Learn MS .NET

While working on a clients DotNetNuke install trying to get the mail server working correctly.  I tried to access the host settings for the web portal framework and came up with the following:

  1: Error: Host Settings is currently unavailable.
  2: DotNetNuke.Services.Exceptions.ModuleLoadException: 
  3: D:\admin\Host\FriendlyUrls.ascx.vb(44): error BC30560: 'RewriterRuleCollection' is ambiguous in the namespace 'DotNetNuke.HttpModules.Config'. ---> 
  4: System.Exception: D:\admin\Host\FriendlyUrls.ascx.vb(44): 
  5: error BC30560: 'RewriterRuleCollection' is ambiguous in the namespace 'DotNetNuke.HttpModules.Config'. ---> 
  6: System.Web.HttpCompileException: D:\admin\Host\FriendlyUrls.ascx.vb(44): 
  7: error BC30560: 'RewriterRuleCollection' is ambiguous in the namespace 'DotNetNuke.HttpModules.Config'. 
  8: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildManager.PostProcessFoundBuildResult(BuildResult result, Boolean keyFromVPP, VirtualPath virtualPath) 
  9: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildManager.GetBuildResultFromCacheInternal(String cacheKey, Boolean keyFromVPP, VirtualPath virtualPath, Int64 hashCode) 
 10: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildManager.GetVPathBuildResultFromCacheInternal(VirtualPath virtualPath) 
 11: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildManager.GetVPathBuildResultInternal(VirtualPath virtualPath, Boolean noBuild, Boolean allowCrossApp, Boolean allowBuildInPrecompile) 
 12: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildManager.GetVPathBuildResultWithNoAssert(HttpContext context, VirtualPath virtualPath, Boolean noBuild, Boolean allowCrossApp, Boolean allowBuildInPrecompile) 
 13: at System.Web.UI.BaseTemplateParser.GetReferencedType(VirtualPath virtualPath, Boolean allowNoCompile) 
 14: at System.Web.UI.BaseTemplateParser.GetUserControlType(VirtualPath virtualPath) 
 15: at System.Web.UI.MainTagNameToTypeMapper.ProcessUserControlRegistration(UserControlRegisterEntry ucRegisterEntry) 
 16: at System.Web.UI.BaseTemplateParser.ProcessDirective(String directiveName, IDictionary directive) 
 17: at System.Web.UI.TemplateControlParser.ProcessDirective(String directiveName, IDictionary directive) 
 18: at System.Web.UI.TemplateParser.ParseStringInternal(String text, Encoding fileEncoding) 
 19: --- End of inner exception stack trace --- 
 20: at System.Web.UI.TemplateParser.ProcessException(Exception ex) 
 21: at System.Web.UI.TemplateParser.ParseStringInternal(String text, Encoding fileEncoding) 
 22: at System.Web.UI.TemplateParser.ParseString(String text, VirtualPath virtualPath, Encoding fileEncoding) 
 23: at System.Web.UI.TemplateParser.ParseFile(String physicalPath, VirtualPath virtualPath) 
 24: at System.Web.UI.TemplateParser.ParseInternal() 
 25: at System.Web.UI.TemplateParser.Parse() 
 26: at System.Web.Compilation.BaseTemplateBuildProvider.get_CodeCompilerType() 
 27: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildProvider.GetCompilerTypeFromBuildProvider(BuildProvider buildProvider) 
 28: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildProvidersCompiler.ProcessBuildProviders() 
 29: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildProvidersCompiler.PerformBuild() 
 30: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildManager.CompileWebFile(VirtualPath virtualPath) 
 31: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildManager.GetVPathBuildResultInternal(VirtualPath virtualPath, Boolean noBuild, Boolean allowCrossApp, Boolean allowBuildInPrecompile) 
 32: at System.Web.Compilation.BuildManager.GetVPathBuildResultWithNoAssert(HttpContext context, VirtualPath virtualPath, Boolean noBuild, Boolean allowCrossApp, Boolean allowBuildInPrecompile) 
 33: at System.Web.UI.TemplateControl.LoadControl(VirtualPath virtualPath) 
 34: at System.Web.UI.TemplateControl.LoadControl(String virtualPath) 
 35: at DotNetNuke.UI.Skins.Skin.InjectModule(Control objPane, ModuleInfo objModule, PortalSettings PortalSettings) 
 36: --- End of inner exception stack trace ---

This did not bode well for trying to access any of the mail settings or anything else for that matter that was controlled through the Host Settings.  So off to Google I went to try and discover what could be causing our issue. 

Upon searching I found a forum post on DotNetNuke that sounded very close to what was causing my issue.  On the third page of the thread Rija RABETOKOTANY RAOBIVELO provided just the answer I was looking for:

Don't know if this is still needed but I post it anyway.

I got the same problem and found that the DotNetNuke.HttpModules.dll replaces all other dll in the same namespace including DotNetNuke.HttpModules.UrlRewriter.dll since 4.6.0. So in my case these two files exist in the bin directory of my 4.5.3 install. Surely that an upgrade attempt was made so the new assembly copies the DotNetNuke.HttpModules.dll into the bin directory and it co-exists then with DotNetNuke.HttpModules.UrlRewriter.dll

So you can delete the DotNetNuke.HttpModules.dll file from your bin directory if you're still in 4.5.* but delete DotNetNuke.HttpModules.* if you're in 4.6.*

That fixes my issue

Hope it will help

When I looked at his answer I then went and checked the properties of the DotNetNuke.dll file in my bin folder which let me know that the site was currently using version 4.5.3 of the platform.  I then looked through the bin folder and found that I indeed had both the DotNetNuke.HttpModules.dll and the DotNetNuke.HttpModules.UrlRewriter.dll file in my bin folder.  So this was giving me my error message from before.  To verify this I checked the properties of the DotNetNuke.HttpModules.dll and found that it was attached to version 4.6.2 so at some point someone tried to do an upgrade to the portal framework that didn’t take and caused us the small grief.

Once the file was removed, the host settings came up just like there were supposed to and it has been working great every since.  Hope this helps anyone else that runs into this issue with DNN.

Having worked with DotNetNuke since Version 1.0 and before I have seen many changes within the framework.  One of the changes that I liked but found it to be repetitive was when working with the registration tools, we had this field called Display Name that was always asking for input in the form.

This image shows the display name as a required field.  I understand the need for this as we want to display a user’s preferred name to them when they login, but it is also nice being able to set this to our own predetermined fields as well. Well this can be done within the framework, with the added bonus that the display name will now not be part of the registration process. 

To accomplish this, lets walk through the process.

Remove the display Name

1. Login to the portal as an administrator
2. Go to Admin –> User Accounts
3. Click on User Settings either at the bottom of the module or in the drop down menu for the module.
4. Locate the Display Name Format field near the bottom of the user settings
   
5. Place the following within the textbox [FIRSTNAME] [LASTNAME]. This will set the display name to the first and last name of the user that is registering.
6. Click the update button at the bottom of the module.
7. Log out of the portal as administrator and then click on the registration link. The Display Name field should now not be visible in your registration form.
   

This makes for a consistent naming scheme for wherever the Display Name field is used within your portal as well as allowing the field not to be required during registration when having new users register.

If you have any comments or other suggestions about tips you would like to see about DotNetNuke please leave them in the comments below.

With the release of the latest version of DotNetNuke 4.9, there have been some new improvements to things.  Some of these things won’t be apparent unless your paying close attention.  This post will not summarize the changes as I made a post previous to this that eluded to the changes.  This post will center around the new Styles skin object.

Style Skin Object

This skin object is new and allows us as skin developers to make better use of the styles that we use with our skins.  We can now use conditional expressions to insert other style sheets within our skin.  This makes it much easier to build a skin and then tweak it for the different types of browsers that may be viewing the site.

Style Object Properties

• Condition
  • This is an Internet Explorer specific condition.  All valid conditional expressions may be used such as “LT IE 7” or “(IE6) | (IE7)”. More information on these and other Internet Explorer conditions can be found at the MSDN Library.
• IsFirst
  • This Boolean property allows us to define if the style sheet link should be loaded as the first link or not. If the value is false then it will be loaded as the last link.
  • Values: True, False
• Name
  • This is a string value that will define the ID of the style sheet link.
• StyleSheet
  • This is a string value that will contain the path to the  style sheet that is to be loaded. This path is relative to the root of the application.
• UseSkinPath
  • This Boolean property allows to determine whether we should be loading the style sheet relative to the path of the skin.
  • Values: True, False

As we can see from the properties of the style object, it now gives us many options in how we want to structure our CSS files and even the ability to determine the loading order somewhat of how DotNetNuke places them in the loading order. 

Example

With this new object it always helps to see how to implement it properly.  With that in mind we will explore the sample that is readily available for everyone in the new 4.9 release with the new Entropy skin that replaces the old standby Blue skin.

First up will be how this is implemented in the ASCX files for skin development.

ASCX Method

  1: <%@ Control Language="vb" AutoEventWireup="false" Explicit="True" Inherits="DotNetNuke.UI.Skins.Skin" %>
  2: <%@ Register TagPrefix="dnn" TagName="STYLES" Src="~/Admin/Skins/Styles.ascx" %>
  3: 
  4: <dnn:STYLES runat="server" ID="StylesIE6" Name="IE6Minus" 
  5:     StyleSheet="ie6skin.css" Condition="LT IE 7" UseSkinPath="true" />

As we can see from the example we have a style sheet that will be added to the skin if the browser being used is less than Internet Explorer 7.  The link will be named “IE6Minus” and that we want to load the style sheet “ie6skin.css” from the root of the skin folder because we have the “UseSkinPath” set to true.

HTML/XML Method

  1: <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
  2:     "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
  3: <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
  4: <head>
  5:     <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="skin.css" />
  6: </head>
  7: <body>
  8:     [STYLES]
  9: </body>
 10: </html>

The content of the html file.

  1: <Objects>
  2:     <Object>
  3:         <Token>[STYLES]</Token>
  4:         <Settings>
  5:             <Setting>
  6:                 <Name>Name</Name>
  7:                 <Value>IE6Minus</Value>
  8:             </Setting>
  9:             <Setting>
 10:                 <Name>StyleSheet</Name>
 11:                 <Value>ie6skin.css</Value>
 12:             </Setting>
 13:             <Setting>
 14:                 <Name>Condition</Name>
 15:                 <Value>LT IE 7</Value>
 16:             </Setting>
 17:             <Setting>
 18:                 <Name>UseSkinPath</Name>
 19:                 <Value>True</Value>
 20:             </Setting>
 21:         </Settings>
 22:     </Object>
 23: </Objects>

The content of the xml file.

Both examples will produce the same output when used in a skin.  They would load the ie6skin.css if the page determines that we are viewing this on a browser that is lower then Internet Explorer 7.  I think in the long run this skin object will be a great addition to the core skin objects that are contained within the DNN Framework.

This is another post for my own remembrance. While working with controls in ASP.NET most of the back colors use the RGB color references instead of allowing you to quickly plug in the Hexadecimal numbers to the control.  At first glance this looks to be a daunting task as there doesn’t appear to be a quick solution for this within the Color class in either VB.NET or C#. But the solution is pretty simple

VB.NET Example

  1: MyControl.BackColor = ColorTranslator.FromHtml("#FFFFFF")

C# Example

  1: MyControl.BackColor = ColorTranslator.FromHtml("#FFFFFF");

It actually becomes pretty easy after you find it.  There are some pretty elegant solutions to this problem on the NET but a lot of them don’t take advantage to what Microsoft has already built into the .NET Framework.

I’ve been slowly adding things that I run across that I need to remember to my blog so that I can find them at a later time. As well as allowing other people with the same issue to find a solution for themselves.

  1: typeof(Widget)

is the equivalent in VB.NET of

  1: GetType(Widget)

Now the next time I start looking for this I’ll have it on the blog and easily searchable.

Shaun Walker creator of DotNetNuke is featured this week on Twit.tv.  In episode 41 of their weekly podcast they speak with him about DotNetNuke and the future of this framework on the ASP.NET framework.  You can find the the podcast on iTunes or at the Twit site – www.twit.tv/FLOSS.

This release comes with a number of module updates including the following:

• Documents 04.01.00
• Events 04.00.02
• Help 03.00.02
• HTML 04.08.01
• Links 04.00.01
• NewsFeeds 04.00.00
• Repository 03.01.15
• Survey 04.50.00
• UserDefinedTable 03.05.01
• Wiki 04.01.00

• FCK Html Editor Provider 02.00.02
• AD Authentication Provider 01.00.04

This new version can be dowloaded from the DotNetNuke website.

The latest release of the News Feeds module has made it through the project release cycle.  Peter Donker made the announcement on 8/24/2008.  He has chosen to completely rewrite the module to provide us in the Community with some very interesting options moving forward with this module.

The first one is Aggregation

The module uses a new version of the RSS Toolkit located at CodePlex.  This toolkit allows the module to aggregate feeds of different types together as one feed.

The next one is Caching

They have made some very interesting choices in how they cache the rss feeds for use within the module.  They now store information on disk in the form of the aggregated feed as an xml document as well as storing information in a SQL table with when the feed needs to be refreshed and other information.

The next was Transformation

Previously the XML/XSL transformation was handled by the standard ASP.NET XML component. Now this module uses the same mechanism as the XML module and allows for parameters to be passed to the XSL style sheet.

The next was Displaying

In older versions the news feed module did not display till it had successfully downloaded all the content to display.  This new version uses AJAX to allow for quicker loading of the page and better management of the experience for the end user.

The last note is on Security

If you turn on caching of the module and you use an internal page to display a feed. It is important to remember that the feed that is cached will display the information for the user that was logged in when the feed was first called, so if that user has higher privileges then you want to display information for that may inadvertently get cached.

More reading

Peter Donker’s Blog post

News Feed Download

News Feed Discussion Forum

Hector Sosa of SystemWidgets has released a Windows Winform application that allows you to modify the User database in DotNetNuke. I’ve checked out the screen shots and it looks interesting and useful.  There is a download for the binary files as well as the source of the application.  More information can be found at his blog.

Hector Sosa Blog

The links module for DotNetNuke was updated today to allow installation on DNN 4.7.  The 4.0.0 release had an issue with installation on 4.7 as well not allowing it to be installed on DNN 4.9 which is soon to be released.  This is the version that will be included with the new version of DotNetNuke that should be released very shortly.   The issue was around the compatibility node of the DNN Config file for installation.

DotNetNuke Links Home

DotNetNuke Links Discussion

DotNetNuke Links Download