Learn MS .NET

Microsoft has released one full E-book on LINQ from Microsoft Press called Introducing Microsoft LINQ as well as providing a couple of chapters from two other books that they are publishing.  The other two are Introducing Microsoft ASP.NET AJAX and Introducing Microsoft SILVERLIGHT 1.0.

Introducing Microsoft LINQ
by Paulo Pialorsi and Marco Russo

ISBN: 9780735623910

Product Description

Data-rich applications can be difficult to create because of the tremendous differences between query languages used to access data and programming languages commonly used to write applications. This practical guide introduces LINQ, a set of extensions to the Microsoft Visual C# and Microsoft Visual Basic programming languages.

• Chapter 1: Introduction
• Chapter 2: C# Language Features
• Chapter 3: Visual Basic 9 Language Features
• Chapter 4: LINQ Syntax Fundamentals
• Chapter 5: LINQ to ADO.NET
• Chapter 6: LINQ to XML

Introducing Microsoft ASP.NET AJAX
by Dino Esposito

ISBN: 9780735624139

Product Description

Get an expert introduction to the new JavaScript enhancements for Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0. More than a basic AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript And XML) script library, the Microsoft implementation brings object orientation to JavaScript, together with enhanced client-side and server-side controls that greatly simplify coding while delivering enhanced Web experiences with any browser.

• Chapter 1: The AJAX Revolution
• Chapter 5: The AJAX Control Toolkit

Introducing Microsoft SilverLight 1.0
by Laurence Moroney

ISBN: 9780735625396

Product Description

Get a first look at Microsoft Silverlight with this practical introduction. This ideal reference delivers pragmatic advice, from in an insider s perspective, of how the tool was developed from concept to release. An expert on Silverlight and a Technical Evangelist on the Silverlight team delivers a first look at the new cross-platform, cross-browser plug-in and details the relationships among Silverlight and Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 and 3.5 technologies.

• Chapter 1: SilverLight and User Experience
• Chapter 5: Programming SilverLight with JavaScript

The free E-Book and free chapters can be downloaded from here.

While getting started with a new project and hopefully successful business venture.  One of the first things I did was to install the latest version of DotNetNuke 4.8.0.  The install went flawless as usual with DNN.  One of the things I love of the newer releases of DNN was the ability to test at each stage of the install.

During the initial install of DNN it checks to see if the database is at the same version as the DotNetNuke assembly.  If the version is not the same or the database doesn't currently contain any DNN Tables then it runs the Install Wizard which looks like this on the first running.

DNN Installation Screen 1:

I believe it was in version 4.4.0 that introduced this new wizard tool for installing DNN on the server.  I've really grown to love this as it allows for much more testing at each stage of the setup for the Directory Permissions as well as for Database Connections.

This screen offers us 3 choices for installing DNN.

1. Custom - The "Custom" installation method provides you with the ability to completely customise your DotNetNuke installation. Select this option if you wish to control which optional components get installed.
2. Typical - The "Typical" installation method makes some "typical" choices for you.
3. Auto - The "Auto" installation method bypasses the Wizard completely and uses the legacy Auto-Install procedure.

I typically select Custom to give me the most control over what features I want to install with the portal.  With these newer versions we also have the ability to choose what language we want to work in with the portal during the install.  After choosing the Installation Method and Language click Next.

More...

Well seems as if the DotNetNuke core team has given all us DNN developers a late Christmas present.  Seems on Boxing day we had a new maintenance release which can be found at the DNN Downloads. 

As with all releases it bears reminding to always do a backup of your current installation if you are going to do an upgrade.  For best results it is better to do a backup and then restore it to a test environment if you have the abilities and then perform your upgrade and do some testing.  If all the tests go well then do your upgrade to your production environment.

Also to take note of with this release is that if you are using the Active Directory provider and looking to upgrade then please take a look at this post on the DotNetNuke forum found here.

DNN AD Forum Post

For anyone looking to build a new site build on DNN. I would install this new version and do some testing to see if anything shakes out that would cause concern for further development.

What I nice surprise this morning as I fired up Mozilla to do some web browsing before getting to work.  It asked me if I wanted to update the software to the 2nd beta release of the product.  I quickly clicked the button to get it done immediately to see what changes were made.  I've been using the beta 1 version with little issue so far so I don't expect any significant issue with the second beta. 

The have a really cool graphic the first time you run it.

This is the run down of what they have to promote:

Everyone

• Find the page you were looking for with the new location bar feature.
• Use the new History and Bookmarks features to build smart search folders of your websites.
• Download large files? Try pausing and resuming your downloads in the new Download Manager.
• Check out our plans for the new theme and tell us what you think!

Web Developers

• Play with the improved CSS support in Firefox 3.
• Test out the new DOM improvements, especially in regard to support for extensions to the DOM added by other browsers.
• Add power to your web applications with JavaScript 1.8, included in Firefox 3.
• Look through this handy guide on updating web applications for Firefox 3.

Extension Developers

• Take advantage of the FUEL library which simplifies many of your most common tasks.
• Experiment with the new Places API, a massive simplification to our history and bookmark platform, providing significantly more functionality and performance.
• Check out the Improvements to XUL in Firefox 3.
• Be sure to look at all the details in our online documentation for extension developers.

Firefox 3 Beta 2 includes approximately 900 improvements over the previous beta, including fixes for stability, performance, memory usage, platform enhancements and user interface improvements. Many of these improvements were based on community feedback from the previous beta.

This article first appeared in LearnMSNET.com on June 25, 2003

Many of the web developers that are currently moving to ASP.NET were previously ASP developers, which made them used to developing their script code inline with the HTML.

This coding style of using inline code is still available within the ASP.NET framework, but a new coding style designed for large team development has also been introduced with ASP.NET this has been dubbed code-behind.

This coding style places all the code that is to be executed by the server into separate files for each .aspx page.  This allows web designers who specialize in the HTML development of a site, and application developers who specialize in the programming logic of the site to work together in a way that the page designer does not disturb the code in the page.  This also allows a company who is interested in protecting it’s investment or who are developing web applications for resale to distribute just the .aspx files and the compiled code-behind files as a .dll file for the site.

There are three ways of working with .aspx pages.

1. Inline code that is compiled on the web server as it is needed.
2. Code-behind files that are compiled into a .dll file and then removed from production.
3. Code-behind files that are compiled on the web server as they are needed.

With these options in mind it becomes very important to consider how a developer will work with .aspx pages in ASP.NET.  Along with the tools that will be used to develop these pages.  Currently the most popular way of developing is with either Web Matrix which is available from http://www.asp.net/ or to use Visual Studio 2008.  Not to say there aren’t other tools out there to develop .aspx pages because there are.

More...

While setting up an installation of DNN for a client I ran into an issue of not being able to display the Image Gallery from within the FCK Editor on an HTML/Text Module.  My first instinct with this was that I did not have read permissions on the "/Portals/0/" folder within the DNN architecture.

So following this assumption I logged into my hosting panel and made the appropriate permissions settings for the folder.  I then went back to the HTML module and proceeded to see if the issue was solved.  NO this didn't solve the issue at all.  I then decided to check the event log under the admin menu to see if there was possibly an error being generated that I could get more information from.

Looking at the Event Viewer I found the several General Exceptions within the log.  I checked one out and this was what I discovered within the log entry.

AssemblyVersion: -1
PortalID: -1
PortalName:
UserID: -1
UserName:
ActiveTabID: -1
ActiveTabName:
RawURL:
AbsoluteURL:
AbsoluteURLReferrer:
UserAgent:
DefaultDataProvider:
ExceptionGUID:
InnerException: Error loading FCK gallery folders: D:\Webs\brit12\portal\Providers\HtmlEditorProviders\Fck\s\0\
FileName:
FileLineNumber: -1
FileColumnNumber: -1
Method:
StackTrace:
Message: System.Exception: Error loading FCK gallery folders: D:\Webs\brit12\portal\Providers\HtmlEditorProviders\Fck\s\0\
Source:
Server Name: W3W14004

This entry showed that I was having difficulty with a folder that I was not expecting at all.  I then proceeded to see about permissions on that folder that it showed me in the event log, but alas this folder doesn't exist.  But the folder FCK did exist.  I placed the necessary read/write permissions on that folder as an experiment to see if I could then view the gallery in the HTML module. 

This solved my issue with the gallery module and allowed my client to merrily continue on developing their web site.

Well after receiving Visual Studio 2008 yesterday.  I proceeded to get my update done and see how the final product compared to the last Beta of the product I had used.

Prior to me receiving my copy of Visual Studio 2008 I had read Scott Guthrie's Blog post on "Steps to Uninstall VS 2008 Beta2 before installing the VS 2008 Final Release". This had given me a head start or preparing to do the upgrade.

Although even with this knowledge I did forget to uninstall one of the components from the Beta 2 build.  I was impressed when the install caught this and let me know about it prior to allowing me to install the RTM version.  I had forgotten to uninstall the MSDN Library.

After installing I ran visual studio and have not had any issues with the product so far as any bugs have been found, but I have ran across an issue with developing modules for DotNetNuke which I will be addressing in another blog post later today or tomorrow.

While reading through my blog posts this morning I ran across an entry for Live Documents.  This looks like a very interesting tool.  It's currently in closed beta and is by invitation only.  This tool is currently being developed under the leadership of an experienced web entrepreneur Sabeer Bhatia. Some people will recognize that name as one of the founders of Hotmail before it was sold to Microsoft.

Reading the documentation that is available on their site shows some very nice features that may make for an excellent tool to work along with your current installation of Office.  The main use of the tool is to allow you to maintain a library of files on their service and to edit them online with their Live Document tools. 

These tools have a similar interface to Microsoft Office 2007 , although they claim that some of their tools have features that are move advanced then is currently available even within Office 2007.

Spreadsheet Tool.

This tool looks like a great way to share documents with friends of colleagues and keep it up to date properly.  I've applied to be included in the beta and i've already received notice that I should be accepted pretty quickly.  Once I get in I'll let everyone know how it works.