B-Virtual

Vici Project

A collegue of mine needed an algorithm to filter out duplicate objects in a List and count the total occurence of each distinct object. He used this query to get his results, it may be usefull to some of you.

myRoles = from c in allRoles
          group c.RoleId
          by new { c.PersonId, c.RoleTypeId }
          into g
          orderby g.Count() descending
          select g;

Credits go to Roel Dieltjens

Development

.NET offers quite an extensive configuration framework in which you can use XML files to configure your applications. The drawback is that most of these files need to be located in the applications directory or sub-directories. Thus excluding reuse throughout different applications. An example of this is using an app.config or web.config file to store all your config information. If you have different applications that use the same base assemblies you can either place them in the GAC or place them in the same application directory as you main applications. Which imply that you need to keep you config settings in sync across multiple files and apps.

You can off course design your own settings-framework to resolve the above issue or use one of the fancy features of Vici Core. Let's get started on how we implement this.

What you need to obtain first is a copy of the latest Vici.Core dll which you can download at http://viciproject.com/wiki/Projects/Mvc/Download (the core has not yet received its own download, so it comes together with the mvc binaries for now, just get it from that download).

After you downoaded Vici.Core.dll, reference it in your project and then let the fun begin. I will include some sample code to show you  how simple it is to load your settings in your application

Step 1 - Create your XML file

As you can see there is a version attribute in the XML file to tell the config framework that we updated the XML file and that a new version needs to be updated in the cache.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?><Config version="1">    <FileLocation>c:\files\</FileLocation>    <TempPath>c:\temp\</TempPath></Config>

Step 2 - Create a POCO to hold your settings

Property names map to the XML nodes in your config file.

public class ConfigSet{  public string FileLocation;  public string TempPath;}

Step 3 - Register your POCO with the Vici Core config framework

using Vici.Core.Config;  class Program  {    public static ConfigSet Config;    static void Main(string[] args)    {      // The path to the location of your config file      string configFilePath = Path.Combine(AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory, "Config.xml");      // Register the provider with the xml file      ConfigManager.RegisterProvider(new ConfigurationProviderXmlConfig(configFilePath));      // Create a new instance of our POCO      Config = new ConfigSet();      // Register our POCO with the framework      ConfigManager.Register(Config);      // Update our manager to tell it that we registered a new config file      ConfigManager.Update();    }  }

Step 4 - Use it

/*  Your code here*/string filePath = Program.Config.FileLocation;/*  More of your code here*/

Development, Featured

So your using SVN as we are? And you need to remove all the SVN files and folders to relocate or just detach your project? Then this trick will save you some time.

It adds a 'Delete SVN Folders' entry to your context menu in Windows Explorer.

How does it work? Create a new file with a .reg extension and add the following lines to the file.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\Folder\shell\DeleteSVN]
@="Delete SVN Folders"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\Folder\shell\DeleteSVN\command]
@="cmd.exe /c \"TITLE Deleting SVN Folders in %1 && COLOR 9A && FOR /r \"%1\" %%f IN (.svn) DO RD /s /q \"%%f\" \""

Development svn

Last weekend a new 2.0 stable version of Vici MVC was released. So if you're really into web development have a break and visit http://www.viciproject.com/

More Tips & Tricks to come ...

Development vici project, c#

The latest Vici MVC releases from 2080 up contain a new ActionResult object. This allows your controllers to return an action instead of the default void. So what should I use it for? Let's say you would like to stream xml or the contents of a file to the browser. This could be done the old way by using the response object from the WebAppContext or by using the new way using ActionResults.

Also for some ajax requests you expect JSON to be returned by the server in order to make your scripts work. You could do the conversion of your data to JSON by yourself or use anonymous types and the new JSONActionResult to convert your data to JSON automatically.

ActionResults currently available

• JSONActionResult: Output your data as a JSON formatted string for AJAX or Javascript use.
• RedirectActionResult: Redirect to another URL.
• RenderViewActionResult: In fact this is the same as you would use the ChangeLayout method. You define a different view from the default for your controller. As an extra you can provide a complete new ViewData collection to be used by the new view.
• SendFileActionResult: Send a file through the browser to the user
• XmlActionResult: Stream an XML string to the browser

In theory this is all very nice, but how do I use this in code? Well here we go.

Stream a file to the browser

using Vici.Mvc;namespace BVirtual.ViciDemo{  [Url("/Download/{DownloadUid}")]  public class Download : BaseController  {    /// <summary>    /// Default action for the download controller    /// </summary>    /// <param name="DownloadUid">Paramter passed in by Vici MVC during URL parsing</param>    public ActionResult Run(string DownloadUid)    {      // Get the object describing the file we would like to stream from disk      DownloadFile dFile = DownloadService.GetFileLocationForUid(DownloadUid);      // Check if we found the file in our system      if (dFile != null)      {        // Now start streaming the contents of the file from disk to the browser using         // - The location on disk        // - The mime type of the file to get the correct program to handle it on the client computer        // - The filename of the file you would like to stream        return new SendFileActionResult(dfile.PhysicalLocationOndisk, dFile.MimeType, dFile.Filename);      }      else      {        // No file found by the given UID, redirect to the error page        return _RedirectToErrorPage();      }    }    /// <summary>    /// Example method to show that you can return ActionResult objects from another method or class    /// </summary>    /// <returns>The action result to be returned by the view</returns>    private ActionResult _RedirectToErrorPage()    {      // Return a redirect action in case of error      return new RedirectActionResult("/Messages/DownloadFailed");    }  }}

In this example we would like to stream a file from the server to the client browser. In case we couldn't find we redirect to user to an error message page.

Development vici project

Once upon a time there was a young boy that was looking for a virtual outlet on the web. Together with a few colleagues they all started their own websites. But! Wait a second, it all stands with a good name right? Right! So of we went, searching for good names for our sites. And there it was, out of the blue, as a flash of lightning: B-Virtual! Why? Since the web is a virtual place on a cloud of its own and my name starts with a B there it was => B-Virtual. So, years past by, visitors enjoyed this website, postings were done under the name B-Virtual and all went well. I've been active on the web for about 14 years now, I've seen domains come and go, technologies rise and fall, experienced venture capital at its best thanks to HyperTrust and met many interesting people.

But here comes the interesting part of the story. A few months ago I was contacted by someone asking me if I was interested in selling my b-virtual.com domain. My first reaction was no, why should I, it's almost my second name. But they kept asking and I went thinking. Since I live in Belgium and I own both .com, .eu and .be domains I started thinking that I could miss the .com if the price was right. Ok, I here you thinking, here we go, he's going to take advantage of the situation. Not really actually, I made some calculations and found a reasonably low price including fees for new logo designs, email campaigns, branding, ... but the price was seen as to high. No problem for me, I'm not really looking to sell it anyway.

Since I'm into the web, I went looking for more information about the company wanting to buy my domain. I came up with B-Virtual, a Belgian, yes Belgian as in Belgium, company. So do the math with me, a Belgian company wanting my name for their company? It seems as if the people at A-Server weren't really in a creative mood. They just took my name. Maybe it's good marketing, take a name that has a good SEO rating a piggyback on it. Don't get me wrong, I'm not against their products, cloud services are the future for some virtual needs. It's just that they were to lazy to search for a fresh and creative name for their brand.

To proof that I'm in favor of them, I'll even advertise their website, since I'm still, at the time of writing, higher ranked in Google ;)

Here we go:

B-Virtual delivers ground breaking cloud storage solutions

I wish you all great success in your business since I'm also a through believer in virtual storage solutions.

Featured, Varia

As you all might know, or not know, I'm a hardcore user of the Vici Project. So I will try to post some tips and tricks on Vici projects here.

This piece of code helps those who would like to loop over a range of items or just use a counter to loop over.

Ok, this is easy, it just loops over the numbers 1 to 20 for i. But what if I would like to do it the other way around. Just do.

Development c#, vici project

Op zaterdag 9 mei 2009 kan je in Schelle terecht voor hun 5e garageverkoop. Bewoners uit de gemeente kunnen dan hun garage openzetten om naar goede oude amerikaanse, of is het nu schelse, traditie hun overbodige spulletjes te verkopen.

Voor meer info en adressen van de garages die meedoen kan je terecht op Schelle Leeft!.

Oh ja, vergeet vooral niet onze garage eens een bezoekje te brengen ... voor de ingewijden.

Actua schelle

Gezien we tegenwoordig, als Belgen, bijna allemaal met een digitale identiteitskaart rondlopen is het misschien wel eens nuttig om te weten wat we er juist mee kunnen doen. Ja we kunnen tax-on-web gebruiken, dat weten de meesten onder ons. Wat je dan nodig hebt is een kaartlezer. In veel laptops zit dit al standaard in tegenwoordig en anders kan je altijd nog een externe USB kaartlezer aankopen.

Maar wat kan je er nu nog mee, buiten 1 x per jaar je belastingen invullen? Wel, op je identiteitskaart staat iets als een certificaat, dit certificaat is uniek voor elke identiteitskaart en dus uniek voor iedere Belg. Het is een manier om je op internet te identificeren als zijnde jezelf. Dit merk je al als je je kaart in de lezer steekt en je foto op het scherm verschijnt.

Als je nu bv facturen of persoonlijke documenten wil doorsturen via email, waarbij je zeker wil zijn dat jij als afzender kan worden aangeduid, dan kan je deze emails handtekenen of 'signen' met jouw certificaat. Zo weet de ontvanger zeker dat jij de verzender bent van de email en dat de inhoud onderweg niet is gewijzigd. Mocht de inhoud wel zijn gewijzigd onderweg, we zitten ten slotte op het openbare internet, dan vervalt de handtekening en krijgt de ontvanger een waarschuwing dat er met de email geknoeid werd.

Hoe ga je nu te werk? Na enig zoekwerk op de website van eID heb ik volgende pagina gevonden waar er voor verschillende scenario's een handleiding werd voorzien. Dus alle hierheen.

Nu is het alleen nog wachten op de banken opdat ze onze certificaten kunnen aanvaarden als authenticatiemethode ;)

Varia eid