job searching - Page 477

Help with MVC controller: passing a string from view to controller

- by 109221793

Hi guys, I'm having trouble with one particular issue, I was hoping someone could help me out. I've completed the MVC Music Store tutorial, and now I'm trying to add some administrator functionality - practice as I will have to do this in an MVC application in my job. The application is using the aspnet membership api, and what I have done so far is created a view to list the users. What I want to be able to do, is click on the users name in order to change their password. To try and carry the username to the changeUserPassword controller (custom made). I registered a new route in the global.asax.cs file in order to display the username in the URL, which is working so far. UserList View <%: Html.RouteLink(user.UserName, "AdminPassword", new { controller="StoreManager", action="changeUserPassword", username = user.UserName }) %> Global.asax.cs routes.MapRoute( "AdminPassword", //Route name "{controller}/{action}/{username}", //URL with parameters new { controller = "StoreManager", action = "changeUserPassword", username = UrlParameter.Optional} ); So now the URL looks like this when I reach the changeUserPassword view: http://localhost:51236/StoreManager/changeUserPassword/Administrator Here is the GET changeUserPassword action: public ActionResult changeUserPassword(string username) { ViewData["username"] = username; return View(); } I wanted to store the username in ViewData as I would like to use it in the GET changeUserPassword for display purposes, and also as a hidden value in the form. This is in order to pass it through to enable me to reset the password. Having debugged through the code, it seems that 'username' is null. How can I get this to work so that the username carries over from the Html.RouteLink, to the changeUserPassword action? Any help would be appreciated :) Here is my complete code: UserList.aspx <%@ Page Title="" Language="C#" MasterPageFile="~/Views/Shared/Site.Master" Inherits="System.Web.Mvc.ViewPage<System.Web.Security.MembershipUserCollection>" %> <asp:Content ID="Content1" ContentPlaceHolderID="TitleContent" runat="server"> UserList </asp:Content> <asp:Content ID="Content2" ContentPlaceHolderID="MainContent" runat="server"> <h2>UserList</h2> <table> <tr> <th>User Name</th> <th>Last Activity date</th> <th>Locked Out</th> </tr> <%foreach (MembershipUser user in Model){ %> <tr> <td><%: Html.RouteLink(user.UserName, "AdminPassword", new { controller="StoreManager", action="changeUserPassword", username = user.UserName }) %></td> <td><%: user.LastActivityDate %></td> <td><%: user.IsLockedOut %></td> </tr> <% }%> </table> </asp:Content> changeUserPassword.aspx <%@ Page Title="" Language="C#" MasterPageFile="~/Views/Shared/Site.Master" Inherits="System.Web.Mvc.ViewPage<musicStoreMVC.ViewModels.ResetPasswordAdmin>" %> <asp:Content ID="Content1" ContentPlaceHolderID="TitleContent" runat="server"> changeUserPassword </asp:Content> <asp:Content ID="Content2" ContentPlaceHolderID="MainContent" runat="server"> <h2>Change Password: <%: ViewData["username"] %></h2> <% using (Html.BeginForm()) {%> <%: Html.ValidationSummary(true) %> <fieldset> <legend>Fields</legend> <div class="editor-label"> <%: Html.Hidden("username",ViewData["username"]) %> <%: Html.LabelFor(model => model.password) %> </div> <div class="editor-field"> <%: Html.TextBoxFor(model => model.password) %> <%: Html.ValidationMessageFor(model => model.password) %> </div> <div class="editor-label"> <%: Html.LabelFor(model => model.confirmPassword) %> </div> <div class="editor-field"> <%: Html.TextBoxFor(model => model.confirmPassword) %> <%: Html.ValidationMessageFor(model => model.confirmPassword) %> </div> <p> <input type="submit" value="Create" /> </p> </fieldset> <% } %> <div> <%: Html.ActionLink("Back to List", "Index") %> </div> </asp:Content> My actions public ActionResult UserList() { var users = Membership.GetAllUsers(); return View(users); } public ActionResult changeUserPassword(string username) { ViewData["username"] = username; return View(); }

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i have made a from and want to connect it to a oracle 10g data base using php.can you please assume

- by nachiket-panse

http://www.freecsstemplates.org Released for free under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License -- Sitename.com by Free Css Templates MANAGEMEINT INFORMATION SYSTEM <p class="style2">                                                                                             REGISTRY ENTRY FORM </p> <form id="form2" method="post" action=""> <p align="center"> </p> <p align="center"><span class="style3">JOB DESCRIPTION :</span>                   <textarea name="textarea"></textarea> </p> <p align="center"><span class="style3">QUANTITY :</span>           <input type="text" name="textfield5" /> </p> <p align="center"> <span class="style3">CONTACT PERSON </span>        <input type="text" name="textfield3" /> </p> <p align="center"> </p> <p align="center"><span class="style3">DIVISION CODE: <textarea name="textarea3"></textarea> </span></p> <p align="center"><span class="style3">ACCEPTANCE DATE </span>: <input type="text" name="textfield4" /> </p> <p align="center"><span class="style3">REFERENCE NUMBER :</span> <input type="text" name="textfield2" /> </p> <p align="center"><span class="style3">CLASSIFICATION :</span>        <input type="text" name="textfield" /></p> <p align="center"> </p> <p align="center"><span class="style3">CUMULATIVE COST: </span> <select name="select"> </select> </p> <p align="center"><span class="style3">PLANNING ENGR: </span> <textarea name="textarea2"></textarea> </p> <p align="center"><span class="style3">PLANNING: </span> <input type="text" name="textfield6" /> </p> <p align="center"> <span class="style3">FILL THE COMPLETION DATE: </span> <input type="text" name="textfield7" /> </p> <p align="center"><span class="style3">REMARKS: </span> <input type="text" name="textfield8" /> </p> <p align="center"> </p> <p align="center"> <input type="submit" name="SAVE" value="SAVE" /> <input type="submit" name="Submit2" value="LIST" /> <input type="submit" name="Submit" value="ADD" /> <input type="submit" name="Submit3" value="CANCEL" /> <input type="submit" name="BACK" value="BACK" /></p> <p align="center"> </p> <p align="center"> </p> <p align="center"> </p> <p align="center"> </p> <p align="center"> </p> </form> <p align="center" class="style2"> </p>

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Hard to append a table with many records into another without generating duplicates

- by Bill Mudry

I may seem to be a bit wordy at first but for the hope it will be easier for all of you to understand what I am doing in the first place. I have an uncommon but enjoyable activity of collecting as many species of wood from around the world as I can (over 2,900 so far). Ok, that is the real world. Meanwhile I have spent over 8 years compiling over 5.8 meg of text data on all the woods of the world. That got so large that learning some basic PHP and MySQL was most welcome so I could build a new database driven home for all this research. I am still slow at it but getting there. The original premise was to find evidence of as many species of woods in the world I can. The more names identified, the more successful the project. I have named the project TAXA for ease of conversation (short for Taxonomy). You are most welcome to take a look at what I have so far at www.prowebcanada.com/taxa. It is 95% dynamically driven. So far I am reporting about 6,500 botanical wood names and, as said above, the more I can report, the more successful is the project. I have a file of all the woods in the second largest wood collection in the world, the Tervuren wood collection in the Netherlands with over 11,300 wood names even after cleaning out all duplicates. That is almost twice the number I am reporting now so porting all the new wood names from Tervuren to the 'species' table where I keep the reported data would be a major desirable advancement in the project. At one point I was able to add all the Tervuren records to the species table but over 3,000 duplicates also formed. They were not in the Tervuren file in the first place but represent the same wood names common to both files. It is common sense that there would be woods common to both that when merged would create new duplicates. At one point and with the help of others from another forum, I may very well have finally got the proper SQL statement. When I ran it, though, the system said (semi-amusingly at first) ----- that it had gone away! After looking up on the Net what could have have done this, one reason is that the MySQL timeout lapses and probably because of the large size of files I am running. I am running this on a rented account on Godaddy so I cannot go about trying to adjust any config file. For safety, I copied the tervuren.sql file as tervuren_target.sql and the species.sql file as species_master.sql tp use as working files just to make sure I protect the original files from destruction or damage. Later I can name the species_master back to just species.sql once I am happy all worked well. The species file has about 18 columns in it but only 5 columns match the columns in the Tervuren file (name for name and collation also). The rest of the columns are just along for the ride, so to speak. The common key in both is the 'species_name" columns in both. I am not sure it is at all proper to call one a primary key and the other a foreign key since there really is no relational connection to them. One is just more data for the other and can disappear after, never to be referred to the working code in the application. I have been very surprised and flabbergasted on how hard it can be to append records from one large table into another (with same column names plus others) without generating NEW duplicates in the first place. Watch out thinking that a SELECT DISTINCT statement may do the job because absolutely NO records in the species table must get destroyed in the process and there is no way (well, that I know of) to tell the 'DISTINCT" command this. Yes, the original 'species' table has duplicates in it even before all this but, trust me ---- they have to be removed the long hard way manually record by record or I will lose precious information. It is more important to just make sure no NEW duplicates form through bringing in new names in the tervuren_target.species_name into species.species_name. I am hoping and thinking that a straight SQL solution should work --- except for that nasty timeout. How do I get past that? Could it mean that I may have to turn to a PHP plus SQL method?? Or ..... would I have to break up the Tervuren files into a few smaller ones and run them independently (hope not....)" So far, what seems should be easy has proven to be unexpectedly tricky. I appreciate any help you can give but start from the assumption that this may be harder to do right than it may seem on the surface. By the way --- I am running a quad 64 bit system with Windows 7, so at least I have some fairly hefty power on the client end. I have a direct ethernet cable feeding a cable connection to the Internet. Once I get an algorithm and code working for this, I also have many other lists to process that could make the 'species' table grow even more. It could be equivalent to (ahem) lighting a rocket under my project (especially compared to do this record by record manually)! This is my first time in this forum, so I do not know how I can receive any replies. Do I have to to come back here periodically or are replies emailed out also? It would be great if you CC'd copies to me at billmudry at rogers.com :-) Much thanks for your patience and help, Bill Mudry Mississauga, Ontario Canada (next to Toronto).

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Looking for a better way to integrate a static list into a set of classes

- by EvilTeach

I'm trying to expand my sons interest from Warcraft 3 programming into C++ to broaden his horizons to a degree. We are planning on porting a little game that he wrote. The context goes something like this. There are Ships and Missiles, for which Ships will use Missiles and interact with them A Container exists which will hold 'a list' of ships. A Container exists which will hold 'a list' of planets. One can apply a function over all elements in the Container (for_each) Ships and Missles can be created/destroyed at any time New objects automatically insert themselves into the proper container. I cobbled a small example together to do that job, so we can talk about topics (list, templates etc) but I am not pleased with the results. #include <iostream> #include <list> using namespace std; /* Base class to hold static list in common with various object groups */ template<class T> class ObjectManager { public : ObjectManager ( void ) { cout << "Construct ObjectManager at " << this << endl; objectList.push_back(this); } virtual ~ObjectManager ( void ) { cout << "Destroy ObjectManager at " << this << endl; } void for_each ( void (*function)(T *) ) { for (objectListIter = objectList.begin(); objectListIter != objectList.end(); ++objectListIter) { (*function)((T *) *objectListIter); } } list<ObjectManager<T> *>::iterator objectListIter; static list<ObjectManager<T> *> objectList; }; /* initializer for static list */ template<class T> list<ObjectManager<T> *> ObjectManager<T>::objectList; /* A simple ship for testing */ class Ship : public ObjectManager<Ship> { public : Ship ( void ) : ObjectManager<Ship>() { cout << "Construct Ship at " << this << endl; } ~Ship ( void ) { cout << "Destroy Ship at " << this << endl; } friend ostream &operator<< ( ostream &out, const Ship &that ) { out << "I am a ship"; return out; } }; /* A simple missile for testing */ class Missile : public ObjectManager<Missile> { public : Missile ( void ) : ObjectManager<Missile>() { cout << "Construct Missile at " << this << endl; } ~Missile ( void ) { cout << "Destroy Missile at " << this << endl; } friend ostream &operator<< ( ostream &out, const Missile &that ) { out << "I am a missile"; return out; } }; /* A function suitable for the for_each function */ template <class T> void show ( T *it ) { cout << "Show: " << *it << " at " << it << endl; } int main ( void ) { /* Create dummy planets for testing */ Missile p1; Missile p2; /* Demonstrate Iterator */ p1.for_each(show); /* Create dummy ships for testing */ Ship s1; Ship s2; Ship s3; /* Demonstrate Iterator */ s1.for_each(show); return 0; } Specifically, The list is effectively embedded in each ship though the inheritance mechanism. One must have a ship, in order to access the list of ships. One must have a missile in order to be able to access the list of missiles. That feels awkward. My question boils down to "Is there a better way to do this?" Automatic object container creation Automatic object insertion Container access without requiring an object in the list to access it. I am looking for better ideas. All helpful entries get an upvote. Thanks Evil.

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Inserting Records in Ascending Order function- C homework assignment

- by Aaron McRuer

Good day, Stack Overflow. I have a homework assignment that I'm working on this weekend that I'm having a bit of a problem with. We have a struct "Record" (which contains information about cars for a dealership) that gets placed in a particular spot in a linked list according to 1) its make and 2) according to its model year. This is done when initially building the list, when a "int insertRecordInAscendingOrder" function is called in Main. In "insertRecordInAscendingOrder", a third function, "createRecord" is called, where the linked list is created. The function then goes to the function "compareCars" to determine what elements get put where. Depending on the value returned by this function, insertRecordInAscendingOrder then places the record where it belongs. The list is then printed out. There's more to the assignment, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. Ideally, and for the assignment to be considered correct, the linked list must be ordered as: Chevrolet 2012 25 Chevrolet 2013 10 Ford 2010 5 Ford 2011 3 Ford 2012 15 Honda 2011 9 Honda 2012 3 Honda 2013 12 Toyota 2009 2 Toyota 2011 7 Toyota 2013 20 from the a text file that has the data ordered the following way: Ford 2012 15 Ford 2011 3 Ford 2010 5 Toyota 2011 7 Toyota 2012 20 Toyota 2009 2 Honda 2011 9 Honda 2012 3 Honda 2013 12 Chevrolet 2013 10 Chevrolet 2012 25 Notice that the alphabetical order of the "make" field takes precedence, then, the model year is arranged from oldest to newest. However, the program produces this as the final list: Chevrolet 2012 25 Chevrolet 2013 10 Honda 2011 9 Honda 2012 3 Honda 2013 12 Toyota 2009 2 Toyota 2011 7 Toyota 2012 20 Ford 2010 5 Ford 2011 3 Ford 2012 15 I sat down with a grad student and tried to work out all of this yesterday, but we just couldn't figure out why it was kicking the Ford nodes down to the end of the list. Here's the code. As you'll notice, I included a printList call at each instance of the insertion of a node. This way, you can see just what is happening when the nodes are being put in "order". It is in ANSI C99. All function calls must be made as they are specified, so unfortunately, there's no real way of getting around this problem by creating a more efficient algorithm. #include <stdio.h> #include <stdlib.h> #include <string.h> #define MAX_LINE 50 #define MAX_MAKE 20 typedef struct record { char *make; int year; int stock; struct record *next; } Record; int compareCars(Record *car1, Record *car2); void printList(Record *head); Record* createRecord(char *make, int year, int stock); int insertRecordInAscendingOrder(Record **head, char *make, int year, int stock); int main(int argc, char **argv) { FILE *inFile = NULL; char line[MAX_LINE + 1]; char *make, *yearStr, *stockStr; int year, stock, len; Record* headRecord = NULL; /*Input and file diagnostics*/ if (argc!=2) { printf ("Filename not provided.\n"); return 1; } if((inFile=fopen(argv[1], "r"))==NULL) { printf("Can't open the file\n"); return 2; } /*obtain values for linked list*/ while (fgets(line, MAX_LINE, inFile)) { make = strtok(line, " "); yearStr = strtok(NULL, " "); stockStr = strtok(NULL, " "); year = atoi(yearStr); stock = atoi(stockStr); insertRecordInAscendingOrder(&headRecord,make, year, stock); } printf("The original list in ascending order: \n"); printList(headRecord); } /*use strcmp to compare two makes*/ int compareCars(Record *car1, Record *car2) { int compStrResult; compStrResult = strcmp(car1->make, car2->make); int compYearResult = 0; if(car1->year > car2->year) { compYearResult = 1; } else if(car1->year == car2->year) { compYearResult = 0; } else { compYearResult = -1; } if(compStrResult == 0 ) { if(compYearResult == 1) { return 1; } else if(compYearResult == -1) { return -1; } else { return compStrResult; } } else if(compStrResult == 1) { return 1; } else { return -1; } } int insertRecordInAscendingOrder(Record **head, char *make, int year, int stock) { Record *previous = *head; Record *newRecord = createRecord(make, year, stock); Record *current = *head; int compResult; if(*head == NULL) { *head = newRecord; printf("Head is null, list was empty\n"); printList(*head); return 1; } else if ( compareCars(newRecord, *head)==-1) { *head = newRecord; (*head)->next = current; printf("New record was less than the head, replacing\n"); printList(*head); return 1; } else { printf("standard case, searching and inserting\n"); previous = *head; while ( current != NULL &&(compareCars(newRecord, current)==1)) { printList(*head); previous = current; current = current->next; } printList(*head); previous->next = newRecord; previous->next->next = current; } return 1; } /*creates records from info passed in from main via insertRecordInAscendingOrder.*/ Record* createRecord(char *make, int year, int stock) { printf("CreateRecord\n"); Record *theRecord; int len; if(!make) { return NULL; } theRecord = malloc(sizeof(Record)); if(!theRecord) { printf("Unable to allocate memory for the structure.\n"); return NULL; } theRecord->year = year; theRecord->stock = stock; len = strlen(make); theRecord->make = malloc(len + 1); strncpy(theRecord->make, make, len); theRecord->make[len] = '\0'; theRecord->next=NULL; return theRecord; } /*prints list. lists print.*/ void printList(Record *head) { int i; int j = 50; Record *aRecord; aRecord = head; for(i = 0; i < j; i++) { printf("-"); } printf("\n"); printf("%20s%20s%10s\n", "Make", "Year", "Stock"); for(i = 0; i < j; i++) { printf("-"); } printf("\n"); while(aRecord != NULL) { printf("%20s%20d%10d\n", aRecord->make, aRecord->year, aRecord->stock); aRecord = aRecord->next; } printf("\n"); } The text file you'll need for a command line argument can be saved under any name you like; here are the contents you'll need: Ford 2012 15 Ford 2011 3 Ford 2010 5 Toyota 2011 7 Toyota 2012 20 Toyota 2009 2 Honda 2011 9 Honda 2012 3 Honda 2013 12 Chevrolet 2013 10 Chevrolet 2012 25 Thanks in advance for your help. I shall continue to plow away at it myself.

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How do I prove I should put a table of values in source code instead of a database table?

- by FastAl

<tldr>looking for a reference to a book or other undeniably authoritative source that gives reasons when you should choose a database vs. when you should choose other storage methods. I have provided an un-authoritative list of reasons about 2/3 of the way down this post.</tldr> I have a situation at my company where a database is being used where it would be better to use another solution (in this case, an auto-generated piece of source code that contains a static lookup table, searched by binary sort). Normally, a database would be an OK solution even though the problem does not require a database, e.g, none of the elements of ACID are needed, as it is read-only data, updated about every 3-5 years (also requiring other sourcecode changes), and fits in memory, and can be keyed into via binary search (a tad faster than db, but speed is not an issue). The problem is that this code runs on our enterprise server, but is shared with several PC platforms (some disconnected, some use a central DB, etc.), and parts of it are managed by multiple programming units, parts by the DBAs, parts even by mathematicians in another department, etc. These hit their own platform’s version of their databases (containing their own copy of the static data). What happens is that every implementation, every little change, something different goes wrong. There are many other issues as well. I can’t even use a flatfile, because one mode of running on our enterprise server does not have permission to read files (only databases, and of course, its own literal storage, e.g., in-source table). Of course, other parts of the system use databases in proper, less obscure manners; there is no problem with those parts. So why don’t we just change it? I don’t have administrative ability to force a change. But I’m affected because sometimes I have to help fix the problems, but mostly because it causes outages and tons of extra IT time by other programmers and d*mmit that makes me mad! The reason neither management, nor the designers of the system, can see the problem is that they propose a solution that won’t work: increase communication; implement more safeguards and standards; etc. But every time, in a different part of the already-pared-down but still multi-step processes, a few different diligent, hard-working, top performing IT personnel make a unique subtle error that causes it to fail, sometimes after the last round of testing! And in general these are not single-person failures, but understandable miscommunications. And communication at our company is actually better than most. People just don't think that's the case because they haven't dug into the matter. However, I have it on very good word from somebody with extensive formal study of sociology and psychology that the relatively small amount of less-than-proper database usage in this gigantic cross-platform multi-source, multi-language project is bureaucratically un-maintainable. Impossible. No chance. At least with Human Beings in the loop, and it can’t be automated. In addition, the management and developers who could change this, though intelligent and capable, don’t understand the rigidity of this ‘how humans are’ issue, and are not convincible on the matter. The reason putting the static data in sourcecode will solve the problem is, although the solution is less sexy than a database, it would function with no technical drawbacks; and since the sharing of sourcecode already works very well, you basically erase any database-related effort from this section of the project, along with all the drawbacks of it that are causing problems. OK, that’s the background, for the curious. I won’t be able to convince management that this is an unfixable sociological problem, and that the real solution is coding around these limits of human nature, just as you would code around a bug in a 3rd party component that you can’t change. So what I have to do is exploit the unsuitableness of the database solution, and not do it using logic, but rather authority. I am aware of many reasons, and posts on this site giving reasons for one over the other; I’m not looking for lists of reasons like these (although you can add a comment if I've miss a doozy): WHY USE A DATABASE? instead of flatfile/other DB vs. file: if you need... Random Read / Transparent search optimization Advanced / varied / customizable Searching and sorting capabilities Transaction/rollback Locks, semaphores Concurrency control / Shared users Security 1-many/m-m is easier Easy modification Scalability Load Balancing Random updates / inserts / deletes Advanced query Administrative control of design, etc. SQL / learning curve Debugging / Logging Centralized / Live Backup capabilities Cached queries / dvlp & cache execution plans Interleaved update/read Referential integrity, avoid redundant/missing/corrupt/out-of-sync data Reporting (from on olap or oltp db) / turnkey generation tools [Disadvantages:] Important to get right the first time - professional design - but only b/c it's meant to last s/w & h/w cost Usu. over a network, speed issue (best vs. best design vs. local=even then a separate process req's marshalling/netwk layers/inter-p comm) indicies and query processing can stand in the way of simple processing (vs. flatfile) WHY USE FLATFILE: If you only need... Sequential Row processing only Limited usage append only (no reading, no master key/update) Only Update the record you're reading (fixed length recs only) Too big to fit into memory If Local disk / read-ahead network connection Portability / small system Email / cut & Paste / store as document by novice - simple format Low design learning curve but high cost later WHY USE IN-MEMORY/TABLE (tables, arrays, etc.): if you need... Processing a single db/ff record that was imported Known size of data Static data if hardcoding the table Narrow, unchanging use (e.g., one program or proc) -includes a class that will be shared, but encapsulates its data manipulation Extreme speed needed / high transaction frequency Random access - but search is dependent on implementation Following are some other posts about the topic: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1499239/database-vs-flat-text-file-what-are-some-technical-reasons-for-choosing-one-over http://stackoverflow.com/questions/332825/are-flat-file-databases-any-good http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2356851/database-vs-flat-files http://stackoverflow.com/questions/514455/databases-vs-plain-text/514530 What I’d like to know is if anybody could recommend a hard, authoritative source containing these reasons. I’m looking for a paper book I can buy, or a reputable website with whitepapers about the issue (e.g., Microsoft, IBM), not counting the user-generated content on those sites. This will have a greater change to elicit a change that I’m looking for: less wasted programmer time, and more reliable programs. Thanks very much for your help. You win a prize for reading such a large post!

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Flash and Google Maps - Only Last Icon showing

- by Peter

I have a simple Map and geocoding sample in Flash using CS4 The problem is simple - I can retrieve a short list from the google search api, but when I try to generate the icons on the map using a loop, only the last icon is displayed. (ignore the house icon, it is generated earlier) I feel I am missing something or made a stupid AS3 mistake (like treating it as if it was c#) - or even a stupid wood-for-the-trees mistake. The problem is in the last line of the code. I have added all my code just in case somebody else can find a use for it - lord knows it took me a great while to figure this out :) It runs here (also, if anybody has an idea why the icon is slightly in the wrong place on render, but corrects if you move the map - please let me know) Any help would be great. Thanks. P import com.google.maps.services.ClientGeocoder; import com.google.maps.services.GeocodingEvent; import com.google.maps.LatLng; import com.google.maps.Map; import com.google.maps.MapEvent; import com.google.maps.MapType; import com.google.maps.overlays.Marker; import com.google.maps.overlays.MarkerOptions; import com.google.maps.styles.FillStyle; import com.google.maps.styles.StrokeStyle; import com.google.maps.controls.* import com.google.maps.overlays.* import flash.display.Bitmap; import flash.display.BitmapData; import com.adobe.utils.StringUtil; import be.boulevart.google.ajaxapi.search.GoogleSearchResult; import be.boulevart.google.events.GoogleApiEvent; import be.boulevart.google.ajaxapi.search.local.GoogleLocalSearch; import be.boulevart.google.ajaxapi.search.local.data.GoogleLocalSearchItem; var strZip:String = new String(); strZip="60661"; var strAddress:String = new String(); strAddress ="100 W. Jackson Blvd, chicago, IL 60661"; var IconArray:Array = new Array; var SearchArray:Array = new Array; /*-------------------------------------------------------------- // The returned search data gets placed into this array ---------------------------------------------------------------*/ var LocalInfo:Array = new Array(); var intCount:int = new int; var intMapReady:int=0; /*=================================================================================== We load the map first and then get the search criteria - this will keep the order of operation clean. The ====================================================================================*/ var map:Map = new Map(); map.key = "ABQIAAAAHwSPp7Lhew456ffD6qa2WmxT_VwdLJEfmcCgytxKjcH1jLKkiihQtfC- TbcwryvBQYhRwHWa8F_Gp9Q"; map.setSize(new Point(600, 550)); map.addEventListener(MapEvent.MAP_READY, onMapReady); //Places the map on the page this.addChild(map); map.x=5; map.y=5; function onMapReady(event:Event):void { //Center the map and place the house marker doGeocode(); } /*========================================================================== Goecode to return the LAT and LONG for the specific address, center the map and add the house icon ===========================================================================*/ function doGeocode() { var geocoder:ClientGeocoder = new ClientGeocoder(); geocoder.addEventListener(GeocodingEvent.GEOCODING_SUCCESS, function(event:GeocodingEvent):void { var objPlacemarks:Array = event.response.placemarks; if (objPlacemarks.length > 0) { map.setCenter(objPlacemarks[0].point, 14, MapType.NORMAL_MAP_TYPE); var request:URLRequest = new URLRequest("house.png"); var imageLoader:Loader = new Loader(); imageLoader.load(request); var objMarkerOptions:MarkerOptions = new MarkerOptions(); objMarkerOptions.icon=imageLoader; objMarkerOptions.icon.scaleX=.15; objMarkerOptions.icon.scaleY=.15; objMarkerOptions.iconAlignment = MarkerOptions.ALIGN_HORIZONTAL_CENTER + MarkerOptions.ALIGN_VERTICAL_CENTER; var objMarker:Marker = new Marker(objPlacemarks[0].point, objMarkerOptions); map.addOverlay(objMarker); doLoadSearch() } }); //Failure code - good practice, really geocoder.addEventListener(GeocodingEvent.GEOCODING_FAILURE, function(event:GeocodingEvent):void { txtResult.appendText("Geocoding failed"); }); // generate geocode geocoder.geocode(strAddress); } /*=============================================================== XML Loader - loads icon file and search text pair from xml file =================================================================*/ function doLoadSearch() { var xmlLoader:URLLoader = new URLLoader(); var xmlData:XML = new XML(); xmlLoader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, LoadXML); xmlLoader.load(new URLRequest("config.xml")); function LoadXML(e:Event):void { xmlData = new XML(e.target.data); RetrieveSearch(); } function RetrieveSearch() { //extract the MapData subset var xmlSearch = xmlData.MapData; // push this to an xml list object var xmlChildren:XMLList = xmlSearch.children(); //loop the list and extract the data into an //array of formatted search criteria for each (var Search:XML in xmlChildren) { txtResult.appendText("Searching For: "+Search.Criteria+" Icon=" + Search.Icon+ "Zip=" + strZip +"\r\n\r\n"); //retrieve search criteria loadLocalInfo(Search.Criteria,Search.Icon,strZip); } } } /*================================================================================== Search Functionality - does a google API search and loads the lats and longs required to place the icons on the map - THIS WILL NOT RUN LOCALLY ===================================================================================*/ function loadLocalInfo(strSearch,strIcon,strZip) { var objLocal:GoogleLocalSearch=new GoogleLocalSearch() objLocal.search(strSearch+" "+strZip,0,"0,0","","") objLocal.addEventListener(GoogleApiEvent.LOCAL_SEARCH_RESULT,onSearchComplete) function onSearchComplete(e:GoogleApiEvent):void { var resulta:GoogleSearchResult=e.data as GoogleSearchResult; //------------------------------------------------ // Load the icon for this particular search //------------------------------------------------ var request:URLRequest = new URLRequest(strIcon); var imageLoader:Loader = new Loader(); imageLoader.load(request); //------------------------------------------------------------- // For test purposes txtResult.appendText("Result Count for "+strSearch+" = "+e.data.results.length+"\r\n\r\n"); for each (var result:GoogleLocalSearchItem in e.data.results as Array) { LocalInfo[intCount]=[String(result.title),strIcon,String(result.latitude),String(result.longitude)]; //--------------------------------------- // Pop the icon onto the map //--------------------------------------- var objLatLng:LatLng = new LatLng(parseFloat(result.latitude), parseFloat(result.longitude)); var objMarkerOptions:MarkerOptions = new MarkerOptions(); objMarkerOptions.icon=imageLoader; objMarkerOptions.hasShadow=false; objMarkerOptions.iconAlignment = MarkerOptions.ALIGN_HORIZONTAL_CENTER + MarkerOptions.ALIGN_VERTICAL_CENTER; var objMarker:Marker = new Marker(objLatLng, objMarkerOptions); /********************************************************** *Everything* works to here - I have traced out execution and all variables. It only works on the last item in the array :( ***********************************************************/ map.addOverlay(objMarker); } } }

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Is there any better way for creating a dynamic HTML table without using any javascript library like

- by piemesons

Dont worry we dont need to find out any bug in this code.. Its working perfectly.:-P My boss came to me and said "Hey just tell me whats the best of way of writing code for a dynamic HTML table (add row, delete row, update row).No need to add any CSS. Just javascript. No Jquery library etc. I was confused that in the middle of the project why he asking for some stupid exercise like this. What ever i wrote the following code and mailed him and after 15 mins i got a mail from him. " I was expecting much better code from a guy like you. Anyways good job monkey.(And with a picture of monkey as attachment.) thats was the mail. Line by line. I want to reply him but before that i want to know about the quality of my code. Is this really shitty...!!! Or he was just making fun of mine. I dont think that code is really shitty. Still correct me if you can.Code is working perfectly fine. Just copy paste it in a HTML file. <html> <head> <title> Exercise CSS </title> <script type="text/javascript"> function add_row() { var table = document.getElementById('table'); var rowCount = table.rows.length; var row = table.insertRow(rowCount); var cell1 = row.insertCell(0); var element1 = document.createElement("input"); element1.type = "text"; cell1.appendChild(element1); var cell2 = row.insertCell(1); var element2 = document.createElement("input"); element2.type = "text"; cell2.appendChild(element2); var cell3 = row.insertCell(2); cell3.innerHTML = ' <span onClick="edit(this)">Edit</span>/<span onClick="delete_row(this)">Delete</span>'; cell3.setAttribute("style", "display:none;"); var cell4 = row.insertCell(3); cell4.innerHTML = '<span onClick="save(this)">Save</span>'; } function save(e) { var elTableCells = e.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName("td"); elTableCells[0].innerHTML=elTableCells[0].firstChild.value; elTableCells[1].innerHTML=elTableCells[1].firstChild.value; elTableCells[2].setAttribute("style", "display:block;"); elTableCells[3].setAttribute("style", "display:none;"); } function edit(e) { var elTableCells = e.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName("td"); elTableCells[0].innerHTML='<input type="text" value="'+elTableCells[0].innerHTML+'">'; elTableCells[1].innerHTML='<input type="text" value="'+elTableCells[1].innerHTML+'">'; elTableCells[2].setAttribute("style", "display:none;"); elTableCells[3].setAttribute("style", "display:block;"); } function delete_row(e) { e.parentNode.parentNode.parentNode.removeChild(e.parentNode.parentNode); } </script> </head> <body > <div id="display"> <table id='table'> <tr id='id'> <td> Piemesons </td> <td> 23 </td> <td > <span onClick="edit(this)">Edit</span>/<span onClick="delete_row(this)">Delete</span> </td> <td style="display:none;"> <span onClick="save(this)">Save</span> </td> </tr> </table> <input type="button" value="Add new row" onClick="add_row();" /> </div> </body>

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New hire expectations... (Am I being unreasonable?)

- by user295841

I work for a very small custom software shop. We currently consist me and my boss. My boss is an old FoxPro DOS developer and OOP makes him uncomfortable. He is planning on taking a back seat in the next few years to hopefully enjoy a “partial retirement”. I will be taking over the day to day operations and we are now desperately looking for more help. We tried Monster.com, Dice.com, and others a few years ago when we started our search. We had no success. We have tried outsourcing overseas (total disaster), hiring kids right out of college (mostly a disaster but that’s where I came from), interns (good for them, not so good for us) and hiring laid off “experienced” developers (there was a reason they were laid off). I have heard hiring practices discussed on podcasts, blogs, etc... and have tried a few. The “Fizz Buzz” test was a good one. One kid looked physically ill before he finally gave up. I think my problem is that I have grown so much as a developer since I started here that I now have a high standard. I hear/read very intelligent people podcasts and blogs and I know that there are lots of people out there that can do the job. I don’t want to settle for less than a “good” developer. Perhaps my expectations are unreasonable. I expect any good developer (entry level or experienced) to be billable (at least paying their own wage) in under one month. I expect any good developer to be able to be productive (at least dangerous) in any language or technology with only a few days of research/training. I expect any good developer to be able to take a project from initial customer request to completion with little or no help from others. Am I being unreasonable? What constitutes a valuable developer? What should be expected of an entry level developer? What should be expected of an experienced developer? I realize that everyone is different but there has to be some sort of expectations standard, right? I have been giving the test project below to potential canidates to weed them out. Good idea? Too much? Too little? Please let me know what you think. Thanks. Project ID: T00001 Description: Order Entry System Deadline: 1 Week Scope The scope of this project is to develop a fully function order entry system. Screen/Form design must be user friendly and promote efficient data entry and modification. User experience (Navigation, Screen/Form layouts, Look and Feel…) is at the developer’s discretion. System may be developed using any technologies that conform to the technical and system requirements. Deliverables Complete source code Database setup instructions (Scripts or restorable backup) Application installation instructions (Installer or installation procedure) Any necessary documentation Technical Requirements Server Platform – Windows XP / Windows Server 2003 / SBS Client Platform – Windows XP Web Browser (If applicable) – IE 8 Database – At developer’s discretion (Must be a relational SQL database.) Language – At developer’s discretion All data must be normalized. (+) All data must maintain referential integrity. (++) All data must be indexed for optimal performance. System must handle concurrency. System Requirements Customer Maintenance Customer records must have unique ID. Customer data will include Name, Address, Phone, etc. User must be able to perform all CRUD (Create, Read, Update, and Delete) operations on the Customer table. User must be able to enter a specific Customer ID to edit. User must be able to pull up a sortable/queryable search grid/utility to find a customer to edit. Validation must be performed prior to database commit. Customer record cannot be deleted if the customer has an order in the system. (++) Inventory Maintenance Part records must have unique ID. Part data will include Description, Price, UOM (Unit of Measure), etc. User must be able to perform all CRUD operations on the part table. User must be able to enter a specific Part ID to edit. User must be able to pull up a sortable/queryable search grid/utility to find a part to edit. Validation must be performed prior to database commit. Part record cannot be deleted if the part has been used in an order. (++) Order Entry Order records must have a unique auto-incrementing key (Order Number). Order data must be split into a header/detail structure. (+) Order can contain an infinite number of detail records. Order header data will include Order Number, Customer ID (++), Order Date, Order Status (Open/Closed), etc. Order detail data will include Part Number (++), Quantity, Price, etc. User must be able to perform all CRUD operations on the order tables. User must be able to enter a specific Order Number to edit. User must be able to pull up a sortable/queryable search grid/utility to find an order to edit. User must be able to print an order form from within the order entry form. Validation must be performed prior to database commit. Reports Customer Listing – All Customers in the system. Inventory Listing – All parts in the system. Open Order Listing – All open orders in system. Customer Order Listing – All orders for specific customer. All reports must include sorts and filter functions where applicable. Ex. Customer Listing by range of Customer IDs. Open Order Listing by date range.

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Where should I put zoomIn in my MapActivity?

- by Johny

I'm writing an Android app, and I'd like to zoomIn as soon as the map has been loaded. I get the following error: java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: width and height must be > 0 This MapActivity - width and height must be > 0 question suggests the problem is the zoomIn() method is in the onCreate() method. But I get same error when I put it in the onResume() method. I've been searching for hours and I can't find anything about it at http://developer.android.com or anywhere else... Also I can't find a way to get the time point the map has been loaded. A "MapLoadedListener" or something like that... EDIT Here is my code: public class AMap extends MapActivity{ private final String LOG_TAG = this.getClass().getSimpleName(); private Context mContext; private Chronometer timer; private TextView tvCountdown; private RelativeLayout rl; private MapView mapView; private MapController mapController; private List<Overlay> mapOverlays; private PlayersOverlay playersOverlay; private Drawable drawable; private Builder endDialog; private ContextThemeWrapper ctw; private Handler mHandler = new Handler(); private Player player = new Player(); private StartTask startTask; private EndTask endTask; private MyDBAdapter mdba; private Cursor playersCursor; private UpdateBroadcastReceiver r; @Override public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) { super.onCreate(savedInstanceState); setContentView(R.layout.map_view); mContext = AMap.this; // set map mapView = (MapView) findViewById(R.id.mapview); mapView.setBuiltInZoomControls(true); mapView.setFocusable(true); // find the relative layout rl = (RelativeLayout) findViewById(R.id.rl); // set the chronometer timer = (Chronometer) findViewById(R.id.tv_timer); timer.setBackgroundColor(Color.DKGRAY); // set the countdown textview tvCountdown = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.tv_countdown); // Open DB connection and get players Cursor mdba = new MyDBAdapter(mContext); mdba.open(); playersCursor = mdba.getGame(); // Get this player's id and location Intent starter = this.getIntent(); player.setId(starter.getIntExtra("id", 0)); player.setLatitude(starter.getDoubleExtra("lat", 0)); player.setLongitude(starter.getDoubleExtra("lon", 0)); // Set this player's location as map's center GeoPoint geoPoint = new GeoPoint((int) (player.getLatitude()*1E6), (int) (player.getLongitude()*1E6)); mapController = mapView.getController(); mapController.setCenter(geoPoint); mapController.setZoom(15); Log.d(LOG_TAG, "My playersCursor has "+playersCursor.getCount()+" rows"); // drawable is needed but not used drawable = this.getResources().getDrawable(R.drawable.ic_launcher); // set PlayersOverlay (locations and statuses) playersOverlay = new PlayersOverlay(player.getId(), playersCursor, drawable, this); mapOverlays = mapView.getOverlays(); mapOverlays.add(playersOverlay); mHandler.postDelayed(mUpdateTimeTask, 100); } private Runnable mUpdateTimeTask = new Runnable() { public void run() { int h = mapView.getLayoutParams().height; int w = mapView.getLayoutParams().width; Log.d(LOG_TAG, "w = "+w+" , h = "+h); mHandler.postAtTime(this, System.currentTimeMillis() + 1000); } }; @Override public void onAttachedToWindow(){ Log.d(LOG_TAG, "Attached to Window"); int h = mapView.getLayoutParams().height; int w = mapView.getLayoutParams().width; Log.d(LOG_TAG, " Attached to window: w = "+w+" , h = "+h); //mapController.zoomInFixing(screenPoint.x, screenPoint.y); } public void onWindowFocusChanged(boolean hasFocus){ Log.d(LOG_TAG, "Focus changed to: "+hasFocus); int h = mapView.getLayoutParams().height; int w = mapView.getLayoutParams().width; Log.d(LOG_TAG, " Window focus changed: w = "+w+" , h = "+h); //mapController.zoomInFixing(screenPoint.x, screenPoint.y); } @Override protected void onStart(){ super.onStart(); // Create and register the broadcast receiver for messages from service IntentFilter filter = new IntentFilter(AppConstants.iGAME_UPDATE); r = new UpdateBroadcastReceiver(); registerReceiver(r, filter); // Create the dialog for end of game ctw = new ContextThemeWrapper(mContext, android.R.style.Theme_Translucent_NoTitleBar_Fullscreen); endDialog = new AlertDialog.Builder(ctw); endDialog.setMessage("End of Game"); endDialog.setCancelable(false); endDialog.setNeutralButton("OK", new OnClickListener(){ @Override public void onClick(DialogInterface dialog, int which) { Intent highScores = new Intent(AMap.this, HighScores.class); startActivity(highScores); playersCursor.close(); finish(); } }); } @Override protected void onStop() { if(!playersCursor.isClosed()) playersCursor.close(); unregisterReceiver(r); mdba.close(); super.onStop(); } @Override protected boolean isRouteDisplayed() { return false; } // Receives signal from NetworkService that DB has been updated public class UpdateBroadcastReceiver extends BroadcastReceiver { boolean startSignal, update, endSignal; @Override public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) { endSignal = intent.getBooleanExtra("endSignal", false); if(endSignal){ Log.d(LOG_TAG, "Game Update BroadcastReceiver received End Signal"); endTask = new EndTask(); endTask.execute(); return; } update = intent.getBooleanExtra("update", false); if(update){ Log.d(LOG_TAG, "Game Update BroadcastReceiver received game update"); playersCursor.requery(); mapView.invalidate(); return; } startSignal = intent.getBooleanExtra("startSignal", false); if(startSignal){ Log.d(LOG_TAG, "Game Update BroadcastReceiver received Start Signal"); startTask = new StartTask(); startTask.execute(); return; } } } class StartTask extends AsyncTask<Void,Integer,Void>{ private final ToneGenerator tg = new ToneGenerator(AudioManager.STREAM_NOTIFICATION, 100); private final long DELAY = 1200; @Override protected Void doInBackground(Void... params) { int i = 3; while(i>=0){ publishProgress(i); try { Thread.sleep(DELAY); } catch (InterruptedException e) { e.printStackTrace(); } i--; } return null; } @Override protected void onProgressUpdate(Integer... progress){ tg.startTone(ToneGenerator.TONE_PROP_PROMPT); tvCountdown.setText(""+progress[0]); } @Override protected void onPostExecute(Void result) { rl.removeView(tvCountdown); timer.setBase(SystemClock.elapsedRealtime()); timer.start(); //enable screen touches playersOverlay.setGameStarted(true); } } class EndTask extends AsyncTask<Void,Void,Void>{ @Override protected void onPreExecute(){ //disable screen touches playersOverlay.setEndOfGame(true); timer.stop(); } @Override protected Void doInBackground(Void... params) { return null; } @Override protected void onPostExecute(Void result) { try{ endDialog.show(); }catch(Exception e){ Toast.makeText(mContext, "End of game", Toast.LENGTH_LONG); Intent highScores = new Intent(AMap.this, HighScores.class); startActivity(highScores); playersCursor.close(); finish(); } mHandler.removeCallbacks(mUpdateTimeTask); } } }

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Access Qry Questions

- by kralco626

It was suggested that I repost this questions as I didn't do a very good job discribing my issue the first time. (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2921286/access-question) THE SITUATION: I have inspections from many months of many years. Sometimes there is more than one inspection in a month, sometimes there is no inspection. However, the report that is desired by the clients requires that I have EXACTLY ONE record per month for the time frame they request the report. They understand the data issues and have stated that if there is more than one inspection in a month to take the latest one. If the is not an inspection for that month, go back in time untill you find one and use that one. So a sample of the data is as follows: (I am including many records because I was told I did not include enough data on my last try) equip_id month year runtime date 1 5 2008 400 5/10/2008 12:34 PM 1 7 2008 500 7/12/2008 1:45 PM 1 8 2008 600 8/20/2008 1:12 PM 1 8 2008 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 1 2010 2000 1/12/2010 2:00 PM 1 3 2010 2200 3/24/2010 10:00 AM 2 7 2009 1000 7/20/2009 8:00 AM 2 10 2009 1400 10/14/2009 9:00 AM 2 1 2010 1600 1/15/2010 1:00 PM 2 1 2010 1610 1/30/2010 4:00 PM 2 3 2010 1800 3/15/2010 1:00PM After all the transformations to the data are done, it should look like this: equip_id month year runtime date 1 5 2008 400 5/10/2008 12:34 PM 1 6 2008 400 5/10/2008 12:34 PM 1 7 2008 500 7/12/2008 1:45 PM 1 8 2008 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 9 2008 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 10 2008 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 11 2008 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 12 2008 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 1 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 2 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 3 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 4 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 5 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 6 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 7 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 8 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 9 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 10 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 11 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 12 2009 605 8/30/2008 8:00 AM 1 1 2010 2000 1/12/2010 2:00 PM 1 2 2010 2000 1/12/2010 2:00 PM 1 3 2010 2200 3/24/2010 10:00 AM 2 7 2009 1000 7/20/2009 8:00 AM 2 8 2009 1000 7/20/2009 8:00 AM 2 9 2009 1000 7/20/2009 8:00 AM 2 10 2009 1400 10/14/2009 9:00 AM 2 11 2009 1400 10/14/2009 9:00 AM 2 12 2009 1400 10/14/2009 9:00 AM 2 1 2010 1610 1/30/2010 4:00 PM 2 2 2010 1610 1/30/2010 4:00 PM 2 3 2010 1800 3/15/2010 1:00PM I think that this is the most accurate dipiction of the problem that I can give. I will now say what I have tried. Although if someone else has a better approach, I am perfectly willing to throw away what I have done and do it differently... STEP 1: create a query that removes the duplicates from the data. Ie. only one record per equip_id for each month/year, keeping the latest one. (done successfully) STEP 2: create a table of the date ranges the client wants the report for. (This is done dynamically at runtime) This table two field, Month and Year. So if the client wants a report from FEb 2008 to March 2010 the table would look like: Month Year 2 2008 3 2008 . . . 12 2008 1 2009 . . . 12 2009 1 2010 2 2010 3 2010 I then left joined this table with my query from step 1. So now I have a record for every month and every year that they want the report for, with nulls(or blanks) or sometimes 0s (not sure why, access is weird, but sometiems they are nulls and sumtimes they are 0s...) for the runtimes that are not avaiable. I don't particurally like this solution, but ill do it if i have to. (this is also done successfully) STEP 3: Fill in the missing runtime values. This I HAVE NOT done successfully. Note that if the request range for the report is feb 2008 to march 2010 and the oldest record for a particular equip_id is say june 2008, it is O.K. for the runtimes to be null (or zeros) for feb - may 2008. I am working with the following query for this step: SELECT equip_id as e_id,year,month, (select top 1 runhours from qry_1_c_One_Record_per_Month a where a.equip_id = e_id order by year,month) FROM qry_1_c_One_Record_per_Month where runhours is null or runhours = 0; UNION SELECT equip_id, year, month, runhours FROM qry_1_c_One_Record_per_Month WHERE .runhours Is Not Null And runhours <> 0 However I clearly can't check the a.equip_id = e_id ... so i don't have anyway to make sure i'm looking at the correct equip_id SUMMARY: So like i said i'm willing to throw away any part, or all of what I tried. Just trying to give everyone a complete picture. I REALLY apreciate ANY help! Thanks so much in advance!

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Java MVC project - either I can't update the drawing, or I can't see it

- by user1881164

I've got a project based around the Model-View-Controller paradigm, and I've been having a lot of trouble with getting it to work properly. The program has 4 panels, which are supposed to allow me to modify an oval drawn on the screen in various ways. These seem to work fine, and after considerable trouble I was able to get them to display in the JFrame which holds the whole shebang. I've managed to get them to display by breaking away from the provided instructions, but when I do that, I can't seem to get the oval to update. However, if I follow the directions to the letter, I only ever see an empty frame. The project had pretty specific directions, which I followed up to a point, but some of the documentation was unclear. I think what I'm missing must be something simple, since nothing is jumping out at me as not making sense. I have to admit though that my Java experience is limited and my experience with GUI design/paradigms is even more so. Anyway, I've been searching the web and this site extensively trying to figure out what's wrong, but this is a somewhat specific example and honestly I just don't know enough about this to generalize any of the answers I've found online and figure out what's missing. I've been poring over this code for far too long now so I'm really hoping someone can help me out. public class Model { private Controller controller; private View view; private MvcFrame mvcFrame; private int radius = 44; private Color color = Color.BLUE; private boolean solid = true; //bunch of mutators and accessors for the above variables public Model() { controller = new Controller(this); view = new View(this); mvcFrame = new MvcFrame(this); } } Here's the model class. This seems to be fairly simple. I think my understanding of what's going on here is solid, and nothing seems to be wrong. Included mostly for context. public class Controller extends JPanel{ private Model model; public Controller(Model model) { this.model = model; setBorder(BorderFactory.createLineBorder(Color.GREEN)); setLayout(new GridLayout(4,1)); add(new RadiusPanel(model)); add(new ColorPanel(model)); add(new SolidPanel(model)); add(new TitlePanel(model)); } } This is the Controller class. As far as I can tell, the setBorder, setLayout, and series of adds do nothing here. I had them commented out, but this is the way that the instructions told me to do things, so either there's a mistake there or something about my setup is wrong. However, when I did it this way, I would get an empty window (JFrame) but none of the panels would show up in it. What I did to fix this is put those add functions in the mvcFrame class: public class MvcFrame extends JFrame { private Model model; public MvcFrame(Model model){ this.model = model; //setLayout(new GridLayout(4,1)); //add(new RadiusPanel(model)); //add(new ColorPanel(model)); //add(new SolidPanel(model)); //add(new TitlePanel(model)); //add(new View(model)); setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE); setLocationRelativeTo(null); setSize(800,600); setVisible(true); } } So here's where things kind of started getting weird. The first block of commented out code is the same as what's in the Controller class. The reason I have it commented out is because that was just a lucky guess - it's not supposed to be like that according to the instructions. However, this did work for getting the panels to show up - but at that point I was still tearing my hair out trying to get the oval to display. The other commented line ( add(new View(model)); ) was a different attempt at making things work. In this case, I put those add functions in the View class (see commented out code below). This actually worked to display both the oval and the panels, but that method wouldn't allow me to update the oval. Also, though I just had the oval displaying, I can't seem to figure out what exactly made that happen, and I can't seem to make it come back. public class View extends JPanel{ private Model model; public View(Model model) { this.model = model; //setLayout(new GridLayout(4,1)); //add(new RadiusPanel(model)); //add(new ColorPanel(model)); //add(new SolidPanel(model)); //add(new TitlePanel(model)); repaint(); } @Override protected void paintComponent(Graphics g){ super.paintComponent(g); //center of view panel, in pixels: int xCenter = getWidth()/2; int yCenter = getHeight()/2; int radius = model.getRadius(); int xStart = xCenter - radius; int yStart = yCenter - radius; int xWidth = 2 * radius; int yHeight = 2 * radius; g.setColor(model.getColor()); g.clearRect(0, 0, getWidth(), getHeight()); if (model.isSolid()){ g.fillOval(xStart, yStart, xWidth, yHeight); } else { g.drawOval(xStart, yStart, xWidth, yHeight); } } } Kinda same idea as before - the commented out code is stuff I added to try to get things working, but is not based on the provided directions. In the case where that stuff was uncommented, I had the add(new View(model)); line from the mvcFrame line uncommented as well. The various panel classes (SolidPanel, ColorPanel, etc) simply extend a class called ControlPanel which extends JPanel. These all seem to work as expected, not having much issue with them. There is also a driver which launches the GUI. This also seems to work as expected. The main problem I'm having is that I can't get the oval to show up, and the one time I could make it show up, none of the options for changing it seemed to work. I feel like I'm close but I'm just at a loss for other things to try out at this point. Anyone who can help will have my sincerest gratitude.

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How to put Listview items into String Array?

- by user2851687

Im developing an app and as the title says how to put items of listview into String array, not string array to listview but listview to string array. I've been searching for this but what I only found is putting String array items into listview. Please help me thank you in advance. To clarify this thread, the question is how to put listview items into String array. Thanks. :D Codes public class DailyPlanTab extends Activity implements OnItemClickListener { ListView dailyPlanList; ArrayList<DailyManager> taskList = new ArrayList<DailyManager>(); DatabaseDailyPlan db; @Override protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub super.onCreate(savedInstanceState); setContentView(R.layout.dailyplan_layout); dailyPlanList = (ListView) findViewById(R.id.lvDailyPlanList); dailyPlanList.setOnItemClickListener(this); ImageView add = (ImageView) findViewById(R.id.ivDailyPlanAdd); add.setOnClickListener(new OnClickListener() { @Override public void onClick(View v) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub Intent newDailyIntent = new Intent(getApplicationContext(), NewDailyPlan.class); startActivity(newDailyIntent); } }); } @Override protected void onResume() { // TODO Auto-generated method stub super.onResume(); taskList.clear(); db = new DatabaseDailyPlan(getApplicationContext()); db.getWritableDatabase(); ArrayList<DailyManager> tempList = db.getTask(); for (int i = 0; i < tempList.size(); i++) { String getTask = tempList.get(i).getDaily_name(); String getDate = tempList.get(i).getDaily_date(); int getId = tempList.get(i).getDaily_id(); DailyManager dm = new DailyManager(); dm.setDaily_name(getTask); dm.setDaily_date(getDate); dm.setDaily_id(getId); taskList.add(dm); } dailyPlanList.setAdapter(new ListAdapter(this)); // db.close(); } public class ListAdapter extends BaseAdapter { LayoutInflater inflater; ViewHolder viewHolder; public ListAdapter(Context c) { // TODO Auto-generated constructor stub inflater = LayoutInflater.from(c); } @Override public int getCount() { // TODO Auto-generated method stub return taskList.size(); } @Override public Object getItem(int position) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub return position; } @Override public long getItemId(int position) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub return position; } @Override public View getView(int position, View convertView, ViewGroup parent) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub if (convertView == null) { convertView = inflater.inflate(R.layout.row_checklist_item, null); viewHolder = new ViewHolder(); viewHolder.taskTitle = (TextView) convertView .findViewById(R.id.tvCheckListItem); convertView.setTag(viewHolder); } else { viewHolder = (ViewHolder) convertView.getTag(); } viewHolder.taskTitle.setText("" + taskList.get(position).getDaily_name()); return convertView; } } public class ViewHolder { TextView taskTitle, taskDate; } @Override public void onItemClick(AdapterView<?> arg0, View arg1, int position, long arg3) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub int taskId = taskList.get(position).getDaily_id(); String taskName = taskList.get(position).getDaily_name(); String taskDate = taskList.get(position).getDaily_date(); Intent newPlan = new Intent(getApplicationContext(), DailyPlan.class); newPlan.putExtra("task_id", taskId); newPlan.putExtra("task_name", taskName); startActivity(newPlan); } next is the information of the item inside the listview public class DailyPlan extends Activity implements OnItemClickListener { final ArrayList<DailyManager> savedItems = new ArrayList<DailyManager>(); ListView checkList; Boolean nextItem = false; TempManager tm; DatabaseTemp dbTemp; Intent i; int taskId = -1; String taskName = " ", taskDate = null; DatabaseDailyPlan db; DailyManager dm; @Override protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub super.onCreate(savedInstanceState); setContentView(R.layout.saved_dailyplan); checkList = (ListView) findViewById(R.id.lvCheckList); // checkList.setOnItemClickListener(this); try { i = getIntent(); taskId = i.getExtras().getInt("task_id"); taskName = i.getExtras().getString("task_name"); Toast.makeText(getApplicationContext(), "From new id is" + taskId, 5000).show(); } catch (Exception e) { } Button addList = (Button) findViewById(R.id.bAddList); addList.setOnClickListener(new OnClickListener() { @Override public void onClick(View v) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub // openDialog("", false, -1); } }); if (nextItem) { // openDialog("", false, -1); } } public void refresh() { DailyPlan.this.onResume(); } @Override protected void onResume() { // TODO Auto-generated method stub super.onResume(); savedItems.clear(); dbTemp = new DatabaseTemp(getApplicationContext()); dbTemp.getWritableDatabase(); db = new DatabaseDailyPlan(getApplicationContext()); db.getWritableDatabase(); if (taskId != -1) { // / For Load ArrayList<DailyManager> savedList = db.getList(taskId); for (int i = 0; i < savedList.size(); i++) { String savedListItems = savedList.get(i).getDaily_list(); String savedListTitle = savedList.get(i).getDaily_name(); String savedListDate = savedList.get(i).getDaily_date(); int savedListId = savedList.get(i).getDaily_id(); DailyManager dm = new DailyManager(); dm.setDaily_list(savedListItems); dm.setDaily_name(savedListTitle); dm.setDaily_date(savedListDate); dm.setDaily_id(savedListId); savedItems.add(dm); } } else { // / For New } checkList.setAdapter(new ListAdapter(this)); } public class ListAdapter extends BaseAdapter { LayoutInflater inflater; ViewHolder viewHolder; public ListAdapter(Context c) { // TODO Auto-generated constructor stub inflater = LayoutInflater.from(c); } @Override public int getCount() { // TODO Auto-generated method stub return savedItems.size(); } @Override public Object getItem(int position) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub return position; } @Override public long getItemId(int position) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub return position; } @Override public View getView(int position, View convertView, ViewGroup parent) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub if (convertView == null) { convertView = inflater.inflate(R.layout.row_checklist_item, null); viewHolder = new ViewHolder(); viewHolder.checkListItem = (TextView) convertView .findViewById(R.id.tvCheckListItem); convertView.setTag(viewHolder); } else { viewHolder = (ViewHolder) convertView.getTag(); } viewHolder.checkListItem.setText(savedItems.get(position) .getDaily_list() + position); final int temp = position; return convertView; } } private class ViewHolder { TextView checkListItem; } @Override public void onItemClick(AdapterView<?> arg0, View arg1, int item, long arg3) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub // openDialog(savedItems.get(item).getDaily_name(), true, // savedItems.get(item).getDaily_id()); } }

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Which workaround to use for the following SQL deadlock?

- by Marko

I found a SQL deadlock scenario in my application during concurrency. I belive that the two statements that cause the deadlock are (note - I'm using LINQ2SQL and DataContext.ExecuteCommand(), that's where this.studioId.ToString() comes into play): exec sp_executesql N'INSERT INTO HQ.dbo.SynchronizingRows ([StudioId], [UpdatedRowId]) SELECT @p0, [t0].[Id] FROM [dbo].[UpdatedRows] AS [t0] WHERE NOT (EXISTS( SELECT NULL AS [EMPTY] FROM [dbo].[ReceivedUpdatedRows] AS [t1] WHERE ([t1].[StudioId] = @p0) AND ([t1].[UpdatedRowId] = [t0].[Id]) ))',N'@p0 uniqueidentifier',@p0='" + this.studioId.ToString() + "'; and exec sp_executesql N'INSERT INTO HQ.dbo.ReceivedUpdatedRows ([UpdatedRowId], [StudioId], [ReceiveDateTime]) SELECT [t0].[UpdatedRowId], @p0, GETDATE() FROM [dbo].[SynchronizingRows] AS [t0] WHERE ([t0].[StudioId] = @p0)',N'@p0 uniqueidentifier',@p0='" + this.studioId.ToString() + "'; The basic logic of my (client-server) application is this: Every time someone inserts or updates a row on the server side, I also insert a row into the table UpdatedRows, specifying the RowId of the modified row. When a client tries to synchronize data, it first copies all of the rows in the UpdatedRows table, that don't contain a reference row for the specific client in the table ReceivedUpdatedRows, to the table SynchronizingRows (the first statement taking part in the deadlock). Afterwards, during the synchronization I look for modified rows via lookup of the SynchronizingRows table. This step is required, otherwise if someone inserts new rows or modifies rows on the server side during synchronization I will miss them and won't get them during the next synchronization (explanation scenario to long to write here...). Once synchronization is complete, I insert rows to the ReceivedUpdatedRows table specifying that this client has received the UpdatedRows contained in the SynchronizingRows table (the second statement taking part in the deadlock). Finally I delete all rows from the SynchronizingRows table that belong to the current client. The way I see it, the deadlock is occuring on tables SynchronizingRows (abbreviation SR) and ReceivedUpdatedRows (abbreviation RUR) during steps 2 and 3 (one client is in step 2 and is inserting into SR and selecting from RUR; while another client is in step 3 inserting into RUR and selecting from SR). I googled a bit about SQL deadlocks and came to a conclusion that I have three options. Inorder to make a decision I need more input about each option/workaround: Workaround 1: The first advice given on the web about SQL deadlocks - restructure tables/queries so that deadlocks don't happen in the first place. Only problem with this is that with my IQ I don't see a way to do the synchronization logic any differently. If someone wishes to dwelve deeper into my current synchronization logic, how and why it is set up the way it is, I'll post a link for the explanation. Perhaps, with the help of someone smarter than me, it's possible to create a logic that is deadlock free. Workaround 2: The second most common advice seems to be the use of WITH(NOLOCK) hint. The problem with this is that NOLOCK might miss or duplicate some rows. Duplication is not a problem, but missing rows is catastrophic! Another option is the WITH(READPAST) hint. On the face of it, this seems to be a perfect solution. I really don't care about rows that other clients are inserting/modifying, because each row belongs only to a specific client, so I may very well skip locked rows. But the MSDN documentaion makes me a bit worried - "When READPAST is specified, both row-level and page-level locks are skipped". As I said, row-level locks would not be a problem, but page-level locks may very well be, since a page might contain rows that belong to multiple clients (including the current one). While there are lots of blog posts specifically mentioning that NOLOCK might miss rows, there seems to be none about READPAST (never) missing rows. This makes me skeptical and nervous to implement it, since there is no easy way to test it (implementing would be a piece of cake, just pop WITH(READPAST) into both statements SELECT clause and job done). Can someone confirm whether the READPAST hint can miss rows? Workaround 3: The final option is to use ALLOW_SNAPSHOT_ISOLATION and READ_COMMITED_SNAPSHOT. This would seem to be the only option to work 100% - at least I can't find any information that would contradict with it. But it is a little bit trickier to setup (I don't care much about the performance hit), because I'm using LINQ. Off the top of my head I probably need to manually open a SQL connection and pass it to the LINQ2SQL DataContext, etc... I haven't looked into the specifics very deeply. Mostly I would prefer option 2 if somone could only reassure me that READPAST will never miss rows concerning the current client (as I said before, each client has and only ever deals with it's own set of rows). Otherwise I'll likely have to implement option 3, since option 1 is probably impossible... I'll post the table definitions for the three tables as well, just in case: CREATE TABLE [dbo].[UpdatedRows]( [Id] [uniqueidentifier] NOT NULL ROWGUIDCOL DEFAULT NEWSEQUENTIALID() PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED, [RowId] [uniqueidentifier] NOT NULL, [UpdateDateTime] [datetime] NOT NULL, ) ON [PRIMARY] GO CREATE NONCLUSTERED INDEX IX_RowId ON dbo.UpdatedRows ([RowId] ASC) WITH (STATISTICS_NORECOMPUTE = OFF, IGNORE_DUP_KEY = OFF, ALLOW_ROW_LOCKS = ON, ALLOW_PAGE_LOCKS = ON) ON [PRIMARY] GO CREATE TABLE [dbo].[ReceivedUpdatedRows]( [Id] [uniqueidentifier] NOT NULL ROWGUIDCOL DEFAULT NEWSEQUENTIALID() PRIMARY KEY NONCLUSTERED, [UpdatedRowId] [uniqueidentifier] NOT NULL REFERENCES [dbo].[UpdatedRows] ([Id]), [StudioId] [uniqueidentifier] NOT NULL REFERENCES, [ReceiveDateTime] [datetime] NOT NULL, ) ON [PRIMARY] GO CREATE CLUSTERED INDEX IX_Studios ON dbo.ReceivedUpdatedRows ([StudioId] ASC) WITH (STATISTICS_NORECOMPUTE = OFF, IGNORE_DUP_KEY = OFF, ALLOW_ROW_LOCKS = ON, ALLOW_PAGE_LOCKS = ON) ON [PRIMARY] GO CREATE TABLE [dbo].[SynchronizingRows]( [StudioId] [uniqueidentifier] NOT NULL [UpdatedRowId] [uniqueidentifier] NOT NULL REFERENCES [dbo].[UpdatedRows] ([Id]) PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED ([StudioId], [UpdatedRowId]) ) ON [PRIMARY] GO PS! Studio = Client. PS2! I just noticed that the index definitions have ALLOW_PAGE_LOCK=ON. If I would turn it off, would that make any difference to READPAST? Are there any negative downsides for turning it off?

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Numpy zero rank array indexing/broadcasting

- by Lemming

I'm trying to write a function that supports broadcasting and is fast at the same time. However, numpy's zero-rank arrays are causing trouble as usual. I couldn't find anything useful on google, or by searching here. So, I'm asking you. How should I implement broadcasting efficiently and handle zero-rank arrays at the same time? This whole post became larger than anticipated, sorry. Details: To clarify what I'm talking about I'll give a simple example: Say I want to implement a Heaviside step-function. I.e. a function that acts on the real axis, which is 0 on the negative side, 1 on the positive side, and from case to case either 0, 0.5, or 1 at the point 0. Implementation Masking The most efficient way I found so far is the following. It uses boolean arrays as masks to assign the correct values to the corresponding slots in the output vector. from numpy import * def step_mask(x, limit=+1): """Heaviside step-function. y = 0 if x < 0 y = 1 if x > 0 See below for x == 0. Arguments: x Evaluate the function at these points. limit Which limit at x == 0? limit > 0: y = 1 limit == 0: y = 0.5 limit < 0: y = 0 Return: The values corresponding to x. """ b = broadcast(x, limit) out = zeros(b.shape) out[x>0] = 1 mask = (limit > 0) & (x == 0) out[mask] = 1 mask = (limit == 0) & (x == 0) out[mask] = 0.5 mask = (limit < 0) & (x == 0) out[mask] = 0 return out List Comprehension The following-the-numpy-docs way is to use a list comprehension on the flat iterator of the broadcast object. However, list comprehensions become absolutely unreadable for such complicated functions. def step_comprehension(x, limit=+1): b = broadcast(x, limit) out = empty(b.shape) out.flat = [ ( 1 if x_ > 0 else ( 0 if x_ < 0 else ( 1 if l_ > 0 else ( 0.5 if l_ ==0 else ( 0 ))))) for x_, l_ in b ] return out For Loop And finally, the most naive way is a for loop. It's probably the most readable option. However, Python for-loops are anything but fast. And hence, a really bad idea in numerics. def step_for(x, limit=+1): b = broadcast(x, limit) out = empty(b.shape) for i, (x_, l_) in enumerate(b): if x_ > 0: out[i] = 1 elif x_ < 0: out[i] = 0 elif l_ > 0: out[i] = 1 elif l_ < 0: out[i] = 0 else: out[i] = 0.5 return out Test First of all a brief test to see if the output is correct. >>> x = array([-1, -0.1, 0, 0.1, 1]) >>> step_mask(x, +1) array([ 0., 0., 1., 1., 1.]) >>> step_mask(x, 0) array([ 0. , 0. , 0.5, 1. , 1. ]) >>> step_mask(x, -1) array([ 0., 0., 0., 1., 1.]) It is correct, and the other two functions give the same output. Performance How about efficiency? These are the timings: In [45]: xl = linspace(-2, 2, 500001) In [46]: %timeit step_mask(xl) 10 loops, best of 3: 19.5 ms per loop In [47]: %timeit step_comprehension(xl) 1 loops, best of 3: 1.17 s per loop In [48]: %timeit step_for(xl) 1 loops, best of 3: 1.15 s per loop The masked version performs best as expected. However, I'm surprised that the comprehension is on the same level as the for loop. Zero Rank Arrays But, 0-rank arrays pose a problem. Sometimes you want to use a function scalar input. And preferably not have to worry about wrapping all scalars in at least 1-D arrays. >>> step_mask(1) Traceback (most recent call last): File "<ipython-input-50-91c06aa4487b>", line 1, in <module> step_mask(1) File "script.py", line 22, in step_mask out[x>0] = 1 IndexError: 0-d arrays can't be indexed. >>> step_for(1) Traceback (most recent call last): File "<ipython-input-51-4e0de4fcb197>", line 1, in <module> step_for(1) File "script.py", line 55, in step_for out[i] = 1 IndexError: 0-d arrays can't be indexed. >>> step_comprehension(1) array(1.0) Only the list comprehension can handle 0-rank arrays. The other two versions would need special case handling for 0-rank arrays. Numpy gets a bit messy when you want to use the same code for arrays and scalars. However, I really like to have functions that work on as arbitrary input as possible. Who knows which parameters I'll want to iterate over at some point. Question: What is the best way to implement a function as the one above? Is there a way to avoid if scalar then like special cases? I'm not looking for a built-in Heaviside. It's just a simplified example. In my code the above pattern appears in many places to make parameter iteration as simple as possible without littering the client code with for loops or comprehensions. Furthermore, I'm aware of Cython, or weave & Co., or implementation directly in C. However, the performance of the masked version above is sufficient for the moment. And for the moment I would like to keep things as simple as possible.

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How should I implement simple caches with concurrency on Redis?

- by solublefish

Background I have a 2-tier web service - just my app server and an RDBMS. I want to move to a pool of identical app servers behind a load balancer. I currently cache a bunch of objects in-process. I hope to move them to a shared Redis. I have a dozen or so caches of simple, small-sized business objects. For example, I have a set of Foos. Each Foo has a unique FooId and an OwnerId. One "owner" may own multiple Foos. In a traditional RDBMS this is just a table with an index on the PK FooId and one on OwnerId. I'm caching this in one process simply: Dictionary<int,Foo> _cacheFooById; Dictionary<int,HashSet<int>> _indexFooIdsByOwnerId; Reads come straight from here, and writes go here and to the RDBMS. I usually have this invariant: "For a given group [say by OwnerId], the whole group is in cache or none of it is." So when I cache miss on a Foo, I pull that Foo and all the owner's other Foos from the RDBMS. Updates make sure to keep the index up to date and respect the invariant. When an owner calls GetMyFoos I never have to worry that some are cached and some aren't. What I did already The first/simplest answer seems to be to use plain ol' SET and GET with a composite key and json value: SET( "ServiceCache:Foo:" + theFoo.Id, JsonSerialize(theFoo)); I later decided I liked: HSET( "ServiceCache:Foo", theFoo.FooId, JsonSerialize(theFoo)); That lets me get all the values in one cache as HVALS. It also felt right - I'm literally moving hashtables to Redis, so perhaps my top-level items should be hashes. This works to first order. If my high-level code is like: UpdateCache(myFoo); AddToIndex(myFoo); That translates into: HSET ("ServiceCache:Foo", theFoo.FooId, JsonSerialize(theFoo)); var myFoos = JsonDeserialize( HGET ("ServiceCache:FooIndex", theFoo.OwnerId) ); myFoos.Add(theFoo.OwnerId); HSET ("ServiceCache:FooIndex", theFoo.OwnerId, JsonSerialize(myFoos)); However, this is broken in two ways. Two concurrent operations can read/modify/write at the same time. The latter "wins" the final HSET and the former's index update is lost. Another operation could read the index in between the first and second lines. It would miss a Foo that it should find. So how do I index properly? I think I could use a Redis set instead of a json-encoded value for the index. That would solve part of the problem since the "add-to-index-if-not-already-present" would be atomic. I also read about using MULTI as a "transaction" but it doesn't seem like it does what I want. Am I right that I can't really MULTI; HGET; {update}; HSET; EXEC since it doesn't even do the HGET before I issue the EXEC? I also read about using WATCH and MULTI for optimistic concurrency, then retrying on failure. But WATCH only works on top-level keys. So it's back to SET/GET instead of HSET/HGET. And now I need a new index-like-thing to support getting all the values in a given cache. If I understand it right, I can combine all these things to do the job. Something like: while(!succeeded) { WATCH( "ServiceCache:Foo:" + theFoo.FooId ); WATCH( "ServiceCache:FooIndexByOwner:" + theFoo.OwnerId ); WATCH( "ServiceCache:FooIndexAll" ); MULTI(); SET ("ServiceCache:Foo:" + theFoo.FooId, JsonSerialize(theFoo)); SADD ("ServiceCache:FooIndexByOwner:" + theFoo.OwnerId, theFoo.FooId); SADD ("ServiceCache:FooIndexAll", theFoo.FooId); EXEC(); //TODO somehow set succeeded properly } Finally I'd have to translate this pseudocode into real code depending how my client library uses WATCH/MULTI/EXEC; it looks like they need some sort of context to hook them together. All in all this seems like a lot of complexity for what has to be a very common case; I can't help but think there's a better, smarter, Redis-ish way to do things that I'm just not seeing. How do I lock properly? Even if I had no indexes, there's still a (probably rare) race condition. A: HGET - cache miss B: HGET - cache miss A: SELECT B: SELECT A: HSET C: HGET - cache hit C: UPDATE C: HSET B: HSET ** this is stale data that's clobbering C's update. Note that C could just be a really-fast A. Again I think WATCH, MULTI, retry would work, but... ick. I know in some places people use special Redis keys as locks for other objects. Is that a reasonable approach here? Should those be top-level keys like ServiceCache:FooLocks:{Id} or ServiceCache:Locks:Foo:{Id}? Or make a separate hash for them - ServiceCache:Locks with subkeys Foo:{Id}, or ServiceCache:Locks:Foo with subkeys {Id} ? How would I work around abandoned locks, say if a transaction (or a whole server) crashes while "holding" the lock?

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How do I search the MediaStore for a specific directory instead of entire external storage?

- by Nick Lopez

In my app I have an option that allows users to browse for audio files on their phone to add to the app. I am having trouble however with creating a faster way of processing the query code. Currently it searches the entire external storage and causes the phone to prompt a force close/wait warning. I would like to take the code I have posted below and make it more efficient by either searching in a specific folder on the phone or by streamlining the process to make the file search quicker. I am not sure how to do this however. Thanks! public class BrowseActivity extends DashboardActivity implements OnClickListener, OnItemClickListener { private List<Sound> soundsInDevice = new ArrayList<Sound>(); private List<Sound> checkedList; private ListView browsedList; private BrowserSoundAdapter adapter; private long categoryId; private Category category; private String currentCategoryName; private String description; // private Category newCategory ; private Button doneButton; @Override protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) { super.onCreate(savedInstanceState); requestWindowFeature(Window.FEATURE_NO_TITLE); setContentView(R.layout.activity_browse); checkedList = new ArrayList<Sound>(); browsedList = (ListView) findViewById(android.R.id.list); doneButton = (Button) findViewById(R.id.doneButton); soundsInDevice = getMediaSounds(); if (soundsInDevice.size() > 0) { adapter = new BrowserSoundAdapter(this, R.id.browseSoundName, soundsInDevice); } else { Toast.makeText(getApplicationContext(), getString(R.string.no_sounds_available), Toast.LENGTH_SHORT) .show(); } browsedList.setAdapter(adapter); browsedList.setOnItemClickListener(this); doneButton.setOnClickListener(this); } private List<Sound> getMediaSounds() { List<Sound> mediaSoundList = new ArrayList<Sound>(); ContentResolver cr = getContentResolver(); String[] projection = {MediaStore.Audio.Media._ID, MediaStore.Audio.Media.DISPLAY_NAME, MediaStore.Audio.Media.TITLE, MediaStore.Audio.Media.DATA, MediaStore.Audio.Media.DURATION}; final Uri uri = MediaStore.Audio.Media.EXTERNAL_CONTENT_URI; Log.v("MediaStore.Audio.Media.EXTERNAL_CONTENT_URI", "" + uri); final Cursor cursor = cr.query(uri, projection, null, null, null); int n = cursor.getCount(); Log.v("count", "" + n); if (cursor.moveToFirst()) { do { String soundName = cursor .getString(cursor .getColumnIndexOrThrow(MediaStore.Audio.Media.DISPLAY_NAME)); Log.v("soundName", "" + soundName); String title = cursor .getString(cursor .getColumnIndexOrThrow(MediaStore.Audio.Media.TITLE)); Log.v("title", "" + title); String path = cursor.getString(cursor .getColumnIndexOrThrow(MediaStore.Audio.Media.DATA)); Log.v("path", "" + path); Sound browsedSound = new Sound(title, path, false, false, false, false, 0); Log.v("browsedSound", "" + browsedSound); mediaSoundList.add(browsedSound); Log.v("mediaSoundList", "" + mediaSoundList.toString()); } while (cursor.moveToNext()); } return mediaSoundList; } public class BrowserSoundAdapter extends ArrayAdapter<Sound> { public BrowserSoundAdapter(Context context, int textViewResourceId, List<Sound> objects) { super(context, textViewResourceId, objects); } @Override public View getView(final int position, View convertView, ViewGroup parent) { ViewHolder viewHolder; View view = convertView; LayoutInflater inflater = getLayoutInflater(); if (view == null) { view = inflater.inflate(R.layout.list_item_browse, null); viewHolder = new ViewHolder(); viewHolder.soundNameTextView = (TextView) view .findViewById(R.id.browseSoundName); viewHolder.pathTextView = (TextView) view .findViewById(R.id.browseSoundPath); viewHolder.checkToAddSound = (CheckBox) view .findViewById(R.id.browse_checkbox); view.setTag(viewHolder); } else { viewHolder = (ViewHolder) view.getTag(); } final Sound sound = soundsInDevice.get(position); if (sound.isCheckedState()) { viewHolder.checkToAddSound.setChecked(true); } else { viewHolder.checkToAddSound.setChecked(false); } viewHolder.soundNameTextView.setText(sound.getName()); viewHolder.pathTextView.setText(sound.getUri()); viewHolder.checkToAddSound .setOnClickListener(new OnClickListener() { @Override public void onClick(View v) { CheckBox cb = (CheckBox) v .findViewById(R.id.browse_checkbox); boolean checked = cb.isChecked(); boolean newValue = checked; updateView(position, newValue); doneButtonStatus(checkedList.size()); } }); return view; } } // Adapter view holder class private class ViewHolder { private TextView soundNameTextView; private TextView pathTextView; private CheckBox checkToAddSound; } // done button On Click @Override public void onClick(View view) { boolean status = getIntent().getBooleanExtra("FromAddCat", false); Log.v("for add category","enters in if"); if(status){ Log.v("for add category","enters in if1"); currentCategoryName = getIntent().getStringExtra("categoryName"); description = getIntent().getStringExtra("description"); boolean existCategory = SQLiteHelper.getCategoryStatus(currentCategoryName); if (!existCategory) { category = new Category(currentCategoryName, description, false); category.insert(); category.update(); Log.v("for add category","enters in if2"); } }else{ categoryId = getIntent().getLongExtra("categoryId",-1); category = SQLiteHelper.getCategory(categoryId); } for (Sound checkedsound : checkedList) { checkedsound.setCheckedState(false); checkedsound.insert(); category.getSounds().add(checkedsound); final Intent intent = new Intent(this, CategoriesActivity.class); finish(); startActivity(intent); } } @Override public void onItemClick(AdapterView<?> arg0, View view, int position, long arg3) { boolean checked = true; boolean newValue = false; CheckBox cb = (CheckBox) view.findViewById(R.id.browse_checkbox); if (cb.isChecked()) { cb.setChecked(!checked); newValue = !checked; } else { cb.setChecked(checked); newValue = checked; } updateView(position, newValue); doneButtonStatus(checkedList.size()); } private void doneButtonStatus(int size) { if (size > 0) { doneButton.setEnabled(true); doneButton.setBackgroundResource(R.drawable.done_button_drawable); } else { doneButton.setEnabled(false); doneButton.setBackgroundResource(R.drawable.done_btn_disabled); } } private void updateView(int index, boolean newValue) { System.out.println(newValue); Sound sound = soundsInDevice.get(index); if (newValue == true) { checkedList.add(sound); sound.setCheckedState(newValue); } else { checkedList.remove(sound); sound.setCheckedState(newValue); } } }

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What's New in ASP.NET 4

- by Navaneeth

The .NET Framework version 4 includes enhancements for ASP.NET 4 in targeted areas. Visual Studio 2010 and Microsoft Visual Web Developer Express also include enhancements and new features for improved Web development. This document provides an overview of many of the new features that are included in the upcoming release. This topic contains the following sections: ASP.NET Core Services ASP.NET Web Forms ASP.NET MVC Dynamic Data ASP.NET Chart Control Visual Web Developer Enhancements Web Application Deployment with Visual Studio 2010 Enhancements to ASP.NET Multi-Targeting ASP.NET Core Services ASP.NET 4 introduces many features that improve core ASP.NET services such as output caching and session state storage. Extensible Output Caching Since the time that ASP.NET 1.0 was released, output caching has enabled developers to store the generated output of pages, controls, and HTTP responses in memory. On subsequent Web requests, ASP.NET can serve content more quickly by retrieving the generated output from memory instead of regenerating the output from scratch. However, this approach has a limitation — generated content always has to be stored in memory. On servers that experience heavy traffic, the memory requirements for output caching can compete with memory requirements for other parts of a Web application. ASP.NET 4 adds extensibility to output caching that enables you to configure one or more custom output-cache providers. Output-cache providers can use any storage mechanism to persist HTML content. These storage options can include local or remote disks, cloud storage, and distributed cache engines. Output-cache provider extensibility in ASP.NET 4 lets you design more aggressive and more intelligent output-caching strategies for Web sites. For example, you can create an output-cache provider that caches the "Top 10" pages of a site in memory, while caching pages that get lower traffic on disk. Alternatively, you can cache every vary-by combination for a rendered page, but use a distributed cache so that the memory consumption is offloaded from front-end Web servers. You create a custom output-cache provider as a class that derives from the OutputCacheProvider type. You can then configure the provider in the Web.config file by using the new providers subsection of the outputCache element For more information and for examples that show how to configure the output cache, see outputCache Element for caching (ASP.NET Settings Schema). For more information about the classes that support caching, see the documentation for the OutputCache and OutputCacheProvider classes. By default, in ASP.NET 4, all HTTP responses, rendered pages, and controls use the in-memory output cache. The defaultProvider attribute for ASP.NET is AspNetInternalProvider. You can change the default output-cache provider used for a Web application by specifying a different provider name for defaultProvider attribute. In addition, you can select different output-cache providers for individual control and for individual requests and programmatically specify which provider to use. For more information, see the HttpApplication.GetOutputCacheProviderName(HttpContext) method. The easiest way to choose a different output-cache provider for different Web user controls is to do so declaratively by using the new providerName attribute in a page or control directive, as shown in the following example: <%@ OutputCache Duration="60" VaryByParam="None" providerName="DiskCache" %> Preloading Web Applications Some Web applications must load large amounts of data or must perform expensive initialization processing before serving the first request. In earlier versions of ASP.NET, for these situations you had to devise custom approaches to "wake up" an ASP.NET application and then run initialization code during the Application_Load method in the Global.asax file. To address this scenario, a new application preload manager (autostart feature) is available when ASP.NET 4 runs on IIS 7.5 on Windows Server 2008 R2. The preload feature provides a controlled approach for starting up an application pool, initializing an ASP.NET application, and then accepting HTTP requests. It lets you perform expensive application initialization prior to processing the first HTTP request. For example, you can use the application preload manager to initialize an application and then signal a load-balancer that the application was initialized and ready to accept HTTP traffic. To use the application preload manager, an IIS administrator sets an application pool in IIS 7.5 to be automatically started by using the following configuration in the applicationHost.config file: <applicationPools> <add name="MyApplicationPool" startMode="AlwaysRunning" /> </applicationPools> Because a single application pool can contain multiple applications, you specify individual applications to be automatically started by using the following configuration in the applicationHost.config file: <sites> <site name="MySite" id="1"> <application path="/" serviceAutoStartEnabled="true" serviceAutoStartProvider="PrewarmMyCache" >  </application> </site> </sites>  <serviceAutoStartProviders> <add name="PrewarmMyCache" type="MyNamespace.CustomInitialization, MyLibrary" /> </serviceAutoStartProviders> When an IIS 7.5 server is cold-started or when an individual application pool is recycled, IIS 7.5 uses the information in the applicationHost.config file to determine which Web applications have to be automatically started. For each application that is marked for preload, IIS7.5 sends a request to ASP.NET 4 to start the application in a state during which the application temporarily does not accept HTTP requests. When it is in this state, ASP.NET instantiates the type defined by the serviceAutoStartProvider attribute (as shown in the previous example) and calls into its public entry point. You create a managed preload type that has the required entry point by implementing the IProcessHostPreloadClient interface, as shown in the following example: public class CustomInitialization : System.Web.Hosting.IProcessHostPreloadClient { public void Preload(string[] parameters) { // Perform initialization. } } After your initialization code runs in the Preload method and after the method returns, the ASP.NET application is ready to process requests. Permanently Redirecting a Page Content in Web applications is often moved over the lifetime of the application. This can lead to links to be out of date, such as the links that are returned by search engines. In ASP.NET, developers have traditionally handled requests to old URLs by using the Redirect method to forward a request to the new URL. However, the Redirect method issues an HTTP 302 (Found) response (which is used for a temporary redirect). This results in an extra HTTP round trip. ASP.NET 4 adds a RedirectPermanent helper method that makes it easy to issue HTTP 301 (Moved Permanently) responses, as in the following example: RedirectPermanent("/newpath/foroldcontent.aspx"); Search engines and other user agents that recognize permanent redirects will store the new URL that is associated with the content, which eliminates the unnecessary round trip made by the browser for temporary redirects. Session State Compression By default, ASP.NET provides two options for storing session state across a Web farm. The first option is a session state provider that invokes an out-of-process session state server. The second option is a session state provider that stores data in a Microsoft SQL Server database. Because both options store state information outside a Web application's worker process, session state has to be serialized before it is sent to remote storage. If a large amount of data is saved in session state, the size of the serialized data can become very large. ASP.NET 4 introduces a new compression option for both kinds of out-of-process session state providers. By using this option, applications that have spare CPU cycles on Web servers can achieve substantial reductions in the size of serialized session state data. You can set this option using the new compressionEnabled attribute of the sessionState element in the configuration file. When the compressionEnabled configuration option is set to true, ASP.NET compresses (and decompresses) serialized session state by using the .NET Framework GZipStreamclass. The following example shows how to set this attribute. <sessionState mode="SqlServer" sqlConnectionString="data source=dbserver;Initial Catalog=aspnetstate" allowCustomSqlDatabase="true" compressionEnabled="true" /> ASP.NET Web Forms Web Forms has been a core feature in ASP.NET since the release of ASP.NET 1.0. Many enhancements have been in this area for ASP.NET 4, such as the following: The ability to set meta tags. More control over view state. Support for recently introduced browsers and devices. Easier ways to work with browser capabilities. Support for using ASP.NET routing with Web Forms. More control over generated IDs. The ability to persist selected rows in data controls. More control over rendered HTML in the FormView and ListView controls. Filtering support for data source controls. Enhanced support for Web standards and accessibility Setting Meta Tags with the Page.MetaKeywords and Page.MetaDescription Properties Two properties have been added to the Page class: MetaKeywords and MetaDescription. These two properties represent corresponding meta tags in the HTML rendered for a page, as shown in the following example: <head id="Head1" runat="server"> <title>Untitled Page</title> <meta name="keywords" content="keyword1, keyword2' /> <meta name="description" content="Description of my page" /> </head> These two properties work like the Title property does, and they can be set in the @ Page directive. For more information, see Page.MetaKeywords and Page.MetaDescription. Enabling View State for Individual Controls A new property has been added to the Control class: ViewStateMode. You can use this property to disable view state for all controls on a page except those for which you explicitly enable view state. View state data is included in a page's HTML and increases the amount of time it takes to send a page to the client and post it back. Storing more view state than is necessary can cause significant decrease in performance. In earlier versions of ASP.NET, you could reduce the impact of view state on a page's performance by disabling view state for specific controls. But sometimes it is easier to enable view state for a few controls that need it instead of disabling it for many that do not need it. For more information, see Control.ViewStateMode. Support for Recently Introduced Browsers and Devices ASP.NET includes a feature that is named browser capabilities that lets you determine the capabilities of the browser that a user is using. Browser capabilities are represented by the HttpBrowserCapabilities object which is stored in the HttpRequest.Browser property. Information about a particular browser's capabilities is defined by a browser definition file. In ASP.NET 4, these browser definition files have been updated to contain information about recently introduced browsers and devices such as Google Chrome, Research in Motion BlackBerry smart phones, and Apple iPhone. Existing browser definition files have also been updated. For more information, see How to: Upgrade an ASP.NET Web Application to ASP.NET 4 and ASP.NET Web Server Controls and Browser Capabilities. The browser definition files that are included with ASP.NET 4 are shown in the following list: •blackberry.browser •chrome.browser •Default.browser •firefox.browser •gateway.browser •generic.browser •ie.browser •iemobile.browser •iphone.browser •opera.browser •safari.browser A New Way to Define Browser Capabilities ASP.NET 4 includes a new feature referred to as browser capabilities providers. As the name suggests, this lets you build a provider that in turn lets you write custom code to determine browser capabilities. In ASP.NET version 3.5 Service Pack 1, you define browser capabilities in an XML file. This file resides in a machine-level folder or an application-level folder. Most developers do not need to customize these files, but for those who do, the provider approach can be easier than dealing with complex XML syntax. The provider approach makes it possible to simplify the process by implementing a common browser definition syntax, or a database that contains up-to-date browser definitions, or even a Web service for such a database. For more information about the new browser capabilities provider, see the What's New for ASP.NET 4 White Paper. Routing in ASP.NET 4 ASP.NET 4 adds built-in support for routing with Web Forms. Routing is a feature that was introduced with ASP.NET 3.5 SP1 and lets you configure an application to use URLs that are meaningful to users and to search engines because they do not have to specify physical file names. This can make your site more user-friendly and your site content more discoverable by search engines. For example, the URL for a page that displays product categories in your application might look like the following example: http://website/products.aspx?categoryid=12 By using routing, you can use the following URL to render the same information: http://website/products/software The second URL lets the user know what to expect and can result in significantly improved rankings in search engine results. the new features include the following: The PageRouteHandler class is a simple HTTP handler that you use when you define routes. You no longer have to write a custom route handler. The HttpRequest.RequestContext and Page.RouteData properties make it easier to access information that is passed in URL parameters. The RouteUrl expression provides a simple way to create a routed URL in markup. The RouteValue expression provides a simple way to extract URL parameter values in markup. The RouteParameter class makes it easier to pass URL parameter values to a query for a data source control (similar to FormParameter). You no longer have to change the Web.config file to enable routing. For more information about routing, see the following topics: ASP.NET Routing Walkthrough: Using ASP.NET Routing in a Web Forms Application How to: Define Routes for Web Forms Applications How to: Construct URLs from Routes How to: Access URL Parameters in a Routed Page Setting Client IDs The new ClientIDMode property makes it easier to write client script that references HTML elements rendered for server controls. Increasing use of Microsoft Ajax makes the need to do this more common. For example, you may have a data control that renders a long list of products with prices and you want to use client script to make a Web service call and update individual prices in the list as they change without refreshing the entire page. Typically you get a reference to an HTML element in client script by using the document.GetElementById method. You pass to this method the value of the id attribute of the HTML element you want to reference. In the case of elements that are rendered for ASP.NET server controls earlier versions of ASP.NET could make this difficult or impossible. You were not always able to predict what id values ASP.NET would generate, or ASP.NET could generate very long id values. The problem was especially difficult for data controls that would generate multiple rows for a single instance of the control in your markup. ASP.NET 4 adds two new algorithms for generating id attributes. These algorithms can generate id attributes that are easier to work with in client script because they are more predictable and that are easier to work with because they are simpler. For more information about how to use the new algorithms, see the following topics: ASP.NET Web Server Control Identification Walkthrough: Making Data-Bound Controls Easier to Access from JavaScript Walkthrough: Making Controls Located in Web User Controls Easier to Access from JavaScript How to: Access Controls from JavaScript by ID Persisting Row Selection in Data Controls The GridView and ListView controls enable users to select a row. In previous versions of ASP.NET, row selection was based on the row index on the page. For example, if you select the third item on page 1 and then move to page 2, the third item on page 2 is selected. In most cases, is more desirable not to select any rows on page 2. ASP.NET 4 supports Persisted Selection, a new feature that was initially supported only in Dynamic Data projects in the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1. When this feature is enabled, the selected item is based on the row data key. This means that if you select the third row on page 1 and move to page 2, nothing is selected on page 2. When you move back to page 1, the third row is still selected. This is a much more natural behavior than the behavior in earlier versions of ASP.NET. Persisted selection is now supported for the GridView and ListView controls in all projects. You can enable this feature in the GridView control, for example, by setting the EnablePersistedSelection property, as shown in the following example: <asp:GridView id="GridView2" runat="server" PersistedSelection="true"> </asp:GridView> FormView Control Enhancements The FormView control is enhanced to make it easier to style the content of the control with CSS. In previous versions of ASP.NET, the FormView control rendered it contents using an item template. This made styling more difficult in the markup because unexpected table row and table cell tags were rendered by the control. The FormView control supports RenderOuterTable, a property in ASP.NET 4. When this property is set to false, as show in the following example, the table tags are not rendered. This makes it easier to apply CSS style to the contents of the control. <asp:FormView ID="FormView1" runat="server" RenderTable="false"> For more information, see FormView Web Server Control Overview. ListView Control Enhancements The ListView control, which was introduced in ASP.NET 3.5, has all the functionality of the GridView control while giving you complete control over the output. This control has been made easier to use in ASP.NET 4. The earlier version of the control required that you specify a layout template that contained a server control with a known ID. The following markup shows a typical example of how to use the ListView control in ASP.NET 3.5. <asp:ListView ID="ListView1" runat="server"> <LayoutTemplate> <asp:PlaceHolder ID="ItemPlaceHolder" runat="server"></asp:PlaceHolder> </LayoutTemplate> <ItemTemplate> <% Eval("LastName")%> </ItemTemplate> </asp:ListView> In ASP.NET 4, the ListView control does not require a layout template. The markup shown in the previous example can be replaced with the following markup: <asp:ListView ID="ListView1" runat="server"> <ItemTemplate> <% Eval("LastName")%> </ItemTemplate> </asp:ListView> For more information, see ListView Web Server Control Overview. Filtering Data with the QueryExtender Control A very common task for developers who create data-driven Web pages is to filter data. This traditionally has been performed by building Where clauses in data source controls. This approach can be complicated, and in some cases the Where syntax does not let you take advantage of the full functionality of the underlying database. To make filtering easier, a new QueryExtender control has been added in ASP.NET 4. This control can be added to EntityDataSource or LinqDataSource controls in order to filter the data returned by these controls. Because the QueryExtender control relies on LINQ, but you do not to need to know how to write LINQ queries to use the query extender. The QueryExtender control supports a variety of filter options. The following lists QueryExtender filter options. Term Definition SearchExpression Searches a field or fields for string values and compares them to a specified string value. RangeExpression Searches a field or fields for values in a range specified by a pair of values. PropertyExpression Compares a specified value to a property value in a field. If the expression evaluates to true, the data that is being examined is returned. OrderByExpression Sorts data by a specified column and sort direction. CustomExpression Calls a function that defines custom filter in the page. For more information, see QueryExtenderQueryExtender Web Server Control Overview. Enhanced Support for Web Standards and Accessibility Earlier versions of ASP.NET controls sometimes render markup that does not conform to HTML, XHTML, or accessibility standards. ASP.NET 4 eliminates most of these exceptions. For details about how the HTML that is rendered by each control meets accessibility standards, see ASP.NET Controls and Accessibility. CSS for Controls that Can be Disabled In ASP.NET 3.5, when a control is disabled (see WebControl.Enabled), a disabled attribute is added to the rendered HTML element. For example, the following markup creates a Label control that is disabled: <asp:Label id="Label1" runat="server" Text="Test" Enabled="false" /> In ASP.NET 3.5, the previous control settings generate the following HTML: <span id="Label1" disabled="disabled">Test</span> In HTML 4.01, the disabled attribute is not considered valid on span elements. It is valid only on input elements because it specifies that they cannot be accessed. On display-only elements such as span elements, browsers typically support rendering for a disabled appearance, but a Web page that relies on this non-standard behavior is not robust according to accessibility standards. For display-only elements, you should use CSS to indicate a disabled visual appearance. Therefore, by default ASP.NET 4 generates the following HTML for the control settings shown previously: <span id="Label1" class="aspNetDisabled">Test</span> You can change the value of the class attribute that is rendered by default when a control is disabled by setting the DisabledCssClass property. CSS for Validation Controls In ASP.NET 3.5, validation controls render a default color of red as an inline style. For example, the following markup creates a RequiredFieldValidator control: <asp:RequiredFieldValidator ID="RequiredFieldValidator1" runat="server" ErrorMessage="Required Field" ControlToValidate="RadioButtonList1" /> ASP.NET 3.5 renders the following HTML for the validator control: <span id="RequiredFieldValidator1" style="color:Red;visibility:hidden;">RequiredFieldValidator</span> By default, ASP.NET 4 does not render an inline style to set the color to red. An inline style is used only to hide or show the validator, as shown in the following example: <span id="RequiredFieldValidator1" style"visibility:hidden;">RequiredFieldValidator</span> Therefore, ASP.NET 4 does not automatically show error messages in red. For information about how to use CSS to specify a visual style for a validation control, see Validating User Input in ASP.NET Web Pages. CSS for the Hidden Fields Div Element ASP.NET uses hidden fields to store state information such as view state and control state. These hidden fields are contained by a div element. In ASP.NET 3.5, this div element does not have a class attribute or an id attribute. Therefore, CSS rules that affect all div elements could unintentionally cause this div to be visible. To avoid this problem, ASP.NET 4 renders the div element for hidden fields with a CSS class that you can use to differentiate the hidden fields div from others. The new classvalue is shown in the following example: <div class="aspNetHidden"> CSS for the Table, Image, and ImageButton Controls By default, in ASP.NET 3.5, some controls set the border attribute of rendered HTML to zero (0). The following example shows HTML that is generated by the Table control in ASP.NET 3.5: <table id="Table2" border="0"> The Image control and the ImageButton control also do this. Because this is not necessary and provides visual formatting information that should be provided by using CSS, the attribute is not generated in ASP.NET 4. CSS for the UpdatePanel and UpdateProgress Controls In ASP.NET 3.5, the UpdatePanel and UpdateProgress controls do not support expando attributes. This makes it impossible to set a CSS class on the HTMLelements that they render. In ASP.NET 4 these controls have been changed to accept expando attributes, as shown in the following example: <asp:UpdatePanel runat="server" class="myStyle"> </asp:UpdatePanel> The following HTML is rendered for this markup: <div id="ctl00_MainContent_UpdatePanel1" class="expandoclass"> </div> Eliminating Unnecessary Outer Tables In ASP.NET 3.5, the HTML that is rendered for the following controls is wrapped in a table element whose purpose is to apply inline styles to the entire control: FormView Login PasswordRecovery ChangePassword If you use templates to customize the appearance of these controls, you can specify CSS styles in the markup that you provide in the templates. In that case, no extra outer table is required. In ASP.NET 4, you can prevent the table from being rendered by setting the new RenderOuterTable property to false. Layout Templates for Wizard Controls In ASP.NET 3.5, the Wizard and CreateUserWizard controls generate an HTML table element that is used for visual formatting. In ASP.NET 4 you can use a LayoutTemplate element to specify the layout. If you do this, the HTML table element is not generated. In the template, you create placeholder controls to indicate where items should be dynamically inserted into the control. (This is similar to how the template model for the ListView control works.) For more information, see the Wizard.LayoutTemplate property. New HTML Formatting Options for the CheckBoxList and RadioButtonList Controls ASP.NET 3.5 uses HTML table elements to format the output for the CheckBoxList and RadioButtonList controls. To provide an alternative that does not use tables for visual formatting, ASP.NET 4 adds two new options to the RepeatLayout enumeration: UnorderedList. This option causes the HTML output to be formatted by using ul and li elements instead of a table. OrderedList. This option causes the HTML output to be formatted by using ol and li elements instead of a table. For examples of HTML that is rendered for the new options, see the RepeatLayout enumeration. Header and Footer Elements for the Table Control In ASP.NET 3.5, the Table control can be configured to render thead and tfoot elements by setting the TableSection property of the TableHeaderRow class and the TableFooterRow class. In ASP.NET 4 these properties are set to the appropriate values by default. CSS and ARIA Support for the Menu Control In ASP.NET 3.5, the Menu control uses HTML table elements for visual formatting, and in some configurations it is not keyboard-accessible. ASP.NET 4 addresses these problems and improves accessibility in the following ways: The generated HTML is structured as an unordered list (ul and li elements). CSS is used for visual formatting. The menu behaves in accordance with ARIA standards for keyboard access. You can use arrow keys to navigate menu items. (For information about ARIA, see Accessibility in Visual Studio and ASP.NET.) ARIA role and property attributes are added to the generated HTML. (Attributes are added by using JavaScript instead of included in the HTML, to avoid generating HTML that would cause markup validation errors.) Styles for the Menu control are rendered in a style block at the top of the page, instead of inline with the rendered HTML elements. If you want to use a separate CSS file so that you can modify the menu styles, you can set the Menu control's new IncludeStyleBlock property to false, in which case the style block is not generated. Valid XHTML for the HtmlForm Control In ASP.NET 3.5, the HtmlForm control (which is created implicitly by the <form runat="server"> tag) renders an HTML form element that has both name and id attributes. The name attribute is deprecated in XHTML 1.1. Therefore, this control does not render the name attribute in ASP.NET 4. Maintaining Backward Compatibility in Control Rendering An existing ASP.NET Web site might have code in it that assumes that controls are rendering HTML the way they do in ASP.NET 3.5. To avoid causing backward compatibility problems when you upgrade the site to ASP.NET 4, you can have ASP.NET continue to generate HTML the way it does in ASP.NET 3.5 after you upgrade the site. To do so, you can set the controlRenderingCompatibilityVersion attribute of the pages element to "3.5" in the Web.config file of an ASP.NET 4 Web site, as shown in the following example: <system.web> <pages controlRenderingCompatibilityVersion="3.5"/> </system.web> If this setting is omitted, the default value is the same as the version of ASP.NET that the Web site targets. (For information about multi-targeting in ASP.NET, see .NET Framework Multi-Targeting for ASP.NET Web Projects.) ASP.NET MVC ASP.NET MVC helps Web developers build compelling standards-based Web sites that are easy to maintain because it decreases the dependency among application layers by using the Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern. MVC provides complete control over the page markup. It also improves testability by inherently supporting Test Driven Development (TDD). Web sites created using ASP.NET MVC have a modular architecture. This allows members of a team to work independently on the various modules and can be used to improve collaboration. For example, developers can work on the model and controller layers (data and logic), while the designer work on the view (presentation). For tutorials, walkthroughs, conceptual content, code samples, and a complete API reference, see ASP.NET MVC 2. Dynamic Data Dynamic Data was introduced in the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 release in mid-2008. This feature provides many enhancements for creating data-driven applications, such as the following: A RAD experience for quickly building a data-driven Web site. Automatic validation that is based on constraints defined in the data model. The ability to easily change the markup that is generated for fields in the GridView and DetailsView controls by using field templates that are part of your Dynamic Data project. For ASP.NET 4, Dynamic Data has been enhanced to give developers even more power for quickly building data-driven Web sites. For more information, see ASP.NET Dynamic Data Content Map. Enabling Dynamic Data for Individual Data-Bound Controls in Existing Web Applications You can use Dynamic Data features in existing ASP.NET Web applications that do not use scaffolding by enabling Dynamic Data for individual data-bound controls. Dynamic Data provides the presentation and data layer support for rendering these controls. When you enable Dynamic Data for data-bound controls, you get the following benefits: Setting default values for data fields. Dynamic Data enables you to provide default values at run time for fields in a data control. Interacting with the database without creating and registering a data model. Automatically validating the data that is entered by the user without writing any code. For more information, see Walkthrough: Enabling Dynamic Data in ASP.NET Data-Bound Controls. New Field Templates for URLs and E-mail Addresses ASP.NET 4 introduces two new built-in field templates, EmailAddress.ascx and Url.ascx. These templates are used for fields that are marked as EmailAddress or Url using the DataTypeAttribute attribute. For EmailAddress objects, the field is displayed as a hyperlink that is created by using the mailto: protocol. When users click the link, it opens the user's e-mail client and creates a skeleton message. Objects typed as Url are displayed as ordinary hyperlinks. The following example shows how to mark fields. [DataType(DataType.EmailAddress)] public object HomeEmail { get; set; } [DataType(DataType.Url)] public object Website { get; set; } Creating Links with the DynamicHyperLink Control Dynamic Data uses the new routing feature that was added in the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 to control the URLs that users see when they access the Web site. The new DynamicHyperLink control makes it easy to build links to pages in a Dynamic Data site. For information, see How to: Create Table Action Links in Dynamic Data Support for Inheritance in the Data Model Both the ADO.NET Entity Framework and LINQ to SQL support inheritance in their data models. An example of this might be a database that has an InsurancePolicy table. It might also contain CarPolicy and HousePolicy tables that have the same fields as InsurancePolicy and then add more fields. Dynamic Data has been modified to understand inherited objects in the data model and to support scaffolding for the inherited tables. For more information, see Walkthrough: Mapping Table-per-Hierarchy Inheritance in Dynamic Data. Support for Many-to-Many Relationships (Entity Framework Only) The Entity Framework has rich support for many-to-many relationships between tables, which is implemented by exposing the relationship as a collection on an Entity object. New field templates (ManyToMany.ascx and ManyToMany_Edit.ascx) have been added to provide support for displaying and editing data that is involved in many-to-many relationships. For more information, see Working with Many-to-Many Data Relationships in Dynamic Data. New Attributes to Control Display and Support Enumerations The DisplayAttribute has been added to give you additional control over how fields are displayed. The DisplayNameAttribute attribute in earlier versions of Dynamic Data enabled you to change the name that is used as a caption for a field. The new DisplayAttribute class lets you specify more options for displaying a field, such as the order in which a field is displayed and whether a field will be used as a filter. The attribute also provides independent control of the name that is used for the labels in a GridView control, the name that is used in a DetailsView control, the help text for the field, and the watermark used for the field (if the field accepts text input). The EnumDataTypeAttribute class has been added to let you map fields to enumerations. When you apply this attribute to a field, you specify an enumeration type. Dynamic Data uses the new Enumeration.ascx field template to create UI for displaying and editing enumeration values. The template maps the values from the database to the names in the enumeration. Enhanced Support for Filters Dynamic Data 1.0 had built-in filters for Boolean columns and foreign-key columns. The filters did not let you specify the order in which they were displayed. The new DisplayAttribute attribute addresses this by giving you control over whether a column appears as a filter and in what order it will be displayed. An additional enhancement is that filtering support has been rewritten to use the new QueryExtender feature of Web Forms. This lets you create filters without requiring knowledge of the data source control that the filters will be used with. Along with these extensions, filters have also been turned into template controls, which lets you add new ones. Finally, the DisplayAttribute class mentioned earlier allows the default filter to be overridden, in the same way that UIHint allows the default field template for a column to be overridden. For more information, see Walkthrough: Filtering Rows in Tables That Have a Parent-Child Relationship and QueryableFilterRepeater. ASP.NET Chart Control The ASP.NET chart server control enables you to create ASP.NET pages applications that have simple, intuitive charts for complex statistical or financial analysis. The chart control supports the following features: Data series, chart areas, axes, legends, labels, titles, and more. Data binding. Data manipulation, such as copying, splitting, merging, alignment, grouping, sorting, searching, and filtering. Statistical formulas and financial formulas. Advanced chart appearance, such as 3-D, anti-aliasing, lighting, and perspective. Events and customizations. Interactivity and Microsoft Ajax. Support for the Ajax Content Delivery Network (CDN), which provides an optimized way for you to add Microsoft Ajax Library and jQuery scripts to your Web applications. For more information, see Chart Web Server Control Overview. Visual Web Developer Enhancements The following sections provide information about enhancements and new features in Visual Studio 2010 and Visual Web Developer Express. The Web page designer in Visual Studio 2010 has been enhanced for better CSS compatibility, includes additional support for HTML and ASP.NET markup snippets, and features a redesigned version of IntelliSense for JScript. Improved CSS Compatibility The Visual Web Developer designer in Visual Studio 2010 has been updated to improve CSS 2.1 standards compliance. The designer better preserves HTML source code and is more robust than in previous versions of Visual Studio. HTML and JScript Snippets In the HTML editor, IntelliSense auto-completes tag names. The IntelliSense Snippets feature auto-completes whole tags and more. In Visual Studio 2010, IntelliSense snippets are supported for JScript, alongside C# and Visual Basic, which were supported in earlier versions of Visual Studio. Visual Studio 2010 includes over 200 snippets that help you auto-complete common ASP.NET and HTML tags, including required attributes (such as runat="server") and common attributes specific to a tag (such as ID, DataSourceID, ControlToValidate, and Text). You can download additional snippets, or you can write your own snippets that encapsulate the blocks of markup that you or your team use for common tasks. For more information on HTML snippets, see Walkthrough: Using HTML Snippets. JScript IntelliSense Enhancements In Visual 2010, JScript IntelliSense has been redesigned to provide an even richer editing experience. IntelliSense now recognizes objects that have been dynamically generated by methods such as registerNamespace and by similar techniques used by other JavaScript frameworks. Performance has been improved to analyze large libraries of script and to display IntelliSense with little or no processing delay. Compatibility has been significantly increased to support almost all third-party libraries and to support diverse coding styles. Documentation comments are now parsed as you type and are immediately leveraged by IntelliSense. Web Application Deployment with Visual Studio 2010 For Web application projects, Visual Studio now provides tools that work with the IIS Web Deployment Tool (Web Deploy) to automate many processes that had to be done manually in earlier versions of ASP.NET. For example, the following tasks can now be automated: Creating an IIS application on the destination computer and configuring IIS settings. Copying files to the destination computer. Changing Web.config settings that must be different in the destination environment. Propagating changes to data or data structures in SQL Server databases that are used by the Web application. For more information about Web application deployment, see ASP.NET Deployment Content Map. Enhancements to ASP.NET Multi-Targeting ASP.NET 4 adds new features to the multi-targeting feature to make it easier to work with projects that target earlier versions of the .NET Framework. Multi-targeting was introduced in ASP.NET 3.5 to enable you to use the latest version of Visual Studio without having to upgrade existing Web sites or Web services to the latest version of the .NET Framework. In Visual Studio 2008, when you work with a project targeted for an earlier version of the .NET Framework, most features of the development environment adapt to the targeted version. However, IntelliSense displays language features that are available in the current version, and property windows display properties available in the current version. In Visual Studio 2010, only language features and properties available in the targeted version of the .NET Framework are shown. For more information about multi-targeting, see the following topics: .NET Framework Multi-Targeting for ASP.NET Web Projects ASP.NET Side-by-Side Execution Overview How to: Host Web Applications That Use Different Versions of the .NET Framework on the Same Server How to: Deploy Web Site Projects Targeted for Earlier Versions of the .NET Framework

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Using FiddlerCore to capture HTTP Requests with .NET

- by Rick Strahl

Over the last few weeks I’ve been working on my Web load testing utility West Wind WebSurge. One of the key components of a load testing tool is the ability to capture URLs effectively so that you can play them back later under load. One of the options in WebSurge for capturing URLs is to use its built-in capture tool which acts as an HTTP proxy to capture any HTTP and HTTPS traffic from most Windows HTTP clients, including Web Browsers as well as standalone Windows applications and services. To make this happen, I used Eric Lawrence’s awesome FiddlerCore library, which provides most of the functionality of his desktop Fiddler application, all rolled into an easy to use library that you can plug into your own applications. FiddlerCore makes it almost too easy to capture HTTP content! For WebSurge I needed to capture all HTTP traffic in order to capture the full HTTP request – URL, headers and any content posted by the client. The result of what I ended up creating is this semi-generic capture form: In this post I’m going to demonstrate how easy it is to use FiddlerCore to build this HTTP Capture Form. If you want to jump right in here are the links to get Telerik’s Fiddler Core and the code for the demo provided here. FiddlerCore Download FiddlerCore on NuGet Show me the Code (WebSurge Integration code from GitHub) Download the WinForms Sample Form West Wind Web Surge (example implementation in live app) Note that FiddlerCore is bound by a license for commercial usage – see license.txt in the FiddlerCore distribution for details. Integrating FiddlerCore FiddlerCore is a library that simply plugs into your application. You can download it from the Telerik site and manually add the assemblies to your project, or you can simply install the NuGet package via: PM> Install-Package FiddlerCore The library consists of the FiddlerCore.dll as well as a couple of support libraries (CertMaker.dll and BCMakeCert.dll) that are used for installing SSL certificates. I’ll have more on SSL captures and certificate installation later in this post. But first let’s see how easy it is to use FiddlerCore to capture HTTP content by looking at how to build the above capture form. Capturing HTTP Content Once the library is installed it’s super easy to hook up Fiddler functionality. Fiddler includes a number of static class methods on the FiddlerApplication object that can be called to hook up callback events as well as actual start monitoring HTTP URLs. In the following code directly lifted from WebSurge, I configure a few filter options on Form level object, from the user inputs shown on the form by assigning it to a capture options object. In the live application these settings are persisted configuration values, but in the demo they are one time values initialized and set on the form. Once these options are set, I hook up the AfterSessionComplete event to capture every URL that passes through the proxy after the request is completed and start up the Proxy service:void Start() { if (tbIgnoreResources.Checked) CaptureConfiguration.IgnoreResources = true; else CaptureConfiguration.IgnoreResources = false; string strProcId = txtProcessId.Text; if (strProcId.Contains('-')) strProcId = strProcId.Substring(strProcId.IndexOf('-') + 1).Trim(); strProcId = strProcId.Trim(); int procId = 0; if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(strProcId)) { if (!int.TryParse(strProcId, out procId)) procId = 0; } CaptureConfiguration.ProcessId = procId; CaptureConfiguration.CaptureDomain = txtCaptureDomain.Text; FiddlerApplication.AfterSessionComplete += FiddlerApplication_AfterSessionComplete; FiddlerApplication.Startup(8888, true, true, true); } The key lines for FiddlerCore are just the last two lines of code that include the event hookup code as well as the Startup() method call. Here I only hook up to the AfterSessionComplete event but there are a number of other events that hook various stages of the HTTP request cycle you can also hook into. Other events include BeforeRequest, BeforeResponse, RequestHeadersAvailable, ResponseHeadersAvailable and so on. In my case I want to capture the request data and I actually have several options to capture this data. AfterSessionComplete is the last event that fires in the request sequence and it’s the most common choice to capture all request and response data. I could have used several other events, but AfterSessionComplete is one place where you can look both at the request and response data, so this will be the most common place to hook into if you’re capturing content. The implementation of AfterSessionComplete is responsible for capturing all HTTP request headers and it looks something like this:private void FiddlerApplication_AfterSessionComplete(Session sess) { // Ignore HTTPS connect requests if (sess.RequestMethod == "CONNECT") return; if (CaptureConfiguration.ProcessId > 0) { if (sess.LocalProcessID != 0 && sess.LocalProcessID != CaptureConfiguration.ProcessId) return; } if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(CaptureConfiguration.CaptureDomain)) { if (sess.hostname.ToLower() != CaptureConfiguration.CaptureDomain.Trim().ToLower()) return; } if (CaptureConfiguration.IgnoreResources) { string url = sess.fullUrl.ToLower(); var extensions = CaptureConfiguration.ExtensionFilterExclusions; foreach (var ext in extensions) { if (url.Contains(ext)) return; } var filters = CaptureConfiguration.UrlFilterExclusions; foreach (var urlFilter in filters) { if (url.Contains(urlFilter)) return; } } if (sess == null || sess.oRequest == null || sess.oRequest.headers == null) return; string headers = sess.oRequest.headers.ToString(); var reqBody = sess.GetRequestBodyAsString(); // if you wanted to capture the response //string respHeaders = session.oResponse.headers.ToString(); //var respBody = session.GetResponseBodyAsString(); // replace the HTTP line to inject full URL string firstLine = sess.RequestMethod + " " + sess.fullUrl + " " + sess.oRequest.headers.HTTPVersion; int at = headers.IndexOf("\r\n"); if (at < 0) return; headers = firstLine + "\r\n" + headers.Substring(at + 1); string output = headers + "\r\n" + (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(reqBody) ? reqBody + "\r\n" : string.Empty) + Separator + "\r\n\r\n"; BeginInvoke(new Action<string>((text) => { txtCapture.AppendText(text); UpdateButtonStatus(); }), output); } The code starts by filtering out some requests based on the CaptureOptions I set before the capture is started. These options/filters are applied when requests actually come in. This is very useful to help narrow down the requests that are captured for playback based on options the user picked. I find it useful to limit requests to a certain domain for captures, as well as filtering out some request types like static resources – images, css, scripts etc. This is of course optional, but I think it’s a common scenario and WebSurge makes good use of this feature. AfterSessionComplete like other FiddlerCore events, provides a Session object parameter which contains all the request and response details. There are oRequest and oResponse objects to hold their respective data. In my case I’m interested in the raw request headers and body only, as you can see in the commented code you can also retrieve the response headers and body. Here the code captures the request headers and body and simply appends the output to the textbox on the screen. Note that the Fiddler events are asynchronous, so in order to display the content in the UI they have to be marshaled back the UI thread with BeginInvoke, which here simply takes the generated headers and appends it to the existing textbox test on the form. As each request is processed, the headers are captured and appended to the bottom of the textbox resulting in a Session HTTP capture in the format that Web Surge internally supports, which is basically raw request headers with a customized 1st HTTP Header line that includes the full URL rather than a server relative URL. When the capture is done the user can either copy the raw HTTP session to the clipboard, or directly save it to file. This raw capture format is the same format WebSurge and also Fiddler use to import/export request data. While this code is application specific, it demonstrates the kind of logic that you can easily apply to the request capture process, which is one of the reasonsof why FiddlerCore is so powerful. You get to choose what content you want to look up as part of your own application logic and you can then decide how to capture or use that data as part of your application. The actual captured data in this case is only a string. The user can edit the data by hand or in the the case of WebSurge, save it to disk and automatically open the captured session as a new load test. Stopping the FiddlerCore Proxy Finally to stop capturing requests you simply disconnect the event handler and call the FiddlerApplication.ShutDown() method:void Stop() { FiddlerApplication.AfterSessionComplete -= FiddlerApplication_AfterSessionComplete; if (FiddlerApplication.IsStarted()) FiddlerApplication.Shutdown(); } As you can see, adding HTTP capture functionality to an application is very straight forward. FiddlerCore offers tons of features I’m not even touching on here – I suspect basic captures are the most common scenario, but a lot of different things can be done with FiddlerCore’s simple API interface. Sky’s the limit! The source code for this sample capture form (WinForms) is provided as part of this article. Adding Fiddler Certificates with FiddlerCore One of the sticking points in West Wind WebSurge has been that if you wanted to capture HTTPS/SSL traffic, you needed to have the full version of Fiddler and have HTTPS decryption enabled. Essentially you had to use Fiddler to configure HTTPS decryption and the associated installation of the Fiddler local client certificate that is used for local decryption of incoming SSL traffic. While this works just fine, requiring to have Fiddler installed and then using a separate application to configure the SSL functionality isn’t ideal. Fortunately FiddlerCore actually includes the tools to register the Fiddler Certificate directly using FiddlerCore. Why does Fiddler need a Certificate in the first Place? Fiddler and FiddlerCore are essentially HTTP proxies which means they inject themselves into the HTTP conversation by re-routing HTTP traffic to a special HTTP port (8888 by default for Fiddler) and then forward the HTTP data to the original client. Fiddler injects itself as the system proxy in using the WinInet Windows settings which are the same settings that Internet Explorer uses and that are configured in the Windows and Internet Explorer Internet Settings dialog. Most HTTP clients running on Windows pick up and apply these system level Proxy settings before establishing new HTTP connections and that’s why most clients automatically work once Fiddler – or FiddlerCore/WebSurge are running. For plain HTTP requests this just works – Fiddler intercepts the HTTP requests on the proxy port and then forwards them to the original port (80 for HTTP and 443 for SSL typically but it could be any port). For SSL however, this is not quite as simple – Fiddler can easily act as an HTTPS/SSL client to capture inbound requests from the server, but when it forwards the request to the client it has to also act as an SSL server and provide a certificate that the client trusts. This won’t be the original certificate from the remote site, but rather a custom local certificate that effectively simulates an SSL connection between the proxy and the client. If there is no custom certificate configured for Fiddler the SSL request fails with a certificate validation error. The key for this to work is that a custom certificate has to be installed that the HTTPS client trusts on the local machine. For a much more detailed description of the process you can check out Eric Lawrence’s blog post on Certificates. If you’re using the desktop version of Fiddler you can install a local certificate into the Windows certificate store. Fiddler proper does this from the Options menu: This operation does several things: It installs the Fiddler Root Certificate It sets trust to this Root Certificate A new client certificate is generated for each HTTPS site monitored Certificate Installation with FiddlerCore You can also provide this same functionality using FiddlerCore which includes a CertMaker class. Using CertMaker is straight forward to use and it provides an easy way to create some simple helpers that can install and uninstall a Fiddler Root certificate:public static bool InstallCertificate() { if (!CertMaker.rootCertExists()) { if (!CertMaker.createRootCert()) return false; if (!CertMaker.trustRootCert()) return false; } return true; } public static bool UninstallCertificate() { if (CertMaker.rootCertExists()) { if (!CertMaker.removeFiddlerGeneratedCerts(true)) return false; } return true; } InstallCertificate() works by first checking whether the root certificate is already installed and if it isn’t goes ahead and creates a new one. The process of creating the certificate is a two step process – first the actual certificate is created and then it’s moved into the certificate store to become trusted. I’m not sure why you’d ever split these operations up since a cert created without trust isn’t going to be of much value, but there are two distinct steps. When you trigger the trustRootCert() method, a message box will pop up on the desktop that lets you know that you’re about to trust a local private certificate. This is a security feature to ensure that you really want to trust the Fiddler root since you are essentially installing a man in the middle certificate. It’s quite safe to use this generated root certificate, because it’s been specifically generated for your machine and thus is not usable from external sources, the only way to use this certificate in a trusted way is from the local machine. IOW, unless somebody has physical access to your machine, there’s no useful way to hijack this certificate and use it for nefarious purposes (see Eric’s post for more details). Once the Root certificate has been installed, FiddlerCore/Fiddler create new certificates for each site that is connected to with HTTPS. You can end up with quite a few temporary certificates in your certificate store. To uninstall you can either use Fiddler and simply uncheck the Decrypt HTTPS traffic option followed by the remove Fiddler certificates button, or you can use FiddlerCore’s CertMaker.removeFiddlerGeneratedCerts() which removes the root cert and any of the intermediary certificates Fiddler created. Keep in mind that when you uninstall you uninstall the certificate for both FiddlerCore and Fiddler, so use UninstallCertificate() with care and realize that you might affect the Fiddler application’s operation by doing so as well. When to check for an installed Certificate Note that the check to see if the root certificate exists is pretty fast, while the actual process of installing the certificate is a relatively slow operation that even on a fast machine takes a few seconds. Further the trust operation pops up a message box so you probably don’t want to install the certificate repeatedly. Since the check for the root certificate is fast, you can easily put a call to InstallCertificate() in any capture startup code – in which case the certificate installation only triggers when a certificate is in fact not installed. Personally I like to make certificate installation explicit – just like Fiddler does, so in WebSurge I use a small drop down option on the menu to install or uninstall the SSL certificate: This code calls the InstallCertificate and UnInstallCertificate functions respectively – the experience with this is similar to what you get in Fiddler with the extra dialog box popping up to prompt confirmation for installation of the root certificate. Once the cert is installed you can then capture SSL requests. There’s a gotcha however… Gotcha: FiddlerCore Certificates don’t stick by Default When I originally tried to use the Fiddler certificate installation I ran into an odd problem. I was able to install the certificate and immediately after installation was able to capture HTTPS requests. Then I would exit the application and come back in and try the same HTTPS capture again and it would fail due to a missing certificate. CertMaker.rootCertExists() would return false after every restart and if re-installed the certificate a new certificate would get added to the certificate store resulting in a bunch of duplicated root certificates with different keys. What the heck? CertMaker and BcMakeCert create non-sticky CertificatesI turns out that FiddlerCore by default uses different components from what the full version of Fiddler uses. Fiddler uses a Windows utility called MakeCert.exe to create the Fiddler Root certificate. FiddlerCore however installs the CertMaker.dll and BCMakeCert.dll assemblies, which use a different crypto library (Bouncy Castle) for certificate creation than MakeCert.exe which uses the Windows Crypto API. The assemblies provide support for non-windows operation for Fiddler under Mono, as well as support for some non-Windows certificate platforms like iOS and Android for decryption. The bottom line is that the FiddlerCore provided bouncy castle assemblies are not sticky by default as the certificates created with them are not cached as they are in Fiddler proper. To get certificates to ‘stick’ you have to explicitly cache the certificates in Fiddler’s internal preferences. A cache aware version of InstallCertificate looks something like this:public static bool InstallCertificate() { if (!CertMaker.rootCertExists()) { if (!CertMaker.createRootCert()) return false; if (!CertMaker.trustRootCert()) return false; App.Configuration.UrlCapture.Cert = FiddlerApplication.Prefs.GetStringPref("fiddler.certmaker.bc.cert", null); App.Configuration.UrlCapture.Key = FiddlerApplication.Prefs.GetStringPref("fiddler.certmaker.bc.key", null); } return true; } public static bool UninstallCertificate() { if (CertMaker.rootCertExists()) { if (!CertMaker.removeFiddlerGeneratedCerts(true)) return false; } App.Configuration.UrlCapture.Cert = null; App.Configuration.UrlCapture.Key = null; return true; } In this code I store the Fiddler cert and private key in an application configuration settings that’s stored with the application settings (App.Configuration.UrlCapture object). These settings automatically persist when WebSurge is shut down. The values are read out of Fiddler’s internal preferences store which is set after a new certificate has been created. Likewise I clear out the configuration settings when the certificate is uninstalled. In order for these setting to be used you have to also load the configuration settings into the Fiddler preferences *before* a call to rootCertExists() is made. I do this in the capture form’s constructor:public FiddlerCapture(StressTestForm form) { InitializeComponent(); CaptureConfiguration = App.Configuration.UrlCapture; MainForm = form; if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(App.Configuration.UrlCapture.Cert)) { FiddlerApplication.Prefs.SetStringPref("fiddler.certmaker.bc.key", App.Configuration.UrlCapture.Key); FiddlerApplication.Prefs.SetStringPref("fiddler.certmaker.bc.cert", App.Configuration.UrlCapture.Cert); }} This is kind of a drag to do and not documented anywhere that I could find, so hopefully this will save you some grief if you want to work with the stock certificate logic that installs with FiddlerCore. MakeCert provides sticky Certificates and the same functionality as Fiddler But there’s actually an easier way. If you want to skip the above Fiddler preference configuration code in your application you can choose to distribute MakeCert.exe instead of certmaker.dll and bcmakecert.dll. When you use MakeCert.exe, the certificates settings are stored in Windows so they are available without any custom configuration inside of your application. It’s easier to integrate and as long as you run on Windows and you don’t need to support iOS or Android devices is simply easier to deal with. To integrate into your project, you can remove the reference to CertMaker.dll (and the BcMakeCert.dll assembly) from your project. Instead copy MakeCert.exe into your output folder. To make sure MakeCert.exe gets pushed out, include MakeCert.exe in your project and set the Build Action to None, and Copy to Output Directory to Copy if newer. Note that the CertMaker.dll reference in the project has been removed and on disk the files for Certmaker.dll, as well as the BCMakeCert.dll files on disk. Keep in mind that these DLLs are resources of the FiddlerCore NuGet package, so updating the package may end up pushing those files back into your project. Once MakeCert.exe is distributed FiddlerCore checks for it first before using the assemblies so as long as MakeCert.exe exists it’ll be used for certificate creation (at least on Windows). Summary FiddlerCore is a pretty sweet tool, and it’s absolutely awesome that we get to plug in most of the functionality of Fiddler right into our own applications. A few years back I tried to build this sort of functionality myself for an app and ended up giving up because it’s a big job to get HTTP right – especially if you need to support SSL. FiddlerCore now provides that functionality as a turnkey solution that can be plugged into your own apps easily. The only downside is FiddlerCore’s documentation for more advanced features like certificate installation which is pretty sketchy. While for the most part FiddlerCore’s feature set is easy to work with without any documentation, advanced features are often not intuitive to gleam by just using Intellisense or the FiddlerCore help file reference (which is not terribly useful). While Eric Lawrence is very responsive on his forum and on Twitter, there simply isn’t much useful documentation on Fiddler/FiddlerCore available online. If you run into trouble the forum is probably the first place to look and then ask a question if you can’t find the answer. The best documentation you can find is Eric’s Fiddler Book which covers a ton of functionality of Fiddler and FiddlerCore. The book is a great reference to Fiddler’s feature set as well as providing great insights into the HTTP protocol. The second half of the book that gets into the innards of HTTP is an excellent read for anybody who wants to know more about some of the more arcane aspects and special behaviors of HTTP – it’s well worth the read. While the book has tons of information in a very readable format, it’s unfortunately not a great reference as it’s hard to find things in the book and because it’s not available online you can’t electronically search for the great content in it. But it’s hard to complain about any of this given the obvious effort and love that’s gone into this awesome product for all of these years. A mighty big thanks to Eric Lawrence for having created this useful tool that so many of us use all the time, and also to Telerik for picking up Fiddler/FiddlerCore and providing Eric the resources to support and improve this wonderful tool full time and keeping it free for all. Kudos! Resources FiddlerCore Download FiddlerCore NuGet Fiddler Capture Sample Form Fiddler Capture Form in West Wind WebSurge (GitHub) Eric Lawrence’s Fiddler Book© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2014Posted in .NET HTTP 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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Using JSON.NET for dynamic JSON parsing

- by Rick Strahl

With the release of ASP.NET Web API as part of .NET 4.5 and MVC 4.0, JSON.NET has effectively pushed out the .NET native serializers to become the default serializer for Web API. JSON.NET is vastly more flexible than the built in DataContractJsonSerializer or the older JavaScript serializer. The DataContractSerializer in particular has been very problematic in the past because it can't deal with untyped objects for serialization - like values of type object, or anonymous types which are quite common these days. The JavaScript Serializer that came before it actually does support non-typed objects for serialization but it can't do anything with untyped data coming in from JavaScript and it's overall model of extensibility was pretty limited (JavaScript Serializer is what MVC uses for JSON responses). JSON.NET provides a robust JSON serializer that has both high level and low level components, supports binary JSON, JSON contracts, Xml to JSON conversion, LINQ to JSON and many, many more features than either of the built in serializers. ASP.NET Web API now uses JSON.NET as its default serializer and is now pulled in as a NuGet dependency into Web API projects, which is great. Dynamic JSON Parsing One of the features that I think is getting ever more important is the ability to serialize and deserialize arbitrary JSON content dynamically - that is without mapping the JSON captured directly into a .NET type as DataContractSerializer or the JavaScript Serializers do. Sometimes it isn't possible to map types due to the differences in languages (think collections, dictionaries etc), and other times you simply don't have the structures in place or don't want to create them to actually import the data. If this topic sounds familiar - you're right! I wrote about dynamic JSON parsing a few months back before JSON.NET was added to Web API and when Web API and the System.Net HttpClient libraries included the System.Json classes like JsonObject and JsonArray. With the inclusion of JSON.NET in Web API these classes are now obsolete and didn't ship with Web API or the client libraries. I re-linked my original post to this one. In this post I'll discus JToken, JObject and JArray which are the dynamic JSON objects that make it very easy to create and retrieve JSON content on the fly without underlying types. Why Dynamic JSON? So, why Dynamic JSON parsing rather than strongly typed parsing? Since applications are interacting more and more with third party services it becomes ever more important to have easy access to those services with easy JSON parsing. Sometimes it just makes lot of sense to pull just a small amount of data out of large JSON document received from a service, because the third party service isn't directly related to your application's logic most of the time - and it makes little sense to map the entire service structure in your application. For example, recently I worked with the Google Maps Places API to return information about businesses close to me (or rather the app's) location. The Google API returns a ton of information that my application had no interest in - all I needed was few values out of the data. Dynamic JSON parsing makes it possible to map this data, without having to map the entire API to a C# data structure. Instead I could pull out the three or four values I needed from the API and directly store it on my business entities that needed to receive the data - no need to map the entire Maps API structure. Getting JSON.NET The easiest way to use JSON.NET is to grab it via NuGet and add it as a reference to your project. You can add it to your project with: PM> Install-Package Newtonsoft.Json From the Package Manager Console or by using Manage NuGet Packages in your project References. As mentioned if you're using ASP.NET Web API or MVC 4 JSON.NET will be automatically added to your project. Alternately you can also go to the CodePlex site and download the latest version including source code: http://json.codeplex.com/ Creating JSON on the fly with JObject and JArray Let's start with creating some JSON on the fly. It's super easy to create a dynamic object structure with any of the JToken derived JSON.NET objects. The most common JToken derived classes you are likely to use are JObject and JArray. JToken implements IDynamicMetaProvider and so uses the dynamic keyword extensively to make it intuitive to create object structures and turn them into JSON via dynamic object syntax. Here's an example of creating a music album structure with child songs using JObject for the base object and songs and JArray for the actual collection of songs:[TestMethod] public void JObjectOutputTest() { // strong typed instance var jsonObject = new JObject(); // you can explicitly add values here using class interface jsonObject.Add("Entered", DateTime.Now); // or cast to dynamic to dynamically add/read properties dynamic album = jsonObject; album.AlbumName = "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap"; album.Artist = "AC/DC"; album.YearReleased = 1976; album.Songs = new JArray() as dynamic; dynamic song = new JObject(); song.SongName = "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap"; song.SongLength = "4:11"; album.Songs.Add(song); song = new JObject(); song.SongName = "Love at First Feel"; song.SongLength = "3:10"; album.Songs.Add(song); Console.WriteLine(album.ToString()); } This produces a complete JSON structure: { "Entered": "2012-08-18T13:26:37.7137482-10:00", "AlbumName": "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap", "Artist": "AC/DC", "YearReleased": 1976, "Songs": [ { "SongName": "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap", "SongLength": "4:11" }, { "SongName": "Love at First Feel", "SongLength": "3:10" } ] } Notice that JSON.NET does a nice job formatting the JSON, so it's easy to read and paste into blog posts :-). JSON.NET includes a bunch of configuration options that control how JSON is generated. Typically the defaults are just fine, but you can override with the JsonSettings object for most operations. The important thing about this code is that there's no explicit type used for holding the values to serialize to JSON. Rather the JSON.NET objects are the containers that receive the data as I build up my JSON structure dynamically, simply by adding properties. This means this code can be entirely driven at runtime without compile time restraints of structure for the JSON output. Here I use JObject to create a album 'object' and immediately cast it to dynamic. JObject() is kind of similar in behavior to ExpandoObject in that it allows you to add properties by simply assigning to them. Internally, JObject values are stored in pseudo collections of key value pairs that are exposed as properties through the IDynamicMetaObject interface exposed in JSON.NET's JToken base class. For objects the syntax is very clean - you add simple typed values as properties. For objects and arrays you have to explicitly create new JObject or JArray, cast them to dynamic and then add properties and items to them. Always remember though these values are dynamic - which means no Intellisense and no compiler type checking. It's up to you to ensure that the names and values you create are accessed consistently and without typos in your code. Note that you can also access the JObject instance directly (not as dynamic) and get access to the underlying JObject type. This means you can assign properties by string, which can be useful for fully data driven JSON generation from other structures. Below you can see both styles of access next to each other:// strong type instance var jsonObject = new JObject(); // you can explicitly add values here jsonObject.Add("Entered", DateTime.Now); // expando style instance you can just 'use' properties dynamic album = jsonObject; album.AlbumName = "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap"; JContainer (the base class for JObject and JArray) is a collection so you can also iterate over the properties at runtime easily:foreach (var item in jsonObject) { Console.WriteLine(item.Key + " " + item.Value.ToString()); } The functionality of the JSON objects are very similar to .NET's ExpandObject and if you used it before, you're already familiar with how the dynamic interfaces to the JSON objects works. Importing JSON with JObject.Parse() and JArray.Parse() The JValue structure supports importing JSON via the Parse() and Load() methods which can read JSON data from a string or various streams respectively. Essentially JValue includes the core JSON parsing to turn a JSON string into a collection of JsonValue objects that can be then referenced using familiar dynamic object syntax. Here's a simple example:public void JValueParsingTest() { var jsonString = @"{""Name"":""Rick"",""Company"":""West Wind"", ""Entered"":""2012-03-16T00:03:33.245-10:00""}"; dynamic json = JValue.Parse(jsonString); // values require casting string name = json.Name; string company = json.Company; DateTime entered = json.Entered; Assert.AreEqual(name, "Rick"); Assert.AreEqual(company, "West Wind"); } The JSON string represents an object with three properties which is parsed into a JObject class and cast to dynamic. Once cast to dynamic I can then go ahead and access the object using familiar object syntax. Note that the actual values - json.Name, json.Company, json.Entered - are actually of type JToken and I have to cast them to their appropriate types first before I can do type comparisons as in the Asserts at the end of the test method. This is required because of the way that dynamic types work which can't determine the type based on the method signature of the Assert.AreEqual(object,object) method. I have to either assign the dynamic value to a variable as I did above, or explicitly cast ( (string) json.Name) in the actual method call. The JSON structure can be much more complex than this simple example. Here's another example of an array of albums serialized to JSON and then parsed through with JsonValue():[TestMethod] public void JsonArrayParsingTest() { var jsonString = @"[ { ""Id"": ""b3ec4e5c"", ""AlbumName"": ""Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap"", ""Artist"": ""AC/DC"", ""YearReleased"": 1976, ""Entered"": ""2012-03-16T00:13:12.2810521-10:00"", ""AlbumImageUrl"": ""http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61kTaH-uZBL._AA115_.jpg"", ""AmazonUrl"": ""http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/…ASIN=B00008BXJ4"", ""Songs"": [ { ""AlbumId"": ""b3ec4e5c"", ""SongName"": ""Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap"", ""SongLength"": ""4:11"" }, { ""AlbumId"": ""b3ec4e5c"", ""SongName"": ""Love at First Feel"", ""SongLength"": ""3:10"" }, { ""AlbumId"": ""b3ec4e5c"", ""SongName"": ""Big Balls"", ""SongLength"": ""2:38"" } ] }, { ""Id"": ""7b919432"", ""AlbumName"": ""End of the Silence"", ""Artist"": ""Henry Rollins Band"", ""YearReleased"": 1992, ""Entered"": ""2012-03-16T00:13:12.2800521-10:00"", ""AlbumImageUrl"": ""http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51FO3rb1tuL._SL160_AA160_.jpg"", ""AmazonUrl"": ""http://www.amazon.com/End-Silence-Rollins-Band/dp/B0000040OX/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1302232195&sr=8-5"", ""Songs"": [ { ""AlbumId"": ""7b919432"", ""SongName"": ""Low Self Opinion"", ""SongLength"": ""5:24"" }, { ""AlbumId"": ""7b919432"", ""SongName"": ""Grip"", ""SongLength"": ""4:51"" } ] } ]"; JArray jsonVal = JArray.Parse(jsonString) as JArray; dynamic albums = jsonVal; foreach (dynamic album in albums) { Console.WriteLine(album.AlbumName + " (" + album.YearReleased.ToString() + ")"); foreach (dynamic song in album.Songs) { Console.WriteLine("\t" + song.SongName); } } Console.WriteLine(albums[0].AlbumName); Console.WriteLine(albums[0].Songs[1].SongName); } JObject and JArray in ASP.NET Web API Of course these types also work in ASP.NET Web API controller methods. If you want you can accept parameters using these object or return them back to the server. The following contrived example receives dynamic JSON input, and then creates a new dynamic JSON object and returns it based on data from the first:[HttpPost] public JObject PostAlbumJObject(JObject jAlbum) { // dynamic input from inbound JSON dynamic album = jAlbum; // create a new JSON object to write out dynamic newAlbum = new JObject(); // Create properties on the new instance // with values from the first newAlbum.AlbumName = album.AlbumName + " New"; newAlbum.NewProperty = "something new"; newAlbum.Songs = new JArray(); foreach (dynamic song in album.Songs) { song.SongName = song.SongName + " New"; newAlbum.Songs.Add(song); } return newAlbum; } The raw POST request to the server looks something like this: POST http://localhost/aspnetwebapi/samples/PostAlbumJObject HTTP/1.1User-Agent: FiddlerContent-type: application/jsonHost: localhostContent-Length: 88 {AlbumName: "Dirty Deeds",Songs:[ { SongName: "Problem Child"},{ SongName: "Squealer"}]} and the output that comes back looks like this: { "AlbumName": "Dirty Deeds New", "NewProperty": "something new", "Songs": [ { "SongName": "Problem Child New" }, { "SongName": "Squealer New" } ]} The original values are echoed back with something extra appended to demonstrate that we're working with a new object. When you receive or return a JObject, JValue, JToken or JArray instance in a Web API method, Web API ignores normal content negotiation and assumes your content is going to be received and returned as JSON, so effectively the parameter and result type explicitly determines the input and output format which is nice. Dynamic to Strong Type Mapping You can also map JObject and JArray instances to a strongly typed object, so you can mix dynamic and static typing in the same piece of code. Using the 2 Album jsonString shown earlier, the code below takes an array of albums and picks out only a single album and casts that album to a static Album instance.[TestMethod] public void JsonParseToStrongTypeTest() { JArray albums = JArray.Parse(jsonString) as JArray; // pick out one album JObject jalbum = albums[0] as JObject; // Copy to a static Album instance Album album = jalbum.ToObject<Album>(); Assert.IsNotNull(album); Assert.AreEqual(album.AlbumName,jalbum.Value<string>("AlbumName")); Assert.IsTrue(album.Songs.Count > 0); } This is pretty damn useful for the scenario I mentioned earlier - you can read a large chunk of JSON and dynamically walk the property hierarchy down to the item you want to access, and then either access the specific item dynamically (as shown earlier) or map a part of the JSON to a strongly typed object. That's very powerful if you think about it - it leaves you in total control to decide what's dynamic and what's static. Strongly typed JSON Parsing With all this talk of dynamic let's not forget that JSON.NET of course also does strongly typed serialization which is drop dead easy. Here's a simple example on how to serialize and deserialize an object with JSON.NET:[TestMethod] public void StronglyTypedSerializationTest() { // Demonstrate deserialization from a raw string var album = new Album() { AlbumName = "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap", Artist = "AC/DC", Entered = DateTime.Now, YearReleased = 1976, Songs = new List<Song>() { new Song() { SongName = "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap", SongLength = "4:11" }, new Song() { SongName = "Love at First Feel", SongLength = "3:10" } } }; // serialize to string string json2 = JsonConvert.SerializeObject(album,Formatting.Indented); Console.WriteLine(json2); // make sure we can serialize back var album2 = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<Album>(json2); Assert.IsNotNull(album2); Assert.IsTrue(album2.AlbumName == "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap"); Assert.IsTrue(album2.Songs.Count == 2); } JsonConvert is a high level static class that wraps lower level functionality, but you can also use the JsonSerializer class, which allows you to serialize/parse to and from streams. It's a little more work, but gives you a bit more control. The functionality available is easy to discover with Intellisense, and that's good because there's not a lot in the way of documentation that's actually useful. Summary JSON.NET is a pretty complete JSON implementation with lots of different choices for JSON parsing from dynamic parsing to static serialization, to complex querying of JSON objects using LINQ. It's good to see this open source library getting integrated into .NET, and pushing out the old and tired stock .NET parsers so that we finally have a bit more flexibility - and extensibility - in our JSON parsing. Good to go! Resources Sample Test Project http://json.codeplex.com/© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2012Posted in .NET Web Api AJAX 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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Tools and Utilities for the .NET Developer

- by mbcrump

Tweet this list! Add a link to my site to your bookmarks to quickly find this page again! Add me to twitter! This is a list of the tools/utilities that I use to do my job/hobby. I wanted this page to load fast and contain information that only you care about. If I have missed a tool that you like, feel free to contact me and I will add it to the list. Also, this list took a lot of time to complete. Please do not steal my work, if you like the page then please link back to my site. I will keep the links/information updated as new tools/utilities are created. Windows/.NET Development – This is a list of tools that any Windows/.NET developer should have in his bag. I have used at some point in my career everything listed on this page and below is the tools worth keeping. Name Description License AnkhSVN Subversion support for Visual Studio. It also works with VS2010. Free Aurora XAML Designer One of the best XAML creation tools available. Has a ton of built in templates that you can copy/paste into VS2010. COST/Trial BeyondCompare Beyond Compare 3 is the ideal tool for comparing files and folders on your Windows or Linux system. Visualize changes in your code and carefully reconcile them. COST/Trial BuildIT Automated Task Tool Its main purpose is to automate tasks, whether it is the final packaging of a product, an automated daily build, maybe sending out a mailing list, even backing-up files. Free C Sharper for VB Convert VB to C#. COST CLRProfiler Analyze and improve the behavior of your .NET app. Free CodeRush Direct competitor to ReSharper, contains similar feature. This is one of those decide for yourself. COST/Trial Disk2VHD Disk2vhd is a utility that creates VHD (Virtual Hard Disk - Microsoft's Virtual Machine disk format) versions of physical disks for use in Microsoft Virtual PC or Microsoft Hyper-V virtual machines (VMs). Free Eazfuscator.NET Is a free obfuscator for .NET. The main purpose is to protect intellectual property of software. Free EQATEC Profiler Make your .NET app run faster. No source code changes are needed. Just point the profiler to your app, run the modified code, and get a visual report. COST Expression Studio 3/4 Comes with Web, Blend, Sketch Flow and more. You can create websites, produce beautiful XAML and more. COST/Trial Expresso The award-winning Expresso editor is equally suitable as a teaching tool for the beginning user of regular expressions or as a full-featured development environment for the experienced programmer or web designer with an extensive knowledge of regular expressions. Free Fiddler Fiddler is a web debugging proxy which logs all HTTP(s) traffic between your computer and the internet. Free Firebug Powerful Web development tool. If you build websites, you will need this. Free FxCop FxCop is an application that analyzes managed code assemblies (code that targets the .NET Framework common language runtime) and reports information about the assemblies, such as possible design, localization, performance, and security improvements. Free GAC Browser and Remover Easy way to remove multiple assemblies from the GAC. Assemblies registered by programs like Install Shield can also be removed. Free GAC Util The Global Assembly Cache tool allows you to view and manipulate the contents of the global assembly cache and download cache. Free HelpScribble Help Scribble is a full-featured, easy-to-use help authoring tool for creating help files from start to finish. You can create Win Help (.hlp) files, HTML Help (.chm) files, a printed manual and online documentation (on a web site) all from the same Help Scribble project. COST/Trial IETester IETester is a free Web Browser that allows you to have the rendering and JavaScript engines of IE9 preview, IE8, IE7 IE 6 and IE5.5 on Windows 7, Vista and XP, as well as the installed IE in the same process. Free iTextSharp iText# (iTextSharp) is a port of the iText open source java library for PDF generation written entirely in C# for the .NET platform. Use the iText mailing list to get support. Free Kaxaml Kaxaml is a lightweight XAML editor that gives you a "split view" so you can see both your XAML and your rendered content. Free LINQPad LinqPad lets you interactively query databases in a LINQ. Free Linquer Many programmers are familiar with SQL and will need a help in the transition to LINQ. Sometimes there are complicated queries to be written and Linqer can help by converting SQL scripts to LINQ. COST/Trial LiquidXML Liquid XML Studio 2010 is an advanced XML developers toolkit and IDE, containing all the tools needed for designing and developing XML schema and applications. COST/Trial Log4Net log4net is a tool to help the programmer output log statements to a variety of output targets. log4net is a port of the excellent log4j framework to the .NET runtime. We have kept the framework similar in spirit to the original log4j while taking advantage of new features in the .NET runtime. For more information on log4net see the features document. Free Microsoft Web Platform Installer The Microsoft Web Platform Installer 2.0 (Web PI) is a free tool that makes getting the latest components of the Microsoft Web Platform, including Internet Information Services (IIS), SQL Server Express, .NET Framework and Visual Web Developer easy. Free Mono Development Don't have Visual Studio - no problem! This is an open Source C# and .NET development environment for Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X Free Net Mass Downloader While it’s great that Microsoft has released the .NET Reference Source Code, you can only get it one file at a time while you’re debugging. If you’d like to batch download it for reading or to populate the cache, you’d have to write a program that instantiated and called each method in the Framework Class Library. Fortunately, .NET Mass Downloader comes to the rescue! Free nMap Nmap ("Network Mapper") is a free and open source (license) utility for network exploration or security auditing. Many systems and network administrators also find it useful for tasks such as network inventory, managing service upgrade schedules, and monitoring host or service uptime. Free NoScript (Firefox add-in) The NoScript Firefox extension provides extra protection for Firefox, Flock, Seamonkey and other Mozilla-based browsers: this free, open source add-on allows JavaScript, Java and Flash and other plug-ins to be executed only by trusted web sites of your choice (e.g. your online bank), and provides the most powerful Anti-XSS protection available in a browser. Free NotePad 2 Notepad2, a fast and light-weight Notepad-like text editor with syntax highlighting. This program can be run out of the box without installation, and does not touch your system's registry. Free PageSpy PageSpy is a small add-on for Internet Explorer that allows you to select any element within a webpage, select an option in the context menu, and view detailed information about both the coding behind the page and the element you selected. Free Phrase Express PhraseExpress manages your frequently used text snippets in customizable categories for quick access. Free PowerGui PowerGui is a free community for PowerGUI, a graphical user interface and script editor for Microsoft Windows PowerShell! Free Powershell Comes with Win7, but you can automate tasks by using the .NET Framework. Great for network admins. Free Process Explorer Ever wondered which program has a particular file or directory open? Now you can find out. Process Explorer shows you information about which handles and DLLs processes have opened or loaded. Also, included in the SysInterals Suite. Free Process Monitor Process Monitor is an advanced monitoring tool for Windows that shows real-time file system, Registry and process/thread activity. Free Reflector Explore and analyze compiled .NET assemblies, viewing them in C#, Visual Basic, and IL. This is an Essential for any .NET developer. Free Regular Expression Library Stuck on a Regular Expression but you think someone has already figured it out? Chances are they have. Free Regulator Regulator makes Regular Expressions easy. This is a must have for a .NET Developer. Free RenameMaestro RenameMaestro is probably the easiest batch file renamer you'll find to instantly rename multiple files COST ReSharper The one program that I cannot live without. Supports VS2010 and offers simple refactoring, code analysis/assistance/cleanup/templates. One of the few applications that is worth the $$$. COST/Trial ScrewTurn Wiki ScrewTurn Wiki allows you to create, manage and share wikis. A wiki is a collaboratively-edited, information-centered website: the most famous is Wikipedia. Free SharpDevelop What is #develop? SharpDevelop is a free IDE for C# and VB.NET projects on Microsoft's .NET platform. Free Show Me The Template Show Me The Template is a tool for exploring the templates, be their data, control or items panel, that comes with the controls built into WPF for all 6 themes. Free SnippetCompiler Compiles code snippets without opening Visual Studio. It does not support .NET 4. Free SQL Prompt SQL Prompt is a plug-in that increases how fast you can work with SQL. It provides code-completion for SQL server, reformatting, db schema information and snippets. Awesome! COST/Trial SQLinForm SQLinForm is an automatic SQL code formatter for all major databases including ORACLE, SQL Server, DB2, UDB, Sybase, Informix, PostgreSQL, Teradata, MySQL, MS Access etc. with over 70 formatting options. COST/OnlineFree SSMS Tools SSMS Tools Pack is an add-in for Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) including SSMS Express. Free Storm STORM is a free and open source tool for testing web services. Free Telerik Code Convertor Convert code from VB to C Sharp and Vice Versa. Free TurtoiseSVN TortoiseSVN is a really easy to use Revision control / version control / source control software for Windows.Since it's not an integration for a specific IDE you can use it with whatever development tools you like. Free UltraEdit UltraEdit is the ideal text, HTML and hex editor, and an advanced PHP, Perl, Java and JavaScript editor for programmers. UltraEdit is also an XML editor including a tree-style XML parser. An industry-award winner, UltraEdit supports disk-based 64-bit file handling (standard) on 32-bit Windows platforms (Windows 2000 and later). COST/Trial Virtual Windows XP Comes with some W7 version and allows you to run WinXP along side W7. Free VirtualBox Virtualization by Sun Microsystems. You can virtualize Windows, Linux and more. Free Visual Log Parser SQL queries against a variety of log files and other system data sources. Free WinMerge WinMerge is an Open Source differencing and merging tool for Windows. WinMerge can compare both folders and files, presenting differences in a visual text format that is easy to understand and handle. Free Wireshark Wireshark is one of the best network protocol analyzer's for Unix and windows. This has been used several times to get me out of a bind. Free XML Notepad 07 Old, but still one of my favorite XML viewers. Free Productivity Tools – This is the list of tools that I use to save time or quickly navigate around Windows. Name Description License AutoHotKey Automate almost anything by sending keystrokes and mouse clicks. You can write a mouse or keyboard macro by hand or use the macro recorder. Free CLCL CLCL is clipboard caching utility. Free Ditto Ditto is an extension to the standard windows clipboard. It saves each item placed on the clipboard allowing you access to any of those items at a later time. Ditto allows you to save any type of information that can be put on the clipboard, text, images, html, custom formats, ..... Free Evernote Remember everything from notes to photos. It will synch between computers/devices. Free InfoRapid Inforapid is a search tool that will display all you search results in a html like browser. If you click on a word in that browser, it will start another search to the word you clicked on. Handy if you want to trackback something to it's true origin. The word you looked for will be highlighted in red. Clicking on the red word will open the containing file in a text based viewer. Clicking on any word in the opened document will start another search on that word. Free KatMouse The prime purpose of the KatMouse utility is to enhance the functionality of mice with a scroll wheel, offering 'universal' scrolling: moving the mouse wheel will scroll the window directly beneath the mouse cursor (not the one with the keyboard focus, which is default on Windows OSes). This is a major increase in the usefulness of the mouse wheel. Free ScreenR Instant Screencast with nothing to download. Works with Mac or PC and free. Free Start++ Start++ is an enhancement for the Start Menu in Windows Vista. It also extends the Run box and the command-line with customizable commands. For example, typing "w Windows Vista" will take you to the Windows Vista page on Wikipedia! Free Synergy Synergy lets you easily share a single mouse and keyboard between multiple computers with different operating systems, each with its own display, without special hardware. It's intended for users with multiple computers on their desk since each system uses its own monitor(s). Free Texter Texter lets you define text substitution hot strings that, when triggered, will replace hotstring with a larger piece of text. By entering your most commonly-typed snippets of text into Texter, you can save countless keystrokes in the course of the day. Free Total Commander File handling, FTP, Archive handling and much more. Even works with Win3.11. COST/Trial Available Wizmouse WizMouse is a mouse enhancement utility that makes your mouse wheel work on the window currently under the mouse pointer, instead of the currently focused window. This means you no longer have to click on a window before being able to scroll it with the mouse wheel. This is a far more comfortable and practical way to make use of the mouse wheel. Free Xmarks Bookmark sync and search between computers. Free General Utilities – This is a list for power user users or anyone that wants more out of Windows. I usually install a majority of these whenever I get a new system. Name Description License µTorrent µTorrent is a lightweight and efficient BitTorrent client for Windows or Mac with many features. I use this for downloading LEGAL media. Free Audacity Audacity® is free, open source software for recording and editing sounds. It is available for Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows, GNU/Linux, and other operating systems. Learn more about Audacity... Also check our Wiki and Forum for more information. Free AVast Free FREE Antivirus. Free CD Burner XP Pro CDBurnerXP is a free application to burn CDs and DVDs, including Blu-Ray and HD-DVDs. It also includes the feature to burn and create ISOs, as well as a multilanguage interface. Free CDEX You can extract digital audio CDs into mp3/wav. Free Combofix Combofix is a freeware (a legitimate spyware remover created by sUBs), Combofix was designed to scan a computer for known malware, spyware (SurfSideKick, QooLogic, and Look2Me as well as any other combination of the mentioned spyware applications) and remove them. Free Cpu-Z Provides information about some of the main devices of your system. Free Cropper Cropper is a screen capture utility written in C#. It makes it fast and easy to grab parts of your screen. Use it to easily crop out sections of vector graphic files such as Fireworks without having to flatten the files or open in a new editor. Use it to easily capture parts of a web site, including text and images. It's also great for writing documentation that needs images of your application or web site. Free DropBox Drag and Drop files to sync between computers. Free DVD-Fab Converts/Copies DVDs/Blu-Ray to different formats. (like mp4, mkv, avi) COST/Trial Available FastStone Capture FastStone Capture is a powerful, lightweight, yet full-featured screen capture tool that allows you to easily capture and annotate anything on the screen including windows, objects, menus, full screen, rectangular/freehand regions and even scrolling windows/web pages. Free ffdshow FFDShow is a DirectShow decoding filter for decompressing DivX, XviD, H.264, FLV1, WMV, MPEG-1 and MPEG-2, MPEG-4 movies. Free Filezilla FileZilla Client is a fast and reliable cross-platform FTP, FTPS and SFTP client with lots of useful features and an intuitive graphical user interface. You can also download a server version. Free FireFox Web Browser, do you really need an explanation? Free FireGestures A customizable mouse gestures extension which enables you to execute various commands and user scripts with five types of gestures. Free FoxIt Reader Light weight PDF viewer. You should install this with the advanced setting or it will install a toolbar and setup some shortcuts. Free gSynchIt Synch Gmail and Outlook. Even supports Outlook 2010 32/64 bit COST/Trial Available Hulu Desktop At home or in a hotel, this has replaced my cable/satellite subscription. Free ImgBurn ImgBurn is a lightweight CD / DVD / HD DVD / Blu-ray burning application that everyone should have in their toolkit! Free Infrarecorder InfraRecorder is a free CD/DVD burning solution for Microsoft Windows. It offers a wide range of powerful features; all through an easy to use application interface and Windows Explorer integration. Free KeePass KeePass is a free open source password manager, which helps you to manage your passwords in a secure way. Free LastPass Another password management, synchronize between browsers, automatic form filling and more. Free Live Essentials One download and lots of programs including Mail, Live Writer, Movie Maker and more! Free Monitores MonitorES is a small windows utility that helps you to turnoff monitor display when you lock down your machine.Also when you lock your machine, it will pause all your running media programs & set your IM status message to "Away" / Custom message(via options) and restore it back to normal when you back. Free mRemote mRemote is a full-featured, multi-tab remote connections manager. Free Open Office OpenOffice.org 3 is the leading open-source office software suite for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics, databases and more. It is available in many languages and works on all common computers. It stores all your data in an international open standard format and can also read and write files from other common office software packages. It can be downloaded and used completely free of charge for any purpose. Free Paint.NET Simple, intuitive, and innovative user interface for editing photos. Free Picasa Picasa is free photo editing software from Google that makes your pictures look great. Free Pidgin Pidgin is an easy to use and free chat client used by millions. Connect to AIM, MSN, Yahoo, and more chat networks all at once. Free PING PING is a live Linux ISO, based on the excellent Linux From Scratch (LFS) documentation. It can be burnt on a CD and booted, or integrated into a PXE / RIS environment. Free Putty PuTTY is an SSH and telnet client, developed originally by Simon Tatham for the Windows platform. Free Revo Uninstaller Revo Uninstaller Pro helps you to uninstall software and remove unwanted programs installed on your computer easily! Even if you have problems uninstalling and cannot uninstall them from "Windows Add or Remove Programs" control panel applet.Revo Uninstaller is a much faster and more powerful alternative to "Windows Add or Remove Programs" applet! It has very powerful features to uninstall and remove programs. Free Security Essentials Microsoft Security Essentials is a new, free consumer anti-malware solution for your computer. Free SetupVirtualCloneDrive Virtual CloneDrive works and behaves just like a physical CD/DVD drive, however it exists only virtually. Point to the .ISO file and it appears in Windows Explorer as a Drive. Free Shark 007 Codec Pack Play just about any file format with this download. Also includes my W7 Media Playlist Generator. Free Snagit 9 Screen Capture on steroids. Add arrows, captions, etc to any screenshot. COST/Trial Available SysinternalsSuite Go ahead and download the entire sys internals suite. I have mentioned multiple programs in this suite already. Free TeraCopy TeraCopy is a compact program designed to copy and move files at the maximum possible speed, providing the user with a lot of features. Free for Home TrueCrypt Free open-source disk encryption software for Windows 7/Vista/XP, Mac OS X, and Linux Free TweetDeck Fully featured Twitter client. Free UltraVNC UltraVNC is a powerful, easy to use and free software that can display the screen of another computer (via internet or network) on your own screen. The program allows you to use your mouse and keyboard to control the other PC remotely. It means that you can work on a remote computer, as if you were sitting in front of it, right from your current location. Free Unlocker Unlocks locked files. Pretty simple right? Free VLC Media Player VLC media player is a highly portable multimedia player and multimedia framework capable of reading most audio and video formats Free Windows 7 Media Playlist This program is special to my heart because I wrote it. It has been mentioned on podcast and various websites. It allows you to quickly create wvx video playlist for Windows Media Center. Free WinRAR WinRAR is a powerful archive manager. It can backup your data and reduce the size of email attachments, decompress RAR, ZIP and other files downloaded from Internet and create new archives in RAR and ZIP file format. COST/Trial Available Blogging – I use the following for my blog. Name Description License Insert Code for Windows Live Writer Insert Code for Windows Live Writer will format a snippet of text in a number of programming languages such as C#, HTML, MSH, JavaScript, Visual Basic and TSQL. Free LiveWriter Included in Live Essentials, but the ultimate in Windows Blogging Free PasteAsVSCode Plug-in for Windows Live Writer that pastes clipboard content as Visual Studio code. Preserves syntax highlighting, indentation and background color. Converts RTF, outputted by Visual Studio, into HTML. Free Desktop Management – The list below represent the best in Windows Desktop Management. Name Description License 7 Stacks Allows users to have "stacks" of icons in their taskbar. Free Executor Executor is a multi purpose launcher and a more advanced and customizable version of windows run. Free Fences Fences is a program that helps you organize your desktop and can hide your icons when they are not in use. Free RocketDock Rocket Dock is a smoothly animated, alpha blended application launcher. It provides a nice clean interface to drop shortcuts on for easy access and organization. With each item completely customizable there is no end to what you can add and launch from the dock. Free WindowsTab Tabbing is an essential feature of modern web browsers. Window Tabs brings the productivity of tabbed window management to all of your desktop applications. Free

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Differences Between NHibernate and Entity Framework

- by Ricardo Peres

Introduction NHibernate and Entity Framework are two of the most popular O/RM frameworks on the .NET world. Although they share some functionality, there are some aspects on which they are quite different. This post will describe this differences and will hopefully help you get started with the one you know less. Mind you, this is a personal selection of features to compare, it is by no way an exhaustive list. History First, a bit of history. NHibernate is an open-source project that was first ported from Java’s venerable Hibernate framework, one of the first O/RM frameworks, but nowadays it is not tied to it, for example, it has .NET specific features, and has evolved in different ways from those of its Java counterpart. Current version is 3.3, with 3.4 on the horizon. It currently targets .NET 3.5, but can be used as well in .NET 4, it only makes no use of any of its specific functionality. You can find its home page at NHForge. Entity Framework 1 came out with .NET 3.5 and is now on its second major version, despite being version 4. Code First sits on top of it and but came separately and will also continue to be released out of line with major .NET distributions. It is currently on version 4.3.1 and version 5 will be released together with .NET Framework 4.5. All versions will target the current version of .NET, at the time of their release. Its home location is located at MSDN. Architecture In NHibernate, there is a separation between the Unit of Work and the configuration and model instances. You start off by creating a Configuration object, where you specify all global NHibernate settings such as the database and dialect to use, the batch sizes, the mappings, etc, then you build an ISessionFactory from it. The ISessionFactory holds model and metadata that is tied to a particular database and to the settings that came from the Configuration object, and, there will typically be only one instance of each in a process. Finally, you create instances of ISession from the ISessionFactory, which is the NHibernate representation of the Unit of Work and Identity Map. This is a lightweight object, it basically opens and closes a database connection as required and keeps track of the entities associated with it. ISession objects are cheap to create and dispose, because all of the model complexity is stored in the ISessionFactory and Configuration objects. As for Entity Framework, the ObjectContext/DbContext holds the configuration, model and acts as the Unit of Work, holding references to all of the known entity instances. This class is therefore not lightweight as its NHibernate counterpart and it is not uncommon to see examples where an instance is cached on a field. Mappings Both NHibernate and Entity Framework (Code First) support the use of POCOs to represent entities, no base classes are required (or even possible, in the case of NHibernate). As for mapping to and from the database, NHibernate supports three types of mappings: XML-based, which have the advantage of not tying the entity classes to a particular O/RM; the XML files can be deployed as files on the file system or as embedded resources in an assembly; Attribute-based, for keeping both the entities and database details on the same place at the expense of polluting the entity classes with NHibernate-specific attributes; Strongly-typed code-based, which allows dynamic creation of the model and strongly typing it, so that if, for example, a property name changes, the mapping will also be updated. Entity Framework can use: Attribute-based (although attributes cannot express all of the available possibilities – for example, cascading); Strongly-typed code mappings. Database Support With NHibernate you can use mostly any database you want, including: SQL Server; SQL Server Compact; SQL Server Azure; Oracle; DB2; PostgreSQL; MySQL; Sybase Adaptive Server/SQL Anywhere; Firebird; SQLLite; Informix; Any through OLE DB; Any through ODBC. Out of the box, Entity Framework only supports SQL Server, but a number of providers exist, both free and commercial, for some of the most used databases, such as Oracle and MySQL. See a list here. Inheritance Strategies Both NHibernate and Entity Framework support the three canonical inheritance strategies: Table Per Type Hierarchy (Single Table Inheritance), Table Per Type (Class Table Inheritance) and Table Per Concrete Type (Concrete Table Inheritance). Associations Regarding associations, both support one to one, one to many and many to many. However, NHibernate offers far more collection types: Bags of entities or values: unordered, possibly with duplicates; Lists of entities or values: ordered, indexed by a number column; Maps of entities or values: indexed by either an entity or any value; Sets of entities or values: unordered, no duplicates; Arrays of entities or values: indexed, immutable. Querying NHibernate exposes several querying APIs: LINQ is probably the most used nowadays, and really does not need to be introduced; Hibernate Query Language (HQL) is a database-agnostic, object-oriented SQL-alike language that exists since NHibernate’s creation and still offers the most advanced querying possibilities; well suited for dynamic queries, even if using string concatenation; Criteria API is an implementation of the Query Object pattern where you create a semi-abstract conceptual representation of the query you wish to execute by means of a class model; also a good choice for dynamic querying; Query Over offers a similar API to Criteria, but using strongly-typed LINQ expressions instead of strings; for this, although more refactor-friendlier that Criteria, it is also less suited for dynamic queries; SQL, including stored procedures, can also be used; Integration with Lucene.NET indexer is available. As for Entity Framework: LINQ to Entities is fully supported, and its implementation is considered very complete; it is the API of choice for most developers; Entity-SQL, HQL’s counterpart, is also an object-oriented, database-independent querying language that can be used for dynamic queries; SQL, of course, is also supported. Caching Both NHibernate and Entity Framework, of course, feature first-level cache. NHibernate also supports a second-level cache, that can be used among multiple ISessionFactorys, even in different processes/machines: Hashtable (in-memory); SysCache (uses ASP.NET as the cache provider); SysCache2 (same as above but with support for SQL Server SQL Dependencies); Prevalence; SharedCache; Memcached; Redis; NCache; Appfabric Caching. Out of the box, Entity Framework does not have any second-level cache mechanism, however, there are some public samples that show how we can add this. ID Generators NHibernate supports different ID generation strategies, coming from the database and otherwise: Identity (for SQL Server, MySQL, and databases who support identity columns); Sequence (for Oracle, PostgreSQL, and others who support sequences); Trigger-based; HiLo; Sequence HiLo (for databases that support sequences); Several GUID flavors, both in GUID as well as in string format; Increment (for single-user uses); Assigned (must know what you’re doing); Sequence-style (either uses an actual sequence or a single-column table); Table of ids; Pooled (similar to HiLo but stores high values in a table); Native (uses whatever mechanism the current database supports, identity or sequence). Entity Framework only supports: Identity generation; GUIDs; Assigned values. Properties NHibernate supports properties of entity types (one to one or many to one), collections (one to many or many to many) as well as scalars and enumerations. It offers a mechanism for having complex property types generated from the database, which even include support for querying. It also supports properties originated from SQL formulas. Entity Framework only supports scalars, entity types and collections. Enumerations support will come in the next version. Events and Interception NHibernate has a very rich event model, that exposes more than 20 events, either for synchronous pre-execution or asynchronous post-execution, including: Pre/Post-Load; Pre/Post-Delete; Pre/Post-Insert; Pre/Post-Update; Pre/Post-Flush. It also features interception of class instancing and SQL generation. As for Entity Framework, only two events exist: ObjectMaterialized (after loading an entity from the database); SavingChanges (before saving changes, which include deleting, inserting and updating). Tracking Changes For NHibernate as well as Entity Framework, all changes are tracked by their respective Unit of Work implementation. Entities can be attached and detached to it, Entity Framework does, however, also support self-tracking entities. Optimistic Concurrency Control NHibernate supports all of the imaginable scenarios: SQL Server’s ROWVERSION; Oracle’s ORA_ROWSCN; A column containing date and time; A column containing a version number; All/dirty columns comparison. Entity Framework is more focused on Entity Framework, so it only supports: SQL Server’s ROWVERSION; Comparing all/some columns. Batching NHibernate has full support for insertion batching, but only if the ID generator in use is not database-based (for example, it cannot be used with Identity), whereas Entity Framework has no batching at all. Cascading Both support cascading for collections and associations: when an entity is deleted, their conceptual children are also deleted. NHibernate also offers the possibility to set the foreign key column on children to NULL instead of removing them. Flushing Changes NHibernate’s ISession has a FlushMode property that can have the following values: Auto: changes are sent to the database when necessary, for example, if there are dirty instances of an entity type, and a query is performed against this entity type, or if the ISession is being disposed; Commit: changes are sent when committing the current transaction; Never: changes are only sent when explicitly calling Flush(). As for Entity Framework, changes have to be explicitly sent through a call to AcceptAllChanges()/SaveChanges(). Lazy Loading NHibernate supports lazy loading for Associated entities (one to one, many to one); Collections (one to many, many to many); Scalar properties (thing of BLOBs or CLOBs). Entity Framework only supports lazy loading for: Associated entities; Collections. Generating and Updating the Database Both NHibernate and Entity Framework Code First (with the Migrations API) allow creating the database model from the mapping and updating it if the mapping changes. Extensibility As you can guess, NHibernate is far more extensible than Entity Framework. Basically, everything can be extended, from ID generation, to LINQ to SQL transformation, HQL native SQL support, custom column types, custom association collections, SQL generation, supported databases, etc. With Entity Framework your options are more limited, at least, because practically no information exists as to what can be extended/changed. It features a provider model that can be extended to support any database. Integration With Other Microsoft APIs and Tools When it comes to integration with Microsoft technologies, it will come as no surprise that Entity Framework offers the best support. For example, the following technologies are fully supported: ASP.NET (through the EntityDataSource); ASP.NET Dynamic Data; WCF Data Services; WCF RIA Services; Visual Studio (through the integrated designer). Documentation This is another point where Entity Framework is superior: NHibernate lacks, for starters, an up to date API reference synchronized with its current version. It does have a community mailing list, blogs and wikis, although not much used. Entity Framework has a number of resources on MSDN and, of course, several forums and discussion groups exist. Conclusion Like I said, this is a personal list. I may come as a surprise to some that Entity Framework is so behind NHibernate in so many aspects, but it is true that NHibernate is much older and, due to its open-source nature, is not tied to product-specific timeframes and can thus evolve much more rapidly. I do like both, and I chose whichever is best for the job I have at hands. I am looking forward to the changes in EF5 which will add significant value to an already interesting product. So, what do you think? Did I forget anything important or is there anything else worth talking about? Looking forward for your comments!

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Use IIS Application Initialization for keeping ASP.NET Apps alive

- by Rick Strahl

I've been working quite a bit with Windows Services in the recent months, and well, it turns out that Windows Services are quite a bear to debug, deploy, update and maintain. The process of getting services set up, debugged and updated is a major chore that has to be extensively documented and or automated specifically. On most projects when a service is built, people end up scrambling for the right 'process' to use for administration. Web app deployment and maintenance on the other hand are common and well understood today, as we are constantly dealing with Web apps. There's plenty of infrastructure and tooling built into Web Tools like Visual Studio to facilitate the process. By comparison Windows Services or anything self-hosted for that matter seems convoluted.In fact, in a recent blog post I mentioned that on a recent project I'd been using self-hosting for SignalR inside of a Windows service, because the application is in fact a 'service' that also needs to send out lots of messages via SignalR. But the reality is that it could just as well be an IIS application with a service component that runs in the background. Either way you look at it, it's either a Windows Service with a built in Web Server, or an IIS application running a Service application, neither of which follows the standard Service or Web App template.Personally I much prefer Web applications. Running inside of IIS I get all the benefits of the IIS platform including service lifetime management (crash and restart), controlled shutdowns, the whole security infrastructure including easy certificate support, hot-swapping of code and the the ability to publish directly to IIS from within Visual Studio with ease.Because of these benefits we set out to move from the self hosted service into an ASP.NET Web app instead.The Missing Link for ASP.NET as a Service: Auto-LoadingI've had moments in the past where I wanted to run a 'service like' application in ASP.NET because when you think about it, it's so much easier to control a Web application remotely. Services are locked into start/stop operations, but if you host inside of a Web app you can write your own ticket and control it from anywhere. In fact nearly 10 years ago I built a background scheduling application that ran inside of ASP.NET and it worked great and it's still running doing its job today.The tricky part for running an app as a service inside of IIS then and now, is how to get IIS and ASP.NET launched so your 'service' stays alive even after an Application Pool reset. 7 years ago I faked it by using a web monitor (my own West Wind Web Monitor app) I was running anyway to monitor my various web sites for uptime, and having the monitor ping my 'service' every 20 seconds to effectively keep ASP.NET alive or fire it back up after a reload. I used a simple scheduler class that also includes some logic for 'self-reloading'. Hacky for sure, but it worked reliably.Luckily today it's much easier and more integrated to get IIS to launch ASP.NET as soon as an Application Pool is started by using the Application Initialization Module. The Application Initialization Module basically allows you to turn on Preloading on the Application Pool and the Site/IIS App, which essentially fires a request through the IIS pipeline as soon as the Application Pool has been launched. This means that effectively your ASP.NET app becomes active immediately, Application_Start is fired making sure your app stays up and running at all times. All the other features like Application Pool recycling and auto-shutdown after idle time still work, but IIS will then always immediately re-launch the application.Getting started with Application InitializationAs of IIS 8 Application Initialization is part of the IIS feature set. For IIS 7 and 7.5 there's a separate download available via Web Platform Installer. Using IIS 8 Application Initialization is an optional install component in Windows or the Windows Server Role Manager: This is an optional component so make sure you explicitly select it.IIS Configuration for Application InitializationInitialization needs to be applied on the Application Pool as well as the IIS Application level. As of IIS 8 these settings can be made through the IIS Administration console.Start with the Application Pool:Here you need to set both the Start Automatically which is always set, and the StartMode which should be set to AlwaysRunning. Both have to be set - the Start Automatically flag is set true by default and controls the starting of the application pool itself while Always Running flag is required in order to launch the application. Without the latter flag set the site settings have no effect.Now on the Site/Application level you can specify whether the site should pre load: Set the Preload Enabled flag to true.At this point ASP.NET apps should auto-load. This is all that's needed to pre-load the site if all you want is to get your site launched automatically.If you want a little more control over the load process you can add a few more settings to your web.config file that allow you to show a static page while the App is starting up. This can be useful if startup is really slow, so rather than displaying blank screen while the user is fiddling their thumbs you can display a static HTML page instead: <system.webServer> <applicationInitialization remapManagedRequestsTo="Startup.htm" skipManagedModules="true"> <add initializationPage="ping.ashx" /> </applicationInitialization> </system.webServer>This allows you to specify a page to execute in a dry run. IIS basically fakes request and pushes it directly into the IIS pipeline without hitting the network. You specify a page and IIS will fake a request to that page in this case ping.ashx which just returns a simple OK string - ie. a fast pipeline request. This request is run immediately after Application Pool restart, and while this request is running and your app is warming up, IIS can display an alternate static page - Startup.htm above. So instead of showing users an empty loading page when clicking a link on your site you can optionally show some sort of static status page that says, "we'll be right back". I'm not sure if that's such a brilliant idea since this can be pretty disruptive in some cases. Personally I think I prefer letting people wait, but at least get the response they were supposed to get back rather than a random page. But it's there if you need it.Note that the web.config stuff is optional. If you don't provide it IIS hits the default site link (/) and even if there's no matching request at the end of that request it'll still fire the request through the IIS pipeline. Ideally though you want to make sure that an ASP.NET endpoint is hit either with your default page, or by specify the initializationPage to ensure ASP.NET actually gets hit since it's possible for IIS fire unmanaged requests only for static pages (depending how your pipeline is configured).What about AppDomain Restarts?In addition to full Worker Process recycles at the IIS level, ASP.NET also has to deal with AppDomain shutdowns which can occur for a variety of reasons:Files are updated in the BIN folderWeb Deploy to your siteweb.config is changedHard application crashThese operations don't cause the worker process to restart, but they do cause ASP.NET to unload the current AppDomain and start up a new one. Because the features above only apply to Application Pool restarts, AppDomain restarts could also cause your 'ASP.NET service' to stop processing in the background.In order to keep the app running on AppDomain recycles, you can resort to a simple ping in the Application_End event:protected void Application_End() { var client = new WebClient(); var url = App.AdminConfiguration.MonitorHostUrl + "ping.aspx"; client.DownloadString(url); Trace.WriteLine("Application Shut Down Ping: " + url); }which fires any ASP.NET url to the current site at the very end of the pipeline shutdown which in turn ensures that the site immediately starts back up.Manual Configuration in ApplicationHost.configThe above UI corresponds to the following ApplicationHost.config settings. If you're using IIS 7, there's no UI for these flags so you'll have to manually edit them.When you install the Application Initialization component into IIS it should auto-configure the module into ApplicationHost.config. Unfortunately for me, with Mr. Murphy in his best form for me, the module registration did not occur and I had to manually add it.<globalModules> <add name="ApplicationInitializationModule" image="%windir%\System32\inetsrv\warmup.dll" /> </globalModules>Most likely you won't need ever need to add this, but if things are not working it's worth to check if the module is actually registered.Next you need to configure the ApplicationPool and the Web site. The following are the two relevant entries in ApplicationHost.config.<system.applicationHost> <applicationPools> <add name="West Wind West Wind Web Connection" autoStart="true" startMode="AlwaysRunning" managedRuntimeVersion="v4.0" managedPipelineMode="Integrated"> <processModel identityType="LocalSystem" setProfileEnvironment="true" /> </add> </applicationPools> <sites> <site name="Default Web Site" id="1"> <application path="/MPress.Workflow.WebQueueMessageManager" applicationPool="West Wind West Wind Web Connection" preloadEnabled="true"> <virtualDirectory path="/" physicalPath="C:\Clients\…" /> </application> </site> </sites> </system.applicationHost>On the Application Pool make sure to set the autoStart and startMode flags to true and AlwaysRunning respectively. On the site make sure to set the preloadEnabled flag to true.And that's all you should need. You can still set the web.config settings described above as well.ASP.NET as a Service?In the particular application I'm working on currently, we have a queue manager that runs as standalone service that polls a database queue and picks out jobs and processes them on several threads. The service can spin up any number of threads and keep these threads alive in the background while IIS is running doing its own thing. These threads are newly created threads, so they sit completely outside of the IIS thread pool. In order for this service to work all it needs is a long running reference that keeps it alive for the life time of the application.In this particular app there are two components that run in the background on their own threads: A scheduler that runs various scheduled tasks and handles things like picking up emails to send out outside of IIS's scope and the QueueManager. Here's what this looks like in global.asax:public class Global : System.Web.HttpApplication { private static ApplicationScheduler scheduler; private static ServiceLauncher launcher; protected void Application_Start(object sender, EventArgs e) { // Pings the service and ensures it stays alive scheduler = new ApplicationScheduler() { CheckFrequency = 600000 }; scheduler.Start(); launcher = new ServiceLauncher(); launcher.Start(); // register so shutdown is controlled HostingEnvironment.RegisterObject(launcher); }}By keeping these objects around as static instances that are set only once on startup, they survive the lifetime of the application. The code in these classes is essentially unchanged from the Windows Service code except that I could remove the various overrides required for the Windows Service interface (OnStart,OnStop,OnResume etc.). Otherwise the behavior and operation is very similar.In this application ASP.NET serves two purposes: It acts as the host for SignalR and provides the administration interface which allows remote management of the 'service'. I can start and stop the service remotely by shutting down the ApplicationScheduler very easily. I can also very easily feed stats from the queue out directly via a couple of Web requests or (as we do now) through the SignalR service.Registering a Background Object with ASP.NETNotice also the use of the HostingEnvironment.RegisterObject(). This function registers an object with ASP.NET to let it know that it's a background task that should be notified if the AppDomain shuts down. RegisterObject() requires an interface with a Stop() method that's fired and allows your code to respond to a shutdown request. Here's what the IRegisteredObject::Stop() method looks like on the launcher:public void Stop(bool immediate = false) { LogManager.Current.LogInfo("QueueManager Controller Stopped."); Controller.StopProcessing(); Controller.Dispose(); Thread.Sleep(1500); // give background threads some time HostingEnvironment.UnregisterObject(this); }Implementing IRegisterObject should help with reliability on AppDomain shutdowns. Thanks to Justin Van Patten for pointing this out to me on Twitter.RegisterObject() is not required but I would highly recommend implementing it on whatever object controls your background processing to all clean shutdowns when the AppDomain shuts down.Testing it outI'm still in the testing phase with this particular service to see if there are any side effects. But so far it doesn't look like it. With about 50 lines of code I was able to replace the Windows service startup to Web start up - everything else just worked as is. An honorable mention goes to SignalR 2.0's oWin hosting, because with the new oWin based hosting no code changes at all were required, merely a couple of configuration file settings and an assembly directive needed, to point at the SignalR startup class. Sweet!It also seems like SignalR is noticeably faster running inside of IIS compared to self-host. Startup feels faster because of the preload.Starting and Stopping the 'Service'Because the application is running as a Web Server, it's easy to have a Web interface for starting and stopping the services running inside of the service. For our queue manager the SignalR service and front monitoring app has a play and stop button for toggling the queue.If you want more administrative control and have it work more like a Windows Service you can also stop the application pool explicitly from the command line which would be equivalent to stopping and restarting a service.To start and stop from the command line you can use the IIS appCmd tool. To stop:> %windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd stop apppool /apppool.name:"Weblog"and to start> %windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd start apppool /apppool.name:"Weblog"Note that when you explicitly force the AppPool to stop running either in the UI (on the ApplicationPools page use Start/Stop) or via command line tools, the application pool will not auto-restart immediately. You have to manually start it back up.What's not to like?There are certainly a lot of benefits to running a background service in IIS, but… ASP.NET applications do have more overhead in terms of memory footprint and startup time is a little slower, but generally for server applications this is not a big deal. If the application is stable the service should fire up and stay running indefinitely. A lot of times this kind of service interface can simply be attached to an existing Web application, or if scalability requires be offloaded to its own Web server.Easier to work withBut the ultimate benefit here is that it's much easier to work with a Web app as opposed to a service. While developing I can simply turn off the auto-launch features and launch the service on demand through IIS simply by hitting a page on the site. If I want to shut down an IISRESET -stop will shut down the service easily enough. I can then attach a debugger anywhere I want and this works like any other ASP.NET application. Yes you end up on a background thread for debugging but Visual Studio handles that just fine and if you stay on a single thread this is no different than debugging any other code.SummaryUsing ASP.NET to run background service operations is probably not a super common scenario, but it probably should be something that is considered carefully when building services. Many applications have service like features and with the auto-start functionality of the Application Initialization module, it's easy to build this functionality into ASP.NET. Especially when combined with the notification features of SignalR it becomes very, very easy to create rich services that can also communicate their status easily to the outside world.Whether it's existing applications that need some background processing for scheduling related tasks, or whether you just create a separate site altogether just to host your service it's easy to do and you can leverage the same tool chain you're already using for other Web projects. If you have lots of service projects it's worth considering… give it some thought…© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2013Posted in ASP.NET SignalR IIS 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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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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OIM 11g notification framework

- by Rajesh G Kumar

OIM 11g has introduced an improved and template based Notifications framework. New release has removed the limitation of sending text based emails (out-of-the-box emails) and enhanced to support html features. New release provides in-built out-of-the-box templates for events like 'Reset Password', 'Create User Self Service' , ‘User Deleted' etc. Also provides new APIs to support custom templates to send notifications out of OIM. OIM notification framework supports notification mechanism based on events, notification templates and template resolver. They are defined as follows: Ø Events are defined as XML file and imported as part of MDS database in order to make notification event available for use. Ø Notification templates are created using OIM advance administration console. The template contains the text and the substitution 'variables' which will be replaced with the data provided by the template resolver. Templates support internationalization and can be defined as HTML or in form of simple text. Ø Template resolver is a Java class that is responsible to provide attributes and data to be used at runtime and design time. It must be deployed following the OIM plug-in framework. Resolver data provided at design time is to be used by end user to design notification template with available entity variables and it also provides data at runtime to replace the designed variable with value to be displayed to recipients. Steps to define custom notifications in OIM 11g are: Steps# Steps 1. Define the Notification Event 2. Create the Custom Template Resolver class 3. Create Template with notification contents to be sent to recipients 4. Create Event triggering spots in OIM 1. Notification Event metadata The Notification Event is defined as XML file which need to be imported into MDS database. An event file must be compliant with the schema defined by the notification engine, which is NotificationEvent.xsd. The event file contains basic information about the event.XSD location in MDS database: “/metadata/iam-features-notification/NotificationEvent.xsd”Schema file can be viewed by exporting file from MDS using weblogicExportMetadata.sh script.Sample Notification event metadata definition: 1: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> 2: <Events xmlns:xsi=http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="../../../metadata/NotificationEvent.xsd"> 3: <EventType name="Sample Notification"> 4: <StaticData> 5: <Attribute DataType="X2-Entity" EntityName="User" Name="Granted User"/> 6: </StaticData> 7: <Resolver class="com.iam.oim.demo.notification.DemoNotificationResolver"> 8: <Param DataType="91-Entity" EntityName="Resource" Name="ResourceInfo"/> 9: </Resolver> 10: </EventType> 11: </Events> Line# Description 1. XML file notation tag 2. Events is root tag 3. EventType tag is to declare a unique event name which will be available for template designing 4. The StaticData element lists a set of parameters which allow user to add parameters that are not data dependent. In other words, this element defines the static data to be displayed when notification is to be configured. An example of static data is the User entity, which is not dependent on any other data and has the same set of attributes for all event instances and notification templates. Available attributes are used to be defined as substitution tokens in the template. 5. Attribute tag is child tag for StaticData to declare the entity and its data type with unique reference name. User entity is most commonly used Entity as StaticData. 6. StaticData closing tag 7. Resolver tag defines the resolver class. The Resolver class must be defined for each notification. It defines what parameters are available in the notification creation screen and how those parameters are replaced when the notification is to be sent. Resolver class resolves the data dynamically at run time and displays the attributes in the UI. 8. The Param DataType element lists a set of parameters which allow user to add parameters that are data dependent. An example of the data dependent or a dynamic entity is a resource object which user can select at run time. A notification template is to be configured for the resource object. Corresponding to the resource object field, a lookup is displayed on the UI. When a user selects the event the call goes to the Resolver class provided to fetch the fields that are displayed in the Available Data list, from which user can select the attribute to be used on the template. Param tag is child tag to declare the entity and its data type with unique reference name. 9. Resolver closing tag 10 EventType closing tag 11. Events closing tag Note: - DataType needs to be declared as “X2-Entity” for User entity and “91-Entity” for Resource or Organization entities. The dynamic entities supported for lookup are user, resource, and organization. Once notification event metadata is defined, need to be imported into MDS database. Fully qualified resolver class name need to be define for XML but do not need to load the class in OIM yet (it can be loaded later). 2. Coding the notification resolver All event owners have to provide a resolver class which would resolve the data dynamically at run time. Custom resolver class must implement the interface oracle.iam.notification.impl.NotificationEventResolver and override the implemented methods with actual implementation. It has 2 methods: S# Methods Descriptions 1. public List<NotificationAttribute> getAvailableData(String eventType, Map<String, Object> params); This API will return the list of available data variables. These variables will be available on the UI while creating/modifying the Templates and would let user select the variables so that they can be embedded as a token as part of the Messages on the template. These tokens are replaced by the value passed by the resolver class at run time. Available data is displayed in a list. The parameter "eventType" specifies the event Name for which template is to be read.The parameter "params" is the map which has the entity name and the corresponding value for which available data is to be fetched. Sample code snippet: List<NotificationAttribute> list = new ArrayList<NotificationAttribute>(); long objKey = (Long) params.get("resource"); //Form Field details based on Resource object key HashMap<String, Object> formFieldDetail = getObjectFormName(objKey); for (Iterator<?> itrd = formFieldDetail.entrySet().iterator(); itrd.hasNext(); ) { NotificationAttribute availableData = new NotificationAttribute(); Map.Entry formDetailEntrySet = (Entry<?, ?>)itrd.next(); String fieldLabel = (String)formDetailEntrySet.getValue(); availableData.setName(fieldLabel); list.add(availableData); } return list; 2. Public HashMap<String, Object> getReplacedData(String eventType, Map<String, Object> params); This API would return the resolved value of the variables present on the template at the runtime when notification is being sent. The parameter "eventType" specifies the event Name for which template is to be read.The parameter "params" is the map which has the base values such as usr_key, obj_key etc required by the resolver implementation to resolve the rest of the variables in the template. Sample code snippet: HashMap<String, Object> resolvedData = new HashMap<String, Object>();String firstName = getUserFirstname(params.get("usr_key"));resolvedData.put("fname", firstName); String lastName = getUserLastName(params.get("usr_key"));resolvedData.put("lname", lastname);resolvedData.put("count", "1 million");return resolvedData; This code must be deployed as per OIM 11g plug-in framework. The XML file defining the plug-in is as below: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <oimplugins xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"> <plugins pluginpoint="oracle.iam.notification.impl.NotificationEventResolver"> <plugin pluginclass= " com.iam.oim.demo.notification.DemoNotificationResolver" version="1.0" name="Sample Notification Resolver"/> </plugins> </oimplugins> 3. Defining the template To create a notification template: Log in to the Oracle Identity Administration Click the System Management tab and then click the Notification tab From the Actions list on the left pane, select Create On the Create page, enter values for the following fields under the Template Information section: Template Name: Demo template Description Text: Demo template Under the Event Details section, perform the following: From the Available Event list, select the event for which the notification template is to be created from a list of available events. Depending on your selection, other fields are displayed in the Event Details section. Note that the template Sample Notification Event created in the previous step being used as the notification event. The contents of the Available Data drop down are based on the event XML StaticData tag, the drop down basically lists all the attributes of the entities defined in that tag. Once you select an element in the drop down, it will show up in the Selected Data text field and then you can just copy it and paste it into either the message subject or the message body fields prefixing $ symbol. Example if list has attribute like First_Name then message body will contains this as $First_Name which resolver will parse and replace it with actual value at runtime. In the Resource field, select a resource from the lookup. This is the dynamic data defined by the Param DataType element in the XML definition. Based on selected resource getAvailableData method of resolver will be called to fetch the resource object attribute detail, if method is overridden with required implementation. For current scenario, Map<String, Object> params will get populated with object key as value and key as “resource” in the map. This is the only input will be provided to resolver at design time. You need to implement the further logic to fetch the object attributes detail to populate the available Data list. List string should not have space in between, if object attributes has space for attribute name then implement logic to replace the space with ‘_’ before populating the list. Example if attribute name is “First Name” then make it “First_Name” and populate the list. Space is not supported while you try to parse and replace the token at run time with real value. Make a note that the Available Data and Selected Data are used in the substitution tokens definition only, they do not define the final data that will be sent in the notification. OIM will invoke the resolver class to get the data and make the substitutions. Under the Locale Information section, enter values in the following fields: To specify a form of encoding, select either UTF-8 or ASCII. In the Message Subject field, enter a subject for the notification. From the Type options, select the data type in which you want to send the message. You can choose between HTML and Text/Plain. In the Short Message field, enter a gist of the message in very few words. In the Long Message field, enter the message that will be sent as the notification with Available data token which need to be replaced by resolver at runtime. After you have entered the required values in all the fields, click Save. A message is displayed confirming the creation of the notification template. Click OK 4. Triggering the event A notification event can be triggered from different places in OIM. The logic behind the triggering must be coded and plugged into OIM. Examples of triggering points for notifications: Event handlers: post process notifications for specific data updates in OIM users Process tasks: to notify the users that a provisioning task was executed by OIM Scheduled tasks: to notify something related to the task The scheduled job has two parameters: Template Name: defines the notification template to be sent User Login: defines the user record that will provide the data to be sent in the notification Sample Code Snippet: public void execute(String templateName , String userId) { try { NotificationService notService = Platform.getService(NotificationService.class); NotificationEvent eventToSend=this.createNotificationEvent(templateName,userId); notService.notify(eventToSend); } catch (Exception e) { e.printStackTrace(); } } private NotificationEvent createNotificationEvent(String poTemplateName, String poUserId) { NotificationEvent event = new NotificationEvent(); String[] receiverUserIds= { poUserId }; event.setUserIds(receiverUserIds); event.setTemplateName(poTemplateName); event.setSender(null); HashMap<String, Object> templateParams = new HashMap<String, Object>(); templateParams.put("USER_LOGIN",poUserId); event.setParams(templateParams); return event; } public HashMap getAttributes() { return null; } public void setAttributes() {} }

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