tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-161230452011-11-28T00:53:00.640+01:00Sharing knowledge about .Net and other technologiesJulienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.comBlogger311100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-53417554488954568852010-03-25T09:41:00.000+01:002010-03-25T09:41:03.028+01:00

Microsoft finally released the so awaited version 2.0 of its Open XML SDK, which is supposed to radically improve the performances compared to v1.0 that was simply unusable! I did not have time yet to test it out but I will try posting some results later on. In the meantime, you can download it here

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-81023730989010231102010-03-23T12:48:00.011+01:002010-03-23T14:44:00.006+01:00

It is a common need to clean the destination folder (deleting all files and folders) when you automate your deployment builds. Unfortunately, MSBuild does not have a built-in task that does it all for you, and googling about it does not give you a clear answer. It is however pretty easy to do by combining the Delete and RemoveDir tasks together. Below is a code snippet that does it. The code

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-48347832478028995032009-11-26T09:09:00.002+01:002009-11-26T09:15:31.518+01:00

Since I am using Qwerty keyboards, it is not that easy to type the accented characters in french or even the euro symbol.I can still use the Windows Character Map, or remember the ASCII code, but I can now also open up a website such http://www.copypastecharacter.com/, which simply does what it says he does (Copy/Paste characters)

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-38377012469042885992009-11-02T10:28:00.004+01:002009-11-02T16:51:36.241+01:00

Resharper 5.0 is on its way...Despite the VS 2010 support, there are some promising new featuresExternal PDB supportProject RefactoringBetter ASP.Net supportAnd much more as the JetBrains' Guys demonstrated us over the past years...Visit their blog for all detailsReSharper 5.0: IntroReSharper 5.0 Overview

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-65760610786585385382009-10-21T09:18:00.003+02:002010-11-17T08:40:54.719+01:00

It's now a casual thing to publish the tools you used, so here is my list (for a .Net developer): Visual Studio 2008/2010 Pro Visual Studio Power Commands Add-In Web Deployment Project 2008/2010 JetBrains Resharper 5.x Sybase PowerDesigner Enterprise Library Blocks (Data, PolicyInjection) MyGeneration (Code Generation) MS Build (+ Commuity Tasks) NUnit Wix JetBrains TeamCity Redgate

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-74864827533335515662009-09-28T16:54:00.003+02:002009-09-28T17:07:08.154+02:00

If you are using MS SQL Server, there is a good chance that you have (or will have) to monitor and improve some of your queries.Since its 2005 edition, SQL Server provides a feature to find the missing indexes, giving you some information about potential indexes that it thinks would improve performances. This information can be really useful to proactively improve the queries that are getting

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-43447392691529377392009-07-01T19:54:00.001+02:002009-07-01T19:55:55.890+02:00

For those who wants to help saving the Earth, http://www.ecofont.eu

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-7981083357160221572008-12-16T17:53:00.006+01:002009-01-17T12:34:40.017+01:00

It's often useful to run a stored procedure or any script with the permissions of another user (i.e. impersonate a different user than the current one).It is possible to do so since SQL 2005 is out there, and is as simple as shown below:EXECUTE AS USER = 'anotheruser'GO--Your SQL StatementREVERTGONote the REVERT command to restore the original user.In order to impersonate a user, you will grant

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-27630122013835316152008-12-16T17:36:00.004+01:002008-12-16T17:50:36.792+01:00

It is always useful to have several browser instances when developing and testing so that you can "impersonate" several different users at the same time.IE does it for each different window; Firefox always shares the same instance even for different windows.As per the title of this entry, you already know that Firefox allows you to do it but the "feature" is simply not available as a simple check

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-54382030592741683762008-09-22T18:40:00.007+02:002008-12-16T17:51:23.421+01:00

With Firefox, follow the steps below to enable Windows authentication for your servers.1. Open Firefox 2.x or 3.x2. Navigate to the url "about:config"3. Locate the following preference names and set their value with the list of servers separated with comma. network.automatic-ntlm-auth.trusted-urisnetwork.negotiate-auth.delegation-urisnetwork.negotiate-auth.trusted-urisYour value should look

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-26104959515007261872008-09-02T21:34:00.003+02:002008-09-02T21:51:31.579+02:00

Google had just made the first BETA version of his (open-source) browser available.First impression is good! The browser starts really fast with a simple UI as Google knows hwo to make them.Browsing is also fast, using the same rendering engine as Safari (i.e WebKit)Oops, I also forgot to give its name: Google ChromeRead the comics explaining the history of the browser,Download and install it,And

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-66988720214942667042008-08-13T10:06:00.003+02:002008-08-13T10:12:40.232+02:00

I am a big fan of code generation based on templates. It gives all the flexibility you are expecting when coding by hand, but still Increase your productivityDecrease maintenance effortsCode consistency across your project(s)etc...I have been using MyGeneration for a while now and I recently found a good post from Michael Freidgeim summarizing most of the good links you need if you use it.

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-33742889036455820522008-05-27T15:05:00.003+02:002008-12-18T19:50:00.670+01:00

I am using Microsoft Web Deployment Projects in order to deploy automatically my nightly build on the development and test servers.It worked great but I struggled quite some time trying to replace the configuration section.Well, it was as stupid as that you cannot replace the whole system.serviceModel because it's not a configuration section, but is a configuration section group...and guess what

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-8155137366225459002008-05-26T08:43:00.004+02:002010-03-23T14:39:12.993+01:00

Use the Simple-Talk Prettifer to format your code (SQL, C#, VB and Python)http://extras.sqlservercentral.com/prettifier/prettifier.aspx in your web pages. Update (23-March-10): I have been recently using http://www.manoli.net/csharpformat/, which does a better job and allow xml formatting.

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-32395083524526329142008-05-14T17:14:00.012+02:002008-05-26T08:57:38.859+02:00

Based on WCF best practices, calling a WCF service should not be wrapped in a using statement as exceptions can be raised (http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa355056.aspx). Below is a code snippet highlighting the best practice:ServiceClient client = new ServiceClient();try{client.MyOperation();client.Close();}catch (CommunicationException e){//Handle exception if necessaryclient.Abort();}

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-64418174542039911682008-04-17T09:17:00.004+02:002008-05-21T09:30:37.738+02:00

SQL Server 2005 improves on the current situation by making the EXECUTE permission grantable at the database scope.What it means is that we can issue a statement like the example below and this will GRANT execute permissions on ALL existing stored procedures and scalar functions AND all subsequently created ones.GRANT EXECUTE TO [myUser] AS [dbo]If you only make use of stored procedures to access

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-3519602489530859132008-02-25T18:31:00.005+01:002009-01-17T12:47:39.557+01:00

It is a must to be able to generate certificates in order to test various security scenarios like running HTTP over SSL, message signing and/or encryption.The .Net Framework SDK is shipped with a command line tool makecrt.exe that can create a self-signed certificate. This certificate can then be used on a developer's workstation or testing server.Note: This should not be used for Production

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-59440595321238261682008-02-04T15:56:00.002+01:002008-03-21T08:37:56.280+01:00

You can use the IIS 6 Resources Kit to generate and install a self-signed certificate with the SelfSSL.exe command line tool.The IIS 6 Resouces Kit is available on the Microsoft.com website: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=34407Note that you should use a self-signed certificate when you need to troubleshoot third-party certificate problems or when you need to create a secure private

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-87465830343336768842008-02-04T15:52:00.005+01:002008-05-26T09:18:02.501+02:00

When you restore a database from one server to another (i.e. restoring from Production to QA or Development), the user permissions of SQL logins are not automatically reset even if a user with the same name exists (note that this does not apply if you use Windows authentication)In order to reset the user permissions, you can use the system command sp_change_users_login.When passing REPORT as a

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-8227915214301010162008-02-04T15:43:00.001+01:002008-05-26T09:01:37.329+02:00

If you're somehow perfectionnist as I am, you probably want to reset the your identity columns when deleting all records from a table.With SQL Server, you can do so by using the DBCC CHECKIDENT command.DBCC CHECKIDENT ('MyTable', RESEED, 0)Now if you want to reset the identity of a table that still contains some rows, you must reseed it to the last number used.DBCC CHECKIDENT ('MyTable', RESEED,

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-35594764739486266142007-02-02T13:47:00.000+01:002007-02-02T13:53:27.669+01:00

If you manage Lotus Notes application, there is always a time when you will need to edit a document to change a value. That say, you are not always able to do so even with full administrator rights (the application may not allow you to do it via the user interface)One solution is to create a simple agent that will do the work for you but it ends being painful!Another solution is to use the very

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-1160315812410714892006-10-08T15:56:00.000+02:002007-02-02T13:55:35.759+01:00

I just discovered the Writely project, which the Google online word processing project.It is actually very good, providing with most of the features you are looking for in a word processing tool.It is certainly not as good as a full-blown desktop software but provides some other features like online reviews with other users.Other cools features are the capabilities to save to other standards

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-1156159465411884472006-08-21T13:16:00.000+02:002007-02-02T13:58:48.144+01:00

For those like me who have not yet fully migrated to Visual Studio 2005, MS has finally released the very long-waited service pack for Visual Studio 2003.The list of bug fixes can be found at http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=918007The SP1 fixes a large number of issues, which were bugging us every day. One regret is that it took 3 years for Microsoft to get it out. Let's be positive and say

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-1154421627517930612006-08-01T10:37:00.000+02:002007-02-02T14:02:21.852+01:00

What's the difference between Int32.Parse() and Convert.ToInt()?That's a good question, isn't it? At least, that's a question that I often hear.Int32.Parse converts a string variable (or some other valid types) into a variable of type int. However if you pass a non-recognized value (text string, empty string or null string), it will throw an exception (System.NullArgumentException if null else

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-1153830394624974472006-07-25T14:03:00.000+02:002007-02-02T14:03:19.753+01:00

There is one thing that is always difficult to understand for C# beginners (and even more experience developers): .Net events. Many persons keep asking me questions about events handling.What is the delegate?Where/How do I declare my event?etc...First reflex is to look for a good article or some documents that will make it crystal clear....but sincerely I was not able to find a good one, or let

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-1144494658330563562006-04-08T12:49:00.000+02:002007-02-02T13:56:22.820+01:00

I recently discovered a useful function in Office Word that allow you to generate some sample text. It is very useful when you need some text for your tests instead of typing manually "bla bla bla".Open Word, create a new document and type =rand()Word will automatically generates the following text:The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. The quick

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-1140005118087245352006-02-15T12:53:00.000+01:002007-02-02T13:59:19.927+01:00

I finally got my boss to buy me a MSDN subscription :-)MSDN comes with a lot of ISO file (CD image files), which are great but I did not want to burn a CD or DVD each time.I looked for a virtual CD tool to mount this image files, but again did not want to pay for it...I found that Microsoft has released a free virtual CD tool named "Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel v2.0.1.1". However it does not seem

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-1139000735897539172006-02-03T21:51:00.000+01:002007-02-02T13:57:13.077+01:00

Microsoft has just released the Beta 2 of IE7.It can be downloaded from the Microsoft site.The new UI is simply great and simpler with the useful tab browsing, ripping off all the unuseful menus and toolbars to widen the screen space. A must with the endless growing content of websites. Another great feature to ease content reading is printing improvement, which is supposed to allow you to print

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-1136799489308879112006-01-09T10:32:00.002+01:002008-05-26T09:28:44.137+02:00

The built-in ComboBox Windows Forms control is often used but it has a drawback in the sense that you cannot add an extra blank item automatically.This is quite painful as you often like to add an item like "Select one item".I have created a control BlankItemComboBox, which does this.It works with DataTable, DataView and Collections. It currently does not support Arrays of objects.You can

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-1135283797229066012005-12-22T21:25:00.000+01:002007-02-02T14:01:28.639+01:00

During my last project, I was using a HTML editor for the user to submit content. I used FreeTextBox http://www.freetextbox.comI wanted to let the users copying their text from Word. However I wanted to "filter"the HTML I was getting to only keep carriage returns.After some researches, I decided to use Regular Expressions and I found a very good code sample on a weblog that was doing something

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16123045.post-1125562122440686952005-09-01T10:01:00.000+02:002006-11-13T15:41:37.462+01:00

I have been thinking to create my blog for awhile now, but I was not sure of what to write...There are lots of blogs outhere and many of them are just boring (you may think the same for mine). I did not want to blog about me. Blogging about technologies? Why not but there are already so many...Finally I decided to post technical tips to share my experience and some of my knowledge, either to help

Julienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05117973862039521081noreply@blogger.com0