proper - Page 187 - Developer IT

firebug saying not a function

- by Aaron

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Can this Query be corrected or different table structure needed? (database dumps provided)

- by sandeepan

This is a bit lengthy but I have provided sufficient details and kept things very clear. Please see if you can help. (I will surely accept answer if it solves my problem) I am sure a person experienced with this can surely help or suggest me to decide the tables structure. About the system:- There are tutors who create classes A tags based search approach is being followed Tag relations are created/edited when new tutors registers/edits profile data and when tutors create classes (this makes tutors and classes searcheable).For simplicity, let us consider only tutor name and class name are the fields which are matched against search keywords. In this example, I am considering - tutor "Sandeepan Nath" has created a class called "first class" tutor "Bob Cratchit" has created a class called "new class" Desired search results- AND logic to be appied on the search keywords and match against class and tutor data(class name + tutor name), in other words, All those classes be shown such that all the search terms are present in the class name or its tutor name. Example to be clear - Searching "first class" returns class with id_wc = 1. Working Searching "Sandeepan class" should also return class with id_wc = 1. Not working in System 2. Problem with profile editing and searching To tell in one sentence, I am facing a conflict between the ease of profile edition (edition of tag relations when tutor profiles are edited) and the ease of search logic. In the beginning, we had one table structure and search was easy but tag edition logic was very clumsy and unmaintainable(Check System 1 in the section below) . So we created separate tag relations tables to make profile edition simpler but search has become difficult. Please dump the tables so that you can run the search query I have given below and see the results. System 1 (previous system - search easy - profile edition difficult):- Only one table called All_Tag_Relations table had the all the tag relations. The tags table below is common to both systems 1 and 2. CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `all_tag_relations` ( `id_tag_rel` int(10) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL DEFAULT '0', `id_tutor` int(10) DEFAULT NULL, `id_wc` int(10) unsigned DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag_rel`), KEY `All_Tag_Relations_FKIndex1` (`id_tag`), KEY `id_wc` (`id_wc`), KEY `id_tag` (`id_tag`) ) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1; INSERT INTO `all_tag_relations` (`id_tag_rel`, `id_tag`, `id_tutor`, `id_wc`) VALUES (1, 1, 1, NULL), (2, 2, 1, NULL), (3, 1, 1, 1), (4, 2, 1, 1), (5, 3, 1, 1), (6, 4, 1, 1), (7, 6, 2, NULL), (8, 7, 2, NULL), (9, 6, 2, 2), (10, 7, 2, 2), (11, 5, 2, 2), (12, 4, 2, 2); CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `tags` ( `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `tag` varchar(255) DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag`), UNIQUE KEY `tag` (`tag`), KEY `id_tag` (`id_tag`), KEY `tag_2` (`tag`), KEY `tag_3` (`tag`), KEY `tag_4` (`tag`), FULLTEXT KEY `tag_5` (`tag`) ) ENGINE=MyISAM DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1 AUTO_INCREMENT=8 ; INSERT INTO `tags` (`id_tag`, `tag`) VALUES (1, 'Sandeepan'), (2, 'Nath'), (3, 'first'), (4, 'class'), (5, 'new'), (6, 'Bob'), (7, 'Cratchit'); Please note that for every class, the tag rels of its tutor have to be duplicated. Example, for class with id_wc=1, the tag rel records with id_tag_rel = 3 and 4 are actually extras if you compare with the tag rel records with id_tag_rel = 1 and 2. System 2 (present system - profile edition easy, search difficult) Two separate tables Tutors_Tag_Relations and Webclasses_Tag_Relations have the corresponding tag relations data (Please dump into a separate database)- CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `tutors_tag_relations` ( `id_tag_rel` int(10) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL DEFAULT '0', `id_tutor` int(10) DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag_rel`), KEY `All_Tag_Relations_FKIndex1` (`id_tag`), KEY `id_tag` (`id_tag`) ) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1; INSERT INTO `tutors_tag_relations` (`id_tag_rel`, `id_tag`, `id_tutor`) VALUES (1, 1, 1), (2, 2, 1), (3, 6, 2), (4, 7, 2); CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `webclasses_tag_relations` ( `id_tag_rel` int(10) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL DEFAULT '0', `id_tutor` int(10) DEFAULT NULL, `id_wc` int(10) DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag_rel`), KEY `webclasses_Tag_Relations_FKIndex1` (`id_tag`), KEY `id_wc` (`id_wc`), KEY `id_tag` (`id_tag`) ) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1; INSERT INTO `webclasses_tag_relations` (`id_tag_rel`, `id_tag`, `id_tutor`, `id_wc`) VALUES (1, 3, 1, 1), (2, 4, 1, 1), (3, 5, 2, 2), (4, 4, 2, 2); CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `tags` ( `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `tag` varchar(255) DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag`), UNIQUE KEY `tag` (`tag`), KEY `id_tag` (`id_tag`), KEY `tag_2` (`tag`), KEY `tag_3` (`tag`), KEY `tag_4` (`tag`), FULLTEXT KEY `tag_5` (`tag`) ) ENGINE=MyISAM DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1 AUTO_INCREMENT=8 ; INSERT INTO `tags` (`id_tag`, `tag`) VALUES (1, 'Sandeepan'), (2, 'Nath'), (3, 'first'), (4, 'class'), (5, 'new'), (6, 'Bob'), (7, 'Cratchit'); CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `all_tag_relations` ( `id_tag_rel` int(10) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL DEFAULT '0', `id_tutor` int(10) DEFAULT NULL, `id_wc` int(10) unsigned DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag_rel`), KEY `All_Tag_Relations_FKIndex1` (`id_tag`), KEY `id_wc` (`id_wc`) ) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1; insert into All_Tag_Relations select NULL,id_tag,id_tutor,NULL from Tutors_Tag_Relations; insert into All_Tag_Relations select NULL,id_tag,id_tutor,id_wc from Webclasses_Tag_Relations; Here you can see how easily tutor first name can be edited only in one place. But search has become really difficult, so on being advised to use a Temporary table, I am creating one at every search request, then dumping all the necessary data and then searching from it, I am creating this All_Tag_Relations table at search run time. Here I am just dumping all the data from the two tables Tutors_Tag_Relations and Webclasses_Tag_Relations. But, I am still not able to get classes if I search with tutor name This is the query which searches "first class". Running them on both the systems shows correct results (returns the class with id_wc = 1). SELECT wtagrels.id_wc,SUM(DISTINCT( wtagrels.id_tag =3)) AS key_1_total_matches, SUM(DISTINCT( wtagrels.id_tag =4)) AS key_2_total_matches FROM all_tag_relations AS wtagrels WHERE ( wtagrels.id_tag =3 OR wtagrels.id_tag =4 ) GROUP BY wtagrels.id_wc HAVING key_1_total_matches = 1 AND key_2_total_matches = 1 LIMIT 0, 20 But, searching for "Sandeepan class" works only with the 1st system Here is the query which searches "Sandeepan class" SELECT wtagrels.id_wc,SUM(DISTINCT( wtagrels.id_tag =1)) AS key_1_total_matches, SUM(DISTINCT( wtagrels.id_tag =4)) AS key_2_total_matches FROM all_tag_relations AS wtagrels WHERE ( wtagrels.id_tag =1 OR wtagrels.id_tag =4 ) GROUP BY wtagrels.id_wc HAVING key_1_total_matches = 1 AND key_2_total_matches = 1 LIMIT 0, 20 Can anybody alter this query and somehow do a proper join or something to get correct results. That solves my problem in a nice way. As you can figure out, the reason why it does not work in system 2 is that in system 1, for every class, one additional tag relation linking class and tutor name is present. e.g. for class first class, (records with id_tag_rel 3 and 4) which returns the class on searching with tutor name. So, you see the trade-off between the search and profile edition difficulty with the two systems. How do I overcome both. I have to reach a conclusion soon. So far my reasoning is it is definitely not good from a code maintainability point of view to follow the single tag rel table structure of system one, because in a real system while editing a field like "tutor qualifications", there can be as many records in tag rels table as there are words in qualification of a tutor (one word in a field = one tag relation). Now suppose a tutor has 100 classes. When he edits his qualification, all the tag rel rows corresponding to him are deleted and then as many copies are to be created (as per the new qualification data) as there are classes. This becomes particularly difficult if later more searcheable fields are added. The code cannot be robust. Is the best solution to follow system 2 (edition has to be in one table - no extra work for each and every class) and somehow re-create the all_tag_relations table like system 1 (from the tables tutor_tag_relations and webclasses_tag_relations), creating the extra tutor tag rels for each and every class by a tutor (which is currently missing in system 2's temporary all_tag_relations table). That would be a time consuming logic script. I doubt that table can be recreated without resorting to PHP sript (mysql alone cannot do that). But the problem is that running all this at search time will make search definitely slow. So, how do such systems work? How are such situations handled? I thought about we can run a cron which initiates that PHP script, say every 1 minute and replaces the existing all_tag_relations table as per new tag rels from tutor_tag_relations and webclasses_tag_relations (replaces means creates a new table, deletes the original and renames the new one as all_tag_relations, otherwise search won't work during that period- or is there any better way to that?). Anyway, the result would be that any changes by tutors will reflect in search in the next 1 minute and not immediately. An alternateve would be to initate that PHP script every time a tutor edits his profile. But here again, since many users may edit their profiles concurrently, will the creation of so many tables be a burden and can mysql make the server slow? Any help would be appreciated and working solution will be accepted as answer. Thanks, Sandeepan

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.Net 3.5 Asynchronous Socket Server Performance Problem

- by iBrAaAa

I'm developing an Asynchronous Game Server using .Net Socket Asynchronous Model( BeginAccept/EndAccept...etc.) The problem I'm facing is described like that: When I have only one client connected, the server response time is very fast but once a second client connects, the server response time increases too much. I've measured the time from a client sends a message to the server until it gets the reply in both cases. I found that the average time in case of one client is about 17ms and in case of 2 clients about 280ms!!! What I really see is that: When 2 clients are connected and only one of them is moving(i.e. requesting service from the server) it is equivalently equal to the case when only one client is connected(i.e. fast response). However, when the 2 clients move at the same time(i.e. requests service from the server at the same time) their motion becomes very slow (as if the server replies each one of them in order i.e. not simultaneously). Basically, what I am doing is that: When a client requests a permission for motion from the server and the server grants him the request, the server then broadcasts the new position of the client to all the players. So if two clients are moving in the same time, the server is eventually trying to broadcast to both clients the new position of each of them at the same time. EX: Client1 asks to go to position (2,2) Client2 asks to go to position (5,5) Server sends to each of Client1 & Client2 the same two messages: message1: "Client1 at (2,2)" message2: "Client2 at (5,5)" I believe that the problem comes from the fact that Socket class is thread safe according MSDN documentation http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.net.sockets.socket.aspx. (NOT SURE THAT IT IS THE PROBLEM) Below is the code for the server: /// /// This class is responsible for handling packet receiving and sending /// public class NetworkManager { /// /// An integer to hold the server port number to be used for the connections. Its default value is 5000. /// private readonly int port = 5000; /// /// hashtable contain all the clients connected to the server. /// key: player Id /// value: socket /// private readonly Hashtable connectedClients = new Hashtable(); /// /// An event to hold the thread to wait for a new client /// private readonly ManualResetEvent resetEvent = new ManualResetEvent(false); /// /// keeps track of the number of the connected clients /// private int clientCount; /// /// The socket of the server at which the clients connect /// private readonly Socket mainSocket = new Socket(AddressFamily.InterNetwork, SocketType.Stream, ProtocolType.Tcp); /// /// The socket exception that informs that a client is disconnected /// private const int ClientDisconnectedErrorCode = 10054; /// /// The only instance of this class. /// private static readonly NetworkManager networkManagerInstance = new NetworkManager(); /// /// A delegate for the new client connected event. /// /// the sender object /// the event args public delegate void NewClientConnected(Object sender, SystemEventArgs e); /// /// A delegate for the position update message reception. /// /// the sender object /// the event args public delegate void PositionUpdateMessageRecieved(Object sender, PositionUpdateEventArgs e); /// /// The event which fires when a client sends a position message /// public PositionUpdateMessageRecieved PositionUpdateMessageEvent { get; set; } /// /// keeps track of the number of the connected clients /// public int ClientCount { get { return clientCount; } } /// /// A getter for this class instance. /// /// only instance. public static NetworkManager NetworkManagerInstance { get { return networkManagerInstance; } } private NetworkManager() {} /// Starts the game server and holds this thread alive /// public void StartServer() { //Bind the mainSocket to the server IP address and port mainSocket.Bind(new IPEndPoint(IPAddress.Any, port)); //The server starts to listen on the binded socket with max connection queue //1024 mainSocket.Listen(1024); //Start accepting clients asynchronously mainSocket.BeginAccept(OnClientConnected, null); //Wait until there is a client wants to connect resetEvent.WaitOne(); } /// /// Receives connections of new clients and fire the NewClientConnected event /// private void OnClientConnected(IAsyncResult asyncResult) { Interlocked.Increment(ref clientCount); ClientInfo newClient = new ClientInfo { WorkerSocket = mainSocket.EndAccept(asyncResult), PlayerId = clientCount }; //Add the new client to the hashtable and increment the number of clients connectedClients.Add(newClient.PlayerId, newClient); //fire the new client event informing that a new client is connected to the server if (NewClientEvent != null) { NewClientEvent(this, System.EventArgs.Empty); } newClient.WorkerSocket.BeginReceive(newClient.Buffer, 0, BasePacket.GetMaxPacketSize(), SocketFlags.None, new AsyncCallback(WaitForData), newClient); //Start accepting clients asynchronously again mainSocket.BeginAccept(OnClientConnected, null); } /// Waits for the upcoming messages from different clients and fires the proper event according to the packet type. /// /// private void WaitForData(IAsyncResult asyncResult) { ClientInfo sendingClient = null; try { //Take the client information from the asynchronous result resulting from the BeginReceive sendingClient = asyncResult.AsyncState as ClientInfo; // If client is disconnected, then throw a socket exception // with the correct error code. if (!IsConnected(sendingClient.WorkerSocket)) { throw new SocketException(ClientDisconnectedErrorCode); } //End the pending receive request sendingClient.WorkerSocket.EndReceive(asyncResult); //Fire the appropriate event FireMessageTypeEvent(sendingClient.ConvertBytesToPacket() as BasePacket); // Begin receiving data from this client sendingClient.WorkerSocket.BeginReceive(sendingClient.Buffer, 0, BasePacket.GetMaxPacketSize(), SocketFlags.None, new AsyncCallback(WaitForData), sendingClient); } catch (SocketException e) { if (e.ErrorCode == ClientDisconnectedErrorCode) { // Close the socket. if (sendingClient.WorkerSocket != null) { sendingClient.WorkerSocket.Close(); sendingClient.WorkerSocket = null; } // Remove it from the hash table. connectedClients.Remove(sendingClient.PlayerId); if (ClientDisconnectedEvent != null) { ClientDisconnectedEvent(this, new ClientDisconnectedEventArgs(sendingClient.PlayerId)); } } } catch (Exception e) { // Begin receiving data from this client sendingClient.WorkerSocket.BeginReceive(sendingClient.Buffer, 0, BasePacket.GetMaxPacketSize(), SocketFlags.None, new AsyncCallback(WaitForData), sendingClient); } } /// /// Broadcasts the input message to all the connected clients /// /// public void BroadcastMessage(BasePacket message) { byte[] bytes = message.ConvertToBytes(); foreach (ClientInfo client in connectedClients.Values) { client.WorkerSocket.BeginSend(bytes, 0, bytes.Length, SocketFlags.None, SendAsync, client); } } /// /// Sends the input message to the client specified by his ID. /// /// /// The message to be sent. /// The id of the client to receive the message. public void SendToClient(BasePacket message, int id) { byte[] bytes = message.ConvertToBytes(); (connectedClients[id] as ClientInfo).WorkerSocket.BeginSend(bytes, 0, bytes.Length, SocketFlags.None, SendAsync, connectedClients[id]); } private void SendAsync(IAsyncResult asyncResult) { ClientInfo currentClient = (ClientInfo)asyncResult.AsyncState; currentClient.WorkerSocket.EndSend(asyncResult); } /// Fires the event depending on the type of received packet /// /// The received packet. void FireMessageTypeEvent(BasePacket packet) { switch (packet.MessageType) { case MessageType.PositionUpdateMessage: if (PositionUpdateMessageEvent != null) { PositionUpdateMessageEvent(this, new PositionUpdateEventArgs(packet as PositionUpdatePacket)); } break; } } } The events fired are handled in a different class, here are the event handling code for the PositionUpdateMessage (Other handlers are irrelevant): private readonly Hashtable onlinePlayers = new Hashtable(); /// /// Constructor that creates a new instance of the GameController class. /// private GameController() { //Start the server server = new Thread(networkManager.StartServer); server.Start(); //Create an event handler for the NewClientEvent of networkManager networkManager.PositionUpdateMessageEvent += OnPositionUpdateMessageReceived; } /// /// this event handler is called when a client asks for movement. /// private void OnPositionUpdateMessageReceived(object sender, PositionUpdateEventArgs e) { Point currentLocation = ((PlayerData)onlinePlayers[e.PositionUpdatePacket.PlayerId]).Position; Point locationRequested = e.PositionUpdatePacket.Position; ((PlayerData)onlinePlayers[e.PositionUpdatePacket.PlayerId]).Position = locationRequested; // Broadcast the new position networkManager.BroadcastMessage(new PositionUpdatePacket { Position = locationRequested, PlayerId = e.PositionUpdatePacket.PlayerId }); }

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Can this Query can be corrected or different table structure needed? (question is clear, detailed, d

- by sandeepan

This is a bit lengthy but I have provided sufficient details and kept things very clear. Please see if you can help. (I will surely accept answer if it solves my problem) I am sure a person experienced with this can surely help or suggest me to decide the tables structure. About the system:- There are tutors who create classes A tags based search approach is being followed Tag relations are created/edited when new tutors registers/edits profile data and when tutors create classes (this makes tutors and classes searcheable).For simplicity, let us consider only tutor name and class name are the fields which are matched against search keywords. In this example, I am considering - tutor "Sandeepan Nath" has created a class called "first class" tutor "Bob Cratchit" has created a class called "new class" Desired search results- AND logic to be appied on the search keywords and match against class and tutor data(class name + tutor name), in other words, All those classes be shown such that all the search terms are present in the class name or its tutor name. Example to be clear - Searching "first class" returns class with id_wc = 1. Working Searching "Sandeepan class" should also return class with id_wc = 1. Not working in System 2. Problem with profile editing and searching To tell in one sentence, I am facing a conflict between the ease of profile edition (edition of tag relations when tutor profiles are edited) and the ease of search logic. In the beginning, we had one table structure and search was easy but tag edition logic was very clumsy and unmaintainable(Check System 1 in the section below) . So we created separate tag relations tables to make profile edition simpler but search has become difficult. Please dump the tables so that you can run the search query I have given below and see the results. System 1 (previous system - search easy - profile edition difficult):- Only one table called All_Tag_Relations table had the all the tag relations. The tags table below is common to both systems 1 and 2. CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `all_tag_relations` ( `id_tag_rel` int(10) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL DEFAULT '0', `id_tutor` int(10) DEFAULT NULL, `id_wc` int(10) unsigned DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag_rel`), KEY `All_Tag_Relations_FKIndex1` (`id_tag`), KEY `id_wc` (`id_wc`), KEY `id_tag` (`id_tag`) ) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1; INSERT INTO `all_tag_relations` (`id_tag_rel`, `id_tag`, `id_tutor`, `id_wc`) VALUES (1, 1, 1, NULL), (2, 2, 1, NULL), (3, 1, 1, 1), (4, 2, 1, 1), (5, 3, 1, 1), (6, 4, 1, 1), (7, 6, 2, NULL), (8, 7, 2, NULL), (9, 6, 2, 2), (10, 7, 2, 2), (11, 5, 2, 2), (12, 4, 2, 2); CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `tags` ( `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `tag` varchar(255) DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag`), UNIQUE KEY `tag` (`tag`), KEY `id_tag` (`id_tag`), KEY `tag_2` (`tag`), KEY `tag_3` (`tag`), KEY `tag_4` (`tag`), FULLTEXT KEY `tag_5` (`tag`) ) ENGINE=MyISAM DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1 AUTO_INCREMENT=8 ; INSERT INTO `tags` (`id_tag`, `tag`) VALUES (1, 'Sandeepan'), (2, 'Nath'), (3, 'first'), (4, 'class'), (5, 'new'), (6, 'Bob'), (7, 'Cratchit'); Please note that for every class, the tag rels of its tutor have to be duplicated. Example, for class with id_wc=1, the tag rel records with id_tag_rel = 3 and 4 are actually extras if you compare with the tag rel records with id_tag_rel = 1 and 2. System 2 (present system - profile edition easy, search difficult) Two separate tables Tutors_Tag_Relations and Webclasses_Tag_Relations have the corresponding tag relations data (Please dump into a separate database)- CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `tutors_tag_relations` ( `id_tag_rel` int(10) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL DEFAULT '0', `id_tutor` int(10) DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag_rel`), KEY `All_Tag_Relations_FKIndex1` (`id_tag`), KEY `id_tag` (`id_tag`) ) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1; INSERT INTO `tutors_tag_relations` (`id_tag_rel`, `id_tag`, `id_tutor`) VALUES (1, 1, 1), (2, 2, 1), (3, 6, 2), (4, 7, 2); CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `webclasses_tag_relations` ( `id_tag_rel` int(10) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL DEFAULT '0', `id_tutor` int(10) DEFAULT NULL, `id_wc` int(10) DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag_rel`), KEY `webclasses_Tag_Relations_FKIndex1` (`id_tag`), KEY `id_wc` (`id_wc`), KEY `id_tag` (`id_tag`) ) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1; INSERT INTO `webclasses_tag_relations` (`id_tag_rel`, `id_tag`, `id_tutor`, `id_wc`) VALUES (1, 3, 1, 1), (2, 4, 1, 1), (3, 5, 2, 2), (4, 4, 2, 2); CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `tags` ( `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `tag` varchar(255) DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag`), UNIQUE KEY `tag` (`tag`), KEY `id_tag` (`id_tag`), KEY `tag_2` (`tag`), KEY `tag_3` (`tag`), KEY `tag_4` (`tag`), FULLTEXT KEY `tag_5` (`tag`) ) ENGINE=MyISAM DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1 AUTO_INCREMENT=8 ; INSERT INTO `tags` (`id_tag`, `tag`) VALUES (1, 'Sandeepan'), (2, 'Nath'), (3, 'first'), (4, 'class'), (5, 'new'), (6, 'Bob'), (7, 'Cratchit'); CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `all_tag_relations` ( `id_tag_rel` int(10) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, `id_tag` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL DEFAULT '0', `id_tutor` int(10) DEFAULT NULL, `id_wc` int(10) unsigned DEFAULT NULL, PRIMARY KEY (`id_tag_rel`), KEY `All_Tag_Relations_FKIndex1` (`id_tag`), KEY `id_wc` (`id_wc`) ) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1; insert into All_Tag_Relations select NULL,id_tag,id_tutor,NULL from Tutors_Tag_Relations; insert into All_Tag_Relations select NULL,id_tag,id_tutor,id_wc from Webclasses_Tag_Relations; Here you can see how easily tutor first name can be edited only in one place. But search has become really difficult, so on being advised to use a Temporary table, I am creating one at every search request, then dumping all the necessary data and then searching from it, I am creating this All_Tag_Relations table at search run time. Here I am just dumping all the data from the two tables Tutors_Tag_Relations and Webclasses_Tag_Relations. But, I am still not able to get classes if I search with tutor name This is the query which searches "first class". Running them on both the systems shows correct results (returns the class with id_wc = 1). SELECT wtagrels.id_wc,SUM(DISTINCT( wtagrels.id_tag =3)) AS key_1_total_matches, SUM(DISTINCT( wtagrels.id_tag =4)) AS key_2_total_matches FROM all_tag_relations AS wtagrels WHERE ( wtagrels.id_tag =3 OR wtagrels.id_tag =4 ) GROUP BY wtagrels.id_wc HAVING key_1_total_matches = 1 AND key_2_total_matches = 1 LIMIT 0, 20 But, searching for "Sandeepan class" works only with the 1st system Here is the query which searches "Sandeepan class" SELECT wtagrels.id_wc,SUM(DISTINCT( wtagrels.id_tag =1)) AS key_1_total_matches, SUM(DISTINCT( wtagrels.id_tag =4)) AS key_2_total_matches FROM all_tag_relations AS wtagrels WHERE ( wtagrels.id_tag =1 OR wtagrels.id_tag =4 ) GROUP BY wtagrels.id_wc HAVING key_1_total_matches = 1 AND key_2_total_matches = 1 LIMIT 0, 20 Can anybody alter this query and somehow do a proper join or something to get correct results. That solves my problem in a nice way. As you can figure out, the reason why it does not work in system 2 is that in system 1, for every class, one additional tag relation linking class and tutor name is present. e.g. for class first class, (records with id_tag_rel 3 and 4) which returns the class on searching with tutor name. So, you see the trade-off between the search and profile edition difficulty with the two systems. How do I overcome both. I have to reach a conclusion soon. So far my reasoning is it is definitely not good from a code maintainability point of view to follow the single tag rel table structure of system one, because in a real system while editing a field like "tutor qualifications", there can be as many records in tag rels table as there are words in qualification of a tutor (one word in a field = one tag relation). Now suppose a tutor has 100 classes. When he edits his qualification, all the tag rel rows corresponding to him are deleted and then as many copies are to be created (as per the new qualification data) as there are classes. This becomes particularly difficult if later more searcheable fields are added. The code cannot be robust. Is the best solution to follow system 2 (edition has to be in one table - no extra work for each and every class) and somehow re-create the all_tag_relations table like system 1 (from the tables tutor_tag_relations and webclasses_tag_relations), creating the extra tutor tag rels for each and every class by a tutor (which is currently missing in system 2's temporary all_tag_relations table). That would be a time consuming logic script. I doubt that table can be recreated without resorting to PHP sript (mysql alone cannot do that). But the problem is that running all this at search time will make search definitely slow. So, how do such systems work? How are such situations handled? I thought about we can run a cron which initiates that PHP script, say every 1 minute and replaces the existing all_tag_relations table as per new tag rels from tutor_tag_relations and webclasses_tag_relations (replaces means creates a new table, deletes the original and renames the new one as all_tag_relations, otherwise search won't work during that period- or is there any better way to that?). Anyway, the result would be that any changes by tutors will reflect in search in the next 1 minute and not immediately. An alternateve would be to initate that PHP script every time a tutor edits his profile. But here again, since many users may edit their profiles concurrently, will the creation of so many tables be a burden and can mysql make the server slow? Any help would be appreciated and working solution will be accepted as answer. Thanks, Sandeepan

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MVC 3 Client Validation works intermittently

- by Gutek

I have MVC 3 version, System.Web.Mvc product version is: 3.0.20105.0 modified on 5th of Jan 2011 - i think that's the latest. I’ve notice that client validation is not working as it suppose in the application that we are creating, so I’ve made a quick test. I’ve created basic MVC 3 Application using Internet Application template. I’ve added Test Controller: using System.Web.Mvc; using MvcApplication3.Models; namespace MvcApplication3.Controllers { public class TestController : Controller { public ActionResult Index() { return View(); } public ActionResult Create() { Sample model = new Sample(); return View(model); } [HttpPost] public ActionResult Create(Sample model) { if(!ModelState.IsValid) { return View(); } return RedirectToAction("Display"); } public ActionResult Display() { Sample model = new Sample(); model.Age = 10; model.CardNumber = "1324234"; model.Email = "[email protected]"; model.Title = "hahah"; return View(model); } } } Model: using System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations; namespace MvcApplication3.Models { public class Sample { [Required] public string Title { get; set; } [Required] public string Email { get; set; } [Required] [Range(4, 120, ErrorMessage = "Oi! Common!")] public short Age { get; set; } [Required] public string CardNumber { get; set; } } } And 3 views: Create: @model MvcApplication3.Models.Sample @{ ViewBag.Title = "Create"; Layout = "~/Views/Shared/_Layout.cshtml"; } <h2>Create</h2> <script src="@Url.Content("~/Scripts/jquery.validate.min.js")" type="text/javascript"></script> <script src="@Url.Content("~/Scripts/jquery.validate.unobtrusive.min.js")" type="text/javascript"></script> @*@{ Html.EnableClientValidation(); }*@ @using (Html.BeginForm()) { @Html.ValidationSummary(false) <fieldset> <legend>Sample</legend> <div class="editor-label"> @Html.LabelFor(model => model.Title) </div> <div class="editor-field"> @Html.EditorFor(model => model.Title) @Html.ValidationMessageFor(model => model.Title) </div> <div class="editor-label"> @Html.LabelFor(model => model.Email) </div> <div class="editor-field"> @Html.EditorFor(model => model.Email) @Html.ValidationMessageFor(model => model.Email) </div> <div class="editor-label"> @Html.LabelFor(model => model.Age) </div> <div class="editor-field"> @Html.EditorFor(model => model.Age) @Html.ValidationMessageFor(model => model.Age) </div> <div class="editor-label"> @Html.LabelFor(model => model.CardNumber) </div> <div class="editor-field"> @Html.EditorFor(model => model.CardNumber) @Html.ValidationMessageFor(model => model.CardNumber) </div> <p> <input type="submit" value="Create" /> </p> </fieldset> @*<fieldset> @Html.EditorForModel() <p> <input type="submit" value="Create" /> </p> </fieldset> *@ } <div> @Html.ActionLink("Back to List", "Index") </div> Display: @model MvcApplication3.Models.Sample @{ ViewBag.Title = "Display"; Layout = "~/Views/Shared/_Layout.cshtml"; } <h2>Display</h2> <fieldset> <legend>Sample</legend> <div class="display-label">Title</div> <div class="display-field">@Model.Title</div> <div class="display-label">Email</div> <div class="display-field">@Model.Email</div> <div class="display-label">Age</div> <div class="display-field">@Model.Age</div> <div class="display-label">CardNumber</div> <div class="display-field">@Model.CardNumber</div> </fieldset> <p> @Html.ActionLink("Back to List", "Index") </p> Index: @{ ViewBag.Title = "Index"; Layout = "~/Views/Shared/_Layout.cshtml"; } <h2>Index</h2> <p> @Html.ActionLink("Create", "Create") </p> <p> @Html.ActionLink("Display", "Display") </p> Everything is default here – Create Controller, AddView from controller action with model specified with proper scaffold template and using provided layout in sample application. When I will go to /Test/Create client validation in most cases works only for Title and Age fields, after clicking Create it works for all fields (create does not goes to server). However in some cases (after a build) Title validation is not working and Email is, or CardNumber or Title and CardNumber but Email is not. But never all validation is working before clicking Create. I’ve tried creating form with Html.EditorForModel as well as enforce client validation just before BeginForm: @{ Html.EnableClientValidation(); } I’m providing a source code for this sample on dropbox – as maybe our dev env is broken :/ I’ve done tests on IE 8 and Chrome 10 beta. Just in case, in web config validation scripts are enabled: <appSettings> <add key="ClientValidationEnabled" value="true"/> <add key="UnobtrusiveJavaScriptEnabled" value="true"/> </appSettings> So my questions are Is there a way to ensure that Client validation will work as it supposed to work and not intermittently? Is this a desired behavior and I'm missing something in configuration/implementation?

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What is the right way to structure HTML and CSS?

- by Meke

So, I'm a script monkey at the core. Lately I seem to get stuffed into doing design too for some odd reason and, well, let's just say I should probably have studied better. Either way - What I ask is, what's the Right way to structure a website? This one has a header with links, then a block with tabs, right under another block which consists of two parts and under those a few others who I'm not at yet. However, the thing is, I need to make a block that consists of two parts that are in the same box but structured independently. I'll try to draw it up. Browser window..................-[]X ------------------------------------ |.................Header Links Here| ||Tab|Tab|Tab|_____________........| ||Tab content.............|Small...| ||........................|Section.| ||---Line signing new section------| ||........................|Another.| ||..Content Area..........|Small...| ||........................|Section.| ------------------------------------ My issue is in the division of small sections and tab/content areas. I tried using floats, making them as tables, aligning and whatnot. The putting float:left on both tables worked. Kinda. Until I tried to resize the window. So, how do you PROPERLY structure a site like this? three divs and tables? Something else? I'll clarify this again: It's the Code to use to create the look above that I'm trying to figure out the proper way to do, not the design As requested here's the current structure I have <div class="container"> <div class="topBlock"> //Header Links Here </div> <div class="inputBlock"> <ul id="tabs"> <li><a href="#strict">Strict</a></li> <li><a href="#flex">Flex</a></li> <li><a href="#multiStep">Multi-Step</a></li> </ul> <div id="strict" class="tabContent"> <table class="tableLeft"> <tr> <td>From</td> </tr> <tr> <td><input id="inputBlockFrom" type="text" placeholder="FROM"/></td> </tr> <tr> <td>To</td> </tr> <tr> <td><input id="inputBlockTo" type="text" placeholder="TO"/></td> </tr> </table> <table class="tableRight"> <tr> <td>Leave</td> </tr> <tr> <td><input id="inputBlockLeave" type="text" name="leave" placeholder="LEAVE"/></td> <td><input id="inputBlockOne" type="radio" name="one"/></td> <td>One</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Return</td> </tr> <tr> <td><input id="inputBlockReturn" type="text" name="return" placeholder="RETURN"/></td> <td><input id="inputBlockBut" type="radio" name="one" checked/></td> <td>Return</td> </tr> <tr> <td><input id="inputBlockSubmit" type="submit" value="Search"/></td> </tr> </table> </div> <div id="flex" class="tabContent"> Test Two </div> <div id="multiStep" class="tabContent"> Test Three </div> </div> <div class="mapBlock tabContent"> <table class="tableLeft"> <tr><td> <div id="map" class="google_map"></div> </td></tr> </table> <table class="tableRight smallTable"> <tr> <td>Distance</td> </tr> <tr> <td>[-------------|------------]</td> //Slider to be </tr> </table> <table class="tableRight smallTable"> <tr> <td>Choice / Choice</td> </tr> </table> <table class="tableRight"> <tr> <td>Show:</td> </tr> <tr> <td><input type="radio"/></td> <td>Price</td> <td><input type="radio"/></td> <td>Button!</td> </tr> <tr> <td><input type="radio"/></td> </tr> <tr> <td><input type="radio"/></td> </tr> </table> </div> </div> </body> Sorry if it's messed up in the whitespacing somewhere.. The CSS: body { font-size: 80%; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', Verdana, Arial, Sans-Serif; background-color: #e2edff; } .container { margin: 5px 5px 5px 5px; padding: 5px 5px 5px 5px; } .pageBlock { /* To future me: This class is for One Full Screen ideas */ min-height: 300px; } .topBlock { text-align: right; color: #000000; } .topBlock a { text-decoration: none; color: #000000; } .tableLeft { width: 75%; float: left; border-right: dotted 2px black; } .tableRight { float: left; overflow: auto; } .smallTable { border-bottom: 1px dotted #c9c3ba; } .google_map { height: 270px; width: 100%; }

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Use a single freemarker template to display tables of arbitrary pojos

- by Kevin Pauli

Attention advanced Freemarker gurus: I want to use a single freemarker template to be able to output tables of arbitrary pojos, with the columns to display defined separately than the data. The problem is that I can't figure out how to get a handle to a function on a pojo at runtime, and then have freemarker invoke that function (lambda style). From skimming the docs it seems that Freemarker supports functional programming, but I can't seem to forumulate the proper incantation. I whipped up a simplistic concrete example. Let's say I have two lists: a list of people with a firstName and lastName, and a list of cars with a make and model. would like to output these two tables: <table> <tr> <th>firstName</th> <th>lastName</th> </tr> <tr> <td>Joe</td> <td>Blow</d> </tr> <tr> <td>Mary</td> <td>Jane</d> </tr> </table> and <table> <tr> <th>make</th> <th>model</th> </tr> <tr> <td>Toyota</td> <td>Tundra</d> </tr> <tr> <td>Honda</td> <td>Odyssey</d> </tr> </table> But I want to use the same template, since this is part of a framework that has to deal with dozens of different pojo types. Given the following code: public class FreemarkerTest { public static class Table { private final List<Column> columns = new ArrayList<Column>(); public Table(Column[] columns) { this.columns.addAll(Arrays.asList(columns)); } public List<Column> getColumns() { return columns; } } public static class Column { private final String name; public Column(String name) { this.name = name; } public String getName() { return name; } } public static class Person { private final String firstName; private final String lastName; public Person(String firstName, String lastName) { this.firstName = firstName; this.lastName = lastName; } public String getFirstName() { return firstName; } public String getLastName() { return lastName; } } public static class Car { String make; String model; public Car(String make, String model) { this.make = make; this.model = model; } public String getMake() { return make; } public String getModel() { return model; } } public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception { final Table personTableDefinition = new Table(new Column[] { new Column("firstName"), new Column("lastName") }); final List<Person> people = Arrays.asList(new Person[] { new Person("Joe", "Blow"), new Person("Mary", "Jane") }); final Table carTable = new Table(new Column[] { new Column("make"), new Column("model") }); final List<Car> cars = Arrays.asList(new Car[] { new Car("Toyota", "Tundra"), new Car("Honda", "Odyssey") }); final Configuration cfg = new Configuration(); cfg.setClassForTemplateLoading(FreemarkerTest.class, ""); cfg.setObjectWrapper(new DefaultObjectWrapper()); final Template template = cfg.getTemplate("test.ftl"); process(template, personTableDefinition, people); process(template, carTable, cars); } private static void process(Template template, Table tableDefinition, List<? extends Object> data) throws Exception { final Map<String, Object> dataMap = new HashMap<String, Object>(); dataMap.put("tableDefinition", tableDefinition); dataMap.put("data", data); final Writer out = new OutputStreamWriter(System.out); template.process(dataMap, out); out.flush(); } } All the above is a given for this problem. So here is the template I have been hacking on. Note the comment where I am having trouble. <table> <tr> <#list tableDefinition.columns as col> <th>${col.name}</th> </#list> </tr> <#list data as pojo> <tr> <#list tableDefinition.columns as col> <td><#-- what goes here? --></td> </#list> </tr> </#list> </table> So col.name has the name of the property I want to access from the pojo. I have tried a few things, such as pojo.col.name and <#assign property = col.name/> ${pojo.property} but of course these don't work, I just included them to help convey my intent. I am looking for a way to get a handle to a function and have freemarker invoke it, or perhaps some kind of "evaluate" feature that can take an arbitrary expression as a string and evaluate it at runtime.

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Is it possible to pass a structure of delegates from managed to native?

- by Veiva

I am writing a wrapper for the game programming library "Allegro" and its less stable 4.9 branch. Now, I have done good insofar, except for when it comes to wrapping a structure of function pointers. Basically, I can't change the original code, despite having access to it, because that would require me to fork it in some manner. I need to know how I can somehow pass a structure of delegates from managed to native without causing an AccessViolationException that has occurred so far. Now, for the code. Here is the Allegro definition of the structure: typedef struct ALLEGRO_FILE_INTERFACE { AL_METHOD(ALLEGRO_FILE*, fi_fopen, (const char *path, const char *mode)); AL_METHOD(void, fi_fclose, (ALLEGRO_FILE *handle)); AL_METHOD(size_t, fi_fread, (ALLEGRO_FILE *f, void *ptr, size_t size)); AL_METHOD(size_t, fi_fwrite, (ALLEGRO_FILE *f, const void *ptr, size_t size)); AL_METHOD(bool, fi_fflush, (ALLEGRO_FILE *f)); AL_METHOD(int64_t, fi_ftell, (ALLEGRO_FILE *f)); AL_METHOD(bool, fi_fseek, (ALLEGRO_FILE *f, int64_t offset, int whence)); AL_METHOD(bool, fi_feof, (ALLEGRO_FILE *f)); AL_METHOD(bool, fi_ferror, (ALLEGRO_FILE *f)); AL_METHOD(int, fi_fungetc, (ALLEGRO_FILE *f, int c)); AL_METHOD(off_t, fi_fsize, (ALLEGRO_FILE *f)); } ALLEGRO_FILE_INTERFACE; My simple attempt at wrapping it: public delegate IntPtr AllegroInternalOpenFileDelegate(string path, string mode); public delegate void AllegroInternalCloseFileDelegate(IntPtr file); public delegate int AllegroInternalReadFileDelegate(IntPtr file, IntPtr data, int size); public delegate int AllegroInternalWriteFileDelegate(IntPtr file, IntPtr data, int size); public delegate bool AllegroInternalFlushFileDelegate(IntPtr file); public delegate long AllegroInternalTellFileDelegate(IntPtr file); public delegate bool AllegroInternalSeekFileDelegate(IntPtr file, long offset, int where); public delegate bool AllegroInternalIsEndOfFileDelegate(IntPtr file); public delegate bool AllegroInternalIsErrorFileDelegate(IntPtr file); public delegate int AllegroInternalUngetCharFileDelegate(IntPtr file, int c); public delegate long AllegroInternalFileSizeDelegate(IntPtr file); [StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential, Pack = 0)] public struct AllegroInternalFileInterface { [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalOpenFileDelegate fi_fopen; [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalCloseFileDelegate fi_fclose; [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalReadFileDelegate fi_fread; [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalWriteFileDelegate fi_fwrite; [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalFlushFileDelegate fi_fflush; [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalTellFileDelegate fi_ftell; [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalSeekFileDelegate fi_fseek; [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalIsEndOfFileDelegate fi_feof; [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalIsErrorFileDelegate fi_ferror; [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalUngetCharFileDelegate fi_fungetc; [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.FunctionPtr)] public AllegroInternalFileSizeDelegate fi_fsize; } I have a simple auxiliary wrapper that turns an ALLEGRO_FILE_INTERFACE into an ALLEGRO_FILE, like so: #define ALLEGRO_NO_MAGIC_MAIN #include <allegro5/allegro5.h> #include <stdlib.h> #include <string.h> #include <assert.h> __declspec(dllexport) ALLEGRO_FILE * al_aux_create_file(ALLEGRO_FILE_INTERFACE * fi) { ALLEGRO_FILE * file; assert(fi && "`fi' null"); file = (ALLEGRO_FILE *)malloc(sizeof(ALLEGRO_FILE)); if (!file) return NULL; file->vtable = (ALLEGRO_FILE_INTERFACE *)malloc(sizeof(ALLEGRO_FILE_INTERFACE)); if (!(file->vtable)) { free(file); return NULL; } memcpy(file->vtable, fi, sizeof(ALLEGRO_FILE_INTERFACE)); return file; } __declspec(dllexport) void al_aux_destroy_file(ALLEGRO_FILE * f) { assert(f && "`f' null"); assert(f->vtable && "`f->vtable' null"); free(f->vtable); free(f); } Lastly, I have a class that accepts a Stream and provides the proper methods to interact with the stream. Just to make sure, here it is: /// <summary> /// A semi-opaque data type that allows one to load fonts, etc from a stream. /// </summary> public class AllegroFile : AllegroResource, IDisposable { AllegroInternalFileInterface fileInterface; Stream fileStream; /// <summary> /// Gets the file interface. /// </summary> internal AllegroInternalFileInterface FileInterface { get { return fileInterface; } } /// <summary> /// Constructs an Allegro file from the stream provided. /// </summary> /// <param name="stream">The stream to use.</param> public AllegroFile(Stream stream) { fileStream = stream; fileInterface = new AllegroInternalFileInterface(); fileInterface.fi_fopen = Open; fileInterface.fi_fclose = Close; fileInterface.fi_fread = Read; fileInterface.fi_fwrite = Write; fileInterface.fi_fflush = Flush; fileInterface.fi_ftell = GetPosition; fileInterface.fi_fseek = Seek; fileInterface.fi_feof = GetIsEndOfFile; fileInterface.fi_ferror = GetIsError; fileInterface.fi_fungetc = UngetCharacter; fileInterface.fi_fsize = GetLength; Resource = AllegroFunctions.al_aux_create_file(ref fileInterface); if (!IsValid) throw new AllegroException("Unable to create file"); } /// <summary> /// Disposes of all resources. /// </summary> ~AllegroFile() { Dispose(); } /// <summary> /// Disposes of all resources used. /// </summary> public void Dispose() { if (IsValid) { Resource = IntPtr.Zero; // Should call AllegroFunctions.al_aux_destroy_file fileStream.Dispose(); } } IntPtr Open(string path, string mode) { return IntPtr.Zero; } void Close(IntPtr file) { fileStream.Close(); } int Read(IntPtr file, IntPtr data, int size) { byte[] d = new byte[size]; int read = fileStream.Read(d, 0, size); Marshal.Copy(d, 0, data, size); return read; } int Write(IntPtr file, IntPtr data, int size) { byte[] d = new byte[size]; Marshal.Copy(data, d, 0, size); fileStream.Write(d, 0, size); return size; } bool Flush(IntPtr file) { fileStream.Flush(); return true; } long GetPosition(IntPtr file) { return fileStream.Position; } bool Seek(IntPtr file, long offset, int whence) { SeekOrigin origin = SeekOrigin.Begin; if (whence == 1) origin = SeekOrigin.Current; else if (whence == 2) origin = SeekOrigin.End; fileStream.Seek(offset, origin); return true; } bool GetIsEndOfFile(IntPtr file) { return fileStream.Position == fileStream.Length; } bool GetIsError(IntPtr file) { return false; } int UngetCharacter(IntPtr file, int character) { return -1; } long GetLength(IntPtr file) { return fileStream.Length; } } Now, when I do something like this: AllegroFile file = new AllegroFile(new FileStream("Test.bmp", FileMode.Create, FileAccess.ReadWrite)); bitmap.SaveToFile(file, ".bmp"); ...I get an AccessViolationException. I think I understand why (the garbage collector can relocate structs and classes whenever), but I'd think that the method stub that is created by the framework would take this into consideration and route the calls to the valid classes. However, it seems obviously so that I'm wrong. So basically, is there any way I can successfully wrap that structure? (And I'm sorry for all the code! Hope it's not too much...)

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StringIndexOutOfBoundsException error in main method

- by Ro Siv

I am obtaining a StringIndexOutOfBoundsError when running my main method. Here is the output of my program in the command line. "Please enter the shift, 1 for day, 2 for night" 1 "you entered a number for the shift" "Please enter the hourly pay Rate" 2 "you entered a number for the pay Rate" "Please enter the employees name" brenda "cat6b" "your value you entered is correct 0-9 or a - z" "Please enter the employee number" 100e "cat41" "your value you entered is correct 0-9 or a - z" "Please enter current date in XXYYZZZZ format, X is day, Y is month, Z is year" 10203933 "cat81 " "your value you entered is correct 0-9 or a - z" 90 1 valye of array is 1 81 0 value of array is 0 82 2 value of array is 2 83 0 value of array is 0 84 3 value of array is 3 85 9 value of array is 9 86 3 value of array is 3 87 3 value of array is 3 "Exception in thread "main" java.lang.StringIndexOutOfBoundsException: String index out of range: 8 at java.lang.String.charAt(String.java:658) at ProductionWorker<init>(ProductionWorker.java:66) at labBookFiftyFour.main(labBookFiftyFour.java:58)" "Press any key to continue . . ." Ignore the cat parts in the code, i was using a println statement to test the code. Ignore the value of array output as well, as i wanted to use an array in the program later on. Here is my main method. import java.math.*; import java.text.DecimalFormat; import java.io.*; import java.util.*; public class labBookFiftyFour { public static void main(String[] args) { Scanner myInput = new Scanner(System.in); int shift = -1; double pRate = -2; String name = " "; String number = " "; String date = " "; while(shift < 0 || pRate < 0 ) { System.out.println("Please enter the shift, 1 for day, 2 for night"); if(myInput.hasNextInt()){ System.out.println("you entered a number for the shift"); shift = myInput.nextInt(); } System.out.println("Please enter the hourly pay Rate"); if(myInput.hasNextDouble()){ System.out.println("you entered a number for the pay Rate"); pRate = myInput.nextDouble(); } else if (myInput.hasNext()) { System.out.println("Please enter a proper value"); myInput.next(); } else { System.err.println("No more input"); System.exit(1); } } myInput.nextLine(); //consume newLine System.out.println("Please enter the employees name"); name = myInput.nextLine(); //use your isValid method if(isValid(name)) { System.out.println("your value you entered is correct 0-9 or a - z "); } System.out.println("Please enter the employee number"); number = myInput.nextLine(); //use your isValid method if(isValid(number)) { System.out.println("your value you entered is correct 0-9 or a - z "); } System.out.println("Please enter current date in XXYYZZZZ format, X is day, Y is month, Z is year"); date = myInput.nextLine(); //use your isValid method if(isValid(date)) { System.out.println("your value you entered is correct 0-9 or a - z "); } ProductionWorker myWorker = new ProductionWorker(shift, pRate, name, number, date); //int day and night , double payRate System.out.println("THis is the shift " + myWorker.getShift() + " This is the pay Rate " + myWorker.getPRate() + " " + myWorker.getName() + " " + myWorker.getNumber() + " " + myWorker.getDate()); } //Made this method for testing String input for 0-9 or a - z values , put AFTER main method, but before end of class public static boolean isValid(String stringName) //This method has to be static, for some reason? { System.out.println("cat" + stringName.length() + stringName.charAt(0)); boolean flag = true; int index = 0; while(index < stringName.length()) { if(Character.isLetterOrDigit(stringName.charAt(index))) { flag = true; } else { flag = false; } ++index; } return flag; } } Here is my employeeOne. java Superclass public class employeeOne { private String name; private String number; private String date; public employeeOne(String name, String number, String date) { this.name = name; this.number = number; this.date = date; } public String getName() { return name; } public String getNumber() { return number; } public String getDate() { return date; } } Here is my ProductionWorker.java subclass, which extends employeeOne public class ProductionWorker extends employeeOne { private int shift; //shift represents day or night, day = 1, night = 2 private double pRate; //hourly pay rate public ProductionWorker(int shift, double pRate, String name, String number, String date) { super(name, number, date); this.shift = shift; if(this.shift >= 3 || this.shift <= 0) { System.out.println("You entered an out of bounds shift date, enter 1 for day or 2 for night, else shift will be day"); this.shift = 1; } this.pRate = pRate; boolean goodSoFar = true; int indexNum = 0; int indexDate = 0; if(name.length() <= 10 && number.length() <= 4 && date.length() < 9 ) { goodSoFar = true; } else { goodSoFar = false; } while(goodSoFar && indexNum < 3) //XXXL XXX digits 1-9, L is a letter A -M { if(Character.isDigit(number.charAt(indexNum))) { goodSoFar = true; } else { goodSoFar = false; } ++indexNum; } while(goodSoFar && indexNum < 4) { if(Character.isLetter(number.charAt(indexNum))) { goodSoFar = true; } else if(Character.isDigit(number.charAt(indexNum))) { goodSoFar = false; } else if(Character.isDigit(number.charAt(indexNum)) == false && Character.isLetter(number.charAt(indexNum)) == false) { goodSoFar = false; } ++indexNum; } int[] dateValues = new int[date.length()]; while(goodSoFar && indexDate <= date.length()) //XXYYZZZZ { System.out.println("" + date.length() + indexDate + " " + date.charAt(indexDate)); if(Character.isDigit(date.charAt(indexDate))) { dateValues[indexDate] = Character.getNumericValue(date.charAt(indexDate)); System.out.println("value of array is " + dateValues[indexDate]); ++indexDate; } else { goodSoFar = false; } } if(goodSoFar) { System.out.println("your input is good so far"); } else { System.out.println("your input is wrong for name or number or date"); } } public int getShift() { return shift; } public double getPRate() { return pRate; } }

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Upload File to Windows Azure Blob in Chunks through ASP.NET MVC, JavaScript and HTML5

- by Shaun

Originally posted on: http://geekswithblogs.net/shaunxu/archive/2013/07/01/upload-file-to-windows-azure-blob-in-chunks-through-asp.net.aspxMany people are using Windows Azure Blob Storage to store their data in the cloud. Blob storage provides 99.9% availability with easy-to-use API through .NET SDK and HTTP REST. For example, we can store JavaScript files, images, documents in blob storage when we are building an ASP.NET web application on a Web Role in Windows Azure. Or we can store our VHD files in blob and mount it as a hard drive in our cloud service. If you are familiar with Windows Azure, you should know that there are two kinds of blob: page blob and block blob. The page blob is optimized for random read and write, which is very useful when you need to store VHD files. The block blob is optimized for sequential/chunk read and write, which has more common usage. Since we can upload block blob in blocks through BlockBlob.PutBlock, and them commit them as a whole blob with invoking the BlockBlob.PutBlockList, it is very powerful to upload large files, as we can upload blocks in parallel, and provide pause-resume feature. There are many documents, articles and blog posts described on how to upload a block blob. Most of them are focus on the server side, which means when you had received a big file, stream or binaries, how to upload them into blob storage in blocks through .NET SDK. But the problem is, how can we upload these large files from client side, for example, a browser. This questioned to me when I was working with a Chinese customer to help them build a network disk production on top of azure. The end users upload their files from the web portal, and then the files will be stored in blob storage from the Web Role. My goal is to find the best way to transform the file from client (end user’s machine) to the server (Web Role) through browser. In this post I will demonstrate and describe what I had done, to upload large file in chunks with high speed, and save them as blocks into Windows Azure Blob Storage. Traditional Upload, Works with Limitation The simplest way to implement this requirement is to create a web page with a form that contains a file input element and a submit button. 1: @using (Html.BeginForm("About", "Index", FormMethod.Post, new { enctype = "multipart/form-data" })) 2: { 3: <input type="file" name="file" /> 4: <input type="submit" value="upload" /> 5: } And then in the backend controller, we retrieve the whole content of this file and upload it in to the blob storage through .NET SDK. We can split the file in blocks and upload them in parallel and commit. The code had been well blogged in the community. 1: [HttpPost] 2: public ActionResult About(HttpPostedFileBase file) 3: { 4: var container = _client.GetContainerReference("test"); 5: container.CreateIfNotExists(); 6: var blob = container.GetBlockBlobReference(file.FileName); 7: var blockDataList = new Dictionary<string, byte[]>(); 8: using (var stream = file.InputStream) 9: { 10: var blockSizeInKB = 1024; 11: var offset = 0; 12: var index = 0; 13: while (offset < stream.Length) 14: { 15: var readLength = Math.Min(1024 * blockSizeInKB, (int)stream.Length - offset); 16: var blockData = new byte[readLength]; 17: offset += stream.Read(blockData, 0, readLength); 18: blockDataList.Add(Convert.ToBase64String(BitConverter.GetBytes(index)), blockData); 19: 20: index++; 21: } 22: } 23: 24: Parallel.ForEach(blockDataList, (bi) => 25: { 26: blob.PutBlock(bi.Key, new MemoryStream(bi.Value), null); 27: }); 28: blob.PutBlockList(blockDataList.Select(b => b.Key).ToArray()); 29: 30: return RedirectToAction("About"); 31: } This works perfect if we selected an image, a music or a small video to upload. But if I selected a large file, let’s say a 6GB HD-movie, after upload for about few minutes the page will be shown as below and the upload will be terminated. In ASP.NET there is a limitation of request length and the maximized request length is defined in the web.config file. It’s a number which less than about 4GB. So if we want to upload a really big file, we cannot simply implement in this way. Also, in Windows Azure, a cloud service network load balancer will terminate the connection if exceed the timeout period. From my test the timeout looks like 2 - 3 minutes. Hence, when we need to upload a large file we cannot just use the basic HTML elements. Besides the limitation mentioned above, the simple HTML file upload cannot provide rich upload experience such as chunk upload, pause and pause-resume. So we need to find a better way to upload large file from the client to the server. Upload in Chunks through HTML5 and JavaScript In order to break those limitation mentioned above we will try to upload the large file in chunks. This takes some benefit to us such as - No request size limitation: Since we upload in chunks, we can define the request size for each chunks regardless how big the entire file is. - No timeout problem: The size of chunks are controlled by us, which means we should be able to make sure request for each chunk upload will not exceed the timeout period of both ASP.NET and Windows Azure load balancer. It was a big challenge to upload big file in chunks until we have HTML5. There are some new features and improvements introduced in HTML5 and we will use them to implement our solution. In HTML5, the File interface had been improved with a new method called “slice”. It can be used to read part of the file by specifying the start byte index and the end byte index. For example if the entire file was 1024 bytes, file.slice(512, 768) will read the part of this file from the 512nd byte to 768th byte, and return a new object of interface called "Blob”, which you can treat as an array of bytes. In fact, a Blob object represents a file-like object of immutable, raw data. The File interface is based on Blob, inheriting blob functionality and expanding it to support files on the user's system. For more information about the Blob please refer here. File and Blob is very useful to implement the chunk upload. We will use File interface to represent the file the user selected from the browser and then use File.slice to read the file in chunks in the size we wanted. For example, if we wanted to upload a 10MB file with 512KB chunks, then we can read it in 512KB blobs by using File.slice in a loop. Assuming we have a web page as below. User can select a file, an input box to specify the block size in KB and a button to start upload. 1: <div> 2: <input type="file" id="upload_files" name="files[]" /><br /> 3: Block Size: <input type="number" id="block_size" value="512" name="block_size" />KB<br /> 4: <input type="button" id="upload_button_blob" name="upload" value="upload (blob)" /> 5: </div> Then we can have the JavaScript function to upload the file in chunks when user clicked the button. 1: <script type="text/javascript"> 1: 2: $(function () { 3: $("#upload_button_blob").click(function () { 4: }); 5: });</script> Firstly we need to ensure the client browser supports the interfaces we are going to use. Just try to invoke the File, Blob and FormData from the “window” object. If any of them is “undefined” the condition result will be “false” which means your browser doesn’t support these premium feature and it’s time for you to get your browser updated. FormData is another new feature we are going to use in the future. It could generate a temporary form for us. We will use this interface to create a form with chunk and associated metadata when invoked the service through ajax. 1: $("#upload_button_blob").click(function () { 2: // assert the browser support html5 3: if (window.File && window.Blob && window.FormData) { 4: alert("Your brwoser is awesome, let's rock!"); 5: } 6: else { 7: alert("Oh man plz update to a modern browser before try is cool stuff out."); 8: return; 9: } 10: }); Each browser supports these interfaces by their own implementation and currently the Blob, File and File.slice are supported by Chrome 21, FireFox 13, IE 10, Opera 12 and Safari 5.1 or higher. After that we worked on the files the user selected one by one since in HTML5, user can select multiple files in one file input box. 1: var files = $("#upload_files")[0].files; 2: for (var i = 0; i < files.length; i++) { 3: var file = files[i]; 4: var fileSize = file.size; 5: var fileName = file.name; 6: } Next, we calculated the start index and end index for each chunks based on the size the user specified from the browser. We put them into an array with the file name and the index, which will be used when we upload chunks into Windows Azure Blob Storage as blocks since we need to specify the target blob name and the block index. At the same time we will store the list of all indexes into another variant which will be used to commit blocks into blob in Azure Storage once all chunks had been uploaded successfully. 1: $("#upload_button_blob").click(function () { 2: // assert the browser support html5 3: ... ... 4: // start to upload each files in chunks 5: var files = $("#upload_files")[0].files; 6: for (var i = 0; i < files.length; i++) { 7: var file = files[i]; 8: var fileSize = file.size; 9: var fileName = file.name; 10: 11: // calculate the start and end byte index for each blocks(chunks) 12: // with the index, file name and index list for future using 13: var blockSizeInKB = $("#block_size").val(); 14: var blockSize = blockSizeInKB * 1024; 15: var blocks = []; 16: var offset = 0; 17: var index = 0; 18: var list = ""; 19: while (offset < fileSize) { 20: var start = offset; 21: var end = Math.min(offset + blockSize, fileSize); 22: 23: blocks.push({ 24: name: fileName, 25: index: index, 26: start: start, 27: end: end 28: }); 29: list += index + ","; 30: 31: offset = end; 32: index++; 33: } 34: } 35: }); Now we have all chunks’ information ready. The next step should be upload them one by one to the server side, and at the server side when received a chunk it will upload as a block into Blob Storage, and finally commit them with the index list through BlockBlobClient.PutBlockList. But since all these invokes are ajax calling, which means not synchronized call. So we need to introduce a new JavaScript library to help us coordinate the asynchronize operation, which named “async.js”. You can download this JavaScript library here, and you can find the document here. I will not explain this library too much in this post. We will put all procedures we want to execute as a function array, and pass into the proper function defined in async.js to let it help us to control the execution sequence, in series or in parallel. Hence we will define an array and put the function for chunk upload into this array. 1: $("#upload_button_blob").click(function () { 2: // assert the browser support html5 3: ... ... 4: 5: // start to upload each files in chunks 6: var files = $("#upload_files")[0].files; 7: for (var i = 0; i < files.length; i++) { 8: var file = files[i]; 9: var fileSize = file.size; 10: var fileName = file.name; 11: // calculate the start and end byte index for each blocks(chunks) 12: // with the index, file name and index list for future using 13: ... ... 14: 15: // define the function array and push all chunk upload operation into this array 16: blocks.forEach(function (block) { 17: putBlocks.push(function (callback) { 18: }); 19: }); 20: } 21: }); 22: }); As you can see, I used File.slice method to read each chunks based on the start and end byte index we calculated previously, and constructed a temporary HTML form with the file name, chunk index and chunk data through another new feature in HTML5 named FormData. Then post this form to the backend server through jQuery.ajax. This is the key part of our solution. 1: $("#upload_button_blob").click(function () { 2: // assert the browser support html5 3: ... ... 4: // start to upload each files in chunks 5: var files = $("#upload_files")[0].files; 6: for (var i = 0; i < files.length; i++) { 7: var file = files[i]; 8: var fileSize = file.size; 9: var fileName = file.name; 10: // calculate the start and end byte index for each blocks(chunks) 11: // with the index, file name and index list for future using 12: ... ... 13: // define the function array and push all chunk upload operation into this array 14: blocks.forEach(function (block) { 15: putBlocks.push(function (callback) { 16: // load blob based on the start and end index for each chunks 17: var blob = file.slice(block.start, block.end); 18: // put the file name, index and blob into a temporary from 19: var fd = new FormData(); 20: fd.append("name", block.name); 21: fd.append("index", block.index); 22: fd.append("file", blob); 23: // post the form to backend service (asp.net mvc controller action) 24: $.ajax({ 25: url: "/Home/UploadInFormData", 26: data: fd, 27: processData: false, 28: contentType: "multipart/form-data", 29: type: "POST", 30: success: function (result) { 31: if (!result.success) { 32: alert(result.error); 33: } 34: callback(null, block.index); 35: } 36: }); 37: }); 38: }); 39: } 40: }); Then we will invoke these functions one by one by using the async.js. And once all functions had been executed successfully I invoked another ajax call to the backend service to commit all these chunks (blocks) as the blob in Windows Azure Storage. 1: $("#upload_button_blob").click(function () { 2: // assert the browser support html5 3: ... ... 4: // start to upload each files in chunks 5: var files = $("#upload_files")[0].files; 6: for (var i = 0; i < files.length; i++) { 7: var file = files[i]; 8: var fileSize = file.size; 9: var fileName = file.name; 10: // calculate the start and end byte index for each blocks(chunks) 11: // with the index, file name and index list for future using 12: ... ... 13: // define the function array and push all chunk upload operation into this array 14: ... ... 15: // invoke the functions one by one 16: // then invoke the commit ajax call to put blocks into blob in azure storage 17: async.series(putBlocks, function (error, result) { 18: var data = { 19: name: fileName, 20: list: list 21: }; 22: $.post("/Home/Commit", data, function (result) { 23: if (!result.success) { 24: alert(result.error); 25: } 26: else { 27: alert("done!"); 28: } 29: }); 30: }); 31: } 32: }); That’s all in the client side. The outline of our logic would be - Calculate the start and end byte index for each chunks based on the block size. - Defined the functions of reading the chunk form file and upload the content to the backend service through ajax. - Execute the functions defined in previous step with “async.js”. - Commit the chunks by invoking the backend service in Windows Azure Storage finally. Save Chunks as Blocks into Blob Storage In above we finished the client size JavaScript code. It uploaded the file in chunks to the backend service which we are going to implement in this step. We will use ASP.NET MVC as our backend service, and it will receive the chunks, upload into Windows Azure Bob Storage in blocks, then finally commit as one blob. As in the client side we uploaded chunks by invoking the ajax call to the URL "/Home/UploadInFormData", I created a new action under the Index controller and it only accepts HTTP POST request. 1: [HttpPost] 2: public JsonResult UploadInFormData() 3: { 4: var error = string.Empty; 5: try 6: { 7: } 8: catch (Exception e) 9: { 10: error = e.ToString(); 11: } 12: 13: return new JsonResult() 14: { 15: Data = new 16: { 17: success = string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(error), 18: error = error 19: } 20: }; 21: } Then I retrieved the file name, index and the chunk content from the Request.Form object, which was passed from our client side. And then, used the Windows Azure SDK to create a blob container (in this case we will use the container named “test”.) and create a blob reference with the blob name (same as the file name). Then uploaded the chunk as a block of this blob with the index, since in Blob Storage each block must have an index (ID) associated with so that finally we can put all blocks as one blob by specifying their block ID list. 1: [HttpPost] 2: public JsonResult UploadInFormData() 3: { 4: var error = string.Empty; 5: try 6: { 7: var name = Request.Form["name"]; 8: var index = int.Parse(Request.Form["index"]); 9: var file = Request.Files[0]; 10: var id = Convert.ToBase64String(BitConverter.GetBytes(index)); 11: 12: var container = _client.GetContainerReference("test"); 13: container.CreateIfNotExists(); 14: var blob = container.GetBlockBlobReference(name); 15: blob.PutBlock(id, file.InputStream, null); 16: } 17: catch (Exception e) 18: { 19: error = e.ToString(); 20: } 21: 22: return new JsonResult() 23: { 24: Data = new 25: { 26: success = string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(error), 27: error = error 28: } 29: }; 30: } Next, I created another action to commit the blocks into blob once all chunks had been uploaded. Similarly, I retrieved the blob name from the Request.Form. I also retrieved the chunks ID list, which is the block ID list from the Request.Form in a string format, split them as a list, then invoked the BlockBlob.PutBlockList method. After that our blob will be shown in the container and ready to be download. 1: [HttpPost] 2: public JsonResult Commit() 3: { 4: var error = string.Empty; 5: try 6: { 7: var name = Request.Form["name"]; 8: var list = Request.Form["list"]; 9: var ids = list 10: .Split(',') 11: .Where(id => !string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(id)) 12: .Select(id => Convert.ToBase64String(BitConverter.GetBytes(int.Parse(id)))) 13: .ToArray(); 14: 15: var container = _client.GetContainerReference("test"); 16: container.CreateIfNotExists(); 17: var blob = container.GetBlockBlobReference(name); 18: blob.PutBlockList(ids); 19: } 20: catch (Exception e) 21: { 22: error = e.ToString(); 23: } 24: 25: return new JsonResult() 26: { 27: Data = new 28: { 29: success = string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(error), 30: error = error 31: } 32: }; 33: } Now we finished all code we need. The whole process of uploading would be like this below. Below is the full client side JavaScript code. 1: <script type="text/javascript" src="~/Scripts/async.js"></script> 2: <script type="text/javascript"> 3: $(function () { 4: $("#upload_button_blob").click(function () { 5: // assert the browser support html5 6: if (window.File && window.Blob && window.FormData) { 7: alert("Your brwoser is awesome, let's rock!"); 8: } 9: else { 10: alert("Oh man plz update to a modern browser before try is cool stuff out."); 11: return; 12: } 13: 14: // start to upload each files in chunks 15: var files = $("#upload_files")[0].files; 16: for (var i = 0; i < files.length; i++) { 17: var file = files[i]; 18: var fileSize = file.size; 19: var fileName = file.name; 20: 21: // calculate the start and end byte index for each blocks(chunks) 22: // with the index, file name and index list for future using 23: var blockSizeInKB = $("#block_size").val(); 24: var blockSize = blockSizeInKB * 1024; 25: var blocks = []; 26: var offset = 0; 27: var index = 0; 28: var list = ""; 29: while (offset < fileSize) { 30: var start = offset; 31: var end = Math.min(offset + blockSize, fileSize); 32: 33: blocks.push({ 34: name: fileName, 35: index: index, 36: start: start, 37: end: end 38: }); 39: list += index + ","; 40: 41: offset = end; 42: index++; 43: } 44: 45: // define the function array and push all chunk upload operation into this array 46: var putBlocks = []; 47: blocks.forEach(function (block) { 48: putBlocks.push(function (callback) { 49: // load blob based on the start and end index for each chunks 50: var blob = file.slice(block.start, block.end); 51: // put the file name, index and blob into a temporary from 52: var fd = new FormData(); 53: fd.append("name", block.name); 54: fd.append("index", block.index); 55: fd.append("file", blob); 56: // post the form to backend service (asp.net mvc controller action) 57: $.ajax({ 58: url: "/Home/UploadInFormData", 59: data: fd, 60: processData: false, 61: contentType: "multipart/form-data", 62: type: "POST", 63: success: function (result) { 64: if (!result.success) { 65: alert(result.error); 66: } 67: callback(null, block.index); 68: } 69: }); 70: }); 71: }); 72: 73: // invoke the functions one by one 74: // then invoke the commit ajax call to put blocks into blob in azure storage 75: async.series(putBlocks, function (error, result) { 76: var data = { 77: name: fileName, 78: list: list 79: }; 80: $.post("/Home/Commit", data, function (result) { 81: if (!result.success) { 82: alert(result.error); 83: } 84: else { 85: alert("done!"); 86: } 87: }); 88: }); 89: } 90: }); 91: }); 92: </script> And below is the full ASP.NET MVC controller code. 1: public class HomeController : Controller 2: { 3: private CloudStorageAccount _account; 4: private CloudBlobClient _client; 5: 6: public HomeController() 7: : base() 8: { 9: _account = CloudStorageAccount.Parse(CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("DataConnectionString")); 10: _client = _account.CreateCloudBlobClient(); 11: } 12: 13: public ActionResult Index() 14: { 15: ViewBag.Message = "Modify this template to jump-start your ASP.NET MVC application."; 16: 17: return View(); 18: } 19: 20: [HttpPost] 21: public JsonResult UploadInFormData() 22: { 23: var error = string.Empty; 24: try 25: { 26: var name = Request.Form["name"]; 27: var index = int.Parse(Request.Form["index"]); 28: var file = Request.Files[0]; 29: var id = Convert.ToBase64String(BitConverter.GetBytes(index)); 30: 31: var container = _client.GetContainerReference("test"); 32: container.CreateIfNotExists(); 33: var blob = container.GetBlockBlobReference(name); 34: blob.PutBlock(id, file.InputStream, null); 35: } 36: catch (Exception e) 37: { 38: error = e.ToString(); 39: } 40: 41: return new JsonResult() 42: { 43: Data = new 44: { 45: success = string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(error), 46: error = error 47: } 48: }; 49: } 50: 51: [HttpPost] 52: public JsonResult Commit() 53: { 54: var error = string.Empty; 55: try 56: { 57: var name = Request.Form["name"]; 58: var list = Request.Form["list"]; 59: var ids = list 60: .Split(',') 61: .Where(id => !string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(id)) 62: .Select(id => Convert.ToBase64String(BitConverter.GetBytes(int.Parse(id)))) 63: .ToArray(); 64: 65: var container = _client.GetContainerReference("test"); 66: container.CreateIfNotExists(); 67: var blob = container.GetBlockBlobReference(name); 68: blob.PutBlockList(ids); 69: } 70: catch (Exception e) 71: { 72: error = e.ToString(); 73: } 74: 75: return new JsonResult() 76: { 77: Data = new 78: { 79: success = string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(error), 80: error = error 81: } 82: }; 83: } 84: } And if we selected a file from the browser we will see our application will upload chunks in the size we specified to the server through ajax call in background, and then commit all chunks in one blob. Then we can find the blob in our Windows Azure Blob Storage. Optimized by Parallel Upload In previous example we just uploaded our file in chunks. This solved the problem that ASP.NET MVC request content size limitation as well as the Windows Azure load balancer timeout. But it might introduce the performance problem since we uploaded chunks in sequence. In order to improve the upload performance we could modify our client side code a bit to make the upload operation invoked in parallel. The good news is that, “async.js” library provides the parallel execution function. If you remembered the code we invoke the service to upload chunks, it utilized “async.series” which means all functions will be executed in sequence. Now we will change this code to “async.parallel”. This will invoke all functions in parallel. 1: $("#upload_button_blob").click(function () { 2: // assert the browser support html5 3: ... ... 4: // start to upload each files in chunks 5: var files = $("#upload_files")[0].files; 6: for (var i = 0; i < files.length; i++) { 7: var file = files[i]; 8: var fileSize = file.size; 9: var fileName = file.name; 10: // calculate the start and end byte index for each blocks(chunks) 11: // with the index, file name and index list for future using 12: ... ... 13: // define the function array and push all chunk upload operation into this array 14: ... ... 15: // invoke the functions one by one 16: // then invoke the commit ajax call to put blocks into blob in azure storage 17: async.parallel(putBlocks, function (error, result) { 18: var data = { 19: name: fileName, 20: list: list 21: }; 22: $.post("/Home/Commit", data, function (result) { 23: if (!result.success) { 24: alert(result.error); 25: } 26: else { 27: alert("done!"); 28: } 29: }); 30: }); 31: } 32: }); In this way all chunks will be uploaded to the server side at the same time to maximize the bandwidth usage. This should work if the file was not very large and the chunk size was not very small. But for large file this might introduce another problem that too many ajax calls are sent to the server at the same time. So the best solution should be, upload the chunks in parallel with maximum concurrency limitation. The code below specified the concurrency limitation to 4, which means at the most only 4 ajax calls could be invoked at the same time. 1: $("#upload_button_blob").click(function () { 2: // assert the browser support html5 3: ... ... 4: // start to upload each files in chunks 5: var files = $("#upload_files")[0].files; 6: for (var i = 0; i < files.length; i++) { 7: var file = files[i]; 8: var fileSize = file.size; 9: var fileName = file.name; 10: // calculate the start and end byte index for each blocks(chunks) 11: // with the index, file name and index list for future using 12: ... ... 13: // define the function array and push all chunk upload operation into this array 14: ... ... 15: // invoke the functions one by one 16: // then invoke the commit ajax call to put blocks into blob in azure storage 17: async.parallelLimit(putBlocks, 4, function (error, result) { 18: var data = { 19: name: fileName, 20: list: list 21: }; 22: $.post("/Home/Commit", data, function (result) { 23: if (!result.success) { 24: alert(result.error); 25: } 26: else { 27: alert("done!"); 28: } 29: }); 30: }); 31: } 32: }); Summary In this post we discussed how to upload files in chunks to the backend service and then upload them into Windows Azure Blob Storage in blocks. We focused on the frontend side and leverage three new feature introduced in HTML 5 which are - File.slice: Read part of the file by specifying the start and end byte index. - Blob: File-like interface which contains the part of the file content. - FormData: Temporary form element that we can pass the chunk alone with some metadata to the backend service. Then we discussed the performance consideration of chunk uploading. Sequence upload cannot provide maximized upload speed, but the unlimited parallel upload might crash the browser and server if too many chunks. So we finally came up with the solution to upload chunks in parallel with the concurrency limitation. We also demonstrated how to utilize “async.js” JavaScript library to help us control the asynchronize call and the parallel limitation. Regarding the chunk size and the parallel limitation value there is no “best” value. You need to test vary composition and find out the best one for your particular scenario. It depends on the local bandwidth, client machine cores and the server side (Windows Azure Cloud Service Virtual Machine) cores, memory and bandwidth. Below is one of my performance test result. The client machine was Windows 8 IE 10 with 4 cores. I was using Microsoft Cooperation Network. The web site was hosted on Windows Azure China North data center (in Beijing) with one small web role (1.7GB 1 core CPU, 1.75GB memory with 100Mbps bandwidth). The test cases were - Chunk size: 512KB, 1MB, 2MB, 4MB. - Upload Mode: Sequence, parallel (unlimited), parallel with limit (4 threads, 8 threads). - Chunk Format: base64 string, binaries. - Target file: 100MB. - Each case was tested 3 times. Below is the test result chart. Some thoughts, but not guidance or best practice: - Parallel gets better performance than series. - No significant performance improvement between parallel 4 threads and 8 threads. - Transform with binaries provides better performance than base64. - In all cases, chunk size in 1MB - 2MB gets better performance. Hope this helps, Shaun All documents and related graphics, codes are provided "AS IS" without warranty of any kind. Copyright © Shaun Ziyan Xu. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons License.

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Custom ASP.NET Routing to an HttpHandler

- by Rick Strahl

As of version 4.0 ASP.NET natively supports routing via the now built-in System.Web.Routing namespace. Routing features are automatically integrated into the HtttpRuntime via a few custom interfaces. New Web Forms Routing Support In ASP.NET 4.0 there are a host of improvements including routing support baked into Web Forms via a RouteData property available on the Page class and RouteCollection.MapPageRoute() route handler that makes it easy to route to Web forms. To map ASP.NET Page routes is as simple as setting up the routes with MapPageRoute:protected void Application_Start(object sender, EventArgs e) { RegisterRoutes(RouteTable.Routes); } void RegisterRoutes(RouteCollection routes) { routes.MapPageRoute("StockQuote", "StockQuote/{symbol}", "StockQuote.aspx"); routes.MapPageRoute("StockQuotes", "StockQuotes/{symbolList}", "StockQuotes.aspx"); } and then accessing the route data in the page you can then use the new Page class RouteData property to retrieve the dynamic route data information:public partial class StockQuote1 : System.Web.UI.Page { protected StockQuote Quote = null; protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e) { string symbol = RouteData.Values["symbol"] as string; StockServer server = new StockServer(); Quote = server.GetStockQuote(symbol); // display stock data in Page View } } Simple, quick and doesn’t require much explanation. If you’re using WebForms most of your routing needs should be served just fine by this simple mechanism. Kudos to the ASP.NET team for putting this in the box and making it easy! How Routing Works To handle Routing in ASP.NET involves these steps: Registering Routes Creating a custom RouteHandler to retrieve an HttpHandler Attaching RouteData to your HttpHandler Picking up Route Information in your Request code Registering routes makes ASP.NET aware of the Routes you want to handle via the static RouteTable.Routes collection. You basically add routes to this collection to let ASP.NET know which URL patterns it should watch for. You typically hook up routes off a RegisterRoutes method that fires in Application_Start as I did in the example above to ensure routes are added only once when the application first starts up. When you create a route, you pass in a RouteHandler instance which ASP.NET caches and reuses as routes are matched. Once registered ASP.NET monitors the routes and if a match is found just prior to the HttpHandler instantiation, ASP.NET uses the RouteHandler registered for the route and calls GetHandler() on it to retrieve an HttpHandler instance. The RouteHandler.GetHandler() method is responsible for creating an instance of an HttpHandler that is to handle the request and – if necessary – to assign any additional custom data to the handler. At minimum you probably want to pass the RouteData to the handler so the handler can identify the request based on the route data available. To do this you typically add a RouteData property to your handler and then assign the property from the RouteHandlers request context. This is essentially how Page.RouteData comes into being and this approach should work well for any custom handler implementation that requires RouteData. It’s a shame that ASP.NET doesn’t have a top level intrinsic object that’s accessible off the HttpContext object to provide route data more generically, but since RouteData is directly tied to HttpHandlers and not all handlers support it it might cause some confusion of when it’s actually available. Bottom line is that if you want to hold on to RouteData you have to assign it to a custom property of the handler or else pass it to the handler via Context.Items[] object that can be retrieved on an as needed basis. It’s important to understand that routing is hooked up via RouteHandlers that are responsible for loading HttpHandler instances. RouteHandlers are invoked for every request that matches a route and through this RouteHandler instance the Handler gains access to the current RouteData. Because of this logic it’s important to understand that Routing is really tied to HttpHandlers and not available prior to handler instantiation, which is pretty late in the HttpRuntime’s request pipeline. IOW, Routing works with Handlers but not with earlier in the pipeline within Modules. Specifically ASP.NET calls RouteHandler.GetHandler() from the PostResolveRequestCache HttpRuntime pipeline event. Here’s the call stack at the beginning of the GetHandler() call: which fires just before handler resolution. Non-Page Routing – You need to build custom RouteHandlers If you need to route to a custom Http Handler or other non-Page (and non-MVC) endpoint in the HttpRuntime, there is no generic mapping support available. You need to create a custom RouteHandler that can manage creating an instance of an HttpHandler that is fired in response to a routed request. Depending on what you are doing this process can be simple or fairly involved as your code is responsible based on the route data provided which handler to instantiate, and more importantly how to pass the route data on to the Handler. Luckily creating a RouteHandler is easy by implementing the IRouteHandler interface which has only a single GetHttpHandler(RequestContext context) method. In this method you can pick up the requestContext.RouteData, instantiate the HttpHandler of choice, and assign the RouteData to it. Then pass back the handler and you’re done.Here’s a simple example of GetHttpHandler() method that dynamically creates a handler based on a passed in Handler type./// <summary> /// Retrieves an Http Handler based on the type specified in the constructor /// </summary> /// <param name="requestContext"></param> /// <returns></returns> IHttpHandler IRouteHandler.GetHttpHandler(RequestContext requestContext) { IHttpHandler handler = Activator.CreateInstance(CallbackHandlerType) as IHttpHandler; // If we're dealing with a Callback Handler // pass the RouteData for this route to the Handler if (handler is CallbackHandler) ((CallbackHandler)handler).RouteData = requestContext.RouteData; return handler; } Note that this code checks for a specific type of handler and if it matches assigns the RouteData to this handler. This is optional but quite a common scenario if you want to work with RouteData. If the handler you need to instantiate isn’t under your control but you still need to pass RouteData to Handler code, an alternative is to pass the RouteData via the HttpContext.Items collection:IHttpHandler IRouteHandler.GetHttpHandler(RequestContext requestContext) { IHttpHandler handler = Activator.CreateInstance(CallbackHandlerType) as IHttpHandler; requestContext.HttpContext.Items["RouteData"] = requestContext.RouteData; return handler; } The code in the handler implementation can then pick up the RouteData from the context collection as needed:RouteData routeData = HttpContext.Current.Items["RouteData"] as RouteData This isn’t as clean as having an explicit RouteData property, but it does have the advantage that the route data is visible anywhere in the Handler’s code chain. It’s definitely preferable to create a custom property on your handler, but the Context work-around works in a pinch when you don’t’ own the handler code and have dynamic code executing as part of the handler execution. An Example of a Custom RouteHandler: Attribute Based Route Implementation In this post I’m going to discuss a custom routine implementation I built for my CallbackHandler class in the West Wind Web & Ajax Toolkit. CallbackHandler can be very easily used for creating AJAX, REST and POX requests following RPC style method mapping. You can pass parameters via URL query string, POST data or raw data structures, and you can retrieve results as JSON, XML or raw string/binary data. It’s a quick and easy way to build service interfaces with no fuss. As a quick review here’s how CallbackHandler works: You create an Http Handler that derives from CallbackHandler You implement methods that have a [CallbackMethod] Attribute and that’s it. Here’s an example of an CallbackHandler implementation in an ashx.cs based handler:// RestService.ashx.cs public class RestService : CallbackHandler { [CallbackMethod] public StockQuote GetStockQuote(string symbol) { StockServer server = new StockServer(); return server.GetStockQuote(symbol); } [CallbackMethod] public StockQuote[] GetStockQuotes(string symbolList) { StockServer server = new StockServer(); string[] symbols = symbolList.Split(new char[2] { ',',';' },StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries); return server.GetStockQuotes(symbols); } } CallbackHandler makes it super easy to create a method on the server, pass data to it via POST, QueryString or raw JSON/XML data, and then retrieve the results easily back in various formats. This works wonderful and I’ve used these tools in many projects for myself and with clients. But one thing missing has been the ability to create clean URLs. Typical URLs looked like this: http://www.west-wind.com/WestwindWebToolkit/samples/Rest/StockService.ashx?Method=GetStockQuote&symbol=msfthttp://www.west-wind.com/WestwindWebToolkit/samples/Rest/StockService.ashx?Method=GetStockQuotes&symbolList=msft,intc,gld,slw,mwe&format=xml which works and is clear enough, but also clearly very ugly. It would be much nicer if URLs could look like this: http://www.west-wind.com//WestwindWebtoolkit/Samples/StockQuote/msfthttp://www.west-wind.com/WestwindWebtoolkit/Samples/StockQuotes/msft,intc,gld,slw?format=xml (the Virtual Root in this sample is WestWindWebToolkit/Samples and StockQuote/{symbol} is the route)(If you use FireFox try using the JSONView plug-in make it easier to view JSON content) So, taking a clue from the WCF REST tools that use RouteUrls I set out to create a way to specify RouteUrls for each of the endpoints. The change made basically allows changing the above to: [CallbackMethod(RouteUrl="RestService/StockQuote/{symbol}")] public StockQuote GetStockQuote(string symbol) { StockServer server = new StockServer(); return server.GetStockQuote(symbol); } [CallbackMethod(RouteUrl = "RestService/StockQuotes/{symbolList}")] public StockQuote[] GetStockQuotes(string symbolList) { StockServer server = new StockServer(); string[] symbols = symbolList.Split(new char[2] { ',',';' },StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries); return server.GetStockQuotes(symbols); } where a RouteUrl is specified as part of the Callback attribute. And with the changes made with RouteUrls I can now get URLs like the second set shown earlier. So how does that work? Let’s find out… How to Create Custom Routes As mentioned earlier Routing is made up of several steps: Creating a custom RouteHandler to create HttpHandler instances Mapping the actual Routes to the RouteHandler Retrieving the RouteData and actually doing something useful with it in the HttpHandler In the CallbackHandler routing example above this works out to something like this: Create a custom RouteHandler that includes a property to track the method to call Set up the routes using Reflection against the class Looking for any RouteUrls in the CallbackMethod attribute Add a RouteData property to the CallbackHandler so we can access the RouteData in the code of the handler Creating a Custom Route Handler To make the above work I created a custom RouteHandler class that includes the actual IRouteHandler implementation as well as a generic and static method to automatically register all routes marked with the [CallbackMethod(RouteUrl="…")] attribute. Here’s the code:/// <summary> /// Route handler that can create instances of CallbackHandler derived /// callback classes. The route handler tracks the method name and /// creates an instance of the service in a predictable manner /// </summary> /// <typeparam name="TCallbackHandler">CallbackHandler type</typeparam> public class CallbackHandlerRouteHandler : IRouteHandler { /// <summary> /// Method name that is to be called on this route. /// Set by the automatically generated RegisterRoutes /// invokation. /// </summary> public string MethodName { get; set; } /// <summary> /// The type of the handler we're going to instantiate. /// Needed so we can semi-generically instantiate the /// handler and call the method on it. /// </summary> public Type CallbackHandlerType { get; set; } /// <summary> /// Constructor to pass in the two required components we /// need to create an instance of our handler. /// </summary> /// <param name="methodName"></param> /// <param name="callbackHandlerType"></param> public CallbackHandlerRouteHandler(string methodName, Type callbackHandlerType) { MethodName = methodName; CallbackHandlerType = callbackHandlerType; } /// <summary> /// Retrieves an Http Handler based on the type specified in the constructor /// </summary> /// <param name="requestContext"></param> /// <returns></returns> IHttpHandler IRouteHandler.GetHttpHandler(RequestContext requestContext) { IHttpHandler handler = Activator.CreateInstance(CallbackHandlerType) as IHttpHandler; // If we're dealing with a Callback Handler // pass the RouteData for this route to the Handler if (handler is CallbackHandler) ((CallbackHandler)handler).RouteData = requestContext.RouteData; return handler; } /// <summary> /// Generic method to register all routes from a CallbackHandler /// that have RouteUrls defined on the [CallbackMethod] attribute /// </summary> /// <typeparam name="TCallbackHandler">CallbackHandler Type</typeparam> /// <param name="routes"></param> public static void RegisterRoutes<TCallbackHandler>(RouteCollection routes) { // find all methods var methods = typeof(TCallbackHandler).GetMethods(BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.Public); foreach (var method in methods) { var attrs = method.GetCustomAttributes(typeof(CallbackMethodAttribute), false); if (attrs.Length < 1) continue; CallbackMethodAttribute attr = attrs[0] as CallbackMethodAttribute; if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(attr.RouteUrl)) continue; // Add the route routes.Add(method.Name, new Route(attr.RouteUrl, new CallbackHandlerRouteHandler(method.Name, typeof(TCallbackHandler)))); } } } The RouteHandler implements IRouteHandler, and its responsibility via the GetHandler method is to create an HttpHandler based on the route data. When ASP.NET calls GetHandler it passes a requestContext parameter which includes a requestContext.RouteData property. This parameter holds the current request’s route data as well as an instance of the current RouteHandler. If you look at GetHttpHandler() you can see that the code creates an instance of the handler we are interested in and then sets the RouteData property on the handler. This is how you can pass the current request’s RouteData to the handler. The RouteData object also has a RouteData.RouteHandler property that is also available to the Handler later, which is useful in order to get additional information about the current route. In our case here the RouteHandler includes a MethodName property that identifies the method to execute in the handler since that value no longer comes from the URL so we need to figure out the method name some other way. The method name is mapped explicitly when the RouteHandler is created and here the static method that auto-registers all CallbackMethods with RouteUrls sets the method name when it creates the routes while reflecting over the methods (more on this in a minute). The important point here is that you can attach additional properties to the RouteHandler and you can then later access the RouteHandler and its properties later in the Handler to pick up these custom values. This is a crucial feature in that the RouteHandler serves in passing additional context to the handler so it knows what actions to perform. The automatic route registration is handled by the static RegisterRoutes<TCallbackHandler> method. This method is generic and totally reusable for any CallbackHandler type handler. To register a CallbackHandler and any RouteUrls it has defined you simple use code like this in Application_Start (or other application startup code):protected void Application_Start(object sender, EventArgs e) { // Register Routes for RestService CallbackHandlerRouteHandler.RegisterRoutes<RestService>(RouteTable.Routes); } If you have multiple CallbackHandler style services you can make multiple calls to RegisterRoutes for each of the service types. RegisterRoutes internally uses reflection to run through all the methods of the Handler, looking for CallbackMethod attributes and whether a RouteUrl is specified. If it is a new instance of a CallbackHandlerRouteHandler is created and the name of the method and the type are set. routes.Add(method.Name, new Route(attr.RouteUrl, new CallbackHandlerRouteHandler(method.Name, typeof(TCallbackHandler) )) ); While the routing with CallbackHandlerRouteHandler is set up automatically for all methods that use the RouteUrl attribute, you can also use code to hook up those routes manually and skip using the attribute. The code for this is straightforward and just requires that you manually map each individual route to each method you want a routed: protected void Application_Start(objectsender, EventArgs e){ RegisterRoutes(RouteTable.Routes);}void RegisterRoutes(RouteCollection routes) { routes.Add("StockQuote Route",new Route("StockQuote/{symbol}", new CallbackHandlerRouteHandler("GetStockQuote",typeof(RestService) ) ) ); routes.Add("StockQuotes Route",new Route("StockQuotes/{symbolList}", new CallbackHandlerRouteHandler("GetStockQuotes",typeof(RestService) ) ) );}I think it’s clearly easier to have CallbackHandlerRouteHandler.RegisterRoutes() do this automatically for you based on RouteUrl attributes, but some people have a real aversion to attaching logic via attributes. Just realize that the option to manually create your routes is available as well. Using the RouteData in the Handler A RouteHandler’s responsibility is to create an HttpHandler and as mentioned earlier, natively IHttpHandler doesn’t have any support for RouteData. In order to utilize RouteData in your handler code you have to pass the RouteData to the handler. In my CallbackHandlerRouteHandler when it creates the HttpHandler instance it creates the instance and then assigns the custom RouteData property on the handler:IHttpHandler handler = Activator.CreateInstance(CallbackHandlerType) as IHttpHandler; if (handler is CallbackHandler) ((CallbackHandler)handler).RouteData = requestContext.RouteData; return handler; Again this only works if you actually add a RouteData property to your handler explicitly as I did in my CallbackHandler implementation:/// <summary> /// Optionally store RouteData on this handler /// so we can access it internally /// </summary> public RouteData RouteData {get; set; } and the RouteHandler needs to set it when it creates the handler instance. Once you have the route data in your handler you can access Route Keys and Values and also the RouteHandler. Since my RouteHandler has a custom property for the MethodName to retrieve it from within the handler I can do something like this now to retrieve the MethodName (this example is actually not in the handler but target is an instance pass to the processor): // check for Route Data method name if (target is CallbackHandler) { var routeData = ((CallbackHandler)target).RouteData; if (routeData != null) methodToCall = ((CallbackHandlerRouteHandler)routeData.RouteHandler).MethodName; } When I need to access the dynamic values in the route ( symbol in StockQuote/{symbol}) I can retrieve it easily with the Values collection (RouteData.Values["symbol"]). In my CallbackHandler processing logic I’m basically looking for matching parameter names to Route parameters: // look for parameters in the routeif(routeData != null){ string parmString = routeData.Values[parameter.Name] as string; adjustedParms[parmCounter] = ReflectionUtils.StringToTypedValue(parmString, parameter.ParameterType);} And with that we’ve come full circle. We’ve created a custom RouteHandler() that passes the RouteData to the handler it creates. We’ve registered our routes to use the RouteHandler, and we’ve utilized the route data in our handler. For completeness sake here’s the routine that executes a method call based on the parameters passed in and one of the options is to retrieve the inbound parameters off RouteData (as well as from POST data or QueryString parameters):internal object ExecuteMethod(string method, object target, string[] parameters, CallbackMethodParameterType paramType, ref CallbackMethodAttribute callbackMethodAttribute) { HttpRequest Request = HttpContext.Current.Request; object Result = null; // Stores parsed parameters (from string JSON or QUeryString Values) object[] adjustedParms = null; Type PageType = target.GetType(); MethodInfo MI = PageType.GetMethod(method, BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.NonPublic); if (MI == null) throw new InvalidOperationException("Invalid Server Method."); object[] methods = MI.GetCustomAttributes(typeof(CallbackMethodAttribute), false); if (methods.Length < 1) throw new InvalidOperationException("Server method is not accessible due to missing CallbackMethod attribute"); if (callbackMethodAttribute != null) callbackMethodAttribute = methods[0] as CallbackMethodAttribute; ParameterInfo[] parms = MI.GetParameters(); JSONSerializer serializer = new JSONSerializer(); RouteData routeData = null; if (target is CallbackHandler) routeData = ((CallbackHandler)target).RouteData; int parmCounter = 0; adjustedParms = new object[parms.Length]; foreach (ParameterInfo parameter in parms) { // Retrieve parameters out of QueryString or POST buffer if (parameters == null) { // look for parameters in the route if (routeData != null) { string parmString = routeData.Values[parameter.Name] as string; adjustedParms[parmCounter] = ReflectionUtils.StringToTypedValue(parmString, parameter.ParameterType); } // GET parameter are parsed as plain string values - no JSON encoding else if (HttpContext.Current.Request.HttpMethod == "GET") { // Look up the parameter by name string parmString = Request.QueryString[parameter.Name]; adjustedParms[parmCounter] = ReflectionUtils.StringToTypedValue(parmString, parameter.ParameterType); } // POST parameters are treated as methodParameters that are JSON encoded else if (paramType == CallbackMethodParameterType.Json) //string newVariable = methodParameters.GetValue(parmCounter) as string; adjustedParms[parmCounter] = serializer.Deserialize(Request.Params["parm" + (parmCounter + 1).ToString()], parameter.ParameterType); else adjustedParms[parmCounter] = SerializationUtils.DeSerializeObject( Request.Params["parm" + (parmCounter + 1).ToString()], parameter.ParameterType); } else if (paramType == CallbackMethodParameterType.Json) adjustedParms[parmCounter] = serializer.Deserialize(parameters[parmCounter], parameter.ParameterType); else adjustedParms[parmCounter] = SerializationUtils.DeSerializeObject(parameters[parmCounter], parameter.ParameterType); parmCounter++; } Result = MI.Invoke(target, adjustedParms); return Result; } The code basically uses Reflection to loop through all the parameters available on the method and tries to assign the parameters from RouteData, QueryString or POST variables. The parameters are converted into their appropriate types and then used to eventually make a Reflection based method call. What’s sweet is that the RouteData retrieval is just another option for dealing with the inbound data in this scenario and it adds exactly two lines of code plus the code to retrieve the MethodName I showed previously – a seriously low impact addition that adds a lot of extra value to this endpoint callback processing implementation. Debugging your Routes If you create a lot of routes it’s easy to run into Route conflicts where multiple routes have the same path and overlap with each other. This can be difficult to debug especially if you are using automatically generated routes like the routes created by CallbackHandlerRouteHandler.RegisterRoutes. Luckily there’s a tool that can help you out with this nicely. Phill Haack created a RouteDebugging tool you can download and add to your project. The easiest way to do this is to grab and add this to your project is to use NuGet (Add Library Package from your Project’s Reference Nodes): which adds a RouteDebug assembly to your project. Once installed you can easily debug your routes with this simple line of code which needs to be installed at application startup:protected void Application_Start(object sender, EventArgs e) { CallbackHandlerRouteHandler.RegisterRoutes<StockService>(RouteTable.Routes); // Debug your routes RouteDebug.RouteDebugger.RewriteRoutesForTesting(RouteTable.Routes); } Any routed URL then displays something like this: The screen shows you your current route data and all the routes that are mapped along with a flag that displays which route was actually matched. This is useful – if you have any overlap of routes you will be able to see which routes are triggered – the first one in the sequence wins. This tool has saved my ass on a few occasions – and with NuGet now it’s easy to add it to your project in a few seconds and then remove it when you’re done. Routing Around Custom routing seems slightly complicated on first blush due to its disconnected components of RouteHandler, route registration and mapping of custom handlers. But once you understand the relationship between a RouteHandler, the RouteData and how to pass it to a handler, utilizing of Routing becomes a lot easier as you can easily pass context from the registration to the RouteHandler and through to the HttpHandler. The most important thing to understand when building custom routing solutions is to figure out how to map URLs in such a way that the handler can figure out all the pieces it needs to process the request. This can be via URL routing parameters and as I did in my example by passing additional context information as part of the RouteHandler instance that provides the proper execution context. In my case this ‘context’ was the method name, but it could be an actual static value like an enum identifying an operation or category in an application. Basically user supplied data comes in through the url and static application internal data can be passed via RouteHandler property values. Routing can make your application URLs easier to read by non-techie types regardless of whether you’re building Service type or REST applications, or full on Web interfaces. Routing in ASP.NET 4.0 makes it possible to create just about any extensionless URLs you can dream up and custom RouteHanmdler References Sample ProjectIncludes the sample CallbackHandler service discussed here along with compiled versionsof the Westwind.Web and Westwind.Utilities assemblies. (requires .NET 4.0/VS 2010) West Wind Web Toolkit includes full implementation of CallbackHandler and the Routing Handler West Wind Web Toolkit Source CodeContains the full source code to the Westwind.Web and Westwind.Utilities assemblies usedin these samples. Includes the source described in the post.(Latest build in the Subversion Repository) CallbackHandler Source(Relevant code to this article tree in Westwind.Web assembly) JSONView FireFoxPluginA simple FireFox Plugin to easily view JSON data natively in FireFox.For IE you can use a registry hack to display JSON as raw text.© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2011Posted in ASP.NET AJAX HTTP

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AngularJS on top of ASP.NET: Moving the MVC framework out to the browser

- by Varun Chatterji

Heavily drawing inspiration from Ruby on Rails, MVC4’s convention over configuration model of development soon became the Holy Grail of .NET web development. The MVC model brought with it the goodness of proper separation of concerns between business logic, data, and the presentation logic. However, the MVC paradigm, was still one in which server side .NET code could be mixed with presentation code. The Razor templating engine, though cleaner than its predecessors, still encouraged and allowed you to mix .NET server side code with presentation logic. Thus, for example, if the developer required a certain <div> tag to be shown if a particular variable ShowDiv was true in the View’s model, the code could look like the following: Fig 1: To show a div or not. Server side .NET code is used in the View Mixing .NET code with HTML in views can soon get very messy. Wouldn’t it be nice if the presentation layer (HTML) could be pure HTML? Also, in the ASP.NET MVC model, some of the business logic invariably resides in the controller. It is tempting to use an antipattern like the one shown above to control whether a div should be shown or not. However, best practice would indicate that the Controller should not be aware of the div. The ShowDiv variable in the model should not exist. A controller should ideally, only be used to do the plumbing of getting the data populated in the model and nothing else. The view (ideally pure HTML) should render the presentation layer based on the model. In this article we will see how Angular JS, a new JavaScript framework by Google can be used effectively to build web applications where: 1. Views are pure HTML 2. Controllers (in the server sense) are pure REST based API calls 3. The presentation layer is loaded as needed from partial HTML only files. What is MVVM? MVVM short for Model View View Model is a new paradigm in web development. In this paradigm, the Model and View stuff exists on the client side through javascript instead of being processed on the server through postbacks. These frameworks are JavaScript frameworks that facilitate the clear separation of the “frontend” or the data rendering logic from the “backend” which is typically just a REST based API that loads and processes data through a resource model. The frameworks are called MVVM as a change to the Model (through javascript) gets reflected in the view immediately i.e. Model > View. Also, a change on the view (through manual input) gets reflected in the model immediately i.e. View > Model. The following figure shows this conceptually (comments are shown in red): Fig 2: Demonstration of MVVM in action In Fig 2, two text boxes are bound to the same variable model.myInt. Thus, changing the view manually (changing one text box through keyboard input) also changes the other textbox in real time demonstrating V > M property of a MVVM framework. Furthermore, clicking the button adds 1 to the value of model.myInt thus changing the model through JavaScript. This immediately updates the view (the value in the two textboxes) thus demonstrating the M > V property of a MVVM framework. Thus we see that the model in a MVVM JavaScript framework can be regarded as “the single source of truth“. This is an important concept. Angular is one such MVVM framework. We shall use it to build a simple app that sends SMS messages to a particular number. Application, Routes, Views, Controllers, Scope and Models Angular can be used in many ways to construct web applications. For this article, we shall only focus on building Single Page Applications (SPAs). Many of the approaches we will follow in this article have alternatives. It is beyond the scope of this article to explain every nuance in detail but we shall try to touch upon the basic concepts and end up with a working application that can be used to send SMS messages using Sent.ly Plus (a service that is itself built using Angular). Before you read on, we would like to urge you to forget what you know about Models, Views, Controllers and Routes in the ASP.NET MVC4 framework. All these words have different meanings in the Angular world. Whenever these words are used in this article, they will refer to Angular concepts and not ASP.NET MVC4 concepts. The following figure shows the skeleton of the root page of an SPA: Fig 3: The skeleton of a SPA The skeleton of the application is based on the Bootstrap starter template which can be found at: http://getbootstrap.com/examples/startertemplate/ Apart from loading the Angular, jQuery and Bootstrap JavaScript libraries, it also loads our custom scripts /app/js/controllers.js /app/js/app.js These scripts define the routes, views and controllers which we shall come to in a moment. Application Notice that the body tag (Fig. 3) has an extra attribute: ngapp=”smsApp” Providing this tag “bootstraps” our single page application. It tells Angular to load a “module” called smsApp. This “module” is defined /app/js/app.js angular.module('smsApp', ['smsApp.controllers', function () {}]) Fig 4: The definition of our application module The line shows above, declares a module called smsApp. It also declares that this module “depends” on another module called “smsApp.controllers”. The smsApp.controllers module will contain all the controllers for our SPA. Routing and Views Notice that in the Navbar (in Fig 3) we have included two hyperlinks to: “#/app” “#/help” This is how Angular handles routing. Since the URLs start with “#”, they are actually just bookmarks (and not server side resources). However, our route definition (in /app/js/app.js) gives these URLs a special meaning within the Angular framework. angular.module('smsApp', ['smsApp.controllers', function () { }]) //Configure the routes .config(['$routeProvider', function ($routeProvider) { $routeProvider.when('/binding', { templateUrl: '/app/partials/bindingexample.html', controller: 'BindingController' }); }]); Fig 5: The definition of a route with an associated partial view and controller As we can see from the previous code sample, we are using the $routeProvider object in the configuration of our smsApp module. Notice how the code “asks for” the $routeProvider object by specifying it as a dependency in the [] braces and then defining a function that accepts it as a parameter. This is known as dependency injection. Please refer to the following link if you want to delve into this topic: http://docs.angularjs.org/guide/di What the above code snippet is doing is that it is telling Angular that when the URL is “#/binding”, then it should load the HTML snippet (“partial view”) found at /app/partials/bindingexample.html. Also, for this URL, Angular should load the controller called “BindingController”. We have also marked the div with the class “container” (in Fig 3) with the ngview attribute. This attribute tells Angular that views (partial HTML pages) defined in the routes will be loaded within this div. You can see that the Angular JavaScript framework, unlike many other frameworks, works purely by extending HTML tags and attributes. It also allows you to extend HTML with your own tags and attributes (through directives) if you so desire, you can find out more about directives at the following URL: http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/607873/ExtendingHTMLwithAngularJSDirectives Controllers and Models We have seen how we define what views and controllers should be loaded for a particular route. Let us now consider how controllers are defined. Our controllers are defined in the file /app/js/controllers.js. The following snippet shows the definition of the “BindingController” which is loaded when we hit the URL http://localhost:port/index.html#/binding (as we have defined in the route earlier as shown in Fig 5). Remember that we had defined that our application module “smsApp” depends on the “smsApp.controllers” module (see Fig 4). The code snippet below shows how the “BindingController” defined in the route shown in Fig 5 is defined in the module smsApp.controllers: angular.module('smsApp.controllers', [function () { }]) .controller('BindingController', ['$scope', function ($scope) { $scope.model = {}; $scope.model.myInt = 6; $scope.addOne = function () { $scope.model.myInt++; } }]); Fig 6: The definition of a controller in the “smsApp.controllers” module. The pieces are falling in place! Remember Fig.2? That was the code of a partial view that was loaded within the container div of the skeleton SPA shown in Fig 3. The route definition shown in Fig 5 also defined that the controller called “BindingController” (shown in Fig 6.) was loaded when we loaded the URL: http://localhost:22544/index.html#/binding The button in Fig 2 was marked with the attribute ngclick=”addOne()” which added 1 to the value of model.myInt. In Fig 6, we can see that this function is actually defined in the “BindingController”. Scope We can see from Fig 6, that in the definition of “BindingController”, we defined a dependency on $scope and then, as usual, defined a function which “asks for” $scope as per the dependency injection pattern. So what is $scope? Any guesses? As you might have guessed a scope is a particular “address space” where variables and functions may be defined. This has a similar meaning to scope in a programming language like C#. Model: The Scope is not the Model It is tempting to assign variables in the scope directly. For example, we could have defined myInt as $scope.myInt = 6 in Fig 6 instead of $scope.model.myInt = 6. The reason why this is a bad idea is that scope in hierarchical in Angular. Thus if we were to define a controller which was defined within the another controller (nested controllers), then the inner controller would inherit the scope of the parent controller. This inheritance would follow JavaScript prototypal inheritance. Let’s say the parent controller defined a variable through $scope.myInt = 6. The child controller would inherit the scope through java prototypical inheritance. This basically means that the child scope has a variable myInt that points to the parent scopes myInt variable. Now if we assigned the value of myInt in the parent, the child scope would be updated with the same value as the child scope’s myInt variable points to the parent scope’s myInt variable. However, if we were to assign the value of the myInt variable in the child scope, then the link of that variable to the parent scope would be broken as the variable myInt in the child scope now points to the value 6 and not to the parent scope’s myInt variable. But, if we defined a variable model in the parent scope, then the child scope will also have a variable model that points to the model variable in the parent scope. Updating the value of $scope.model.myInt in the parent scope would change the model variable in the child scope too as the variable is pointed to the model variable in the parent scope. Now changing the value of $scope.model.myInt in the child scope would ALSO change the value in the parent scope. This is because the model reference in the child scope is pointed to the scope variable in the parent. We did no new assignment to the model variable in the child scope. We only changed an attribute of the model variable. Since the model variable (in the child scope) points to the model variable in the parent scope, we have successfully changed the value of myInt in the parent scope. Thus the value of $scope.model.myInt in the parent scope becomes the “single source of truth“. This is a tricky concept, thus it is considered good practice to NOT use scope inheritance. More info on prototypal inheritance in Angular can be found in the “JavaScript Prototypal Inheritance” section at the following URL: https://github.com/angular/angular.js/wiki/UnderstandingScopes. Building It: An Angular JS application using a .NET Web API Backend Now that we have a perspective on the basic components of an MVVM application built using Angular, let’s build something useful. We will build an application that can be used to send out SMS messages to a given phone number. The following diagram describes the architecture of the application we are going to build: Fig 7: Broad application architecture We are going to add an HTML Partial to our project. This partial will contain the form fields that will accept the phone number and message that needs to be sent as an SMS. It will also display all the messages that have previously been sent. All the executable code that is run on the occurrence of events (button clicks etc.) in the view resides in the controller. The controller interacts with the ASP.NET WebAPI to get a history of SMS messages, add a message etc. through a REST based API. For the purposes of simplicity, we will use an in memory data structure for the purposes of creating this application. Thus, the tasks ahead of us are: Creating the REST WebApi with GET, PUT, POST, DELETE methods. Creating the SmsView.html partial Creating the SmsController controller with methods that are called from the SmsView.html partial Add a new route that loads the controller and the partial. 1. Creating the REST WebAPI This is a simple task that should be quite straightforward to any .NET developer. The following listing shows our ApiController: public class SmsMessage { public string to { get; set; } public string message { get; set; } } public class SmsResource : SmsMessage { public int smsId { get; set; } } public class SmsResourceController : ApiController { public static Dictionary<int, SmsResource> messages = new Dictionary<int, SmsResource>(); public static int currentId = 0; // GET api/<controller> public List<SmsResource> Get() { List<SmsResource> result = new List<SmsResource>(); foreach (int key in messages.Keys) { result.Add(messages[key]); } return result; } // GET api/<controller>/5 public SmsResource Get(int id) { if (messages.ContainsKey(id)) return messages[id]; return null; } // POST api/<controller> public List<SmsResource> Post([FromBody] SmsMessage value) { //Synchronize on messages so we don't have id collisions lock (messages) { SmsResource res = (SmsResource) value; res.smsId = currentId++; messages.Add(res.smsId, res); //SentlyPlusSmsSender.SendMessage(value.to, value.message); return Get(); } } // PUT api/<controller>/5 public List<SmsResource> Put(int id, [FromBody] SmsMessage value) { //Synchronize on messages so we don't have id collisions lock (messages) { if (messages.ContainsKey(id)) { //Update the message messages[id].message = value.message; messages[id].to = value.message; } return Get(); } } // DELETE api/<controller>/5 public List<SmsResource> Delete(int id) { if (messages.ContainsKey(id)) { messages.Remove(id); } return Get(); } } Once this class is defined, we should be able to access the WebAPI by a simple GET request using the browser: http://localhost:port/api/SmsResource Notice the commented line: //SentlyPlusSmsSender.SendMessage The SentlyPlusSmsSender class is defined in the attached solution. We have shown this line as commented as we want to explain the core Angular concepts. If you load the attached solution, this line is uncommented in the source and an actual SMS will be sent! By default, the API returns XML. For consumption of the API in Angular, we would like it to return JSON. To change the default to JSON, we make the following change to WebApiConfig.cs file located in the App_Start folder. public static class WebApiConfig { public static void Register(HttpConfiguration config) { config.Routes.MapHttpRoute( name: "DefaultApi", routeTemplate: "api/{controller}/{id}", defaults: new { id = RouteParameter.Optional } ); var appXmlType = config.Formatters.XmlFormatter. SupportedMediaTypes. FirstOrDefault( t => t.MediaType == "application/xml"); config.Formatters.XmlFormatter.SupportedMediaTypes.Remove(appXmlType); } } We now have our backend REST Api which we can consume from Angular! 2. Creating the SmsView.html partial This simple partial will define two fields: the destination phone number (international format starting with a +) and the message. These fields will be bound to model.phoneNumber and model.message. We will also add a button that we shall hook up to sendMessage() in the controller. A list of all previously sent messages (bound to model.allMessages) will also be displayed below the form input. The following code shows the code for the partial:  <div class="well" style="margin-top: 30px;"> <table style="width: 100%;"> <tr> <td style="width: 45%; text-align: center;"> <input type="text" placeholder="Phone number (eg; +44 7778 609466)" ng-model="model.phoneNumber" class="form-control" style="width: 90%" onkeypress="return checkPhoneInput();" /> </td> <td style="width: 45%; text-align: center;"> <input type="text" placeholder="Message" ng-model="model.message" class="form-control" style="width: 90%" /> </td> <td style="text-align: center;"> <button class="btn btn-danger" ng-click="sendMessage();" ng-disabled="model.isAjaxInProgress" style="marginright: 5px;">Send</button> <img src="/Content/ajax-loader.gif" ng-show="model.isAjaxInProgress" /> </td> </tr> </table> </div>  <div style="margin-top: 30px;">  <div ng-show="model.allMessages.length == 0"> No messages have been sent yet! </div>  <div ng-show="model.allMessages.length == 0"> <table style="width: 100%;" class="table table-striped"> <tr> <td>Phone Number</td> <td>Message</td> <td></td> </tr>  <tr ng-repeat="message in model.allMessages"> <td>{{ message.to }}</td> <td>{{ message.message }}</td> <td> <button class="btn btn-danger" ng-click="delete(message.smsId);" ng-disabled="model.isAjaxInProgress">Delete</button> </td> </tr> </table> </div> </div> The above code is commented and should be self explanatory. Conditional rendering is achieved through using the ng-show=”condition” attribute on various div tags. Input fields are bound to the model and the send button is bound to the sendMessage() function in the controller as through the ngclick=”sendMessage()” attribute defined on the button tag. While AJAX calls are taking place, the controller sets model.isAjaxInProgress to true. Based on this variable, buttons are disabled through the ng-disabled directive which is added as an attribute to the buttons. The ng-repeat directive added as an attribute to the tr tag causes the table row to be rendered multiple times much like an ASP.NET repeater. 3. Creating the SmsController controller The penultimate piece of our application is the controller which responds to events from our view and interacts with our MVC4 REST WebAPI. The following listing shows the code we need to add to /app/js/controllers.js. Note that controller definitions can be chained. Also note that this controller “asks for” the $http service. The $http service is a simple way in Angular to do AJAX. So far we have only encountered modules, controllers, views and directives in Angular. The $http is new entity in Angular called a service. More information on Angular services can be found at the following URL: http://docs.angularjs.org/guide/dev_guide.services.understanding_services. .controller('SmsController', ['$scope', '$http', function ($scope, $http) { //We define the model $scope.model = {}; //We define the allMessages array in the model //that will contain all the messages sent so far $scope.model.allMessages = []; //The error if any $scope.model.errorMessage = undefined; //We initially load data so set the isAjaxInProgress = true; $scope.model.isAjaxInProgress = true; //Load all the messages $http({ url: '/api/smsresource', method: "GET" }). success(function (data, status, headers, config) { this callback will be called asynchronously //when the response is available $scope.model.allMessages = data; //We are done with AJAX loading $scope.model.isAjaxInProgress = false; }). error(function (data, status, headers, config) { //called asynchronously if an error occurs //or server returns response with an error status. $scope.model.errorMessage = "Error occurred status:" + status; //We are done with AJAX loading $scope.model.isAjaxInProgress = false; }); $scope.delete = function (id) { //We are making an ajax call so we set this to true $scope.model.isAjaxInProgress = true; $http({ url: '/api/smsresource/' + id, method: "DELETE" }). success(function (data, status, headers, config) { // this callback will be called asynchronously // when the response is available $scope.model.allMessages = data; //We are done with AJAX loading $scope.model.isAjaxInProgress = false; }); error(function (data, status, headers, config) { // called asynchronously if an error occurs // or server returns response with an error status. $scope.model.errorMessage = "Error occurred status:" + status; //We are done with AJAX loading $scope.model.isAjaxInProgress = false; }); } $scope.sendMessage = function () { $scope.model.errorMessage = undefined; var message = ''; if($scope.model.message != undefined) message = $scope.model.message.trim(); if ($scope.model.phoneNumber == undefined || $scope.model.phoneNumber == '' || $scope.model.phoneNumber.length < 10 || $scope.model.phoneNumber[0] != '+') { $scope.model.errorMessage = "You must enter a valid phone number in international format. Eg: +44 7778 609466"; return; } if (message.length == 0) { $scope.model.errorMessage = "You must specify a message!"; return; } //We are making an ajax call so we set this to true $scope.model.isAjaxInProgress = true; $http({ url: '/api/smsresource', method: "POST", data: { to: $scope.model.phoneNumber, message: $scope.model.message } }). success(function (data, status, headers, config) { // this callback will be called asynchronously // when the response is available $scope.model.allMessages = data; //We are done with AJAX loading $scope.model.isAjaxInProgress = false; }). error(function (data, status, headers, config) { // called asynchronously if an error occurs // or server returns response with an error status. $scope.model.errorMessage = "Error occurred status:" + status // We are done with AJAX loading $scope.model.isAjaxInProgress = false; }); } }]); We can see from the previous listing how the functions that are called from the view are defined in the controller. It should also be evident how easy it is to make AJAX calls to consume our MVC4 REST WebAPI. Now we are left with the final piece. We need to define a route that associates a particular path with the view we have defined and the controller we have defined. 4. Add a new route that loads the controller and the partial This is the easiest part of the puzzle. We simply define another route in the /app/js/app.js file: $routeProvider.when('/sms', { templateUrl: '/app/partials/smsview.html', controller: 'SmsController' }); Conclusion In this article we have seen how much of the server side functionality in the MVC4 framework can be moved to the browser thus delivering a snappy and fast user interface. We have seen how we can build client side HTML only views that avoid the messy syntax offered by server side Razor views. We have built a functioning app from the ground up. The significant advantage of this approach to building web apps is that the front end can be completely platform independent. Even though we used ASP.NET to create our REST API, we could just easily have used any other language such as Node.js, Ruby etc without changing a single line of our front end code. Angular is a rich framework and we have only touched on basic functionality required to create a SPA. For readers who wish to delve further into the Angular framework, we would recommend the following URL as a starting point: http://docs.angularjs.org/misc/started. To get started with the code for this project: Sign up for an account at http://plus.sent.ly (free) Add your phone number Go to the “My Identies Page” Note Down your Sender ID, Consumer Key and Consumer Secret Download the code for this article at: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BzjEWqSE31yoZjZlV0d0R2Y3eW8/edit?usp=sharing Change the values of Sender Id, Consumer Key and Consumer Secret in the web.config file Run the project through Visual Studio!

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Web Browser Control – Specifying the IE Version

- by Rick Strahl

I use the Internet Explorer Web Browser Control in a lot of my applications to display document type layout. HTML happens to be one of the most common document formats and displaying data in this format – even in desktop applications, is often way easier than using normal desktop technologies. One issue the Web Browser Control has that it’s perpetually stuck in IE 7 rendering mode by default. Even though IE 8 and now 9 have significantly upgraded the IE rendering engine to be more CSS and HTML compliant by default the Web Browser control will have none of it. IE 9 in particular – with its much improved CSS support and basic HTML 5 support is a big improvement and even though the IE control uses some of IE’s internal rendering technology it’s still stuck in the old IE 7 rendering by default. This applies whether you’re using the Web Browser control in a WPF application, a WinForms app, a FoxPro or VB classic application using the ActiveX control. Behind the scenes all these UI platforms use the COM interfaces and so you’re stuck by those same rules. Rendering Challenged To see what I’m talking about here are two screen shots rendering an HTML 5 doctype page that includes some CSS 3 functionality – rounded corners and border shadows - from an earlier post. One uses IE 9 as a standalone browser, and one uses a simple WPF form that includes the Web Browser control. IE 9 Browser: Web Browser control in a WPF form: The IE 9 page displays this HTML correctly – you see the rounded corners and shadow displayed. Obviously the latter rendering using the Web Browser control in a WPF application is a bit lacking. Not only are the new CSS features missing but the page also renders in Internet Explorer’s quirks mode so all the margins, padding etc. behave differently by default, even though there’s a CSS reset applied on this page. If you’re building an application that intends to use the Web Browser control for a live preview of some HTML this is clearly undesirable. Feature Delegation via Registry Hacks Fortunately starting with Internet Explore 8 and later there’s a fix for this problem via a registry setting. You can specify a registry key to specify which rendering mode and version of IE should be used by that application. These are not global mind you – they have to be enabled for each application individually. There are two different sets of keys for 32 bit and 64 bit applications. 32 bit: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\MAIN\FeatureControl\FEATURE_BROWSER_EMULATION Value Key: yourapplication.exe 64 bit: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\MAIN\FeatureControl\FEATURE_BROWSER_EMULATION Value Key: yourapplication.exe The value to set this key to is (taken from MSDN here) as decimal values: 9999 (0x270F) Internet Explorer 9. Webpages are displayed in IE9 Standards mode, regardless of the !DOCTYPE directive. 9000 (0x2328) Internet Explorer 9. Webpages containing standards-based !DOCTYPE directives are displayed in IE9 mode. 8888 (0x22B8) Webpages are displayed in IE8 Standards mode, regardless of the !DOCTYPE directive. 8000 (0x1F40) Webpages containing standards-based !DOCTYPE directives are displayed in IE8 mode. 7000 (0x1B58) Webpages containing standards-based !DOCTYPE directives are displayed in IE7 Standards mode. The added key looks something like this in the Registry Editor: With this in place my Html Html Help Builder application which has wwhelp.exe as its main executable now works with HTML 5 and CSS 3 documents in the same way that Internet Explorer 9 does. Incidentally I accidentally added an ‘empty’ DWORD value of 0 to my EXE name and that worked as well giving me IE 9 rendering. Although not documented I suspect 0 (or an invalid value) will default to the installed browser. Don’t have a good way to test this but if somebody could try this with IE 8 installed that would be great: What happens when setting 9000 with IE 8 installed? What happens when setting 0 with IE 8 installed? Don’t forget to add Keys for Host Environments If you’re developing your application in Visual Studio and you run the debugger you may find that your application is still not rendering right, but if you run the actual generated EXE from Explorer or the OS command prompt it works. That’s because when you run the debugger in Visual Studio it wraps your application into a debugging host container. For this reason you might want to also add another registry key for yourapp.vshost.exe on your development machine. If you’re developing in Visual FoxPro make sure you add a key for vfp9.exe to see the rendering adjustments in the Visual FoxPro development environment. Cleaner HTML - no more HTML mangling! There are a number of additional benefits to setting up rendering of the Web Browser control to the IE 9 engine (or even the IE 8 engine) beyond the obvious rendering functionality. IE 9 actually returns your HTML in something that resembles the original HTML formatting, as opposed to the IE 7 default format which mangled the original HTML content. If you do the following in the WPF application: private void button2_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e) { dynamic doc = this.webBrowser.Document; MessageBox.Show(doc.body.outerHtml); } you get different output depending on the rendering mode active. With the default IE 7 rendering you get: <BODY><DIV> <H1>Rounded Corners and Shadows - Creating Dialogs in CSS</H1> <DIV class=toolbarcontainer><A class=hoverbutton href="./"><IMG src="../../css/images/home.gif"> Home</A> <A class=hoverbutton href="RoundedCornersAndShadows.htm"><IMG src="../../css/images/refresh.gif"> Refresh</A> </DIV> <DIV class=containercontent> <FIELDSET><LEGEND>Plain Box</LEGEND> <DIV style="BORDER-BOTTOM: steelblue 2px solid; BORDER-LEFT: steelblue 2px solid; WIDTH: 550px; BORDER-TOP: steelblue 2px solid; BORDER-RIGHT: steelblue 2px solid" class="roundbox boxshadow"> <DIV style="BACKGROUND: khaki" class="boxcontenttext roundbox">Simple Rounded Corner Box. </DIV></DIV></FIELDSET> <FIELDSET><LEGEND>Box with Header</LEGEND> <DIV style="BORDER-BOTTOM: steelblue 2px solid; BORDER-LEFT: steelblue 2px solid; WIDTH: 550px; BORDER-TOP: steelblue 2px solid; BORDER-RIGHT: steelblue 2px solid" class="roundbox boxshadow"> <DIV class="gridheaderleft roundbox-top">Box with a Header</DIV> <DIV style="BACKGROUND: khaki" class="boxcontenttext roundbox-bottom">Simple Rounded Corner Box. </DIV></DIV></FIELDSET> <FIELDSET><LEGEND>Dialog Style Window</LEGEND> <DIV style="POSITION: relative; WIDTH: 450px" id=divDialog class="dialog boxshadow" jQuery16107208195684204002="2"> <DIV style="POSITION: relative" class=dialog-header> <DIV class=closebox></DIV>User Sign-in <DIV class=closebox jQuery16107208195684204002="3"></DIV></DIV> <DIV class=descriptionheader>This dialog is draggable and closable</DIV> <DIV class=dialog-content><LABEL>Username:</LABEL> <INPUT name=txtUsername value=" "> <LABEL>Password</LABEL> <INPUT name=txtPassword value=" "> <HR> <INPUT id=btnLogin value=Login type=button> </DIV> <DIV class=dialog-statusbar>Ready</DIV></DIV></FIELDSET> </DIV> <SCRIPT type=text/javascript> $(document).ready(function () { $("#divDialog") .draggable({ handle: ".dialog-header" }) .closable({ handle: ".dialog-header", closeHandler: function () { alert("Window about to be closed."); return true; // true closes - false leaves open } }); }); </SCRIPT> </DIV></BODY> Now lest you think I’m out of my mind and create complete whacky HTML rooted in the last century, here’s the IE 9 rendering mode output which looks a heck of a lot cleaner and a lot closer to my original HTML of the page I’m accessing: <body> <div> <h1>Rounded Corners and Shadows - Creating Dialogs in CSS</h1> <div class="toolbarcontainer"> <a class="hoverbutton" href="./"> <img src="../../css/images/home.gif"> Home</a> <a class="hoverbutton" href="RoundedCornersAndShadows.htm"> <img src="../../css/images/refresh.gif"> Refresh</a> </div> <div class="containercontent"> <fieldset> <legend>Plain Box</legend>  <div style="border: 2px solid steelblue; width: 550px;" class="roundbox boxshadow"> <div style="background: khaki;" class="boxcontenttext roundbox"> Simple Rounded Corner Box. </div> </div> </fieldset> <fieldset> <legend>Box with Header</legend> <div style="border: 2px solid steelblue; width: 550px;" class="roundbox boxshadow"> <div class="gridheaderleft roundbox-top">Box with a Header</div> <div style="background: khaki;" class="boxcontenttext roundbox-bottom"> Simple Rounded Corner Box. </div> </div> </fieldset> <fieldset> <legend>Dialog Style Window</legend> <div style="width: 450px; position: relative;" id="divDialog" class="dialog boxshadow"> <div style="position: relative;" class="dialog-header"> <div class="closebox"></div> User Sign-in <div class="closebox"></div></div> <div class="descriptionheader">This dialog is draggable and closable</div> <div class="dialog-content"> <label>Username:</label> <input name="txtUsername" value=" " type="text"> <label>Password</label> <input name="txtPassword" value=" " type="text"> <hr/> <input id="btnLogin" value="Login" type="button"> </div> <div class="dialog-statusbar">Ready</div> </div> </fieldset> </div> <script type="text/javascript"> $(document).ready(function () { $("#divDialog") .draggable({ handle: ".dialog-header" }) .closable({ handle: ".dialog-header", closeHandler: function () { alert("Window about to be closed."); return true; // true closes - false leaves open } }); }); </script> </div> </body> IOW, in IE9 rendering mode IE9 is much closer (but not identical) to the original HTML from the page on the Web that we’re reading from. As a side note: Unfortunately, the browser feature emulation can't be applied against the Html Help (CHM) Engine in Windows which uses the Web Browser control (or COM interfaces anyway) to render Html Help content. I tried setting up hh.exe which is the help viewer, to use IE 9 rendering but a help file generated with CSS3 features will simply show in IE 7 mode. Bummer - this would have been a nice quick fix to allow help content served from CHM files to look better. HTML Editing leaves HTML formatting intact In the same vane, if you do any inline HTML editing in the control by setting content to be editable, IE 9’s control does a much more reasonable job of creating usable and somewhat valid HTML. It also leaves the original content alone other than the text your are editing or adding. No longer is the HTML output stripped of excess spaces and reformatted in IEs format. So if I do: private void button3_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e) { dynamic doc = this.webBrowser.Document; doc.body.contentEditable = true; } and then make some changes to the document by typing into it using IE 9 mode, the document formatting stays intact and only the affected content is modified. The created HTML is reasonably clean (although it does lack proper XHTML formatting for things like <br/> <hr/>). This is very different from IE 7 mode which mangled the HTML as soon as the page was loaded into the control. Any editing you did stripped out all white space and lost all of your existing XHTML formatting. In IE 9 mode at least *most* of your original formatting stays intact. This is huge! In Html Help Builder I have supported HTML editing for a long time but the HTML mangling by the Web Browser control made it very difficult to edit the HTML later. Previously IE would mangle the HTML by stripping out spaces, upper casing all tags and converting many XHTML safe tags to its HTML 3 tags. Now IE leaves most of my document alone while editing, and creates cleaner and more compliant markup (with exception of self-closing elements like BR/HR). The end result is that I now have HTML editing in place that's much cleaner and actually capable of being manually edited. Caveats, Caveats, Caveats It wouldn't be Internet Explorer if there weren't some major compatibility issues involved in using this various browser version interaction. The biggest thing I ran into is that there are odd differences in some of the COM interfaces and what they return. I specifically ran into a problem with the document.selection.createRange() function which with IE 7 compatibility returns an expected text range object. When running in IE 8 or IE 9 mode however. I could not retrieve a valid text range with this code where loEdit is the WebBrowser control: loRange = loEdit.document.selection.CreateRange() The loRange object returned (here in FoxPro) had a length property of 0 but none of the other properties of the TextRange or TextRangeCollection objects were available. I figured this was due to some changed security settings but even after elevating the Intranet Security Zone and mucking with the other browser feature flags pertaining to security I had no luck. In the end I relented and used a JavaScript function in my editor document that returns a selection range object: function getselectionrange() { var range = document.selection.createRange(); return range; } and call that JavaScript function from my host applications code: *** Use a function in the document to get around HTML Editing issues loRange = loEdit.document.parentWindow.getselectionrange(.f.) and that does work correctly. This wasn't a big deal as I'm already loading a support script file into the editor page so all I had to do is add the function to this existing script file. You can find out more how to call script code in the Web Browser control from a host application in a previous post of mine. IE 8 and 9 also clamp down the security environment a little more than the default IE 7 control, so there may be other issues you run into. Other than the createRange() problem above I haven't seen anything else that is breaking in my code so far though and that's encouraging at least since it uses a lot of HTML document manipulation for the custom editor I've created (and would love to replace - any PROFESSIONAL alternatives anybody?) Registry Key Installation for your Application It’s important to remember that this registry setting is made per application, so most likely this is something you want to set up with your installer. Also remember that 32 and 64 bit settings require separate settings in the registry so if you’re creating your installer you most likely will want to set both keys in the registry preemptively for your application. I use Tarma Installer for all of my application installs and in Tarma I configure registry keys for both and set a flag to only install the latter key group in the 64 bit version: Because this setting is application specific you have to do this for every application you install unfortunately, but this also means that you can safely configure this setting in the registry because it is after only applied to your application. Another problem with install based installation is version detection. If IE 8 is installed I’d want 8000 for the value, if IE 9 is installed I want 9000. I can do this easily in code but in the installer this is much more difficult. I don’t have a good solution for this at the moment, but given that the app works with IE 7 mode now, IE 9 mode is just a bonus for the moment. If IE 9 is not installed and 9000 is used the default rendering will remain in use. It sure would be nice if we could specify the IE rendering mode as a property, but I suspect the ActiveX container has to know before it loads what actual version to load up and once loaded can only load a single version of IE. This would account for this annoying application level configuration… Summary The registry feature emulation has been available for quite some time, but I just found out about it today and started experimenting around with it. I’m stoked to see that this is available as I’d pretty much given up in ever seeing any better rendering in the Web Browser control. Now at least my apps can take advantage of newer HTML features. Now if we could only get better HTML Editing support somehow <snicker>… ah can’t have everything.© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2011Posted in .NET FoxPro Windows

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Setting up Mono/ASP.NET 4.0 on Apache2/Ubuntu: Virtual hosts?

- by Dave

I'm attempting to setup Mono/ASP.NET 4.0 on my Apache server (which is running on Ubuntu). Thus far, I've been following a few tutorials/scripts supplied here, and here. As of now: Apache 2.2 is installed (accessible via 'localhost') Mono 2.10.5 is installed However, I'm struggling to configure Apache correctly... apparently the Virtual Host setting isn't doing its job and invoking the mod_mono plugin, nor is it even pulling source from the proper directory. While the Virtual Host setting points to '\srv\www\localhost', it clearly is pulling content instead from 'var/www/', which I've found is the default DocumentRoot for virtual hosts. I can confirm: "/opt/mono-2.10/bin/mod-mono-server4" exists. Virtual hosts file is being read, since undoing the comment in the main httpd.conf changed the root directory from 'htdocs' to 'var/www/' The Mono installation is at least semi-capable of running ASP 4.0, as evidenced by running XSP, navigating to 0.0.0.0:8080/ and getting an ASP.NET style error page with "Mono ASP 4.0.x" at the bottom. Can anyone point out how to fix these configurations and get Mono linked up with Apache? Here are my configs and relevant information: /usr/local/apache2/conf/httpd.conf: # # This is the main Apache HTTP server configuration file. It contains the # configuration directives that give the server its instructions. # See <URL:http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2> for detailed information. # In particular, see # <URL:http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/mod/directives.html> # for a discussion of each configuration directive. # # Do NOT simply read the instructions in here without understanding # what they do. They're here only as hints or reminders. If you are unsure # consult the online docs. You have been warned. # # Configuration and logfile names: If the filenames you specify for many # of the server's control files begin with "/" (or "drive:/" for Win32), the # server will use that explicit path. If the filenames do *not* begin # with "/", the value of ServerRoot is prepended -- so "logs/foo_log" # with ServerRoot set to "/usr/local/apache2" will be interpreted by the # server as "/usr/local/apache2/logs/foo_log". # # ServerRoot: The top of the directory tree under which the server's # configuration, error, and log files are kept. # # Do not add a slash at the end of the directory path. If you point # ServerRoot at a non-local disk, be sure to point the LockFile directive # at a local disk. If you wish to share the same ServerRoot for multiple # httpd daemons, you will need to change at least LockFile and PidFile. # ServerRoot "/usr/local/apache2" # # Listen: Allows you to bind Apache to specific IP addresses and/or # ports, instead of the default. See also the <VirtualHost> # directive. # # Change this to Listen on specific IP addresses as shown below to # prevent Apache from glomming onto all bound IP addresses. # #Listen 12.34.56.78:80 Listen 80 # # Dynamic Shared Object (DSO) Support # # To be able to use the functionality of a module which was built as a DSO you # have to place corresponding `LoadModule' lines at this location so the # directives contained in it are actually available _before_ they are used. # Statically compiled modules (those listed by `httpd -l') do not need # to be loaded here. # # Example: # LoadModule foo_module modules/mod_foo.so # <IfModule !mpm_netware_module> <IfModule !mpm_winnt_module> # # If you wish httpd to run as a different user or group, you must run # httpd as root initially and it will switch. # # User/Group: The name (or #number) of the user/group to run httpd as. # It is usually good practice to create a dedicated user and group for # running httpd, as with most system services. # User daemon Group daemon </IfModule> </IfModule> # 'Main' server configuration # # The directives in this section set up the values used by the 'main' # server, which responds to any requests that aren't handled by a # <VirtualHost> definition. These values also provide defaults for # any <VirtualHost> containers you may define later in the file. # # All of these directives may appear inside <VirtualHost> containers, # in which case these default settings will be overridden for the # virtual host being defined. # # # ServerAdmin: Your address, where problems with the server should be # e-mailed. This address appears on some server-generated pages, such # as error documents. e.g. [email protected] # ServerAdmin david@localhost # # ServerName gives the name and port that the server uses to identify itself. # This can often be determined automatically, but we recommend you specify # it explicitly to prevent problems during startup. # # If your host doesn't have a registered DNS name, enter its IP address here. # ServerName localhost:80 # # DocumentRoot: The directory out of which you will serve your # documents. By default, all requests are taken from this directory, but # symbolic links and aliases may be used to point to other locations. # DocumentRoot "/usr/local/apache2/htdocs" # # Each directory to which Apache has access can be configured with respect # to which services and features are allowed and/or disabled in that # directory (and its subdirectories). # # First, we configure the "default" to be a very restrictive set of # features. # <Directory /> Options FollowSymLinks AllowOverride None Order deny,allow Deny from all </Directory> # # Note that from this point forward you must specifically allow # particular features to be enabled - so if something's not working as # you might expect, make sure that you have specifically enabled it # below. # # # This should be changed to whatever you set DocumentRoot to. # <Directory "/usr/local/apache2/htdocs"> # # Possible values for the Options directive are "None", "All", # or any combination of: # Indexes Includes FollowSymLinks SymLinksifOwnerMatch ExecCGI MultiViews # # Note that "MultiViews" must be named *explicitly* --- "Options All" # doesn't give it to you. # # The Options directive is both complicated and important. Please see # http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/mod/core.html#options # for more information. # Options Indexes FollowSymLinks # # AllowOverride controls what directives may be placed in .htaccess files. # It can be "All", "None", or any combination of the keywords: # Options FileInfo AuthConfig Limit # AllowOverride None # # Controls who can get stuff from this server. # Order allow,deny Allow from all </Directory> # # DirectoryIndex: sets the file that Apache will serve if a directory # is requested. # <IfModule dir_module> DirectoryIndex index.html </IfModule> # # The following lines prevent .htaccess and .htpasswd files from being # viewed by Web clients. # <FilesMatch "^\.ht"> Order allow,deny Deny from all Satisfy All </FilesMatch> # # ErrorLog: The location of the error log file. # If you do not specify an ErrorLog directive within a <VirtualHost> # container, error messages relating to that virtual host will be # logged here. If you *do* define an error logfile for a <VirtualHost> # container, that host's errors will be logged there and not here. # ErrorLog "logs/error_log" # # LogLevel: Control the number of messages logged to the error_log. # Possible values include: debug, info, notice, warn, error, crit, # alert, emerg. # LogLevel warn <IfModule log_config_module> # # The following directives define some format nicknames for use with # a CustomLog directive (see below). # LogFormat "%h %l %u %t \"%r\" %>s %b \"%{Referer}i\" \"%{User-Agent}i\"" combined LogFormat "%h %l %u %t \"%r\" %>s %b" common <IfModule logio_module> # You need to enable mod_logio.c to use %I and %O LogFormat "%h %l %u %t \"%r\" %>s %b \"%{Referer}i\" \"%{User-Agent}i\" %I %O" combinedio </IfModule> # # The location and format of the access logfile (Common Logfile Format). # If you do not define any access logfiles within a <VirtualHost> # container, they will be logged here. Contrariwise, if you *do* # define per-<VirtualHost> access logfiles, transactions will be # logged therein and *not* in this file. # CustomLog "logs/access_log" common # # If you prefer a logfile with access, agent, and referer information # (Combined Logfile Format) you can use the following directive. # #CustomLog "logs/access_log" combined </IfModule> <IfModule alias_module> # # Redirect: Allows you to tell clients about documents that used to # exist in your server's namespace, but do not anymore. The client # will make a new request for the document at its new location. # Example: # Redirect permanent /foo http://www.example.com/bar # # Alias: Maps web paths into filesystem paths and is used to # access content that does not live under the DocumentRoot. # Example: # Alias /webpath /full/filesystem/path # # If you include a trailing / on /webpath then the server will # require it to be present in the URL. You will also likely # need to provide a <Directory> section to allow access to # the filesystem path. # # ScriptAlias: This controls which directories contain server scripts. # ScriptAliases are essentially the same as Aliases, except that # documents in the target directory are treated as applications and # run by the server when requested rather than as documents sent to the # client. The same rules about trailing "/" apply to ScriptAlias # directives as to Alias. # ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ "/usr/local/apache2/cgi-bin/" </IfModule> <IfModule cgid_module> # # ScriptSock: On threaded servers, designate the path to the UNIX # socket used to communicate with the CGI daemon of mod_cgid. # #Scriptsock logs/cgisock </IfModule> # # "/usr/local/apache2/cgi-bin" should be changed to whatever your ScriptAliased # CGI directory exists, if you have that configured. # <Directory "/usr/local/apache2/cgi-bin"> AllowOverride None Options None Order allow,deny Allow from all </Directory> # # DefaultType: the default MIME type the server will use for a document # if it cannot otherwise determine one, such as from filename extensions. # If your server contains mostly text or HTML documents, "text/plain" is # a good value. If most of your content is binary, such as applications # or images, you may want to use "application/octet-stream" instead to # keep browsers from trying to display binary files as though they are # text. # DefaultType text/plain <IfModule mime_module> # # TypesConfig points to the file containing the list of mappings from # filename extension to MIME-type. # TypesConfig conf/mime.types # # AddType allows you to add to or override the MIME configuration # file specified in TypesConfig for specific file types. # #AddType application/x-gzip .tgz # # AddEncoding allows you to have certain browsers uncompress # information on the fly. Note: Not all browsers support this. # #AddEncoding x-compress .Z #AddEncoding x-gzip .gz .tgz # # If the AddEncoding directives above are commented-out, then you # probably should define those extensions to indicate media types: # AddType application/x-compress .Z AddType application/x-gzip .gz .tgz # # AddHandler allows you to map certain file extensions to "handlers": # actions unrelated to filetype. These can be either built into the server # or added with the Action directive (see below) # # To use CGI scripts outside of ScriptAliased directories: # (You will also need to add "ExecCGI" to the "Options" directive.) # #AddHandler cgi-script .cgi # For type maps (negotiated resources): #AddHandler type-map var # # Filters allow you to process content before it is sent to the client. # # To parse .shtml files for server-side includes (SSI): # (You will also need to add "Includes" to the "Options" directive.) # #AddType text/html .shtml #AddOutputFilter INCLUDES .shtml </IfModule> # # The mod_mime_magic module allows the server to use various hints from the # contents of the file itself to determine its type. The MIMEMagicFile # directive tells the module where the hint definitions are located. # #MIMEMagicFile conf/magic # # Customizable error responses come in three flavors: # 1) plain text 2) local redirects 3) external redirects # # Some examples: #ErrorDocument 500 "The server made a boo boo." #ErrorDocument 404 /missing.html #ErrorDocument 404 "/cgi-bin/missing_handler.pl" #ErrorDocument 402 http://www.example.com/subscription_info.html # # # MaxRanges: Maximum number of Ranges in a request before # returning the entire resource, or 0 for unlimited # Default setting is to accept 200 Ranges #MaxRanges 0 # # EnableMMAP and EnableSendfile: On systems that support it, # memory-mapping or the sendfile syscall is used to deliver # files. This usually improves server performance, but must # be turned off when serving from networked-mounted # filesystems or if support for these functions is otherwise # broken on your system. # #EnableMMAP off #EnableSendfile off # Supplemental configuration # # The configuration files in the conf/extra/ directory can be # included to add extra features or to modify the default configuration of # the server, or you may simply copy their contents here and change as # necessary. # Server-pool management (MPM specific) #Include conf/extra/httpd-mpm.conf # Multi-language error messages #Include conf/extra/httpd-multilang-errordoc.conf # Fancy directory listings #Include conf/extra/httpd-autoindex.conf # Language settings #Include conf/extra/httpd-languages.conf # User home directories #Include conf/extra/httpd-userdir.conf # Real-time info on requests and configuration #Include conf/extra/httpd-info.conf # Virtual hosts Include conf/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf # Local access to the Apache HTTP Server Manual #Include conf/extra/httpd-manual.conf # Distributed authoring and versioning (WebDAV) #Include conf/extra/httpd-dav.conf # Various default settings #Include conf/extra/httpd-default.conf # Secure (SSL/TLS) connections #Include conf/extra/httpd-ssl.conf # # Note: The following must must be present to support # starting without SSL on platforms with no /dev/random equivalent # but a statically compiled-in mod_ssl. # <IfModule ssl_module> SSLRandomSeed startup builtin SSLRandomSeed connect builtin </IfModule> * /usr/local/apache2/conf/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf * # # Virtual Hosts # # If you want to maintain multiple domains/hostnames on your # machine you can setup VirtualHost containers for them. Most configurations # use only name-based virtual hosts so the server doesn't need to worry about # IP addresses. This is indicated by the asterisks in the directives below. # # Please see the documentation at # <URL:http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/vhosts/> # for further details before you try to setup virtual hosts. # # You may use the command line option '-S' to verify your virtual host # configuration. # # Use name-based virtual hosting. # NameVirtualHost *:80 # # VirtualHost example: # Almost any Apache directive may go into a VirtualHost container. # The first VirtualHost section is used for all requests that do not # match a ServerName or ServerAlias in any <VirtualHost> block. # <VirtualHost *:80> ServerName localhost ServerAdmin david@localhost DocumentRoot "/srv/www/localhost" # MonoServerPath can be changed to specify which version of ASP.NET is hosted # mod-mono-server1 = ASP.NET 1.1 / mod-mono-server2 = ASP.NET 2.0 # For SUSE Linux Enterprise Mono Extension, uncomment the line below: # MonoServerPath localhost "/opt/novell/mono/bin/mod-mono-server2" # For Mono on openSUSE, uncomment the line below instead: MonoServerPath localhost "/opt/mono-2.10/bin/mod-mono-server4" # To obtain line numbers in stack traces you need to do two things: # 1) Enable Debug code generation in your page by using the Debug="true" # page directive, or by setting <compilation debug="true" /> in the # application's Web.config # 2) Uncomment the MonoDebug true directive below to enable mod_mono debugging MonoDebug localhost true # The MONO_IOMAP environment variable can be configured to provide platform abstraction # for file access in Linux. Valid values for MONO_IOMAP are: # case # drive # all # Uncomment the line below to alter file access behavior for the configured application MonoSetEnv localhost PATH=/opt/mono-2.10/bin:$PATH;LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/opt/mono-2.10/lib:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH; # # Additional environtment variables can be set for this server instance using # the MonoSetEnv directive. MonoSetEnv takes a string of 'name=value' pairs # separated by semicolons. For instance, to enable platform abstraction *and* # use Mono's old regular expression interpreter (which is slower, but has a # shorter setup time), uncomment the line below instead: # MonoSetEnv localhost MONO_IOMAP=all;MONO_OLD_RX=1 MonoApplications localhost "/:/srv/www/localhost" <Location "/"> Allow from all Order allow,deny MonoSetServerAlias localhost SetHandler mono SetOutputFilter DEFLATE SetEnvIfNoCase Request_URI "\.(?:gif|jpe?g|png)$" no-gzip dont-vary </Location> <IfModule mod_deflate.c> AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/html text/plain text/xml text/javascript </IfModule> </VirtualHost> <VirtualHost *:80> ServerAdmin [email protected] DocumentRoot "/usr/local/apache2/docs/dummy-host.example.com" ServerName dummy-host.example.com ServerAlias www.dummy-host.example.com ErrorLog "logs/dummy-host.example.com-error_log" CustomLog "logs/dummy-host.example.com-access_log" common </VirtualHost> <VirtualHost *:80> ServerAdmin [email protected] DocumentRoot "/usr/local/apache2/docs/dummy-host2.example.com" ServerName dummy-host2.example.com ErrorLog "logs/dummy-host2.example.com-error_log" CustomLog "logs/dummy-host2.example.com-access_log" common </VirtualHost> mono -V output: root@david-ubuntu:~# mono -V Mono JIT compiler version 2.6.7 (Debian 2.6.7-5ubuntu3) Copyright (C) 2002-2010 Novell, Inc and Contributors. www.mono-project.com TLS: __thread GC: Included Boehm (with typed GC and Parallel Mark) SIGSEGV: altstack Notifications: epoll Architecture: amd64 Disabled: none

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Using HTML 5 SessionState to save rendered Page Content

- by Rick Strahl

HTML 5 SessionState and LocalStorage are very useful and super easy to use to manage client side state. For building rich client side or SPA style applications it's a vital feature to be able to cache user data as well as HTML content in order to swap pages in and out of the browser's DOM. What might not be so obvious is that you can also use the sessionState and localStorage objects even in classic server rendered HTML applications to provide caching features between pages. These APIs have been around for a long time and are supported by most relatively modern browsers and even all the way back to IE8, so you can use them safely in your Web applications. SessionState and LocalStorage are easy The APIs that make up sessionState and localStorage are very simple. Both object feature the same API interface which is a simple, string based key value store that has getItem, setItem, removeitem, clear and key methods. The objects are also pseudo array objects and so can be iterated like an array with a length property and you have array indexers to set and get values with. Basic usage for storing and retrieval looks like this (using sessionStorage, but the syntax is the same for localStorage - just switch the objects):// set var lastAccess = new Date().getTime(); if (sessionStorage) sessionStorage.setItem("myapp_time", lastAccess.toString()); // retrieve in another page or on a refresh var time = null; if (sessionStorage) time = sessionStorage.getItem("myapp_time"); if (time) time = new Date(time * 1); else time = new Date(); sessionState stores data that is browser session specific and that has a liftetime of the active browser session or window. Shut down the browser or tab and the storage goes away. localStorage uses the same API interface, but the lifetime of the data is permanently stored in the browsers storage area until deleted via code or by clearing out browser cookies (not the cache). Both sessionStorage and localStorage space is limited. The spec is ambiguous about this - supposedly sessionStorage should allow for unlimited size, but it appears that most WebKit browsers support only 2.5mb for either object. This means you have to be careful what you store especially since other applications might be running on the same domain and also use the storage mechanisms. That said 2.5mb worth of character data is quite a bit and would go a long way. The easiest way to get a feel for how sessionState and localStorage work is to look at a simple example. You can go check out the following example online in Plunker: http://plnkr.co/edit/0ICotzkoPjHaWa70GlRZ?p=preview which looks like this: Plunker is an online HTML/JavaScript editor that lets you write and run Javascript code and similar to JsFiddle, but a bit cleaner to work in IMHO (thanks to John Papa for turning me on to it). The sample has two text boxes with counts that update session/local storage every time you click the related button. The counts are 'cached' in Session and Local storage. The point of these examples is that both counters survive full page reloads, and the LocalStorage counter survives a complete browser shutdown and restart. Go ahead and try it out by clicking the Reload button after updating both counters and then shutting down the browser completely and going back to the same URL (with the same browser). What you should see is that reloads leave both counters intact at the counted values, while a browser restart will leave only the local storage counter intact. The code to deal with the SessionStorage (and LocalStorage not shown here) in the example is isolated into a couple of wrapper methods to simplify the code: function getSessionCount() { var count = 0; if (sessionStorage) { var count = sessionStorage.getItem("ss_count"); count = !count ? 0 : count * 1; } $("#txtSession").val(count); return count; } function setSessionCount(count) { if (sessionStorage) sessionStorage.setItem("ss_count", count.toString()); } These two functions essentially load and store a session counter value. The two key methods used here are: sessionStorage.getItem(key); sessionStorage.setItem(key,stringVal); Note that the value given to setItem and return by getItem has to be a string. If you pass another type you get an error. Don't let that limit you though - you can easily enough store JSON data in a variable so it's quite possible to pass complex objects and store them into a single sessionStorage value:var user = { name: "Rick", id="ricks", level=8 } sessionStorage.setItem("app_user",JSON.stringify(user)); to retrieve it:var user = sessionStorage.getItem("app_user"); if (user) user = JSON.parse(user); Simple! If you're using the Chrome Developer Tools (F12) you can also check out the session and local storage state on the Resource tab: You can also use this tool to refresh or remove entries from storage. What we just looked at is a purely client side implementation where a couple of counters are stored. For rich client centric AJAX applications sessionStorage and localStorage provide a very nice and simple API to store application state while the application is running. But you can also use these storage mechanisms to manage server centric HTML applications when you combine server rendering with some JavaScript to perform client side data caching. You can both store some state information and data on the client (ie. store a JSON object and carry it forth between server rendered HTML requests) or you can use it for good old HTTP based caching where some rendered HTML is saved and then restored later. Let's look at the latter with a real life example. Why do I need Client-side Page Caching for Server Rendered HTML? I don't know about you, but in a lot of my existing server driven applications I have lists that display a fair amount of data. Typically these lists contain links to then drill down into more specific data either for viewing or editing. You can then click on a link and go off to a detail page that provides more concise content. So far so good. But now you're done with the detail page and need to get back to the list, so you click on a 'bread crumbs trail' or an application level 'back to list' button and… …you end up back at the top of the list - the scroll position, the current selection in some cases even filters conditions - all gone with the wind. You've left behind the state of the list and are starting from scratch in your browsing of the list from the top. Not cool! Sound familiar? This a pretty common scenario with server rendered HTML content where it's so common to display lists to drill into, only to lose state in the process of returning back to the original list. Look at just about any traditional forums application, or even StackOverFlow to see what I mean here. Scroll down a bit to look at a post or entry, drill in then use the bread crumbs or tab to go back… In some cases returning to the top of a list is not a big deal. On StackOverFlow that sort of works because content is turning around so quickly you probably want to actually look at the top posts. Not always though - if you're browsing through a list of search topics you're interested in and drill in there's no way back to that position. Essentially anytime you're actively browsing the items in the list, that's when state becomes important and if it's not handled the user experience can be really disrupting. Content Caching If you're building client centric SPA style applications this is a fairly easy to solve problem - you tend to render the list once and then update the page content to overlay the detail content, only hiding the list temporarily until it's used again later. It's relatively easy to accomplish this simply by hiding content on the page and later making it visible again. But if you use server rendered content, hanging on to all the detail like filters, selections and scroll position is not quite as easy. Or is it??? This is where sessionStorage comes in handy. What if we just save the rendered content of a previous page, and then restore it when we return to this page based on a special flag that tells us to use the cached version? Let's see how we can do this. A real World Use Case Recently my local ISP asked me to help out with updating an ancient classifieds application. They had a very busy, local classifieds app that was originally an ASP classic application. The old app was - wait for it: frames based - and even though I lobbied against it, the decision was made to keep the frames based layout to allow rapid browsing of the hundreds of posts that are made on a daily basis. The primary reason they wanted this was precisely for the ability to quickly browse content item by item. While I personally hate working with Frames, I have to admit that the UI actually works well with the frames layout as long as you're running on a large desktop screen. You can check out the frames based desktop site here: http://classifieds.gorge.net/ However when I rebuilt the app I also added a secondary view that doesn't use frames. The main reason for this of course was for mobile displays which work horribly with frames. So there's a somewhat mobile friendly interface to the interface, which ditches the frames and uses some responsive design tweaking for mobile capable operation: http://classifeds.gorge.net/mobile (or browse the base url with your browser width under 800px) Here's what the mobile, non-frames view looks like: As you can see this means that the list of classifieds posts now is a list and there's a separate page for drilling down into the item. And of course… originally we ran into that usability issue I mentioned earlier where the browse, view detail, go back to the list cycle resulted in lost list state. Originally in mobile mode you scrolled through the list, found an item to look at and drilled in to display the item detail. Then you clicked back to the list and BAM - you've lost your place. Because there are so many items added on a daily basis the full list is never fully loaded, but rather there's a "Load Additional Listings" entry at the button. Not only did we originally lose our place when coming back to the list, but any 'additionally loaded' items are no longer there because the list was now rendering as if it was the first page hit. The additional listings, and any filters, the selection of an item all were lost. Major Suckage! Using Client SessionStorage to cache Server Rendered Content To work around this problem I decided to cache the rendered page content from the list in SessionStorage. Anytime the list renders or is updated with Load Additional Listings, the page HTML is cached and stored in Session Storage. Any back links from the detail page or the login or write entry forms then point back to the list page with a back=true query string parameter. If the server side sees this parameter it doesn't render the part of the page that is cached. Instead the client side code retrieves the data from the sessionState cache and simply inserts it into the page. It sounds pretty simple, and the overall the process is really easy, but there are a few gotchas that I'll discuss in a minute. But first let's look at the implementation. Let's start with the server side here because that'll give a quick idea of the doc structure. As I mentioned the server renders data from an ASP.NET MVC view. On the list page when returning to the list page from the display page (or a host of other pages) looks like this: https://classifieds.gorge.net/list?back=True The query string value is a flag, that indicates whether the server should render the HTML. Here's what the top level MVC Razor view for the list page looks like:@model MessageListViewModel @{ ViewBag.Title = "Classified Listing"; bool isBack = !string.IsNullOrEmpty(Request.QueryString["back"]); } <form method="post" action="@Url.Action("list")"> <div id="SizingContainer"> @if (!isBack) { @Html.Partial("List_CommandBar_Partial", Model) <div id="PostItemContainer" class="scrollbox" xstyle="-webkit-overflow-scrolling: touch;"> @Html.Partial("List_Items_Partial", Model) @if (Model.RequireLoadEntry) { <div class="postitem loadpostitems" style="padding: 15px;"> <div id="LoadProgress" class="smallprogressright"></div> <div class="control-progress"> Load additional listings... </div> </div> } </div> } </div> </form> As you can see the query string triggers a conditional block that if set is simply not rendered. The content inside of #SizingContainer basically holds the entire page's HTML sans the headers and scripts, but including the filter options and menu at the top. In this case this makes good sense - in other situations the fact that the menu or filter options might be dynamically updated might make you only cache the list rather than essentially the entire page. In this particular instance all of the content works and produces the proper result as both the list along with any filter conditions in the form inputs are restored. Ok, let's move on to the client. On the client there are two page level functions that deal with saving and restoring state. Like the counter example I showed earlier, I like to wrap the logic to save and restore values from sessionState into a separate function because they are almost always used in several places.page.saveData = function(id) { if (!sessionStorage) return; var data = { id: id, scroll: $("#PostItemContainer").scrollTop(), html: $("#SizingContainer").html() }; sessionStorage.setItem("list_html",JSON.stringify(data)); }; page.restoreData = function() { if (!sessionStorage) return; var data = sessionStorage.getItem("list_html"); if (!data) return null; return JSON.parse(data); }; The data that is saved is an object which contains an ID which is the selected element when the user clicks and a scroll position. These two values are used to reset the scroll position when the data is used from the cache. Finally the html from the #SizingContainer element is stored, which makes for the bulk of the document's HTML. In this application the HTML captured could be a substantial bit of data. If you recall, I mentioned that the server side code renders a small chunk of data initially and then gets more data if the user reads through the first 50 or so items. The rest of the items retrieved can be rather sizable. Other than the JSON deserialization that's Ok. Since I'm using SessionStorage the storage space has no immediate limits. Next is the core logic to handle saving and restoring the page state. At first though this would seem pretty simple, and in some cases it might be, but as the following code demonstrates there are a few gotchas to watch out for. Here's the relevant code I use to save and restore:$( function() { … var isBack = getUrlEncodedKey("back", location.href); if (isBack) { // remove the back key from URL setUrlEncodedKey("back", "", location.href); var data = page.restoreData(); // restore from sessionState if (!data) { // no data - force redisplay of the server side default list window.location = "list"; return; } $("#SizingContainer").html(data.html); var el = $(".postitem[data-id=" + data.id + "]"); $(".postitem").removeClass("highlight"); el.addClass("highlight"); $("#PostItemContainer").scrollTop(data.scroll); setTimeout(function() { el.removeClass("highlight"); }, 2500); } else if (window.noFrames) page.saveData(null); // save when page loads $("#SizingContainer").on("click", ".postitem", function() { var id = $(this).attr("data-id"); if (!id) return true; if (window.noFrames) page.saveData(id); var contentFrame = window.parent.frames["Content"]; if (contentFrame) contentFrame.location.href = "show/" + id; else window.location.href = "show/" + id; return false; }); … The code starts out by checking for the back query string flag which triggers restoring from the client cache. If cached the cached data structure is read from sessionStorage. It's important here to check if data was returned. If the user had back=true on the querystring but there is no cached data, he likely bookmarked this page or otherwise shut down the browser and came back to this URL. In that case the server didn't render any detail and we have no cached data, so all we can do is redirect to the original default list view using window.location. If we continued the page would render no data - so make sure to always check the cache retrieval result. Always! If there is data the it's loaded and the data.html data is restored back into the document by simply injecting the HTML back into the document's #SizingContainer element:$("#SizingContainer").html(data.html); It's that simple and it's quite quick even with a fully loaded list of additional items and on a phone. The actual HTML data is stored to the cache on every page load initially and then again when the user clicks on an element to navigate to a particular listing. The former ensures that the client cache always has something in it, and the latter updates with additional information for the selected element. For the click handling I use a data-id attribute on the list item (.postitem) in the list and retrieve the id from that. That id is then used to navigate to the actual entry as well as storing that Id value in the saved cached data. The id is used to reset the selection by searching for the data-id value in the restored elements. The overall process of this save/restore process is pretty straight forward and it doesn't require a bunch of code, yet it yields a huge improvement in the usability of the site on mobile devices (or anybody who uses the non-frames view). Some things to watch out for As easy as it conceptually seems to simply store and retrieve cached content, you have to be quite aware what type of content you are caching. The code above is all that's specific to cache/restore cycle and it works, but it took a few tweaks to the rest of the script code and server code to make it all work. There were a few gotchas that weren't immediately obvious. Here are a few things to pay attention to: Event Handling Logic Timing of manipulating DOM events Inline Script Code Bookmarking to the Cache Url when no cache exists Do you have inline script code in your HTML? That script code isn't going to run if you restore from cache and simply assign or it may not run at the time you think it would normally in the DOM rendering cycle. JavaScript Event Hookups The biggest issue I ran into with this approach almost immediately is that originally I had various static event handlers hooked up to various UI elements that are now cached. If you have an event handler like:$("#btnSearch").click( function() {…}); that works fine when the page loads with server rendered HTML, but that code breaks when you now load the HTML from cache. Why? Because the elements you're trying to hook those events to may not actually be there - yet. Luckily there's an easy workaround for this by using deferred events. With jQuery you can use the .on() event handler instead:$("#SelectionContainer").on("click","#btnSearch", function() {…}); which monitors a parent element for the events and checks for the inner selector elements to handle events on. This effectively defers to runtime event binding, so as more items are added to the document bindings still work. For any cached content use deferred events. Timing of manipulating DOM Elements Along the same lines make sure that your DOM manipulation code follows the code that loads the cached content into the page so that you don't manipulate DOM elements that don't exist just yet. Ideally you'll want to check for the condition to restore cached content towards the top of your script code, but that can be tricky if you have components or other logic that might not all run in a straight line. Inline Script Code Here's another small problem I ran into: I use a DateTime Picker widget I built a while back that relies on the jQuery date time picker. I also created a helper function that allows keyboard date navigation into it that uses JavaScript logic. Because MVC's limited 'object model' the only way to embed widget content into the page is through inline script. This code broken when I inserted the cached HTML into the page because the script code was not available when the component actually got injected into the page. As the last bullet - it's a matter of timing. There's no good work around for this - in my case I pulled out the jQuery date picker and relied on native <input type="date" /> logic instead - a better choice these days anyway, especially since this view is meant to be primarily to serve mobile devices which actually support date input through the browser (unlike desktop browsers of which only WebKit seems to support it). Bookmarking Cached Urls When you cache HTML content you have to make a decision whether you cache on the client and also not render that same content on the server. In the Classifieds app I didn't render server side content so if the user comes to the page with back=True and there is no cached content I have to a have a Plan B. Typically this happens when somebody ends up bookmarking the back URL. The easiest and safest solution for this scenario is to ALWAYS check the cache result to make sure it exists and if not have a safe URL to go back to - in this case to the plain uncached list URL which amounts to effectively redirecting. This seems really obvious in hindsight, but it's easy to overlook and not see a problem until much later, when it's not obvious at all why the page is not rendering anything. Don't use <body> to replace Content Since we're practically replacing all the HTML in the page it may seem tempting to simply replace the HTML content of the <body> tag. Don't. The body tag usually contains key things that should stay in the page and be there when it loads. Specifically script tags and elements and possibly other embedded content. It's best to create a top level DOM element specifically as a placeholder container for your cached content and wrap just around the actual content you want to replace. In the app above the #SizingContainer is that container. Other Approaches The approach I've used for this application is kind of specific to the existing server rendered application we're running and so it's just one approach you can take with caching. However for server rendered content caching this is a pattern I've used in a few apps to retrofit some client caching into list displays. In this application I took the path of least resistance to the existing server rendering logic. Here are a few other ways that come to mind: Using Partial HTML Rendering via AJAXInstead of rendering the page initially on the server, the page would load empty and the client would render the UI by retrieving the respective HTML and embedding it into the page from a Partial View. This effectively makes the initial rendering and the cached rendering logic identical and removes the server having to decide whether this request needs to be rendered or not (ie. not checking for a back=true switch). All the logic related to caching is made on the client in this case. Using JSON Data and Client RenderingThe hardcore client option is to do the whole UI SPA style and pull data from the server and then use client rendering or databinding to pull the data down and render using templates or client side databinding with knockout/angular et al. As with the Partial Rendering approach the advantage is that there's no difference in the logic between pulling the data from cache or rendering from scratch other than the initial check for the cache request. Of course if the app is a full on SPA app, then caching may not be required even - the list could just stay in memory and be hidden and reactivated. I'm sure there are a number of other ways this can be handled as well especially using AJAX. AJAX rendering might simplify the logic, but it also complicates search engine optimization since there's no content loaded initially. So there are always tradeoffs and it's important to look at all angles before deciding on any sort of caching solution in general. State of the Session SessionState and LocalStorage are easy to use in client code and can be integrated even with server centric applications to provide nice caching features of content and data. In this post I've shown a very specific scenario of storing HTML content for the purpose of remembering list view data and state and making the browsing experience for lists a bit more friendly, especially if there's dynamically loaded content involved. If you haven't played with sessionStorage or localStorage I encourage you to give it a try. There's a lot of cool stuff that you can do with this beyond the specific scenario I've covered here… Resources Overview of localStorage (also applies to sessionStorage) Web Storage Compatibility Modernizr Test Suite© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2013Posted in JavaScript HTML5 ASP.NET MVC Tweet !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js";fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); (function() { var po = document.createElement('script'); po.type = 'text/javascript'; po.async = true; po.src = 'https://apis.google.com/js/plusone.js'; var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(po, s); })();

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iPhone SDK vs Windows Phone 7 Series SDK Challenge, Part 1: Hello World!

In this series, I will be taking sample applications from the iPhone SDK and implementing them on Windows Phone 7 Series. My goal is to do as much of an apples-to-apples comparison as I can. This series will be written to not only compare and contrast how easy or difficult it is to complete tasks on either platform, how many lines of code, etc., but Id also like it to be a way for iPhone developers to either get started on Windows Phone 7 Series development, or for developers in general to learn the platform. Heres my methodology: Run the iPhone SDK app in the iPhone Simulator to get a feel for what it does and how it works, without looking at the implementation Implement the equivalent functionality on Windows Phone 7 Series using Silverlight. Compare the two implementations based on complexity, functionality, lines of code, number of files, etc. Add some functionality to the Windows Phone 7 Series app that shows off a way to make the scenario more interesting or leverages an aspect of the platform, or uses a better design pattern to implement the functionality. You can download Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone CTP here, and the Expression Blend 4 Beta here. Hello World! Of course no first post would be allowed if it didnt focus on the hello world scenario. The iPhone SDK follows that tradition with the Your First iPhone Application walkthrough. I will say that the developer documentation for iPhone is pretty good. There are plenty of walkthoughs and they break things down into nicely sized steps and do a good job of bringing the user along. As expected, this application is quite simple. It comprises of a text box, a label, and a button. When you push the button, the label changes to Hello plus the word you typed into the text box. Makes perfect sense for a starter application. Theres not much to this but it covers a few basic elements: Laying out basic UI Handling user input Hooking up events Formatting text So, lets get started building a similar app for Windows Phone 7 Series! Implementing the UI: UI in Silverlight (and therefore Windows Phone 7) is defined in XAML, which is a declarative XML language also used by WPF on the desktop. For anyone thats familiar with similar types of markup, its relatively straightforward to learn, but has a lot of power in it once you get it figured out. Well talk more about that. This UI is very simple. When I look at this, I note a couple of things: Elements are arranged vertically They are all centered So, lets create our Application and then start with the UI. Once you have the the VS 2010 Express for Windows Phone tool running, create a new Windows Phone Project, and call it Hello World: Once created, youll see the designer on one side and your XAML on the other: Now, we can create our UI in one of three ways: Use the designer in Visual Studio to drag and drop the components Use the designer in Expression Blend 4 to drag and drop the components Enter the XAML by hand in either of the above Well start with (1), then kind of move to (3) just for instructional value. To develop this UI in the designer: First, delete all of the markup between inside of the Grid element (LayoutRoot). You should be left with just this XAML for your MainPage.xaml (i shortened all the xmlns declarations below for brevity): 1: <phoneNavigation:PhoneApplicationPage 2: x:Class="HelloWorld.MainPage" 3: xmlns="...[snip]" 4: FontFamily="{StaticResource PhoneFontFamilyNormal}" 5: FontSize="{StaticResource PhoneFontSizeNormal}" 6: Foreground="{StaticResource PhoneForegroundBrush}"> 7: 8: <Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot" Background="{StaticResource PhoneBackgroundBrush}"> 9: 10: </Grid> 11: 12: </phoneNavigation:PhoneApplicationPage> .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } Well be adding XAML at line 9, so thats the important part. Now, Click on the center area of the phone surface Open the Toolbox and double click StackPanel Double click TextBox Double click TextBlock Double click Button That will create the necessary UI elements but they wont be arranged quite right. Well fix it in a second. Heres the XAML that we end up with: 1: <StackPanel Height="100" HorizontalAlignment="Left" Margin="10,10,0,0" Name="stackPanel1" VerticalAlignment="Top" Width="200"> 2: <TextBox Height="32" Name="textBox1" Text="TextBox" Width="100" /> 3: <TextBlock Height="23" Name="textBlock1" Text="TextBlock" /> 4: <Button Content="Button" Height="70" Name="button1" Width="160" /> 5: </StackPanel> .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } The designer does its best at guessing what we want, but in this case we want things to be a bit simpler. So well just clean it up a bit. We want the items to be centered and we want them to have a little bit of a margin on either side, so heres what we end up with. Ive also made it match the values and style from the iPhone app: 1: <StackPanel Margin="10"> 2: <TextBox Name="textBox1" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" Text="You" TextAlignment="Center"/> 3: <TextBlock Name="textBlock1" HorizontalAlignment="Center" Margin="0,100,0,0" Text="Hello You!" /> 4: <Button Name="button1" HorizontalAlignment="Center" Margin="0,150,0,0" Content="Hello"/> 5: </StackPanel> .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } Now lets take a look at what weve done there. Line 1: We removed all of the formatting from the StackPanel, except for Margin, as thats all we need. Since our parent element is a Grid, by default the StackPanel will be sized to fit in that space. The Margin says that we want to reserve 10 pixels on each side of the StackPanel. Line 2: Weve set the HorizontalAlignment of the TextBox to Stretch, which says that it should fill its parents size horizontally. We want to do this so the TextBox is always full-width. We also set TextAlignment to Center, to center the text. Line 3: In contrast to the TextBox above, we dont care how wide the TextBlock is, just so long as it is big enough for its text. Thatll happen automatically, so we just set its Horizontal alignment to Center. We also set a Margin above the TextBlock of 100 pixels to bump it down a bit, per the iPhone UI. Line 4: We do the same things here as in Line 3. Heres how the UI looks in the designer: Believe it or not, were almost done! Implementing the App Logic Now, we want the TextBlock to change its text when the Button is clicked. In the designer, double click the Button to be taken to the Event Handler for the Buttons Click event. In that event handler, we take the Text property from the TextBox, and format it into a string, then set it into the TextBlock. Thats it! 1: private void button1_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e) 2: { 3: string name = textBox1.Text; 4: 5: // if there isn't a name set, just use "World" 6: if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(name)) 7: { 8: name = "World"; 9: } 10: 11: // set the value into the TextBlock 12: textBlock1.Text = String.Format("Hello {0}!", name); 13: 14: } .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } We use the String.Format() method to handle the formatting for us. Now all thats left is to test the app in the Windows Phone Emulator and verify it does what we think it does! And it does! Comparing against the iPhone Looking at the iPhone example, there are basically three things that you have to touch as the developer: 1) The UI in the Nib file 2) The app delegate 3) The view controller Counting lines is a bit tricky here, but to try to keep this even, Im going to only count lines of code that I could not have (or would not have) generated with the tooling. Meaning, Im not counting XAML and Im not counting operations that happen in the Nib file with the XCode designer tool. So in the case of the above, even though I modified the XAML, I could have done all of those operations using the visual designer tool. And normally I would have, but the XAML is more instructive (and less steps!). Im interested in things that I, as the developer have to figure out in code. Im also not counting lines that just have a curly brace on them, or lines that are generated for me (e.g. method names that are generated for me when I make a connection, etc.) So, by that count, heres what I get from the code listing for the iPhone app found here: HelloWorldAppDelegate.h: 6 HelloWorldAppDelegate.m: 12 MyViewController.h: 8 MyViewController.m: 18 Which gives me a grand total of about 44 lines of code on iPhone. I really do recommend looking at the iPhone code for a comparison to the above. Now, for the Windows Phone 7 Series application, the only code I typed was in the event handler above Main.Xaml.cs: 4 So a total of 4 lines of code on Windows Phone 7. And more importantly, the process is just A LOT simpler. For example, I was surprised that the User Interface Designer in XCode doesnt automatically create instance variables for me and wire them up to the corresponding elements. I assumed I wouldnt have to write this code myself (and risk getting it wrong!). I dont need to worry about view controllers or anything. I just write my code. This blog post up to this point has covered almost every aspect of this apps development in a few pages. The iPhone tutorial has 5 top level steps with 2-3 sub sections of each. Now, its worth pointing out that the iPhone development model uses the Model View Controller (MVC) pattern, which is a very flexible and powerful pattern that enforces proper separation of concerns. But its fairly complex and difficult to understand when you first walk up to it. Here at Microsoft weve dabbled in MVC a bit, with frameworks like MFC on Visual C++ and with the ASP.NET MVC framework now. Both are very powerful frameworks. But one of the reasons weve stayed away from MVC with client UI frameworks is that its difficult to tool. We havent seen the type of value that beats double click, write code! for the broad set of scenarios. Another thing to think about is how many of those lines of code were focused on my apps functionality?. Or, the converse of How many lines of code were boilerplate plumbing? In both examples, the actual number of functional code lines is similar. I count most of them in MyViewController.m, in the changeGreeting method. Its about 7 lines of code that do the work of taking the value from the TextBox and putting it into the label. Versus 4 on the Windows Phone 7 side. But, unfortunately, on iPhone I still have to write that other 37 lines of code, just to get there. 10% of the code, 1 file instead of 4, its just much simpler. Making Some Tweaks It turns out, I can actually do this application with ZERO lines of code, if Im willing to change the spec a bit. The data binding functionality in Silverlight is incredibly powerful. And what I can do is databind the TextBoxs value directly to the TextBlock. Take some time looking at this XAML below. Youll see that I have added another nested StackPanel and two more TextBlocks. Why? Because thats how I build that string, and the nested StackPanel will lay things out Horizontally for me, as specified by the Orientation property. 1: <StackPanel Margin="10"> 2: <TextBox Name="textBox1" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" Text="You" TextAlignment="Center"/> 3: <StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal" HorizontalAlignment="Center" Margin="0,100,0,0" > 4: <TextBlock Text="Hello " /> 5: <TextBlock Name="textBlock1" Text="{Binding ElementName=textBox1, Path=Text}" /> 6: <TextBlock Text="!" /> 7: </StackPanel> 8: <Button Name="button1" HorizontalAlignment="Center" Margin="0,150,0,0" Content="Hello" Click="button1_Click" /> 9: </StackPanel> .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } Now, the real action is there in the bolded TextBlock.Text property: Text="{Binding ElementName=textBox1, Path=Text}" .csharpcode, .csharpcode pre { font-size: small; color: black; font-family: consolas, "Courier New", courier, monospace; background-color: #ffffff; /*white-space: pre;*/ } .csharpcode pre { margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .rem { color: #008000; } .csharpcode .kwrd { color: #0000ff; } .csharpcode .str { color: #006080; } .csharpcode .op { color: #0000c0; } .csharpcode .preproc { color: #cc6633; } .csharpcode .asp { background-color: #ffff00; } .csharpcode .html { color: #800000; } .csharpcode .attr { color: #ff0000; } .csharpcode .alt { background-color: #f4f4f4; width: 100%; margin: 0em; } .csharpcode .lnum { color: #606060; } That does all the heavy lifting. It sets up a databinding between the TextBox.Text property on textBox1 and the TextBlock.Text property on textBlock1. As I change the text of the TextBox, the label updates automatically. In fact, I dont even need the button any more, so I could get rid of that altogether. And no button means no event handler. No event handler means no C# code at all. Did you know that DotNetSlackers also publishes .net articles written by top known .net Authors? We already have over 80 articles in several categories including Silverlight. Take a look: here.

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Using repaint() method.

- by owca

I'm still struggling to create this game : http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2844190/choosing-design-method-for-ladder-like-word-game .I've got it almost working but there is a problem though. When I'm inserting a word and it's correct, the whole window should reload, and JButtons containing letters should be repainted with different style. But somehow repaint() method for the game panel (in Main method) doesn't affect it at all. What am I doing wrong ? Here's my code: Main: import java.util.Scanner; import javax.swing.*; import java.awt.*; public class Main { public static void main(String[] args){ final JFrame f = new JFrame("Ladder Game"); Scanner sc = new Scanner(System.in); System.out.println("Creating game data..."); System.out.println("Height: "); //setting height of the grid while (!sc.hasNextInt()) { System.out.println("int, please!"); sc.next(); } final int height = sc.nextInt(); /* * I'm creating Grid[]game. Each row of game contains Grid of Element[]line. * Each row of line contains Elements, which are single letters in the game. */ Grid[]game = new Grid[height]; for(int L = 0; L < height; L++){ Grid row = null; int i = L+1; String s; do { System.out.println("Length "+i+", please!"); s = sc.next(); } while (s.length() != i); Element[] line = new Element[s.length()]; Element single = null; String[] temp = null; String[] temp2 = new String[s.length()]; temp = s.split(""); for( int j = temp2.length; j>0; j--){ temp2[j-1] = temp[j]; } for (int k = 0 ; k < temp2.length ; k++) { if( k == 0 ){ single = new Element(temp2[k], 2); } else{ single = new Element(temp2[k], 1); } line[k] = single; } row = new Grid(line); game[L] = row; } //############################################ //THE GAME STARTS HERE //############################################ //create new game panel with box layout JPanel panel = new JPanel(); panel.setLayout(new BoxLayout(panel, BoxLayout.Y_AXIS)); panel.setBackground(Color.ORANGE); panel.setBorder(BorderFactory.createEmptyBorder(10, 10, 10, 10)); //for each row of the game array add panel containing letters Single panel //is drawn with Grid's paint() method and then returned here to be added for(int i = 0; i < game.length; i++){ panel.add(game[i].paint()); } f.setContentPane(panel); f.pack(); f.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE); f.setVisible(true); boolean end = false; boolean word = false; String text; /* * Game continues until solved() returns true. First check if given word matches the length, * and then the value of any row. If yes - change state of each letter from EMPTY * to OTHER_LETTER. Then repaint the window. */ while( !end ){ while( !word ){ text = JOptionPane.showInputDialog("Input word: "); for(int i = 1; i< game.length; i++){ if(game[i].equalLength(text)){ if(game[i].equalValue(text)){ game[i].changeState(3); f.repaint(); //simple debug - I'm checking if letter, and //state values for each Element are proper for(int k=0; k<=i; k++){ System.out.print(game[k].e[k].letter()); } System.out.println(); for(int k=0; k<=i; k++){ System.out.print(game[k].e[k].getState()); } System.out.println(); //set word to true and ask for another word word = true; } } } } word = false; //check if the game has ended for(int i = 0; i < game.length; i++){ if(game[i].solved()){ end = true; } else { end = false; } } } } } Element: import javax.swing.*; import java.awt.*; public class Element { final int INVISIBLE = 0; final int EMPTY = 1; final int FIRST_LETTER = 2; final int OTHER_LETTER = 3; private int state; private String letter; public Element(){ } //empty block public Element(int state){ this("", 0); } //filled block public Element(String s, int state){ this.state = state; this.letter = s; } public JButton paint(){ JButton button = null; if( state == EMPTY ){ button = new JButton(" "); button.setBackground(Color.WHITE); } else if ( state == FIRST_LETTER ){ button = new JButton(letter); button.setBackground(Color.red); } else { button = new JButton(letter); button.setBackground(Color.yellow); } return button; } public void changeState(int s){ state = s; } public void setLetter(String s){ letter = s; } public String letter(){ return letter; } public int getState(){ return state; } } Grid: import javax.swing.*; import java.awt.*; public class Grid extends JPanel{ public Element[]e; private Grid[]g; public Grid(){} public Grid( Element[]elements ){ e = new Element[elements.length]; for(int i=0; i< e.length; i++){ e[i] = elements[i]; } } public Grid(Grid[]grid){ g = new Grid[grid.length]; for(int i=0; i<g.length; i++){ g[i] = grid[i]; } Dimension d = new Dimension(600, 600); setMinimumSize(d); setPreferredSize(new Dimension(d)); setMaximumSize(d); } //for Each element in line - change state to i public void changeState(int i){ for(int j=0; j< e.length; j++){ e[j].changeState(3); } } //create panel which will be single row of the game. Add elements to the panel. // return JPanel to be added to grid. public JPanel paint(){ JPanel panel = new JPanel(); panel.setLayout(new GridLayout(1, e.length)); panel.setBorder(BorderFactory.createEmptyBorder(2, 2, 2, 2)); for(int j = 0; j < e.length; j++){ panel.add(e[j].paint()); } return panel; } //check if the length of given string is equal to length of row public boolean equalLength(String s){ int len = s.length(); boolean equal = false; for(int j = 0; j < e.length; j++){ if(e.length == len){ equal = true; } } return equal; } //check if the value of given string is equal to values of elements in row public boolean equalValue(String s){ int len = s.length(); boolean equal = false; String[] temp = null; String[] temp2 = new String[len]; temp = s.split(""); for( int j = len; j>0; j--){ temp2[j-1] = temp[j]; } for(int j = 0; j < e.length; j++){ if( e[j].letter().equals(temp2[j]) ){ equal = true; } else { equal = false; } } if(equal){ for(int i = 0; i < e.length; i++){ e[i].changeState(3); } } return equal; } //check if the game has finished public boolean solved(){ boolean solved = false; for(int j = 0; j < e.length; j++){ if(e[j].getState() == 3){ solved = true; } else { solved = false; } } return solved; } }

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jQuery Datatables throws error when dynamically created row headers

- by JM4

I am using the Datatables jquery plugin for one of my projects. For one in particular, the number of columns can vary based on how many children a consumer has (yes I realize normalization and proper technique would insert on another row but it is a client requirement). Datatables must be set up as such: <table> <thead> <tr> <th></th> </tr> </thead> <tbody> <tr> <td></td> </tr> </tbody> </table> my script starts out as: <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0" class="display" id="sortable"> <thead> <tr> <th>parent name</th> <th>parent phone</th> <?php try { $db->beginTransaction(); $stmt = $db->prepare("SELECT max(num_deps) FROM (SELECT count(a.id) as num_deps FROM children a INNER JOIN parents b USING(id) WHERE a.id !=0 GROUP BY a.id) x"); $stmt->execute(); $rows = $stmt->fetchAll(); for($i=1; $i<=$rows[0][0]; $i++) { echo " <th>Child Name ".$i."</th> <th>Date of Birth ".$i."</th> "; } $db->commit(); } catch (PDOException $e) { echo "<p align='center'>There was a system error. Please contact administration.<br>".$e->getMessage()."</p><br />"; } ?> </tr> </thead> In this manner, the final column headers can be 1 or 50 spots long. However, with this dynamic code in place, datatables throws the following error: ""DataTables warning (table id = 'datatable'): Cannot reinitialise DataTable. To retrieve the DataTables object for this table, please pass either no arguments to the dataTable() function, or set bRetrive to true. Alternativly, to destroy old table and create a new one...ETC."' Yes I have set "bRetrieve" : true in the javascript above and that does not do the trick. If I remove the code above, the file "works" fine but it leaves off the necessary columns for my table. Any ideas? Displaying JS <script type="text/javascript" src="//ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.8.6/jquery-ui.min.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="../media/js/jquery.dataTables.min.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="../media/js/TableTools/TableTools.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="../media/ZeroClipboard/ZeroClipboard.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript"> $(document).ready(function() { TableToolsInit.sSwfPath = "../media/swf/ZeroClipboard.swf"; oTable = $('#sortable').dataTable({ "bRetrieve": true, "bProcessing": true, "sScrollX": "100%", "sScrollXInner": "110%", "bScrollCollapse": true, "bJQueryUI": true, "sPaginationType": "full_numbers", "sDom": 'T<"clear"><"fg-toolbar ui-widget-header ui-corner-tl ui-corner-tr ui-helper-clearfix"lfr>t<"fg-toolbar ui-widget-header ui-corner-bl ui-corner-br ui-helper-clearfix"ip>' }); }); </script> </head> TOP piece of HTML <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> <head> <title>Home</title> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="style.css" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="default.css" /> <script type="text/javascript" src="//ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.4.3/jquery.min.js"></script> <style type="text/css" title="currentStyle"> @import "TableTools.css"; @import "demo_table_jui.css"; @import "jquery-ui-1.8.4.custom.css"; </style> <script type="text/javascript" src="//ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.8.6/jquery-ui.min.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/jquery.dataTables.min.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/TableTools/TableTools.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="ZeroClipboard/ZeroClipboard.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript"> $(document).ready(function() { TableToolsInit.sSwfPath = "ZeroClipboard.swf"; oTable = $('#sortable').dataTable({ "bRetrieve": true, "bProcessing": true, "sScrollX": "100%", "sScrollXInner": "110%", "bScrollCollapse": true, "bJQueryUI": true, "sPaginationType": "full_numbers", "sDom": 'T<"clear"><"fg-toolbar ui-widget-header ui-corner-tl ui-corner-tr ui-helper-clearfix"lfr>t<"fg-toolbar ui-widget-header ui-corner-bl ui-corner-br ui-helper-clearfix"ip>' }); }); </script> </head> <body bgcolor="#e0e0e0"> <div class="main"> <div class="body"> <div class="body_resize"> <div class="liquid-round"> <div class="top"><span><h2>Details</h2></span></div> <div class="center-content"> <div style="overflow-x:hidden; min-height:400px; max-height:600px; overflow-y:auto;"> <div class="demo_jui"><br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0" class="display" width="100%" id="sortable"> <thead> <tr> <th>First Name</th> <th>MI</th> <th>Last Name</th> <th>Street Address</th> <th>City</th> <th>State</th> <th>Zip</th> <th>DOB</th> <th>Gender</th> <th>Spouse Name</th> <th>Spouse Date of Birth</th>  <th>Dependent Child Name 1</th> <th>Dependent Date of Birth 1</th> <th>Dependent Child Name 2</th> <th>Dependent Date of Birth 2</th> <th>Dependent Child Name 3</th> <th>Dependent Date of Birth 3</th> <th>Dependent Child Name 4</th> <th>Dependent Date of Birth 4</th> <th>Dependent Child Name 5</th> <th>Dependent Date of Birth 5</th> <th>Dependent Child Name 6</th> <th>Dependent Date of Birth 6</th> <th>Dependent Child Name 7</th> <th>Dependent Date of Birth 7</th> </tr> </thead> <tbody> <tr> ... UPDATE REGARDING COMMENTS/ANSWERS I have received a number of responses indicating the number of headers may not match the field count in the body. As I mention below, eliminating the php script below altogether would eliminate 5+ fields in the header and without question throw the count match off balance. This DOES NOT however cause an error and in fact "resolves" the issue in that datatables functions properly (even though there is NO header record for 5+ fields in the body.

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Silverlight MVVM Confusion: Updating Image Based on State

- by senfo

I'm developing a Silverlight application and I'm trying to stick to the MVVM principals, but I'm running into some problems changing the source of an image based on the state of a property in the ViewModel. For all intents and purposes, you can think of the functionality I'm implementing as a play/pause button for an audio app. When in the "Play" mode, IsActive is true in the ViewModel and the "Pause.png" image on the button should be displayed. When paused, IsActive is false in the ViewModel and "Play.png" is displayed on the button. Naturally, there are two additional images to handle when the mouse hovers over the button. I thought I could use a Style Trigger, but apparently they're not supported in Silverlight. I've been reviewing a forum post with a question similar to mine where it's suggested to use the VisualStateManager. While this might help with changing the image for hover/normal states, the part missing (or I'm not understanding) is how this would work with a state set via the view model. The post seems to apply only to events rather than properties of the view model. Having said that, I also haven't successfully completed the normal/hover affects, either. Below is my Silverlight 4 XAML. It should also probably be noted I'm working with MVVM Light. <UserControl x:Class="Foo.Bar.MyUserControl" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation" xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml" xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008" xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006" xmlns:i="clr-namespace:System.Windows.Interactivity;assembly=System.Windows.Interactivity" mc:Ignorable="d" d:DesignHeight="100" d:DesignWidth="200"> <UserControl.Resources> <Style x:Key="MyButtonStyle" TargetType="Button"> <Setter Property="IsEnabled" Value="true"/> <Setter Property="IsTabStop" Value="true"/> <Setter Property="Background" Value="#FFA9A9A9"/> <Setter Property="Foreground" Value="#FF000000"/> <Setter Property="MinWidth" Value="5"/> <Setter Property="MinHeight" Value="5"/> <Setter Property="Margin" Value="0"/> <Setter Property="HorizontalAlignment" Value="Left" /> <Setter Property="HorizontalContentAlignment" Value="Center"/> <Setter Property="VerticalAlignment" Value="Top" /> <Setter Property="VerticalContentAlignment" Value="Center"/> <Setter Property="Cursor" Value="Hand"/> <Setter Property="Template"> <Setter.Value> <ControlTemplate TargetType="Button"> <Grid> <Image Source="/Foo.Bar;component/Resources/Icons/Bar/Play.png"> <VisualStateManager.VisualStateGroups> <VisualStateGroup x:Name="Active"> <VisualState x:Name="MouseOver"> <Storyboard> <ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames Storyboard.TargetProperty="Source" Storyboard.TargetName="/Foo.Bar;component/Resources/Icons/Bar/Play_Hover.png" /> </Storyboard> </VisualState> </VisualStateGroup> </VisualStateManager.VisualStateGroups> </Image> </Grid> </ControlTemplate> </Setter.Value> </Setter> </Style> </UserControl.Resources> <Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot" Background="White"> <Button Style="{StaticResource MyButtonStyle}" Command="{Binding ChangeStatus}" Height="30" Width="30" /> </Grid> </UserControl> What is the proper way to update images on buttons with the state determined by the view model? Update I changed my Button to a ToggleButton hoping I could use the Checked state to differentiate between play/pause. I practically have it, but I ran into one additional problem. I need to account for two states at the same time. For example, Checked Normal/Hover and Unchecked Normal/Hover. Following is my updated XAML: <UserControl x:Class="Foo.Bar.MyUserControl" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation" xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml" xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008" xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006" xmlns:i="clr-namespace:System.Windows.Interactivity;assembly=System.Windows.Interactivity" mc:Ignorable="d" d:DesignHeight="100" d:DesignWidth="200"> <UserControl.Resources> <Style x:Key="MyButtonStyle" TargetType="ToggleButton"> <Setter Property="IsEnabled" Value="true"/> <Setter Property="IsTabStop" Value="true"/> <Setter Property="Background" Value="#FFA9A9A9"/> <Setter Property="Foreground" Value="#FF000000"/> <Setter Property="MinWidth" Value="5"/> <Setter Property="MinHeight" Value="5"/> <Setter Property="Margin" Value="0"/> <Setter Property="HorizontalAlignment" Value="Left" /> <Setter Property="HorizontalContentAlignment" Value="Center"/> <Setter Property="VerticalAlignment" Value="Top" /> <Setter Property="VerticalContentAlignment" Value="Center"/> <Setter Property="Cursor" Value="Hand"/> <Setter Property="Template"> <Setter.Value> <ControlTemplate TargetType="ToggleButton"> <Grid> <VisualStateManager.VisualStateGroups> <VisualStateGroup x:Name="CommonStates"> <VisualState x:Name="Normal"> <Storyboard> <ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames Storyboard.TargetProperty="(UIElement.Visibility)" Storyboard.TargetName="Pause"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame KeyTime="0"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> <Visibility>Collapsed</Visibility> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame> </ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames> </Storyboard> </VisualState> <VisualState x:Name="MouseOver"> <Storyboard> <ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames Storyboard.TargetProperty="(UIElement.Visibility)" Storyboard.TargetName="PlayHover"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame KeyTime="0"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> <Visibility>Visible</Visibility> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame> </ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames> <ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames Storyboard.TargetProperty="(UIElement.Visibility)" Storyboard.TargetName="Play"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame KeyTime="0"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> <Visibility>Collapsed</Visibility> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame> </ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames> </Storyboard> </VisualState> </VisualStateGroup> <VisualStateGroup x:Name="CheckStates"> <VisualState x:Name="Checked"> <Storyboard> <ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames Storyboard.TargetProperty="(UIElement.Visibility)" Storyboard.TargetName="Pause"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame KeyTime="0"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> <Visibility>Visible</Visibility> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame> </ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames> <ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames Storyboard.TargetProperty="(UIElement.Visibility)" Storyboard.TargetName="Play"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame KeyTime="0"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> <Visibility>Collapsed</Visibility> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame> </ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames> <ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames Storyboard.TargetProperty="(UIElement.Visibility)" Storyboard.TargetName="PlayHover"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame KeyTime="0"> <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> <Visibility>Collapsed</Visibility> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value> </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame> </ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames> </Storyboard> </VisualState> <VisualState x:Name="Unchecked" /> </VisualStateGroup> </VisualStateManager.VisualStateGroups> <Image x:Name="Play" Source="/Foo.Bar;component/Resources/Icons/Bar/Play.png" /> <Image x:Name="Pause" Source="/Foo.Bar;component/Resources/Icons/Bar/Pause.png" Visibility="Collapsed" /> <Image x:Name="PlayHover" Source="/Foo.Bar;component/Resources/Icons/Bar/Play_Hover.png" Visibility="Collapsed" /> <Image x:Name="PauseHover" Source="/Foo.Bar;component/Resources/Icons/Bar/Pause_Hover.png" Visibility="Collapsed" /> </Grid> </ControlTemplate> </Setter.Value> </Setter> </Style> </UserControl.Resources> <Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot" Background="White"> <ToggleButton Style="{StaticResource MyButtonStyle}" IsChecked="{Binding IsPlaying}" Command="{Binding ChangeStatus}" Height="30" Width="30" /> </Grid> </UserControl>

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Joining Windows 7 Professional to a Windows Server 2003 R2 x64 domain fails.

- by Vinko Vrsalovic

I have a windows 7 professional (spanish) laptop trying to join a Windows Server 2003 (english) domain. It detect correctly the SRV record, finding the proper domain controller, but then the join fails with the error message (snippet, because the error is in spanish) An Active Directory Domain Controller for This Domain Could Not be Contacted The DNS is correctly set, and client can ping by name and IP the server, the server can ping the client by IP. I've tested with the FW down to no avail. A host of other XP Pro clients are connected to the domain. I've restarted Net Logon and checked that Windows Time is up. Also the times are in sync between the server and the client. I'll put below diagnostics output. I'm wondering if there's anything special to be done on either the server or the client to have a Win 7 Pro join a 2k3 R2 domain. The following diagnostic information follows: netdiag /q for the DC dcdiag on the DC ipconfig /all on the Win 7 client netdiag /q on the DC: .................................. Computer Name: HI-X2 DNS Host Name: hi-x2.hi.local System info : Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 (Build 3790) Processor : EM64T Family 6 Model 23 Stepping 10, GenuineIntel List of installed hotfixes : KB923561 KB924667-v2 KB925398_WMP64 KB925902 KB926122 KB927891 KB929123 KB930178 KB932168 KB936357 KB938127 KB941569 KB942830 KB942831 KB943055 KB943460 KB944338-v2 KB944653 KB945553 KB946026 KB948496 KB950760 KB950762 KB950974 KB951066 KB951748 KB952004 KB952069 KB952954 KB954155 KB954550-v7 KB955069 KB955759 KB956572 KB956802 KB956803 KB956844 KB958469 KB958644 KB958869 KB959426 KB960225 KB960803 KB960859 KB961063 KB961118 KB961501 KB967715 KB967723 KB968389 KB968816 KB969059 KB969947 KB970238 KB970430 KB970483 KB971032 KB971468 KB971657 KB971737 KB971961 KB971961-IE8 KB972270 KB973037 KB973354 KB973507 KB973540 KB973687 KB973815 KB973825 KB973869 KB973904 KB973917-v2 KB974112 KB974318 KB974392 KB974571 KB975025 KB975467 KB975560 KB975713 KB976662-IE8 KB977290 KB977816 KB977914 KB978037 KB978262 KB978338 KB978542 KB978601 KB978706 KB979306 KB979309 KB979683 KB980182 KB980182-IE8 KB980232 KB980302-IE8 KB981332-IE8 KB981350 Q147222 Per interface results: Adapter : Local Area Connection Host Name. . . . . . . . . : hi-x2.hi.local IP Address . . . . . . . . : 10.0.1.199 Subnet Mask. . . . . . . . : 255.0.0.0 Default Gateway. . . . . . : 10.0.1.1 Dns Servers. . . . . . . . : 10.0.1.199 WINS service test. . . . . : Skipped Global results: [WARNING] You don't have a single interface with the 'WorkStation Service', 'Messenger Service', 'WINS' names defined. DNS test . . . . . . . . . . . . . : Passed PASS - All the DNS entries for DC are registered on DNS server '10.0.1.199'. IP Security test . . . . . . . . . : Skipped The command completed successfully dcdiag on the DC: Domain Controller Diagnosis Performing initial setup: Done gathering initial info. Doing initial required tests Testing server: Default-First-Site-Name\HI-X2 Starting test: Connectivity ......................... HI-X2 passed test Connectivity Doing primary tests Testing server: Default-First-Site-Name\HI-X2 Starting test: Replications ......................... HI-X2 passed test Replications Starting test: NCSecDesc ......................... HI-X2 passed test NCSecDesc Starting test: NetLogons ......................... HI-X2 passed test NetLogons Starting test: Advertising ......................... HI-X2 passed test Advertising Starting test: KnowsOfRoleHolders ......................... HI-X2 passed test KnowsOfRoleHolders Starting test: RidManager ......................... HI-X2 passed test RidManager Starting test: MachineAccount ......................... HI-X2 passed test MachineAccount Starting test: Services ......................... HI-X2 passed test Services Starting test: ObjectsReplicated ......................... HI-X2 passed test ObjectsReplicated Starting test: frssysvol ......................... HI-X2 passed test frssysvol Starting test: frsevent ......................... HI-X2 passed test frsevent Starting test: kccevent ......................... HI-X2 passed test kccevent Starting test: systemlog ......................... HI-X2 passed test systemlog Starting test: VerifyReferences ......................... HI-X2 passed test VerifyReferences Running partition tests on : ForestDnsZones Starting test: CrossRefValidation ......................... ForestDnsZones passed test CrossRefValidation Starting test: CheckSDRefDom ......................... ForestDnsZones passed test CheckSDRefDom Running partition tests on : DomainDnsZones Starting test: CrossRefValidation ......................... DomainDnsZones passed test CrossRefValidation Starting test: CheckSDRefDom ......................... DomainDnsZones passed test CheckSDRefDom Running partition tests on : Schema Starting test: CrossRefValidation ......................... Schema passed test CrossRefValidation Starting test: CheckSDRefDom ......................... Schema passed test CheckSDRefDom Running partition tests on : Configuration Starting test: CrossRefValidation ......................... Configuration passed test CrossRefValidation Starting test: CheckSDRefDom ......................... Configuration passed test CheckSDRefDom Running partition tests on : hi Starting test: CrossRefValidation ......................... hi passed test CrossRefValidation Starting test: CheckSDRefDom ......................... hi passed test CheckSDRefDom Running enterprise tests on : hi.local Starting test: Intersite ......................... hi.local passed test Intersite Starting test: FsmoCheck ......................... hi.local passed test FsmoCheck ipconfig /all on the Windows 7 client: Configuraci¢n IP de Windows Nombre de host. . . . . . . . . : hi-p6 Sufijo DNS principal . . . . . : Tipo de nodo. . . . . . . . . . : h¡brido Enrutamiento IP habilitado. . . : no Proxy WINS habilitado . . . . . : no Adaptador de LAN inal mbrica Conexi¢n de red inal mbrica: Sufijo DNS espec¡fico para la conexi¢n. . : Descripci¢n . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : Intel(R) WiFi Link 5100 AGN Direcci¢n f¡sica. . . . . . . . . . . . . : 00-22-FB-63-47-A0 DHCP habilitado . . . . . . . . . . . . . : no Configuraci¢n autom tica habilitada . . . : s¡ Direcci¢n IPv4. . . . . . . . . . . . . . : 10.0.1.42(Preferido) M scara de subred . . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0 Puerta de enlace predeterminada . . . . . : 10.0.1.1 Servidores DNS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . : 10.0.1.199 NetBIOS sobre TCP/IP. . . . . . . . . . . : habilitado Adaptador de Ethernet Conexi¢n de rea local: Estado de los medios. . . . . . . . . . . : medios desconectados Sufijo DNS espec¡fico para la conexi¢n. . : Descripci¢n . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : Realtek PCIe GBE Family Controller Direcci¢n f¡sica. . . . . . . . . . . . . : 00-1E-33-1F-35-B1 DHCP habilitado . . . . . . . . . . . . . : s¡ Configuraci¢n autom tica habilitada . . . : s¡ Adaptador de t£nel isatap.{8926581E-09AC-4123-906B-DA6386AD2D60}: Estado de los medios. . . . . . . . . . . : medios desconectados Sufijo DNS espec¡fico para la conexi¢n. . : Descripci¢n . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : Adaptador ISATAP de Microsoft Direcci¢n f¡sica. . . . . . . . . . . . . : 00-00-00-00-00-00-00-E0 DHCP habilitado . . . . . . . . . . . . . : no Configuraci¢n autom tica habilitada . . . : s¡ Adaptador de t£nel Teredo Tunneling Pseudo-Interface: Sufijo DNS espec¡fico para la conexi¢n. . : Descripci¢n . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : Teredo Tunneling Pseudo-Interface Direcci¢n f¡sica. . . . . . . . . . . . . : 00-00-00-00-00-00-00-E0 DHCP habilitado . . . . . . . . . . . . . : no Configuraci¢n autom tica habilitada . . . : s¡ Direcci¢n IPv6 . . . . . . . . . . : 2001:0:5ef5:73ba:1cec:3883:f5ff:fed5(Preferido) V¡nculo: direcci¢n IPv6 local. . . : fe80::1cec:3883:f5ff:fed5%13(Preferido) Puerta de enlace predeterminada . . . . . : :: NetBIOS sobre TCP/IP. . . . . . . . . . . : deshabilitado

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Is there a Telecommunications Reference Architecture?

- by raul.goycoolea

@font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Abstract Reference architecture provides needed architectural information that can be provided in advance to an enterprise to enable consistent architectural best practices. Enterprise Reference Architecture helps business owners to actualize their strategies, vision, objectives, and principles. It evaluates the IT systems, based on Reference Architecture goals, principles, and standards. It helps to reduce IT costs by increasing functionality, availability, scalability, etc. Telecom Reference Architecture provides customers with the flexibility to view bundled service bills online with the provision of multiple services. It provides real-time, flexible billing and charging systems, to handle complex promotions, discounts, and settlements with multiple parties. This paper attempts to describe the Reference Architecture for the Telecom Enterprises. It lays the foundation for a Telecom Reference Architecture by articulating the requirements, drivers, and pitfalls for telecom service providers. It describes generic reference architecture for telecom enterprises and moves on to explain how to achieve Enterprise Reference Architecture by using SOA. Introduction A Reference Architecture provides a methodology, set of practices, template, and standards based on a set of successful solutions implemented earlier. These solutions have been generalized and structured for the depiction of both a logical and a physical architecture, based on the harvesting of a set of patterns that describe observations in a number of successful implementations. It helps as a reference for the various architectures that an enterprise can implement to solve various problems. It can be used as the starting point or the point of comparisons for various departments/business entities of a company, or for the various companies for an enterprise. It provides multiple views for multiple stakeholders. Major artifacts of the Enterprise Reference Architecture are methodologies, standards, metadata, documents, design patterns, etc. Purpose of Reference Architecture In most cases, architects spend a lot of time researching, investigating, defining, and re-arguing architectural decisions. It is like reinventing the wheel as their peers in other organizations or even the same organization have already spent a lot of time and effort defining their own architectural practices. This prevents an organization from learning from its own experiences and applying that knowledge for increased effectiveness. Reference architecture provides missing architectural information that can be provided in advance to project team members to enable consistent architectural best practices. Enterprise Reference Architecture helps an enterprise to achieve the following at the abstract level: · Reference architecture is more of a communication channel to an enterprise · Helps the business owners to accommodate to their strategies, vision, objectives, and principles. · Evaluates the IT systems based on Reference Architecture Principles · Reduces IT spending through increasing functionality, availability, scalability, etc · A Real-time Integration Model helps to reduce the latency of the data updates Is used to define a single source of Information · Provides a clear view on how to manage information and security · Defines the policy around the data ownership, product boundaries, etc. · Helps with cost optimization across project and solution portfolios by eliminating unused or duplicate investments and assets · Has a shorter implementation time and cost Once the reference architecture is in place, the set of architectural principles, standards, reference models, and best practices ensure that the aligned investments have the greatest possible likelihood of success in both the near term and the long term (TCO). Common pitfalls for Telecom Service Providers Telecom Reference Architecture serves as the first step towards maturity for a telecom service provider. During the course of our assignments/experiences with telecom players, we have come across the following observations – Some of these indicate a lack of maturity of the telecom service provider: · In markets that are growing and not so mature, it has been observed that telcos have a significant amount of in-house or home-grown applications. In some of these markets, the growth has been so rapid that IT has been unable to cope with business demands. Telcos have shown a tendency to come up with workarounds in their IT applications so as to meet business needs. · Even for core functions like provisioning or mediation, some telcos have tried to manage with home-grown applications. · Most of the applications do not have the required scalability or maintainability to sustain growth in volumes or functionality. · Applications face interoperability issues with other applications in the operator's landscape. Integrating a new application or network element requires considerable effort on the part of the other applications. · Application boundaries are not clear, and functionality that is not in the initial scope of that application gets pushed onto it. This results in the development of the multiple, small applications without proper boundaries. · Usage of Legacy OSS/BSS systems, poor Integration across Multiple COTS Products and Internal Systems. Most of the Integrations are developed on ad-hoc basis and Point-to-Point Integration. · Redundancy of the business functions in different applications • Fragmented data across the different applications and no integrated view of the strategic data • Lot of performance Issues due to the usage of the complex integration across OSS and BSS systems However, this is where the maturity of the telecom industry as a whole can be of help. The collaborative efforts of telcos to overcome some of these problems have resulted in bodies like the TM Forum. They have come up with frameworks for business processes, data, applications, and technology for telecom service providers. These could be a good starting point for telcos to clean up their enterprise landscape. Industry Trends in Telecom Reference Architecture Telecom reference architectures are evolving rapidly because telcos are facing business and IT challenges. “The reality is that there probably is no killer application, no silver bullet that the telcos can latch onto to carry them into a 21st Century.... Instead, there are probably hundreds – perhaps thousands – of niche applications.... And the only way to find which of these works for you is to try out lots of them, ramp up the ones that work, and discontinue the ones that fail.” – Martin Creaner President & CTO TM Forum. The following trends have been observed in telecom reference architecture: · Transformation of business structures to align with customer requirements · Adoption of more Internet-like technical architectures. The Web 2.0 concept is increasingly being used. · Virtualization of the traditional operations support system (OSS) · Adoption of SOA to support development of IP-based services · Adoption of frameworks like Service Delivery Platforms (SDPs) and IP Multimedia Subsystem · (IMS) to enable seamless deployment of various services over fixed and mobile networks · Replacement of in-house, customized, and stove-piped OSS/BSS with standards-based COTS products · Compliance with industry standards and frameworks like eTOM, SID, and TAM to enable seamless integration with other standards-based products Drivers of Reference Architecture The drivers of the Reference Architecture are Reference Architecture Goals, Principles, and Enterprise Vision and Telecom Transformation. The details are depicted below diagram. @font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; } Figure 1. Drivers for Reference Architecture @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Today’s telecom reference architectures should seamlessly integrate traditional legacy-based applications and transition to next-generation network technologies (e.g., IP multimedia subsystems). This has resulted in new requirements for flexible, real-time billing and OSS/BSS systems and implications on the service provider’s organizational requirements and structure. Telecom reference architectures are today expected to: · Integrate voice, messaging, email and other VAS over fixed and mobile networks, back end systems · Be able to provision multiple services and service bundles • Deliver converged voice, video and data services · Leverage the existing Network Infrastructure · Provide real-time, flexible billing and charging systems to handle complex promotions, discounts, and settlements with multiple parties. · Support charging of advanced data services such as VoIP, On-Demand, Services (e.g. Video), IMS/SIP Services, Mobile Money, Content Services and IPTV. · Help in faster deployment of new services • Serve as an effective platform for collaboration between network IT and business organizations · Harness the potential of converging technology, networks, devices and content to develop multimedia services and solutions of ever-increasing sophistication on a single Internet Protocol (IP) · Ensure better service delivery and zero revenue leakage through real-time balance and credit management · Lower operating costs to drive profitability Enterprise Reference Architecture The Enterprise Reference Architecture (RA) fills the gap between the concepts and vocabulary defined by the reference model and the implementation. Reference architecture provides detailed architectural information in a common format such that solutions can be repeatedly designed and deployed in a consistent, high-quality, supportable fashion. This paper attempts to describe the Reference Architecture for the Telecom Application Usage and how to achieve the Enterprise Level Reference Architecture using SOA. • Telecom Reference Architecture • Enterprise SOA based Reference Architecture Telecom Reference Architecture Tele Management Forum’s New Generation Operations Systems and Software (NGOSS) is an architectural framework for organizing, integrating, and implementing telecom systems. NGOSS is a component-based framework consisting of the following elements: · The enhanced Telecom Operations Map (eTOM) is a business process framework. · The Shared Information Data (SID) model provides a comprehensive information framework that may be specialized for the needs of a particular organization. · The Telecom Application Map (TAM) is an application framework to depict the functional footprint of applications, relative to the horizontal processes within eTOM. · The Technology Neutral Architecture (TNA) is an integrated framework. TNA is an architecture that is sustainable through technology changes. NGOSS Architecture Standards are: · Centralized data · Loosely coupled distributed systems · Application components/re-use · A technology-neutral system framework with technology specific implementations · Interoperability to service provider data/processes · Allows more re-use of business components across multiple business scenarios · Workflow automation The traditional operator systems architecture consists of four layers, · Business Support System (BSS) layer, with focus toward customers and business partners. Manages order, subscriber, pricing, rating, and billing information. · Operations Support System (OSS) layer, built around product, service, and resource inventories. · Networks layer – consists of Network elements and 3rd Party Systems. · Integration Layer – to maximize application communication and overall solution flexibility. Reference architecture for telecom enterprises is depicted below. @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Figure 2. Telecom Reference Architecture The major building blocks of any Telecom Service Provider architecture are as follows: 1. Customer Relationship Management CRM encompasses the end-to-end lifecycle of the customer: customer initiation/acquisition, sales, ordering, and service activation, customer care and support, proactive campaigns, cross sell/up sell, and retention/loyalty. CRM also includes the collection of customer information and its application to personalize, customize, and integrate delivery of service to a customer, as well as to identify opportunities for increasing the value of the customer to the enterprise. The key functionalities related to Customer Relationship Management are · Manage the end-to-end lifecycle of a customer request for products. · Create and manage customer profiles. · Manage all interactions with customers – inquiries, requests, and responses. · Provide updates to Billing and other south bound systems on customer/account related updates such as customer/ account creation, deletion, modification, request bills, final bill, duplicate bills, credit limits through Middleware. · Work with Order Management System, Product, and Service Management components within CRM. · Manage customer preferences – Involve all the touch points and channels to the customer, including contact center, retail stores, dealers, self service, and field service, as well as via any media (phone, face to face, web, mobile device, chat, email, SMS, mail, the customer's bill, etc.). · Support single interface for customer contact details, preferences, account details, offers, customer premise equipment, bill details, bill cycle details, and customer interactions. CRM applications interact with customers through customer touch points like portals, point-of-sale terminals, interactive voice response systems, etc. The requests by customers are sent via fulfillment/provisioning to billing system for ordering processing. 2. Billing and Revenue Management Billing and Revenue Management handles the collection of appropriate usage records and production of timely and accurate bills – for providing pre-bill usage information and billing to customers; for processing their payments; and for performing payment collections. In addition, it handles customer inquiries about bills, provides billing inquiry status, and is responsible for resolving billing problems to the customer's satisfaction in a timely manner. This process grouping also supports prepayment for services. The key functionalities provided by these applications are · To ensure that enterprise revenue is billed and invoices delivered appropriately to customers. · To manage customers’ billing accounts, process their payments, perform payment collections, and monitor the status of the account balance. · To ensure the timely and effective fulfillment of all customer bill inquiries and complaints. · Collect the usage records from mediation and ensure appropriate rating and discounting of all usage and pricing. · Support revenue sharing; split charging where usage is guided to an account different from the service consumer. · Support prepaid and post-paid rating. · Send notification on approach / exceeding the usage thresholds as enforced by the subscribed offer, and / or as setup by the customer. · Support prepaid, post paid, and hybrid (where some services are prepaid and the rest of the services post paid) customers and conversion from post paid to prepaid, and vice versa. · Support different billing function requirements like charge prorating, promotion, discount, adjustment, waiver, write-off, account receivable, GL Interface, late payment fee, credit control, dunning, account or service suspension, re-activation, expiry, termination, contract violation penalty, etc. · Initiate direct debit to collect payment against an invoice outstanding. · Send notification to Middleware on different events; for example, payment receipt, pre-suspension, threshold exceed, etc. Billing systems typically get usage data from mediation systems for rating and billing. They get provisioning requests from order management systems and inquiries from CRM systems. Convergent and real-time billing systems can directly get usage details from network elements. 3. Mediation Mediation systems transform/translate the Raw or Native Usage Data Records into a general format that is acceptable to billing for their rating purposes. The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Mediation system in the end-to-end solution. · Collect Usage Data Records from different data sources – like network elements, routers, servers – via different protocol and interfaces. · Process Usage Data Records – Mediation will process Usage Data Records as per the source format. · Validate Usage Data Records from each source. · Segregates Usage Data Records coming from each source to multiple, based on the segregation requirement of end Application. · Aggregates Usage Data Records based on the aggregation rule if any from different sources. · Consolidates multiple Usage Data Records from each source. · Delivers formatted Usage Data Records to different end application like Billing, Interconnect, Fraud Management, etc. · Generates audit trail for incoming Usage Data Records and keeps track of all the Usage Data Records at various stages of mediation process. · Checks duplicate Usage Data Records across files for a given time window. 4. Fulfillment This area is responsible for providing customers with their requested products in a timely and correct manner. It translates the customer's business or personal need into a solution that can be delivered using the specific products in the enterprise's portfolio. This process informs the customers of the status of their purchase order, and ensures completion on time, as well as ensuring a delighted customer. These processes are responsible for accepting and issuing orders. They deal with pre-order feasibility determination, credit authorization, order issuance, order status and tracking, customer update on customer order activities, and customer notification on order completion. Order management and provisioning applications fall into this category. The key functionalities provided by these applications are · Issuing new customer orders, modifying open customer orders, or canceling open customer orders; · Verifying whether specific non-standard offerings sought by customers are feasible and supportable; · Checking the credit worthiness of customers as part of the customer order process; · Testing the completed offering to ensure it is working correctly; · Updating of the Customer Inventory Database to reflect that the specific product offering has been allocated, modified, or cancelled; · Assigning and tracking customer provisioning activities; · Managing customer provisioning jeopardy conditions; and · Reporting progress on customer orders and other processes to customer. These applications typically get orders from CRM systems. They interact with network elements and billing systems for fulfillment of orders. 5. Enterprise Management This process area includes those processes that manage enterprise-wide activities and needs, or have application within the enterprise as a whole. They encompass all business management processes that · Are necessary to support the whole of the enterprise, including processes for financial management, legal management, regulatory management, process, cost, and quality management, etc.; · Are responsible for setting corporate policies, strategies, and directions, and for providing guidelines and targets for the whole of the business, including strategy development and planning for areas, such as Enterprise Architecture, that are integral to the direction and development of the business; · Occur throughout the enterprise, including processes for project management, performance assessments, cost assessments, etc. (i) Enterprise Risk Management: Enterprise Risk Management focuses on assuring that risks and threats to the enterprise value and/or reputation are identified, and appropriate controls are in place to minimize or eliminate the identified risks. The identified risks may be physical or logical/virtual. Successful risk management ensures that the enterprise can support its mission critical operations, processes, applications, and communications in the face of serious incidents such as security threats/violations and fraud attempts. Two key areas covered in Risk Management by telecom operators are: · Revenue Assurance: Revenue assurance system will be responsible for identifying revenue loss scenarios across components/systems, and will help in rectifying the problems. The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Revenue Assurance system in the end-to-end solution. o Identify all usage information dropped when networks are being upgraded. o Interconnect bill verification. o Identify where services are routinely provisioned but never billed. o Identify poor sales policies that are intensifying collections problems. o Find leakage where usage is sent to error bucket and never billed for. o Find leakage where field service, CRM, and network build-out are not optimized. · Fraud Management: Involves collecting data from different systems to identify abnormalities in traffic patterns, usage patterns, and subscription patterns to report suspicious activity that might suggest fraudulent usage of resources, resulting in revenue losses to the operator. The key roles and responsibilities of the system component are as follows: o Fraud management system will capture and monitor high usage (over a certain threshold) in terms of duration, value, and number of calls for each subscriber. The threshold for each subscriber is decided by the system and fixed automatically. o Fraud management will be able to detect the unauthorized access to services for certain subscribers. These subscribers may have been provided unauthorized services by employees. The component will raise the alert to the operator the very first time of such illegal calls or calls which are not billed. o The solution will be to have an alarm management system that will deliver alarms to the operator/provider whenever it detects a fraud, thus minimizing fraud by catching it the first time it occurs. o The Fraud Management system will be capable of interfacing with switches, mediation systems, and billing systems (ii) Knowledge Management This process focuses on knowledge management, technology research within the enterprise, and the evaluation of potential technology acquisitions. Key responsibilities of knowledge base management are to · Maintain knowledge base – Creation and updating of knowledge base on ongoing basis. · Search knowledge base – Search of knowledge base on keywords or category browse · Maintain metadata – Management of metadata on knowledge base to ensure effective management and search. · Run report generator. · Provide content – Add content to the knowledge base, e.g., user guides, operational manual, etc. (iii) Document Management It focuses on maintaining a repository of all electronic documents or images of paper documents relevant to the enterprise using a system. (iv) Data Management It manages data as a valuable resource for any enterprise. For telecom enterprises, the typical areas covered are Master Data Management, Data Warehousing, and Business Intelligence. It is also responsible for data governance, security, quality, and database management. Key responsibilities of Data Management are · Using ETL, extract the data from CRM, Billing, web content, ERP, campaign management, financial, network operations, asset management info, customer contact data, customer measures, benchmarks, process data, e.g., process inputs, outputs, and measures, into Enterprise Data Warehouse. · Management of data traceability with source, data related business rules/decisions, data quality, data cleansing data reconciliation, competitors data – storage for all the enterprise data (customer profiles, products, offers, revenues, etc.) · Get online update through night time replication or physical backup process at regular frequency. · Provide the data access to business intelligence and other systems for their analysis, report generation, and use. (v) Business Intelligence It uses the Enterprise Data to provide the various analysis and reports that contain prospects and analytics for customer retention, acquisition of new customers due to the offers, and SLAs. It will generate right and optimized plans – bolt-ons for the customers. The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Business Intelligence system at the Enterprise Level: · It will do Pattern analysis and reports problem. · It will do Data Analysis – Statistical analysis, data profiling, affinity analysis of data, customer segment wise usage patterns on offers, products, service and revenue generation against services and customer segments. · It will do Performance (business, system, and forecast) analysis, churn propensity, response time, and SLAs analysis. · It will support for online and offline analysis, and report drill down capability. · It will collect, store, and report various SLA data. · It will provide the necessary intelligence for marketing and working on campaigns, etc., with cost benefit analysis and predictions. It will advise on customer promotions with additional services based on loyalty and credit history of customer · It will Interface with Enterprise Data Management system for data to run reports and analysis tasks. It will interface with the campaign schedules, based on historical success evidence. (vi) Stakeholder and External Relations Management It manages the enterprise's relationship with stakeholders and outside entities. Stakeholders include shareholders, employee organizations, etc. Outside entities include regulators, local community, and unions. Some of the processes within this grouping are Shareholder Relations, External Affairs, Labor Relations, and Public Relations. (vii) Enterprise Resource Planning It is used to manage internal and external resources, including tangible assets, financial resources, materials, and human resources. Its purpose is to facilitate the flow of information between all business functions inside the boundaries of the enterprise and manage the connections to outside stakeholders. ERP systems consolidate all business operations into a uniform and enterprise wide system environment. The key roles and responsibilities for Enterprise System are given below: · It will handle responsibilities such as core accounting, financial, and management reporting. · It will interface with CRM for capturing customer account and details. · It will interface with billing to capture the billing revenue and other financial data. · It will be responsible for executing the dunning process. Billing will send the required feed to ERP for execution of dunning. · It will interface with the CRM and Billing through batch interfaces. Enterprise management systems are like horizontals in the enterprise and typically interact with all major telecom systems. E.g., an ERP system interacts with CRM, Fulfillment, and Billing systems for different kinds of data exchanges. 6. External Interfaces/Touch Points The typical external parties are customers, suppliers/partners, employees, shareholders, and other stakeholders. External interactions from/to a Service Provider to other parties can be achieved by a variety of mechanisms, including: · Exchange of emails or faxes · Call Centers · Web Portals · Business-to-Business (B2B) automated transactions These applications provide an Internet technology driven interface to external parties to undertake a variety of business functions directly for themselves. These can provide fully or partially automated service to external parties through various touch points. Typical characteristics of these touch points are · Pre-integrated self-service system, including stand-alone web framework or integration front end with a portal engine · Self services layer exposing atomic web services/APIs for reuse by multiple systems across the architectural environment · Portlets driven connectivity exposing data and services interoperability through a portal engine or web application These touch points mostly interact with the CRM systems for requests, inquiries, and responses. 7. Middleware The component will be primarily responsible for integrating the different systems components under a common platform. It should provide a Standards-Based Platform for building Service Oriented Architecture and Composite Applications. The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Middleware component in the end-to-end solution. · As an integration framework, covering to and fro interfaces · Provide a web service framework with service registry. · Support SOA framework with SOA service registry. · Each of the interfaces from / to Middleware to other components would handle data transformation, translation, and mapping of data points. · Receive data from the caller / activate and/or forward the data to the recipient system in XML format. · Use standard XML for data exchange. · Provide the response back to the service/call initiator. · Provide a tracking until the response completion. · Keep a store transitional data against each call/transaction. · Interface through Middleware to get any information that is possible and allowed from the existing systems to enterprise systems; e.g., customer profile and customer history, etc. · Provide the data in a common unified format to the SOA calls across systems, and follow the Enterprise Architecture directive. · Provide an audit trail for all transactions being handled by the component. 8. Network Elements The term Network Element means a facility or equipment used in the provision of a telecommunications service. Such terms also includes features, functions, and capabilities that are provided by means of such facility or equipment, including subscriber numbers, databases, signaling systems, and information sufficient for billing and collection or used in the transmission, routing, or other provision of a telecommunications service. Typical network elements in a GSM network are Home Location Register (HLR), Intelligent Network (IN), Mobile Switching Center (MSC), SMS Center (SMSC), and network elements for other value added services like Push-to-talk (PTT), Ring Back Tone (RBT), etc. Network elements are invoked when subscribers use their telecom devices for any kind of usage. These elements generate usage data and pass it on to downstream systems like mediation and billing system for rating and billing. They also integrate with provisioning systems for order/service fulfillment. 9. 3rd Party Applications 3rd Party systems are applications like content providers, payment gateways, point of sale terminals, and databases/applications maintained by the Government. Depending on applicability and the type of functionality provided by 3rd party applications, the integration with different telecom systems like CRM, provisioning, and billing will be done. 10. Service Delivery Platform A service delivery platform (SDP) provides the architecture for the rapid deployment, provisioning, execution, management, and billing of value added telecom services. SDPs are based on the concept of SOA and layered architecture. They support the delivery of voice, data services, and content in network and device-independent fashion. They allow application developers to aggregate network capabilities, services, and sources of content. SDPs typically contain layers for web services exposure, service application development, and network abstraction. SOA Reference Architecture SOA concept is based on the principle of developing reusable business service and building applications by composing those services, instead of building monolithic applications in silos. It’s about bridging the gap between business and IT through a set of business-aligned IT services, using a set of design principles, patterns, and techniques. In an SOA, resources are made available to participants in a value net, enterprise, line of business (typically spanning multiple applications within an enterprise or across multiple enterprises). It consists of a set of business-aligned IT services that collectively fulfill an organization’s business processes and goals. We can choreograph these services into composite applications and invoke them through standard protocols. SOA, apart from agility and reusability, enables: · The business to specify processes as orchestrations of reusable services · Technology agnostic business design, with technology hidden behind service interface · A contractual-like interaction between business and IT, based on service SLAs · Accountability and governance, better aligned to business services · Applications interconnections untangling by allowing access only through service interfaces, reducing the daunting side effects of change · Reduced pressure to replace legacy and extended lifetime for legacy applications, through encapsulation in services · A Cloud Computing paradigm, using web services technologies, that makes possible service outsourcing on an on-demand, utility-like, pay-per-usage basis The following section represents the Reference Architecture of logical view for the Telecom Solution. The new custom built application needs to align with this logical architecture in the long run to achieve EA benefits. Packaged implementation applications, such as ERP billing applications, need to expose their functions as service providers (as other applications consume) and interact with other applications as service consumers. COT applications need to expose services through wrappers such as adapters to utilize existing resources and at the same time achieve Enterprise Architecture goal and objectives. The following are the various layers for Enterprise level deployment of SOA. This diagram captures the abstract view of Enterprise SOA layers and important components of each layer. Layered architecture means decomposition of services such that most interactions occur between adjacent layers. However, there is no strict rule that top layers should not directly communicate with bottom layers. The diagram below represents the important logical pieces that would result from overall SOA transformation. @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Figure 3. Enterprise SOA Reference Architecture 1. Operational System Layer: This layer consists of all packaged applications like CRM, ERP, custom built applications, COTS based applications like Billing, Revenue Management, Fulfilment, and the Enterprise databases that are essential and contribute directly or indirectly to the Enterprise OSS/BSS Transformation. ERP holds the data of Asset Lifecycle Management, Supply Chain, and Advanced Procurement and Human Capital Management, etc. CRM holds the data related to Order, Sales, and Marketing, Customer Care, Partner Relationship Management, Loyalty, etc. Content Management handles Enterprise Search and Query. Billing application consists of the following components: · Collections Management, Customer Billing Management, Invoices, Real-Time Rating, Discounting, and Applying of Charges · Enterprise databases will hold both the application and service data, whether structured or unstructured. MDM - Master data majorly consists of Customer, Order, Product, and Service Data. 2. Enterprise Component Layer: This layer consists of the Application Services and Common Services that are responsible for realizing the functionality and maintaining the QoS of the exposed services. This layer uses container-based technologies such as application servers to implement the components, workload management, high availability, and load balancing. Application Services: This Service Layer enables application, technology, and database abstraction so that the complex accessing logic is hidden from the other service layers. This is a basic service layer, which exposes application functionalities and data as reusable services. The three types of the Application access services are: · Application Access Service: This Service Layer exposes application level functionalities as a reusable service between BSS to BSS and BSS to OSS integration. This layer is enabled using disparate technology such as Web Service, Integration Servers, and Adaptors, etc. · Data Access Service: This Service Layer exposes application data services as a reusable reference data service. This is done via direct interaction with application data. and provides the federated query. · Network Access Service: This Service Layer exposes provisioning layer as a reusable service from OSS to OSS integration. This integration service emphasizes the need for high performance, stateless process flows, and distributed design. Common Services encompasses management of structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data such as information services, portal services, interaction services, infrastructure services, and security services, etc. 3. Integration Layer: This consists of service infrastructure components like service bus, service gateway for partner integration, service registry, service repository, and BPEL processor. Service bus will carry the service invocation payloads/messages between consumers and providers. The other important functions expected from it are itinerary based routing, distributed caching of routing information, transformations, and all qualities of service for messaging-like reliability, scalability, and availability, etc. Service registry will hold all contracts (wsdl) of services, and it helps developers to locate or discover service during design time or runtime. • BPEL processor would be useful in orchestrating the services to compose a complex business scenario or process. • Workflow and business rules management are also required to support manual triggering of certain activities within business process. based on the rules setup and also the state machine information. Application, data, and service mediation layer typically forms the overall composite application development framework or SOA Framework. 4. Business Process Layer: These are typically the intermediate services layer and represent Shared Business Process Services. At Enterprise Level, these services are from Customer Management, Order Management, Billing, Finance, and Asset Management application domains. 5. Access Layer: This layer consists of portals for Enterprise and provides a single view of Enterprise information management and dashboard services. 6. Channel Layer: This consists of various devices; applications that form part of extended enterprise; browsers through which users access the applications. 7. Client Layer: This designates the different types of users accessing the enterprise applications. The type of user typically would be an important factor in determining the level of access to applications. 8. Vertical pieces like management, monitoring, security, and development cut across all horizontal layers Management and monitoring involves all aspects of SOA-like services, SLAs, and other QoS lifecycle processes for both applications and services surrounding SOA governance. 9. EA Governance, Reference Architecture, Roadmap, Principles, and Best Practices: EA Governance is important in terms of providing the overall direction to SOA implementation within the enterprise. This involves board-level involvement, in addition to business and IT executives. At a high level, this involves managing the SOA projects implementation, managing SOA infrastructure, and controlling the entire effort through all fine-tuned IT processes in accordance with COBIT (Control Objectives for Information Technology). Devising tools and techniques to promote reuse culture, and the SOA way of doing things needs competency centers to be established in addition to training the workforce to take up new roles that are suited to SOA journey. Conclusions Reference Architectures can serve as the basis for disparate architecture efforts throughout the organization, even if they use different tools and technologies. Reference architectures provide best practices and approaches in the independent way a vendor deals with technology and standards. Reference Architectures model the abstract architectural elements for an enterprise independent of the technologies, protocols, and products that are used to implement an SOA. Telecom enterprises today are facing significant business and technology challenges due to growing competition, a multitude of services, and convergence. Adopting architectural best practices could go a long way in meeting these challenges. The use of SOA-based architecture for communication to each of the external systems like Billing, CRM, etc., in OSS/BSS system has made the architecture very loosely coupled, with greater flexibility. Any change in the external systems would be absorbed at the Integration Layer without affecting the rest of the ecosystem. The use of a Business Process Management (BPM) tool makes the management and maintenance of the business processes easy, with better performance in terms of lead time, quality, and cost. Since the Architecture is based on standards, it will lower the cost of deploying and managing OSS/BSS applications over their lifecycles.

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Agile Development

- by James Oloo Onyango

Alot of literature has and is being written about agile developement and its surrounding philosophies. In my quest to find the best way to express the importance of agile methodologies, i have found Robert C. Martin's "A Satire Of Two Companies" to be both the most concise and thorough! Enjoy the read! Rufus Inc Project Kick Off Your name is Bob. The date is January 3, 2001, and your head still aches from the recent millennial revelry. You are sitting in a conference room with several managers and a group of your peers. You are a project team leader. Your boss is there, and he has brought along all of his team leaders. His boss called the meeting. "We have a new project to develop," says your boss's boss. Call him BB. The points in his hair are so long that they scrape the ceiling. Your boss's points are just starting to grow, but he eagerly awaits the day when he can leave Brylcream stains on the acoustic tiles. BB describes the essence of the new market they have identified and the product they want to develop to exploit this market. "We must have this new project up and working by fourth quarter October 1," BB demands. "Nothing is of higher priority, so we are cancelling your current project." The reaction in the room is stunned silence. Months of work are simply going to be thrown away. Slowly, a murmur of objection begins to circulate around the conference table. His points give off an evil green glow as BB meets the eyes of everyone in the room. One by one, that insidious stare reduces each attendee to quivering lumps of protoplasm. It is clear that he will brook no discussion on this matter. Once silence has been restored, BB says, "We need to begin immediately. How long will it take you to do the analysis?" You raise your hand. Your boss tries to stop you, but his spitwad misses you and you are unaware of his efforts. "Sir, we can't tell you how long the analysis will take until we have some requirements." "The requirements document won't be ready for 3 or 4 weeks," BB says, his points vibrating with frustration. "So, pretend that you have the requirements in front of you now. How long will you require for analysis?" No one breathes. Everyone looks around to see whether anyone has some idea. "If analysis goes beyond April 1, we have a problem. Can you finish the analysis by then?" Your boss visibly gathers his courage: "We'll find a way, sir!" His points grow 3 mm, and your headache increases by two Tylenol. "Good." BB smiles. "Now, how long will it take to do the design?" "Sir," you say. Your boss visibly pales. He is clearly worried that his 3 mms are at risk. "Without an analysis, it will not be possible to tell you how long design will take." BB's expression shifts beyond austere. "PRETEND you have the analysis already!" he says, while fixing you with his vacant, beady little eyes. "How long will it take you to do the design?" Two Tylenol are not going to cut it. Your boss, in a desperate attempt to save his new growth, babbles: "Well, sir, with only six months left to complete the project, design had better take no longer than 3 months." "I'm glad you agree, Smithers!" BB says, beaming. Your boss relaxes. He knows his points are secure. After a while, he starts lightly humming the Brylcream jingle. BB continues, "So, analysis will be complete by April 1, design will be complete by July 1, and that gives you 3 months to implement the project. This meeting is an example of how well our new consensus and empowerment policies are working. Now, get out there and start working. I'll expect to see TQM plans and QIT assignments on my desk by next week. Oh, and don't forget that your crossfunctional team meetings and reports will be needed for next month's quality audit." "Forget the Tylenol," you think to yourself as you return to your cubicle. "I need bourbon." Visibly excited, your boss comes over to you and says, "Gosh, what a great meeting. I think we're really going to do some world shaking with this project." You nod in agreement, too disgusted to do anything else. "Oh," your boss continues, "I almost forgot." He hands you a 30-page document. "Remember that the SEI is coming to do an evaluation next week. This is the evaluation guide. You need to read through it, memorize it, and then shred it. It tells you how to answer any questions that the SEI auditors ask you. It also tells you what parts of the building you are allowed to take them to and what parts to avoid. We are determined to be a CMM level 3 organization by June!" You and your peers start working on the analysis of the new project. This is difficult because you have no requirements. But from the 10-minute introduction given by BB on that fateful morning, you have some idea of what the product is supposed to do. Corporate process demands that you begin by creating a use case document. You and your team begin enumerating use cases and drawing oval and stick diagrams. Philosophical debates break out among the team members. There is disagreement as to whether certain use cases should be connected with <<extends>> or <<includes>> relationships. Competing models are created, but nobody knows how to evaluate them. The debate continues, effectively paralyzing progress. After a week, somebody finds the iceberg.com Web site, which recommends disposing entirely of <<extends>> and <<includes>> and replacing them with <<precedes>> and <<uses>>. The documents on this Web site, authored by Don Sengroiux, describes a method known as stalwart-analysis, which claims to be a step-by-step method for translating use cases into design diagrams. More competing use case models are created using this new scheme, but again, people can't agree on how to evaluate them. The thrashing continues. More and more, the use case meetings are driven by emotion rather than by reason. If it weren't for the fact that you don't have requirements, you'd be pretty upset by the lack of progress you are making. The requirements document arrives on February 15. And then again on February 20, 25, and every week thereafter. Each new version contradicts the previous one. Clearly, the marketing folks who are writing the requirements, empowered though they might be, are not finding consensus. At the same time, several new competing use case templates have been proposed by the various team members. Each template presents its own particularly creative way of delaying progress. The debates rage on. On March 1, Prudence Putrigence, the process proctor, succeeds in integrating all the competing use case forms and templates into a single, all-encompassing form. Just the blank form is 15 pages long. She has managed to include every field that appeared on all the competing templates. She also presents a 159- page document describing how to fill out the use case form. All current use cases must be rewritten according to the new standard. You marvel to yourself that it now requires 15 pages of fill-in-the-blank and essay questions to answer the question: What should the system do when the user presses Return? The corporate process (authored by L. E. Ott, famed author of "Holistic Analysis: A Progressive Dialectic for Software Engineers") insists that you discover all primary use cases, 87 percent of all secondary use cases, and 36.274 percent of all tertiary use cases before you can complete analysis and enter the design phase. You have no idea what a tertiary use case is. So in an attempt to meet this requirement, you try to get your use case document reviewed by the marketing department, which you hope will know what a tertiary use case is. Unfortunately, the marketing folks are too busy with sales support to talk to you. Indeed, since the project started, you have not been able to get a single meeting with marketing, which has provided a never-ending stream of changing and contradictory requirements documents. While one team has been spinning endlessly on the use case document, another team has been working out the domain model. Endless variations of UML documents are pouring out of this team. Every week, the model is reworked. The team members can't decide whether to use <<interfaces>> or <<types>> in the model. A huge disagreement has been raging on the proper syntax and application of OCL. Others on the team just got back from a 5-day class on catabolism, and have been producing incredibly detailed and arcane diagrams that nobody else can fathom. On March 27, with one week to go before analysis is to be complete, you have produced a sea of documents and diagrams but are no closer to a cogent analysis of the problem than you were on January 3. **** And then, a miracle happens. **** On Saturday, April 1, you check your e-mail from home. You see a memo from your boss to BB. It states unequivocally that you are done with the analysis! You phone your boss and complain. "How could you have told BB that we were done with the analysis?" "Have you looked at a calendar lately?" he responds. "It's April 1!" The irony of that date does not escape you. "But we have so much more to think about. So much more to analyze! We haven't even decided whether to use <<extends>> or <<precedes>>!" "Where is your evidence that you are not done?" inquires your boss, impatiently. "Whaaa . . . ." But he cuts you off. "Analysis can go on forever; it has to be stopped at some point. And since this is the date it was scheduled to stop, it has been stopped. Now, on Monday, I want you to gather up all existing analysis materials and put them into a public folder. Release that folder to Prudence so that she can log it in the CM system by Monday afternoon. Then get busy and start designing." As you hang up the phone, you begin to consider the benefits of keeping a bottle of bourbon in your bottom desk drawer. They threw a party to celebrate the on-time completion of the analysis phase. BB gave a colon-stirring speech on empowerment. And your boss, another 3 mm taller, congratulated his team on the incredible show of unity and teamwork. Finally, the CIO takes the stage to tell everyone that the SEI audit went very well and to thank everyone for studying and shredding the evaluation guides that were passed out. Level 3 now seems assured and will be awarded by June. (Scuttlebutt has it that managers at the level of BB and above are to receive significant bonuses once the SEI awards level 3.) As the weeks flow by, you and your team work on the design of the system. Of course, you find that the analysis that the design is supposedly based on is flawedno, useless; no, worse than useless. But when you tell your boss that you need to go back and work some more on the analysis to shore up its weaker sections, he simply states, "The analysis phase is over. The only allowable activity is design. Now get back to it." So, you and your team hack the design as best you can, unsure of whether the requirements have been properly analyzed. Of course, it really doesn't matter much, since the requirements document is still thrashing with weekly revisions, and the marketing department still refuses to meet with you. The design is a nightmare. Your boss recently misread a book named The Finish Line in which the author, Mark DeThomaso, blithely suggested that design documents should be taken down to code-level detail. "If we are going to be working at that level of detail," you ask, "why don't we simply write the code instead?" "Because then you wouldn't be designing, of course. And the only allowable activity in the design phase is design!" "Besides," he continues, "we have just purchased a companywide license for Dandelion! This tool enables 'Round the Horn Engineering!' You are to transfer all design diagrams into this tool. It will automatically generate our code for us! It will also keep the design diagrams in sync with the code!" Your boss hands you a brightly colored shrinkwrapped box containing the Dandelion distribution. You accept it numbly and shuffle off to your cubicle. Twelve hours, eight crashes, one disk reformatting, and eight shots of 151 later, you finally have the tool installed on your server. You consider the week your team will lose while attending Dandelion training. Then you smile and think, "Any week I'm not here is a good week." Design diagram after design diagram is created by your team. Dandelion makes it very difficult to draw these diagrams. There are dozens and dozens of deeply nested dialog boxes with funny text fields and check boxes that must all be filled in correctly. And then there's the problem of moving classes between packages. At first, these diagram are driven from the use cases. But the requirements are changing so often that the use cases rapidly become meaningless. Debates rage about whether VISITOR or DECORATOR design patterns should be used. One developer refuses to use VISITOR in any form, claiming that it's not a properly object-oriented construct. Someone refuses to use multiple inheritance, since it is the spawn of the devil. Review meetings rapidly degenerate into debates about the meaning of object orientation, the definition of analysis versus design, or when to use aggregation versus association. Midway through the design cycle, the marketing folks announce that they have rethought the focus of the system. Their new requirements document is completely restructured. They have eliminated several major feature areas and replaced them with feature areas that they anticipate customer surveys will show to be more appropriate. You tell your boss that these changes mean that you need to reanalyze and redesign much of the system. But he says, "The analysis phase is system. But he says, "The analysis phase is over. The only allowable activity is design. Now get back to it." You suggest that it might be better to create a simple prototype to show to the marketing folks and even some potential customers. But your boss says, "The analysis phase is over. The only allowable activity is design. Now get back to it." Hack, hack, hack, hack. You try to create some kind of a design document that might reflect the new requirements documents. However, the revolution of the requirements has not caused them to stop thrashing. Indeed, if anything, the wild oscillations of the requirements document have only increased in frequency and amplitude. You slog your way through them. On June 15, the Dandelion database gets corrupted. Apparently, the corruption has been progressive. Small errors in the DB accumulated over the months into bigger and bigger errors. Eventually, the CASE tool just stopped working. Of course, the slowly encroaching corruption is present on all the backups. Calls to the Dandelion technical support line go unanswered for several days. Finally, you receive a brief e-mail from Dandelion, informing you that this is a known problem and that the solution is to purchase the new version, which they promise will be ready some time next quarter, and then reenter all the diagrams by hand. **** Then, on July 1 another miracle happens! You are done with the design! Rather than go to your boss and complain, you stock your middle desk drawer with some vodka. **** They threw a party to celebrate the on-time completion of the design phase and their graduation to CMM level 3. This time, you find BB's speech so stirring that you have to use the restroom before it begins. New banners and plaques are all over your workplace. They show pictures of eagles and mountain climbers, and they talk about teamwork and empowerment. They read better after a few scotches. That reminds you that you need to clear out your file cabinet to make room for the brandy. You and your team begin to code. But you rapidly discover that the design is lacking in some significant areas. Actually, it's lacking any significance at all. You convene a design session in one of the conference rooms to try to work through some of the nastier problems. But your boss catches you at it and disbands the meeting, saying, "The design phase is over. The only allowable activity is coding. Now get back to it." **** The code generated by Dandelion is really hideous. It turns out that you and your team were using association and aggregation the wrong way, after all. All the generated code has to be edited to correct these flaws. Editing this code is extremely difficult because it has been instrumented with ugly comment blocks that have special syntax that Dandelion needs in order to keep the diagrams in sync with the code. If you accidentally alter one of these comments, the diagrams will be regenerated incorrectly. It turns out that "Round the Horn Engineering" requires an awful lot of effort. The more you try to keep the code compatible with Dandelion, the more errors Dandelion generates. In the end, you give up and decide to keep the diagrams up to date manually. A second later, you decide that there's no point in keeping the diagrams up to date at all. Besides, who has time? Your boss hires a consultant to build tools to count the number of lines of code that are being produced. He puts a big thermometer graph on the wall with the number 1,000,000 on the top. Every day, he extends the red line to show how many lines have been added. Three days after the thermometer appears on the wall, your boss stops you in the hall. "That graph isn't growing quickly enough. We need to have a million lines done by October 1." "We aren't even sh-sh-sure that the proshect will require a m-million linezh," you blather. "We have to have a million lines done by October 1," your boss reiterates. His points have grown again, and the Grecian formula he uses on them creates an aura of authority and competence. "Are you sure your comment blocks are big enough?" Then, in a flash of managerial insight, he says, "I have it! I want you to institute a new policy among the engineers. No line of code is to be longer than 20 characters. Any such line must be split into two or more preferably more. All existing code needs to be reworked to this standard. That'll get our line count up!" You decide not to tell him that this will require two unscheduled work months. You decide not to tell him anything at all. You decide that intravenous injections of pure ethanol are the only solution. You make the appropriate arrangements. Hack, hack, hack, and hack. You and your team madly code away. By August 1, your boss, frowning at the thermometer on the wall, institutes a mandatory 50-hour workweek. Hack, hack, hack, and hack. By September 1st, the thermometer is at 1.2 million lines and your boss asks you to write a report describing why you exceeded the coding budget by 20 percent. He institutes mandatory Saturdays and demands that the project be brought back down to a million lines. You start a campaign of remerging lines. Hack, hack, hack, and hack. Tempers are flaring; people are quitting; QA is raining trouble reports down on you. Customers are demanding installation and user manuals; salespeople are demanding advance demonstrations for special customers; the requirements document is still thrashing, the marketing folks are complaining that the product isn't anything like they specified, and the liquor store won't accept your credit card anymore. Something has to give. On September 15, BB calls a meeting. As he enters the room, his points are emitting clouds of steam. When he speaks, the bass overtones of his carefully manicured voice cause the pit of your stomach to roll over. "The QA manager has told me that this project has less than 50 percent of the required features implemented. He has also informed me that the system crashes all the time, yields wrong results, and is hideously slow. He has also complained that he cannot keep up with the continuous train of daily releases, each more buggy than the last!" He stops for a few seconds, visibly trying to compose himself. "The QA manager estimates that, at this rate of development, we won't be able to ship the product until December!" Actually, you think it's more like March, but you don't say anything. "December!" BB roars with such derision that people duck their heads as though he were pointing an assault rifle at them. "December is absolutely out of the question. Team leaders, I want new estimates on my desk in the morning. I am hereby mandating 65-hour work weeks until this project is complete. And it better be complete by November 1." As he leaves the conference room, he is heard to mutter: "Empowermentbah!" * * * Your boss is bald; his points are mounted on BB's wall. The fluorescent lights reflecting off his pate momentarily dazzle you. "Do you have anything to drink?" he asks. Having just finished your last bottle of Boone's Farm, you pull a bottle of Thunderbird from your bookshelf and pour it into his coffee mug. "What's it going to take to get this project done? " he asks. "We need to freeze the requirements, analyze them, design them, and then implement them," you say callously. "By November 1?" your boss exclaims incredulously. "No way! Just get back to coding the damned thing." He storms out, scratching his vacant head. A few days later, you find that your boss has been transferred to the corporate research division. Turnover has skyrocketed. Customers, informed at the last minute that their orders cannot be fulfilled on time, have begun to cancel their orders. Marketing is re-evaluating whether this product aligns with the overall goals of the company. Memos fly, heads roll, policies change, and things are, overall, pretty grim. Finally, by March, after far too many sixty-five hour weeks, a very shaky version of the software is ready. In the field, bug-discovery rates are high, and the technical support staff are at their wits' end, trying to cope with the complaints and demands of the irate customers. Nobody is happy. In April, BB decides to buy his way out of the problem by licensing a product produced by Rupert Industries and redistributing it. The customers are mollified, the marketing folks are smug, and you are laid off. Rupert Industries: Project Alpha Your name is Robert. The date is January 3, 2001. The quiet hours spent with your family this holiday have left you refreshed and ready for work. You are sitting in a conference room with your team of professionals. The manager of the division called the meeting. "We have some ideas for a new project," says the division manager. Call him Russ. He is a high-strung British chap with more energy than a fusion reactor. He is ambitious and driven but understands the value of a team. Russ describes the essence of the new market opportunity the company has identified and introduces you to Jane, the marketing manager, who is responsible for defining the products that will address it. Addressing you, Jane says, "We'd like to start defining our first product offering as soon as possible. When can you and your team meet with me?" You reply, "We'll be done with the current iteration of our project this Friday. We can spare a few hours for you between now and then. After that, we'll take a few people from the team and dedicate them to you. We'll begin hiring their replacements and the new people for your team immediately." "Great," says Russ, "but I want you to understand that it is critical that we have something to exhibit at the trade show coming up this July. If we can't be there with something significant, we'll lose the opportunity." "I understand," you reply. "I don't yet know what it is that you have in mind, but I'm sure we can have something by July. I just can't tell you what that something will be right now. In any case, you and Jane are going to have complete control over what we developers do, so you can rest assured that by July, you'll have the most important things that can be accomplished in that time ready to exhibit." Russ nods in satisfaction. He knows how this works. Your team has always kept him advised and allowed him to steer their development. He has the utmost confidence that your team will work on the most important things first and will produce a high-quality product. * * * "So, Robert," says Jane at their first meeting, "How does your team feel about being split up?" "We'll miss working with each other," you answer, "but some of us were getting pretty tired of that last project and are looking forward to a change. So, what are you people cooking up?" Jane beams. "You know how much trouble our customers currently have . . ." And she spends a half hour or so describing the problem and possible solution. "OK, wait a second" you respond. "I need to be clear about this." And so you and Jane talk about how this system might work. Some of her ideas aren't fully formed. You suggest possible solutions. She likes some of them. You continue discussing. During the discussion, as each new topic is addressed, Jane writes user story cards. Each card represents something that the new system has to do. The cards accumulate on the table and are spread out in front of you. Both you and Jane point at them, pick them up, and make notes on them as you discuss the stories. The cards are powerful mnemonic devices that you can use to represent complex ideas that are barely formed. At the end of the meeting, you say, "OK, I've got a general idea of what you want. I'm going to talk to the team about it. I imagine they'll want to run some experiments with various database structures and presentation formats. Next time we meet, it'll be as a group, and we'll start identifying the most important features of the system." A week later, your nascent team meets with Jane. They spread the existing user story cards out on the table and begin to get into some of the details of the system. The meeting is very dynamic. Jane presents the stories in the order of their importance. There is much discussion about each one. The developers are concerned about keeping the stories small enough to estimate and test. So they continually ask Jane to split one story into several smaller stories. Jane is concerned that each story have a clear business value and priority, so as she splits them, she makes sure that this stays true. The stories accumulate on the table. Jane writes them, but the developers make notes on them as needed. Nobody tries to capture everything that is said; the cards are not meant to capture everything but are simply reminders of the conversation. As the developers become more comfortable with the stories, they begin writing estimates on them. These estimates are crude and budgetary, but they give Jane an idea of what the story will cost. At the end of the meeting, it is clear that many more stories could be discussed. It is also clear that the most important stories have been addressed and that they represent several months worth of work. Jane closes the meeting by taking the cards with her and promising to have a proposal for the first release in the morning. * * * The next morning, you reconvene the meeting. Jane chooses five cards and places them on the table. "According to your estimates, these cards represent about one perfect team-week's worth of work. The last iteration of the previous project managed to get one perfect team-week done in 3 real weeks. If we can get these five stories done in 3 weeks, we'll be able to demonstrate them to Russ. That will make him feel very comfortable about our progress." Jane is pushing it. The sheepish look on her face lets you know that she knows it too. You reply, "Jane, this is a new team, working on a new project. It's a bit presumptuous to expect that our velocity will be the same as the previous team's. However, I met with the team yesterday afternoon, and we all agreed that our initial velocity should, in fact, be set to one perfectweek for every 3 real-weeks. So you've lucked out on this one." "Just remember," you continue, "that the story estimates and the story velocity are very tentative at this point. We'll learn more when we plan the iteration and even more when we implement it." Jane looks over her glasses at you as if to say "Who's the boss around here, anyway?" and then smiles and says, "Yeah, don't worry. I know the drill by now."Jane then puts 15 more cards on the table. She says, "If we can get all these cards done by the end of March, we can turn the system over to our beta test customers. And we'll get good feedback from them." You reply, "OK, so we've got our first iteration defined, and we have the stories for the next three iterations after that. These four iterations will make our first release." "So," says Jane, can you really do these five stories in the next 3 weeks?" "I don't know for sure, Jane," you reply. "Let's break them down into tasks and see what we get." So Jane, you, and your team spend the next several hours taking each of the five stories that Jane chose for the first iteration and breaking them down into small tasks. The developers quickly realize that some of the tasks can be shared between stories and that other tasks have commonalities that can probably be taken advantage of. It is clear that potential designs are popping into the developers' heads. From time to time, they form little discussion knots and scribble UML diagrams on some cards. Soon, the whiteboard is filled with the tasks that, once completed, will implement the five stories for this iteration. You start the sign-up process by saying, "OK, let's sign up for these tasks." "I'll take the initial database generation." Says Pete. "That's what I did on the last project, and this doesn't look very different. I estimate it at two of my perfect workdays." "OK, well, then, I'll take the login screen," says Joe. "Aw, darn," says Elaine, the junior member of the team, "I've never done a GUI, and kinda wanted to try that one." "Ah, the impatience of youth," Joe says sagely, with a wink in your direction. "You can assist me with it, young Jedi." To Jane: "I think it'll take me about three of my perfect workdays." One by one, the developers sign up for tasks and estimate them in terms of their own perfect workdays. Both you and Jane know that it is best to let the developers volunteer for tasks than to assign the tasks to them. You also know full well that you daren't challenge any of the developers' estimates. You know these people, and you trust them. You know that they are going to do the very best they can. The developers know that they can't sign up for more perfect workdays than they finished in the last iteration they worked on. Once each developer has filled his or her schedule for the iteration, they stop signing up for tasks. Eventually, all the developers have stopped signing up for tasks. But, of course, tasks are still left on the board. "I was worried that that might happen," you say, "OK, there's only one thing to do, Jane. We've got too much to do in this iteration. What stories or tasks can we remove?" Jane sighs. She knows that this is the only option. Working overtime at the beginning of a project is insane, and projects where she's tried it have not fared well. So Jane starts to remove the least-important functionality. "Well, we really don't need the login screen just yet. We can simply start the system in the logged-in state." "Rats!" cries Elaine. "I really wanted to do that." "Patience, grasshopper." says Joe. "Those who wait for the bees to leave the hive will not have lips too swollen to relish the honey." Elaine looks confused. Everyone looks confused. "So . . .," Jane continues, "I think we can also do away with . . ." And so, bit by bit, the list of tasks shrinks. Developers who lose a task sign up for one of the remaining ones. The negotiation is not painless. Several times, Jane exhibits obvious frustration and impatience. Once, when tensions are especially high, Elaine volunteers, "I'll work extra hard to make up some of the missing time." You are about to correct her when, fortunately, Joe looks her in the eye and says, "When once you proceed down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny." In the end, an iteration acceptable to Jane is reached. It's not what Jane wanted. Indeed, it is significantly less. But it's something the team feels that can be achieved in the next 3 weeks. And, after all, it still addresses the most important things that Jane wanted in the iteration. "So, Jane," you say when things had quieted down a bit, "when can we expect acceptance tests from you?" Jane sighs. This is the other side of the coin. For every story the development team implements, Jane must supply a suite of acceptance tests that prove that it works. And the team needs these long before the end of the iteration, since they will certainly point out differences in the way Jane and the developers imagine the system's behaviour. "I'll get you some example test scripts today," Jane promises. "I'll add to them every day after that. You'll have the entire suite by the middle of the iteration." * * * The iteration begins on Monday morning with a flurry of Class, Responsibilities, Collaborators sessions. By midmorning, all the developers have assembled into pairs and are rapidly coding away. "And now, my young apprentice," Joe says to Elaine, "you shall learn the mysteries of test-first design!" "Wow, that sounds pretty rad," Elaine replies. "How do you do it?" Joe beams. It's clear that he has been anticipating this moment. "OK, what does the code do right now?" "Huh?" replied Elaine, "It doesn't do anything at all; there is no code." "So, consider our task; can you think of something the code should do?" "Sure," Elaine said with youthful assurance, "First, it should connect to the database." "And thereupon, what must needs be required to connecteth the database?" "You sure talk weird," laughed Elaine. "I think we'd have to get the database object from some registry and call the Connect() method. "Ah, astute young wizard. Thou perceives correctly that we requireth an object within which we can cacheth the database object." "Is 'cacheth' really a word?" "It is when I say it! So, what test can we write that we know the database registry should pass?" Elaine sighs. She knows she'll just have to play along. "We should be able to create a database object and pass it to the registry in a Store() method. And then we should be able to pull it out of the registry with a Get() method and make sure it's the same object." "Oh, well said, my prepubescent sprite!" "Hay!" "So, now, let's write a test function that proves your case." "But shouldn't we write the database object and registry object first?" "Ah, you've much to learn, my young impatient one. Just write the test first." "But it won't even compile!" "Are you sure? What if it did?" "Uh . . ." "Just write the test, Elaine. Trust me." And so Joe, Elaine, and all the other developers began to code their tasks, one test case at a time. The room in which they worked was abuzz with the conversations between the pairs. The murmur was punctuated by an occasional high five when a pair managed to finish a task or a difficult test case. As development proceeded, the developers changed partners once or twice a day. Each developer got to see what all the others were doing, and so knowledge of the code spread generally throughout the team. Whenever a pair finished something significant whether a whole task or simply an important part of a task they integrated what they had with the rest of the system. Thus, the code base grew daily, and integration difficulties were minimized. The developers communicated with Jane on a daily basis. They'd go to her whenever they had a question about the functionality of the system or the interpretation of an acceptance test case. Jane, good as her word, supplied the team with a steady stream of acceptance test scripts. The team read these carefully and thereby gained a much better understanding of what Jane expected the system to do. By the beginning of the second week, there was enough functionality to demonstrate to Jane. She watched eagerly as the demonstration passed test case after test case. "This is really cool," Jane said as the demonstration finally ended. "But this doesn't seem like one-third of the tasks. Is your velocity slower than anticipated?" You grimace. You'd been waiting for a good time to mention this to Jane but now she was forcing the issue. "Yes, unfortunately, we are going more slowly than we had expected. The new application server we are using is turning out to be a pain to configure. Also, it takes forever to reboot, and we have to reboot it whenever we make even the slightest change to its configuration." Jane eyes you with suspicion. The stress of last Monday's negotiations had still not entirely dissipated. She says, "And what does this mean to our schedule? We can't slip it again, we just can't. Russ will have a fit! He'll haul us all into the woodshed and ream us some new ones." You look Jane right in the eyes. There's no pleasant way to give someone news like this. So you just blurt out, "Look, if things keep going like they're going, we're not going to be done with everything by next Friday. Now it's possible that we'll figure out a way to go faster. But, frankly, I wouldn't depend on that. You should start thinking about one or two tasks that could be removed from the iteration without ruining the demonstration for Russ. Come hell or high water, we are going to give that demonstration on Friday, and I don't think you want us to choose which tasks to omit." "Aw forchrisakes!" Jane barely manages to stifle yelling that last word as she stalks away, shaking her head. Not for the first time, you say to yourself, "Nobody ever promised me project management would be easy." You are pretty sure it won't be the last time, either. Actually, things went a bit better than you had hoped. The team did, in fact, have to drop one task from the iteration, but Jane had chosen wisely, and the demonstration for Russ went without a hitch. Russ was not impressed with the progress, but neither was he dismayed. He simply said, "This is pretty good. But remember, we have to be able to demonstrate this system at the trade show in July, and at this rate, it doesn't look like you'll have all that much to show." Jane, whose attitude had improved dramatically with the completion of the iteration, responded to Russ by saying, "Russ, this team is working hard, and well. When July comes around, I am confident that we'll have something significant to demonstrate. It won't be everything, and some of it may be smoke and mirrors, but we'll have something." Painful though the last iteration was, it had calibrated your velocity numbers. The next iteration went much better. Not because your team got more done than in the last iteration but simply because the team didn't have to remove any tasks or stories in the middle of the iteration. By the start of the fourth iteration, a natural rhythm has been established. Jane, you, and the team know exactly what to expect from one another. The team is running hard, but the pace is sustainable. You are confident that the team can keep up this pace for a year or more. The number of surprises in the schedule diminishes to near zero; however, the number of surprises in the requirements does not. Jane and Russ frequently look over the growing system and make recommendations or changes to the existing functionality. But all parties realize that these changes take time and must be scheduled. So the changes do not cause anyone's expectations to be violated. In March, there is a major demonstration of the system to the board of directors. The system is very limited and is not yet in a form good enough to take to the trade show, but progress is steady, and the board is reasonably impressed. The second release goes even more smoothly than the first. By now, the team has figured out a way to automate Jane's acceptance test scripts. The team has also refactored the design of the system to the point that it is really easy to add new features and change old ones. The second release was done by the end of June and was taken to the trade show. It had less in it than Jane and Russ would have liked, but it did demonstrate the most important features of the system. Although customers at the trade show noticed that certain features were missing, they were very impressed overall. You, Russ, and Jane all returned from the trade show with smiles on your faces. You all felt as though this project was a winner. Indeed, many months later, you are contacted by Rufus Inc. That company had been working on a system like this for its internal operations. Rufus has canceled the development of that system after a death-march project and is negotiating to license your technology for its environment. Indeed, things are looking up!

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WMI Remote Process Starting

- by Goober

Scenario I've written a WMI Wrapper that seems to be quite sufficient, however whenever I run the code to start a remote process on a server, I see the process name appear in the task manager but the process itself does not start like it should (as in, I don't see the command line log window of the process that prints out what it's doing etc.) The process I am trying to start is just a C# application executable that I have written. Below is my WMI Wrapper Code and the code I am using to start running the process. Question Is the process actually running? - Even if it is only displaying the process name in the task manager and not actually launching the application to the users window? Code To Start The Process IPHostEntry hostEntry = Dns.GetHostEntry("InsertServerName"); WMIWrapper wrapper = new WMIWrapper("Insert User Name", "Insert Password", hostEntry.HostName); List<Process> processes = wrapper.GetProcesses(); foreach (Process process in processes) { if (process.Caption.Equals("MyAppName.exe")) { Console.WriteLine(process.Caption); Console.WriteLine(process.CommandLine); int processId; wrapper.StartProcess("E:\\MyData\\Data\\MyAppName.exe", out processId); Console.WriteLine(processId.ToString()); } } Console.ReadLine(); WMI Wrapper Code using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Management; using System.Runtime.InteropServices; using Common.WMI.Objects; using System.Net; namespace Common.WMIWrapper { public class WMIWrapper : IDisposable { #region Constructor /// <summary> /// Creates a new instance of the wrapper /// </summary> /// <param jobName="username"></param> /// <param jobName="password"></param> /// <param jobName="server"></param> public WMIWrapper(string server) { Initialise(server); } /// <summary> /// Creates a new instance of the wrapper /// </summary> /// <param jobName="username"></param> /// <param jobName="password"></param> /// <param jobName="server"></param> public WMIWrapper(string username, string password, string server) { Initialise(username, password, server); } #endregion #region Destructor /// <summary> /// Clean up unmanaged references /// </summary> ~WMIWrapper() { Dispose(false); } #endregion #region Initialise /// <summary> /// Initialise the WMI Connection (local machine) /// </summary> /// <param name="server"></param> private void Initialise(string server) { m_server = server; // set connection options m_connectOptions = new ConnectionOptions(); IPHostEntry host = Dns.GetHostEntry(Environment.MachineName); } /// <summary> /// Initialise the WMI connection /// </summary> /// <param jobName="username">Username to connect to server with</param> /// <param jobName="password">Password to connect to server with</param> /// <param jobName="server">Server to connect to</param> private void Initialise(string username, string password, string server) { m_server = server; // set connection options m_connectOptions = new ConnectionOptions(); IPHostEntry host = Dns.GetHostEntry(Environment.MachineName); if (host.HostName.Equals(server, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase)) return; m_connectOptions.Username = username; m_connectOptions.Password = password; m_connectOptions.Impersonation = ImpersonationLevel.Impersonate; m_connectOptions.EnablePrivileges = true; } #endregion /// <summary> /// Return a list of available wmi namespaces /// </summary> /// <returns></returns> public List<String> GetWMINamespaces() { ManagementScope wmiScope = new ManagementScope(String.Format("\\\\{0}\\root", this.Server), this.ConnectionOptions); List<String> wmiNamespaceList = new List<String>(); ManagementClass wmiNamespaces = new ManagementClass(wmiScope, new ManagementPath("__namespace"), null); ; foreach (ManagementObject ns in wmiNamespaces.GetInstances()) wmiNamespaceList.Add(ns["Name"].ToString()); return wmiNamespaceList; } /// <summary> /// Return a list of available classes in a namespace /// </summary> /// <param jobName="wmiNameSpace">Namespace to get wmi classes for</param> /// <returns>List of classes in the requested namespace</returns> public List<String> GetWMIClassList(string wmiNameSpace) { ManagementScope wmiScope = new ManagementScope(String.Format("\\\\{0}\\root\\{1}", this.Server, wmiNameSpace), this.ConnectionOptions); List<String> wmiClasses = new List<String>(); ManagementObjectSearcher wmiSearcher = new ManagementObjectSearcher(wmiScope, new WqlObjectQuery("SELECT * FROM meta_Class"), null); foreach (ManagementClass wmiClass in wmiSearcher.Get()) wmiClasses.Add(wmiClass["__CLASS"].ToString()); return wmiClasses; } /// <summary> /// Get a list of wmi properties for the specified class /// </summary> /// <param jobName="wmiNameSpace">WMI Namespace</param> /// <param jobName="wmiClass">WMI Class</param> /// <returns>List of properties for the class</returns> public List<String> GetWMIClassPropertyList(string wmiNameSpace, string wmiClass) { List<String> wmiClassProperties = new List<string>(); ManagementClass managementClass = GetWMIClass(wmiNameSpace, wmiClass); foreach (PropertyData property in managementClass.Properties) wmiClassProperties.Add(property.Name); return wmiClassProperties; } /// <summary> /// Returns a list of methods for the class /// </summary> /// <param jobName="wmiNameSpace"></param> /// <param jobName="wmiClass"></param> /// <returns></returns> public List<String> GetWMIClassMethodList(string wmiNameSpace, string wmiClass) { List<String> wmiClassMethods = new List<string>(); ManagementClass managementClass = GetWMIClass(wmiNameSpace, wmiClass); foreach (MethodData method in managementClass.Methods) wmiClassMethods.Add(method.Name); return wmiClassMethods; } /// <summary> /// Retrieve the specified management class /// </summary> /// <param jobName="wmiNameSpace">Namespace of the class</param> /// <param jobName="wmiClass">Type of the class</param> /// <returns></returns> public ManagementClass GetWMIClass(string wmiNameSpace, string wmiClass) { ManagementScope wmiScope = new ManagementScope(String.Format("\\\\{0}\\root\\{1}", this.Server, wmiNameSpace), this.ConnectionOptions); ManagementClass managementClass = null; ManagementObjectSearcher wmiSearcher = new ManagementObjectSearcher(wmiScope, new WqlObjectQuery(String.Format("SELECT * FROM meta_Class WHERE __CLASS = '{0}'", wmiClass)), null); foreach (ManagementClass wmiObject in wmiSearcher.Get()) managementClass = wmiObject; return managementClass; } /// <summary> /// Get an instance of the specficied class /// </summary> /// <param jobName="wmiNameSpace">Namespace of the classes</param> /// <param jobName="wmiClass">Type of the classes</param> /// <returns>Array of management classes</returns> public ManagementObject[] GetWMIClassObjects(string wmiNameSpace, string wmiClass) { ManagementScope wmiScope = new ManagementScope(String.Format("\\\\{0}\\root\\{1}", this.Server, wmiNameSpace), this.ConnectionOptions); List<ManagementObject> wmiClasses = new List<ManagementObject>(); ManagementObjectSearcher wmiSearcher = new ManagementObjectSearcher(wmiScope, new WqlObjectQuery(String.Format("SELECT * FROM {0}", wmiClass)), null); foreach (ManagementObject wmiObject in wmiSearcher.Get()) wmiClasses.Add(wmiObject); return wmiClasses.ToArray(); } /// <summary> /// Get a full list of services /// </summary> /// <returns></returns> public List<Service> GetServices() { return GetService(null); } /// <summary> /// Get a list of services /// </summary> /// <returns></returns> public List<Service> GetService(string name) { ManagementObject[] services = GetWMIClassObjects("CIMV2", "WIN32_Service"); List<Service> serviceList = new List<Service>(); for (int i = 0; i < services.Length; i++) { ManagementObject managementObject = services[i]; Service service = new Service(managementObject); service.Status = (string)managementObject["Status"]; service.Name = (string)managementObject["Name"]; service.DisplayName = (string)managementObject["DisplayName"]; service.PathName = (string)managementObject["PathName"]; service.ProcessId = (uint)managementObject["ProcessId"]; service.Started = (bool)managementObject["Started"]; service.StartMode = (string)managementObject["StartMode"]; service.ServiceType = (string)managementObject["ServiceType"]; service.InstallDate = (string)managementObject["InstallDate"]; service.Description = (string)managementObject["Description"]; service.Caption = (string)managementObject["Caption"]; if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(name) || name.Equals(service.Name, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase)) serviceList.Add(service); } return serviceList; } /// <summary> /// Get a list of processes /// </summary> /// <returns></returns> public List<Process> GetProcesses() { return GetProcess(null); } /// <summary> /// Get a list of processes /// </summary> /// <returns></returns> public List<Process> GetProcess(uint? processId) { ManagementObject[] processes = GetWMIClassObjects("CIMV2", "WIN32_Process"); List<Process> processList = new List<Process>(); for (int i = 0; i < processes.Length; i++) { ManagementObject managementObject = processes[i]; Process process = new Process(managementObject); process.Priority = (uint)managementObject["Priority"]; process.ProcessId = (uint)managementObject["ProcessId"]; process.Status = (string)managementObject["Status"]; DateTime createDate; if (ConvertFromWmiDate((string)managementObject["CreationDate"], out createDate)) process.CreationDate = createDate.ToString("dd-MMM-yyyy HH:mm:ss"); process.Caption = (string)managementObject["Caption"]; process.CommandLine = (string)managementObject["CommandLine"]; process.Description = (string)managementObject["Description"]; process.ExecutablePath = (string)managementObject["ExecutablePath"]; process.ExecutionState = (string)managementObject["ExecutionState"]; process.MaximumWorkingSetSize = (UInt32?)managementObject ["MaximumWorkingSetSize"]; process.MinimumWorkingSetSize = (UInt32?)managementObject["MinimumWorkingSetSize"]; process.KernelModeTime = (UInt64)managementObject["KernelModeTime"]; process.ThreadCount = (UInt32)managementObject["ThreadCount"]; process.UserModeTime = (UInt64)managementObject["UserModeTime"]; process.VirtualSize = (UInt64)managementObject["VirtualSize"]; process.WorkingSetSize = (UInt64)managementObject["WorkingSetSize"]; if (processId == null || process.ProcessId == processId.Value) processList.Add(process); } return processList; } /// <summary> /// Start the specified process /// </summary> /// <param jobName="commandLine"></param> /// <returns></returns> public bool StartProcess(string command, out int processId) { processId = int.MaxValue; ManagementClass processClass = GetWMIClass("CIMV2", "WIN32_Process"); object[] objectsIn = new object[4]; objectsIn[0] = command; processClass.InvokeMethod("Create", objectsIn); if (objectsIn[3] == null) return false; processId = int.Parse(objectsIn[3].ToString()); return true; } /// <summary> /// Schedule a process on the remote machine /// </summary> /// <param name="command"></param> /// <param name="scheduleTime"></param> /// <param name="jobName"></param> /// <returns></returns> public bool ScheduleProcess(string command, DateTime scheduleTime, out string jobName) { jobName = String.Empty; ManagementClass scheduleClass = GetWMIClass("CIMV2", "Win32_ScheduledJob"); object[] objectsIn = new object[7]; objectsIn[0] = command; objectsIn[1] = String.Format("********{0:00}{1:00}{2:00}.000000+060", scheduleTime.Hour, scheduleTime.Minute, scheduleTime.Second); objectsIn[5] = true; scheduleClass.InvokeMethod("Create", objectsIn); if (objectsIn[6] == null) return false; UInt32 scheduleid = (uint)objectsIn[6]; jobName = scheduleid.ToString(); return true; } /// <summary> /// Returns the current time on the remote server /// </summary> /// <returns></returns> public DateTime Now() { ManagementScope wmiScope = new ManagementScope(String.Format("\\\\{0}\\root\\{1}", this.Server, "CIMV2"), this.ConnectionOptions); ManagementClass managementClass = null; ManagementObjectSearcher wmiSearcher = new ManagementObjectSearcher(wmiScope, new WqlObjectQuery(String.Format("SELECT * FROM Win32_LocalTime")), null); DateTime localTime = DateTime.MinValue; foreach (ManagementObject time in wmiSearcher.Get()) { UInt32 day = (UInt32)time["Day"]; UInt32 month = (UInt32)time["Month"]; UInt32 year = (UInt32)time["Year"]; UInt32 hour = (UInt32)time["Hour"]; UInt32 minute = (UInt32)time["Minute"]; UInt32 second = (UInt32)time["Second"]; localTime = new DateTime((int)year, (int)month, (int)day, (int)hour, (int)minute, (int)second); }; return localTime; } /// <summary> /// Converts a wmi date into a proper date /// </summary> /// <param jobName="wmiDate">Wmi formatted date</param> /// <returns>Date time object</returns> private static bool ConvertFromWmiDate(string wmiDate, out DateTime properDate) { properDate = DateTime.MinValue; string properDateString; // check if string is populated if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(wmiDate)) return false; wmiDate = wmiDate.Trim().ToLower().Replace("*", "0"); string[] months = new string[] { "Jan", "Feb", "Mar", "Apr", "May", "Jun", "Jul", "Aug", "Sep", "Oct", "Nov", "Dec" }; try { properDateString = String.Format("{0}-{1}-{2} {3}:{4}:{5}.{6}", wmiDate.Substring(6, 2), months[int.Parse(wmiDate.Substring(4, 2)) - 1], wmiDate.Substring(0, 4), wmiDate.Substring(8, 2), wmiDate.Substring(10, 2), wmiDate.Substring(12, 2), wmiDate.Substring(15, 6)); } catch (InvalidCastException) { return false; } catch (ArgumentOutOfRangeException) { return false; } // try and parse the new date if (!DateTime.TryParse(properDateString, out properDate)) return false; // true if conversion successful return true; } private bool m_disposed; #region IDisposable Members /// <summary> /// Managed dispose /// </summary> public void Dispose() { Dispose(true); GC.SuppressFinalize(this); } /// <summary> /// Dispose of managed and unmanaged objects /// </summary> /// <param jobName="disposing"></param> public void Dispose(bool disposing) { if (disposing) { m_connectOptions = null; } } #endregion #region Properties private ConnectionOptions m_connectOptions; /// <summary> /// Gets or sets the management scope /// </summary> private ConnectionOptions ConnectionOptions { get { return m_connectOptions; } set { m_connectOptions = value; } } private String m_server; /// <summary> /// Gets or sets the server to connect to /// </summary> public String Server { get { return m_server; } set { m_server = value; } } #endregion } }

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$_POST data returns empty when headers are > POST_MAX_SIZE

- by Jared

Hi Hopefully someone here might have an answer to my question. I have a basic form that contains simple fields, like name, number, email address etc and 1 file upload field. I am trying to add some validation into my script that detects if the file is too large and then rejects the user back to the form to select/upload a smaller file. My problem is, if a user selects a file that is bigger than my validation file size rule and larger than php.ini POST_MAX_SIZE/UPLOAD_MAX_FILESIZE and pushes submit, then PHP seems to try process the form only to fail on the POST_MAX_SIZE settings and then clears the entire $_POST array and returns nothing back to the form. Is there a way around this? Surely if someone uploads something than the max size configured in the php.ini then you can still get the rest of the $_POST data??? Here is my code. <?php function validEmail($email) { $isValid = true; $atIndex = strrpos($email, "@"); if (is_bool($atIndex) && !$atIndex) { $isValid = false; } else { $domain = substr($email, $atIndex+1); $local = substr($email, 0, $atIndex); $localLen = strlen($local); $domainLen = strlen($domain); if ($localLen < 1 || $localLen > 64) { // local part length exceeded $isValid = false; } else if ($domainLen < 1 || $domainLen > 255) { // domain part length exceeded $isValid = false; } else if ($local[0] == '.' || $local[$localLen-1] == '.') { // local part starts or ends with '.' $isValid = false; } else if (preg_match('/\\.\\./', $local)) { // local part has two consecutive dots $isValid = false; } else if (!preg_match('/^[A-Za-z0-9\\-\\.]+$/', $domain)) { // character not valid in domain part $isValid = false; } else if (preg_match('/\\.\\./', $domain)) { // domain part has two consecutive dots $isValid = false; } else if (!preg_match('/^(\\\\.|[A-Za-z0-9!#%&`_=\\/$\'*+?^{}|~.-])+$/', str_replace("\\\\","",$local))) { // character not valid in local part unless // local part is quoted if (!preg_match('/^"(\\\\"|[^"])+"$/', str_replace("\\\\","",$local))) { $isValid = false; } } } return $isValid; } //setup post variables @$name = htmlspecialchars(trim($_REQUEST['name'])); @$emailCheck = htmlspecialchars(trim($_REQUEST['email'])); @$organisation = htmlspecialchars(trim($_REQUEST['organisation'])); @$title = htmlspecialchars(trim($_REQUEST['title'])); @$phone = htmlspecialchars(trim($_REQUEST['phone'])); @$location = htmlspecialchars(trim($_REQUEST['location'])); @$description = htmlspecialchars(trim($_REQUEST['description'])); @$fileError = 0; @$phoneError = ""; //setup file upload handler $target_path = 'uploads/'; $filename = basename( @$_FILES['uploadedfile']['name']); $max_size = 8000000; // maximum file size (8mb in bytes) NB: php.ini max filesize upload is 10MB on test environment. $allowed_filetypes = Array(".pdf", ".doc", ".zip", ".txt", ".xls", ".docx", ".csv", ".rtf"); //put extensions in here that should be uploaded only. $ext = substr($filename, strpos($filename,'.'), strlen($filename)-1); // Get the extension from the filename. if(!is_writable($target_path)) die('You cannot upload to the specified directory, please CHMOD it to 777.'); //Check if we can upload to the specified upload folder. //display form function function displayForm($name, $emailCheck, $organisation, $phone, $title, $location, $description, $phoneError, $allowed_filetypes, $ext, $filename, $fileError) { //make $emailCheck global so function can get value from global scope. global $emailCheck; global $max_size; echo '<form action="geodetic_form.php" method="post" name="contact" id="contact" enctype="multipart/form-data">'."\n". '<fieldset>'."\n".'<div>'."\n"; //name echo '<label for="name"><span class="mandatory">*</span>Your name:</label>'."\n". '<input type="text" name="name" id="name" class="inputText required" value="'. $name .'" />'."\n"; //check if name field is filled out if (isset($_REQUEST['submit']) && empty($name)) { echo '<label for="name" class="error">Please enter your name.</label>'."\n"; } echo '</div>'."\n". '<div>'."\n"; //Email echo '<label for="email"><span class="mandatory">*</span>Your email:</label>'."\n". '<input type="text" name="email" id="email" class="inputText required email" value="'. $emailCheck .'" />'."\n"; // check if email field is filled out and proper format if (isset($_REQUEST['submit']) && validEmail($emailCheck) == false) { echo '<label for="email" class="error">Invalid email address entered.</label>'."\n"; } echo '</div>'."\n". '<div>'."\n"; //organisation echo '<label for="phone">Organisation:</label>'."\n". '<input type="text" name="organisation" id="organisation" class="inputText" value="'. $organisation .'" />'."\n"; echo '</div>'."\n". '</fieldset>'."\n".'<fieldset>'. "\n" . '<div>'."\n"; //title echo '<label for="phone">Title:</label>'."\n". '<input type="text" name="title" id="title" class="inputText" value="'. $title .'" />'."\n"; echo '</div>'."\n". '</fieldset>'."\n".'<fieldset>'. "\n" . '<div>'."\n"; //phone echo '<label for="phone"><span class="mandatory">*</span>Phone <br /><span class="small">(include area code)</span>:</label>'."\n". '<input type="text" name="phone" id="phone" class="inputText required" value="'. $phone .'" />'."\n"; // check if phone field is filled out that it has numbers and not characters if (isset($_REQUEST['submit']) && $phoneError == "true" && empty($phone)) echo '<label for="email" class="error">Please enter a valid phone number.</label>'."\n"; echo '</div>'."\n". '</fieldset>'."\n".'<fieldset>'. "\n" . '<div>'."\n"; //Location echo '<label class="location" for="location"><span class="mandatory">*</span>Location:</label>'."\n". '<textarea name="location" id="location" class="required">'. $location .'</textarea>'."\n"; //check if message field is filled out if (isset($_REQUEST['submit']) && empty($_REQUEST['location'])) echo '<label for="location" class="error">This field is required.</label>'."\n"; echo '</div>'."\n". '</fieldset>'."\n".'<fieldset>'. "\n" . '<div>'."\n"; //description echo '<label class="description" for="description">Description:</label>'."\n". '<textarea name="description" id="queryComments">'. $description .'</textarea>'."\n"; echo '</div>'."\n". '</fieldset>'."\n".'<fieldset>'. "\n" . '<div>'."\n"; //file upload echo '<label class="uploadedfile" for="uploadedfile">File:</label>'."\n". '<input type="file" name="uploadedfile" id="uploadedfile" value="'. $filename .'" />'."\n"; // Check if the filetype is allowed, if not DIE and inform the user. switch ($fileError) { case "1": echo '<label for="uploadedfile" class="error">The file you attempted to upload is not allowed.</label>'; break; case "2": echo '<label for="uploadedfile" class="error">The file you attempted to upload is too large.</label>'; break; } echo '</div>'."\n". '</fieldset>'; //end of form echo '<div class="submit"><input type="submit" name="submit" value="Submit" id="submit" /></div>'. '<div class="clear"><p><br /></p></div>'; } //end function //setup error validations if (isset($_REQUEST['submit']) && !empty($_REQUEST['phone']) && !is_numeric($_REQUEST['phone'])) $phoneError = "true"; if (isset($_REQUEST['submit']) && $_FILES['uploadedfile']['error'] != 4 && !in_array($ext, $allowed_filetypes)) $fileError = 1; if (isset($_REQUEST['submit']) && $_FILES["uploadedfile"]["size"] > $max_size) $fileError = 2; echo "this condition " . $fileError; $POST_MAX_SIZE = ini_get('post_max_size'); $mul = substr($POST_MAX_SIZE, -1); $mul = ($mul == 'M' ? 1048576 : ($mul == 'K' ? 1024 : ($mul == 'G' ? 1073741824 : 1))); if ($_SERVER['CONTENT_LENGTH'] > $mul*(int)$POST_MAX_SIZE && $POST_MAX_SIZE) echo "too big!!"; echo $POST_MAX_SIZE; if(empty($name) || empty($phone) || empty($location) || validEmail($emailCheck) == false || $phoneError == "true" || $fileError != 0) { displayForm($name, $emailCheck, $organisation, $phone, $title, $location, $description, $phoneError, $allowed_filetypes, $ext, $filename, $fileError); echo $fileError; echo "max size is: " .$max_size; echo "and file size is: " . $_FILES["uploadedfile"]["size"]; exit; } else { //copy file from temp to upload directory $path_of_uploaded_file = $target_path . $filename; $tmp_path = $_FILES["uploadedfile"]["tmp_name"]; echo $tmp_path; echo "and file size is: " . filesize($_FILES["uploadedfile"]["tmp_name"]); exit; if(is_uploaded_file($tmp_path)) { if(!copy($tmp_path,$path_of_uploaded_file)) { echo 'error while copying the uploaded file'; } } //test debug stuff echo "sending email..."; exit; } ?> PHP is returning this error in the log: [29-Apr-2010 10:32:47] PHP Warning: POST Content-Length of 57885895 bytes exceeds the limit of 10485760 bytes in Unknown on line 0 Excuse all the debug stuff :) FTR, I am running PHP 5.1.2 on IIS. TIA Jared

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Sensible Way to Pass Web Data in XML to a SQL Server Database

- by Emtucifor

After exploring several different ways to pass web data to a database for update purposes, I'm wondering if XML might be a good strategy. The database is currently SQL 2000. In a few months it will move to SQL 2005 and I will be able to change things if needed, but I need a SQL 2000 solution now. First of all, the database in question uses the EAV model. I know that this kind of database is generally highly frowned on, so for the purposes of this question, please just accept that this is not going to change. The current update method has the web server inserting values (that have all been converted first to their correct underlying types, then to sql_variant) to a temp table. A stored procedure is then run which expects the temp table to exist and it takes care of updating, inserting, or deleting things as needed. So far, only a single element has needed to be updated at a time. But now, there is a requirement to be able to edit multiple elements at once, and also to support hierarchical elements, each of which can have its own list of attributes. Here's some example XML I hand-typed to demonstrate what I'm thinking of. Note that in this database the Entity is Element and an ID of 0 signifies "create" aka an insert of a new item. <Elements> <Element ID="1234"> <Attr ID="221">Value</Attr> <Attr ID="225">287</Attr> <Attr ID="234"> <Element ID="99825"> <Attr ID="7">Value1</Attr> <Attr ID="8">Value2</Attr> <Attr ID="9" Action="delete" /> </Element> <Element ID="99826" Action="delete" /> <Element ID="0" Type="24"> <Attr ID="7">Value4</Attr> <Attr ID="8">Value5</Attr> <Attr ID="9">Value6</Attr> </Element> <Element ID="0" Type="24"> <Attr ID="7">Value7</Attr> <Attr ID="8">Value8</Attr> <Attr ID="9">Value9</Attr> </Element> </Attr> <Rel ID="3827" Action="delete" /> <Rel ID="2284" Role="parent"> <Element ID="3827" /> <Element ID="3829" /> <Attr ID="665">1</Attr> </Rel> <Rel ID="0" Type="23" Role="child"> <Element ID="3830" /> <Attr ID="67" </Rel> </Element> <Element ID="0" Type="87"> <Attr ID="221">Value</Attr> <Attr ID="225">569</Attr> <Attr ID="234"> <Element ID="0" Type="24"> <Attr ID="7">Value10</Attr> <Attr ID="8">Value11</Attr> <Attr ID="9">Value12</Attr> </Element> </Attr> </Element> <Element ID="1235" Action="delete" /> </Elements> Some Attributes are straight value types, such as AttrID 221. But AttrID 234 is a special "multi-value" type that can have a list of elements underneath it, and each one can have one or more values. Types only need to be presented when a new item is created, since the ElementID fully implies the type if it already exists. I'll probably support only passing in changed items (as detected by javascript). And there may be an Action="Delete" on Attr elements as well, since NULLs are treated as "unselected"--sometimes it's very important to know if a Yes/No question has intentionally been answered No or if no one's bothered to say Yes yet. There is also a different kind of data, a Relationship. At this time, those are updated through individual AJAX calls as things are edited in the UI, but I'd like to include those so that changes to relationships can be canceled (right now, once you change it, it's done). So those are really elements, too, but they are called Rel instead of Element. Relationships are implemented as ElementID1 and ElementID2, so the RelID 2284 in the XML above is in the database as: ElementID 2284 ElementID1 1234 ElementID2 3827 Having multiple children in one relationship isn't currently supported, but it would be nice later. Does this strategy and the example XML make sense? Is there a more sensible way? I'm just looking for some broad critique to help save me from going down a bad path. Any aspect that you'd like to comment on would be helpful. The web language happens to be Classic ASP, but that could change to ASP.Net at some point. A persistence engine like Linq or nHibernate is probably not acceptable right now--I just want to get this already working application enhanced without a huge amount of development time. I'll choose the answer that shows experience and has a balance of good warnings about what not to do, confirmations of what I'm planning to do, and recommendations about something else to do. I'll make it as objective as possible. P.S. I'd like to handle unicode characters as well as very long strings (10k +). UPDATE I have had this working for some time and I used the ADO Recordset Save-To-Stream trick to make creating the XML really easy. The result seems to be fairly fast, though if speed ever becomes a problem I may revisit this. In the meantime, my code works to handle any number of elements and attributes on the page at once, including updating, deleting, and creating new items all in one go. I settled on a scheme like so for all my elements: Existing data elements Example: input name e12345_a678 (element 12345, attribute 678), the input value is the value of the attribute. New elements Javascript copies a hidden template of the set of HTML elements needed for the type into the correct location on the page, increments a counter to get a new ID for this item, and prepends the number to the names of the form items. var newid = 0; function metadataAdd(reference, nameid, value) { var t = document.createElement('input'); t.setAttribute('name', nameid); t.setAttribute('id', nameid); t.setAttribute('type', 'hidden'); t.setAttribute('value', value); reference.appendChild(t); } function multiAdd(target, parentelementid, attrid, elementtypeid) { var proto = document.getElementById('a' + attrid + '_proto'); var instance = document.createElement('p'); target.parentNode.parentNode.insertBefore(instance, target.parentNode); var thisid = ++newid; instance.innerHTML = proto.innerHTML.replace(/{prefix}/g, 'n' + thisid + '_'); instance.id = 'n' + thisid; instance.className += ' new'; metadataAdd(instance, 'n' + thisid + '_p', parentelementid); metadataAdd(instance, 'n' + thisid + '_c', attrid); metadataAdd(instance, 'n' + thisid + '_t', elementtypeid); return false; } Example: Template input name _a678 becomes n1_a678 (a new element, the first one on the page, attribute 678). all attributes of this new element are tagged with the same prefix of n1. The next new item will be n2, and so on. Some hidden form inputs are created: n1_t, value is the elementtype of the element to be created n1_p, value is the parent id of the element (if it is a relationship) n1_c, value is the child id of the element (if it is a relationship) Deleting elements A hidden input is created in the form e12345_t with value set to 0. The existing controls displaying that attribute's values are disabled so they are not included in the form post. So "set type to 0" is treated as delete. With this scheme, every item on the page has a unique name and can be distinguished properly, and every action can be represented properly. When the form is posted, here's a sample of building one of the two recordsets used (classic ASP code): Set Data = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Recordset") Data.Fields.Append "ElementID", adInteger, 4, adFldKeyColumn Data.Fields.Append "AttrID", adInteger, 4, adFldKeyColumn Data.Fields.Append "Value", adLongVarWChar, 2147483647, adFldIsNullable Or adFldMayBeNull Data.CursorLocation = adUseClient Data.CursorType = adOpenDynamic Data.Open This is the recordset for values, the other is for the elements themselves. I step through the posted form and for the element recordset use a Scripting.Dictionary populated with instances of a custom Class that has the properties I need, so that I can add the values piecemeal, since they don't always come in order. New elements are added as negative to distinguish them from regular elements (rather than requiring a separate column to indicate if it is new or addresses an existing element). I use regular expression to tear apart the form keys: "^(e|n)([0-9]{1,10})_(a|p|t|c)([0-9]{0,10})$" Then, adding an attribute looks like this. Data.AddNew ElementID.Value = DataID AttrID.Value = Integerize(Matches(0).SubMatches(3)) AttrValue.Value = Request.Form(Key) Data.Update ElementID, AttrID, and AttrValue are references to the fields of the recordset. This method is hugely faster than using Data.Fields("ElementID").Value each time. I loop through the Dictionary of element updates and ignore any that don't have all the proper information, adding the good ones to the recordset. Then I call my data-updating stored procedure like so: Set Cmd = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Command") With Cmd Set .ActiveConnection = MyDBConn .CommandType = adCmdStoredProc .CommandText = "DataPost" .Prepared = False .Parameters.Append .CreateParameter("@ElementMetadata", adLongVarWChar, adParamInput, 2147483647, XMLFromRecordset(Element)) .Parameters.Append .CreateParameter("@ElementData", adLongVarWChar, adParamInput, 2147483647, XMLFromRecordset(Data)) End With Result.Open Cmd ' previously created recordset object with options set Here's the function that does the xml conversion: Private Function XMLFromRecordset(Recordset) Dim Stream Set Stream = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Stream") Stream.Open Recordset.Save Stream, adPersistXML Stream.Position = 0 XMLFromRecordset = Stream.ReadText End Function Just in case the web page needs to know, the SP returns a recordset of any new elements, showing their page value and their created value (so I can see that n1 is now e12346 for example). Here are some key snippets from the stored procedure. Note this is SQL 2000 for now, though I'll be able to switch to 2005 soon: CREATE PROCEDURE [dbo].[DataPost] @ElementMetaData ntext, @ElementData ntext AS DECLARE @hdoc int --- snip --- EXEC sp_xml_preparedocument @hdoc OUTPUT, @ElementMetaData, '<xml xmlns:s="uuid:BDC6E3F0-6DA3-11d1-A2A3-00AA00C14882" xmlns:dt="uuid:C2F41010-65B3-11d1-A29F-00AA00C14882" xmlns:rs="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:rowset" xmlns:z="#RowsetSchema" />' INSERT #ElementMetadata (ElementID, ElementTypeID, ElementID1, ElementID2) SELECT * FROM OPENXML(@hdoc, '/xml/rs:data/rs:insert/z:row', 0) WITH ( ElementID int, ElementTypeID int, ElementID1 int, ElementID2 int ) ORDER BY ElementID -- orders negative items (new elements) first so they begin counting at 1 for later ID calculation EXEC sp_xml_removedocument @hdoc --- snip --- UPDATE E SET E.ElementTypeID = M.ElementTypeID FROM Element E INNER JOIN #ElementMetadata M ON E.ElementID = M.ElementID WHERE E.ElementID >= 1 AND M.ElementTypeID >= 1 The following query does the correlation of the negative new element ids to the newly inserted ones: UPDATE #ElementMetadata -- Correlate the new ElementIDs with the input rows SET NewElementID = Scope_Identity() - @@RowCount + DataID WHERE ElementID < 0 Other set-based queries do all the other work of validating that the attributes are allowed, are the correct data type, and inserting, updating, and deleting elements and attributes. I hope this brief run-down is useful to others some day! Converting ADO Recordsets to an XML stream was a huge winner for me as it saved all sorts of time and had a namespace and schema already defined that made the results come out correctly. Using a flatter XML format with 2 inputs was also much easier than sticking to some ideal about having everything in a single XML stream.

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