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SOA Suite 11g Native Format Builder Complex Format Example

- by bob.webster

This rather long posting details the steps required to process a grouping of fixed length records using Format Builder. If it’s 10 pm and you’re feeling beat you might want to leave this until tomorrow. But if it’s 10 pm and you need to get a Format Builder Complex template done, read on… The goal is to process individual orders from a file using the 11g File Adapter and Format Builder Sample Data =========== 001Square Widget 0245.98 102Triagular Widget 1120.00 403Circular Widget 0099.45 ORD8898302/01/2011 301Hexagon Widget 1150.98 ORD6735502/01/2011 The records are fixed length records representing a number of logical Order records. Each order record consists of a number of item records starting with a 3 digit number, followed by a single Summary Record which starts with the constant ORD. How can this file be processed so that the first poll returns the first order? 001Square Widget 0245.98 102Triagular Widget 1120.00 403Circular Widget 0099.45 ORD8898302/01/2011 And the second poll returns the second order? 301Hexagon Widget 1150.98 ORD6735502/01/2011 Note: if you need more than one order per poll, that’s also possible, see the “Multiple Messages” field in the “File Adapter Step 6 of 9” snapshot further down. To follow along with this example you will need - Studio Edition Version 11.1.1.4.0 with the - SOA Extension for JDeveloper 11.1.1.4.0 installed Both can be downloaded from here: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/middleware/soasuite/downloads/index.html You will not need a running WebLogic Server domain to complete the steps and Format Builder tests in this article. Start with a SOA Composite containing a File Adapter The Format Builder is part of the File Adapter so start by creating a new SOA Project and Composite. Here is a quick summary for those not familiar with these steps - Start JDeveloper - From the Main Menu choose File->New - In the New Gallery window that opens Expand the “General” category and Select the Applications node. Then choose SOA Application from the Items section on the right. Finally press the OK button. - In Step 1 of the “Create SOA Application wizard” that appears enter an Application Name and an Directory of your choice, then press the Next button. - In Step 2 of the “Create SOA Application wizard”, press the Next button leaving all entries as defaulted. - In Step 3 of the “Create SOA Application wizard”, Enter a composite name of your choice and Press the Finish Button These steps result in a new Application and SOA Project. The SOA Project contains a composite.xml file which is opened and shown below. For our example we have not defined a Mediator or a BPEL process to minimize the steps, but one or the other would eventually be needed to use the File Adapter we are about to create. Drag and drop the File Adapter icon from the Component Pallette onto either the LEFT side of the diagram under “Exposed Services” or the right side under “External References”. (See the Green Circle in the image below). Placing the adapter on the left side would indicate the file being processed is inbound to the composite, if the adapter is placed on the right side then the data is outbound to a file. Note that the same Format Builder definition can be used in both directions. For example we could use the format with a File Adapter on the left side of the composite to parse fixed data into XML, modify the data in our Composite or BPEL process and then use the same Format Builder definition with a File adapter on the right side of the composite to write the data back out in the same fixed data format When the File Adapter is dropped on the Composite the File Adapter Wizard Appears. Skip Past the first page, Step 1 of 9 by pressing the Next button. In Step 2 enter a service name of your choice as shown below, then press Next When the Native Format Builder appears, skip the welcome page by pressing next. Also press the Next button to accept the settings on Step 3 of 9 On Step 4, select Read File and press the Next button as shown below. On Step 5 enter a directory that will contain a file with the input data, then Press the Next button as shown below. In step 6, enter *.txt or another file format to select input files from the input directory mentioned in step 5. ALSO check the “Files contain Multiple Messages” checkbox and set the “Publish Messages in Batches of” field to 1. The value can be set higher to increase the number of logical order group records returned on each poll of the file adapter. In other words, it determines the number of Orders that will be sent to each instance of a Mediator or Composite processing using the File Adapter. Skip Step 7 by pressing the Next button In Step 8 press the Gear Icon on the right side to load the Native Format Builder. Native Format Builder appears Before diving into the format, here is an overview of the process. Approach - Bottom up Assuming an Order is a grouping of item records and a summary record…. - Define a separate Complex Type for each Record Type found in the group. (One for itemRecord and one for summaryRecord) - Define a Complex Type to contain the Group of Record types defined above (LogicalOrderRecord) - Define a top level element to represent an order. (order) The order element will be of type LogicalOrderRecord Defining the Format In Step 1 select “Create new” and “Complex Type” and “Next” In Step two browse to and select a file containing the test data shown at the start of this article. A link is provided at the end of this article to download a file containing the test data. Press the Next button In Step 3 Complex types must be define for each type of input record. Select the Root-Element and Click on the Add Complex Type icon This creates a new empty complex type definition shown below. The fastest way to create the definition is to highlight the first line of the Sample File data and drag the line onto the <new_complex_type> Format Builder introspects the data and provides a grid to define additional fields. Change the “Complex Type Name” to “itemRecord” Then click on the ruler to indicate the position of fixed columns. Drag the red triangle icons to the exact columns if necessary. Double click on an existing red triangle to remove an unwanted entry. In the case below fields are define in columns 0-3, 4-28, 29-eol When the field definitions are correct, press the “Generate Fields” button. Field entries named C1, C2 and C3 will be created as shown below. Click on the field names and rename them from C1->itemNum, C2->itemDesc and C3->itemCost When all the fields are correctly defined press OK to save the complex type. Next, the process is repeated to define a Complex Type for the SummaryRecord. Select the Root-Element in the schema tree and press the new complex type icon Then highlight and drag the Summary Record from the sample data onto the <new_complex_type> Change the complex type name to “summaryRecord” Mark the fixed fields for Order Number and Order Date. Press the Generate Fields button and rename C1 and C2 to itemNum and orderDate respectively. The last complex type to be defined is a type to hold the group of items and the summary record. Select the Root-Element in the schema tree and click the new complex type icon Select the “<new_complex_type>” entry and click the pencil icon On the Complex Type Details page change the name and type of each input field. Change line 1 to be named item and set the Type to “itemRecord” Change line 2 to be named summary and set the Type to “summaryRecord” We also need to indicate that itemRecords repeat in the input file. Click the pencil icon at the right side of the item line. On the Edit Details page change the “Max Occurs” entry from 1 to UNBOUNDED. We also need to indicate how to identify an itemRecord. Since each item record has “.” in column 32 we can use this fact to differentiate an item record from a summary record. Change the “Look Ahead” field to value 32 and enter a period in the “Look For” field Press the OK button to save entry. Finally, its time to create a top level element to represent an order. Select the “Root-Element” in the schema tree and press the New element icon Click on the <new_element> and press the pencil icon. Set the Element Name to “order” and change the Data Type to “logicalOrderRecord” Press the OK button to save the element definition. The final definition should match the screenshot below. Press the Next Button to view the definition source. Press the Test Button to test the definition Press the Green Triangle Icon to run the test. And we are presented with an unwelcome error. The error states that the processor ran out of data while working through the definition. The processor was unable to differentiate between itemRecords and summaryRecords and therefore treated the entire file as a list of itemRecords. At end of file, the “summary” portion of the logicalOrderRecord remained unprocessed but mandatory. This root cause of this error is the loss of our “lookAhead” definition used to identify itemRecords. This appears to be a bug in the Native Format Builder 11.1.1.4.0 Luckily, a simple workaround exists. Press the Cancel button and return to the “Step 4 of 4” Window. Manually add nxsd:lookAhead="32" nxsd:lookFor="." attributes after the maxOccurs attribute of the item element. as shown in the highlighted text below. When the lookAhead and lookFor attributes have been added Press the Test button and on the Test page press the Green Triangle. The test is now successful, the first order in the file is returned by the File Adapter. Below is a complete listing of the Result XML from the right column of the screen above Try running it The downloaded input test file and completed schema file can be used for testing without following all the Native Format Builder steps in this example. Use the following link to download a file containing the sample data. Download Sample Input Data This is the best approach rather than cutting and pasting the input data at the top of the article. Since the data is fixed length it’s very important to watch out for trailing spaces in the data and to ensure an eol character at the end of every line. The download file is correctly formatted. The final schema definition can be downloaded at the following link Download Completed Schema Definition - Save the inputData.txt file to a known location like the xsd folder in your project. - Save the inputData_6.xsd file to the xsd folder in your project. - At step 1 in the Native Format Builder wizard (as shown above) check the “Edit existing” radio button, then browse and select the inputData_6.xsd file - At step 2 of the Format Builder configuration Wizard (as shown above) supply the path and filename for the inputData.txt file. - You can then proceed to the test page and run a test. - Remember the wizard bug will drop the lookAhead and lookFor attributes, you will need to manually add nxsd:lookAhead="32" nxsd:lookFor="." after the maxOccurs attribute of the item element in the LogicalOrderRecord Complex Type. (as shown above) Good Luck with your Format Project

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HTG Reviews the CODE Keyboard: Old School Construction Meets Modern Amenities

- by Jason Fitzpatrick

There’s nothing quite as satisfying as the smooth and crisp action of a well built keyboard. If you’re tired of mushy keys and cheap feeling keyboards, a well-constructed mechanical keyboard is a welcome respite from the $10 keyboard that came with your computer. Read on as we put the CODE mechanical keyboard through the paces. What is the CODE Keyboard? The CODE keyboard is a collaboration between manufacturer WASD Keyboards and Jeff Atwood of Coding Horror (the guy behind the Stack Exchange network and Discourse forum software). Atwood’s focus was incorporating the best of traditional mechanical keyboards and the best of modern keyboard usability improvements. In his own words: The world is awash in terrible, crappy, no name how-cheap-can-we-make-it keyboards. There are a few dozen better mechanical keyboard options out there. I’ve owned and used at least six different expensive mechanical keyboards, but I wasn’t satisfied with any of them, either: they didn’t have backlighting, were ugly, had terrible design, or were missing basic functions like media keys. That’s why I originally contacted Weyman Kwong of WASD Keyboards way back in early 2012. I told him that the state of keyboards was unacceptable to me as a geek, and I proposed a partnership wherein I was willing to work with him to do whatever it takes to produce a truly great mechanical keyboard. Even the ardent skeptic who questions whether Atwood has indeed created a truly great mechanical keyboard certainly can’t argue with the position he starts from: there are so many agonizingly crappy keyboards out there. Even worse, in our opinion, is that unless you’re a typist of a certain vintage there’s a good chance you’ve never actually typed on a really nice keyboard. Those that didn’t start using computers until the mid-to-late 1990s most likely have always typed on modern mushy-key keyboards and never known the joy of typing on a really responsive and crisp mechanical keyboard. Is our preference for and love of mechanical keyboards shining through here? Good. We’re not even going to try and hide it. So where does the CODE keyboard stack up in pantheon of keyboards? Read on as we walk you through the simple setup and our experience using the CODE. Setting Up the CODE Keyboard Although the setup of the CODE keyboard is essentially plug and play, there are two distinct setup steps that you likely haven’t had to perform on a previous keyboard. Both highlight the degree of care put into the keyboard and the amount of customization available. Inside the box you’ll find the keyboard, a micro USB cable, a USB-to-PS2 adapter, and a tool which you may be unfamiliar with: a key puller. We’ll return to the key puller in a moment. Unlike the majority of keyboards on the market, the cord isn’t permanently affixed to the keyboard. What does this mean for you? Aside from the obvious need to plug it in yourself, it makes it dead simple to repair your own keyboard cord if it gets attacked by a pet, mangled in a mechanism on your desk, or otherwise damaged. It also makes it easy to take advantage of the cable routing channels in on the underside of the keyboard to route your cable exactly where you want it. While we’re staring at the underside of the keyboard, check out those beefy rubber feet. By peripherals standards they’re huge (and there is six instead of the usual four). Once you plunk the keyboard down where you want it, it might as well be glued down the rubber feet work so well. After you’ve secured the cable and adjusted it to your liking, there is one more task before plug the keyboard into the computer. On the bottom left-hand side of the keyboard, you’ll find a small recess in the plastic with some dip switches inside: The dip switches are there to switch hardware functions for various operating systems, keyboard layouts, and to enable/disable function keys. By toggling the dip switches you can change the keyboard from QWERTY mode to Dvorak mode and Colemak mode, the two most popular alternative keyboard configurations. You can also use the switches to enable Mac-functionality (for Command/Option keys). One of our favorite little toggles is the SW3 dip switch: you can disable the Caps Lock key; goodbye accidentally pressing Caps when you mean to press Shift. You can review the entire dip switch configuration chart here. The quick-start for Windows users is simple: double check that all the switches are in the off position (as seen in the photo above) and then simply toggle SW6 on to enable the media and backlighting function keys (this turns the menu key on the keyboard into a function key as typically found on laptop keyboards). After adjusting the dip switches to your liking, plug the keyboard into an open USB port on your computer (or into your PS/2 port using the included adapter). Design, Layout, and Backlighting The CODE keyboard comes in two flavors, a traditional 87-key layout (no number pad) and a traditional 104-key layout (number pad on the right hand side). We identify the layout as traditional because, despite some modern trapping and sneaky shortcuts, the actual form factor of the keyboard from the shape of the keys to the spacing and position is as classic as it comes. You won’t have to learn a new keyboard layout and spend weeks conditioning yourself to a smaller than normal backspace key or a PgUp/PgDn pair in an unconventional location. Just because the keyboard is very conventional in layout, however, doesn’t mean you’ll be missing modern amenities like media-control keys. The following additional functions are hidden in the F11, F12, Pause button, and the 2×6 grid formed by the Insert and Delete rows: keyboard illumination brightness, keyboard illumination on/off, mute, and then the typical play/pause, forward/backward, stop, and volume +/- in Insert and Delete rows, respectively. While we weren’t sure what we’d think of the function-key system at first (especially after retiring a Microsoft Sidewinder keyboard with a huge and easily accessible volume knob on it), it took less than a day for us to adapt to using the Fn key, located next to the right Ctrl key, to adjust our media playback on the fly. Keyboard backlighting is a largely hit-or-miss undertaking but the CODE keyboard nails it. Not only does it have pleasant and easily adjustable through-the-keys lighting but the key switches the keys themselves are attached to are mounted to a steel plate with white paint. Enough of the light reflects off the interior cavity of the keys and then diffuses across the white plate to provide nice even illumination in between the keys. Highlighting the steel plate beneath the keys brings us to the actual construction of the keyboard. It’s rock solid. The 87-key model, the one we tested, is 2.0 pounds. The 104-key is nearly a half pound heavier at 2.42 pounds. Between the steel plate, the extra-thick PCB board beneath the steel plate, and the thick ABS plastic housing, the keyboard has very solid feel to it. Combine that heft with the previously mentioned thick rubber feet and you have a tank-like keyboard that won’t budge a millimeter during normal use. Examining The Keys This is the section of the review the hardcore typists and keyboard ninjas have been waiting for. We’ve looked at the layout of the keyboard, we’ve looked at the general construction of it, but what about the actual keys? There are a wide variety of keyboard construction techniques but the vast majority of modern keyboards use a rubber-dome construction. The key is floated in a plastic frame over a rubber membrane that has a little rubber dome for each key. The press of the physical key compresses the rubber dome downwards and a little bit of conductive material on the inside of the dome’s apex connects with the circuit board. Despite the near ubiquity of the design, many people dislike it. The principal complaint is that dome keyboards require a complete compression to register a keystroke; keyboard designers and enthusiasts refer to this as “bottoming out”. In other words, the register the “b” key, you need to completely press that key down. As such it slows you down and requires additional pressure and movement that, over the course of tens of thousands of keystrokes, adds up to a whole lot of wasted time and fatigue. The CODE keyboard features key switches manufactured by Cherry, a company that has manufactured key switches since the 1960s. Specifically the CODE features Cherry MX Clear switches. These switches feature the same classic design of the other Cherry switches (such as the MX Blue and Brown switch lineups) but they are significantly quieter (yes this is a mechanical keyboard, but no, your neighbors won’t think you’re firing off a machine gun) as they lack the audible click found in most Cherry switches. This isn’t to say that they keyboard doesn’t have a nice audible key press sound when the key is fully depressed, but that the key mechanism isn’t doesn’t create a loud click sound when triggered. One of the great features of the Cherry MX clear is a tactile “bump” that indicates the key has been compressed enough to register the stroke. For touch typists the very subtle tactile feedback is a great indicator that you can move on to the next stroke and provides a welcome speed boost. Even if you’re not trying to break any word-per-minute records, that little bump when pressing the key is satisfying. The Cherry key switches, in addition to providing a much more pleasant typing experience, are also significantly more durable than dome-style key switch. Rubber dome switch membrane keyboards are typically rated for 5-10 million contacts whereas the Cherry mechanical switches are rated for 50 million contacts. You’d have to write the next War and Peace and follow that up with A Tale of Two Cities: Zombie Edition, and then turn around and transcribe them both into a dozen different languages to even begin putting a tiny dent in the lifecycle of this keyboard. So what do the switches look like under the classicly styled keys? You can take a look yourself with the included key puller. Slide the loop between the keys and then gently beneath the key you wish to remove: Wiggle the key puller gently back and forth while exerting a gentle upward pressure to pop the key off; You can repeat the process for every key, if you ever find yourself needing to extract piles of cat hair, Cheeto dust, or other foreign objects from your keyboard. There it is, the naked switch, the source of that wonderful crisp action with the tactile bump on each keystroke. The last feature worthy of a mention is the N-key rollover functionality of the keyboard. This is a feature you simply won’t find on non-mechanical keyboards and even gaming keyboards typically only have any sort of key roller on the high-frequency keys like WASD. So what is N-key rollover and why do you care? On a typical mass-produced rubber-dome keyboard you cannot simultaneously press more than two keys as the third one doesn’t register. PS/2 keyboards allow for unlimited rollover (in other words you can’t out type the keyboard as all of your keystrokes, no matter how fast, will register); if you use the CODE keyboard with the PS/2 adapter you gain this ability. If you don’t use the PS/2 adapter and use the native USB, you still get 6-key rollover (and the CTRL, ALT, and SHIFT don’t count towards the 6) so realistically you still won’t be able to out type the computer as even the more finger twisting keyboard combos and high speed typing will still fall well within the 6-key rollover. The rollover absolutely doesn’t matter if you’re a slow hunt-and-peck typist, but if you’ve read this far into a keyboard review there’s a good chance that you’re a serious typist and that kind of quality construction and high-number key rollover is a fantastic feature. The Good, The Bad, and the Verdict We’ve put the CODE keyboard through the paces, we’ve played games with it, typed articles with it, left lengthy comments on Reddit, and otherwise used and abused it like we would any other keyboard. The Good: The construction is rock solid. In an emergency, we’re confident we could use the keyboard as a blunt weapon (and then resume using it later in the day with no ill effect on the keyboard). The Cherry switches are an absolute pleasure to type on; the Clear variety found in the CODE keyboard offer a really nice middle-ground between the gun-shot clack of a louder mechanical switch and the quietness of a lesser-quality dome keyboard without sacrificing quality. Touch typists will love the subtle tactile bump feedback. Dip switch system makes it very easy for users on different systems and with different keyboard layout needs to switch between operating system and keyboard layouts. If you’re investing a chunk of change in a keyboard it’s nice to know you can take it with you to a different operating system or “upgrade” it to a new layout if you decide to take up Dvorak-style typing. The backlighting is perfect. You can adjust it from a barely-visible glow to a blazing light-up-the-room brightness. Whatever your intesity preference, the white-coated steel backplate does a great job diffusing the light between the keys. You can easily remove the keys for cleaning (or to rearrange the letters to support a new keyboard layout). The weight of the unit combined with the extra thick rubber feet keep it planted exactly where you place it on the desk. The Bad: While you’re getting your money’s worth, the $150 price tag is a shock when compared to the $20-60 price tags you find on lower-end keyboards. People used to large dedicated media keys independent of the traditional key layout (such as the large buttons and volume controls found on many modern keyboards) might be off put by the Fn-key style media controls on the CODE. The Verdict: The keyboard is clearly and heavily influenced by the needs of serious typists. Whether you’re a programmer, transcriptionist, or just somebody that wants to leave the lengthiest article comments the Internet has ever seen, the CODE keyboard offers a rock solid typing experience. Yes, $150 isn’t pocket change, but the quality of the CODE keyboard is so high and the typing experience is so enjoyable, you’re easily getting ten times the value you’d get out of purchasing a lesser keyboard. Even compared to other mechanical keyboards on the market, like the Das Keyboard, you’re still getting more for your money as other mechanical keyboards don’t come with the lovely-to-type-on Cherry MX Clear switches, back lighting, and hardware-based operating system keyboard layout switching. If it’s in your budget to upgrade your keyboard (especially if you’ve been slogging along with a low-end rubber-dome keyboard) there’s no good reason to not pickup a CODE keyboard. Key animation courtesy of Geekhack.org user Lethal Squirrel.

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Windows Phone 7 development: reading RSS feeds

- by DigiMortal

One limitation on Windows Phone 7 is related to System.Net namespace classes. There is no convenient way to read data from web. There is no WebClient class. There is no GetResponse() method – we have to do it all asynchronously because compact framework has limited set of classes we can use in our applications to communicate with internet. In this posting I will show you how to read RSS-feeds on Windows Phone 7. NB! This is my draft code and it may contain some design flaws and some questionable solutions. This code is intended to use as test-drive for Windows Phone 7 CTP developer tools and I don’t suppose you are going to use this code in production environment. Current state of my RSS-reader Currently my RSS-reader for Windows Phone 7 is very simple, primitive and uses almost all defaults that come out-of-box with Windows Phone 7 CTP developer tools. My first goal before going on with nicer user interface design was making RSS-reading work because instead of convenient classes from .NET Framework we have to use very limited classes from .NET Framework CE. This is why I took the reading of RSS-feeds as my first task. There are currently more things to solve regarding user-interface. As I am pretty new to all this Silverlight stuff I am not very sure if I can modify default controls easily or should I write my own controls that have better look and that work faster. The image on right shows you how my RSS-reader looks like right now. Upper side of screen is filled with list that shows headlines from this blog. The bottom part of screen is used to show description of selected posting. You can click on the image to see it in original size. In my next posting I will show you some improvements of my RSS-reader user interface that make it look nicer. But currently it is nice enough to make sure that RSS-feeds are read correctly. FeedItem class As this is most straight-forward part of the following code I will show you RSS-feed items class first. I think we have to stop on it because it is simple one. public class FeedItem { public string Title { get; set; } public string Description { get; set; } public DateTime PublishDate { get; set; } public List<string> Categories { get; set; } public string Link { get; set; } public FeedItem() { Categories = new List<string>(); } } RssClient RssClient takes feed URL and when asked it loads all items from feed and gives them back to caller through ItemsReceived event. Why it works this way? Because we can make responses only using asynchronous methods. I will show you in next section how to use this class. Although the code here is not very good but it works like expected. I will refactor this code later because it needs some more efforts and investigating. But let’s hope I find excellent solution. :) public class RssClient { private readonly string _rssUrl; public delegate void ItemsReceivedDelegate(RssClient client, IList<FeedItem> items); public event ItemsReceivedDelegate ItemsReceived; public RssClient(string rssUrl) { _rssUrl = rssUrl; } public void LoadItems() { var request = (HttpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create(_rssUrl); var result = (IAsyncResult)request.BeginGetResponse(ResponseCallback, request); } void ResponseCallback(IAsyncResult result) { var request = (HttpWebRequest)result.AsyncState; var response = request.EndGetResponse(result); var stream = response.GetResponseStream(); var reader = XmlReader.Create(stream); var items = new List<FeedItem>(50); FeedItem item = null; var pointerMoved = false; while (!reader.EOF) { if (pointerMoved) { pointerMoved = false; } else { if (!reader.Read()) break; } var nodeName = reader.Name; var nodeType = reader.NodeType; if (nodeName == "item") { if (nodeType == XmlNodeType.Element) item = new FeedItem(); else if (nodeType == XmlNodeType.EndElement) if (item != null) { items.Add(item); item = null; } continue; } if (nodeType != XmlNodeType.Element) continue; if (item == null) continue; reader.MoveToContent(); var nodeValue = reader.ReadElementContentAsString(); // we just moved internal pointer pointerMoved = true; if (nodeName == "title") item.Title = nodeValue; else if (nodeName == "description") item.Description = Regex.Replace(nodeValue,@"<(.|\n)*?>",string.Empty); else if (nodeName == "feedburner:origLink") item.Link = nodeValue; else if (nodeName == "pubDate") { if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(nodeValue)) item.PublishDate = DateTime.Parse(nodeValue); } else if (nodeName == "category") item.Categories.Add(nodeValue); } if (ItemsReceived != null) ItemsReceived(this, items); } } This method is pretty long but it works. Now let’s try to use it in Windows Phone 7 application. Using RssClient And this is the fragment of code behing the main page of my application start screen. You can see how RssClient is initialized and how items are bound to list that shows them. public MainPage() { InitializeComponent(); SupportedOrientations = SupportedPageOrientation.Portrait | SupportedPageOrientation.Landscape; listBox1.Width = Width; var rssClient = new RssClient("http://feedproxy.google.com/gunnarpeipman"); rssClient.ItemsReceived += new RssClient.ItemsReceivedDelegate(rssClient_ItemsReceived); rssClient.LoadItems(); } void rssClient_ItemsReceived(RssClient client, IList<FeedItem> items) { Dispatcher.BeginInvoke(delegate() { listBox1.ItemsSource = items; }); } Conclusion As you can see it was not very hard task to read RSS-feed and populate list with feed entries. Although we are not able to use more powerful classes that are part of full version on .NET Framework we can still live with limited set of classes that .NET Framework CE provides.

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Guide to reduce TFS database growth using the Test Attachment Cleaner

- by terje

Recently there has been several reports on TFS databases growing too fast and growing too big. Notable this has been observed when one has started to use more features of the Testing system. Also, the TFS 2010 handles test results differently from TFS 2008, and this leads to more data stored in the TFS databases. As a consequence of this there has been released some tools to remove unneeded data in the database, and also some fixes to correct for bugs which has been found and corrected during this process. Further some preventive practices and maintenance rules should be adopted. A lot of people have blogged about this, among these are: Anu’s very important blog post here describes both the problem and solutions to handle it. She describes both the Test Attachment Cleaner tool, and also some QFE/CU releases to fix some underlying bugs which prevented the tool from being fully effective. Brian Harry’s blog post here describes the problem too This forum thread describes the problem with some solution hints. Ravi Shanker’s blog post here describes best practices on solving this (TBP) Grant Holidays blogpost here describes strategies to use the Test Attachment Cleaner both to detect space problems and how to rectify them. The problem can be divided into the following areas: Publishing of test results from builds Publishing of manual test results and their attachments in particular Publishing of deployment binaries for use during a test run Bugs in SQL server preventing total cleanup of data (All the published data above is published into the TFS database as attachments.) The test results will include all data being collected during the run. Some of this data can grow rather large, like IntelliTrace logs and video recordings. Also the pushing of binaries which happen for automated test runs, including tests run during a build using code coverage which will include all the files in the deployment folder, contributes a lot to the size of the attached data. In order to handle this systematically, I have set up a 3-stage process: Find out if you have a database space issue Set up your TFS server to minimize potential database issues If you have the “problem”, clean up the database and otherwise keep it clean Analyze the data Are your database( s) growing ? Are unused test results growing out of proportion ? To find out about this you need to query your TFS database for some of the information, and use the Test Attachment Cleaner (TAC) to obtain some more detailed information. If you don’t have too many databases you can use the SQL Server reports from within the Management Studio to analyze the database and table sizes. Or, you can use a set of queries . I find queries often faster to use because I can tweak them the way I want them. But be aware that these queries are non-documented and non-supported and may change when the product team wants to change them. If you have multiple Project Collections, find out which might have problems: (Disclaimer: The queries below work on TFS 2010. They will not work on Dev-11, since the table structure have been changed. I will try to update them for Dev-11 when it is released.) Open a SQL Management Studio session onto the SQL Server where you have your TFS Databases. Use the query below to find the Project Collection databases and their sizes, in descending size order. use master select DB_NAME(database_id) AS DBName, (size/128) SizeInMB FROM sys.master_files where type=0 and substring(db_name(database_id),1,4)='Tfs_' and DB_NAME(database_id)<>'Tfs_Configuration' order by size desc Doing this on one of our SQL servers gives the following results: It is pretty easy to see on which collection to start the work Find out which tables are possibly too large Keep a special watch out for the Tfs_Attachment table. Use the script at the bottom of Grant’s blog to find the table sizes in descending size order. In our case we got this result: From Grant’s blog we learnt that the tbl_Content is in the Version Control category, so the major only big issue we have here is the tbl_AttachmentContent. Find out which team projects have possibly too large attachments In order to use the TAC to find and eventually delete attachment data we need to find out which team projects have these attachments. The team project is a required parameter to the TAC. Use the following query to find this, replace the collection database name with whatever applies in your case: use Tfs_DefaultCollection select p.projectname, sum(a.compressedlength)/1024/1024 as sizeInMB from dbo.tbl_Attachment as a inner join tbl_testrun as tr on a.testrunid=tr.testrunid inner join tbl_project as p on p.projectid=tr.projectid group by p.projectname order by sum(a.compressedlength) desc In our case we got this result (had to remove some names), out of more than 100 team projects accumulated over quite some years: As can be seen here it is pretty obvious the “Byggtjeneste – Projects” are the main team project to take care of, with the ones on lines 2-4 as the next ones. Check which attachment types takes up the most space It can be nice to know which attachment types takes up the space, so run the following query: use Tfs_DefaultCollection select a.attachmenttype, sum(a.compressedlength)/1024/1024 as sizeInMB from dbo.tbl_Attachment as a inner join tbl_testrun as tr on a.testrunid=tr.testrunid inner join tbl_project as p on p.projectid=tr.projectid group by a.attachmenttype order by sum(a.compressedlength) desc We then got this result: From this it is pretty obvious that the problem here is the binary files, as also mentioned in Anu’s blog. Check which file types, by their extension, takes up the most space Run the following query use Tfs_DefaultCollection select SUBSTRING(filename,len(filename)-CHARINDEX('.',REVERSE(filename))+2,999)as Extension, sum(compressedlength)/1024 as SizeInKB from tbl_Attachment group by SUBSTRING(filename,len(filename)-CHARINDEX('.',REVERSE(filename))+2,999) order by sum(compressedlength) desc This gives a result like this: Now you should have collected enough information to tell you what to do – if you got to do something, and some of the information you need in order to set up your TAC settings file, both for a cleanup and for scheduled maintenance later. Get your TFS server and environment properly set up Even if you have got the problem or if have yet not got the problem, you should ensure the TFS server is set up so that the risk of getting into this problem is minimized. To ensure this you should install the following set of updates and components. The assumption is that your TFS Server is at SP1 level. Install the QFE for KB2608743 – which also contains detailed instructions on its use, download from here. The QFE changes the default settings to not upload deployed binaries, which are used in automated test runs. Binaries will still be uploaded if: Code coverage is enabled in the test settings. You change the UploadDeploymentItem to true in the testsettings file. Be aware that this might be reset back to false by another user which haven't installed this QFE. The hotfix should be installed to The build servers (the build agents) The machine hosting the Test Controller Local development computers (Visual Studio) Local test computers (MTM) It is not required to install it to the TFS Server, test agents or the build controller – it has no effect on these programs. If you use the SQL Server 2008 R2 you should also install the CU 10 (or later). This CU fixes a potential problem of hanging “ghost” files. This seems to happen only in certain trigger situations, but to ensure it doesn’t bite you, it is better to make sure this CU is installed. There is no such CU for SQL Server 2008 pre-R2 Work around: If you suspect hanging ghost files, they can be – with some mental effort, deduced from the ghost counters using the following SQL query: use master SELECT DB_NAME(database_id) as 'database',OBJECT_NAME(object_id) as 'objectname', index_type_desc,ghost_record_count,version_ghost_record_count,record_count,avg_record_size_in_bytes FROM sys.dm_db_index_physical_stats (DB_ID(N'<DatabaseName>'), OBJECT_ID(N'<TableName>'), NULL, NULL , 'DETAILED') The problem is a stalled ghost cleanup process. Restarting the SQL server after having stopped all components that depends on it, like the TFS Server and SPS services – that is all applications that connect to the SQL server. Then restart the SQL server, and finally start up all dependent processes again. (I would guess a complete server reboot would do the trick too.) After this the ghost cleanup process will run properly again. The fix will come in the next CU cycle for SQL Server R2 SP1. The R2 pre-SP1 and R2 SP1 have separate maintenance cycles, and are maintained individually. Each have its own set of CU’s. When it comes I will add the link here to that CU. The "hanging ghost file” issue came up after one have run the TAC, and deleted enourmes amount of data. The SQL Server can get into this hanging state (without the QFE) in certain cases due to this. And of course, install and set up the Test Attachment Cleaner command line power tool. This should be done following some guidelines from Ravi Shanker: “When you run TAC, ensure that you are deleting small chunks of data at regular intervals (say run TAC every night at 3AM to delete data that is between age 730 to 731 days) – this will ensure that small amounts of data are being deleted and SQL ghosted record cleanup can catch up with the number of deletes performed. “ This rule minimizes the risk of the ghosted hang problem to occur, and further makes it easier for the SQL server ghosting process to work smoothly. “Run DBCC SHRINKDB post the ghosted records are cleaned up to physically reclaim the space on the file system” This is the last step in a 3 step process of removing SQL server data. First they are logically deleted. Then they are cleaned out by the ghosting process, and finally removed using the shrinkdb command. Cleaning out the attachments The TAC is run from the command line using a set of parameters and controlled by a settingsfile. The parameters point out a server uri including the team project collection and also point at a specific team project. So in order to run this for multiple team projects regularly one has to set up a script to run the TAC multiple times, once for each team project. When you install the TAC there is a very useful readme file in the same directory. When the deployment binaries are published to the TFS server, ALL items are published up from the deployment folder. That often means much more files than you would assume are necessary. This is a brute force technique. It works, but you need to take care when cleaning up. Grant has shown how their settings file looks in his blog post, removing all attachments older than 180 days , as long as there are no active workitems connected to them. This setting can be useful to clean out all items, both in a clean-up once operation, and in a general There are two scenarios we need to consider: Cleaning up an existing overgrown database Maintaining a server to avoid an overgrown database using scheduled TAC 1. Cleaning up a database which has grown too big due to these attachments. This job is a “Once” job. We do this once and then move on to make sure it won’t happen again, by taking the actions in 2) below. In this scenario you should only consider the large files. Your goal should be to simply reduce the size, and don’t bother about the smaller stuff. That can be left a scheduled TAC cleanup ( 2 below). Here you can use a very general settings file, and just remove the large attachments, or you can choose to remove any old items. Grant’s settings file is an example of the last one. A settings file to remove only large attachments could look like this:  <DeletionCriteria> <TestRun /> <Attachment> <SizeInMB GreaterThan="10" /> </Attachment> </DeletionCriteria> Or like this: If you want only to remove dll’s and pdb’s about that size, add an Extensions-section. Without that section, all extensions will be deleted.  <DeletionCriteria> <TestRun /> <Attachment> <SizeInMB GreaterThan="10" /> <Extensions> <Include value="dll" /> <Include value="pdb" /> </Extensions> </Attachment> </DeletionCriteria> Before you start up your scheduled maintenance, you should clear out all older items. 2. Scheduled maintenance using the TAC If you run a schedule every night, and remove old items, and also remove them in small batches. It is important to run this often, like every night, in order to keep the number of deleted items low. That way the SQL ghost process works better. One approach could be to delete all items older than some number of days, let’s say 180 days. This could be combined with restricting it to keep attachments with active or resolved bugs. Doing this every night ensures that only small amounts of data is deleted.  <DeletionCriteria> <TestRun> <AgeInDays OlderThan="180" /> </TestRun> <Attachment /> <LinkedBugs> <Exclude state="Active" /> <Exclude state="Resolved"/> </LinkedBugs> </DeletionCriteria> In my experience there are projects which are left with active or resolved workitems, akthough no further work is done. It can be wise to have a cleanup process with no restrictions on linked bugs at all. Note that you then have to remove the whole LinkedBugs section. A approach which could work better here is to do a two step approach, use the schedule above to with no LinkedBugs as a sweeper cleaning task taking away all data older than you could care about. Then have another scheduled TAC task to take out more specifically attachments that you are not likely to use. This task could be much more specific, and based on your analysis clean out what you know is troublesome data.  <DeletionCriteria> <TestRun > <AgeInDays OlderThan="30" /> </TestRun> <Attachment> <SizeInMB GreaterThan="10" /> <Extensions> <Include value="iTrace"/> <Include value="dll"/> <Include value="pdb"/> <Include value="wmv"/> </Extensions> </Attachment> <LinkedBugs> <Exclude state="Active" /> <Exclude state="Resolved" /> </LinkedBugs> </DeletionCriteria> The readme document for the TAC says that it recognizes “internal” extensions, but it does recognize any extension. To run the tool do the following command: tcmpt attachmentcleanup /collection:your_tfs_collection_url /teamproject:your_team_project /settingsfile:path_to_settingsfile /outputfile:%temp%/teamproject.tcmpt.log /mode:delete Shrinking the database You could run a shrink database command after the TAC has run in cases where there are a lot of data being deleted. In this case you SHOULD do it, to free up all that space. But, after the shrink operation you should do a rebuild indexes, since the shrink operation will leave the database in a very fragmented state, which will reduce performance. Note that you need to rebuild indexes, reorganizing is not enough. For smaller amounts of data you should NOT shrink the database, since the data will be reused by the SQL server when it need to add more records. In fact, it is regarded as a bad practice to shrink the database regularly. So on a daily maintenance schedule you should NOT shrink the database. To shrink the database you do a DBCC SHRINKDATABASE command, and then follow up with a DBCC INDEXDEFRAG afterwards. I find the easiest way to do this is to create a SQL Maintenance plan including the Shrink Database Task and the Rebuild Index Task and just execute it when you need to do this.

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Mobile Friendly Websites with CSS Media Queries

- by dwahlin

In a previous post the concept of CSS media queries was introduced and I discussed the fundamentals of how they can be used to target different screen sizes. I showed how they could be used to convert a 3-column wide page into a more vertical view of data that displays better on devices such as an iPhone: In this post I'll provide an additional look at how CSS media queries can be used to mobile-enable a sample site called "Widget Masters" without having to change any server-side code or HTML code. The site that will be discussed is shown next: This site has some of the standard items shown in most websites today including a title area, menu bar, and sections where data is displayed. Without including CSS media queries the site is readable but has to be zoomed out to see everything on a mobile device, cuts-off some of the menu items, and requires horizontal scrolling to get to additional content. The following image shows what the site looks like on an iPhone. While the site works on mobile devices it's definitely not optimized for mobile. Let's take a look at how CSS media queries can be used to override existing styles in the site based on different screen widths. Adding CSS Media Queries into a Site The Widget Masters Website relies on standard CSS combined with HTML5 elements to provide the layout shown earlier. For example, to layout the menu bar shown at the top of the page the nav element is used as shown next. A standard div element could certainly be used as well if desired. <nav> <ul class="clearfix"> <li><a href="#home">Home</a></li> <li><a href="#products">Products</a></li> <li><a href="#aboutus">About Us</a></li> <li><a href="#contactus">Contact Us</a></li> <li><a href="#store">Store</a></li> </ul> </nav> This HTML is combined with the CSS shown next to add a CSS3 gradient, handle the horizontal orientation, and add some general hover effects. nav { width: 100%; } nav ul { border-radius: 6px; height: 40px; width: 100%; margin: 0; padding: 0; background: rgb(125,126,125); /* Old browsers */ background: -moz-linear-gradient(top, rgba(125,126,125,1) 0%, rgba(14,14,14,1) 100%); /* FF3.6+ */ background: -webkit-gradient(linear, left top, left bottom, color-stop(0%,rgba(125,126,125,1)), color-stop(100%,rgba(14,14,14,1))); /* Chrome,Safari4+ */ background: -webkit-linear-gradient(top, rgba(125,126,125,1) 0%, rgba(14,14,14,1) 100%); /* Chrome10+,Safari5.1+ */ background: -o-linear-gradient(top, rgba(125,126,125,1) 0%, rgba(14,14,14,1) 100%); /* Opera 11.10+ */ background: -ms-linear-gradient(top, rgba(125,126,125,1) 0%, rgba(14,14,14,1) 100%); /* IE10+ */ background: linear-gradient(top, rgba(125,126,125,1) 0%, rgba(14,14,14,1) 100%); /* W3C */ filter: progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.gradient( startColorstr='#7d7e7d', endColorstr='#0e0e0e',GradientType=0 ); /* IE6-9 */ } nav ul > li { list-style: none; float: left; margin: 0; padding: 0; } nav ul > li:first-child { margin-left: 8px; } nav ul > li > a { color: #ccc; text-decoration: none; line-height: 2.8em; font-size: 0.95em; font-weight: bold; padding: 8px 25px 7px 25px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; } nav ul > li a:hover { background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.1); color: #fff; } When mobile devices hit the site the layout of the menu items needs to be adjusted so that they're all visible without having to swipe left or right to get to them. This type of modification can be accomplished using CSS media queries by targeting specific screen sizes. To start, a media query can be added into the site's CSS file as shown next: @media screen and (max-width:320px) { /* CSS style overrides for this screen width go here */ } This media query targets screens that have a maximum width of 320 pixels. Additional types of queries can also be added – refer to my previous post for more details as well as resources that can be used to test media queries in different devices. In that post I emphasize (and I'll emphasize again) that CSS media queries only modify the overall layout and look and feel of a site. They don't optimize the site as far as the size of the images or content sent to the device which is important to keep in mind. To make the navigation menu more accessible on devices such as an iPhone or Android the CSS shown next can be used. This code changes the height of the menu from 40 pixels to 100%, takes off the li element floats, changes the line-height, and changes the margins. @media screen and (max-width:320px) { nav ul { height: 100%; } nav ul > li { float: none; } nav ul > li a { line-height: 1.5em; } nav ul > li:first-child { margin-left: 0px; } /* Additional CSS overrides go here */ } The following image shows an example of what the menu look like when run on a device with a width of 320 pixels: Mobile devices with a maximum width of 480 pixels need different CSS styles applied since they have 160 additional pixels of width. This can be done by adding a new CSS media query into the stylesheet as shown next. Looking through the CSS you'll see that only a minimal override is added to adjust the padding of anchor tags since the menu fits by default in this screen width. @media screen and (max-width: 480px) { nav ul > li > a { padding: 8px 10px 7px 10px; } } Running the site on a device with 480 pixels results in the menu shown next being rendered. Notice that the space between the menu items is much smaller compared to what was shown when the main site loads in a standard browser. In addition to modifying the menu, the 3 horizontal content sections shown earlier can be changed from a horizontal layout to a vertical layout so that they look good on a variety of smaller mobile devices and are easier to navigate by end users. The HTML5 article and section elements are used as containers for the 3 sections in the site as shown next: <article class="clearfix"> <section id="info"> <header>Why Choose Us?</header> <br /> <img id="mainImage" src="Images/ArticleImage.png" title="Article Image" /> <p> Post emensos insuperabilis expeditionis eventus languentibus partium animis, quas periculorum varietas fregerat et laborum, nondum tubarum cessante clangore vel milite locato per stationes hibernas. </p> </section> <section id="products"> <header>Products</header> <br /> <img id="gearsImage" src="Images/Gears.png" title="Article Image" /> <p> <ul> <li>Widget 1</li> <li>Widget 2</li> <li>Widget 3</li> <li>Widget 4</li> <li>Widget 5</li> </ul> </p> </section> <section id="FAQ"> <header>FAQ</header> <br /> <img id="faqImage" src="Images/faq.png" title="Article Image" /> <p> <ul> <li>FAQ 1</li> <li>FAQ 2</li> <li>FAQ 3</li> <li>FAQ 4</li> <li>FAQ 5</li> </ul> </p> </section> </article> To force the sections into a vertical layout for smaller mobile devices the CSS styles shown next can be added into the media queries targeting 320 pixel and 480 pixel widths. Styles to target the display size of the images in each section are also included. It's important to note that the original image is still being downloaded from the server and isn't being optimized in any way for the mobile device. It's certainly possible for the CSS to include URL information for a mobile-optimized image if desired. @media screen and (max-width:320px) { section { float: none; width: 97%; margin: 0px; padding: 5px; } #wrapper { padding: 5px; width: 96%; } #mainImage, #gearsImage, #faqImage { width: 100%; height: 100px; } } @media screen and (max-width: 480px) { section { float: none; width: 98%; margin: 0px 0px 10px 0px; padding: 5px; } article > section:last-child { margin-right: 0px; float: none; } #bottomSection { width: 99%; } #wrapper { padding: 5px; width: 96%; } #mainImage, #gearsImage, #faqImage { width: 100%; height: 100px; } } The following images show the site rendered on an iPhone with the CSS media queries in place. Each of the sections now displays vertically making it much easier for the user to access them. Images inside of each section also scale appropriately to fit properly. CSS media queries provide a great way to override default styles in a website and target devices with different resolutions. In this post you've seen how CSS media queries can be used to convert a standard browser-based site into a site that is more accessible to mobile users. Although much more can be done to optimize sites for mobile, CSS media queries provide a nice starting point if you don't have the time or resources to create mobile-specific versions of sites.

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Customize the SimpleMembership in ASP.NET MVC 4.0

- by thangchung

As we know, .NET 4.5 have come up to us, and come along with a lot of new interesting features as well. Visual Studio 2012 was also introduced some days ago. They made us feel very happy with cool improvement along with us. Performance when loading code editor is very good at the moment (immediate after click on the solution). I explore some of cool features at these days. Some of them like Json.NET integrated in ASP.NET MVC 4.0, improvement on asynchronous action, new lightweight theme on Visual Studio, supporting very good on mobile development, improvement on authentication… I reviewed them, and found out that in this version of .NET Microsoft was not only developed new feature that suggest from community but also focused on improvement performance of existing features or components. Besides that, they also opened source more projects, like Entity Framework, Reactive Extensions, ASP.NET Web Stack… At the moment, I feel Microsoft want to open source more and more their projects. Today, I am going to dive in deep on new SimpleMembership model. It is really good because in this security model, Microsoft actually focus on development needs. As we know, in the past, they introduce some of provider supplied for coding security like MembershipProvider, RoleProvider… I don’t need to talk but everyone that have ever used it know that they were actually hard to use, and not easy to maintain and unit testing. Why? Because every time you inherit it, you need to override all methods inside it. Some people try to abstract it by introduce more method with virtual keyword, and try to implement basic behavior, so in the subclass we only need to override the method that need for their business. But to me, it’s only the way to work around. ASP.NET team and Web Matrix knew about it, so they built the new features based on existing components on .NET framework. And one of component that comes to us is SimpleMembership and SimpleRole. They implemented the Façade pattern on the top of those, and called it is WebSecurity. In the web, we can call WebSecurity anywhere we want, and make a call to inside wrapper of it. I read a lot of them on web blog, on technical news, on MSDN as well. Matthew Osborn had an excellent article about it at his blog. Jon Galloway had an article like this at here. He analyzed why old membership provider not fixed well to ASP.NET MVC and how to get over it. Those are very good to me. It introduced to me about how to doing SimpleMembership on it, how to doing it on new ASP.NET MVC web application. But one thing, those didn’t tell me was how to doing it on existing security model (that mean we already had Users and Roles on legacy system, and how we can integrate it to this system), that’s a reason I will introduce it today. I have spent couples of hours to see what’s inside this, and try to make one example to clarify my concern. And it’s lucky that I can make it working well.The first thing, we need to create new ASP.NET MVC application on Visual Studio 2012. We need to choose Internet type for this web application. ASP.NET MVC actually creates all needs components for the basic membership and basic role. The cool feature is DoNetOpenAuth come along with it that means we can log-in using facebook, twitter or Windows Live if you want. But it’s only for LocalDb, so we need to change it to fix with existing database model on SQL Server. The next step we have to make SimpleMembership can understand which database we use and show it which column need to point to for the ID and UserName. I really like this feature because SimpleMembership on need to know about the ID and UserName, and they don’t care about rest of it. I assume that we have an existing database model like So we will point it in code like The codes for it, we put on InitializeSimpleMembershipAttribute like [AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Class | AttributeTargets.Method, AllowMultiple = false, Inherited = true)] public sealed class InitializeSimpleMembershipAttribute : ActionFilterAttribute { private static SimpleMembershipInitializer _initializer; private static object _initializerLock = new object(); private static bool _isInitialized; public override void OnActionExecuting(ActionExecutingContext filterContext) { // Ensure ASP.NET Simple Membership is initialized only once per app start LazyInitializer.EnsureInitialized(ref _initializer, ref _isInitialized, ref _initializerLock); } private class SimpleMembershipInitializer { public SimpleMembershipInitializer() { try { WebSecurity.InitializeDatabaseConnection("DefaultDb", "User", "Id", "UserName", autoCreateTables: true); } catch (Exception ex) { throw new InvalidOperationException("The ASP.NET Simple Membership database could not be initialized. For more information, please see http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=256588", ex); } } } }And decorating it in the AccountController as below [Authorize] [InitializeSimpleMembership] public class AccountController : ControllerIn this case, assuming that we need to override the ValidateUser to point this to existing User database table, and validate it. We have to add one more class like public class CustomAdminMembershipProvider : SimpleMembershipProvider { // TODO: will do a better way private const string SELECT_ALL_USER_SCRIPT = "select * from [dbo].[User]private where UserName = '{0}'"; private readonly IEncrypting _encryptor; private readonly SimpleSecurityContext _simpleSecurityContext; public CustomAdminMembershipProvider(SimpleSecurityContext simpleSecurityContext) : this(new Encryptor(), new SimpleSecurityContext("DefaultDb")) { } public CustomAdminMembershipProvider(IEncrypting encryptor, SimpleSecurityContext simpleSecurityContext) { _encryptor = encryptor; _simpleSecurityContext = simpleSecurityContext; } public override bool ValidateUser(string username, string password) { if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(username)) { throw new ArgumentException("Argument cannot be null or empty", "username"); } if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(password)) { throw new ArgumentException("Argument cannot be null or empty", "password"); } var hash = _encryptor.Encode(password); using (_simpleSecurityContext) { var users = _simpleSecurityContext.Users.SqlQuery( string.Format(SELECT_ALL_USER_SCRIPT, username)); if (users == null && !users.Any()) { return false; } return users.FirstOrDefault().Password == hash; } } }SimpleSecurityDataContext at here public class SimpleSecurityContext : DbContext { public DbSet<User> Users { get; set; } public SimpleSecurityContext(string connStringName) : base(connStringName) { this.Configuration.LazyLoadingEnabled = true; this.Configuration.ProxyCreationEnabled = false; } protected override void OnModelCreating(DbModelBuilder modelBuilder) { base.OnModelCreating(modelBuilder); modelBuilder.Configurations.Add(new UserMapping()); } }And Mapping for User as below public class UserMapping : EntityMappingBase<User> { public UserMapping() { this.Property(x => x.UserName); this.Property(x => x.DisplayName); this.Property(x => x.Password); this.Property(x => x.Email); this.ToTable("User"); } }One important thing, you need to modify the web.config to point to our customize SimpleMembership <membership defaultProvider="AdminMemberProvider" userIsOnlineTimeWindow="15"> <providers> <clear/> <add name="AdminMemberProvider" type="CIK.News.Web.Infras.Security.CustomAdminMembershipProvider, CIK.News.Web.Infras" /> </providers> </membership> <roleManager enabled="false"> <providers> <clear /> <add name="AdminRoleProvider" type="CIK.News.Web.Infras.Security.AdminRoleProvider, CIK.News.Web.Infras" /> </providers> </roleManager>The good thing at here is we don’t need to modify the code on AccountController. We only need to modify on SimpleMembership and Simple Role (if need). Now build all solutions, run it. We should see a screen like thisIf I login to Twitter button at the bottom of this page, we will be transfer to twitter authentication pageYou have to waiting for a moment Afterwards it will transfer you back to your admin screenYou can find all source codes at my MSDN code. I will really happy if you guys feel free to put some comments as below. It will be helpful to improvement my code in the future. Thank for all your readings.

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Jolicloud is a Nifty New OS for Your Netbook

- by Matthew Guay

Want to breathe new life into your netbook? Here’s a quick look at Jolicloud, a unique new Linux based OS that lets you use your netbook in a whole new way. Netbooks have been an interesting category of computers. When they were first released, most netbooks came with a stripped down Linux based operating system designed to let you easily access the internet first and foremost. Consumers wanted more from their netbooks, so full OSes such as Windows XP and Ubuntu became the standard on netbooks. Microsoft worked hard to get Windows 7 working great on netbooks, and today most netbooks run Windows 7 great. But the Linux community hasn’t stood still either, and Jolicloud is proof of that. Jolicloud is a unique OS designed to bring the best of both webapps and standard programs to your netbook. Keep reading to see if this is the perfect netbook OS for you. Getting Started Installing Jolicloud on your netbook is easy thanks to a the Jolicloud Express installer for Windows. Since many netbooks run Windows by default, this makes it easy to install Jolicloud. Plus, your Windows install is left untouched, so you can still easily access all your Windows files and programs. Download and run the roughly 700Mb installer (link below) just as a normal installer in Windows. This will first extract the needed files. Click Get started to install Jolicloud on your netbook. Enter a username, password, and nickname for your computer. Please note that the username must be all lowercase, and the nickname should not contain spaces or special characters. Now you can review the default installation settings. By default it will take up 39Gb and install on your C:\ drive in English. If you wish to change this, click Change. We chose to install it on the D: drive on this netbook, as its harddrive was already partitioned into two parts. Click Save when your settings are all correct, and then click Next in the previous window. Jolicloud will prepare for the installation. This took about 5 minutes in our test. Click Next when this is finished. Click Restart now to install and run Jolicloud. When your netbook reboots, it will initialize the Jolicloud setup. It will then automatically finish the installation. Just sit back and wait; there’s nothing for you to do right now. The installation took about 20 minutes in our test. Jolicloud will automatically reboot when the setup is finished. Once it’s rebooted, you’re ready to go! Enter the username, then the password, that you chose earlier when you were installing Jolicloud from Windows. Welcome to your Jolicloud desktop! Hardware Support We installed Jolicloud on a Samsung N150 netbook with an Atom N450 processor, 1Gb Ram, 250Gb harddrive, and WiFi b/g/n with Bluetooth. Amazingly, once Jolicloud was installed, everything was ready to use. No drivers to install, no settings to hassle with, it was all installed and set up perfectly. Power settings worked great, and closing the netbook put it to sleep just like in Windows. WiFi drivers have typically been difficult to find and install on Linux, but Jolicloud had our netbook’s wifi working immediately. To get online, simply click the Wireless icon on the top right, and select the wireless network you want to connect to. Jolicloud will let you know when it is signed on. Wired Lan networking was also seamless; simply connect your cable and you’re ready to go. The webcam and touchpad also worked perfectly directly. The only thing missing was multitouch; this touchpad has two finger scroll, pinch zoom, and other nice multitouch features in Windows, but in Julicloud it only functioned as a standard touchpad. It did have tap to click activated by default, as well as right-side scrolling, which is nice. Jolicloud also supported our video card without any extra work. The native resolution was already selected, and the only problem we had with the screen was that there was no apparent way to change the brightness. This is not a major problem, but would be nice to have. The Samsung N150 has Intel GMA3150 integrated graphics, and Jolicloud promises 1080p HD video on it. It did playback 720p H.264 video flawlessly without installing anything extra, but it stuttered on full 1080p HD (which is the exact same as this netbook’s video playback in Windows 7 – 720p works great, but it stutters on 1080p). We would be excited to see full HD on this netbook, but 720p is definitely fine for most stuff. Jolicloud supports a wide range of netbooks, and based on our experience we would expect it to work as good on any supported hardware. Check out the list of supported netbooks to see if your netbook is supported; if not, it still may work but you may have to install special drivers. Jolicloud’s performance was very similar to Windows 7 on our netbook. It boots in about 30 seconds, and apps load fairly quickly. In general, we couldn’t tell much difference in performance between Jolicloud and Windows 7, though this isn’t a problem since Windows 7 runs great on the current generation of netbooks. Using Jolicloud Ready to start putting Jolicloud to use? Your fresh Jolicloud install you can run several built-in apps, such as Firefox, a calculator, and the chat client Pidgin. It also has a media player and file viewer installed, so you can play MP3s or MPG videos, or read PDF ebooks without installing anything extra. It also has Flash player installed so you can watch videos online easily. You can also directly access all of your files from the right side of your home screen. You can even access your Windows files; in our test, the 116.9 GB Media was C: from Windows. Select it to browse and open any file you had saved in Windows. You may need to enter your password to access it. Once you’re authenticated it, you’ll see all of your Windows files and folders. Your User files (Documents, Music, Videos, etc.) will be in the Users folder. And, you can easily add files from removable media such as USB flash drives and memory cards. Jolicloud recognized a flash drive we tested with no trouble at all. Add new apps But, the best part about Jolicloud is that it makes it very easy to install new apps. Click the Get Started button on your homescreen. You’ll first need to create an account. You can then use this same account on another netbook if you wish, and your settings will automatically be synced between the two. You can either signup using your Facebook account, …or you can sign up the traditional way with your email address, name, and password. If you sign up this way, you will need to confirm your email address before your account will be finished. Now, choose your netbook model from the list, and enter a name for your computer. And that’s it! You’ll now see the Jolicloud dashboard, which will show you updates and notifications from friends who also use Jolicloud. Click the App directory to find new apps for your netbook. Here you will find a variety of webapps, such as Gmail, along with native applications, such as Skype, that you can install on your netbook. Simply click the Install button on the right to add the app to your netbook. You will be prompted to enter your system password, and then the app will install without any further input. Once an app is installed, a check mark will appear beside its name. You can remove it by clicking the Remove button, and it will uninstall seamlessly. Webapps, such as Gmail, actually run in in a Chrome-powered window that lets the webapp run full screen. This gives the webapps a native feel, but actually they’re just running the same as they would in a standard web browser. The Jolicloud Interface Most apps run maximized, and there is no way to run them smaller. This in general works good, since with small screens most apps need to run full-screen anyhow. Smaller apps, such as a calculator or the Pidgin chat client, run in a window just like they do on other operating systems. You can switch to another app that’s running by selecting it’s icon on the top left, or you can go back to the home screen by clicking the home screen. If you’re finished with an program, simply click the red X button on the top right of the window when you’re running it. Or, you can switch between programs using standard keyboard shortcuts such as Alt-tab. The default page on the home screen is the favorites page, and all of your other programs are orginized in their own sections on the left hand side. But, if you want to add one of these to your favorites page, simply right-click on it and select Add to Favorites. When you’re done for the day, you can simply close your netbook to put it to sleep. Or, if you want to shut down, just press the Quit button on the bottom right of the home screen and then select Shut Down. Booting Jolicloud When you install Jolicloud, it will set itself as the default operating system. Now, when you boot your netbook, it will show you a list of installed operating systems. You can select either Windows or Jolicloud, but if you don’t make a selection it will boot into Jolicloud after waiting 10 seconds. If you’d perfer to boot into Windows by default, you can easily change this. First, boot your netbook in to Windows. Open the start menu, right-click on the Computer button, and select Properties. Click the “Advanced system settings” link on the left side. Click the Settings button in the Startup and Recovery section. Now, select Windows as the default operating system, and click Ok. Your netbook will now boot into Windows by default, but will give you 10 seconds to choose to boot into Jolicloud when you start your computer. Or, if you decided you don’t want Jolicloud, you can easily uninstall it from within Windows. Please note that this will also remove any files you may have saved in Jolicloud, so be sure to copy them to your Windows drive before uninstalling. To uninstall Jolicloud from within Windows, open Control Panel, and select Uninstall a Program. Scroll down to select Jolicloud, and click Uninstall/Change. Click Yes to confirm that you want to uninstall Jolicloud. After a few moments, it will let you know that Jolicloud has been uninstalled. You’re netbook is now back the same as it was before you installed Jolicloud, with only Windows installed. Closing Whether you’re wanting to replace your current OS on your netbook or would simply like to try out a fresh new Linux version on your netbook, Jolicloud is a great option for you. We were very impressed by it’s solid hardware support and the ease of installing new apps in Jolicloud. Rather than simply giving us a standard OS, Jolicloud offers a unique way to use your netbook with native programs and webapps. And whether you’re an IT pro or are a new computer user, Jolicloud was easy enough to use that anyone can do it. Give it a try, and let us know what your favorite netbook OS is! Link Download Jolicloud for your netbook Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips How To Change XSplash Themes in Ubuntu 9.10Verify the Integrity of Windows Vista System FilesMonitor Multiple Logs in a Single Shell with MultiTail for LinuxHide Some or All of the GUI Bars in FirefoxAsk the Readers: Do You Use a Laptop, Desktop, or Both? TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Stop In The Name Of Love (Firefox addon) Chitika iPad Labs Gives Live iPad Sale Stats Heaven & Hell Finder Icon Using TrueCrypt to Secure Your Data Quickly Schedule Meetings With NeedtoMeet Share Flickr Photos On Facebook Automatically

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Working with PivotTables in Excel

- by Mark Virtue

PivotTables are one of the most powerful features of Microsoft Excel. They allow large amounts of data to be analyzed and summarized in just a few mouse clicks. In this article, we explore PivotTables, understand what they are, and learn how to create and customize them. Note: This article is written using Excel 2010 (Beta). The concept of a PivotTable has changed little over the years, but the method of creating one has changed in nearly every iteration of Excel. If you are using a version of Excel that is not 2010, expect different screens from the ones you see in this article. A Little History In the early days of spreadsheet programs, Lotus 1-2-3 ruled the roost. Its dominance was so complete that people thought it was a waste of time for Microsoft to bother developing their own spreadsheet software (Excel) to compete with Lotus. Flash-forward to 2010, and Excel’s dominance of the spreadsheet market is greater than Lotus’s ever was, while the number of users still running Lotus 1-2-3 is approaching zero. How did this happen? What caused such a dramatic reversal of fortunes? Industry analysts put it down to two factors: Firstly, Lotus decided that this fancy new GUI platform called “Windows” was a passing fad that would never take off. They declined to create a Windows version of Lotus 1-2-3 (for a few years, anyway), predicting that their DOS version of the software was all anyone would ever need. Microsoft, naturally, developed Excel exclusively for Windows. Secondly, Microsoft developed a feature for Excel that Lotus didn’t provide in 1-2-3, namely PivotTables. The PivotTables feature, exclusive to Excel, was deemed so staggeringly useful that people were willing to learn an entire new software package (Excel) rather than stick with a program (1-2-3) that didn’t have it. This one feature, along with the misjudgment of the success of Windows, was the death-knell for Lotus 1-2-3, and the beginning of the success of Microsoft Excel. Understanding PivotTables So what is a PivotTable, exactly? Put simply, a PivotTable is a summary of some data, created to allow easy analysis of said data. But unlike a manually created summary, Excel PivotTables are interactive. Once you have created one, you can easily change it if it doesn’t offer the exact insights into your data that you were hoping for. In a couple of clicks the summary can be “pivoted” – rotated in such a way that the column headings become row headings, and vice versa. There’s a lot more that can be done, too. Rather than try to describe all the features of PivotTables, we’ll simply demonstrate them… The data that you analyze using a PivotTable can’t be just any data – it has to be raw data, previously unprocessed (unsummarized) – typically a list of some sort. An example of this might be the list of sales transactions in a company for the past six months. Examine the data shown below: Notice that this is not raw data. In fact, it is already a summary of some sort. In cell B3 we can see $30,000, which apparently is the total of James Cook’s sales for the month of January. So where is the raw data? How did we arrive at the figure of $30,000? Where is the original list of sales transactions that this figure was generated from? It’s clear that somewhere, someone must have gone to the trouble of collating all of the sales transactions for the past six months into the summary we see above. How long do you suppose this took? An hour? Ten? Probably. If we were to track down the original list of sales transactions, it might look something like this: You may be surprised to learn that, using the PivotTable feature of Excel, we can create a monthly sales summary similar to the one above in a few seconds, with only a few mouse clicks. We can do this – and a lot more too! How to Create a PivotTable First, ensure that you have some raw data in a worksheet in Excel. A list of financial transactions is typical, but it can be a list of just about anything: Employee contact details, your CD collection, or fuel consumption figures for your company’s fleet of cars. So we start Excel… …and we load such a list… Once we have the list open in Excel, we’re ready to start creating the PivotTable. Click on any one single cell within the list: Then, from the Insert tab, click the PivotTable icon: The Create PivotTable box appears, asking you two questions: What data should your new PivotTable be based on, and where should it be created? Because we already clicked on a cell within the list (in the step above), the entire list surrounding that cell is already selected for us ($A$1:$G$88 on the Payments sheet, in this example). Note that we could select a list in any other region of any other worksheet, or even some external data source, such as an Access database table, or even a MS-SQL Server database table. We also need to select whether we want our new PivotTable to be created on a new worksheet, or on an existing one. In this example we will select a new one: The new worksheet is created for us, and a blank PivotTable is created on that worksheet: Another box also appears: The PivotTable Field List. This field list will be shown whenever we click on any cell within the PivotTable (above): The list of fields in the top part of the box is actually the collection of column headings from the original raw data worksheet. The four blank boxes in the lower part of the screen allow us to choose the way we would like our PivotTable to summarize the raw data. So far, there is nothing in those boxes, so the PivotTable is blank. All we need to do is drag fields down from the list above and drop them in the lower boxes. A PivotTable is then automatically created to match our instructions. If we get it wrong, we only need to drag the fields back to where they came from and/or drag new fields down to replace them. The Values box is arguably the most important of the four. The field that is dragged into this box represents the data that needs to be summarized in some way (by summing, averaging, finding the maximum, minimum, etc). It is almost always numerical data. A perfect candidate for this box in our sample data is the “Amount” field/column. Let’s drag that field into the Values box: Notice that (a) the “Amount” field in the list of fields is now ticked, and “Sum of Amount” has been added to the Values box, indicating that the amount column has been summed. If we examine the PivotTable itself, we indeed find the sum of all the “Amount” values from the raw data worksheet: We’ve created our first PivotTable! Handy, but not particularly impressive. It’s likely that we need a little more insight into our data than that. Referring to our sample data, we need to identify one or more column headings that we could conceivably use to split this total. For example, we may decide that we would like to see a summary of our data where we have a row heading for each of the different salespersons in our company, and a total for each. To achieve this, all we need to do is to drag the “Salesperson” field into the Row Labels box: Now, finally, things start to get interesting! Our PivotTable starts to take shape…. With a couple of clicks we have created a table that would have taken a long time to do manually. So what else can we do? Well, in one sense our PivotTable is complete. We’ve created a useful summary of our source data. The important stuff is already learned! For the rest of the article, we will examine some ways that more complex PivotTables can be created, and ways that those PivotTables can be customized. First, we can create a two-dimensional table. Let’s do that by using “Payment Method” as a column heading. Simply drag the “Payment Method” heading to the Column Labels box: Which looks like this: Starting to get very cool! Let’s make it a three-dimensional table. What could such a table possibly look like? Well, let’s see… Drag the “Package” column/heading to the Report Filter box: Notice where it ends up…. This allows us to filter our report based on which “holiday package” was being purchased. For example, we can see the breakdown of salesperson vs payment method for all packages, or, with a couple of clicks, change it to show the same breakdown for the “Sunseekers” package: And so, if you think about it the right way, our PivotTable is now three-dimensional. Let’s keep customizing… If it turns out, say, that we only want to see cheque and credit card transactions (i.e. no cash transactions), then we can deselect the “Cash” item from the column headings. Click the drop-down arrow next to Column Labels, and untick “Cash”: Let’s see what that looks like…As you can see, “Cash” is gone. Formatting This is obviously a very powerful system, but so far the results look very plain and boring. For a start, the numbers that we’re summing do not look like dollar amounts – just plain old numbers. Let’s rectify that. A temptation might be to do what we’re used to doing in such circumstances and simply select the whole table (or the whole worksheet) and use the standard number formatting buttons on the toolbar to complete the formatting. The problem with that approach is that if you ever change the structure of the PivotTable in the future (which is 99% likely), then those number formats will be lost. We need a way that will make them (semi-)permanent. First, we locate the “Sum of Amount” entry in the Values box, and click on it. A menu appears. We select Value Field Settings… from the menu: The Value Field Settings box appears. Click the Number Format button, and the standard Format Cells box appears: From the Category list, select (say) Accounting, and drop the number of decimal places to 0. Click OK a few times to get back to the PivotTable… As you can see, the numbers have been correctly formatted as dollar amounts. While we’re on the subject of formatting, let’s format the entire PivotTable. There are a few ways to do this. Let’s use a simple one… Click the PivotTable Tools/Design tab: Then drop down the arrow in the bottom-right of the PivotTable Styles list to see a vast collection of built-in styles: Choose any one that appeals, and look at the result in your PivotTable: Other Options We can work with dates as well. Now usually, there are many, many dates in a transaction list such as the one we started with. But Excel provides the option to group data items together by day, week, month, year, etc. Let’s see how this is done. First, let’s remove the “Payment Method” column from the Column Labels box (simply drag it back up to the field list), and replace it with the “Date Booked” column: As you can see, this makes our PivotTable instantly useless, giving us one column for each date that a transaction occurred on – a very wide table! To fix this, right-click on any date and select Group… from the context-menu: The grouping box appears. We select Months and click OK: Voila! A much more useful table: (Incidentally, this table is virtually identical to the one shown at the beginning of this article – the original sales summary that was created manually.) Another cool thing to be aware of is that you can have more than one set of row headings (or column headings): …which looks like this…. You can do a similar thing with column headings (or even report filters). Keeping things simple again, let’s see how to plot averaged values, rather than summed values. First, click on “Sum of Amount”, and select Value Field Settings… from the context-menu that appears: In the Summarize value field by list in the Value Field Settings box, select Average: While we’re here, let’s change the Custom Name, from “Average of Amount” to something a little more concise. Type in something like “Avg”: Click OK, and see what it looks like. Notice that all the values change from summed totals to averages, and the table title (top-left cell) has changed to “Avg”: If we like, we can even have sums, averages and counts (counts = how many sales there were) all on the same PivotTable! Here are the steps to get something like that in place (starting from a blank PivotTable): Drag “Salesperson” into the Column Labels Drag “Amount” field down into the Values box three times For the first “Amount” field, change its custom name to “Total” and it’s number format to Accounting (0 decimal places) For the second “Amount” field, change its custom name to “Average”, its function to Average and it’s number format to Accounting (0 decimal places) For the third “Amount” field, change its name to “Count” and its function to Count Drag the automatically created field from Column Labels to Row Labels Here’s what we end up with: Total, average and count on the same PivotTable! Conclusion There are many, many more features and options for PivotTables created by Microsoft Excel – far too many to list in an article like this. To fully cover the potential of PivotTables, a small book (or a large website) would be required. Brave and/or geeky readers can explore PivotTables further quite easily: Simply right-click on just about everything, and see what options become available to you. There are also the two ribbon-tabs: PivotTable Tools/Options and Design. It doesn’t matter if you make a mistake – it’s easy to delete the PivotTable and start again – a possibility old DOS users of Lotus 1-2-3 never had. We’ve included an Excel that should work with most versions of Excel, so you can download to practice your PivotTable skills. Download Our Practice Excel File Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Magnify Selected Cells In Excel 2007Share Access Data with Excel in Office 2010Make Excel 2007 Print Gridlines In Workbook FileMake Excel 2007 Always Save in Excel 2003 FormatConvert Older Excel Documents to Excel 2007 Format TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Ben & Jerry’s Free Cone Day, 3/23/10 New Stinger from McAfee Helps Remove ‘FakeAlert’ Threats Google Apps Marketplace: Tools & Services For Google Apps Users Get News Quick and Precise With Newser Scan for Viruses in Ubuntu using ClamAV Replace Your Windows Task Manager With System Explorer

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On automating a split-mirror ASM backup with EMC TimeFinder ...

- by [email protected]

Normal 0 21 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 st1\:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) } /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} Hi clerks, Offloading the backup operation to another host using disk cloning could really improve the performance on highly busy databases ( 24x7, zero downtime and all this stuff ...) There are well know white papers on this subject, ASM included, but today Im showing you a nice way to automate the procedure using shell scripting with EMC TimeFinder technologies: Assumptions: *********** ASM diskgroups name: +data_${db_name} : asm data diskgroup +fra_${db_name} : asm fra diskgroup EMC Time Finder sync groups name: rac_${DB_NAME}_data_tf : data group rac_${DB_NAME}_fra_tf: fra group There are two scripts, one located on the production box ( bck_database.sh ) and the other one on the backup server node ( bck_database_mirror.sh ) The second one is remotly executed from the production host There are a bunch of variables along the code with selfexplanatory names I guess, anyway let me know if you want some help #!/bin/ksh ### ### Copyright (c) 1988, 2010, Oracle Corporation. All Rights Reserved. ### ### NAME ### bck_database.sh ### ### DESCRIPTION ### Database backup on third mirror ### ### RETURNS ### ### NOTES ### ### MODIFIED (DD/MM/YY) ### Oracle 28/01/10 - Creacion ### V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` V_FICH_LOG=`dirname $0`/trace_dir_location/`basename $0`.${V_DATE}.log exec 4>&1 tee ${V_FICH_LOG} >&4 |& exec 1>&p 2>&1 ADMIN_DIR=`dirname $0` . ${ADMIN_DIR}/setenv_instance.sh -- This script should set the instance vars like Oracle Home, Sid, db_name ... if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when setting the environment." exit 1 fi echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Executing database backup: ${DB_NAME}" echo "####################################################################" V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Sync asm data diskgroups ..." echo "####################################################################" sudo symmir -g rac_${DB_NAME}_data_tf establish -noprompt if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when sync asm data diskgroups" exit 2 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Verifying asm data disks ..." echo "####################################################################" sudo symmir -g rac_${DB_NAME}_data_tf -i 30 verify if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when verifying asm data diskgroups" exit 3 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Sync asm fra diskgroups ..." echo "####################################################################" sudo symmir -g rac_${DB_NAME}_fra_tf establish -noprompt if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when sync asm fra diskgroups" exit 4 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Verifying asm fra disks ..." echo "####################################################################" sudo symmir -g rac_${DB_NAME}_fra_tf -i 30 verify if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when verifying asm fra diskgroups" exit 5 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "ASM sync sucessfully completed!" echo "####################################################################" V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Updating status ${DB_NAME} to BEGIN BACKUP ..." echo "####################################################################" sqlplus -s /nolog <<-! whenever sqlerror exit 1 connect / as sysdba whenever sqlerror exit alter system archive log current; alter database ${DB_NAME} begin backup; ! if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when updating database status to BEGIN backup" exit 6 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Splitting asm data disks....." echo "####################################################################" sudo symmir -g rac_${DB_NAME}_data_tf split -noprompt if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when splitting asm data disks" exit 7 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Updating status ${DB_NAME} to END BACKUP ..." echo "####################################################################" sqlplus -s /nolog <<-! whenever sqlerror exit 1 connect / as sysdba whenever sqlerror exit alter database ${DB_NAME} end backup; alter system archive log current; ! if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when updating database status to END backup" exit 8 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Generating controlfile copies...." echo "####################################################################" rman<<-! connect target / run { allocate channel ch1 type DISK; copy current controlfile to '+FRA_${DB_NAME}/${DB_NAME}/CONTROLFILE/control_mount.ctl'; copy current controlfile to '+FRA_${DB_NAME}/${DB_NAME}/CONTROLFILE/control_backup.ctl'; } ! if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error generating controlfile copies" exit 9 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Resync RMAN catalog ....." echo "####################################################################" rman<<-! connect target / connect catalog ${V_RMAN_USR}/${V_RMAN_PWD}@${V_DB_CATALOG} resync catalog; ! if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when resyncing RMAN catalog" exit 10 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Splitting asm fra disks....." echo "####################################################################" sudo symmir -g rac_${DB_NAME}_fra_tf split -noprompt if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when splitting asm fra disks" exit 11 fi echo "WARNING!: Calling bck_database_mirror.sh host ${NODE_BCK_SERVER}..." ssh ${NODO_BCK_SERVER} ${ADMIN_DIR_BCK}/bck_database_mirror.sh if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error, when remote executing the backup " exit 12 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Cleaning the archived redo logs already copied to tape ..." echo "####################################################################" rman<<-! connect target / connect catalog ${V_RMAN_USR}/${V_RMAN_PWD}@${V_DB_CATALOG} run { resync catalog; delete noprompt archivelog all backed up 1 times to device type sbt; } ! if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when cleaning the archived redo logs" exit 13 fi echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Backup sucessfully executed!!" echo "####################################################################" exit 0 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------** BACKUP SERVER NODE ** ----------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ #!/bin/ksh ### ### Copyright (c) 1988, 2010, Oracle Corporation. All Rights Reserved. ### ### ### NAME ### bck_database_mirror.sh ### ### DESCRIPTION ### Backup @ backup server ### ### RETURNS ### ### NOTES ### ### MODIFIED (DD/MM/YY) ### Oracle 28/01/10 - Creacion V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Starting ASM instance ..." echo "####################################################################" ${V_ADMIN_DIR}/start_asm.sh -- This script is supposed to start the ASM instance in the backup server if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when tying to start ASM instance." exit 1 fi . ${V_ADMIN_DIR}/setenv_asm.sh -- This script is supposed to set the env. variables of the ASM instance if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when setting the ASM environment" exit 1 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "The asm diskgroups/disks dettected are the following ..." echo "####################################################################" sqlplus /nolog <<-! whenever sqlerror exit 1 connect / as sysdba whenever sqlerror exit SET LINES 200 COL PATH FORMAT A25 SELECT DISK.MOUNT_STATUS, DISK.PATH, DISK.NAME, DISK_GROUP.NAME, DISK_GROUP.TOTAL_MB FROM V\$ASM_DISK DISK, V\$ASM_DISKGROUP DISK_GROUP WHERE DISK.GROUP_NUMBER=DISK_GROUP.GROUP_NUMBER; ! V_ADMIN_DIR=`dirname $0` . ${V_ADMIN_DIR}/setenv_instance.sh -- This script is supposed to set the env. variables of the database instance if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error when setting the database instance environment" exit 1 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Starting ${DB_NAME} in MOUNT mode..." echo "####################################################################" ${V_ADMIN_DIR}/start_instance_mount.sh -- This script is supposed to do a startup mount if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error starting ${DB_NAME} in MOUNT mode" exit 1 fi V_DATE=`/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` echo "${V_DATE} ####################################################" echo "Executing RMAN backup..." echo "####################################################################" rman<<-! connect target / connect catalog ${V_RMAN_USR}/${V_RMAN_PWD}@${V_DB_CATALOG} run { allocate channel ch1 type 'SBT_TAPE' parms'ENV=(TDPO_OPTFILE=/opt/tivoli/tsm/client/oracle/bin64/tdpo.opt)'; -- TDPO Media Library crosscheck archivelog all; backup tag BCK_CONTROLFILE_ST_${DB_NAME} format 'ctl_%d_%s__%p_%t' controlfilecopy '+FRA_${DB_NAME}/${DB_NAME}/CONTROLFILE/control_backup.ctl'; backup tag BCK_DATAFILE_ST_${DB_NAME} full format 'db_%d_%s_%p_%t'database; backup tag BCK_ARCHLOG_ST_${DB_NAME} format 'al_%d_%s_%p_%t' archivelog all; release channel ch1; } ! if [ $? -ne 0 ] then echo "Error executing the RMAN backup" exit 1 fi ${V_ADMIN_DIR}/stop_instance_immediate.sh -- This script is supposed to do a shutdown immediate of the database instance ${ADMIN_DIR}/stop_asm_immediate.sh -- This script is supposed to do a shutdown immediate of the ASM instance exit 0 fi Hope it helps someone! --L

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Using VLOOKUP in Excel

- by Mark Virtue

VLOOKUP is one of Excel’s most useful functions, and it’s also one of the least understood. In this article, we demystify VLOOKUP by way of a real-life example. We’ll create a usable Invoice Template for a fictitious company. So what is VLOOKUP? Well, of course it’s an Excel function. This article will assume that the reader already has a passing understanding of Excel functions, and can use basic functions such as SUM, AVERAGE, and TODAY. In its most common usage, VLOOKUP is a database function, meaning that it works with database tables – or more simply, lists of things in an Excel worksheet. What sort of things? Well, any sort of thing. You may have a worksheet that contains a list of employees, or products, or customers, or CDs in your CD collection, or stars in the night sky. It doesn’t really matter. Here’s an example of a list, or database. In this case it’s a list of products that our fictitious company sells: Usually lists like this have some sort of unique identifier for each item in the list. In this case, the unique identifier is in the “Item Code” column. Note: For the VLOOKUP function to work with a database/list, that list must have a column containing the unique identifier (or “key”, or “ID”), and that column must be the first column in the table. Our sample database above satisfies this criterion. The hardest part of using VLOOKUP is understanding exactly what it’s for. So let’s see if we can get that clear first: VLOOKUP retrieves information from a database/list based on a supplied instance of the unique identifier. Put another way, if you put the VLOOKUP function into a cell and pass it one of the unique identifiers from your database, it will return you one of the pieces of information associated with that unique identifier. In the example above, you would pass VLOOKUP an item code, and it would return to you either the corresponding item’s description, its price, or its availability (its “In stock” quantity). Which of these pieces of information will it pass you back? Well, you get to decide this when you’re creating the formula. If all you need is one piece of information from the database, it would be a lot of trouble to go to to construct a formula with a VLOOKUP function in it. Typically you would use this sort of functionality in a reusable spreadsheet, such as a template. Each time someone enters a valid item code, the system would retrieve all the necessary information about the corresponding item. Let’s create an example of this: An Invoice Template that we can reuse over and over in our fictitious company. First we start Excel… …and we create ourselves a blank invoice: This is how it’s going to work: The person using the invoice template will fill in a series of item codes in column “A”, and the system will retrieve each item’s description and price, which will be used to calculate the line total for each item (assuming we enter a valid quantity). For the purposes of keeping this example simple, we will locate the product database on a separate sheet in the same workbook: In reality, it’s more likely that the product database would be located in a separate workbook. It makes little difference to the VLOOKUP function, which doesn’t really care if the database is located on the same sheet, a different sheet, or a completely different workbook. In order to test the VLOOKUP formula we’re about to write, we first enter a valid item code into cell A11: Next, we move the active cell to the cell in which we want information retrieved from the database by VLOOKUP to be stored. Interestingly, this is the step that most people get wrong. To explain further: We are about to create a VLOOKUP formula that will retrieve the description that corresponds to the item code in cell A11. Where do we want this description put when we get it? In cell B11, of course. So that’s where we write the VLOOKUP formula – in cell B11. Select cell B11: We need to locate the list of all available functions that Excel has to offer, so that we can choose VLOOKUP and get some assistance in completing the formula. This is found by first clicking the Formulas tab, and then clicking Insert Function: A box appears that allows us to select any of the functions available in Excel. To find the one we’re looking for, we could type a search term like “lookup” (because the function we’re interested in is a lookup function). The system would return us a list of all lookup-related functions in Excel. VLOOKUP is the second one in the list. Select it an click OK… The Function Arguments box appears, prompting us for all the arguments (or parameters) needed in order to complete the VLOOKUP function. You can think of this box as the function is asking us the following questions: What unique identifier are you looking up in the database? Where is the database? Which piece of information from the database, associated with the unique identifier, do you wish to have retrieved for you? The first three arguments are shown in bold, indicating that they are mandatory arguments (the VLOOKUP function is incomplete without them and will not return a valid value). The fourth argument is not bold, meaning that it’s optional: We will complete the arguments in order, top to bottom. The first argument we need to complete is the Lookup_value argument. The function needs us to tell it where to find the unique identifier (the item code in this case) that it should be retuning the description of. We must select the item code we entered earlier (in A11). Click on the selector icon to the right of the first argument: Then click once on the cell containing the item code (A11), and press Enter: The value of “A11” is inserted into the first argument. Now we need to enter a value for the Table_array argument. In other words, we need to tell VLOOKUP where to find the database/list. Click on the selector icon next to the second argument: Now locate the database/list and select the entire list – not including the header line. The database is located on a separate worksheet, so we first click on that worksheet tab: Next we select the entire database, not including the header line: …and press Enter. The range of cells that represents the database (in this case “’Product Database’!A2:D7”) is entered automatically for us into the second argument. Now we need to enter the third argument, Col_index_num. We use this argument to specify to VLOOKUP which piece of information from the database, associate with our item code in A11, we wish to have returned to us. In this particular example, we wish to have the item’s description returned to us. If you look on the database worksheet, you’ll notice that the “Description” column is the second column in the database. This means that we must enter a value of “2” into the Col_index_num box: It is important to note that that we are not entering a “2” here because the “Description” column is in the B column on that worksheet. If the database happened to start in column K of the worksheet, we would still enter a “2” in this field. Finally, we need to decide whether to enter a value into the final VLOOKUP argument, Range_lookup. This argument requires either a true or false value, or it should be left blank. When using VLOOKUP with databases (as is true 90% of the time), then the way to decide what to put in this argument can be thought of as follows: If the first column of the database (the column that contains the unique identifiers) is sorted alphabetically/numerically in ascending order, then it’s possible to enter a value of true into this argument, or leave it blank. If the first column of the database is not sorted, or it’s sorted in descending order, then you must enter a value of false into this argument As the first column of our database is not sorted, we enter false into this argument: That’s it! We’ve entered all the information required for VLOOKUP to return the value we need. Click the OK button and notice that the description corresponding to item code “R99245” has been correctly entered into cell B11: The formula that was created for us looks like this: If we enter a different item code into cell A11, we will begin to see the power of the VLOOKUP function: The description cell changes to match the new item code: We can perform a similar set of steps to get the item’s price returned into cell E11. Note that the new formula must be created in cell E11. The result will look like this: …and the formula will look like this: Note that the only difference between the two formulae is the third argument (Col_index_num) has changed from a “2” to a “3” (because we want data retrieved from the 3rd column in the database). If we decided to buy 2 of these items, we would enter a “2” into cell D11. We would then enter a simple formula into cell F11 to get the line total: =D11*E11 …which looks like this… Completing the Invoice Template We’ve learned a lot about VLOOKUP so far. In fact, we’ve learned all we’re going to learn in this article. It’s important to note that VLOOKUP can be used in other circumstances besides databases. This is less common, and may be covered in future How-To Geek articles. Our invoice template is not yet complete. In order to complete it, we would do the following: We would remove the sample item code from cell A11 and the “2” from cell D11. This will cause our newly created VLOOKUP formulae to display error messages: We can remedy this by judicious use of Excel’s IF() and ISBLANK() functions. We change our formula from this… =VLOOKUP(A11,’Product Database’!A2:D7,2,FALSE) …to this… =IF(ISBLANK(A11),”",VLOOKUP(A11,’Product Database’!A2:D7,2,FALSE)) We would copy the formulas in cells B11, E11 and F11 down to the remainder of the item rows of the invoice. Note that if we do this, the resulting formulas will no longer correctly refer to the database table. We could fix this by changing the cell references for the database to absolute cell references. Alternatively – and even better – we could create a range name for the entire product database (such as “Products”), and use this range name instead of the cell references. The formula would change from this… =IF(ISBLANK(A11),”",VLOOKUP(A11,’Product Database’!A2:D7,2,FALSE)) …to this… =IF(ISBLANK(A11),”",VLOOKUP(A11,Products,2,FALSE)) …and then copy the formulas down to the rest of the invoice item rows. We would probably “lock” the cells that contain our formulae (or rather unlock the other cells), and then protect the worksheet, in order to ensure that our carefully constructed formulae are not accidentally overwritten when someone comes to fill in the invoice. We would save the file as a template, so that it could be reused by everyone in our company If we were feeling really clever, we would create a database of all our customers in another worksheet, and then use the customer ID entered in cell F5 to automatically fill in the customer’s name and address in cells B6, B7 and B8. If you would like to practice with VLOOKUP, or simply see our resulting Invoice Template, it can be downloaded from here. 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Beware Sneaky Reads with Unique Indexes

- by Paul White NZ

A few days ago, Sandra Mueller (twitter | blog) asked a question using twitter’s #sqlhelp hash tag: “Might SQL Server retrieve (out-of-row) LOB data from a table, even if the column isn’t referenced in the query?” Leaving aside trivial cases (like selecting a computed column that does reference the LOB data), one might be tempted to say that no, SQL Server does not read data you haven’t asked for. In general, that’s quite correct; however there are cases where SQL Server might sneakily retrieve a LOB column… Example Table Here’s a T-SQL script to create that table and populate it with 1,000 rows: CREATE TABLE dbo.LOBtest ( pk INTEGER IDENTITY NOT NULL, some_value INTEGER NULL, lob_data VARCHAR(MAX) NULL, another_column CHAR(5) NULL, CONSTRAINT [PK dbo.LOBtest pk] PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED (pk ASC) ); GO DECLARE @Data VARCHAR(MAX); SET @Data = REPLICATE(CONVERT(VARCHAR(MAX), 'x'), 65540); WITH Numbers (n) AS ( SELECT ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY (SELECT 0)) FROM master.sys.columns C1, master.sys.columns C2 ) INSERT LOBtest WITH (TABLOCKX) ( some_value, lob_data ) SELECT TOP (1000) N.n, @Data FROM Numbers N WHERE N.n <= 1000; Test 1: A Simple Update Let’s run a query to subtract one from every value in the some_value column: UPDATE dbo.LOBtest WITH (TABLOCKX) SET some_value = some_value - 1; As you might expect, modifying this integer column in 1,000 rows doesn’t take very long, or use many resources. The STATITICS IO and TIME output shows a total of 9 logical reads, and 25ms elapsed time. The query plan is also very simple: Looking at the Clustered Index Scan, we can see that SQL Server only retrieves the pk and some_value columns during the scan: The pk column is needed by the Clustered Index Update operator to uniquely identify the row that is being changed. The some_value column is used by the Compute Scalar to calculate the new value. (In case you are wondering what the Top operator is for, it is used to enforce SET ROWCOUNT). Test 2: Simple Update with an Index Now let’s create a nonclustered index keyed on the some_value column, with lob_data as an included column: CREATE NONCLUSTERED INDEX [IX dbo.LOBtest some_value (lob_data)] ON dbo.LOBtest (some_value) INCLUDE ( lob_data ) WITH ( FILLFACTOR = 100, MAXDOP = 1, SORT_IN_TEMPDB = ON ); This is not a useful index for our simple update query; imagine that someone else created it for a different purpose. Let’s run our update query again: UPDATE dbo.LOBtest WITH (TABLOCKX) SET some_value = some_value - 1; We find that it now requires 4,014 logical reads and the elapsed query time has increased to around 100ms. The extra logical reads (4 per row) are an expected consequence of maintaining the nonclustered index. The query plan is very similar to before (click to enlarge): The Clustered Index Update operator picks up the extra work of maintaining the nonclustered index. The new Compute Scalar operators detect whether the value in the some_value column has actually been changed by the update. SQL Server may be able to skip maintaining the nonclustered index if the value hasn’t changed (see my previous post on non-updating updates for details). Our simple query does change the value of some_data in every row, so this optimization doesn’t add any value in this specific case. The output list of columns from the Clustered Index Scan hasn’t changed from the one shown previously: SQL Server still just reads the pk and some_data columns. Cool. Overall then, adding the nonclustered index hasn’t had any startling effects, and the LOB column data still isn’t being read from the table. Let’s see what happens if we make the nonclustered index unique. Test 3: Simple Update with a Unique Index Here’s the script to create a new unique index, and drop the old one: CREATE UNIQUE NONCLUSTERED INDEX [UQ dbo.LOBtest some_value (lob_data)] ON dbo.LOBtest (some_value) INCLUDE ( lob_data ) WITH ( FILLFACTOR = 100, MAXDOP = 1, SORT_IN_TEMPDB = ON ); GO DROP INDEX [IX dbo.LOBtest some_value (lob_data)] ON dbo.LOBtest; Remember that SQL Server only enforces uniqueness on index keys (the some_data column). The lob_data column is simply stored at the leaf-level of the non-clustered index. With that in mind, we might expect this change to make very little difference. Let’s see: UPDATE dbo.LOBtest WITH (TABLOCKX) SET some_value = some_value - 1; Whoa! Now look at the elapsed time and logical reads: Scan count 1, logical reads 2016, physical reads 0, read-ahead reads 0, lob logical reads 36015, lob physical reads 0, lob read-ahead reads 15992. CPU time = 172 ms, elapsed time = 16172 ms. Even with all the data and index pages in memory, the query took over 16 seconds to update just 1,000 rows, performing over 52,000 LOB logical reads (nearly 16,000 of those using read-ahead). Why on earth is SQL Server reading LOB data in a query that only updates a single integer column? The Query Plan The query plan for test 3 looks a bit more complex than before: In fact, the bottom level is exactly the same as we saw with the non-unique index. The top level has heaps of new stuff though, which I’ll come to in a moment. You might be expecting to find that the Clustered Index Scan is now reading the lob_data column (for some reason). After all, we need to explain where all the LOB logical reads are coming from. Sadly, when we look at the properties of the Clustered Index Scan, we see exactly the same as before: SQL Server is still only reading the pk and some_value columns – so what’s doing the LOB reads? Updates that Sneakily Read Data We have to go as far as the Clustered Index Update operator before we see LOB data in the output list: [Expr1020] is a bit flag added by an earlier Compute Scalar. It is set true if the some_value column has not been changed (part of the non-updating updates optimization I mentioned earlier). The Clustered Index Update operator adds two new columns: the lob_data column, and some_value_OLD. The some_value_OLD column, as the name suggests, is the pre-update value of the some_value column. At this point, the clustered index has already been updated with the new value, but we haven’t touched the nonclustered index yet. An interesting observation here is that the Clustered Index Update operator can read a column into the data flow as part of its update operation. SQL Server could have read the LOB data as part of the initial Clustered Index Scan, but that would mean carrying the data through all the operations that occur prior to the Clustered Index Update. The server knows it will have to go back to the clustered index row to update it, so it delays reading the LOB data until then. Sneaky! Why the LOB Data Is Needed This is all very interesting (I hope), but why is SQL Server reading the LOB data? For that matter, why does it need to pass the pre-update value of the some_value column out of the Clustered Index Update? The answer relates to the top row of the query plan for test 3. I’ll reproduce it here for convenience: Notice that this is a wide (per-index) update plan. SQL Server used a narrow (per-row) update plan in test 2, where the Clustered Index Update took care of maintaining the nonclustered index too. I’ll talk more about this difference shortly. The Split/Sort/Collapse combination is an optimization, which aims to make per-index update plans more efficient. It does this by breaking each update into a delete/insert pair, reordering the operations, removing any redundant operations, and finally applying the net effect of all the changes to the nonclustered index. Imagine we had a unique index which currently holds three rows with the values 1, 2, and 3. If we run a query that adds 1 to each row value, we would end up with values 2, 3, and 4. The net effect of all the changes is the same as if we simply deleted the value 1, and added a new value 4. By applying net changes, SQL Server can also avoid false unique-key violations. If we tried to immediately update the value 1 to a 2, it would conflict with the existing value 2 (which would soon be updated to 3 of course) and the query would fail. You might argue that SQL Server could avoid the uniqueness violation by starting with the highest value (3) and working down. That’s fine, but it’s not possible to generalize this logic to work with every possible update query. SQL Server has to use a wide update plan if it sees any risk of false uniqueness violations. It’s worth noting that the logic SQL Server uses to detect whether these violations are possible has definite limits. As a result, you will often receive a wide update plan, even when you can see that no violations are possible. Another benefit of this optimization is that it includes a sort on the index key as part of its work. Processing the index changes in index key order promotes sequential I/O against the nonclustered index. A side-effect of all this is that the net changes might include one or more inserts. In order to insert a new row in the index, SQL Server obviously needs all the columns – the key column and the included LOB column. This is the reason SQL Server reads the LOB data as part of the Clustered Index Update. In addition, the some_value_OLD column is required by the Split operator (it turns updates into delete/insert pairs). In order to generate the correct index key delete operation, it needs the old key value. The irony is that in this case the Split/Sort/Collapse optimization is anything but. Reading all that LOB data is extremely expensive, so it is sad that the current version of SQL Server has no way to avoid it. Finally, for completeness, I should mention that the Filter operator is there to filter out the non-updating updates. Beating the Set-Based Update with a Cursor One situation where SQL Server can see that false unique-key violations aren’t possible is where it can guarantee that only one row is being updated. Armed with this knowledge, we can write a cursor (or the WHILE-loop equivalent) that updates one row at a time, and so avoids reading the LOB data: SET NOCOUNT ON; SET STATISTICS XML, IO, TIME OFF; DECLARE @PK INTEGER, @StartTime DATETIME; SET @StartTime = GETUTCDATE(); DECLARE curUpdate CURSOR LOCAL FORWARD_ONLY KEYSET SCROLL_LOCKS FOR SELECT L.pk FROM LOBtest L ORDER BY L.pk ASC; OPEN curUpdate; WHILE (1 = 1) BEGIN FETCH NEXT FROM curUpdate INTO @PK; IF @@FETCH_STATUS = -1 BREAK; IF @@FETCH_STATUS = -2 CONTINUE; UPDATE dbo.LOBtest SET some_value = some_value - 1 WHERE CURRENT OF curUpdate; END; CLOSE curUpdate; DEALLOCATE curUpdate; SELECT DATEDIFF(MILLISECOND, @StartTime, GETUTCDATE()); That completes the update in 1280 milliseconds (remember test 3 took over 16 seconds!) I used the WHERE CURRENT OF syntax there and a KEYSET cursor, just for the fun of it. One could just as well use a WHERE clause that specified the primary key value instead. Clustered Indexes A clustered index is the ultimate index with included columns: all non-key columns are included columns in a clustered index. Let’s re-create the test table and data with an updatable primary key, and without any non-clustered indexes: IF OBJECT_ID(N'dbo.LOBtest', N'U') IS NOT NULL DROP TABLE dbo.LOBtest; GO CREATE TABLE dbo.LOBtest ( pk INTEGER NOT NULL, some_value INTEGER NULL, lob_data VARCHAR(MAX) NULL, another_column CHAR(5) NULL, CONSTRAINT [PK dbo.LOBtest pk] PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED (pk ASC) ); GO DECLARE @Data VARCHAR(MAX); SET @Data = REPLICATE(CONVERT(VARCHAR(MAX), 'x'), 65540); WITH Numbers (n) AS ( SELECT ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY (SELECT 0)) FROM master.sys.columns C1, master.sys.columns C2 ) INSERT LOBtest WITH (TABLOCKX) ( pk, some_value, lob_data ) SELECT TOP (1000) N.n, N.n, @Data FROM Numbers N WHERE N.n <= 1000; Now here’s a query to modify the cluster keys: UPDATE dbo.LOBtest SET pk = pk + 1; The query plan is: As you can see, the Split/Sort/Collapse optimization is present, and we also gain an Eager Table Spool, for Halloween protection. In addition, SQL Server now has no choice but to read the LOB data in the Clustered Index Scan: The performance is not great, as you might expect (even though there is no non-clustered index to maintain): Table 'LOBtest'. Scan count 1, logical reads 2011, physical reads 0, read-ahead reads 0, lob logical reads 36015, lob physical reads 0, lob read-ahead reads 15992. Table 'Worktable'. Scan count 1, logical reads 2040, physical reads 0, read-ahead reads 0, lob logical reads 34000, lob physical reads 0, lob read-ahead reads 8000. SQL Server Execution Times: CPU time = 483 ms, elapsed time = 17884 ms. Notice how the LOB data is read twice: once from the Clustered Index Scan, and again from the work table in tempdb used by the Eager Spool. If you try the same test with a non-unique clustered index (rather than a primary key), you’ll get a much more efficient plan that just passes the cluster key (including uniqueifier) around (no LOB data or other non-key columns): A unique non-clustered index (on a heap) works well too: Both those queries complete in a few tens of milliseconds, with no LOB reads, and just a few thousand logical reads. (In fact the heap is rather more efficient). There are lots more fun combinations to try that I don’t have space for here. Final Thoughts The behaviour shown in this post is not limited to LOB data by any means. If the conditions are met, any unique index that has included columns can produce similar behaviour – something to bear in mind when adding large INCLUDE columns to achieve covering queries, perhaps. Paul White Email: [email protected] Twitter: @PaulWhiteNZ

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Windows Azure Evolution – Caching (Preview)

- by Shaun

Caching is a popular topic when we are building a high performance and high scalable system not only on top of the cloud platform but the on-premise environment as well. On March 2011 the Windows Azure AppFabric Caching had been production launched. It provides an in-memory, distributed caching service over the cloud. And now, in this June 2012 update, the cache team announce a grand new caching solution on Windows Azure, which is called Windows Azure Caching (Preview). And the original Windows Azure AppFabric Caching was renamed to Windows Azure Shared Caching. What’s Caching (Preview) If you had been using the Shared Caching you should know that it is constructed by a bunch of cache servers. And when you want to use you should firstly create a cache account from the developer portal and specify the size you want to use, which means how much memory you can use to store your data that wanted to be cached. Then you can add, get and remove them through your code through the cache URL. The Shared Caching is a multi-tenancy system which host all cached items across all users. So you don’t know which server your data was located. This caching mode works well and can take most of the cases. But it has some problems. The first one is the performance. Since the Shared Caching is a multi-tenancy system, which means all cache operations should go through the Shared Caching gateway and then routed to the server which have the data your are looking for. Even though there are some caches in the Shared Caching system it also takes time from your cloud services to the cache service. Secondary, the Shared Caching service works as a block box to the developer. The only thing we know is my cache endpoint, and that’s all. Someone may satisfied since they don’t want to care about anything underlying. But if you need to know more and want more control that’s impossible in the Shared Caching. The last problem would be the price and cost-efficiency. You pay the bill based on how much cache you requested per month. But when we host a web role or worker role, it seldom consumes all of the memory and CPU in the virtual machine (service instance). If using Shared Caching we have to pay for the cache service while waste of some of our memory and CPU locally. Since the issues above Microsoft offered a new caching mode over to us, which is the Caching (Preview). Instead of having a separated cache service, the Caching (Preview) leverage the memory and CPU in our cloud services (web role and worker role) as the cache clusters. Hence the Caching (Preview) runs on the virtual machines which hosted or near our cloud applications. Without any gateway and routing, since it located in the same data center and same racks, it provides really high performance than the Shared Caching. The Caching (Preview) works side-by-side to our application, initialized and worked as a Windows Service running in the virtual machines invoked by the startup tasks from our roles, we could get more information and control to them. And since the Caching (Preview) utilizes the memory and CPU from our existing cloud services, so it’s free. What we need to pay is the original computing price. And the resource on each machines could be used more efficiently. Enable Caching (Preview) It’s very simple to enable the Caching (Preview) in a cloud service. Let’s create a new windows azure cloud project from Visual Studio and added an ASP.NET Web Role. Then open the role setting and select the Caching page. This is where we enable and configure the Caching (Preview) on a role. To enable the Caching (Preview) just open the “Enable Caching (Preview Release)” check box. And then we need to specify which mode of the caching clusters we want to use. There are two kinds of caching mode, co-located and dedicate. The co-located mode means we use the memory in the instances we run our cloud services (web role or worker role). By using this mode we must specify how many percentage of the memory will be used as the cache. The default value is 30%. So make sure it will not affect the role business execution. The dedicate mode will use all memory in the virtual machine as the cache. In fact it will reserve some for operation system, azure hosting etc.. But it will try to use as much as the available memory to be the cache. As you can see, the Caching (Preview) was defined based on roles, which means all instances of this role will apply the same setting and play as a whole cache pool, and you can consume it by specifying the name of the role, which I will demonstrate later. And in a windows azure project we can have more than one role have the Caching (Preview) enabled. Then we will have more caches. For example, let’s say I have a web role and worker role. The web role I specified 30% co-located caching and the worker role I specified dedicated caching. If I have 3 instances of my web role and 2 instances of my worker role, then I will have two caches. As the figure above, cache 1 was contributed by three web role instances while cache 2 was contributed by 2 worker role instances. Then we can add items into cache 1 and retrieve it from web role code and worker role code. But the items stored in cache 1 cannot be retrieved from cache 2 since they are isolated. Back to our Visual Studio we specify 30% of co-located cache and use the local storage emulator to store the cache cluster runtime status. Then at the bottom we can specify the named caches. Now we just use the default one. Now we had enabled the Caching (Preview) in our web role settings. Next, let’s have a look on how to consume our cache. Consume Caching (Preview) The Caching (Preview) can only be consumed by the roles in the same cloud services. As I mentioned earlier, a cache contributed by web role can be connected from a worker role if they are in the same cloud service. But you cannot consume a Caching (Preview) from other cloud services. This is different from the Shared Caching. The Shared Caching is opened to all services if it has the connection URL and authentication token. To consume the Caching (Preview) we need to add some references into our project as well as some configuration in the Web.config. NuGet makes our life easy. Right click on our web role project and select “Manage NuGet packages”, and then search the package named “WindowsAzure.Caching”. In the package list install the “Windows Azure Caching Preview”. It will download all necessary references from the NuGet repository and update our Web.config as well. Open the Web.config of our web role and find the “dataCacheClients” node. Under this node we can specify the cache clients we are going to use. For each cache client it will use the role name to identity and find the cache. Since we only have this web role with the Caching (Preview) enabled so I pasted the current role name in the configuration. Then, in the default page I will add some code to show how to use the cache. I will have a textbox on the page where user can input his or her name, then press a button to generate the email address for him/her. And in backend code I will check if this name had been added in cache. If yes I will return the email back immediately. Otherwise, I will sleep the tread for 2 seconds to simulate the latency, then add it into cache and return back to the page. 1: protected void btnGenerate_Click(object sender, EventArgs e) 2: { 3: // check if name is specified 4: var name = txtName.Text; 5: if (string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(name)) 6: { 7: lblResult.Text = "Error. Please specify name."; 8: return; 9: } 10: 11: bool cached; 12: var sw = new Stopwatch(); 13: sw.Start(); 14: 15: // create the cache factory and cache 16: var factory = new DataCacheFactory(); 17: var cache = factory.GetDefaultCache(); 18: 19: // check if the name specified is in cache 20: var email = cache.Get(name) as string; 21: if (email != null) 22: { 23: cached = true; 24: sw.Stop(); 25: } 26: else 27: { 28: cached = false; 29: // simulate the letancy 30: Thread.Sleep(2000); 31: email = string.Format("{0}@igt.com", name); 32: // add to cache 33: cache.Add(name, email); 34: } 35: 36: sw.Stop(); 37: lblResult.Text = string.Format( 38: "Cached = {0}. Duration: {1}s. {2} => {3}", 39: cached, sw.Elapsed.TotalSeconds.ToString("0.00"), name, email); 40: } The Caching (Preview) can be used on the local emulator so we just F5. The first time I entered my name it will take about 2 seconds to get the email back to me since it was not in the cache. But if we re-enter my name it will be back at once from the cache. Since the Caching (Preview) is distributed across all instances of the role, so we can scaling-out it by scaling-out our web role. Just use 2 instances and tweak some code to show the current instance ID in the page, and have another try. Then we can see the cache can be retrieved even though it was added by another instance. Consume Caching (Preview) Across Roles As I mentioned, the Caching (Preview) can be consumed by all other roles within the same cloud service. For example, let’s add another web role in our cloud solution and add the same code in its default page. In the Web.config we add the cache client to one enabled in the last role, by specifying its role name here. Then we start the solution locally and go to web role 1, specify the name and let it generate the email to us. Since there’s no cache for this name so it will take about 2 seconds but will save the email into cache. And then we go to web role 2 and specify the same name. Then you can see it retrieve the email saved by the web role 1 and returned back very quickly. Finally then we can upload our application to Windows Azure and test again. Make sure you had changed the cache cluster status storage account to the real azure account. More Awesome Features As a in-memory distributed caching solution, the Caching (Preview) has some fancy features I would like to highlight here. The first one is the high availability support. This is the first time I have heard that a distributed cache support high availability. In the distributed cache world if a cache cluster was failed, the data it stored will be lost. This behavior was introduced by Memcached and is followed by almost all distributed cache productions. But Caching (Preview) provides high availability, which means you can specify if the named cache will be backup automatically. If yes then the data belongs to this named cache will be replicated on another role instance of this role. Then if one of the instance was failed the data can be retrieved from its backup instance. To enable the backup just open the Caching page in Visual Studio. In the named cache you want to enable backup, change the Backup Copies value from 0 to 1. The value of Backup Copies only for 0 and 1. “0” means no backup and no high availability while “1” means enabled high availability with backup the data into another instance. But by using the high availability feature there are something we need to make sure. Firstly the high availability does NOT means the data in cache will never be lost for any kind of failure. For example, if we have a role with cache enabled that has 10 instances, and 9 of them was failed, then most of the cached data will be lost since the primary and backup instance may failed together. But normally is will not be happened since MS guarantees that it will use the instance in the different fault domain for backup cache. Another one is that, enabling the backup means you store two copies of your data. For example if you think 100MB memory is OK for cache, but you need at least 200MB if you enabled backup. Besides the high availability, the Caching (Preview) support more features introduced in Windows Server AppFabric Caching than the Windows Azure Shared Caching. It supports local cache with notification. It also support absolute and slide window expiration types as well. And the Caching (Preview) also support the Memcached protocol as well. This means if you have an application based on Memcached, you can use Caching (Preview) without any code changes. What you need to do is to change the configuration of how you connect to the cache. Similar as the Windows Azure Shared Caching, MS also offers the out-of-box ASP.NET session provider and output cache provide on top of the Caching (Preview). Summary Caching is very important component when we building a cloud-based application. In the June 2012 update MS provides a new cache solution named Caching (Preview). Different from the existing Windows Azure Shared Caching, Caching (Preview) runs the cache cluster within the role instances we have deployed to the cloud. It gives more control, more performance and more cost-effect. So now we have two caching solutions in Windows Azure, the Shared Caching and Caching (Preview). If you need a central cache service which can be used by many cloud services and web sites, then you have to use the Shared Caching. But if you only need a fast, near distributed cache, then you’d better use Caching (Preview). 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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On checking kernel parms HP-UX & Oracle 10.2

- by [email protected]

Hi,Just did this little script for a customer wanting to investigate if the kernel parameters of their HP-UX machines fits or not the Oracle 10.2 specifications ( looks like someone checked the "User Verified" at database installation time on some prerequisites)Just want to share ( its in Spanish)Hope it helps!--L Normal 0 21 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} ### ### check_kernel_parms.sh ### ### ### ### NAME ### check_kernel_parms.sh ### ### DESCRIPTION ### Comprueba los parametros de kernel ### ### NOTES ### Valido para versiones de SO HP-UX y Oracle 10.2 ### ### ### MODIFIED (MM/DD/YY) ### lvelasco 05/20/10 - Creacion V_DATE=`/usr/bin/date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S` if [ "${1}" != 'sin_traza' ]; then V_FICHERO_LOG=`dirname $0`/`basename $0`.${V_DATE}.log exec 4>&1 tee ${V_FICHERO_LOG} >&4 |& exec 1>&p 2>&1 fi echo "${V_DATE}- check_params.sh *******************************************" echo "Comenzado ejecucion de chequeo de parametros de kernel en maquina `hostname`" echo "****************************************************************************" UX_VERS=`uname -a | awk '{print $3}'` KCTUNE=/usr/sbin/kctune MEM_TOTAL_MB=`./check_mem` <-- This should return the physical mem of the machine on bytes MEM_TOTAL=$((MEM_TOTAL_MB*1024)) NPROC=$(${KCTUNE} | grep nproc | grep -v '(nproc' | grep -v *nproc | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${NPROC} -lt 4096 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro nproc con valor actual ${NPROC} debe tener una valor superior a 4096" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro nproc con valor actual ${NPROC} debe tener una valor superior a 4096" fi KSI_ALLOC_MAX_T=$(${KCTUNE} | grep ksi_alloc | awk '{print $2}') KSI_ALLOC_MAX=$((NPROC*8)) if [ ${KSI_ALLOC_MAX_T} -lt ${KSI_ALLOC_MAX} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro ksi_alloc_max con valor actual ${KSI_ALLOC_MAX_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${KSI_ALLOC_MAX}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro ksi_alloc_max con valor actual ${KSI_ALLOC_MAX_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${KSI_ALLOC_MAX}" fi EXECUTABLE_STACK=$(${KCTUNE} | grep executable_stack | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${EXECUTABLE_STACK} -ne 0 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro executable_stack con valor actual ${EXECUTABLE_STACK} debe tener una valor igual a 0" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro executable_stack con valor actual ${EXECUTABLE_STACK} debe tener una valor igual a 0" fi MAX_THREAD_PROC=$(${KCTUNE} | grep max_thread_proc | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${MAX_THREAD_PROC} -lt 1024 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro max_thread_proc con valor actual ${MAX_THREAD_PROC} debe tener una valor superior a 1024" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro max_thread_proc con valor actual ${MAX_THREAD_PROC} debe tener una valor superior a 1024" fi MAXDSIZ=$(${KCTUNE} | grep 'maxdsiz ' | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${MAXDSIZ} -lt 1073741824 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro maxdsiz con valor actual ${MAXDSIZ} debe tener una valor superior a 1073741824" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro maxdsiz con valor actual ${MAXDSIZ} debe tener una valor superior a 1073741824" fi MAXDSIZ_64BIT=$(${KCTUNE} | grep maxdsiz_64bit | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${MAXDSIZ} -lt 2147483648 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro maxdsiz_64bit con valor actual ${MAXDSIZ_64BIT} debe tener una valor superior a 2147483648" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro maxdsiz_64bit con valor actual ${MAXDSIZ_64BIT} debe tener una valor superior a 2147483648" fi MAXSSIZ=$(${KCTUNE} | grep 'maxssiz ' | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${MAXSSIZ} -lt 134217728 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro maxssiz con valor actual ${MAXSSIZ} debe tener una valor superior a 134217728" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro maxssiz con valor actual ${MAXSSIZ} debe tener una valor superior a 134217728" fi MAXSSIZ_64BIT=$(${KCTUNE} | grep maxssiz_64bit | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${MAXSSIZ} -lt 1073741824 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro maxssiz_64bit con valor actual ${MAXSSIZ} debe tener una valor superior a 1073741824" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro maxssiz_64bit con valor actual ${MAXSSIZ} debe tener una valor superior a 1073741824" fi MAXUPRC_T=$(${KCTUNE} | grep maxuprc | awk '{print $2}') MAXUPRC=$(((NPROC*9)/10)) if [ ${MAXUPRC_T} -lt ${MAXUPRC} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro maxuprc con valor actual ${MAXUPRC_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${MAXUPRC}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro maxuprc con valor actual ${MAXUPRC_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${MAXUPRC}" fi MSGMNI=$(${KCTUNE} | grep msgmni | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${MSGMNI} -lt ${NPROC} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro msgni con valor actual ${MSGMNI} debe tener una valor superior a ${NPROC}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro msgni con valor actual ${MSGMNI} debe tener una valor superior a ${NPROC}" fi if [ ${UX_VERS} = "B.11.23" ] then MSGSEG=$(${KCTUNE} | grep msgseg | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${MSGSEG} -lt 32767 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro msgseg con valor actual ${MSGSEG} debe tener una valor superior a 32767" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro msgseg con valor actual ${MSGSEG} debe tener una valor superior a 32767" fi fi MSGTQL=$(${KCTUNE} | grep msgtql | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${MSGTQL} -lt ${NPROC} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro msgtql con valor actual ${MSGTQL} debe tener una valor superior a ${NPROC}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro msgtql con valor actual ${MSGTQL} debe tener una valor superior a ${NPROC}" fi if [ ${UX_VERS} = "B.11.23" ] then NFILE_T=$(${KCTUNE} | grep nfile | awk '{print $2}') NFILE=$((15*NPROC+2048)) if [ ${NFILE_T} -lt ${NFILE} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro nfile con valor actual ${NFILE_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${NFILE}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro nfile con valor actual ${NFILE_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${NFILE}" fi fi NFLOCKS=$(${KCTUNE} | grep nflocks | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${NFLOCKS} -lt ${NPROC} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro nflocks con valor actual ${NFLOCKS} debe tener una valor superior a ${NPROC}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro nflocks con valor actual ${NFLOCKS} debe tener una valor superior a ${NPROC}" fi NINODE_T=$(${KCTUNE} | grep ninode | grep -v vx | awk '{print $2}') NINODE=$((8*NPROC+2048)) if [ ${NINODE_T} -lt ${NINODE} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro ninode con valor actual ${NINODE_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${NINODE}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro ninode con valor actual ${NINODE_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${NINODE}" fi NCSIZE_T=$(${KCTUNE} | grep ncsize | awk '{print $2}') NCSIZE=$((NINODE+1024)) if [ ${NCSIZE_T} -lt ${NCSIZE} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro ncsize con valor actual ${NCSIZE_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${NCSIZE}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro ncsize con valor actual ${NCSIZE_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${NCSIZE}" fi if [ ${UX_VERS} = "B.11.23" ] then MSGMAP_T=$(${KCTUNE} | grep msgmap | awk '{print $2}') MSGMAP=$((MSGTQL+2)) if [ ${MSGMAP_T} -lt ${MSGMAP} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro msgmap con valor actual ${MSGMAP_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${MSGMAP}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro msgmap con valor actual ${MSGMAP_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${MSGMAP}" fi fi NKTHREAD_T=$(${KCTUNE} | grep nkthread | awk '{print $2}') NKTHREAD=$((((NPROC*7)/4)+16)) if [ ${NKTHREAD_T} -lt ${NKTHREAD} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro nkthread con valor actual ${NKTHREAD_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${NKTHREAD}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro nkthread con valor actual ${NKTHREAD_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${NKTHREAD}" fi SEMMNI=$(${KCTUNE} | grep semmni | grep -v '(semm' | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${SEMMNI} -lt ${NPROC} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro semmni con valor actual ${SEMMNI} debe tener una valor superior a ${NPROC}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro semmni con valor actual ${SEMMNI} debe tener una valor superior a ${NPROC}" fi SEMMNS_T=$(${KCTUNE} | grep semmns | awk '{print $2}') SEMMNS=$((SEMMNI+2)) if [ ${SEMMNS_T} -lt ${SEMMNI} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro semmns con valor actual ${SEMMNS_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${SEMMNS}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro semmns con valor actual ${SEMMNS_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${SEMMNS}" fi SEMMNU_T=$(${KCTUNE} | grep semmnu | awk '{print $2}') SEMMNU=$((NPROC-4)) if [ ${SEMMNU_T} -lt ${SEMMNU} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro semmnu con valor actual ${SEMMNU_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${SEMMNU}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro semmnu con valor actual ${SEMMNU_T} debe tener una valor superior a ${SEMMNU}" fi if [ ${UX_VERS} = "B.11.23" ] then SEMVMX=$(${KCTUNE} | grep msgseg | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${SEMVMX} -lt 32767 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro semvmx con valor actual ${SEMVMX} debe tener una valor superior a 32767" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro semvmx con valor actual ${SEMVMX} debe tener una valor superior a 32767" fi fi SHMMNI=$(${KCTUNE} | grep shmmni | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${SHMMNI} -lt 512 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro shmmni con valor actual ${SHMMNI} debe tener una valor superior a 512" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro shmmni con valor actual ${SHMMNI} debe tener una valor superior a 512" fi SHMSEG=$(${KCTUNE} | grep shmseg | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${SHMSEG} -lt 120 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro shmseg con valor actual ${SHMSEG} debe tener una valor superior a 120" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro shmseg con valor actual ${SHMSEG} debe tener una valor superior a 120" fi VPS_CEILING=$(${KCTUNE} | grep vps_ceiling | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${VPS_CEILING} -lt 64 ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro vps_ceiling con valor actual ${VPS_CEILING} debe tener una valor superior a 64" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro vps_ceiling con valor actual ${VPS_CEILING} debe tener una valor superior a 64" fi SHMMAX=$(${KCTUNE} | grep shmmax | awk '{print $2}') if [ ${SHMMAX} -lt ${MEM_TOTAL} ] then echo "[FAILED] Information: El parametro shmmax con valor actual ${SHMMAX} debe tener una valor superior a ${MEM_TOTAL}" else echo "[OK] Information: El parametro shmmax con valor actual ${SHMMAX} debe tener una valor superior a ${MEM_TOTAL}" fi exit 0

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Dynamic XAP loading in Task-It - Part 1

Download Source Code NOTE 1: The source code provided is running against the RC versions of Silverlight 4 and VisualStudio 2010, so you will need to update to those bits to run it. NOTE 2: After downloading the source, be sure to set the .Web project as the StartUp Project, and Default.aspx as the Start Page In my MEF into post, MEF to the rescue in Task-It, I outlined a couple of issues I was facing and explained why I chose MEF (the Managed Extensibility Framework) to solve these issues. Other posts to check out There are a few other resources out there around dynamic XAP loading that you may want to review (by the way, Glenn Block is the main dude when it comes to MEF): Glenn Blocks 3-part series on a dynamically loaded dashboard Glenn and John Papas Silverlight TV video on dynamic xap loading These provide some great info, but didnt exactly cover the scenario I wanted to achieve in Task-Itand that is dynamically loading each of the apps pages the first time the user enters a page. The code In the code I provided for download above, I created a simple solution that shows the technique I used for dynamic XAP loading in Task-It, but without all of the other code that surrounds it. Taking all that other stuff away should make it easier to grasp. Having said that, there is still a fair amount of code involved. I am always looking for ways to make things simpler, and to achieve the desired result with as little code as possible, so if I find a better/simpler way I will blog about it, but for now this technique works for me. When I created this solution I started by creating a new Silverlight Navigation Application called DynamicXAP Loading. I then added the following line to my UriMappings in MainPage.xaml: <uriMapper:UriMapping Uri="/{assemblyName};component/{path}" MappedUri="/{assemblyName};component/{path}"/> In the section of MainPage.xaml that produces the page links in the upper right, I kept the Home link, but added a couple of new ones (page1 and page 2). These are the pages that will be dynamically (lazy) loaded: <StackPanel x:Name="LinksStackPanel" Style="{StaticResource LinksStackPanelStyle}"> <HyperlinkButton Style="{StaticResource LinkStyle}" NavigateUri="/Home" TargetName="ContentFrame" Content="home"/> <Rectangle Style="{StaticResource DividerStyle}"/> <HyperlinkButton Style="{StaticResource LinkStyle}" Content="page 1" Command="{Binding NavigateCommand}" CommandParameter="{Binding ModulePage1}"/> <Rectangle Style="{StaticResource DividerStyle}"/> <HyperlinkButton Style="{StaticResource LinkStyle}" Content="page 2" Command="{Binding NavigateCommand}" CommandParameter="{Binding ModulePage2}"/> </StackPanel> In App.xaml.cs I added a bit of MEF code. In Application_Startup I call a method called InitializeContainer, which creates a PackageCatalog (a MEF thing), then I create a CompositionContainer and pass it to the CompositionHost.Initialize method. This is boiler-plate MEF stuff that allows you to do 'composition' and import 'packages'. You're welcome to do a bit more MEF research on what is happening here if you'd like, but for the purpose of this example you can just trust that it works. :-) private void Application_Startup(object sender, StartupEventArgs e) { InitializeContainer(); this.RootVisual = new MainPage(); } private static void InitializeContainer() { var catalog = new PackageCatalog(); catalog.AddPackage(Package.Current); var container = new CompositionContainer(catalog); container.ComposeExportedValue(catalog); CompositionHost.Initialize(container); } Infrastructure In the sample code you'll notice that there is a project in the solution called DynamicXAPLoading.Infrastructure. This is simply a Silverlight Class Library project that I created just to move stuff I considered application 'infrastructure' code into a separate place, rather than cluttering the main Silverlight project (DynamicXapLoading). I did this same thing in Task-It, as the amount of this type of code was starting to clutter up the Silverlight project, and it just seemed to make sense to move things like Enums, Constants and the like off to a separate place. In the DynamicXapLoading.Infrastructure project you'll see 3 classes: Enums - There is only one enum in here called ModuleEnum. We'll use these later. PageMetadata - We will use this class later to add metadata to a new dynamically loaded project. ViewModelBase - This is simply a base class for view models that we will use in this, as well as future samples. As mentioned in my MVVM post, I will be using the MVVM pattern throughout my code for reasons detailed in the post. By the way, the ViewModelExtension class in there allows me to do strongly-typed property changed notification, so rather than OnPropertyChanged("MyProperty"), I can do this.OnPropertyChanged(p => p.MyProperty). It's just a less error-prown approach, because if you don't spell "MyProperty" correctly using the first method, nothing will break, it just won't work. Adding a new page We currently have a couple of pages that are being dynamically (lazy) loaded, but now let's add a third page. 1. First, create a new Silverlight Application project: In this example I call it Page3. In the future you may prefer to use a different name, like DynamicXAPLoading.Page3, or even DynamicXAPLoading.Modules.Page3. It can be whatever you want. In my Task-It application I used the latter approach (with 'Modules' in the name). I do think of these application as 'modules', but Prism uses the same term, so some folks may not like that. Use whichever naming convention you feel is appropriate, but for now Page3 will do. When you change the name to Page3 and click OK, you will be presented with the Add New Project dialog: It is important that you leave the 'Host the Silverlight application in a new or existing Web site in the solution' checked, and the .Web project will be selected in the dropdown below. This will create the .xap file for this project under ClientBin in the .Web project, which is where we want it. 2. Uncheck the 'Add a test page that references the application' checkbox, and leave everything else as is. 3. Once the project is created, you can delete App.xaml and MainPage.xaml. 4. You will need to add references your new project to the following: DynamicXAPLoading.Infrastructure.dll (this is a Project reference) DynamicNavigation.dll (this is in the Libs directory under the DynamicXAPLoading project) System.ComponentModel.Composition.dll System.ComponentModel.Composition.Initialization.dll System.Windows.Controls.Navigation.dll If you have installed the latest RC bits you will find the last 3 dll's under the .NET tab in the Add Referenced dialog. They live in the following location, or if you are on a 64-bit machine like me, it will be Program Files (x86). C:\Program Files\Microsoft SDKs\Silverlight\v4.0\Libraries\Client Now let's create some UI for our new project. 5. First, create a new Silverlight User Control called Page3.dyn.xaml 6. Paste the following code into the xaml: <dyn:DynamicPageShim xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation" xmlns:dyn="clr-namespace:DynamicNavigation;assembly=DynamicNavigation" xmlns:my="clr-namespace:Page3;assembly=Page3"> <my:Page3Host /> </dyn:DynamicPageShim> This is just a 'shim', part of David Poll's technique for dynamic loading. 7. Expand the icon next to Page3.dyn.xaml and delete the code-behind file (Page3.dyn.xaml.cs). 8. Next we will create a control that will 'host' our page. Create another Silverlight User Control called Page3Host.xaml and paste in the following XAML: <dyn:DynamicPage x:Class="Page3.Page3Host" 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:dyn="clr-namespace:DynamicNavigation;assembly=DynamicNavigation" xmlns:Views="clr-namespace:Page3.Views" mc:Ignorable="d" d:DesignHeight="300" d:DesignWidth="400" Title="Page 3"> <Views:Page3/> </dyn:DynamicPage> 9. Now paste the following code into the code-behind for this control: using DynamicXAPLoading.Infrastructure; namespace Page3 { [PageMetadata(NavigateUri = "/Page3;component/Page3.dyn.xaml", Module = Enums.Page3)] public partial class Page3Host { public Page3Host() { InitializeComponent(); } } } Notice that we are now using that PageMetadata custom attribute class that we created in the Infrastructure project, and setting its two properties. NavigateUri - This tells it that the assembly is called Page3 (with a slash beforehand), and the page we want to load is Page3.dyn.xaml...our 'shim'. That line we added to the UriMapper in MainPage.xaml will use this information to load the page. Module - This goes back to that ModuleEnum class in our Infrastructure project. However, setting the Module to ModuleEnum.Page3 will cause a compilation error, so... 10. Go back to that Enums.cs under the Infrastructure project and add a 3rd entry for Page3: public enum ModuleEnum { Page1, Page2, Page3 } 11. Now right-click on the Page3 project and add a folder called Views. 12. Right-click on the Views folder and create a new Silverlight User Control called Page3.xaml. We won't bother creating a view model for this User Control as I did in the Page 1 and Page 2 projects, just for the sake of simplicity. Feel free to add one if you'd like though, and copy the code from one of those other projects. Right now those view models aren't really doing anything anyway...though they will in my next post. :-) 13. Now let's replace the xaml for Page3.xaml with the following: <dyn:DynamicPage x:Class="Page3.Views.Page3" 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:dyn="clr-namespace:DynamicNavigation;assembly=DynamicNavigation" mc:Ignorable="d" d:DesignHeight="300" d:DesignWidth="400" Style="{StaticResource PageStyle}"> <Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot"> <ScrollViewer x:Name="PageScrollViewer" Style="{StaticResource PageScrollViewerStyle}"> <StackPanel x:Name="ContentStackPanel"> <TextBlock x:Name="HeaderText" Style="{StaticResource HeaderTextStyle}" Text="Page 3"/> <TextBlock x:Name="ContentText" Style="{StaticResource ContentTextStyle}" Text="Page 3 content"/> </StackPanel> </ScrollViewer> </Grid> </dyn:DynamicPage> 14. And in the code-behind remove the inheritance from UserControl, so it should look like this: namespace Page3.Views { public partial class Page3 { public Page3() { InitializeComponent(); } } } One thing you may have noticed is that the base class for the last two User Controls we created is DynamicPage. Once again, we are using the infrastructure that David Poll created. 15. OK, a few last things. We need a link on our main page so that we can access our new page. In MainPage.xaml let's update our links to look like this: <StackPanel x:Name="LinksStackPanel" Style="{StaticResource LinksStackPanelStyle}"> <HyperlinkButton Style="{StaticResource LinkStyle}" NavigateUri="/Home" TargetName="ContentFrame" Content="home"/> <Rectangle Style="{StaticResource DividerStyle}"/> <HyperlinkButton Style="{StaticResource LinkStyle}" Content="page 1" Command="{Binding NavigateCommand}" CommandParameter="{Binding ModulePage1}"/> <Rectangle Style="{StaticResource DividerStyle}"/> <HyperlinkButton Style="{StaticResource LinkStyle}" Content="page 2" Command="{Binding NavigateCommand}" CommandParameter="{Binding ModulePage2}"/> <Rectangle Style="{StaticResource DividerStyle}"/> <HyperlinkButton Style="{StaticResource LinkStyle}" Content="page 3" Command="{Binding NavigateCommand}" CommandParameter="{Binding ModulePage3}"/> </StackPanel> 16. Next, we need to add the following at the bottom of MainPageViewModel in the ViewModels directory of our DynamicXAPLoading project: public ModuleEnum ModulePage3 { get { return ModuleEnum.Page3; } } 17. And at last, we need to add a case for our new page to the switch statement in MainPageViewModel: switch (module) { case ModuleEnum.Page1: DownloadPackage("Page1.xap"); break; case ModuleEnum.Page2: DownloadPackage("Page2.xap"); break; case ModuleEnum.Page3: DownloadPackage("Page3.xap"); break; default: break; } Now fire up the application and click the page 1, page 2 and page 3 links. What you'll notice is that there is a 2-second delay the first time you hit each page. That is because I added the following line to the Navigate method in MainPageViewModel: Thread.Sleep(2000); // Simulate a 2 second initial loading delay The reason I put this in there is that I wanted to simulate a delay the first time the page loads (as the .xap is being downloaded from the server). You'll notice that after the first hit to the page though that there is no delay...that's because the .xap has already been downloaded. Feel free to comment out this 2-second delay, or remove it if you'd like. I just wanted to show how subsequent hits to the page would be quicker than the initial one. By the way, you may want to display some sort of BusyIndicator while the .xap is loading. I have that in my Task-It appplication, but for the sake of simplicity I did not include it here. In the future I'll blog about how I show and hide the BusyIndicator using events (I'm currently using the eventing framework in Prism for that, but may move to the one in the MVVM Light Toolkit some time soon). Whew, that felt like a lot of steps, but it does work quite nicely. As I mentioned earlier, I'll try to find ways to simplify the code (I'd like to get away from having things like hard-coded .xap file names) and will blog about it in the future if I find a better way. In my next post, I'll talk more about what is actually happening with the code that makes this all work.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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Synchronize Data between a Silverlight ListBox and a User Control

- by psheriff

One of the great things about XAML is the powerful data-binding capabilities. If you load up a list box with a collection of objects, you can display detail data about each object without writing any C# or VB.NET code. Take a look at Figure 1 that shows a collection of Product objects in a list box. When you click on a list box you bind the current Product object selected in the list box to a set of controls in a user control with just a very simple Binding statement in XAML. Figure 1: Synchronizing a ListBox to a User Control is easy with Data Binding Product and Products Classes To illustrate this data binding feature I am going to just create some local data instead of using a WCF service. The code below shows a Product class that has three properties, namely, ProductId, ProductName and Price. This class also has a constructor that takes 3 parameters and allows us to set the 3 properties in an instance of our Product class. C#public class Product{ public Product(int productId, string productName, decimal price) { ProductId = productId; ProductName = productName; Price = price; } public int ProductId { get; set; } public string ProductName { get; set; } public decimal Price { get; set; }} VBPublic Class Product Public Sub New(ByVal _productId As Integer, _ ByVal _productName As String, _ ByVal _price As Decimal) ProductId = _productId ProductName = _productName Price = _price End Sub Private mProductId As Integer Private mProductName As String Private mPrice As Decimal Public Property ProductId() As Integer Get Return mProductId End Get Set(ByVal value As Integer) mProductId = value End Set End Property Public Property ProductName() As String Get Return mProductName End Get Set(ByVal value As String) mProductName = value End Set End Property Public Property Price() As Decimal Get Return mPrice End Get Set(ByVal value As Decimal) mPrice = value End Set End PropertyEnd Class To fill up a list box you need a collection class of Product objects. The code below creates a generic collection class of Product objects. In the constructor of the Products class I have hard-coded five product objects and added them to the collection. In a real-world application you would get your data through a call to service to fill the list box, but for simplicity and just to illustrate the data binding, I am going to just hard code the data. C#public class Products : List<Product>{ public Products() { this.Add(new Product(1, "Microsoft VS.NET 2008", 1000)); this.Add(new Product(2, "Microsoft VS.NET 2010", 1000)); this.Add(new Product(3, "Microsoft Silverlight 4", 1000)); this.Add(new Product(4, "Fundamentals of N-Tier eBook", 20)); this.Add(new Product(5, "ASP.NET Security eBook", 20)); }} VBPublic Class Products Inherits List(Of Product) Public Sub New() Me.Add(New Product(1, "Microsoft VS.NET 2008", 1000)) Me.Add(New Product(2, "Microsoft VS.NET 2010", 1000)) Me.Add(New Product(3, "Microsoft Silverlight 4", 1000)) Me.Add(New Product(4, "Fundamentals of N-Tier eBook", 20)) Me.Add(New Product(5, "ASP.NET Security eBook", 20)) End SubEnd Class The Product Detail User Control Below is a user control (named ucProduct) that is used to display the product detail information seen in the bottom portion of Figure 1. This is very basic XAML that just creates a text block and a text box control for each of the three properties in the Product class. Notice the {Binding Path=[PropertyName]} on each of the text box controls. This means that if the DataContext property of this user control is set to an instance of a Product class, then the data in the properties of that Product object will be displayed in each of the text boxes. <UserControl x:Class="SL_SyncListBoxAndUserControl_CS.ucProduct" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation" xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml" HorizontalAlignment="Left" VerticalAlignment="Top"> <Grid Margin="4"> <Grid.RowDefinitions> <RowDefinition Height="Auto" /> <RowDefinition Height="Auto" /> <RowDefinition Height="Auto" /> </Grid.RowDefinitions> <Grid.ColumnDefinitions> <ColumnDefinition MinWidth="120" /> <ColumnDefinition /> </Grid.ColumnDefinitions> <TextBlock Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="0" Text="Product Id" /> <TextBox Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="1" Text="{Binding Path=ProductId}" /> <TextBlock Grid.Row="1" Grid.Column="0" Text="Product Name" /> <TextBox Grid.Row="1" Grid.Column="1" Text="{Binding Path=ProductName}" /> <TextBlock Grid.Row="2" Grid.Column="0" Text="Price" /> <TextBox Grid.Row="2" Grid.Column="1" Text="{Binding Path=Price}" /> </Grid></UserControl> Synchronize ListBox with User Control You are now ready to fill the list box with the collection class of Product objects and then bind the SelectedItem of the list box to the Product detail user control. The XAML below is the complete code for Figure 1. <UserControl x:Class="SL_SyncListBoxAndUserControl_CS.MainPage" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation" xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml" xmlns:src="clr-namespace:SL_SyncListBoxAndUserControl_CS" VerticalAlignment="Top" HorizontalAlignment="Left"> <UserControl.Resources> <src:Products x:Key="productCollection" /> </UserControl.Resources> <Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot" Margin="4" Background="White"> <Grid.RowDefinitions> <RowDefinition Height="Auto" /> <RowDefinition Height="*" /> </Grid.RowDefinitions> <ListBox x:Name="lstData" Grid.Row="0" BorderBrush="Black" BorderThickness="1" ItemsSource="{Binding Source={StaticResource productCollection}}" DisplayMemberPath="ProductName" /> <src:ucProduct x:Name="prodDetail" Grid.Row="1" DataContext="{Binding ElementName=lstData, Path=SelectedItem}" /> </Grid></UserControl> The first step to making this happen is to reference the Silverlight project (SL_SyncListBoxAndUserControl_CS) where the Product and Products classes are located. I added this namespace and assigned it a namespace prefix of “src” as shown in the line below: xmlns:src="clr-namespace:SL_SyncListBoxAndUserControl_CS" Next, to use the data from an instance of the Products collection, you create a UserControl.Resources section in the XAML and add a tag that creates an instance of the Products class and assigns it a key of “productCollection”. <UserControl.Resources> <src:Products x:Key="productCollection" /> </UserControl.Resources> Next, you bind the list box to this productCollection object using the ItemsSource property. You bind the ItemsSource of the list box to the static resource named productCollection. You can then set the DisplayMemberPath attribute of the list box to any property of the Product class that you want. In the XAML below I used the ProductName property. <ListBox x:Name="lstData" ItemsSource="{Binding Source={StaticResource productCollection}}" DisplayMemberPath="ProductName" /> You now need to create an instance of the ucProduct user contol below the list box. You do this by once again referencing the “src” namespace and typing in the name of the user control. You then set the DataContext property on this user control to a binding. The binding uses the ElementName attribute to bind to the list box name, in this case “lstData”. The Path of the data is SelectedItem. These two attributes together tell Silverlight to bind the DataContext to the selected item of the list box. That selected item is a Product object. So, once this is bound, the bindings on each text box in the user control are updated and display the current product information. <src:ucProduct x:Name="prodDetail" DataContext="{Binding ElementName=lstData, Path=SelectedItem}" /> Summary Once you understand the basics of data binding in XAML, you eliminate a lot code that is otherwise needed to move data into controls and out of controls back into an object. Connecting two controls together is easy by just binding using the ElementName and Path properties of the Binding markup extension. Another good tip out of this blog is use user controls and set the DataContext of the user control to have all of the data on the user control update through the bindings. NOTE: You can download the complete sample code (in both VB and C#) at my website. http://www.pdsa.com/downloads. Choose Tips & Tricks, then "SL – Synchronize List Box Data with User Control" from the drop-down. Good Luck with your Coding,Paul Sheriff ** SPECIAL OFFER FOR MY BLOG READERS **Visit http://www.pdsa.com/Event/Blog for a free eBook on "Fundamentals of N-Tier".

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AngularJs ng-cloak Problems on large Pages

- by Rick Strahl

I’ve been working on a rather complex and large Angular page. Unlike a typical AngularJs SPA style ‘application’ this particular page is just that: a single page with a large amount of data on it that has to be visible all at once. The problem is that when this large page loads it flickers and displays template markup briefly before kicking into its actual content rendering. This is is what the Angular ng-cloak is supposed to address, but in this case I had no luck getting it to work properly. This application is a shop floor app where workers need to see all related information in one big screen view, so some of the benefits of Angular’s routing and view swapping features couldn’t be applied. Instead, we decided to have one very big view but lots of ng-controllers and directives to break out the logic for code separation. For code separation this works great – there are a number of small controllers that deal with their own individual and isolated application concerns. For HTML separation we used partial ASP.NET MVC Razor Views which made breaking out the HTML into manageable pieces super easy and made migration of this page from a previous server side Razor page much easier. We were also able to leverage most of our server side localization without a lot of changes as a bonus. But as a result of this choice the initial HTML document that loads is rather large – even without any data loaded into it, resulting in a fairly large DOM tree that Angular must manage. Large Page and Angular Startup The problem on this particular page is that there’s quite a bit of markup – 35k’s worth of markup without any data loaded, in fact. It’s a large HTML page with a complex DOM tree. There are quite a lot of Angular {{ }} markup expressions in the document. Angular provides the ng-cloak directive to try and hide the element it cloaks so that you don’t see the flash of these markup expressions when the page initially loads before Angular has a chance to render the data into the markup expressions.<div id="mainContainer" class="mainContainer boxshadow" ng-app="app" ng-cloak> Note the ng-cloak attribute on this element, which here is an outer wrapper element of the most of this large page’s content. ng-cloak is supposed to prevent displaying the content below it, until Angular has taken control and is ready to render the data into the templates. Alas, with this large page the end result unfortunately is a brief flicker of un-rendered markup which looks like this: It’s brief, but plenty ugly – right? And depending on the speed of the machine this flash gets more noticeable with slow machines that take longer to process the initial HTML DOM. ng-cloak Styles ng-cloak works by temporarily hiding the marked up element and it does this by essentially applying a style that does this:[ng\:cloak], [ng-cloak], [data-ng-cloak], [x-ng-cloak], .ng-cloak, .x-ng-cloak { display: none !important; } This style is inlined as part of AngularJs itself. If you looking at the angular.js source file you’ll find this at the very end of the file:!angular.$$csp() && angular.element(document) .find('head') .prepend('<style type="text/css">@charset "UTF-8";[ng\\:cloak],[ng-cloak],' + '[data-ng-cloak],[x-ng-cloak],.ng-cloak,.x-ng-cloak,' + '.ng-hide{display:none !important;}ng\\:form{display:block;}' '.ng-animate-block-transitions{transition:0s all!important;-webkit-transition:0s all!important;}' + '</style>'); This is is meant to initially hide any elements that contain the ng-cloak attribute or one of the other Angular directive permutation markup. Unfortunately on this particular web page ng-cloak had no effect – I still see the flicker. Why doesn’t ng-cloak work? The problem is of course – timing. The problem is that Angular actually needs to get control of the page before it ever starts doing anything like process even the ng-cloak attribute (or style etc). Because this page is rather large (about 35k of non-data HTML) it takes a while for the DOM to actually plow through the HTML. With the Angular <script> tag defined at the bottom of the page after the HTML DOM content there’s a slight delay which causes the flicker. For smaller pages the initial DOM load/parse cycle is so fast that the markup never shows, but with larger content pages it may show and become an annoying problem. Workarounds There a number of simple ways around this issue and some of them are hinted on in the Angular documentation. Load Angular Sooner One obvious thing that would help with this is to load Angular at the top of the page BEFORE the DOM loads and that would give it much earlier control. The old ng-cloak documentation actually recommended putting the Angular.js script into the header of the page (apparently this was recently removed), but generally it’s not a good practice to load scripts in the header for page load performance. This is especially true if you load other libraries like jQuery which should be loaded prior to loading Angular so it can use jQuery rather than its own jqLite subset. This is not something I normally would like to do and also something that I’d likely forget in the future and end up right back here :-). Use ng-include for Child Content Angular supports nesting of child templates via the ng-include directive which essentially delay loads HTML content. This helps by removing a lot of the template content out of the main page and so getting control to Angular a lot sooner in order to hide the markup template content. In the application in question, I realize that in hindsight it might have been smarter to break this page out with client side ng-include directives instead of MVC Razor partial views we used to break up the page sections. Razor partial views give that nice separation as well, but in the end Razor puts humpty dumpty (ie. the HTML) back together into a whole single and rather large HTML document. Razor provides the logical separation, but still results in a large physical result document. But Razor also ended up being helpful to have a few security related blocks handled via server side template logic that simply excludes certain parts of the UI the user is not allowed to see – something that you can’t really do with client side exclusion like ng-hide/ng-show – client side content is always there whereas on the server side you can simply not send it to the client. Another reason I’m not a huge fan of ng-include is that it adds another HTTP hit to a request as templates are loaded from the server dynamically as needed. Given that this page was already heavy with resources adding another 10 separate ng-include directives wouldn’t be beneficial :-) ng-include is a valid option if you start from scratch and partition your logic. Of course if you don’t have complex pages, having completely separate views that are swapped in as they are accessed are even better, but we didn’t have this option due to the information having to be on screen all at once. Avoid using {{ }} Expressions The biggest issue that ng-cloak attempts to address isn’t so much displaying the original content – it’s displaying empty {{ }} markup expression tags that get embedded into content. It gives you the dreaded “now you see it, now you don’t” effect where you sometimes see three separate rendering states: Markup junk, empty views, then views filled with data. If we can remove {{ }} expressions from the page you remove most of the perceived double draw effect as you would effectively start with a blank form and go straight to a filled form. To do this you can forego {{ }} expressions and replace them with ng-bind directives on DOM elements. For example you can turn:<div class="list-item-name listViewOrderNo"> <a href='#'>{{lineItem.MpsOrderNo}}</a> </div>into:<div class="list-item-name listViewOrderNo"> <a href="#" ng-bind="lineItem.MpsOrderNo"></a> </div> to get identical results but because the {{ }} expression has been removed there’s no double draw effect for this element. Again, not a great solution. The {{ }} syntax sure reads cleaner and is more fluent to type IMHO. In some cases you may also not have an outer element to attach ng-bind to which then requires you to artificially inject DOM elements into the page. This is especially painful if you have several consecutive values like {{Firstname}} {{Lastname}} for example. It’s an option though especially if you think of this issue up front and you don’t have a ton of expressions to deal with. Add the ng-cloak Styles manually You can also explicitly define the .css styles that Angular injects via code manually in your application’s style sheet. By doing so the styles become immediately available and so are applied right when the page loads – no flicker. I use the minimal:[ng-cloak] { display: none !important; } which works for:<div id="mainContainer" class="mainContainer dialog boxshadow" ng-app="app" ng-cloak> If you use one of the other combinations add the other CSS selectors as well or use the full style shown earlier. Angular will still load its version of the ng-cloak styling but it overrides those settings later, but this will do the trick of hiding the content before that CSS is injected into the page. Adding the CSS in your own style sheet works well, and is IMHO by far the best option. The nuclear option: Hiding the Content manually Using the explicit CSS is the best choice, so the following shouldn’t ever be necessary. But I’ll mention it here as it gives some insight how you can hide/show content manually on load for other frameworks or in your own markup based templates. Before I figured out that I could explicitly embed the CSS style into the page, I had tried to figure out why ng-cloak wasn’t doing its job. After wasting an hour getting nowhere I finally decided to just manually hide and show the container. The idea is simple – initially hide the container, then show it once Angular has done its initial processing and removal of the template markup from the page. You can manually hide the content and make it visible after Angular has gotten control. To do this I used:<div id="mainContainer" class="mainContainer boxshadow" ng-app="app" style="display:none"> Notice the display: none style that explicitly hides the element initially on the page. Then once Angular has run its initialization and effectively processed the template markup on the page you can show the content. For Angular this ‘ready’ event is the app.run() function:app.run( function ($rootScope, $location, cellService) { $("#mainContainer").show(); … }); This effectively removes the display:none style and the content displays. By the time app.run() fires the DOM is ready to displayed with filled data or at least empty data – Angular has gotten control. Edge Case Clearly this is an edge case. In general the initial HTML pages tend to be reasonably sized and the load time for the HTML and Angular are fast enough that there’s no flicker between the rendering times. This only becomes an issue as the initial pages get rather large. Regardless – if you have an Angular application it’s probably a good idea to add the CSS style into your application’s CSS (or a common shared one) just to make sure that content is always hidden. You never know how slow of a browser somebody might be running and while your super fast dev machine might not show any flicker, grandma’s old XP box very well might…© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2014Posted in Angular JavaScript CSS HTML 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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SOA Community Newsletter: nouvelle lettre !

- by mseika

SOA PARTNER COMMUNITY NEWSLETTERAUGUST 2012 Dear SOA partner community member Have you submitted your feedback on SOA Partner Community Survey 2012? This is the last chance to participate in the survey. We recommend you to complete the survey and help us to improve our SOA Community. Thanks to all attendees and trainers for their participation in the excellent Fusion Middleware Summer Camps held in Lisbon and Munich. I would also like to thank you for the great feedback and the nice reports provided by AMIS Technology Blog & Middleware by Link Consulting. Most of our courses have been overbooked, if you did not get a chance or missed it, we offer a wide range of online training and the course material. Key take-away from the advanced BPM course is to become an expert in ADF. Here is the course from Grant Ronald Learn Advanced ADF online available. The Link Consulting Team became experts in SOA Governance with EAMS and Oracle Enterprise Repository! We always encourage our community members to share their best practices and are very keen to publish it. Please let us know if you want to share your best practices through this medium.We encourage you to make use of the Specialization benefits - this month we are giving an opportunity to Promote Your SOA & BPM Events. Jürgen KressOracle SOA & BPM Partner Adoption EMEA NEW CONTENT Presentations & Training material OFM Summer CampsPromote Your SOA & BPM Events Advanced ADF Online, For Free By Grant BPM 11g Customer Stories & Solution Catalog & Process Accelerators Delivering SOA Governance with EAMS by Link Consulting Team WebLogic Server Provisioning and Patching News from our Partners & CommunityUpdated material by Oracle Connect and Network SOA Blogs SOA on Facebook SOA on LinkedIn SOA on Twitter Mix SOA Forum SOA Workspace PRESENTATIONS & TRAINING MATERIAL OFM SUMMER CAMPS Thanks to all attendees who invested their time and utilized the opportunity to attend the Summer Camps! Due to high demand of our most of the trainings, we had a long waiting list with more numbers of partners who are keen to attend it. We would like to give our special thanks to all trainers, who delivered excellent workshops! Most of the presentations and course material have been posted on our SOA Community Workspaceand WebLogic Community Workspace. You can access the content only if you are a registered community member. To register for the SOA Community please click here. You can register for the WebLogic Community here. To find out the first impressions of the event please visit our Facebook pages:www.facebook.com/WebLogicCommunity &www.facebook.com/soacommunity or Picasa AlbumThanks for the excellent blog posts from AMIS Technology Blog & Middleware by Link Consulting. Let us know if you published a twitter blog on@soacommunity & @wlscommunity. We will be pleased to publish it in our Newsletters. BPM Course Quotes “Its always easy, if you know, what you are doing” - Torsten Winterberg, Opitz“ The best ideas are the ideas from the best” - Filipe Sequeria, Primesoft “Best invest in the education in the last 12 months” - Richard Schaller, IPT “Practice best practice with the best instructor” - Graham Lamond Capgemini “If you have basic BPM knowledge, this is the course to really mater it” - Diogo Henriques Link Consulting “Very good trainers lot of work. Lot of fun as well” - Matthias Gris Workflow Factory “If you like to accelerate in Oracle come to the training to bring it all together” - Marcel van der Glind, Amis ADF Course Quotes "Excellent training, great opportunity to network!" - Frank Houweling, Amis "Lots of fun and good ideas" - Ana Santiago, GFI "Learn ADF, worth it Fusion Apps is the future" - Miguel Delgadillo, STO Consulting "The best way to learn Fusion Middleware from the #1" Alexandro Montantes, STO Consulting "Be advanced to to be the first” - Dimitar Petrov Fadata "Great opportunity to suck all the knowledge out of some very experienced product managers” - Wilfred von der Deijl, The Future Group WebLogic Course Quotes “Oracle trainings are the best” - Pedro Neto Novobas“ "Excellent training, well organized” - Pedro Antunh, Capgemini “This course dives you into Oracle WebLogic giving you a quick start on benefiting from Fusion Apps” - Leonardo Fernandes, Outsystems Additional Quotes “Thanks a lot again for organizing such a great and informative Summer Camp. Both training and networking were organized very professionally. I have gained tons of very useful Info, which will definitely help to increase quality of our future projects.” - Daniel Fasko fss-group.com I didn’t get the chance yesterday to thank you for a most enjoyable and thoroughly educational time I had in Munich over the last few days.” - Jeroen Bakker Ordina “Just to congratulate you on a great event, not only today but also in the previous days of training. As we know, a very good organization and, as a native Portuguese that knows Lisbon very good, a nice choice of places to visit. Looking forward to come again next year.” Pedro Miguel Neto, Novobase PROMOTE YOUR SOA & BPM EVENTS The Partner Event Publisher has just been made available to all SOA & BPM specialized partners in EMEA. Partners now have the opportunity to publish their events to theOracle.com/events site and spread the word on their upcoming live in-person and/or live webcast events. See the demo below and click here to read more information. ADVANCED ADF ONLINE, FOR FREE BY GRANT The second part of the advanced ADF online eCourse is Live now! This covers the advanced topics of region and region interaction as well as getting down and dirty with some of the layout features of ADF Faces, skinning and DVT components. The aim of this course is to give you a self-paced learning aid which covers the more advanced topics of ADF development. The content is developed by Product Management and our Curriculum development teams and is based on advanced training material we have been running internally for about 18 months. We will get started on the next chapter, but in the meantime, please have a look at chapters one and two. Back to top BPM 11G CUSTOMER STORIES & SOLUTION CATALOG & PROCESS ACCELERATORS Stories Everyone loves a good story on planning or implementing a BPM strategy. Everyone wants to hear how it was done before?, what worked?, what was achieved? If you have achieved success with BPM, we are very keen to hear your stories and examples of how your customers use it. We receive lots of requests from people who are thinking of using BPM to solve a specific problem or in combination with a specific technology to talk to someone who has done it before. These stories are invaluable. Drop down the details of anything you think is relevant with a bit of detail and we will follow up on it. As one good deed deserves another, we will do our best to give you stories if you need them to show that where you are going, others have treaded before. Send your stories to us using this e-mail link and we will share them among other like minded people. Solution Catalogue This summer, Oracle is launching a solution catalogue specifically intended for partners. If you have delivered a successful implementation in BPM and think it could be reused and applied again in a similar scenario in the same industry or in a similar environment, then we ware keen to know about it and will add it to the solution catalogue. The solution catalogue will showcase successful BPM solutions both inside and outside Oracle. Be in touch with us on this e-mail link and we will make sure to add your solution. Process AcceleratorsFinally if you have specific processes that you are expert on, you have implemented at a customer and you want to work with us on getting these productised, then we would love to know about it. The process accelerator programme is explained in the most recent SOA/BPM Community Newsletter but again feel free to contact us if you want to get involved. Good luck with BPM and let us know how we can help. Barry O'Reilly Director BPM [email protected] DELIVERING SOA GOVERNANCE WITH EAMS BY LINK CONSULTING TEAM In the last 12 years Link Consulting has been making its presence in specific areas such as Governance and Architecture, both in terms of practices and methodologies, products, know-how and technological expertise. The Enterprise Architecture Management System - Oracle Enterprise Edition (EAMS - OER Edition) is the result of this experience and combines the architecture management solution with OER in order to deliver a product specialized for SOA Governance that gathers the better of two worlds in solution that enables SOA Governance projects, initiatives and programs. Enterprise Architecture Management System Enterprise Architecture Management System (EAMS), is an automation based solution that enables the efficient management of Enterprise Architectures. The solution uses configured enterprise repositories and takes advantages of its features to provide automation capabilities to the users. EAMS provides capabilities to create/customize/analyze repository data, architectural blueprints, reports and analytic charts. Oracle Enterprise Repository Oracle Enterprise Repository (OER) is one of the major and central elements of the Oracle SOA Governance solution. Oracle Enterprise Repository provides the tools to manage and govern the metadata for any type of software asset, from business processes and services to patterns, frameworks, applications, components, and models. OER maps the relationships and inter-dependencies that connect those assets to improve impact analysis, promote and optimize their reuse, and measure their impact on the bottom line. It provides the visibility, feedback, controls, and analytics to keep your SOA on track to deliver business value. The intense focus on automation helps to overcome barriers to SOA adoption and streamline governance throughout the lifecycle. Core capabilities of the OER include: Asset Management Asset Lifecycle Management Usage Tracking Service Discovery Version Management Dependency Analysis Portfolio Management EAMS - OER Edition The solution takes the advantages and features from both products and combines them in a symbiotic tool that enhances the quality of SOA Governance Initiatives and Programs. EAMS is able to produce a vast number of outputs by combining its analytical engine, SOA-specific configurations and the assets in OER and other related tools, catalogs and repositories. The configurations encompass not only the extendable parametrization of the metadata but also fully configurable blueprints, PowerPoint reports, charts and queries. The SOA blueprints The solution comes with a set of predefined architectural representations that help the organization better perceive their SOA landscape. More blueprints can be easily created in order to accommodate the organizations needs in terms of detail, audience and metadata. Charts & Dashboards The solution encompasses a set of predefined charts and dashboards that promote a more agile way to control and explore the assets. Time Based Visualization All representations are time bound, and with EAMS - OER you can truly govern SOA with a complete view of the Past, Present and Future; The solution delivers Gap Analysis, a project oriented approach while taking into consideration the As-Was, As-Is an To-Be. Time based visualization differentiating factors: Extensive automation and maintenance of architectural representations Organization wide solution. Easy access and navigation to and between all architectural artifacts and representations. Flexible meta-model, customization and extensibility capabilities. Lifecycle management and enforcement of the time dimension over all the repository content. Profile based customization. Comprehensive visibility Architectural alignment Friendly and striking user interfaces For more information on EAMS visit us here. For more information on SOA visit us here. WEBLOGIC SERVER PROVISIONING AND PATCHING For access to the Oracle demo systems please visit OPN and talk to your Partner Expert.SOA Suite and BPM Suite runs on WebLogic! We are pleased to announce the availability of a WebLogic Server Management demo that showcases some of the key provisioning and patching capabilities of WebLogic Server Management Pack Enterprise Edition (EE). To learn more about these features - as well as other features of the pack - please visit the pack's saleskit page.Demo Highlights The demo showcases the following capabilities: Patching Oracle WebLogic Servers Standardizing WebLogic Server Patch Rollouts Creating a WebLogic Domain Provisioning Profile Cloning a WebLogic Domain from a Provisioning Profile Deploying a Java EE Application Scaling Out an Oracle WebLogic Cluster Demo Instructions Go to the DSS website for Oracle Partners. On the Standard Demo Launchpad page, under the “Software Lifecycle Automation” section, click on the link “EM Cloud Control 12c WLS Provisioning and Patching” (tagged as “NEW”). Specific demo launchpad page contains a link to the detailed demo script with instructions on how to show the demo.

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A Communication System for XAML Applications

- by psheriff

In any application, you want to keep the coupling between any two or more objects as loose as possible. Coupling happens when one class contains a property that is used in another class, or uses another class in one of its methods. If you have this situation, then this is called strong or tight coupling. One popular design pattern to help with keeping objects loosely coupled is called the Mediator design pattern. The basics of this pattern are very simple; avoid one object directly talking to another object, and instead use another class to mediate between the two. As with most of my blog posts, the purpose is to introduce you to a simple approach to using a message broker, not all of the fine details. IPDSAMessageBroker Interface As with most implementations of a design pattern, you typically start with an interface or an abstract base class. In this particular instance, an Interface will work just fine. The interface for our Message Broker class just contains a single method “SendMessage” and one event “MessageReceived”. public delegate void MessageReceivedEventHandler( object sender, PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs e); public interface IPDSAMessageBroker{ void SendMessage(PDSAMessageBrokerMessage msg); event MessageReceivedEventHandler MessageReceived;} PDSAMessageBrokerMessage Class As you can see in the interface, the SendMessage method requires a type of PDSAMessageBrokerMessage to be passed to it. This class simply has a MessageName which is a ‘string’ type and a MessageBody property which is of the type ‘object’ so you can pass whatever you want in the body. You might pass a string in the body, or a complete Customer object. The MessageName property will help the receiver of the message know what is in the MessageBody property. public class PDSAMessageBrokerMessage{ public PDSAMessageBrokerMessage() { } public PDSAMessageBrokerMessage(string name, object body) { MessageName = name; MessageBody = body; } public string MessageName { get; set; } public object MessageBody { get; set; }} PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs Class As our message broker class will be raising an event that others can respond to, it is a good idea to create your own event argument class. This class will inherit from the System.EventArgs class and add a couple of additional properties. The properties are the MessageName and Message. The MessageName property is simply a string value. The Message property is a type of a PDSAMessageBrokerMessage class. public class PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs : EventArgs{ public PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs() { } public PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs(string name, PDSAMessageBrokerMessage msg) { MessageName = name; Message = msg; } public string MessageName { get; set; } public PDSAMessageBrokerMessage Message { get; set; }} PDSAMessageBroker Class Now that you have an interface class and a class to pass a message through an event, it is time to create your actual PDSAMessageBroker class. This class implements the SendMessage method and will also create the event handler for the delegate created in your Interface. public class PDSAMessageBroker : IPDSAMessageBroker{ public void SendMessage(PDSAMessageBrokerMessage msg) { PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs args; args = new PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs( msg.MessageName, msg); RaiseMessageReceived(args); } public event MessageReceivedEventHandler MessageReceived; protected void RaiseMessageReceived( PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs e) { if (null != MessageReceived) MessageReceived(this, e); }} The SendMessage method will take a PDSAMessageBrokerMessage object as an argument. It then creates an instance of a PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs class, passing to the constructor two items: the MessageName from the PDSAMessageBrokerMessage object and also the object itself. It may seem a little redundant to pass in the message name when that same message name is part of the message, but it does make consuming the event and checking for the message name a little cleaner – as you will see in the next section. Create a Global Message Broker In your WPF application, create an instance of this message broker class in the App class located in the App.xaml file. Create a public property in the App class and create a new instance of that class in the OnStartUp event procedure as shown in the following code: public partial class App : Application{ public PDSAMessageBroker MessageBroker { get; set; } protected override void OnStartup(StartupEventArgs e) { base.OnStartup(e); MessageBroker = new PDSAMessageBroker(); }} Sending and Receiving Messages Let’s assume you have a user control that you load into a control on your main window and you want to send a message from that user control to the main window. You might have the main window display a message box, or put a string into a status bar as shown in Figure 1. Figure 1: The main window can receive and send messages The first thing you do in the main window is to hook up an event procedure to the MessageReceived event of the global message broker. This is done in the constructor of the main window: public MainWindow(){ InitializeComponent(); (Application.Current as App).MessageBroker. MessageReceived += new MessageReceivedEventHandler( MessageBroker_MessageReceived);} One piece of code you might not be familiar with is accessing a property defined in the App class of your XAML application. Within the App.Xaml file is a class named App that inherits from the Application object. You access the global instance of this App class by using Application.Current. You cast Application.Current to ‘App’ prior to accessing any of the public properties or methods you defined in the App class. Thus, the code (Application.Current as App).MessageBroker, allows you to get at the MessageBroker property defined in the App class. In the MessageReceived event procedure in the main window (shown below) you can now check to see if the MessageName property of the PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs is equal to “StatusBar” and if it is, then display the message body into the status bar text block control. void MessageBroker_MessageReceived(object sender, PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs e){ switch (e.MessageName) { case "StatusBar": tbStatus.Text = e.Message.MessageBody.ToString(); break; }} In the Page 1 user control’s Loaded event procedure you will send the message “StatusBar” through the global message broker to any listener using the following code: private void UserControl_Loaded(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e){ // Send Status Message (Application.Current as App).MessageBroker. SendMessage(new PDSAMessageBrokerMessage("StatusBar", "This is Page 1"));} Since the main window is listening for the message ‘StatusBar’, it will display the value “This is Page 1” in the status bar at the bottom of the main window. Sending a Message to a User Control The previous example sent a message from the user control to the main window. You can also send messages from the main window to any listener as well. Remember that the global message broker is really just a broadcaster to anyone who has hooked into the MessageReceived event. In the constructor of the user control named ucPage1 you can hook into the global message broker’s MessageReceived event. You can then listen for any messages that are sent to this control by using a similar switch-case structure like that in the main window. public ucPage1(){ InitializeComponent(); // Hook to the Global Message Broker (Application.Current as App).MessageBroker. MessageReceived += new MessageReceivedEventHandler( MessageBroker_MessageReceived);} void MessageBroker_MessageReceived(object sender, PDSAMessageBrokerEventArgs e){ // Look for messages intended for Page 1 switch (e.MessageName) { case "ForPage1": MessageBox.Show(e.Message.MessageBody.ToString()); break; }} Once the ucPage1 user control has been loaded into the main window you can then send a message using the following code: private void btnSendToPage1_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e){ PDSAMessageBrokerMessage arg = new PDSAMessageBrokerMessage(); arg.MessageName = "ForPage1"; arg.MessageBody = "Message For Page 1"; // Send a message to Page 1 (Application.Current as App).MessageBroker.SendMessage(arg);} Since the MessageName matches what is in the ucPage1 MessageReceived event procedure, ucPage1 can do anything in response to that event. It is important to note that when the message gets sent it is sent to all MessageReceived event procedures, not just the one that is looking for a message called “ForPage1”. If the user control ucPage1 is not loaded and this message is broadcast, but no other code is listening for it, then it is simply ignored. Remove Event Handler In each class where you add an event handler to the MessageReceived event you need to make sure to remove those event handlers when you are done. Failure to do so can cause a strong reference to the class and thus not allow that object to be garbage collected. In each of your user control’s make sure in the Unloaded event to remove the event handler. private void UserControl_Unloaded(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e){ if (_MessageBroker != null) _MessageBroker.MessageReceived -= _MessageBroker_MessageReceived;} Problems with Message Brokering As with most “global” classes or classes that hook up events to other classes, garbage collection is something you need to consider. Just the simple act of hooking up an event procedure to a global event handler creates a reference between your user control and the message broker in the App class. This means that even when your user control is removed from your UI, the class will still be in memory because of the reference to the message broker. This can cause messages to still being handled even though the UI is not being displayed. It is up to you to make sure you remove those event handlers as discussed in the previous section. If you don’t, then the garbage collector cannot release those objects. Instead of using events to send messages from one object to another you might consider registering your objects with a central message broker. This message broker now becomes a collection class into which you pass an object and what messages that object wishes to receive. You do end up with the same problem however. You have to un-register your objects; otherwise they still stay in memory. To alleviate this problem you can look into using the WeakReference class as a method to store your objects so they can be garbage collected if need be. Discussing Weak References is beyond the scope of this post, but you can look this up on the web. Summary In this blog post you learned how to create a simple message broker system that will allow you to send messages from one object to another without having to reference objects directly. This does reduce the coupling between objects in your application. You do need to remember to get rid of any event handlers prior to your objects going out of scope or you run the risk of having memory leaks and events being called even though you can no longer access the object that is responding to that event. NOTE: You can download the sample code for this article by visiting my website at http://www.pdsa.com/downloads. Select “Tips & Tricks”, then select “A Communication System for XAML Applications” from the drop down list.

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How to Run Low-Cost Minecraft on a Raspberry Pi for Block Building on the Cheap

- by Jason Fitzpatrick

We’ve shown you how to run your own blocktastic personal Minecraft server on a Windows/OSX box, but what if you crave something lighter weight, more energy efficient, and always ready for your friends? Read on as we turn a tiny Raspberry Pi machine into a low-cost Minecraft server you can leave on 24/7 for around a penny a day. Why Do I Want to Do This? There’s two aspects to this tutorial, running your own Minecraft server and specifically running that Minecraft server on a Raspberry Pi. Why would you want to run your own Minecraft server? It’s a really great way to extend and build upon the Minecraft play experience. You can leave the server running when you’re not playing so friends and family can join and continue building your world. You can mess around with game variables and introduce mods in a way that isn’t possible when you’re playing the stand-alone game. It also gives you the kind of control over your multiplayer experience that using public servers doesn’t, without incurring the cost of hosting a private server on a remote host. While running a Minecraft server on its own is appealing enough to a dedicated Minecraft fan, running it on the Raspberry Pi is even more appealing. The tiny little Pi uses so little resources that you can leave your Minecraft server running 24/7 for a couple bucks a year. Aside from the initial cost outlay of the Pi, an SD card, and a little bit of time setting it up, you’ll have an always-on Minecraft server at a monthly cost of around one gumball. What Do I Need? For this tutorial you’ll need a mix of hardware and software tools; aside from the actual Raspberry Pi and SD card, everything is free. 1 Raspberry Pi (preferably a 512MB model) 1 4GB+ SD card This tutorial assumes that you have already familiarized yourself with the Raspberry Pi and have installed a copy of the Debian-derivative Raspbian on the device. If you have not got your Pi up and running yet, don’t worry! Check out our guide, The HTG Guide to Getting Started with Raspberry Pi, to get up to speed. Optimizing Raspbian for the Minecraft Server Unlike other builds we’ve shared where you can layer multiple projects over one another (e.g. the Pi is more than powerful enough to serve as a weather/email indicator and a Google Cloud Print server at the same time) running a Minecraft server is a pretty intense operation for the little Pi and we’d strongly recommend dedicating the entire Pi to the process. Minecraft seems like a simple game, with all its blocky-ness and what not, but it’s actually a pretty complex game beneath the simple skin and required a lot of processing power. As such, we’re going to tweak the configuration file and other settings to optimize Rasbian for the job. The first thing you’ll need to do is dig into the Raspi-Config application to make a few minor changes. If you’re installing Raspbian fresh, wait for the last step (which is the Raspi-Config), if you already installed it, head to the terminal and type in “sudo raspi-config” to launch it again. One of the first and most important things we need to attend to is cranking up the overclock setting. We need all the power we can get to make our Minecraft experience enjoyable. In Raspi-Config, select option number 7 “Overclock”. Be prepared for some stern warnings about overclocking, but rest easy knowing that overclocking is directly supported by the Raspberry Pi foundation and has been included in the configuration options since late 2012. Once you’re in the actual selection screen, select “Turbo 1000MhHz”. Again, you’ll be warned that the degree of overclocking you’ve selected carries risks (specifically, potential corruption of the SD card, but no risk of actual hardware damage). Click OK and wait for the device to reset. Next, make sure you’re set to boot to the command prompt, not the desktop. Select number 3 “Enable Boot to Desktop/Scratch” and make sure “Console Text console” is selected. Back at the Raspi-Config menu, select number 8 “Advanced Options’. There are two critical changes we need to make in here and one option change. First, the critical changes. Select A3 “Memory Split”: Change the amount of memory available to the GPU to 16MB (down from the default 64MB). Our Minecraft server is going to ruin in a GUI-less environment; there’s no reason to allocate any more than the bare minimum to the GPU. After selecting the GPU memory, you’ll be returned to the main menu. Select “Advanced Options” again and then select A4 “SSH”. Within the sub-menu, enable SSH. There is very little reason to keep this Pi connected to a monitor and keyboard, by enabling SSH we can remotely access the machine from anywhere on the network. Finally (and optionally) return again to the “Advanced Options” menu and select A2 “Hostname”. Here you can change your hostname from “raspberrypi” to a more fitting Minecraft name. We opted for the highly creative hostname “minecraft”, but feel free to spice it up a bit with whatever you feel like: creepertown, minecraft4life, or miner-box are all great minecraft server names. That’s it for the Raspbian configuration tab down to the bottom of the main screen and select “Finish” to reboot. After rebooting you can now SSH into your terminal, or continue working from the keyboard hooked up to your Pi (we strongly recommend switching over to SSH as it allows you to easily cut and paste the commands). If you’ve never used SSH before, check out how to use PuTTY with your Pi here. Installing Java on the Pi The Minecraft server runs on Java, so the first thing we need to do on our freshly configured Pi is install it. Log into your Pi via SSH and then, at the command prompt, enter the following command to make a directory for the installation: sudo mkdir /java/ Now we need to download the newest version of Java. At the time of this publication the newest release is the OCT 2013 update and the link/filename we use will reflect that. Please check for a more current version of the Linux ARMv6/7 Java release on the Java download page and update the link/filename accordingly when following our instructions. At the command prompt, enter the following command: sudo wget --no-check-certificate http://www.java.net/download/jdk8/archive/b111/binaries/jdk-8-ea-b111-linux-arm-vfp-hflt-09_oct_2013.tar.gz Once the download has finished successfully, enter the following command: sudo tar zxvf jdk-8-ea-b111-linux-arm-vfp-hflt-09_oct_2013.tar.gz -C /opt/ Fun fact: the /opt/ directory name scheme is a remnant of early Unix design wherein the /opt/ directory was for “optional” software installed after the main operating system; it was the /Program Files/ of the Unix world. After the file has finished extracting, enter: sudo /opt/jdk1.8.0/bin/java -version This command will return the version number of your new Java installation like so: java version "1.8.0-ea" Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment (build 1.8.0-ea-b111) Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (build 25.0-b53, mixed mode) If you don’t see the above printout (or a variation thereof if you’re using a newer version of Java), try to extract the archive again. If you do see the readout, enter the following command to tidy up after yourself: sudo rm jdk-8-ea-b111-linux-arm-vfp-hflt-09_oct_2013.tar.gz At this point Java is installed and we’re ready to move onto installing our Minecraft server! Installing and Configuring the Minecraft Server Now that we have a foundation for our Minecraft server, it’s time to install the part that matter. We’ll be using SpigotMC a lightweight and stable Minecraft server build that works wonderfully on the Pi. First, grab a copy of the the code with the following command: sudo wget http://ci.md-5.net/job/Spigot/lastSuccessfulBuild/artifact/Spigot-Server/target/spigot.jar This link should remain stable over time, as it points directly to the most current stable release of Spigot, but if you have any issues you can always reference the SpigotMC download page here. After the download finishes successfully, enter the following command: sudo /opt/jdk1.8.0/bin/java -Xms256M -Xmx496M -jar /home/pi/spigot.jar nogui Note: if you’re running the command on a 256MB Pi change the 256 and 496 in the above command to 128 and 256, respectively. Your server will launch and a flurry of on-screen activity will follow. Be prepared to wait around 3-6 minutes or so for the process of setting up the server and generating the map to finish. Future startups will take much less time, around 20-30 seconds. Note: If at any point during the configuration or play process things get really weird (e.g. your new Minecraft server freaks out and starts spawning you in the Nether and killing you instantly), use the “stop” command at the command prompt to gracefully shutdown the server and let you restart and troubleshoot it. After the process has finished, head over to the computer you normally play Minecraft on, fire it up, and click on Multiplayer. You should see your server: If your world doesn’t popup immediately during the network scan, hit the Add button and manually enter the address of your Pi. Once you connect to the server, you’ll see the status change in the server status window: According to the server, we’re in game. According to the actual Minecraft app, we’re also in game but it’s the middle of the night in survival mode: Boo! Spawning in the dead of night, weaponless and without shelter is no way to start things. No worries though, we need to do some more configuration; no time to sit around and get shot at by skeletons. Besides, if you try and play it without some configuration tweaks first, you’ll likely find it quite unstable. We’re just here to confirm the server is up, running, and accepting incoming connections. Once we’ve confirmed the server is running and connectable (albeit not very playable yet), it’s time to shut down the server. Via the server console, enter the command “stop” to shut everything down. When you’re returned to the command prompt, enter the following command: sudo nano server.properties When the configuration file opens up, make the following changes (or just cut and paste our config file minus the first two lines with the name and date stamp): #Minecraft server properties #Thu Oct 17 22:53:51 UTC 2013 generator-settings= #Default is true, toggle to false allow-nether=false level-name=world enable-query=false allow-flight=false server-port=25565 level-type=DEFAULT enable-rcon=false force-gamemode=false level-seed= server-ip= max-build-height=256 spawn-npcs=true white-list=false spawn-animals=true texture-pack= snooper-enabled=true hardcore=false online-mode=true pvp=true difficulty=1 player-idle-timeout=0 gamemode=0 #Default 20; you only need to lower this if you're running #a public server and worried about loads. max-players=20 spawn-monsters=true #Default is 10, 3-5 ideal for Pi view-distance=5 generate-structures=true spawn-protection=16 motd=A Minecraft Server In the server status window, seen through your SSH connection to the pi, enter the following command to give yourself operator status on your Minecraft server (so that you can use more powerful commands in game, without always returning to the server status window). op [your minecraft nickname] At this point things are looking better but we still have a little tweaking to do before the server is really enjoyable. To that end, let’s install some plugins. The first plugin, and the one you should install above all others, is NoSpawnChunks. To install the plugin, first visit the NoSpawnChunks webpage and grab the download link for the most current version. As of this writing the current release is v0.3. Back at the command prompt (the command prompt of your Pi, not the server console–if your server is still active shut it down) enter the following commands: cd /home/pi/plugins sudo wget http://dev.bukkit.org/media/files/586/974/NoSpawnChunks.jar Next, visit the ClearLag plugin page, and grab the latest link (as of this tutorial, it’s v2.6.0). Enter the following at the command prompt: sudo wget http://dev.bukkit.org/media/files/743/213/Clearlag.jar Because the files aren’t compressed in a .ZIP or similar container, that’s all there is to it: the plugins are parked in the plugin directory. (Remember this for future plugin downloads, the file needs to be whateverplugin.jar, so if it’s compressed you need to uncompress it in the plugin directory.) Resart the server: sudo /opt/jdk1.8.0/bin/java -Xms256M -Xmx496M -jar /home/pi/spigot.jar nogui Be prepared for a slightly longer startup time (closer to the 3-6 minutes and much longer than the 30 seconds you just experienced) as the plugins affect the world map and need a minute to massage everything. After the spawn process finishes, type the following at the server console: plugins This lists all the plugins currently active on the server. You should see something like this: If the plugins aren’t loaded, you may need to stop and restart the server. After confirming your plugins are loaded, go ahead and join the game. You should notice significantly snappier play. In addition, you’ll get occasional messages from the plugins indicating they are active, as seen below: At this point Java is installed, the server is installed, and we’ve tweaked our settings for for the Pi. It’s time to start building with friends!

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Building a “real” extension for Expression Blend

- by Timmy Kokke

.Last time I showed you how to get started building extensions for Expression Blend. Lets build a useful extension this time and go a bit deeper into Blend. Source of project => here Compiled dll => here (extract into /extensions folder of Expression Blend) The Extension When working on large Xaml files in Blend it’s often hard to find a specific control in the "Objects and Timeline Pane”. An extension that searches the active document and presents all elements that satisfy the query would be helpful. When the user starts typing a search query a search will be performed and the results are shown in the list. After the user selects an item in the results list, the control in the "Objects and Timeline Pane” will be selected. Below is a sketch of what it is going to look like. The Solution Create a new WPF User Control project as shown in the earlier tutorial in the Configuring the extension project section, but name it AdvancedSearch this time. Delete the default UserControl1.Xaml to clear the solution (a new user control will be added later thought, but adding a user control is easier then renaming one). Create the main entry point of the addin by adding a new class to the solution and naming this AdvancedSearchPackage. Add a reference to Microsoft.Expression.Extensibility and to System.ComponentModel.Composition . Implement the IPackage interface and add the Export attribute from the MEF to the definition. While you’re at it. Add references to Microsoft.Expression.DesignSurface, Microsoft.Expression.FrameWork and Microsoft.Expression.Markup. These will be used later. The Load method from the IPackage interface is going to create a ViewModel to bind to from the UI. Add another class to the solution and name this AdvancedSearchViewModel. This class needs to implement the INotifyPropertyChanged interface to enable notifications to the view. Add a constructor to the class that takes an IServices interface as a parameter. Create a new instance of the AdvancedSearchViewModel in the load method in the AdvanceSearchPackage class. The AdvancedSearchPackage class should looks like this now: using System.ComponentModel.Composition; using Microsoft.Expression.Extensibility; namespace AdvancedSearch { [Export(typeof(IPackage))] public class AdvancedSearchPackage:IPackage { public void Load(IServices services) { new AdvancedSearchViewModel(services); } public void Unload() { } } } Add a new UserControl to the project and name this AdvancedSearchView. The View will be created by the ViewModel, which will pass itself to the constructor of the view. Change the constructor of the View to take a AdvancedSearchViewModel object as a parameter. Add a private field to store the ViewModel and set this field in the constructor. Point the DataContext of the view to the ViewModel. The View will look something like this now: namespace AdvancedSearch { public partial class AdvancedSearchView:UserControl { private readonly AdvancedSearchViewModel _advancedSearchViewModel; public AdvancedSearchView(AdvancedSearchViewModel advancedSearchViewModel) { _advancedSearchViewModel = advancedSearchViewModel; InitializeComponent(); this.DataContext = _advancedSearchViewModel; } } } The View is going to be created in the constructor of the ViewModel and stored in a read only property. public FrameworkElement View { get; private set; } public AdvancedSearchViewModel(IServices services) { _services = services; View = new AdvancedSearchView(this); } The last thing the solution needs before we’ll wire things up is a new class, PossibleNode. This class will be used later to store the search results. The solution should look like this now: Adding UI to the UI The extension should build and run now, although nothing is showing up in Blend yet. To enable the user to perform a search query add a TextBox and a ListBox to the AdvancedSearchView.xaml file. I’ve set the rows of the grid too to make them look a little better. Add the TextChanged event to the TextBox and the SelectionChanged event to the ListBox, we’ll need those later on. <Grid> <Grid.RowDefinitions> <RowDefinition Height="32" /> <RowDefinition Height="*" /> </Grid.RowDefinitions> <TextBox TextChanged="SearchQueryTextChanged" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" Margin="4" Name="SearchQuery" VerticalAlignment="Stretch" /> <ListBox SelectionChanged="SearchResultSelectionChanged" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" Margin="4" Name="SearchResult" VerticalAlignment="Stretch" Grid.Row="1" /> </Grid> This will create a user interface like: To make the View show up in Blend it has to be registered with the WindowService. The GetService<T> method is used to get services from Blend, which are your entry points into Blend.When writing extensions you will encounter this method very often. In this case we’re asking for an IWindowService interface. The IWindowService interface serves events for changing windows and themes, is used for adding or removing resources and is used for registering and unregistering Palettes. All panes in Blend are palettes and are registered thru the RegisterPalette method. The first parameter passed to this method is a string containing a unique ID for the palette. This ID can be used to get access to the palette later. The second parameter is the View. The third parameter is a title for the pane. This title is shown when the pane is visible. It is also shown in the window menu of Blend. The last parameter is a KeyBinding. I have chosen Ctrl+Shift+F to call the Advanced Search pane. This value is also shown in the window menu of Blend. services.GetService<IWindowService>().RegisterPalette( "AdvancedSearch", viewModel.View, "Advanced Search", new KeyBinding { Key = Key.F, Modifiers = ModifierKeys.Control | ModifierKeys.Shift } ); You can compiler and run now. After Blend starts you can hit Ctrl+Shift+F or go the windows menu to call the advanced search extension. Searching for controls The search has to be cleared on every change of the active document. The DocumentServices fires an event every time a new document is opened, a document is closed or another document view is selected. Add the following line to the constructor of the ViewModel to handle the ActiveDocumentChanged event: _services.GetService<IDocumentService>().ActiveDocumentChanged += ActiveDocumentChanged; And implement the ActiveDocumentChanged method: private void ActiveDocumentChanged(object sender, DocumentChangedEventArgs e) { } To get to the contents of the document we first need to get access to the “Objects and Timeline” pane. This pane is registered in the PaletteRegistry in the same way as this extension has registered itself. The palettes are accessible thru an associative array. All you need to provide is the Identifier of the palette you want. The Id of the “Objects and Timeline” pane is “Designer_TimelinePane”. I’ve included a list of the other default panes at the bottom of this article. Each palette has a Content property which can be cast to the type of the pane. var timelinePane = (TimelinePane)_services.GetService<IWindowService>() .PaletteRegistry["Designer_TimelinePane"] .Content; Add a private field to the top of the AdvancedSearchViewModel class to store the active SceneViewModel. The SceneViewModel is needed to set the current selection and to get the little icons for the type of control. private SceneViewModel _activeSceneViewModel; When the active SceneViewModel changes, the ActiveSceneViewModel is stored in this field. The list of possible nodes is cleared and an PropertyChanged event is fired for this list to notify the UI to clear the list. This will make the eventhandler look like this: private void ActiveDocumentChanged(object sender, DocumentChangedEventArgs e) { var timelinePane = (TimelinePane)_services.GetService<IWindowService>() .PaletteRegistry["Designer_TimelinePane"].Content; _activeSceneViewModel = timelinePane.ActiveSceneViewModel; PossibleNodes = new List<PossibleNode>(); InvokePropertyChanged("PossibleNodes"); } The PossibleNode class used to store information about the controls found by the search. It’s a dumb data class with only 3 properties, the name of the control, the SceneNode and a brush used for the little icon. The SceneNode is the base class for every possible object you can create in Blend, like Brushes, Controls, Annotations, ResourceDictionaries and VisualStates. The entire PossibleNode class looks like this: using System.Windows.Media; using Microsoft.Expression.DesignSurface.ViewModel; namespace AdvancedSearch { public class PossibleNode { public string Name { get; set; } public SceneNode SceneNode { get; set; } public DrawingBrush IconBrush { get; set; } } } Add these two methods to the AdvancedSearchViewModel class: public void Search(string searchText) { } public void SelectElement(PossibleNode node){ } Both these methods are going to be called from the view. The Search method performs the search and updates the PossibleNodes list. The controls in the active document can be accessed thru TimeLineItemsManager class. This class contains a read only collection of TimeLineItems. By using a Linq query the possible nodes are selected and placed in the PossibleNodes list. var timelineItemManager = new TimelineItemManager(_activeSceneViewModel); PossibleNodes = new List<PossibleNode>( (from d in timelineItemManager.ItemList where d.DisplayName.ToLowerInvariant().StartsWith( searchText.ToLowerInvariant()) select new PossibleNode() { IconBrush = d.IconBrush, SceneNode = d.SceneNode, Name = d.DisplayName }).ToList() ); InvokePropertyChanged(InternalConst.PossibleNodes); The Select method is pretty straight forward. It contains two lines.The first to clear the selection. Otherwise the selected element would be added to the current selection. The second line selects the nodes. It is given a new array with the node to be selected. _activeSceneViewModel.ClearSelections(); _activeSceneViewModel.SelectNodes(new[] { node.SceneNode }); The last thing that needs to be done is to wire the whole thing to the View. The two event handlers just call the Search and SelectElement methods on the ViewModel. private void SearchQueryTextChanged(object sender, TextChangedEventArgs e) { _advancedSearchViewModel.Search(SearchQuery.Text); } private void SearchResultSelectionChanged(object sender, SelectionChangedEventArgs e) { if(e.AddedItems.Count>0) { _advancedSearchViewModel.SelectElement(e.AddedItems[0] as PossibleNode); } } The Listbox has to be bound to the PossibleNodes list and a simple DataTemplate is added to show the selection. The IconWithOverlay control can be found in the Microsoft.Expression.DesignSurface.UserInterface.Timeline.UI namespace in the Microsoft.Expression.DesignSurface assembly. The ListBox should look something like: <ListBox SelectionChanged="SearchResultSelectionChanged" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" Margin="4" Name="SearchResult" VerticalAlignment="Stretch" Grid.Row="1" ItemsSource="{Binding PossibleNodes}"> <ListBox.ItemTemplate> <DataTemplate> <StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal"> <tlui:IconWithOverlay Margin="2,0,10,0" Width="12" Height="12" SourceBrush="{Binding Path=IconBrush, Mode=OneWay}" /> <TextBlock Text="{Binding Name}"/> </StackPanel> </DataTemplate> </ListBox.ItemTemplate> </ListBox> Compile and run. Inside Blend the extension could look something like below. What’s Next When you’ve got the extension running. Try placing breakpoints in the code and see what else is in there. There’s a lot to explore and build extension on. I personally would love an extension to search for resources. Last but not least, you can download the source of project here. If you have any questions let me know. If you just want to use this extension, you can download the compiled dll here. Just extract the . zip into the /extensions folder of Expression Blend. Notes Target framework I ran into some issues when using the .NET Framework 4 Client Profile as a target framework. I got some strange error saying certain obvious namespaces could not be found, Microsoft.Expression in my case. If you run into something like this, try setting the target framework to .NET Framework 4 instead of the client version. Identifiers of default panes Identifier Type Title Designer_TimelinePane TimelinePane Objects and Timeline Designer_ToolPane ToolPane Tools Designer_ProjectPane ProjectPane Projects Designer_DataPane DataPane Data Designer_ResourcePane ResourcePane Resources Designer_PropertyInspector PropertyInspector Properties Designer_TriggersPane TriggersPane Triggers Interaction_Skin SkinView States Designer_AssetPane AssetPane Assets Interaction_Parts PartsPane Parts Designer_ResultsPane ResultsPane Results

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Implementing Linked Lists in C#

- by nijhawan.saurabh

Why? The question is why you need Linked Lists and why it is the foundation of any Abstract Data Structure. Take any of the Data Structures - Stacks, Queues, Heaps, Trees; there are two ways to go about implementing them - Using Arrays Using Linked Lists Now you use Arrays when you know about the size of the Nodes in the list at Compile time and Linked Lists are helpful where you are free to add as many Nodes to the List as required at Runtime. How? Now, let's see how we go about implementing a Simple Linked List in C#. Note: We'd be dealing with singly linked list for time being, there's also another version of linked lists - the Doubly Linked List which maintains two pointers (NEXT and BEFORE). Class Diagram Let's see the Class Diagram first: Code 1 // ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 2 // <copyright file="Node.cs" company=""> 3 // TODO: Update copyright text. 4 // </copyright> 5 // ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 6 7 namespace CSharpAlgorithmsAndDS 8 { 9 using System; 10 using System.Collections.Generic; 11 using System.Linq; 12 using System.Text; 13 14 /// <summary> 15 /// TODO: Update summary. 16 /// </summary> 17 public class Node 18 { 19 public Object data { get; set; } 20 21 public Node Next { get; set; } 22 } 23 } 24 1 // ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 2 // <copyright file="LinkedList.cs" company=""> 3 // TODO: Update copyright text. 4 // </copyright> 5 // ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 6 7 namespace CSharpAlgorithmsAndDS 8 { 9 using System; 10 using System.Collections.Generic; 11 using System.Linq; 12 using System.Text; 13 14 /// <summary> 15 /// TODO: Update summary. 16 /// </summary> 17 public class LinkedList 18 { 19 private Node Head; 20 21 public void AddNode(Node n) 22 { 23 n.Next = this.Head; 24 this.Head = n; 25 26 } 27 28 public void printNodes() 29 { 30 31 while (Head!=null) 32 { 33 Console.WriteLine(Head.data); 34 Head = Head.Next; 35 36 } 37 38 } 39 } 40 } 41 1 using System; 2 using System.Collections.Generic; 3 using System.Linq; 4 using System.Text; 5 6 namespace CSharpAlgorithmsAndDS 7 { 8 class Program 9 { 10 static void Main(string[] args) 11 { 12 LinkedList ll = new LinkedList(); 13 Node A = new Node(); 14 A.data = "A"; 15 16 Node B = new Node(); 17 B.data = "B"; 18 19 Node C = new Node(); 20 C.data = "C"; 21 ll.AddNode(A); 22 ll.AddNode(B); 23 ll.AddNode(C); 24 25 ll.printNodes(); 26 } 27 } 28 } 29 Final Words This is just a start, I will add more posts on Linked List covering more operations like Delete etc. and will also explore Doubly Linked List / Implementing Stacks/ Heaps/ Trees / Queues and what not using Linked Lists. Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}

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Abstracting functionality

- by Ralf Westphal

Originally posted on: http://geekswithblogs.net/theArchitectsNapkin/archive/2014/08/22/abstracting-functionality.aspxWhat is more important than data? Functionality. Yes, I strongly believe we should switch to a functionality over data mindset in programming. Or actually switch back to it. Focus on functionality Functionality once was at the core of software development. Back when algorithms were the first thing you heard about in CS classes. Sure, data structures, too, were important - but always from the point of view of algorithms. (Niklaus Wirth gave one of his books the title “Algorithms + Data Structures” instead of “Data Structures + Algorithms” for a reason.) The reason for the focus on functionality? Firstly, because software was and is about doing stuff. Secondly because sufficient performance was hard to achieve, and only thirdly memory efficiency. But then hardware became more powerful. That gave rise to a new mindset: object orientation. And with it functionality was devalued. Data took over its place as the most important aspect. Now discussions revolved around structures motivated by data relationships. (John Beidler gave his book the title “Data Structures and Algorithms: An Object Oriented Approach” instead of the other way around for a reason.) Sure, this data could be embellished with functionality. But nevertheless functionality was second. When you look at (domain) object models what you mostly find is (domain) data object models. The common object oriented approach is: data aka structure over functionality. This is true even for the most modern modeling approaches like Domain Driven Design. Look at the literature and what you find is recommendations on how to get data structures right: aggregates, entities, value objects. I´m not saying this is what object orientation was invented for. But I´m saying that´s what I happen to see across many teams now some 25 years after object orientation became mainstream through C++, Delphi, and Java. But why should we switch back? Because software development cannot become truly agile with a data focus. The reason for that lies in what customers need first: functionality, behavior, operations. To be clear, that´s not why software is built. The purpose of software is to be more efficient than the alternative. Money mainly is spent to get a certain level of quality (e.g. performance, scalability, security etc.). But without functionality being present, there is nothing to work on the quality of. What customers want is functionality of a certain quality. ASAP. And tomorrow new functionality needs to be added, existing functionality needs to be changed, and quality needs to be increased. No customer ever wanted data or structures. Of course data should be processed. Data is there, data gets generated, transformed, stored. But how the data is structured for this to happen efficiently is of no concern to the customer. Ask a customer (or user) whether she likes the data structured this way or that way. She´ll say, “I don´t care.” But ask a customer (or user) whether he likes the functionality and its quality this way or that way. He´ll say, “I like it” (or “I don´t like it”). Build software incrementally From this very natural focus of customers and users on functionality and its quality follows we should develop software incrementally. That´s what Agility is about. Deliver small increments quickly and often to get frequent feedback. That way less waste is produced, and learning can take place much easier (on the side of the customer as well as on the side of developers). An increment is some added functionality or quality of functionality.[1] So as it turns out, Agility is about functionality over whatever. But software developers’ thinking is still stuck in the object oriented mindset of whatever over functionality. Bummer. I guess that (at least partly) explains why Agility always hits a glass ceiling in projects. It´s a clash of mindsets, of cultures. Driving software development by demanding small increases in functionality runs against thinking about software as growing (data) structures sprinkled with functionality. (Excuse me, if this sounds a bit broad-brush. But you get my point.) The need for abstraction In the end there need to be data structures. Of course. Small and large ones. The phrase functionality over data does not deny that. It´s not functionality instead of data or something. It´s just over, i.e. functionality should be thought of first. It´s a tad more important. It´s what the customer wants. That´s why we need a way to design functionality. Small and large. We need to be able to think about functionality before implementing it. We need to be able to reason about it among team members. We need to be able to communicate our mental models of functionality not just by speaking about them, but also on paper. Otherwise reasoning about it does not scale. We learned thinking about functionality in the small using flow charts, Nassi-Shneiderman diagrams, pseudo code, or UML sequence diagrams. That´s nice and well. But it does not scale. You can use these tools to describe manageable algorithms. But it does not work for the functionality triggered by pressing the “1-Click Order” on an amazon product page for example. There are several reasons for that, I´d say. Firstly, the level of abstraction over code is negligible. It´s essentially non-existent. Drawing a flow chart or writing pseudo code or writing actual code is very, very much alike. All these tools are about control flow like code is.[2] In addition all tools are computationally complete. They are about logic which is expressions and especially control statements. Whatever you code in Java you can fully (!) describe using a flow chart. And then there is no data. They are about control flow and leave out the data altogether. Thus data mostly is assumed to be global. That´s shooting yourself in the foot, as I hope you agree. Even if it´s functionality over data that does not mean “don´t think about data”. Right to the contrary! Functionality only makes sense with regard to data. So data needs to be in the picture right from the start - but it must not dominate the thinking. The above tools fail on this. Bottom line: So far we´re unable to reason in a scalable and abstract manner about functionality. That´s why programmers are so driven to start coding once they are presented with a problem. Programming languages are the only tool they´ve learned to use to reason about functional solutions. Or, well, there might be exceptions. Mathematical notation and SQL may have come to your mind already. Indeed they are tools on a higher level of abstraction than flow charts etc. That´s because they are declarative and not computationally complete. They leave out details - in order to deliver higher efficiency in devising overall solutions. We can easily reason about functionality using mathematics and SQL. That´s great. Except for that they are domain specific languages. They are not general purpose. (And they don´t scale either, I´d say.) Bummer. So to be more precise we need a scalable general purpose tool on a higher than code level of abstraction not neglecting data. Enter: Flow Design. Abstracting functionality using data flows I believe the solution to the problem of abstracting functionality lies in switching from control flow to data flow. Data flow very naturally is not about logic details anymore. There are no expressions and no control statements anymore. There are not even statements anymore. Data flow is declarative by nature. With data flow we get rid of all the limiting traits of former approaches to modeling functionality. In addition, nomen est omen, data flows include data in the functionality picture. With data flows, data is visibly flowing from processing step to processing step. Control is not flowing. Control is wherever it´s needed to process data coming in. That´s a crucial difference and needs some rewiring in your head to be fully appreciated.[2] Since data flows are declarative they are not the right tool to describe algorithms, though, I´d say. With them you don´t design functionality on a low level. During design data flow processing steps are black boxes. They get fleshed out during coding. Data flow design thus is more coarse grained than flow chart design. It starts on a higher level of abstraction - but then is not limited. By nesting data flows indefinitely you can design functionality of any size, without losing sight of your data. Data flows scale very well during design. They can be used on any level of granularity. And they can easily be depicted. Communicating designs using data flows is easy and scales well, too. The result of functional design using data flows is not algorithms (too low level), but processes. Think of data flows as descriptions of industrial production lines. Data as material runs through a number of processing steps to be analyzed, enhances, transformed. On the top level of a data flow design might be just one processing step, e.g. “execute 1-click order”. But below that are arbitrary levels of flows with smaller and smaller steps. That´s not layering as in “layered architecture”, though. Rather it´s a stratified design à la Abelson/Sussman. Refining data flows is not your grandpa´s functional decomposition. That was rooted in control flows. Refining data flows does not suffer from the limits of functional decomposition against which object orientation was supposed to be an antidote. Summary I´ve been working exclusively with data flows for functional design for the past 4 years. It has changed my life as a programmer. What once was difficult is now easy. And, no, I´m not using Clojure or F#. And I´m not a async/parallel execution buff. Designing the functionality of increments using data flows works great with teams. It produces design documentation which can easily be translated into code - in which then the smallest data flow processing steps have to be fleshed out - which is comparatively easy. Using a systematic translation approach code can mirror the data flow design. That way later on the design can easily be reproduced from the code if need be. And finally, data flow designs play well with object orientation. They are a great starting point for class design. But that´s a story for another day. To me data flow design simply is one of the missing links of systematic lightweight software design. There are also other artifacts software development can produce to get feedback, e.g. process descriptions, test cases. But customers can be delighted more easily with code based increments in functionality. ? No, I´m not talking about the endless possibilities this opens for parallel processing. Data flows are useful independently of multi-core processors and Actor-based designs. That´s my whole point here. Data flows are good for reasoning and evolvability. So forget about any special frameworks you might need to reap benefits from data flows. None are necessary. Translating data flow designs even into plain of Java is possible. ?

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CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, June 09, 2011

CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, June 09, 2011Popular ReleasesNetOffice - The easiest way to use Office in .NET: NetOffice Release 0.9: Changes: - fix examples (include issue 16026) - add new examples - 32Bit/64Bit Walkthrough is now available in technical Documentation. Includes: - Runtime Binaries and Source Code for .NET Framework:......v2.0, v3.0, v3.5, v4.0 - Tutorials in C# and VB.Net:..............................................................COM Proxy Management, Events, etc. - Examples in C# and VB.Net:............................................................Excel, Word, Outlook, PowerPoint, Access - COMAddi...Reusable Library: V1.1.3: A collection of reusable abstractions for enterprise application developerDevpad: 0.4: Whats new for Devpad 0.4: New JavaScript support New Options dialog Minor Bug Fix's, improvements and speed upsClosedXML - The easy way to OpenXML: ClosedXML 0.54.0: New on this release: 1) Mayor performance improvements. 2) AdjustToContents now take into account the text rotation. 3) Fixed issues 6782, 6784, 6788HTML-IDEx: HTML-IDEx .15 ALPHA: This release fixes line counting a little bit and adds the masshighlight() sub, which highlights pasted and inserted code.AutoLoL: AutoLoL v2.0.3: - Improved summoner spells are now displayed - Fixed some of the startup errors people got - Double clicking an item selects it - Some usability changes that make using AutoLoL just a little easier - Bug fixes AutoLoL v2 is not an update, but an entirely new version! Please install to a different directory than AutoLoL v1VidCoder: 0.9.2: Updated to HandBrake 4024svn. This fixes problems with mpeg2 sources: corrupted previews, incorrect progress indicators and encodes that incorrectly report as failed. Fixed a problem that prevented target sizes above 2048 MB.SharePoint Search XSL Samples: SharePoint 2010 Samples: I have updated some of the samples from the 2007 release. These all work in SharePoint 2010. I removed the Pivot on File Extension because SharePoint 2010 search has refiners that perform the same function.Fingertip detection via OpenNI: Fingertip Detection 1.0.0.0: This release will allow you to recognize fingertips. To do that shake you hand, after pressing button. Known Issues : 1. When your hand is near to some objects, recognition is not working very well 2. When you hand is far away from sensor, recognition is not working very wellAcDown????? - Anime&Comic Downloader: AcDown????? v3.0 Beta5: ??AcDown?????????????，??????????????，????、????。?????Acfun????? ????32??64? Windows XP/Vista/7 ????????????? ??：????????Windows XP???,?????????.NET Framework 2.0???(x86)?.NET Framework 2.0???(x64)，?????"?????????"??? ??v3.0 Beta5 ?????????? ???? ?? ???????? ???"????????"?? ????????????? ????????/???? ?? ???"????"??? ?? ??????????? ?? ?? ??????????? ?? ?????????????????? ??????????????????? ???????????????? ????????????Discussions???????? ????AcDown??????????????VFPX: GoFish 4 Beta 1: Current beta is Build 144 (released 2011-06-07 ) See the GoFish4 info page for details and video link: http://vfpx.codeplex.com/wikipage?title=GoFishSharePoint 2010 FBA Pack: SharePoint 2010 FBA Pack 1.0.3: Fixed User Management screen when "RequiresQuestionAndAnswer" set to true Reply to Email Address can now be customized User Management page now only displays users that reside in the membership database Web parts have been changed to inherit from System.Web.UI.WebControls.WebParts.WebPart, so that they will display on anonymous application pages For installation and configuration steps see here.SizeOnDisk: 1.0.8.2: With installerTerrariViewer: TerrariViewer v2.5: Added new items associated with Terraria v1.0.3 to the character editor. Fixed multiple bugs with Piggy Bank EditorySterling NoSQL OODB for .NET 4.0, Silverlight 4 and 5, and Windows Phone 7: Sterling OODB v1.5: Welcome to the Sterling 1.5 RTM. This version is backwards compatible without modification to the 1.4 beta. For the 1.0, you will need to upgrade your database. Please see this discussion for details. You must modify your 1.0 code for persistence. The 1.5 version defaults to an in-memory driver. To save to isolated storage or use one of the new mechanisms, see the available drivers and pass an instance of the appropriate one to your database (different databases may use different drivers). ...EnhSim: EnhSim 2.4.6 BETA: 2.4.6 BETAThis release supports WoW patch 4.1 at level 85 To use this release, you must have the Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable Package installed. This can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=A7B7A05E-6DE6-4D3A-A423-37BF0912DB84 To use the GUI you must have the .NET 4.0 Framework installed. This can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=9cfb2d51-5ff4-4491-b0e5-b386f32c0992 - Added in the proper...Grammar and Spell Checking Plugin for Windows Live Writer: Grammar Checker Plugin v1.0: First version of the grammar checker plugin for Windows Live Writer. You can show your appreciation for this plugin and support further development by donating via PayPal. Any amount will be appreciated. Thank you. Donatepatterns & practices: Project Silk: Project Silk Community Drop 10 - June 3, 2011: Changes from previous drop: Many code changes: please see the readme.mht for details. New "Application Notifications" chapter. Updated "Server-Side Implementation" chapter. Guidance Chapters Ready for Review The Word documents for the chapters are included with the source code in addition to the CHM to help you provide feedback. The PDF is provided as a separate download for your convenience. Installation Overview To install and run the reference implementation, you must perform the fol...Claims Based Identity & Access Control Guide: Release Candidate: Highlights of this release This is the release candidate drop of the new "Claims Identity Guide" edition. In this release you will find: All code samples, including all ACS v2: ACS as a Federation Provider - Showing authentication with LiveID, Google, etc. ACS as a FP with Multiple Business Partners. ACS and REST endpoints. Using a WP7 client with REST endpoints. All ACS specific chapters. Two new chapters on SharePoint (SSO and Federation) All revised v1 chapters We are now ...Terraria Map Generator: TerrariaMapTool 1.0.0.4 Beta: 1) Fixed the generated map.html file so that the file:/// is included in the base path. 2) Added the ability to use parallelization during generation. This will cause the program to use as many threads as there are physical cores. 3) Fixed some background overdraw.New ProjectsAlumni Association Website Centre: We named our project 'MCIS - Ma Chung Information System Association Centre'. This project is only simulation for us to try building a complex website that have functional features.ASP.NET without ClientID's: Render ASP.NET Controls without ClientID - reduce HTML output responseBLPImage: .BLP files are texture files used in games made by Blizzard Entertainment, also used in other games like Neverwinter Nights.Breaker Dev IRC Client: Breaker Dev IRC is just another IRC client that's Open source.Cloud Upload: CloudUpload shows how to use Shared Access Signatures to upload, download, delete and list blobs in a Azure Storage container. Using shared acces signatures permits to partition a storage account and NOT to use the storage shared key in the application. The project uses REST API.Clounter, count how many lines you have coded: A tiny, small, lightweight, ultra simple app to count how many lines of code you have programmed so far. Or hoe many lines of anything there's on a folder. You can filter by directory and by file extension.Color picker control for Silverlight: Color picker is a custom Silverlight control that makes it easy to add color picking functionality to the Silverlight projects.CommonSample: a code sampleCompactMapper: A simple object/relational mapper for the Compact Framework. Based on attributes and supporting SQLite Tracker https://www.pivotaltracker.com/projects/303523dbkk101 hello codeplex: Trying out ClickOnce deployment/updatesDesktop Browser: Web based file explorer, runs locally on your browser, designed for media desktops.EFMagic: EFMagic is a library based on Entity Framework 4.1 that manage the schema of your database, automatically generates sql script to update your database and generate with Code First your schema.EWF_Install: Installs EWF (Enhanced Write Filter) in Windows XP without hassle. Changes system settings, accordingly to EWF characteristics. Extreme Download: Projeto desenvolvido no tempo livre para auxiliar a gerenciar download de vários arquivos.Flac2Wav: Converts FLAC file into WAV. Example of using libFLAC.dll in C#.Flac2Wma: Converts FLAC files into lossless WMA files. Uses libFLAC.dll, taglib-sharp.dll, MediaInfo32.dll. Converts directory tree, with only one click. Retains information from Tags.GeoMedia PostGIS data server: GeoMedia PostGIS data server is a GDO (Geographic Database Object) component that enables read and write to a Postgre/PostGIS database from Intergraph GeoMedia product family.Google Page Speed for .Net: This little piece of software sends a request to the Google page speed API, then parses the JSON response and presents them in a nice class. I use this class on this webpage to show the page speed score at the bottom right corner of my site: http://schaffhauser.meHubLog: Tool for application administrator: collects and joins logs from multiple instances of an application, and displays them. Example of usage in C#: the telnet protocol, dynamically compiled functions as elements of configuration.hydrodesktop2: HydroDesktop is a free and open source desktop application developed in C# .NET that serves as a client for CUAHSI HIS WaterOneFlow web services data and includes data discovery, download, visualization, editing, and integration with other analysis and modeling tools. ImageResizing.Net: Makes resizing and cropping images easy and fast - just change the URL. Mature and popular HttpModule for ASP.NET and IIS. Works great with jQuery, jCrop, Galleria, and and can be easily integrated into any CMS.License Header Manager for Visual Studio: Automatically insert license headers into your source code files in Visual Studio.Ma Chung Voice website: Ma Chung University website project. created by Yogi Rinaldi & Irfan using ASP.NET Ma Chung University, Indonesia.MCFC Futsal Machung Malang Indonesia: Websites We discuss the sport of futsal. Here we make in such a way that can be accessed easily by the user. please try.Mp3Cleaner: Mp3Cleaner is used to "clean up" and organize the music files external and internal (tags) information. Despite the name, supports most types of music files (flac, wma, wav .... ogg, …), it uses the tagLib library.MSBuild CI Tasks: Provides MSBuild utility tasks for continuous integration. NetMemory: let us remember ancestor better!nhibernate of mvcmusicstore: convert by http://mvcmusicstore.codeplex.com/ ·Shows data access via nhibernate & fluent tool: ·http://nmg.codeplex.com/ demo:http://www.pcme.info Parallelminds Asp.net Web Parts Demo Code: This is Asp.net web part demo code by www.parallelminds.biz to help new developers, community understand what are Asp.net web parts and how to use it for various purposes.This will continue exploring more asp.net related web parts functionality.PivotalTrackerAgent: Pivotal Tracker Agent provides ways to update your projects on PivotalTracker.com. Your developers will no longer have to update it through its web-based GUI if you incorporate it with your event handler of source control and/or bug tracking system.Programa voluntario: Sistema de gerenciamento de instituições e voluntáriosRaytracer for fun: Simple raytracingengine written for fun.SCOPE PHOTOGRAPHY MA CHUNG INDONESIA: This website contains a collection of people who hobby photography. We can shared photo and shared more info about photography. And we can give a comment in other member photo galery. Look and Join us. sqlscriptmover: Exports stored procedures, function, views, tables and triggers to individual files or imports same and attempts to create in designated database.UKM MA CHUNG FUTSAL: This Website Created to all of Ma Chung Student for develop his talent of futsal especially with user friendly interfaceVideoStreamer Iphone/Ipad: Video streamer that support single Range. it will handle video streaming especially MP4, for iphone and ipadVolleyExtracurriculer: We named our project 'UMC Information System Volley Extracurricular’. It doesn't mean this project is really used to be official website for volley extracurricular in our campus, but it only simulation for us to tried to built one complex website.Web Gozar Manager: HI

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CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, December 16, 2010

CodePlex Daily Summary for Thursday, December 16, 2010Popular ReleasesSharpDropBox Client for .NET: WP7 SharpDropBox Client - 0.1 Technology Preview: I decided to go ahead and release this. It works well for simple browsing folder structure/downloading files (and login works). See samples for an example of how to use it. I am in progress with a couple other methods which aren't currently working.SQL Monitor: SQL Monitor 2.9: 1. automatically set sql for new query if a object is selected(table/sp/function/view)uComponents: uComponents v2.0.1: This release: Fixes a critical issue with IIS 6. Removes various script error issues in Internet Explorer Supports the media picker with advanced dialog and preview. uComponents is a collaborative project for creating components for Umbraco including data types, XSLT extensions, controls and more. Containing 20 data-types, 7 XSLT extension libraries, keyboard short-cuts, drag-n-drop functionality, as well as great developer utilities - uComponents is one of the must-have packages for a...SplendidCRM: SplendidCRM 5.0 Community Edition: SplendidCRM Software has adopted the GNU Affero General Public License Version 3 (AGPLv3) for its Community Edition. This release includes the full set of SQL source code in the Community Edition, something that was previously only available in the Professional and Enterprise Editions. An article on the subject of Commercial Open-Source licensing has been posted at http://www.codeproject.com/KB/architecture/splendid-guide-article6.aspx.DotSpatial: DotSpatial 12-15-2010: This release contains a few minor bug fixes and hopefully the GDAL libraries for the 3.5 x86 build actually built to the correct directory this time.DotNetNuke® Community Edition: 05.06.01 Beta: This is the initial Beta of DotNetNuke 5.6.1. See the DotNetNuke Roadmap a full list of changes in this release.MSBuild Extension Pack: December 2010: Release Blog Post The MSBuild Extension Pack December 2010 release provides a collection of over 380 MSBuild tasks. A high level summary of what the tasks currently cover includes the following: System Items: Active Directory, Certificates, COM+, Console, Date and Time, Drives, Environment Variables, Event Logs, Files and Folders, FTP, GAC, Network, Performance Counters, Registry, Services, Sound Code: Assemblies, AsyncExec, CAB Files, Code Signing, DynamicExecute, File Detokenisation, GU...Access Control Service Samples and Documentation (Labs): Samples-R3: Contains latest ACS samples (corresponding to R3 release) that show how to integrate ACS with web services, ASP.NET websites (Web Forms and MVC) and on how to interact with the ACS Management Service. The Readmes for these samples are available here.TweetSharp: TweetSharp v2.0.0.0 - Preview 5: Documentation for this release may be found at http://tweetsharp.codeplex.com/wikipage?title=UserGuide&referringTitle=Documentation. Note: This code is currently preview quality. Preview 5 ChangesMaintenance release with user reported fixes Preview 4 ChangesReintroduced fluent interface support via satellite assembly Added entities support, entity segmentation, and ITweetable/ITweeter interfaces for client development Numerous fixes reported by preview users Preview 3 ChangesNumerous ...EnhSim: EnhSim 2.2.2 ALPHA: 2.2.2 ALPHAThis release adds in the changes for 4.03a at level 85 To use this release, you must have the Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable Package installed. This can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=A7B7A05E-6DE6-4D3A-A423-37BF0912DB84 To use the GUI you must have the .NET 4.0 Framework installed. This can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=9cfb2d51-5ff4-4491-b0e5-b386f32c0992 - The spirit ...Silverlight Contrib: Silverlight Contrib 2010.1.0: 2010.1.0 New FeaturesCompatibility Release for Silverlight 4 and Visual Studio 2010FlickrNet API Library: 3.1.4000: Newest release. Now contains dedicated Windows Phone 7 DLL as well as all previous DLLs. Also contains Windows Help file documentation now as standard.mojoPortal: 2.3.5.8: see release notes on mojoportal.com http://www.mojoportal.com/mojoportal-2358-released.aspx Note that we have separate deployment packages for .NET 3.5 and .NET 4.0 The deployment package downloads on this page are pre-compiled and ready for production deployment, they contain no C# source code. To download the source code see the Source Code Tab I recommend getting the latest source code using TortoiseHG, you can get the source code corresponding to this release here.Microsoft All-In-One Code Framework: Visual Studio 2010 Code Samples 2010-12-13: Code samples for Visual Studio 2010Wii Backup Fusion: Wii Backup Fusion 0.9 Beta: - Aqua or brushed metal style for Mac OS X - Shows selection count beside ID - Game list selection mode via settings - Compare Files <-> WBFS game lists - Verify game images/DVD/WBFS - WIT command line for log (via settings) - Cancel possibility for loading games process - Progress infos while loading games - Localization for dates - UTF-8 support - Shortcuts added - View game infos in browser - Transfer infos for log - All transfer routines rewritten - Extract image from image/WBFS - Support....NETTER Code Starter Pack: v1.0.beta: '.NETTER Code Starter Pack ' contains a gallery of Visual Studio 2010 solutions leveraging latest and new technologies and frameworks based on Microsoft .NET Framework. Each Visual Studio solution included here is focused to provide a very simple starting point for cutting edge development technologies and framework, using well known Northwind database (for database driven scenarios). The current release of this project includes starter samples for the following technologies: ASP.NET Dynamic...NuGet (formerly NuPack): NuGet 1.0 Release Candidate: NuGet is a free, open source developer focused package management system for the .NET platform intent on simplifying the process of incorporating third party libraries into a .NET application during development. This release is a Visual Studio 2010 extension and contains the the Package Manager Console and the Add Package Dialog. This new build targets the newer feed (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=206669) and package format. See http://nupack.codeplex.com/documentation?title=Nuspe...Free Silverlight & WPF Chart Control - Visifire: Visifire Silverlight, WPF Charts v3.6.5 Released: Hi, Today we are releasing final version of Visifire, v3.6.5 with the following new feature: * New property AutoFitToPlotArea has been introduced in DataSeries. AutoFitToPlotArea will bring bubbles inside the PlotArea in order to avoid clipping of bubbles in bubble chart. You can visit Visifire documentation to know more. http://www.visifire.com/visifirechartsdocumentation.php Also this release includes few bug fixes: * Chart threw exception while adding new Axis in Chart using Vi...PHPExcel: PHPExcel 1.7.5 Production: DonationsDonate via PayPal via PayPal. If you want to, we can also add your name / company on our Donation Acknowledgements page. PEAR channelWe now also have a full PEAR channel! Here's how to use it: New installation: pear channel-discover pear.pearplex.net pear install pearplex/PHPExcel Or if you've already installed PHPExcel before: pear upgrade pearplex/PHPExcel The official page can be found at http://pearplex.net. Want to contribute?Please refer the Contribute page.??????????: All-In-One Code Framework ??? 2010-12-10: ?????All-In-One Code Framework（??） 2010?12??????！！http://i3.codeplex.com/Project/Download/FileDownload.aspx?ProjectName=1code&DownloadId=128165 ?????release?，???????ASP.NET, WinForm, Silverlight????12?Sample Code。???，??????????sample code。 ?????：http://blog.csdn.net/sjb5201/archive/2010/12/13/6072675.aspx ??，??????MSDN????????????。 http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/zh-CN/codezhchs/threads ?????????????????，??Email ????New ProjectsAchievement Information System: AchIS is a software which documented all about student's prestigeAutoMock: AutoMock saves you time when writing unit tests by wiring up all the dependencies as mocks for the class under test.Basic samples: Basic C# samplesBCrypt.Net: A .Net port of jBCrypt implemented in C#. It uses a variant of the Blowfish encryption algorithm’s keying schedule, and introduces a work factor, which allows you to determine how expensive the hash function will be, allowing the algorithm to be "future-proof".Desafio Dot.Net: Projeto para o Desafio DotNetEDAFramework: This is a Estimation of Distribution Algorithm framework.Fluxions: Fluxions is a 3D Graphics Engine designed to make writing simple graphics or visualization projects easy. It is ideal for writing computer games or scientific type work where you need to easily prototype an idea. It includes support for writing OpenGL apps with GLUT or SDL.Guruzan.Com: Guruzan.Com is a new way to share your ideas and especially your claims.. We are about the create a next generation social network which will bring improved standarts and innovations for internet sharing. Our project includes many students from different countries...HotCold: This game loads a board of squares, of which one is randomly selected as the "HOT" square. The goal is to find the "HOT" square in the fewest clicks possible. .InSim.NET: A .NET InSim library for the racing simulator Live for Speed.Javascript Utils: JavaScript Utilitieskoppees: Mingi veebiliidesKVB-Abfahrtstafel: Die KVB-Abfahrtstafel erlaubt es, sich einige Haltestellentafeln im Netz der Kölner Verkehrsbetriebe - inklusive Störungsmeldungen - schon vor dem Verlassen des Büros/Hauses/Hotels am PC anzusehen. Besonders bei miesem Wetter eine echte Erleichterung.Lessons in PivotViewer: The Silverlight PivotViewer is a great control with a great deal of potential. However, there are a lot of questions on how to use and customize the PivotViewer. This project will attempt to answer those questions by providing a series of lessons on the PivotViewer.Liuyi: liuyiLiuyi.network: Liuyi.networkMiniDouBan: MiniDouBanN2F Yverdon Database Helper: A class to aid in performing simple database queries within N2F Yverdon. Also provides the capability to store queries for later use.N2F Yverdon Form Helper: A system that allows interaction with web forms in a fashion similar to that of ASP.NET MVC model binding.N2F Yverdon Sanitizers: A system to help ease the pain of sanitizing data. The system comes with some basic sanitizers as well as the framework necessary to enable easy development of custom sanitizers.Next Question: By Relavance: Next Question makes it easier for System Users, Administrators, Business Analysts, etc to run ad-hoc queries on any data store. Regardless of the type or location of the information, Next Question removes the need for T-SQL programmers to write explicit queries to answer businessNPicConvertDemo: azure test/demo/example projectOpenSprints: OpenSprints for WindowsPML_FahrradVerleih: PML_FahrradVerleih PMS ProjektPowerLib: PowerLib extends .NET Base Class Library functionality with algorithms and data structures. First release would be at next week.ProJect Manager Software: Project Manager Softwareqxtplatform: qxtplatformSencha Direct Stack based on ASP.NET MVC: This project focuses on creating ExtJS/Sencha Direct server stack using ASP.NET MVC.SqlExecuter: Simply run sql scripts against a SQL Server databaseSystem8: Experimental Silverlight project to help understand system 8's behavior (mehod of calibration bottom-quark tagging).TeamManager: Team management software based on silverlight application. It use PRISM and MEF to have flexible and extensible architecture.Umbraco Single Item Picker: Extention to the Umbraco, needs to pick: - Content pages, - Media items, - File System Objects, - Member Items in more "better way" additionally control returns not only item name(title) but also extended information (path, icon). WebSharper Community Samples: WebSharper Community SamplesWindows Phone 7 Charts: Charting component for Windows Phone 7 applications.Windows Phone 7 Silverlight ZXing Barcode Scanning Library: ZXing (pronounced "zebra crossing") is an open-source, multi-format 1D/2D barcode image processing library originally implemented by Google in Java. This is a Silverlight port of the csharp ZXing port created by Suraj Supekar at revision 1202 in the SVN repository. WPF RCON: WPF RCON is a RCON client for COD4 servers. It's RCON library + WPF GUI. It's developed in C#. It's far from being complete.

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Down Tools Week Cometh: Kissing Goodbye to CVs/Resumes and Cover Letters

- by Bart Read

I haven't blogged about what I'm doing in my (not so new) temporary role as Red Gate's technical recruiter, mostly because it's been routine, business as usual stuff, and because I've been trying to understand the role by doing it. I think now though the time has come to get a little more radical, so I'm going to tell you why I want to largely eliminate CVs/resumes and cover letters from the application process for some of our technical roles, and why I think that might be a good thing for candidates (and for us). I have a terrible confession to make, or at least it's a terrible confession for a recruiter: I don't really like CV sifting, or reading cover letters, and, unless I've misread the mood around here, neither does anybody else. It's dull, it's time-consuming, and it's somewhat soul destroying because, when all is said and done, you're being paid to be incredibly judgemental about people based on relatively little information. I feel like I've dirtied myself by saying that - I mean, after all, it's a core part of my job - but it sucks, it really does. (And, of course, the truth is I'm still a software engineer at heart, and I'm always looking for ways to do things better.) On the flip side, I've never met anyone who likes writing their CV. It takes hours and hours of faffing around and massaging it into shape, and the whole process is beset by a gnawing anxiety, frustration, and insecurity. All you really want is a chance to demonstrate your skills - not just talk about them - and how do you do that in a CV or cover letter? Often the best candidates will include samples of their work (a portfolio, screenshots, links to websites, product downloads, etc.), but sometimes this isn't possible, or may not be appropriate, or you just don't think you're allowed because of what your school/university careers service has told you (more commonly an issue with grads, obviously). And what are we actually trying to find out about people with all of this? I think the common criteria are actually pretty basic: Smart Gets things done (thanks for these two Joel) Not an a55hole* (sorry, have to get around Simple Talk's swear filter - and thanks to Professor Robert I. Sutton for this one) *Of course, everyone has off days, and I don't honestly think we're too worried about somebody being a bit grumpy every now and again. We can do a bit better than this in the context of the roles I'm talking about: we can be more specific about what "gets things done" means, at least in part. For software engineers and interns, the non-exhaustive meaning of "gets things done" is: Excellent coder For test engineers, the non-exhaustive meaning of "gets things done" is: Good at finding problems in software Competent coder Team player, etc., to me, are covered by "not an a55hole". I don't expect people to be the life and soul of the party, or a wild extrovert - that's not what team player means, and it's not what "not an a55hole" means. Some of our best technical staff are quiet, introverted types, but they're still pleasant to work with. My problem is that I don't think the initial sift really helps us find out whether people are smart and get things done with any great efficacy. It's better than nothing, for sure, but it's not as good as it could be. It's also contentious, and potentially unfair/inequitable - if you want to get an idea of what I mean by this, check out the background information section at the bottom. Before I go any further, let's look at the Red Gate recruitment process for technical staff* as it stands now: (LOTS of) People apply for jobs. All these applications go through a brutal process of manual sifting, which eliminates between 75 and 90% of them, depending upon the role, and the time of year**. Depending upon the role, those who pass the sift will be sent an assessment or telescreened. For the purposes of this blog post I'm only interested in those that are sent some sort of programming assessment, or bug hunt. This means software engineers, test engineers, and software interns, which are the roles for which I receive the most applications. The telescreen tends to be reserved for project or product managers. Those that pass the assessment are invited in for first interview. This interview is mostly about assessing their technical skills***, although we're obviously on the look out for cultural fit red flags as well. If the first interview goes well we'll invite candidates back for a second interview. This is where team/cultural fit is really scoped out. We also use this interview to dive more deeply into certain areas of their skillset, and explore any concerns that may have come out of the first interview (these obviously won't have been serious or obvious enough to cause a rejection at that point, but are things we do need to look into before we'd consider making an offer). We might subsequently invite them in for lunch before we make them an offer. This tends to happen when we're recruiting somebody for a specific team and we'd like them to meet all the people they'll be working with directly. It's not an interview per se, but can prove pivotal if they don't gel with the team. Anyone who's made it this far will receive an offer from us. *We have a slightly quirky definition of "technical staff" as it relates to the technical recruiter role here. It includes software engineers, test engineers, software interns, user experience specialists, technical authors, project managers, product managers, and development managers, but does not include product support or information systems roles. **For example, the quality of graduate applicants overall noticeably drops as the academic year wears on, which is not to say that by now there aren't still stars in there, just that they're fewer and further between. ***Some organisations prefer to assess for team fit first, but I think assessing technical skills is a more effective initial filter - if they're the nicest person in the world, but can't cut a line of code they're not going to work out. Now, as I suggested in the title, Red Gate's Down Tools Week is upon us once again - next week in fact - and I had proposed as a project that we refactor and automate the first stage of marking our programming assessments. Marking assessments, and in fact organising the marking of them, is a somewhat time-consuming process, and we receive many assessment solutions that just don't make the cut, for whatever reason. Whilst I don't think it's possible to fully automate marking, I do think it ought to be possible to run a suite of automated tests over each candidate's solution to see whether or not it behaves correctly and, if it does, move on to a manual stage where we examine the code for structure, decomposition, style, readability, maintainability, etc. Obviously it's possible to use tools to generate potentially helpful metrics for some of these indices as well. This would obviously reduce the marking workload, and would provide candidates with quicker feedback about whether they've been successful - though I do wonder if waiting a tactful interval before sending a (nicely written) rejection might be wise. I duly scrawled out a picture of my ideal process, which looked like this: The problem is, as soon as I'd roughed it out, I realised that fundamentally it wasn't an ideal process at all, which explained the gnawing feeling of cognitive dissonance I'd been wrestling with all week, whilst I'd been trying to find time to do this. Here's what I mean. Automated assessment marking, and the associated infrastructure around that, makes it much easier for us to deal with large numbers of assessments. This means we can be much more permissive about who we send assessments out to or, in other words, we can give more candidates the opportunity to really demonstrate their skills to us. And this leads to a question: why not give everyone the opportunity to demonstrate their skills, to show that they're smart and can get things done? (Two or three of us even discussed this in the down tools week hustings earlier this week.) And isn't this a lot simpler than the alternative we'd been considering? (FYI, this was automated CV/cover letter sifting by some form of textual analysis to ideally eliminate the worst 50% or so of applications based on an analysis of the 20,000 or so historical applications we've received since 2007 - definitely not the basic keyword analysis beloved of recruitment agencies, since this would eliminate hardly anyone who was awful, but definitely would eliminate stellar Oxbridge candidates - #fail - or some nightmarishly complex Google-like system where we profile all our currently employees, only to realise that we're never going to get representative results because we don't have a statistically significant sample size in any given role - also #fail.) No, I think the new way is better. We let people self-select. We make them the masters (or mistresses) of their own destiny. We give applicants the power - we put their fate in their hands - by giving them the chance to demonstrate their skills, which is what they really want anyway, instead of requiring that they spend hours and hours creating a CV and cover letter that I'm going to evaluate for suitability, and make a value judgement about, in approximately 1 minute (give or take). It doesn't matter what university you attended, it doesn't matter if you had a bad year when you took your A-levels - here's your chance to shine, so take it and run with it. (As a side benefit, we cut the number of applications we have to sift by something like two thirds.) WIN! OK, yeah, sounds good, but will it actually work? That's an excellent question. My gut feeling is yes, and I'll justify why below (and hopefully have gone some way towards doing that above as well), but what I'm proposing here is really that we run an experiment for a period of time - probably a couple of months or so - and measure the outcomes we see: How many people apply? (Wouldn't be surprised or alarmed to see this cut by a factor of ten.) How many of them submit a good assessment? (More/less than at present?) How much overhead is there for us in dealing with these assessments compared to now? What are the success and failure rates at each interview stage compared to now? How many people are we hiring at the end of it compared to now? I think it'll work because I hypothesize that, amongst other things: It self-selects for people who really want to work at Red Gate which, at the moment, is something I have to try and assess based on their CV and cover letter - but if you're not that bothered about working here, why would you complete the assessment? Candidates who would submit a shoddy application probably won't feel motivated to do the assessment. Candidates who would demonstrate good attention to detail in their CV/cover letter will demonstrate good attention to detail in the assessment. In general, only the better candidates will complete and submit the assessment. Marking assessments is much less work so we'll be able to deal with any increase that we see (hopefully we will see). There are obviously other questions as well: Is plagiarism going to be a problem? Is there any way we can detect/discourage potential plagiarism? How do we assess candidates' education and experience? What about their ability to communicate in writing? Do we still want them to submit a CV afterwards if they pass assessment? Do we want to offer them the opportunity to tell us a bit about why they'd like the job when they submit their assessment? How does this affect our relationship with recruitment agencies we might use to hire for these roles? So, what's the objective for next week's Down Tools Week? Pretty simple really - we want to implement this process for the Graduate Software Engineer and Software Engineer positions that you can find on our website. I will be joined by a crack team of our best developers (Kevin Boyle, and new Red-Gater, Sam Blackburn), and recruiting hostess with the mostest Laura McQuillen, and hopefully a couple of others as well - if I can successfully twist more arms before Monday.* Hopefully by next Friday our experiment will be up and running, and we may have changed the way Red Gate recruits software engineers for good! Stay tuned and we'll let you know how it goes! *I'm going to play dirty by offering them beer and chocolate during meetings. Some background information: how agonising over the initial CV/cover letter sift helped lead us to bin it off entirely The other day I was agonising about the new university/good degree grade versus poor A-level results issue, and decided to canvas for other opinions to see if there was something I could do that was fairer than my current approach, which is almost always to reject. This generated quite an involved discussion on our Yammer site: I'm sure you can glean a pretty good impression of my own educational prejudices from that discussion as well, although I'm very open to changing my opinion - hopefully you've already figured that out from reading the rest of this post. Hopefully you can also trace a logical path from agonising about sifting to, "Uh, hang on, why on earth are we doing this anyway?!?" Technorati Tags: recruitment,hr,developers,testers,red gate,cv,resume,cover letter,assessment,sea change

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