the database and not the physical files, so it is worth going back and renaming the physical file as well. This keeps everything neat and tidy. If you plan to keep the old TFS 2008 server around, for example if you are doing a test migration first, then you will need to change the TFS GUID. This GUID is unique to each TFS instance and is preserved when you upgrade. This GUID is used by the clients and they can get a little confused if there are two servers with the same one. To kick of the upgrade you need to open a command prompt and change the path to “C:\Program Files\Microsoft Team Foundation Server 2010\Tools” and run the “import” command in  “tfsconfig”. TfsConfig import /sqlinstance:<Previous TFS Data Tier>                  /collectionName:<Collection Name>                  /confirmed Imports a TFS 2005 or 2008 data tier as a new project collection. Important: This command should only be executed after adequate backups have been performed. After you import, you will need to configure portal and reporting settings via the administration console. EXAMPLES -------- TfsConfig import /sqlinstance:tfs2008sql /collectionName:imported /confirmed TfsConfig import /sqlinstance:tfs2008sql\Instance /collectionName:imported /confirmed OPTIONS: -------- sqlinstance         The sql instance of the TFS 2005 or 2008 data tier. The TFS databases at that location will be modified directly and will no longer be usable as previous version databases.  Ensure you have back-ups. collectionName      The name of the new Team Project Collection. confirmed           Confirm that you have backed-up databases before importing. This command will automatically look for the TfsIntegration database and verify that all the other required databases exist. In this case it took around 5 minutes to complete the upgrade as the total database size was under 700MB. This was unlike the upgrade of SSW’s production database with over 17GB of data which took a few hours. At the end of the process you should get no errors and no warnings. The Upgrade operation on the ApplicationTier feature has completed. There were 0 errors and 0 warnings. As this is a new server and not a pure upgrade there should not be a problem with the GUID. If you think at any point you will be doing this more than once, for example doing a test migration, or merging many TFS 2008 instances into a single one, then you should go back and rename the physical TfsVersionControl.mdf file to the same as the new collection. This will avoid confusion later down the line. To do this, detach the new collection from the server and rename the physical files. Then reattach and change the physical file locations to match the new name. You can follow http://www.mssqltips.com/tip.asp?tip=1122 for a more detailed explanation of how to do this. Figure: Stop the collection so TFS does not take a wobbly when we detach the database. When you try to start the new collection again you will get a conflict with project names and will require to remove the Test Upgrade collection. This is fine and it just needs detached. Figure: Detaching the test upgrade from the new Team Foundation Server 2010 so we can start the new Collection again. You will now be able to start the new upgraded collection and you are ready for testing. Do you remember the stats we took off the TFS 2008 server? TFS2008 File count: Type Count 1 1845 2 15770 Areas & Iterations: 139 Well, now we need to compare them to the TFS 2010 stats, remembering that there will probably be more files under source control. TFS2010 File count: Type Count 1 19288 Areas & Iterations: 139 Lovely, the number of iterations are the same, and the number of files is bigger. Just what we were looking for. Testing the upgraded Team Foundation Server 2010 Project Collection Can we connect to the new collection and project? Figure: We can connect to the new collection and project.   Figure: make sure you can connect to The upgraded projects and that you can see all of the files. Figure: Team Web Access is there and working. Note that for Team Web Access you now use the same port and URL as for TFS 2010. So in this case as I am running on the local box you need to use http://localhost:8080/tfs which will redirect you to http://localhost:8080/tfs/web for the web access. If you need to connect with a Visual Studio 2008 client you will need to use the full path of the new collection, http://[servername]/tfs/[collectionname] and this will work with all of your collections. With Visual Studio 2005 you will only be able to connect to the Default collection and in both VS2008 and VS2005 you will need to install the forward compatibility updates. Visual Studio Team System 2005 Service Pack 1 Forward Compatibility Update for Team Foundation Server 2010 Visual Studio Team System 2008 Service Pack 1 Forward Compatibility Update for Team Foundation Server 2010 To make sure that you have everything up to date, make sure that you run SSW Diagnostics and get all green ticks. Upgrade Done! At this point you can send out a notice to everyone that the upgrade is complete and and give them the connection details. You need to remember that at this stage we have 2008 project upgraded to run under TFS 2010 but it is still running under that same process template that it was running before. You can only “enable” 2010 features in a process template you can’t upgrade. So what to do? Well, you need to create a new project and migrate things you want to keep across. Souse code is easy, you can move or Branch, but Work Items are more difficult as you can’t move them between projects. This instance is complicated more as the old project uses the Conchango/EMC Scrum for Team System template and I will need to write a script/application to get the work items across with their attachments in tact. That is my next task! Technorati Tags: TFS 2010,TFS 2008,VS ALM

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• Using a WPF ListView as a DataGrid

  - by psheriff

  Many people like to view data in a grid format of rows and columns. WPF did not come with a data grid control that automatically creates rows and columns for you based on the object you pass it. However, the WPF Toolkit can be downloaded from CodePlex.com that does contain a DataGrid control. This DataGrid gives you the ability to pass it a DataTable or a Collection class and it will automatically figure out the columns or properties and create all the columns for you and display the data.The DataGrid control also supports editing and many other features that you might not always need. This means that the DataGrid does take a little more time to render the data. If you want to just display data (see Figure 1) in a grid format, then a ListView works quite well for this task. Of course, you will need to create the columns for the ListView, but with just a little generic code, you can create the columns on the fly just like the WPF Toolkit’s DataGrid. Figure 1: A List of Data using a ListView A Simple ListView ControlThe XAML below is what you would use to create the ListView shown in Figure 1. However, the problem with using XAML is you have to pre-define the columns. You cannot re-use this ListView except for “Product” data. <ListView x:Name="lstData"          ItemsSource="{Binding}">  <ListView.View>    <GridView>      <GridViewColumn Header="Product ID"                      Width="Auto"               DisplayMemberBinding="{Binding Path=ProductId}" />      <GridViewColumn Header="Product Name"                      Width="Auto"               DisplayMemberBinding="{Binding Path=ProductName}" />      <GridViewColumn Header="Price"                      Width="Auto"               DisplayMemberBinding="{Binding Path=Price}" />    </GridView>  </ListView.View></ListView> So, instead of creating the GridViewColumn’s in XAML, let’s learn to create them in code to create any amount of columns in a ListView. Create GridViewColumn’s From Data TableTo display multiple columns in a ListView control you need to set its View property to a GridView collection object. You add GridViewColumn objects to the GridView collection and assign the GridView to the View property. Each GridViewColumn object needs to be bound to a column or property name of the object that the ListView will be bound to. An ADO.NET DataTable object contains a collection of columns, and these columns have a ColumnName property which you use to bind to the GridViewColumn objects. Listing 1 shows a sample of reading and XML file into a DataSet object. After reading the data a GridView object is created. You can then loop through the DataTable columns collection and create a GridViewColumn object for each column in the DataTable. Notice the DisplayMemberBinding property is set to a new Binding to the ColumnName in the DataTable. C#private void FirstSample(){  // Read the data  DataSet ds = new DataSet();  ds.ReadXml(GetCurrentDirectory() + @"\Xml\Product.xml");    // Create the GridView  GridView gv = new GridView();   // Create the GridView Columns  foreach (DataColumn item in ds.Tables[0].Columns)  {    GridViewColumn gvc = new GridViewColumn();    gvc.DisplayMemberBinding = new Binding(item.ColumnName);    gvc.Header = item.ColumnName;    gvc.Width = Double.NaN;    gv.Columns.Add(gvc);  }   // Setup the GridView Columns  lstData.View = gv;  // Display the Data  lstData.DataContext = ds.Tables[0];} VB.NETPrivate Sub FirstSample()  ' Read the data  Dim ds As New DataSet()  ds.ReadXml(GetCurrentDirectory() & "\Xml\Product.xml")   ' Create the GridView  Dim gv As New GridView()   ' Create the GridView Columns  For Each item As DataColumn In ds.Tables(0).Columns    Dim gvc As New GridViewColumn()    gvc.DisplayMemberBinding = New Binding(item.ColumnName)    gvc.Header = item.ColumnName    gvc.Width = [Double].NaN    gv.Columns.Add(gvc)  Next   ' Setup the GridView Columns  lstData.View = gv  ' Display the Data  lstData.DataContext = ds.Tables(0)End SubListing 1: Loop through the DataTable columns collection to create GridViewColumn objects A Generic Method for Creating a GridViewInstead of having to write the code shown in Listing 1 for each ListView you wish to create, you can create a generic method that given any DataTable will return a GridView column collection. Listing 2 shows how you can simplify the code in Listing 1 by setting up a class called WPFListViewCommon and create a method called CreateGridViewColumns that returns your GridView. C#private void DataTableSample(){  // Read the data  DataSet ds = new DataSet();  ds.ReadXml(GetCurrentDirectory() + @"\Xml\Product.xml");   // Setup the GridView Columns  lstData.View =      WPFListViewCommon.CreateGridViewColumns(ds.Tables[0]);  lstData.DataContext = ds.Tables[0];} VB.NETPrivate Sub DataTableSample()  ' Read the data  Dim ds As New DataSet()  ds.ReadXml(GetCurrentDirectory() & "\Xml\Product.xml")   ' Setup the GridView Columns  lstData.View = _      WPFListViewCommon.CreateGridViewColumns(ds.Tables(0))  lstData.DataContext = ds.Tables(0)End SubListing 2: Call a generic method to create GridViewColumns. The CreateGridViewColumns MethodThe CreateGridViewColumns method will take a DataTable as a parameter and create a GridView object with a GridViewColumn object in its collection for each column in your DataTable. C#public static GridView CreateGridViewColumns(DataTable dt){  // Create the GridView  GridView gv = new GridView();  gv.AllowsColumnReorder = true;   // Create the GridView Columns  foreach (DataColumn item in dt.Columns)  {    GridViewColumn gvc = new GridViewColumn();    gvc.DisplayMemberBinding = new Binding(item.ColumnName);    gvc.Header = item.ColumnName;    gvc.Width = Double.NaN;    gv.Columns.Add(gvc);  }   return gv;} VB.NETPublic Shared Function CreateGridViewColumns _  (ByVal dt As DataTable) As GridView  ' Create the GridView  Dim gv As New GridView()  gv.AllowsColumnReorder = True   ' Create the GridView Columns  For Each item As DataColumn In dt.Columns    Dim gvc As New GridViewColumn()    gvc.DisplayMemberBinding = New Binding(item.ColumnName)    gvc.Header = item.ColumnName    gvc.Width = [Double].NaN    gv.Columns.Add(gvc)  Next   Return gvEnd FunctionListing 3: The CreateGridViewColumns method takes a DataTable and creates GridViewColumn objects in a GridView. By separating this method out into a class you can call this method anytime you want to create a ListView with a collection of columns from a DataTable. SummaryIn this blog you learned how to create a ListView that acts like a DataGrid. You are able to use a DataTable as both the source of the data, and for creating the columns for the ListView. In the next blog entry you will learn how to use the same technique, but for Collection classes. NOTE: You can download the complete sample code (in both VB and C#) at my website. http://www.pdsa.com/downloads. Choose Tips & Tricks, then "WPF ListView as a DataGrid" from the drop-down. Good Luck with your Coding,Paul Sheriff ** SPECIAL OFFER FOR MY BLOG READERS **Visit http://www.pdsa.com/Event/Blog for a free eBook on "Fundamentals of N-Tier".

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• Host AngularJS (Html5Mode) in ASP.NET vNext

  - by Shaun

  Originally posted on: http://geekswithblogs.net/shaunxu/archive/2014/06/10/host-angularjs-html5mode-in-asp.net-vnext.aspxMicrosoft had announced ASP.NET vNext in BUILD and TechED recently and as a developer, I found that we can add features into one ASP.NET vNext application such as MVC, WebAPI, SignalR, etc.. Also it's cross platform which means I can host ASP.NET on Windows, Linux and OS X.   If you are following my blog you should knew that I'm currently working on a project which uses ASP.NET WebAPI, SignalR and AngularJS. Currently the AngularJS part is hosted by Express in Node.js while WebAPI and SignalR are hosted in ASP.NET. I was looking for a solution to host all of them in one platform so that my SignalR can utilize WebSocket. Currently AngularJS and SignalR are hosted in the same domain but different port so it has to use ServerSendEvent. It can be upgraded to WebSocket if I host both of them in the same port.   Host AngularJS in ASP.NET vNext Static File Middleware ASP.NET vNext utilizes middleware pattern to register feature it uses, which is very similar as Express in Node.js. Since AngularJS is a pure client side framework in theory what I need to do is to use ASP.NET vNext as a static file server. This is very easy as there's a build-in middleware shipped alone with ASP.NET vNext. Assuming I have "index.html" as below. 1: <html data-ng-app="demo"> 2: <head> 3: <script type="text/javascript" src="angular.js" /> 4: <script type="text/javascript" src="angular-ui-router.js" /> 5: <script type="text/javascript" src="app.js" /> 6: </head> 7: <body> 8: <h1>ASP.NET vNext with AngularJS</h1> 9: <div> 10: <a href="javascript:void(0)" data-ui-sref="view1">View 1</a> | 11: <a href="javascript:void(0)" data-ui-sref="view2">View 2</a> 12: </div> 13: <div data-ui-view></div> 14: </body> 15: </html> And the AngularJS JavaScript file as below. Notices that I have two views which only contains one line literal indicates the view name. 1: 'use strict'; 2:  3: var app = angular.module('demo', ['ui.router']); 4:  5: app.config(['$stateProvider', '$locationProvider', function ($stateProvider, $locationProvider) { 6: $stateProvider.state('view1', { 7: url: '/view1', 8: templateUrl: 'view1.html', 9: controller: 'View1Ctrl' }); 10:  11: $stateProvider.state('view2', { 12: url: '/view2', 13: templateUrl: 'view2.html', 14: controller: 'View2Ctrl' }); 15: }]); 16:  17: app.controller('View1Ctrl', function ($scope) { 18: }); 19:  20: app.controller('View2Ctrl', function ($scope) { 21: }); All AngularJS files are located in "app" folder and my ASP.NET vNext files are besides it. The "project.json" contains all dependencies I need to host static file server. 1: { 2: "dependencies": { 3: "Helios" : "0.1-alpha-*", 4: "Microsoft.AspNet.FileSystems": "0.1-alpha-*", 5: "Microsoft.AspNet.Http": "0.1-alpha-*", 6: "Microsoft.AspNet.StaticFiles": "0.1-alpha-*", 7: "Microsoft.AspNet.Hosting": "0.1-alpha-*", 8: "Microsoft.AspNet.Server.WebListener": "0.1-alpha-*" 9: }, 10: "commands": { 11: "web": "Microsoft.AspNet.Hosting server=Microsoft.AspNet.Server.WebListener server.urls=http://localhost:22222" 12: }, 13: "configurations" : { 14: "net45" : { 15: }, 16: "k10" : { 17: "System.Diagnostics.Contracts": "4.0.0.0", 18: "System.Security.Claims" : "0.1-alpha-*" 19: } 20: } 21: } Below is "Startup.cs" which is the entry file of my ASP.NET vNext. What I need to do is to let my application use FileServerMiddleware. 1: using System; 2: using Microsoft.AspNet.Builder; 3: using Microsoft.AspNet.FileSystems; 4: using Microsoft.AspNet.StaticFiles; 5:  6: namespace Shaun.AspNet.Plugins.AngularServer.Demo 7: { 8: public class Startup 9: { 10: public void Configure(IBuilder app) 11: { 12: app.UseFileServer(new FileServerOptions() { 13: EnableDirectoryBrowsing = true, 14: FileSystem = new PhysicalFileSystem(System.IO.Path.Combine(AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory, "app")) 15: }); 16: } 17: } 18: } Next, I need to create "NuGet.Config" file in the PARENT folder so that when I run "kpm restore" command later it can find ASP.NET vNext NuGet package successfully. 1: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> 2: <configuration> 3: <packageSources> 4: <add key="AspNetVNext" value="https://www.myget.org/F/aspnetvnext/api/v2" /> 5: <add key="NuGet.org" value="https://nuget.org/api/v2/" /> 6: </packageSources> 7: <packageSourceCredentials> 8: <AspNetVNext> 9: <add key="Username" value="aspnetreadonly" /> 10: <add key="ClearTextPassword" value="4d8a2d9c-7b80-4162-9978-47e918c9658c" /> 11: </AspNetVNext> 12: </packageSourceCredentials> 13: </configuration> Now I need to run "kpm restore" to resolve all dependencies of my application. Finally, use "k web" to start the application which will be a static file server on "app" sub folder in the local 22222 port.   Support AngularJS Html5Mode AngularJS works well in previous demo. But you will note that there is a "#" in the browser address. This is because by default AngularJS adds "#" next to its entry page so ensure all request will be handled by this entry page. For example, in this case my entry page is "index.html", so when I clicked "View 1" in the page the address will be changed to "/#/view1" which means it still tell the web server I'm still looking for "index.html". This works, but makes the address looks ugly. Hence AngularJS introduces a feature called Html5Mode, which will get rid off the annoying "#" from the address bar. Below is the "app.js" with Html5Mode enabled, just one line of code. 1: 'use strict'; 2:  3: var app = angular.module('demo', ['ui.router']); 4:  5: app.config(['$stateProvider', '$locationProvider', function ($stateProvider, $locationProvider) { 6: $stateProvider.state('view1', { 7: url: '/view1', 8: templateUrl: 'view1.html', 9: controller: 'View1Ctrl' }); 10:  11: $stateProvider.state('view2', { 12: url: '/view2', 13: templateUrl: 'view2.html', 14: controller: 'View2Ctrl' }); 15:  16: // enable html5mode 17: $locationProvider.html5Mode(true); 18: }]); 19:  20: app.controller('View1Ctrl', function ($scope) { 21: }); 22:  23: app.controller('View2Ctrl', function ($scope) { 24: }); Then let's went to the root path of our website and click "View 1" you will see there's no "#" in the address. But the problem is, if we hit F5 the browser will be turn to blank. This is because in this mode the browser told the web server I want static file named "view1" but there's no file on the server. So underlying our web server, which is built by ASP.NET vNext, responded 404. To fix this problem we need to create our own ASP.NET vNext middleware. What it needs to do is firstly try to respond the static file request with the default StaticFileMiddleware. If the response status code was 404 then change the request path value to the entry page and try again. 1: public class AngularServerMiddleware 2: { 3: private readonly AngularServerOptions _options; 4: private readonly RequestDelegate _next; 5: private readonly StaticFileMiddleware _innerMiddleware; 6:  7: public AngularServerMiddleware(RequestDelegate next, AngularServerOptions options) 8: { 9: _next = next; 10: _options = options; 11:  12: _innerMiddleware = new StaticFileMiddleware(next, options.FileServerOptions.StaticFileOptions); 13: } 14:  15: public async Task Invoke(HttpContext context) 16: { 17: // try to resolve the request with default static file middleware 18: await _innerMiddleware.Invoke(context); 19: Console.WriteLine(context.Request.Path + ": " + context.Response.StatusCode); 20: // route to root path if the status code is 404 21: // and need support angular html5mode 22: if (context.Response.StatusCode == 404 && _options.Html5Mode) 23: { 24: context.Request.Path = _options.EntryPath; 25: await _innerMiddleware.Invoke(context); 26: Console.WriteLine(">> " + context.Request.Path + ": " + context.Response.StatusCode); 27: } 28: } 29: } We need an option class where user can specify the host root path and the entry page path. 1: public class AngularServerOptions 2: { 3: public FileServerOptions FileServerOptions { get; set; } 4:  5: public PathString EntryPath { get; set; } 6:  7: public bool Html5Mode 8: { 9: get 10: { 11: return EntryPath.HasValue; 12: } 13: } 14:  15: public AngularServerOptions() 16: { 17: FileServerOptions = new FileServerOptions(); 18: EntryPath = PathString.Empty; 19: } 20: } We also need an extension method so that user can append this feature in "Startup.cs" easily. 1: public static class AngularServerExtension 2: { 3: public static IBuilder UseAngularServer(this IBuilder builder, string rootPath, string entryPath) 4: { 5: var options = new AngularServerOptions() 6: { 7: FileServerOptions = new FileServerOptions() 8: { 9: EnableDirectoryBrowsing = false, 10: FileSystem = new PhysicalFileSystem(System.IO.Path.Combine(AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory, rootPath)) 11: }, 12: EntryPath = new PathString(entryPath) 13: }; 14:  15: builder.UseDefaultFiles(options.FileServerOptions.DefaultFilesOptions); 16:  17: return builder.Use(next => new AngularServerMiddleware(next, options).Invoke); 18: } 19: } Now with these classes ready we will change our "Startup.cs", use this middleware replace the default one, tell the server try to load "index.html" file if it cannot find resource. The code below is just for demo purpose. I just tried to load "index.html" in all cases once the StaticFileMiddleware returned 404. In fact we need to validation to make sure this is an AngularJS route request instead of a normal static file request. 1: using System; 2: using Microsoft.AspNet.Builder; 3: using Microsoft.AspNet.FileSystems; 4: using Microsoft.AspNet.StaticFiles; 5: using Shaun.AspNet.Plugins.AngularServer; 6:  7: namespace Shaun.AspNet.Plugins.AngularServer.Demo 8: { 9: public class Startup 10: { 11: public void Configure(IBuilder app) 12: { 13: app.UseAngularServer("app", "/index.html"); 14: } 15: } 16: } Now let's run "k web" again and try to refresh our browser and we can see the page loaded successfully. In the console window we can find the original request got 404 and we try to find "index.html" and return the correct result.   Summary In this post I introduced how to use ASP.NET vNext to host AngularJS application as a static file server. I also demonstrated how to extend ASP.NET vNext, so that it supports AngularJS Html5Mode. You can download the source code here.   Hope this helps, Shaun All documents and related graphics, codes are provided "AS IS" without warranty of any kind. Copyright © Shaun Ziyan Xu. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons License.

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• Quartz.Net Writing your first Hello World Job

  - by Tarun Arora

  In this blog post I’ll be covering, 01: A few things to consider before you should schedule a Job using Quartz.Net 02: Setting up your solution to use Quartz.Net API 03: Quartz.Net configuration 04: Writing & scheduling a hello world job with Quartz.Net If you are new to Quartz.Net I would recommend going through, A brief introduction to Quartz.net Walkthrough of Installing & Testing Quartz.Net as a Windows Service A few things to consider before you should schedule a Job using Quartz.Net - An instance of the scheduler service - A trigger - And last but not the least a job For example, if I wanted to schedule a script to run on the server, I should be jotting down answers to the below questions, a. Considering there are multiple machines set up with Quartz.Net windows service, how can I choose the instance of Quartz.Net where I want my script to be run b. What will trigger the execution of the job c. How often do I want the job to run d. Do I want the job to run right away or start after a delay or may be have the job start at a specific time e. What will happen to my job if Quartz.Net windows service is reset f. Do I want multiple instances of this job to run concurrently g. Can I pass parameters to the job being executed by Quartz.Net windows service Setting up your solution to use Quartz.Net API 1. Create a new C# Console Application project and call it “HelloWorldQuartzDotNet” and add a reference to Quartz.Net.dll. I use the NuGet Package Manager to add the reference. This can be done by right clicking references and choosing Manage NuGet packages, from the Nuget Package Manager choose Online from the left panel and in the search box on the right search for Quartz.Net. Click Install on the package “Quartz” (Screen shot below). 2. Right click the project and choose Add New Item. Add a new Interface and call it ‘IScheduledJob.cs’. Mark the Interface public and add the signature for Run. Your interface should look like below. namespace HelloWorldQuartzDotNet { public interface IScheduledJob { void Run(); } }   3. Right click the project and choose Add new Item. Add a class and call it ‘Scheduled Job’. Use this class to implement the interface ‘IscheduledJob.cs’. Look at the pseudo code in the implementation of the Run method. using System; namespace HelloWorldQuartzDotNet { class ScheduledJob : IScheduledJob { public void Run() { // Get an instance of the Quartz.Net scheduler // Define the Job to be scheduled // Associate a trigger with the Job // Assign the Job to the scheduler throw new NotImplementedException(); } } }   I’ll get into the implementation in more detail, but let’s look at the minimal configuration a sample configuration file for Quartz.Net service to work. Quartz.Net configuration In the App.Config file copy the below configuration <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <configuration> <configSections> <section name="quartz" type="System.Configuration.NameValueSectionHandler, System, Version=1.0.5000.0,Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089" /> </configSections> <quartz> <add key="quartz.scheduler.instanceName" value="ServerScheduler" /> <add key="quartz.threadPool.type" value="Quartz.Simpl.SimpleThreadPool, Quartz" /> <add key="quartz.threadPool.threadCount" value="10" /> <add key="quartz.threadPool.threadPriority" value="2" /> <add key="quartz.jobStore.misfireThreshold" value="60000" /> <add key="quartz.jobStore.type" value="Quartz.Simpl.RAMJobStore, Quartz" /> </quartz> </configuration>   As you can see in the configuration above, I have included the instance name of the quartz scheduler, the thread pool type, count and priority, the job store type has been defined as RAM. You have the option of configuring that to ADO.NET JOB store. More details here. Writing & scheduling a hello world job with Quartz.Net Once fully implemented the ScheduleJob.cs class should look like below. I’ll walk you through the details of the implementation… - GetScheduler() uses the name of the quartz.net and listens on localhost port 555 to try and connect to the quartz.net windows service. - Run() an attempt is made to start the scheduler in case it is in standby mode - I have defined a job “WriteHelloToConsole” (that’s the name of the job), this job belongs to the group “IT”. Think of group as a logical grouping feature. It helps you bucket jobs into groups. Quartz.Net gives you the ability to pause or delete all jobs in a group (We’ll look at that in some of the future posts). I have requested for recovery of this job in case the quartz.net service fails over to the other node in the cluster. The jobType is “HelloWorldJob”. This is the class that would be called to execute the job. More details on this below… - I have defined a trigger for my job. I have called the trigger “WriteHelloToConsole”. The Trigger works on the cron schedule “0 0/1 * 1/1 * ? *” which means fire the job once every minute. I would recommend that you look at www.cronmaker.com a free and great website to build and parse cron expressions. The trigger has a priority 1. So, if two jobs are run at the same time, this trigger will have high priority and will be run first. - Use the Job and Trigger to schedule the job. This method returns a datetime offeset. It is possible to see the next fire time for the job from this variable. using System.Collections.Specialized; using System.Configuration; using Quartz; using System; using Quartz.Impl; namespace HelloWorldQuartzDotNet { class ScheduledJob : IScheduledJob { public void Run() { // Get an instance of the Quartz.Net scheduler var schd = GetScheduler(); // Start the scheduler if its in standby if (!schd.IsStarted) schd.Start(); // Define the Job to be scheduled var job = JobBuilder.Create<HelloWorldJob>() .WithIdentity("WriteHelloToConsole", "IT") .RequestRecovery() .Build(); // Associate a trigger with the Job var trigger = (ICronTrigger)TriggerBuilder.Create() .WithIdentity("WriteHelloToConsole", "IT") .WithCronSchedule("0 0/1 * 1/1 * ? *") // visit http://www.cronmaker.com/ Queues the job every minute .WithPriority(1) .Build(); // Assign the Job to the scheduler var schedule = schd.ScheduleJob(job, trigger); Console.WriteLine("Job '{0}' scheduled for '{1}'", "", schedule.ToString("r")); } // Get an instance of the Quartz.Net scheduler private static IScheduler GetScheduler() { try { var properties = new NameValueCollection(); properties["quartz.scheduler.instanceName"] = "ServerScheduler"; // set remoting expoter properties["quartz.scheduler.proxy"] = "true"; properties["quartz.scheduler.proxy.address"] = string.Format("tcp://{0}:{1}/{2}", "localhost", "555", "QuartzScheduler"); // Get a reference to the scheduler var sf = new StdSchedulerFactory(properties); return sf.GetScheduler(); } catch (Exception ex) { Console.WriteLine("Scheduler not available: '{0}'", ex.Message); throw; } } } }   The above highlighted values have been taken from the Quartz.config file, this file is available in the Quartz.net server installation directory. Implementation of my HelloWorldJob Class below. The HelloWorldJob class gets called to execute the job “WriteHelloToConsole” using the once every minute trigger set up for this job. The HelloWorldJob is a class that implements the interface IJob. I’ll walk you through the details of the implementation… - context is passed to the method execute by the quartz.net scheduler service. This has everything you need to pull out the job, trigger specific information. - for example. I have pulled out the value of the jobKey name, the fire time and next fire time. using Quartz; using System; namespace HelloWorldQuartzDotNet { class HelloWorldJob : IJob { public void Execute(IJobExecutionContext context) { try { Console.WriteLine("Job {0} fired @ {1} next scheduled for {2}", context.JobDetail.Key, context.FireTimeUtc.Value.ToString("r"), context.NextFireTimeUtc.Value.ToString("r")); Console.WriteLine("Hello World!"); } catch (Exception ex) { Console.WriteLine("Failed: {0}", ex.Message); } } } }   I’ll add a call to call the scheduler in the Main method in Program.cs using System; using System.Threading; namespace HelloWorldQuartzDotNet { class Program { static void Main(string[] args) { try { var sj = new ScheduledJob(); sj.Run(); Thread.Sleep(10000 * 10000); } catch (Exception ex) { Console.WriteLine("Failed: {0}", ex.Message); } } } }   This was third in the series of posts on enterprise scheduling using Quartz.net, in the next post I’ll be covering how to pass parameters to the scheduled task scheduled on Quartz.net windows service. Thank you for taking the time out and reading this blog post. If you enjoyed the post, remember to subscribe to http://feeds.feedburner.com/TarunArora. Stay tuned!

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• Oracle Fusion Applications: Changing the Game

  - by kellsey.ruppel(at)oracle.com

  Originally posted in the Oracle Profit Magazine, November 2010 Edition. When the order processing system red-flags a customer's credit status, the IT department doesn't get the customer's call. When a supplier misses a delivery date for a key automotive assembly, it's not the CIO who has to answer for the error. Knowledge workers (known in IT circles as "users") are on the front lines when an exception occurs in an established business process. They're also the ones who study sales trends to decide when to open a new store in an up-and-coming neighborhood, which products are most profitable, how employee skill sets are evolving, and which suppliers are most efficient. In short, knowledge workers are masters of business as unusual. Traditional enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems and other familiar enterprise applications excel at automating, managing, and executing standard business processes. These programs shine when everything goes as planned. Life gets even trickier when a traditional application needs to be extended with a new service or an extra step is added to a business process when new products are brought to market, divisions are merged, or companies are acquired. Monolithic applications often need the IT department to step in and make the necessary adjustments--incurring additional costs and delays. Until now. When Oracle unveiled the much-anticipated family of Oracle Fusion Applications at Oracle OpenWorld in September 2010, knowledge workers in particular had a lot to cheer about. Business users will soon have ready access to analytical information and collaboration tools in the context of what they are working on, so they can make better decisions when problems or opportunities arise. Additionally, the Oracle Fusion Applications platform will make it easy for business users to tweak processes, create new capabilities, and find information, often without the need for IT department assistance and while still following company guidelines. And IT leaders will be happy to hear about new deployment options, guided implementation and setup tools, and cost-saving management capabilities. Just as important, the underlying technologies in Oracle Fusion Applications will allow organizations to choose among their existing investments and next-generation enterprise applications so they can introduce innovations at a pace that makes the most business and financial sense. "Oracle Fusion Applications are architected so you don't have to do rip and replace," says Jim Hayes, managing director of the consulting firm Accenture. "That's very important for creating a business case that will get through the steering committee and be approved by the board. It shows you can drive value and make a difference in the near term." For these and other reasons, analysts and early adopters are calling Oracle Fusion Applications a game changer for enterprise customers. The differences become apparent in three key areas: the way we innovate, work, and adopt technology. Game Changer #1: New Standard for InnovationChange is a constant challenge for most businesses, whether the catalysts are market dynamics, new competition, or the ever-expanding regulatory environment. And, in an ongoing effort to differentiate, business leaders are constantly looking for new ways to do business, serve constituents, and bring new products and services to market. In addition, companies face significant costs to keep their applications up-to-date. For example, when a company adds new suppliers to a procurement system, the IT shop typically has to invest time, effort, and even consulting fees for custom integrations that allow various ERP systems to communicate with each other. Oracle Fusion Applications were built on Web services and a modular SOA foundation to ease customizations and integration activities among all applications--whether from Oracle or another vendor. Interfaces and updates written in ubiquitous Java, rather than a proprietary coding language, allow organizations to tap into existing in-house technical skills rather than seek expensive outside specialists. And with SOA, organizations can extend a feature set or integrate with other SOA environments by combining Web services such as "look up customer" into a new business process managed by the BPEL orchestration engine. Flexibility like this has long-term implications. "Because users capture these changes at a higher metadata layer, not in the application's code, changes and additions are protected even as new versions of Oracle Fusion Applications are released," says Steve Miranda, senior vice president of applications development at Oracle. "This is a much more sustainable approach because you don't incur costly customizations that prevent upgrades and other innovations." And changes are easier to make: if one change is made in the metadata, that change is automatically reflected throughout the application interface, business intelligence, business process, and business logic. Game Changer #2: New Standard for WorkBoosting productivity comes down to doing the basics right: running business processes more efficiently and managing exceptions more effectively, so users can accomplish more in the course of a day or spend more quality time with the most profitable customers. The fastest way to improve process efficiency is to reduce the number of steps it takes to execute common tasks, such as ordering office equipment from an internal procurement system. Oracle Fusion Applications will deliver a complete role-based user experience with business intelligence and collaboration capabilities provided in the context of the work at hand. "We created every Oracle Fusion Applications screen by asking 'What does the user need to know?' 'What does he or she need to do?' and 'Who do they need to work with to get the job done?'" Miranda explains. So when the sales department heads need new laptops, the self-service procurement screen will not only display a list of approved vendors and configurations, but also a running list of reviews by coworkers who recently purchased the various models. Embedded intelligence may also display prevailing delivery lead times based on actual order histories, not the generic shipping dates vendors may quote. The pervasive business intelligence serves many other business activities across all areas of the enterprise. For example, a manager considering whether to promote a direct report can see the person's employee profile, with a salary history, appraisal summaries, and a rundown of skills and training. This approach to business intelligence also has implications for supply chain management. "One of the challenges at Ingersoll Rand is lack of visibility in our supply chain," says Mike Macrie, global director of enterprise applications for global industrial firm Ingersoll Rand. "Oracle Fusion Applications are going to provide the embedded intelligence to give us that visibility and give us the ability to analyze those orders at any point in our supply chain." Oracle Fusion Applications will also create a "role-based user experience" that displays a work list of events that need attention, based on user job function. Role awareness guides users with daily lists of action items and exceptions. So a credit manager may see seven invoices with discounts that are about to expire or 12 suppliers that have been put on hold because credit memos are awaiting approval. Individualization extends to the search capabilities of Oracle Fusion Applications. The platform uses Web-style search screens powered by an Oracle enterprise search engine, with a security framework that filters search results so individuals will only see the internal information they're authorized to access. A further aid to productivity is Oracle Fusion Applications' integration with Web 2.0 collaboration and social networking resources for business environments. Hover-over text will reveal relevant contact information whenever the name of a person appears in an Oracle Fusion Application. Users can connect via an online chat, phone call, or instant message without leaving the main application, reducing the time required for an accounts payable staffer to resolve a mismatch between an invoiced charge and the service record, for example. Addresses of suppliers, customers, or partners will also initiate hover-over text to show contact details and Web-based maps. Finally, Oracle Fusion Applications will promote a new way of working with purpose-driven communities that can bring new efficiencies to everything from cultivating sales leads to managing new projects. As soon as a lead or project materializes, the applications will automatically gather relevant participants into an online community that shares member contact information, schedules, discussion forums, and Wiki pages. "Oracle Fusion Applications will allow us to take it to the next level with embedded Web 2.0 tools and the embedded analytics," says Steve Printz, CIO and vice president, supply chain management, at window-and-door manufacturer Pella. "[This] allows those employees today who are processing transactions to really contribute to the success of the company and become decision-makers." Game Changer #3: New Standard for Technology AdoptionAs IT becomes a dominant component of how businesses run and compete, organizations need to lower the cost of implementing applications and introducing new application features. In the past, rolling out new code often required creating a test bed system, moving beta code to a separate system for user feedback, and--once all the revisions were made--moving version one of the software onto production systems, where business users could finally get the needed new features. Oracle Fusion Applications will use a dedicated setup manager application to streamline this process. First, the setup manager will help scope out the project, querying users about their requirements. "From those questions and answers we determine the steps and the order of those steps that will enable that task," Miranda says. Next, system utilities will assign tasks to owners, track completion status, and monitor the overall status of a programming effort. Oracle Fusion Applications can then recommend Web services that allow users to migrate setup choices and steps across all the various deployments of the application. Those setup capabilities automate the migration from test systems to production systems, as well as between different business units that may be using the same application. "The self-service ability of the setup manager helps business users change setups with very little intervention from the IT team," says Ravi Kumar, vice president at IT services company Infosys. "That to me is a big difference from how we've viewed enterprise applications before." For additional flexibility, organizations will be able to adopt Oracle Fusion Applications modules in either of two modes: a single-instance alternative uses one database for all Oracle Fusion Applications, while a "pillar mode" creates separate databases to underpin each application. This means IT departments running any one of Oracle's applications or even third-party applications can plug Oracle Fusion Applications modules into their environment and see additional business value created on top of their existing systems. And Oracle Fusion Applications offer a hybrid approach to deployment. The applications are all software-as-a-service-ready, so customers can choose on-premises, public or private cloud, or a combination of these to suit their business needs. It's that combination of flexibility and a roadmap for the future that may be the biggest game changer of all. "The Oracle Fusion Applications architecture allows us to migrate our company at a pace that's consistent with our business strategy, whereas before we might have had to do it with a massive upgrade," says Macrie of Ingersoll Rand. "We're looking forward to that architecture to really give us more flexibility in how we migrate over time." For More InformationUser Input Key to the Success of Oracle Fusion ApplicationsTransforming Coexistence into Strategic ValueUnder the HoodOracle Fusion ApplicationsOracle Service-Oriented Architecture  

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• E-Business Suite Technology Sessions at OAUG Collaborate 12

  - by Max Arderius

  Members of our E-Business Suite Applications Technology Group will be at the OAUG Collaborate 12 conference at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas, Nevada on April 22 to 26, 2012.  Please drop by any of our sessions to hear the latest news and meet up with us. Speaker Sessions Session 9675Planning Your Oracle E-Business Suite Upgrade from Release 11i to 12.1 and BeyondAnne Carlson, Senior Director, Applications Technology Group, OracleSunday, April 22, 2:00 pm - 3:00 pmLocation: Jasmine B Attend this session to hear the latest Oracle E-Business Suite Release 12.1 upgrade planning tips gleaned from customers who have already performed the upgrade. Youll get specific, cross-product advice on how to decide your project's scope, understand the factors that affect your project's duration, develop a robust testing strategy, leverage Oracle Support resources, and more. In a nutshell, this session tells you things you need to know before embarking upon your Release 12.1 upgrade project. Session 9401Minimizing Oracle E-Business Suite Maintenance DowntimesElke Phelps, Principal Product Manager, Applications Technology Group, OracleKevin Hudson, Sr. Director, Applications Technology Group, OracleSunday, April 22, 2:10 pm - 3:10 pmLocation: South Seas EThis session starts with an architecture review of Oracle E-Business Suite fundamentals and then moves to a practical view of the different tools and approaches for downtimes. Topics include patching shortcuts, merging patches, distributing worker processes across multiple servers, running ADPatch in no-interactive mode, staged APPL_TOPs, shared file systems, deferring system-wide database tasks, avoiding resource bottlenecks etc... This session also describes the online patching capabilities coming in Release 12.2. Session 9368Oracle E-Business Suite Technology: Latest Features and RoadmapLisa Parekh, Vice President, Applications Technology Group, Oracle Sunday, April 22, 4:30 pm - 5:30 pmLocation: South Seas EThis session provides an overview of Oracle E-Business Suite technology strategy, the capabilities and associated business benefits of recent releases, as well as a review of the product roadmap. As a cornerstone session for Oracle E-Business Suite technology, come hear about the latest usability enhancements, systems administration and configuration management tools, security-related updates, and tools and options for extending, customizing, and integrating the Oracle E-Business Suite with other applications. Session 10709Oracle E-Business Suite Applications Strategy and General Manager UpdateCliff Godwin, Sr. VP, Application Development, OracleMonday, April 23, 2:30 pm - 3:30 pmLocation: Mandalay Bay DIn this session, hear from Oracle E-Business Suite General Manager Cliff Godwin as he delivers an update on the Oracle E-Business Suite product line. The session covers the value delivered by the current release of Oracle E-Business Suite applications, the momentum, and how Oracle E-Business Suite applications integrate into Oracle’s overall applications strategy. You will come away with an understanding of the value Oracle E-Business Suite applications deliver now and in the future. Session 9398How to Reduce TCO Using Oracle Application Management Suite for Oracle E-Business SuiteAngelo Rosado, Principal Product Manager, Applications Technology Group, OracleKenneth Baxter, Principal Product Strategy Manager, Management Pack Fusion Middleware Management, OracleTuesday, April 24, 8:00 am - 9:00 amLocation: Breakers GThis session covers the methods and tools you can use to gain insights into your end users, troubleshoot performance problems, define service-level objectives, and proactively monitor your end-to-end Oracle E-Business Suite environment to meet your availability and performance targets. Come hear how you can manage, diagnose, and monitor the Oracle E-Business Suite environment from a single console by using Oracle Enterprise Manager together with the Oracle Application Management Suite for Oracle E-Business Suite. Session 9370 Coexistence of Oracle E-Business Suite and Oracle Fusion Applications: Platform Perspective Nadia Bendjedou, Senior Director, Product Strategy, Oracle Tuesday, April 24, 2:00 pm - 3:00 pm Location: South Seas E Join us at this session if you are wondering which tools to integrate your data, your processes and your User Interface. Or what tools to customize and extend your screens and reports (OAF, Forms, ADF, Oracle Reports, BI etc....), what tools to secure, protect and manage your Oracle E-Business Suite etc... Or simply if you are looking for a technical roadmap for your Oracle E-Business Suite infrastructure to CO-EXIST with the rest of your enterprise applications including Oracle Fusion Applications. Session 9375 Oracle E-Business Suite Directions: Deployment and System AdministrationMax Arderius, Manager, Applications Development Group, OracleTuesday, April 24, 4:30 pm - 5:30 pmLocation: Breakers GWhat's coming in the next major version of Oracle E-Business Suite 12? This session covers the latest technology stack, including the use of Oracle WebLogic Server and Oracle Database 11g Release 2. Topics include an architectural overview, installation and upgrade options, new configuration options, and new tools for hot-cloning and automated "lights out" cloning. Learn about how online patching will reduce your database patching downtimes to the time it takes to bounce your database server.Session 9369Oracle E-Business Suite Technology Certification Primer and RoadmapSteven Chan, Sr. Director, Applications Technology Group, Oracle Wednesday, April 25, 8:15 am - 9:15 amLocation: South Seas FThis Oracle Development session summarizes the latest certifications and roadmap for the Oracle E-Business Suite technology stack, including database releases/options, Java, Oracle Forms, Oracle Containers for J2EE, desktop OS, browsers, JRE releases, Office/OpenOffice, development and Web authoring tools, user authentication and management, BI, security options, clouds, Oracle VM etc.... It also covers the most-commonly-asked questions about technology stack component support dates and upgrade implications. Session 9407The Latest Oracle E-Business Suite Release User Interface and Usability EnhancementsGustavo Jimenez, Sr. Manager, Applications Technology Group, Oracle Wednesday, April 25, 1:00 pm - 2:00 pmLocation: South Seas GIn this session, developers will get a detailed look at new features designed to enhance usability, offer more capabilities for personalization and extensions, and support the development and use of dashboards and Web services. Topics include rich new UI capabilities such as new home page features, Navigator and Favorites pull-down menus, Oracle ADF task flows etc.... In addition, we will cover the personalization/extensibility enhancements, business layer extensions, Oracle ADF integration and much more. Session 9374Best Practices for Oracle E-Business Suite Performance Tuning and Upgrade OptimizationIsam Alyousfi, Senior Director, Applications Performance, OracleUdayan Parvate, Director, Release Engineering, Quality and Release Management, Oracle Thursday, April 26, 8:30 am - 9:30 amLocation: South Seas FThis presentation will offer tips and techniques on tuning all the layers of the Oracle E-Business Suite stack including the various tiers of the Oracle E-Business Suite environment. You will learn about tuning Oracle Forms, Concurrent Manager, Apache, and Oracle Discoverer. Track down memory leaks and other issues on the Java and Java Virtual Machine layers. The session also covers Oracle E-Business Suite product-level tuning, including Oracle Workflow, Oracle Order Management, Oracle Payroll, and other modules.Session 9412 Oracle E-Business Suite 12.1 Desktop Integration: Beyond Oracle Applications Desktop IntegratorGustavo Jimenez, Sr. Manager, Applications Technology Group, OracleThursday, April 26, 8:30 am - 9:30 amLocation: Breakers GThis session describes the new expanded functionality in Oracle Web Applications Desktop Integrator, Oracle Report Manager, and dedicated integrators. You have more options for desktop integration now, not fewer. Topics include an overview of prepackaged solutions for integrating Oracle E-Business Suite with desktop applications such as Microsoft Excel, Word, and Projects. The session also discusses how you can use the Desktop Integration Framework feature to create your own integrators quickly and easily.Session 9533 Upgrading your Customizations to Oracle E-Business Suite Release 12.1Sara Woodhull, Principal Product Manager, Applications Technology Group, Oracle Thursday, April 26, 11:00 am - 12:00 pmLocation: South Seas FHave you personalized Forms or OA Framework screens? Have you used mod_plsql or Applications Express to tailor your Release 11i functionality? Have you extended or customized your Release 11i environment using other tools? This session will help you understand customization scenarios, use cases, tools, and technologies for ensuring that your Oracle E-Business Suite Release 12.1 environment fits your users' needs closely and that any future customizations will be easy to upgrade. Special Interest Groups (SIG) Session 10535OAUG Database SIG- Part IMichael Brown, Colibri Limited Company Sunday, April 22, 3:20 pm - 4:20 pmLocation: South Seas FThis is the annual meeting of the Database SIG at Collaborate. The call for candidates for the chair will be closed at the meeting. Plans include a speaker from Oracle and a presentation on applications performance. The details of the meeting will be posted on http://www.dbsig.com. Guest Presentation: Oracle E-Business Suite Database PerformanceIsam Alyousfi, Senior Director, Applications Performance, Oracle Session 10720OAUG EBS Applications Technology SIG- Part ISrini Chaval, Cummins Monday, April 23, 2:30 pm - 3:30 pmLocation: South Seas F Guest Presentation:Oracle E-Business Suite Technology Certification RoadmapSteven Chan, Sr. Director, Applications Technology Group, Oracle Session 10510OAUG EBS Applications Technology SIG- Part IISrini Chaval, CumminsMonday, April 23, 3:45 pm - 4:45 pmLocation: South Seas F Guest Presentation:Oracle E-Business Suite 12.2 Online Patching Kevin Hudson, Sr. Director, Applications Technology Group, Oracle Session 10522 OAUG Upgrade SIG- Part IISandra Vucinic, VLAD Group, Inc. Wednesday, April 25, 3:00 pm - 4:00 pmLocation: South Seas FUpgrade SIG will host a business meeting followed by panel (Q&A) related to EBS Upgrade topics and Oracle presentation. Guest Presentation:Upgrading E-Business Suite Amrita Mehrok, Director, Financials Product Strategy, Oracle Nadia Bendjedou, Senior Director, Product Strategy, Oracle Session 10722OAUG Upgrade SIG- Part IISandra Vucinic, VLAD Group, Inc. Wednesday, April 25, 4:15 pm - 5:15 pmLocation: South Seas FUpgrade SIG will host a business meeting followed by panel (Q&A) related to EBS Upgrade topics and Oracle presentation. Guest Presentation:Tuning the Oracle E-Business Suite Upgrade Isam Alyousfi, Senior Director, Applications Performance, Oracle Panels Session 9360Oracle E-Business Suite Cloning PanelSandra Vucinic, VLAD Group, Inc. Guest Speaker: Max Arderius, Manager, Applications Technology Group, OracleWednesday, April 25, 9:30 am - 10:30 amLocation: South Seas FThis panel will discuss differences between available release 11i, R12 and R12.1 cloning methods. Advantages and disadvantages of each cloning method will be discussed in depth. This panel of experienced database administrators will lead a discussion focusing on the questions such as “which cloning method is best to use in your particular environment”. Attendees will gain practical knowledge, tips and tricks to assist with cloning of Oracle E-Business Suite release 11i, R12 and R12.1 environments. Session 10022Oracle Applications Tuning PanelMark Farnham, Rightsizing, Inc.Guest Speaker: Isam Alyousfi, Senior Director, Applications Performance, OracleThursday, April 26, 09:45 am - 10:45 amLocation: South Seas FThis applications performance panel session, sponsored by the OAUG Database SIG, provides a Q&A forum focused on helping you address your Oracle Applications (Oracle E-Business Suite and Oracle's PeopleSoft Enterprise and Siebel applications) performance- and scalability-related issues. The panel comprises several well-known Oracle Applications performance experts. Topic areas include Oracle Database; the network; and the applications tier, including patching and upgrade performance. For complete listing of all speaker sessions and other activities, please visit the OAUG Collaborate Web Site.

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• Communication Between Your PC and Azure VM via Windows Azure Connect

  - by Shaun

  With the new release of the Windows Azure platform there are a lot of new features available. In my previous post I introduced a little bit about one of them, the remote desktop access to azure virtual machine. Now I would like to talk about another cool stuff – Windows Azure Connect.   What’s Windows Azure Connect I would like to quote the definition of the Windows Azure Connect in MSDN With Windows Azure Connect, you can use a simple user interface to configure IP-sec protected connections between computers or virtual machines (VMs) in your organization’s network, and roles running in Windows Azure. IP-sec protects communications over Internet Protocol (IP) networks through the use of cryptographic security services. There’s an image available at the MSDN as well that I would like to forward here As we can see, using the Windows Azure Connect the Worker Role 1 and Web Role 1 are connected with the development machines and database servers which some of them are inside the organization some are not. With the Windows Azure Connect, the roles deployed on the cloud could consume the resource which located inside our Intranet or anywhere in the world. That means the roles can connect to the local database, access the local shared resource such as share files, folders and printers, etc.   Difference between Windows Azure Connect and AppFabric It seems that the Windows Azure Connect are duplicated with the Windows Azure AppFabric. Both of them are aiming to solve the problem on how to communication between the resource in the cloud and inside the local network. The table below lists the differences in my understanding. Category Windows Azure Connect Windows Azure AppFabric Purpose An IP-sec connection between the local machines and azure roles. An application service running on the cloud. Connectivity IP-sec, Domain-joint Net Tcp, Http, Https Components Windows Azure Connect Driver Service Bus, Access Control, Caching Usage Azure roles connect to local database server Azure roles use local shared files,  folders and printers, etc. Azure roles join the local AD. Expose the local service to Internet. Move the authorization process to the cloud. Integrate with existing identities such as Live ID, Google ID, etc. with existing local services. Utilize the distributed cache.   And also some scenarios on which of them should be used. Scenario Connect AppFabric I have a service deployed in the Intranet and I want the people can use it from the Internet.   Y I have a website deployed on Azure and need to use a database which deployed inside the company. And I don’t want to expose the database to the Internet. Y   I have a service deployed in the Intranet and is using AD authorization. I have a website deployed on Azure which needs to use this service. Y   I have a service deployed in the Intranet and some people on the Internet can use it but need to be authorized and authenticated.   Y I have a service in Intranet, and a website deployed on Azure. This service can be used from Internet and that website should be able to use it as well by AD authorization for more functionalities. Y Y   How to Enable Windows Azure Connect OK we talked a lot information about the Windows Azure Connect and differences with the Windows Azure AppFabric. Now let’s see how to enable and use the Windows Azure Connect. First of all, since this feature is in CTP stage we should apply before use it. On the Windows Azure Portal we can see our CTP features status under Home, Beta Program page. You can send the apply to join the Beta Programs to Microsoft in this page. After a few days the Microsoft will send an email to you (the email of your Live ID) when it’s available. In my case we can see that the Windows Azure Connect had been activated by Microsoft and then we can click the Connect button on top, or we can click the Virtual Network item from the left navigation bar.   The first thing we need, if it’s our first time to enter the Connect page, is to enable the Windows Azure Connect. After that we can see our Windows Azure Connect information in this page.   Add a Local Machine to Azure Connect As we explained below the Windows Azure Connect can make an IP-sec connection between the local machines and azure role instances. So that we firstly add a local machine into our Azure Connect. To do this we will click the Install Local Endpoint button on top and then the portal will give us an URL. Copy this URL to the machine we want to add and it will download the software to us. This software will be installed in the local machines which we want to join the Connect. After installed there will be a tray-icon appeared to indicate this machine had been joint our Connect. The local application will be refreshed to the Windows Azure Platform every 5 minutes but we can click the Refresh button to let it retrieve the latest status at once. Currently my local machine is ready for connect and we can see my machine in the Windows Azure Portal if we switched back to the portal and selected back Activated Endpoints node.   Add a Windows Azure Role to Azure Connect Let’s create a very simple azure project with a basic ASP.NET web role inside. To make it available on Windows Azure Connect we will open the azure project property of this role from the solution explorer in the Visual Studio, and select the Virtual Network tab, check the Activate Windows Azure Connect. The next step is to get the activation token from the Windows Azure Portal. In the same page there is a button named Get Activation Token. Click this button then the portal will display the token to me. We copied this token and pasted to the box in the Visual Studio tab. Then we deployed this application to azure. After completed the deployment we can see the role instance was listed in the Windows Azure Portal - Virtual Connect section.   Establish the Connect Group The final task is to create a connect group which contains the machines and role instances need to be connected each other. This can be done in the portal very easy. The machines and instances will NOT be connected until we created the group for them. The machines and instances can be used in one or more groups. In the Virtual Connect section click the Groups and Roles node from the left side navigation bar and clicked the Create Group button on top. This will bring up a dialog to us. What we need to do is to specify a group name, description; and then we need to select the local computers and azure role instances into this group. After the Azure Fabric updated the group setting we can see the groups and the endpoints in the page. And if we switch back to the local machine we can see that the tray-icon have been changed and the status turned connected. The Windows Azure Connect will update the group information every 5 minutes. If you find the status was still in Disconnected please right-click the tray-icon and select the Refresh menu to retrieve the latest group policy to make it connected.   Test the Azure Connect between the Local Machine and the Azure Role Instance Now our local machine and azure role instance had been connected. This means each of them can communication to others in IP level. For example we can open the SQL Server port so that our azure role can connect to it by using the machine name or the IP address. The Windows Azure Connect uses IPv6 to connect between the local machines and role instances. You can get the IP address from the Windows Azure Portal Virtual Network section when select an endpoint. I don’t want to take a full example for how to use the Connect but would like to have two very simple tests. The first one would be PING.   When a local machine and role instance are connected through the Windows Azure Connect we can PING any of them if we opened the ICMP protocol in the Filewall setting. To do this we need to run a command line before test. Open the command window on the local machine and the role instance, execute the command as following netsh advfirewall firewall add rule name="ICMPv6" dir=in action=allow enable=yes protocol=icmpv6 Thanks to Jason Chen, Patriek van Dorp, Anton Staykov and Steve Marx, they helped me to enable  the ICMPv6 setting. For the full discussion we made please visit here. You can use the Remote Desktop Access feature to logon the azure role instance. Please refer my previous blog post to get to know how to use the Remote Desktop Access in Windows Azure. Then we can PING the machine or the role instance by specifying its name. Below is the screen I PING my local machine from my azure instance. We can use the IPv6 address to PING each other as well. Like the image following I PING to my role instance from my local machine thought the IPv6 address.   Another example I would like to demonstrate here is folder sharing. I shared a folder in my local machine and then if we logged on the role instance we can see the folder content from the file explorer window.   Summary In this blog post I introduced about another new feature – Windows Azure Connect. With this feature our local resources and role instances (virtual machines) can be connected to each other. In this way we can make our azure application using our local stuff such as database servers, printers, etc. without expose them to Internet.   Hope this helps, Shaun All documents and related graphics, codes are provided "AS IS" without warranty of any kind. Copyright © Shaun Ziyan Xu. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons License.

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• Do’s and Don’ts Building SharePoint Applications

  - by Bil Simser

  SharePoint is a great platform for building quick LOB applications. Simple things from employee time trackers to server and software inventory to full blown Help Desks can be crafted up using SharePoint from just customizing Lists. No programming necessary. However there are a few tricks I’ve painfully learned over the years that you can use for your own solutions. DO What’s In A Name? When you create a new list, column, or view you’ll commonly name it something like “Expense Reports”. However this has the ugly effect of creating a url to the list as “Expense%20Reports”. Or worse, an internal field name of “Expense_x0x0020_Reports” which is not only cryptic but hard to remember when you’re trying to find the column by internal name. While “Expense Reports 2011” is user friendly, “ExpenseReports2011” is not (unless you’re a programmer). So that’s not the solution. Well, not entirely. Instead when you create your column or list or view use the scrunched up name (I can’t think of the technical term for it right now) of “ExpenseReports2011”, “WomenAtTheOfficeThatAreMen” or “KoalaMeatIsGoodWhenBroiled”. After you’ve created it, go back and change the name to the more friendly “Silly Expense Reports That Nobody Reads”. The original internal name will be the url and code friendly one without spaces while the one used on data entry forms and view headers will be the human version. Smart Columns When building a view include columns that make sense. By default when you add a column the “Add to default view” is checked. Resist the urge to be lazy and leave it checked. Uncheck that puppy and decide consciously what columns should be included in the view. Pick columns that make sense to what the user is trying to do. This means you have to talk to the user. Yes, I know. That can be trying at times and even painful. Go ahead, talk to them. You might learn something. Find out what’s important to them and why. If they’re doing something repetitively as part of their job, try to make their life easier by including what’s most important to them. Do they really need to see the Created *and* Modified date of a document or do they just need the title and author? You’ll only find out after talking to them (or getting them drunk in a bar and leaving them in the back alley handcuffed to a garbage bin, don’t ask). Gotta Keep it Separated Hey, views are there for a reason. Use them. While “All Items” is a fine way to present a list of well, all items, it’s hardly sufficient to present a list of servers built before the Y2K bug hit. You’ll be scrolling the list for hours finally arriving at Page 387 of 12,591 and cursing that SharePoint guy for convincing you that putting your hardware into a list would be of any use to anyone. Next to collecting the data, presenting it is just as important. Views are often overlooked and many times ignored or misused. They’re the way you can slice and dice the data up so that you’re not trying to consume 3,000 years of human evolution on a single web page. Remember views can be filtered so feel free to create a view for each status or one for each operating system or one for each species of Information Worker you might be putting in that list or document library. Not only will it reduce the number of items someone sees at one time, it’ll also make the information that much more relevant. Also remember that each view is a separate page. Use it in navigation by creating a menu on the Quick Launch to each view. The discoverability of the Views menu isn’t overly obvious and if you violate the rule of columns (see Horizontally Scrolling below) the view menu doesn’t even show up until you shuffle the scroll bar to the left. Navigation links, big giant buttons, a screaming flashing “CLICK ME NOW” will help your users find their way. Sort It! Views are great so we’re building nice, rich views for the user. Awesomesauce. However sort is not very discoverable by the user. For example when you’re looking at a view how do you know if it’s ascending or descending and what is it sorted on. Maybe it’s sorted using two fields so what’s that all about? Help your users by letting them know the information they’re looking at is sorted. Maybe you name the view something appropriate like “Bogus Expense Claims Sorted By Deadbeats”. If you use the naming strategy just make sure you keep the name consistent with the description. In the previous example their better be a Deadbeat column so I can see the sort in action. Having a “Loser” column, while equally correct, is a little obtuse to the average Information Worker. Remember, they usually don’t use acronyms and even if they knew how to, it’s not immediately obvious to them that’s what you’re trying to convey. Another option is to simply drop a Content Editor Web Part above the list and explain exactly the view they’re looking at. Each view is it’s own page so one CEWP won’t be used across the board. Be descriptive in what the user is seeing but try to keep it brief. Dumping the first chapter of I, Claudius might be informative to the data but can gobble up screen real estate and miss the point of having the list. DO NOT Useless Attachments The attachments column is, in a word, useless. For the most part. Sure it indicates there’s an attachment on the list item but in the grand scheme of things that’s not overly informative. Maybe it is and by all means, if it makes sense to you include it. Colour it. Make it shine and stand like the Return of Clippy on every SharePoint list. Without it being functional it can be boring. EndUserSharePoint.com has an article to make the son of Clippy that much more useful so feel free to head over and check out this blog post by Paul Grenier on the task (Warning code ahead! Danger Will Robinson!) In any case, I would suggest you remove it from your views. Again if it’s important then include it but consider the jQuery solution above to make it functional. It’s added by default to views and one of things that people forget to clean up. Horizontal Scrolling Screen real estate is premium so building a list that contains 8,000 columns and stretches horizontally across 15 screens probably isn’t the most user friendly experience. Most users can’t figure out how to scroll vertically let alone horizontally so don’t make it even that more confusing for them. Take the Steve Krug approach in your view designs and try not to make the user think. Again views are your friend. Consider splitting up the data into views where one view contains 10 columns and other view contains the other 10. Okay, maybe your information doesn’t work that way but humans can only process 7 pieces of data at a time, 10 at most (then their heads explode and you don’t want to clean that mess up, especially on a Friday night before the big dance). It drives me batshit crazy when I see a view with 80 columns of data. I often ask the user “So what do you do with all this information”. The response is usually “With this data [the first 10 columns] I decide if I’m going to fire everyone, and with this data [the next 10 columns] I decide if I’m going to set the building on fire and collect the insurance”. It’s at that point I show them how to create two new views “People Who Are About To Get The Axe” and “Beach Time For The Executives”. Again, talk to your users and try to reason with them on cutting down the number of columns they see at once. Vertical Scrolling Another big faux pas I find is the use of multi-line comment fields in views. It’s not so bad when you have a statement like this in your view: “I really like, oh my god, thought I was going to scream when I saw this turtle then I decided what I was going to have for dinner and frankly I hate having to work late so when I was talking to the customer I thought, oh my god, what if the customer has turtles and then it appeared to me that I really was hungry so I'm going to have lunch now.” It’s fine if that’s the only column along with two or three others, but once you slap those 20 columns of data into the list, the comment field wraps and forms a new multi-page novel that takes up your entire screen. Do everyone a favour and just avoid adding the column to views. Train the user to just click through to the item if they need to see the contents. Duplicate Information Duplication is never good. Views and great as you can group data together. For example create a view of project status reports grouped by author. Then you can see what project manager is being a dip and not submitting their report. However if you group by author do you really need the Created By field as well in the view? Or if the view is grouped by Project then Author do you need both. Horizontal real estate is always at a premium so try not to clutter up the view with duplicate data like this. Oh  yeah, if you’re scratching your head saying “But Bil, if I don’t include the Project name in the view and I have a lot of items then how do I know which one I’m looking at”. That’s a hint that your grouping is too vague or you have too much data in the view based on that criteria. Filter it down a notch, create some views, and try to keep the group down to a single screen where you can see the group header at the top of the page. Again it’s just managing the information you have. Redundant, See Redundant This partially relates to duplicate information and smart columns but basically remember to not include the obvious in a view. Remember, don’t make me think. If you’ve gone to the trouble (and it was a lot of trouble wasn’t it?) to create separate views of your data by creating a “September Zombie Brain Sales”, “October Zombie Brain Sales”, etc. then please for the love of all that is holy do not include the Month and Product columns in your view. Similarly if you create a “My” view of anything (“My Favourite Brands of Spandex”, “My Co-Workers I Find The Urge To Disinfect”) then again, do not include the owner or author field (or whatever field you use to identify “My”). That’s just silly. Hope that helps! Happy customizing!

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• Not All “Viruses” Are Viruses: 10 Malware Terms Explained

  - by Chris Hoffman

  Most people seem to call every type of malware a “virus”, but that isn’t technically accurate. You’ve probably heard of many more terms beyond virus: malware, worm, Trojan, rootkit, keylogger, spyware, and more. But what do all these terms mean? These terms aren’t just used by geeks. They make their way into even mainstream news stories about the latest web security problems and tech scares. Understanding them will help you understand the dangers your\ hear about. Malware The word “malware” is short for “malicious software.” Many people use the word “virus” to indicate any type of harmful software, but a virus is actually just a specific type of malware. The word “malware” encompasses all harmful software, including all the ones listed below. Virus Let’s start with viruses. A virus is a type of malware that copies itself by infecting other files,  just as viruses in the real world infect biological cells and use those biological cells to reproduce copies of themselves. A virus can do many different things — watch in the background and steal your passwords, display advertisements, or just crash your computer — but the key thing that makes it a virus is how it spreads. When you run a virus, it will infect programs on your computer. When you run the program on another computer, the virus will infect programs on that computer, and so on. For example, a virus might infect program files on a USB stick. When the programs on that USB stick are run on another computer, the virus runs on the other computer and infects more program files. The virus will continue to spread in this way. Worm A worm is similar to a virus, but it spreads a different way. Rather than infecting files and relying on human activity to move those files around and run them on different systems, a worm spreads over computer networks on its own accord. For example, the Blaster and Sasser worms spread very quickly in the days of Windows XP because Windows XP did not come properly secured and exposed system services to the Internet. The worm accessed these system services over the Internet, exploited a vulnerability, and infected the computer. The worm then used the new infected computer to continue replicating itself. Such worms are less common now that Windows is properly firewalled by default, but worms can also spread in other ways — for example, by mass-emailing themselves to every email address in an effected user’s address book. Like a virus, a worm can do any number of other harmful things once it infects a computer. The key thing that makes it a worm is simply how it spreads copies of itself. Trojan (or Trojan Horse) A Trojan horse, or Trojan, is a type of malware that disguises itself as a legitimate file. When you download and run the program, the Trojan horse will run in the background, allowing third-parties to access your computer. Trojans can do this for any number of reasons — to monitor activity on your computer, to join your computer to a botnet. Trojans may also be used to open the floodgates and download many other types of malware onto your computer. The key thing that makes this type of malware a Trojan is how it arrives. It pretends to be a useful program and, when run, it hides in the background and gives malicious people access to your computer. It isn’t obsessed with copying itself into other files or spreading over the network, as viruses and worms are. For example, a piece of pirated software on an unscrupulous website may actually contain a Trojan. Spyware Spyware is a type of malicious software that spies on you without your knowledge. It collects a variety of different types of data, depending on the piece of spyware. Different types of malware can function as spyware — there may be malicious spyware included in Trojans that spies on your keystrokes to steal financial data, for example. More “legitimate” spyware may be bundled along with free software and simply monitor your web browsing habits, uploading this data to advertising servers so the software’s creator can make money from selling their knowledge of your activities. Adware Adware often comes along with spyware. It’s any type of software that displays advertising on your computer. Programs that display advertisements inside the program itself aren’t generally classified as malware. The kind of “adware” that’s particularly malicious is the kind that abuses its access to your system to display ads when it shouldn’t. For example, a piece of harmful adware may cause pop-up advertisements to appear on your computer when you’re not doing anything else. Or, adware may inject additional advertising into other web pages as you browse the web. Adware is often combined with spyware — a piece of malware may monitor your browsing habits and use them to serve you more targeted ads. Adware is more “socially acceptable” than other types of malware on Windows and you may see adware bundled with legitimate programs. For example, some people consider the Ask Toolbar included with Oracle’s Java software adware. Keylogger A keylogger is a type of malware that runs in the background, recording every key stroke you make. These keystrokes can include usernames, passwords, credit card numbers, and other sensitive data. The keylogger then, most likely, uploads these keystrokes to a malicious server, where it can be analyzed and people can pick out the useful passwords and credit card numbers. Other types of malware can act as keyloggers. A virus, worm, or Trojan may function as a keylogger, for example. Keyloggers may also be installed for monitoring purposes by businesses or even jealous spouses. Botnet, Bot A botnet is a large network of computers that are under the botnet creator’s control. Each computer functions as a “bot” because it’s infected with a specific piece of malware. Once the bot software infects the computer, ir will connect to some sort of control server and wait for instructions from the botnet’s creator. For example, a botnet may be used to initiate a DDoS (distributed denial of service) attack. Every computer in the botnet will be told to bombard a specific website or server with requests at once, and such millions or requests can cause a server to become unresponsive or crash. Botnet creators may sell access to their botnets, allowing other malicious individuals to use large botnets to do their dirty work. Rootkit A rootkit is a type of malware designed to burrow deep into your computer, avoiding detection by security programs and users. For example, a rootkit might load before most of Windows, burying itself deep into the system and modifying system functions so that security programs can’t detect it. A rootkit might hide itself completely, preventing itself from showing up in the Windows task manager. The key thing that makes a type of malware a rootkit is that it’s stealthy and focused on hiding itself once it arrives. Ransomware Ransomware is a fairly new type of malware. It holds your computer or files hostage and demands a ransom payment. Some ransomware may simply pop up a box asking for money before you can continue using your computer. Such prompts are easily defeated with antivirus software. More harmful malware like CryptoLocker literally encrypts your files and demands a payment before you can access them. Such types of malware are dangerous, especially if you don’t have backups. Most malware these days is produced for profit, and ransomware is a good example of that. Ransomware doesn’t want to crash your computer and delete your files just to cause you trouble. It wants to take something hostage and get a quick payment from you. So why is it called “antivirus software,” anyway? Well, most people continue to consider the word “virus” synonymous with malware as a whole. Antivirus software doesn’t just protect against viruses, but against all types of malware. It may be more accurately referred to as “antimalware” or “security” software. Image Credit: Marcelo Alves on Flickr, Tama Leaver on Flickr, Szilard Mihaly on Flickr     

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• SQL – NuoDB and Third Party Explorer – SQuirreL SQL Client, SQL Workbench/J and DbVisualizer

  - by Pinal Dave

  I recently wrote a four-part series on how I started to learn about and begin my journey with NuoDB. Big Data is indeed a big world and the learning of the Big Data is like spaghetti – no one knows in reality where to start, so I decided to learn it with the help of NuoDB. You can download NuoDB and continue your journey with me as well. Part 1 – Install NuoDB in 90 Seconds Part 2 – Manage NuoDB Installation Part 3 – Explore NuoDB Database Part 4 – Migrate from SQL Server to NuoDB …and in this blog post we will try to answer the most asked question about NuoDB. “I like the NuoDB Explorer but can I connect to NuoDB from my preferred Graphical User Interface?” Honestly, I did not expect this question to be asked of me so many times but from the question it is clear that we developers absolutely want to learn new things and along with that we do want to continue to use our most efficient developer tools. Now here is the answer to the question: “Absolutely, you can continue to use any of the following most popular SQL clients.” NuoDB supports the three most popular 3rd-party SQL clients. In all the leading development environments there are always more than one database installed and managing each of them with a different tool is often a very difficult task. Developers like to use one tool, which can control most of the databases. Once developers are familiar with one database tool it is very difficult for them to switch to another tool. This is particularly difficult when we developers find that tool to be the key reason for our efficiency. Let us see how to install each of the NuoDB supported 3rd party tools along with a quick tutorial on how to go about using them. SQuirreL SQL Client First download SQuirreL Universal SQL client. On the Windows platform you can double-click on the file and it will install the SQuirrel client. Once it is installed, open the application and it will bring up the following screen. Now go to the Drivers tab on the left side and scroll it down. You will find NuoDB mentioned there. Now right click over it and click on Modify Driver. Now here is where you need to make sure that you make proper entries or your client will not work with the database. Enter following values: Name: NuoDB Example URL: jdbc:com:nuodb://localhost:48004/test Website URL: http://www.nuodb.com Now click on the Extra Class Path tab and Add the location of the nuodbjdbc.jar file. If you are following my blog posts and have installed NuoDB in the default location, you will find the default path as C:\Program Files\NuoDB\jar\nuodbjdbc.jar. The class name of the driver is automatically populated. Once you click OK you will see that there is a small icon displayed to the left of NuoDB, which shows that you have successfully configured and installed the NuoDB driver. Now click on the tab of Alias tab and you can notice that it is empty. Now click on the big Plus icon and it will open screen of adding an alias. “Alias” means nothing more than adding a database to your system. The database name of the original installation can be anything and, if you wish, you can register the database with any other alternative name. Here are the details you should fill into the Alias screen below. Name: Test (or your preferred alias) Driver: NuoDB URL: jdbc:com:nuodb://localhost:48004/test (This is for test database) User Name: dba (This is the username which I entered for test Database) Password: goalie (This is the password which I entered for test Database) Check Auto Logon and Connect at Startup and click on OK. That’s it! You are done. On the right side you will see a table name and on the left side you will see various tabs with all the relevant details from respective table. You can see various metadata, schemas, data types and other information in the table. In addition, you can also generate script and do various important tasks related to database. You can see how easy it is to configure NuoDB with the SQuirreL Client and get going with it immediately. SQL Workbench/J This is another wonderful client tool, which works very well with NuoDB. The best part is that in the Driver dropdown you will see NuoDB being mentioned there. Click here to download  SQL Workbench/J Universal SQL client. The download process is straight forward and the installation is a very easy process for SQL Workbench/J. As soon as you open the client, you will notice on following screen the NuoDB driver when selecting a New Connection Profile. Select NuoDB from the drop down and click on OK. In the driver information, enter following details: Driver: NuoDB (com.nuodb.jdbc.Driver) URL: jdbc:com.nuodb://localhost/test Username: dba Password: goalie While clicking on OK, it will bring up the following pop-up. Click Yes to edit the driver information. Click on OK and it will bring you to following screen. This is the screen where you can perform various tasks. You can write any SQL query you want and it will instantly show you the results. Now click on the database icon, which you see right on the left side of the word User=dba.  Once you click on Database Explorer, you can perform various database related tasks. As a developer, one of my favorite tasks is to look at the source of the table as it gives me a proper view of the structure of the database. I find SQL Workbench/J very efficient in doing the same. DbVisualizer DBVisualizer is another great tool, which helps you to connect to NuoDB and retrieve database information in your desired format. A developer who is familiar with DBVisualizer will find this client to be very easy to work with. The installation of the DBVisualizer is very pretty straight forward. When we open the client, it will bring us to the following screen. As a first step we need to set up the driver. Go to Tools >> Driver Manager. It will bring up following screen where we set up the diver. Click on Create Driver and it will open up the driver settings on the right side. On the right side of the area where it displays Driver Settings please enter the following values- Name: NuoDB URL Format: jdbc:com.nuodb://localhost:48004/test Now under the driver path, click on the folder icon and it will ask for the location of the jar file. Provide the path as a C:\Program Files\NuoDB\jar\nuodbjdbc.jar and click OK. You will notice there is a green button displayed at the bottom right corner. This means the driver is configured properly. Once driver is configured properly, we can go to Create Database Connection and create a database. If the pop up show up for the Wizard. Click on No Wizard and continue to enter the settings manually. Here is the Database Connection screen. This screen can be bit tricky. Here are the settings you need to remember to enter. Name: NuoDB Database Type: Generic Driver: NuoDB Database URL: jdbc:com.nuodb://localhost:48004/test Database Userid: dba Database Password: goalie Once you enter the values, click on Connect. Once Connect is pressed, it will change the button value to Reconnect if the connection is successfully established and it will show the connection details on lthe eft side. When we further explore the NuoDB, we can see various tables created in our test application. We can further click on the right side screen and see various details on the table. If you click on the Data Tab, it will display the entire data of the table. The Tools menu also has some very interesting and cool features like Driver Manager, Data Monitor and SQL History. Summary Well, this was a relatively long post but I find it is extremely essential to cover all the three important clients, which we developers use in our daily database development. Here is my question to you? Which one of the following is your favorite NuoDB 3rd-Party Database Client? (Pick One) SQuirreL SQL Client SQL Workbench/J DbVisualizer I will be very much eager to read your experience about NuoDB. You can download NuoDB from here. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Big Data, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology Tagged: NuoDB

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• Demystifying Silverlight Dependency Properties

  - by dwahlin

  I have the opportunity to teach a lot of people about Silverlight (amongst other technologies) and one of the topics that definitely confuses people initially is the concept of dependency properties. I confess that when I first heard about them my initial thought was “Why do we need a specialized type of property?” While you can certainly use standard CLR properties in Silverlight applications, Silverlight relies heavily on dependency properties for just about everything it does behind the scenes. In fact, dependency properties are an essential part of the data binding, template, style and animation functionality available in Silverlight. They simply back standard CLR properties. In this post I wanted to put together a (hopefully) simple explanation of dependency properties and why you should care about them if you’re currently working with Silverlight or looking to move to it.   What are Dependency Properties? XAML provides a great way to define layout controls, user input controls, shapes, colors and data binding expressions in a declarative manner. There’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes in order to make XAML work and an important part of that magic is the use of dependency properties. If you want to bind data to a property, style it, animate it or transform it in XAML then the property involved has to be a dependency property to work properly. If you’ve ever positioned a control in a Canvas using Canvas.Left or placed a control in a specific Grid row using Grid.Row then you’ve used an attached property which is a specialized type of dependency property. Dependency properties play a key role in XAML and the overall Silverlight framework. Any property that you bind, style, template, animate or transform must be a dependency property in Silverlight applications. You can programmatically bind values to controls and work with standard CLR properties, but if you want to use the built-in binding expressions available in XAML (one of my favorite features) or the Binding class available through code then dependency properties are a necessity. Dependency properties aren’t needed in every situation, but if you want to customize your application very much you’ll eventually end up needing them. For example, if you create a custom user control and want to expose a property that consumers can use to change the background color, you have to define it as a dependency property if you want bindings, styles and other features to be available for use. Now that the overall purpose of dependency properties has been discussed let’s take a look at how you can create them. Creating Dependency Properties When .NET first came out you had to write backing fields for each property that you defined as shown next: Brush _ScheduleBackground; public Brush ScheduleBackground { get { return _ScheduleBackground; } set { _ScheduleBackground = value; } } Although .NET 2.0 added auto-implemented properties (for example: public Brush ScheduleBackground { get; set; }) where the compiler would automatically generate the backing field used by get and set blocks, the concept is still the same as shown in the above code; a property acts as a wrapper around a field. Silverlight dependency properties replace the _ScheduleBackground field shown in the previous code and act as the backing store for a standard CLR property. The following code shows an example of defining a dependency property named ScheduleBackgroundProperty: public static readonly DependencyProperty ScheduleBackgroundProperty = DependencyProperty.Register("ScheduleBackground", typeof(Brush), typeof(Scheduler), null);   Looking through the code the first thing that may stand out is that the definition for ScheduleBackgroundProperty is marked as static and readonly and that the property appears to be of type DependencyProperty. This is a standard pattern that you’ll use when working with dependency properties. You’ll also notice that the property explicitly adds the word “Property” to the name which is another standard you’ll see followed. In addition to defining the property, the code also makes a call to the static DependencyProperty.Register method and passes the name of the property to register (ScheduleBackground in this case) as a string. The type of the property, the type of the class that owns the property and a null value (more on the null value later) are also passed. In this example a class named Scheduler acts as the owner. The code handles registering the property as a dependency property with the call to Register(), but there’s a little more work that has to be done to allow a value to be assigned to and retrieved from the dependency property. The following code shows the complete code that you’ll typically use when creating a dependency property. You can find code snippets that greatly simplify the process of creating dependency properties out on the web. The MVVM Light download available from http://mvvmlight.codeplex.com comes with built-in dependency properties snippets as well. public static readonly DependencyProperty ScheduleBackgroundProperty = DependencyProperty.Register("ScheduleBackground", typeof(Brush), typeof(Scheduler), null); public Brush ScheduleBackground { get { return (Brush)GetValue(ScheduleBackgroundProperty); } set { SetValue(ScheduleBackgroundProperty, value); } } The standard CLR property code shown above should look familiar since it simply wraps the dependency property. However, you’ll notice that the get and set blocks call GetValue and SetValue methods respectively to perform the appropriate operation on the dependency property. GetValue and SetValue are members of the DependencyObject class which is another key component of the Silverlight framework. Silverlight controls and classes (TextBox, UserControl, CompositeTransform, DataGrid, etc.) ultimately derive from DependencyObject in their inheritance hierarchy so that they can support dependency properties. Dependency properties defined in Silverlight controls and other classes tend to follow the pattern of registering the property by calling Register() and then wrapping the dependency property in a standard CLR property (as shown above). They have a standard property that wraps a registered dependency property and allows a value to be assigned and retrieved. If you need to expose a new property on a custom control that supports data binding expressions in XAML then you’ll follow this same pattern. Dependency properties are extremely useful once you understand why they’re needed and how they’re defined. Detecting Changes and Setting Defaults When working with dependency properties there will be times when you want to assign a default value or detect when a property changes so that you can keep the user interface in-sync with the property value. Silverlight’s DependencyProperty.Register() method provides a fourth parameter that accepts a PropertyMetadata object instance. PropertyMetadata can be used to hook a callback method to a dependency property. The callback method is called when the property value changes. PropertyMetadata can also be used to assign a default value to the dependency property. By assigning a value of null for the final parameter passed to Register() you’re telling the property that you don’t care about any changes and don’t have a default value to apply. Here are the different constructor overloads available on the PropertyMetadata class: PropertyMetadata Constructor Overload Description PropertyMetadata(Object) Used to assign a default value to a dependency property. PropertyMetadata(PropertyChangedCallback) Used to assign a property changed callback method. PropertyMetadata(Object, PropertyChangedCalback) Used to assign a default property value and a property changed callback.   There are many situations where you need to know when a dependency property changes or where you want to apply a default. Performing either task is easily accomplished by creating a new instance of the PropertyMetadata class and passing the appropriate values to its constructor. The following code shows an enhanced version of the initial dependency property code shown earlier that demonstrates these concepts: public Brush ScheduleBackground { get { return (Brush)GetValue(ScheduleBackgroundProperty); } set { SetValue(ScheduleBackgroundProperty, value); } } public static readonly DependencyProperty ScheduleBackgroundProperty = DependencyProperty.Register("ScheduleBackground", typeof(Brush), typeof(Scheduler), new PropertyMetadata(new SolidColorBrush(Colors.LightGray), ScheduleBackgroundChanged)); private static void ScheduleBackgroundChanged(DependencyObject d, DependencyPropertyChangedEventArgs e) { var scheduler = d as Scheduler; scheduler.Background = e.NewValue as Brush; } The code wires ScheduleBackgroundProperty to a property change callback method named ScheduleBackgroundChanged. What’s interesting is that this callback method is static (as is the dependency property) so it gets passed the instance of the object that owns the property that has changed (otherwise we wouldn’t be able to get to the object instance). In this example the dependency object is cast to a Scheduler object and its Background property is assigned to the new value of the dependency property. The code also handles assigning a default value of LightGray to the dependency property by creating a new instance of a SolidColorBrush. To Sum Up In this post you’ve seen the role of dependency properties and how they can be defined in code. They play a big role in XAML and the overall Silverlight framework. You can think of dependency properties as being replacements for fields that you’d normally use with standard CLR properties. In addition to a discussion on how dependency properties are created, you also saw how to use the PropertyMetadata class to define default dependency property values and hook a dependency property to a callback method. The most important thing to understand with dependency properties (especially if you’re new to Silverlight) is that they’re needed if you want a property to support data binding, animations, transformations and styles properly. Any time you create a property on a custom control or user control that has these types of requirements you’ll want to pick a dependency property over of a standard CLR property with a backing field. There’s more that can be covered with dependency properties including a related property called an attached property….more to come.

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