DotNetKicks.com : Stories kicked by RyanFarley

Announcing Sueetie - the Open Source .NET Community Platform

Fri, 19 Dec 2008 03:43:57 GMT

Sueetie is a open-source community platform/framework built on open-source .NET applications. It currently integrates great open-source .NET applications such as BlogEngine.NET, ScrewTurn Wiki, YetAnotherForum.NET, Gallery Server Pro, & WSAT Website Starter Kit into a single-themes cohesive community.

How To Guarantee That Your Software Will Suck

Mon, 08 Dec 2008 16:31:10 GMT

Do you bad software and unhappy developers? Well, it isn't that hard...

27 Free Must-have Online Collaboration Tools

Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:46:12 GMT

hese days teams can be dispersed all over the globe. With outsourcing, telecommuting, distance learning and complex project collaboration, it's often helpful to have tools that can assist with the various collaborative tasks need to be done by dispersed teams. I've put together a great list of 27 free...

Starting with jQuery - Using jQuery with Web Forms

Sun, 09 Nov 2008 02:16:02 GMT

In this sixth and final entry on a series of post focused on using jQuery with no prior knowledge, I dive into applying jQuery into the traditional ASP.Net web form environment. The example code covered in this entry focuses on applying the jQuery Validation plug-in against 2 sets of input in the same form. To make the example more realistic, the form fields are contained inside of content page to ensure the code works with ASP.Net's client id renaming feature/annoyance.

Essential Visual Studio Tips & Tricks that Every Developer Should Know

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 23:01:02 GMT

In this blog entry, Stephen Walther lists the essential tips and tricks that every developer who uses Visual Studio 2008 should know. The list is kept brief. The list focuses on only those tips and tricks that can be used on a daily basis. Almost all of these tips and tricks are just as useful regardless of whether you are building an ASP.NET Web Forms or ASP.NET MVC application.

jQuery and Microsoft

Sun, 28 Sep 2008 20:01:02 GMT

ScottGu announce that Microsoft will be shipping jQuery with Visual Studio going forward. We will distribute the jQuery JavaScript library as-is, and will not be forking or changing the source from the main jQuery branch. The files will continue to use and ship under the existing jQuery MIT license.

jQuery, Microsoft, and Nokia

Sun, 28 Sep 2008 19:16:03 GMT

news today: Both Microsoft and Nokia are taking the major step of adopting jQuery as part of their official application development platform. Not only will they be using it for their corporate development but they will be providing it as a core piece of their platform for developers to build with.

Username Availability Validator almost ready, the early demo

Sat, 27 Sep 2008 12:31:02 GMT

A demo on using UserName Availability Validator control that is built using ASP.NET AJAX and the project is available on CodePlex

JQuery, the very very basics - Lesson 1

Sat, 13 Sep 2008 08:46:02 GMT

JQuery is the star among the growing list of JavaScript libraries. A few of its characteristics are light-weight, cross-browser compatibility and simplicity. A task that would take 10 lines of code with traditional JavaScript can be accomplished with JQuery in just 1 line of code. I write to record the series of very basic lessons I learned about JQuery (my study source is the very readable book JQuery in Action).

Starting With jQuery - Dynamically Applying Rules

Tue, 16 Sep 2008 13:16:21 GMT

This series of posts on using jQuery with no prior knowledge comes to its fourth iteration. This week, we're going to build on the Validation plug-in by looking at how to add and remove rules dynamically.

Sending Email in a Development Environment without an SMTP Server

Thu, 11 Sep 2008 20:46:02 GMT

Very handy... I'm forever looking this stuff up :-|

Creating a Custom Validation Control in ASP.NET

Wed, 10 Sep 2008 17:46:09 GMT

The BaseValidator class defines the basic implementation needed for all Validation controls. There are 6 Validation Controls included in the ASP.NET 2.0 and ASP.NET 3.5 framework which validate controls to prevent the users from entering wrong data. However, there are a few shortcomings in these controls. The good part is that ASP.NET provides the framework to create new validation controls. If you would like to create your own validation control, you can do so by deriving a new control from the BaseValidator abstract class. In this article, we will explore how to create a custom validation control in ASP.NET and provide both Server and Client Side Validation for the same.

Details Popup Via jQuery clueTip Plugin

Thu, 11 Sep 2008 02:46:05 GMT

Just to prove there are a million ways to get something done I decided to try using the jQuery clueTip Plugin to provide more details about an item in an ASP.NET ListView via a popup.

Browser Performance - What's Changed with Chrome in the Mix?

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 18:18:39 GMT

This week Google released their new browser, Chrome. There has been so much buzz about it that it's been deafening. It is seriously amazing how passionate people get about a browser. But let's face it, a browser is likely what most people use more than any other software on their computer now days. I spend so much of my time online. Performance is important to me, just like anyone else. Since Chrome's release, I've spent some time reading performance metrics in an attempt to see past the marketing hype, and I've been pleased with what I've found. Not specifically with Chrome, but with the improvements across the board with many, but certainly not all, browsers.

NVelocity Server Control

Tue, 02 Sep 2008 15:31:05 GMT

A light weight server control which wraps the NVelocity implementation.

Dear Alt.Net Developers: Stop blaming Microsoft and WebForms for crea

Fri, 29 Aug 2008 14:46:02 GMT

I am responsible for every website I create. If I create a site or application that is unmaintainable or that has poorly formed HTML or doesn't render well in all browsers, that is my fault. I chose my development tools/framework, or my employer, who I choose to work for, chose the development tools/framework. Either way, it is my responsibility, as a professional, to do my utmost to create the best possible application that is within my capability to create.

Top 10 Things That Annoy Programmers

Thu, 28 Aug 2008 20:46:03 GMT

Programmers all have their personal pet peeves. Whether it's scope creep, Hungarian notation, or smelly coworkers, there are certain nuisances that we must put up with in our line of work. The following is a list of the top 10 things that annoy programmers, compiled from the results of my recent question on StackOverflow along with some of my own experiences as a programmer:

Scraping, or Programatically Accessing, a Secure Webpage

Wed, 27 Aug 2008 08:46:11 GMT

There are many secure websites out there that provide useful information but do not have a public API to access it's data. A prime example of this is the LinkedIn website. You might love to gather some info from LinkedIn, but their promise to deliver a public API has yet to come to fruition. The problem is, the pages with all the good data are secure, requiring the user to log in before accessing these pages. Let's say we want to scrape this data from these pages programatically? We need to authenticate to access these pages. We can do that by reusing the authentication cookie from the site that we receive when we log in with a browser.

URL rewriting in ASP.NET web applications

Mon, 25 Aug 2008 18:31:05 GMT

So, you hate such URLs Or you'll hate it after you realize how easy it is to make it nicer. Besides all, URL rewriting will improve your rankings on search engines. Search engines like Google will easily index your "static" URLs, instead of dynamic URLs. There are several ways to accomplish URL Rewriting. I'll explain how to do this by using HttpModule and how to overcome the postback bug that is the outcome of URL rewriting. Suppose you have a content management system that stores entire pages in the database. So you can have a Home page, and Home page can have sections Products and Services, and each one of these can have their own child pages or sections, and so on. So we want dynamic URL like this: Default.aspx?SectionID=5&ItemID=22 to look like /catalogue/furniture/chairs/chair5.aspx or whatever the business logic requirement is. In the example in this article I will not use a database in order to keep it simple, but you imagine there is a database that keeps the URL for each page. I'll use hard-coded Dictionary that will keep some sample pages. Note: You can download the full code in the attachment. First, we'll make a data access object that will search the database for requested url and return its dynamic url. These are the methods in SampleDAO that will simulate the database and getting the url from there: public string GetRealPath(string requestedUrl) { string path = ""; Dictionary<string, string> paths = GetPathsFromDatabase(); if (paths.ContainsKey(requestedUrl)) paths.TryGetValue(requestedUrl, out path); return path; } private static Dictionary<string, string> GetPathsFromDatabase() { Dictionary<string, string> paths = new Dictionary<string, string>(); paths.Add("/URLRewrite/FirstSection/Default.aspx".ToLower(), "/URLRewrite/Default.aspx?SectionID=1"); paths.Add("/URLRewrite/SecondSection/Default.aspx".ToLower(), "/URLRewrite/Default.aspx?SectionID=2"); paths.Add("/URLRewrite/FirstSection/Page1.aspx".ToLower(), "/URLRewrite/Default.aspx?SectionID=1&Item=1"); paths.Add("/URLRewrite/FirstSection/Page2.aspx".ToLower(), "/URLRewrite/Default.aspx?SectionID=1&Item=2"); paths.Add("/URLRewrite/SecondSection/Page1.aspx".ToLower(), "/URLRewrite/Default.aspx?SectionID=2&Item=1"); paths.Add("/URLRewrite/SecondSection/SubSection/AnotherOne/Page5.aspx".ToLower(), "/URLRewrite/Default.aspx?SectionID=2&Item=5"); paths.Add("/URLRewrite/Default.aspx".ToLo

Roland WeigeIt's GhostDoc for Visual Studio

Sun, 24 Aug 2008 15:31:12 GMT

I have been using Roland WeigeIt's GhostDoc 2.1.3 for both Visual Studio 2005 and 2008 for about six months, and I am hooked. Here's a quick tutorial to get up and running with this free tool.

How To Inject a Managed Assembly (DLL) into Another Process

Sat, 23 Aug 2008 11:12:11 GMT

An easy way to inject a .NET assembly (class library, etc.) into the address space of another application, even an unmanaged application.

ASP.NET Futures: Generating Dynamic Images w/ HttpHandlers Gets Easier

Sun, 24 Aug 2008 09:31:12 GMT

I've done a lot of HttpHandlers that generate images. It's usually pretty tedious. When I was working banking, I wrote an example HttpHandler that would take two Check Images (back and front) and composite them into a single image on the server side, then serving up the composite. Usually you're messing around in with MemoryStreams and Images, and then you serialize the result out to the Response.OutputStream, making sure the MIME Types are set appropriately. If you're really clever, you'll remember to do some client-side and appropriate caching, but I rarely see that in the wild.

ASP.NET Dynamic Data - Simple 5 Table Northwind Example

Fri, 22 Aug 2008 03:31:09 GMT

Excellent summary of what you can do with Dynamic Data - a huge timesaver for most common CRUD-style sites

Exploring System.Web.Routing

Thu, 21 Aug 2008 18:31:11 GMT

An overview of the new System.Web.Routing namespace that was included in .net 3.5 SP1.

Starting with jQuery - Effects

Sat, 23 Aug 2008 09:31:09 GMT

This is second post in a string of posts where I chronicle my adventure in learning jQuery from having no previous experience with the framework. This week, we look at basic animation effects that affect an element's visibility that are available "out of the box" with jQuery.