Basem's

Microsoft Web Platform Installer -- All in one.

2008-10-06T07:26:00.000-07:00

Microsoft has published`"Microsoft Web Platform Installer Beta" an installation package that combines all services required to run an asp.net web application. The package includes IIS7, Visual web developer 2008 express edition and sqlserver 2008 express edition. The bad news is that the package run only on Windows Vista RTM, Windows Vista SP1, Windows Server 2008 which is normal since IIS7 runs on these platforms. However that would make the package more valuable for hosting companies than it's for developers.I think such packages should be targeted for beginner developers who are not yet aware of all components they need to start developing for dotnet and save them from setup hassle for many components.

Is't true that Asp.net gets no respect ?

2008-08-22T06:43:00.000-07:00

Rick Strahl had a good article named ASP.NET gets no Respect regarding asp.net.The article discusses many points including :

- why many developers don't choose asp.net as their web technology?
- what makes asp.net a different web technology?
- Is asp.net is just being hated because it's a microsoft product?

The article is a great one to give you an insight on what is going on out there. Regardless of my loyalty to microsoft technologies I can't stop thinking of a question that every web developer maybe asking :

Do I need to learn a backup web technology?

I HAD A WAR WITH A checkbox

2008-08-15T06:31:00.000-07:00

Have you created a gridview with a checkbox template field. sure you have if not just jumb to that nice article on how to do and that article to know how to implement Check All and Uncheck All functionality but don't forget to come back, am waiting.As you all know the main idea is to save round trips to the server by selecting multiple checkboxes and take an action on the selected rows.So why I had that war since everything seems just cool and under control.The problem was that each time I check the checkbox it returns false on the server side which drive me crazy "Why, why, why ....".However after many trials reviewing the javascript for attaching the event to the checkbox I found myself searching in the wrong part of the city so I got back to the server side where I found my terrible mistake "in that case off course". I was binding the Grodview control each time the page was loading "what was I thinking of, Nothing I guess and That was the problem :D". Anyway It seemed so natural why the checkbox always returned false since it had just been created.To Summary the long story The !IsPostBack check was the solution.

Bolggers need this

2008-05-23T06:27:00.000-07:00

Are you a blogger ? Are you a technical blogger ? Have you faced difficulties pasting your code in to your post???

For me, all the above is just true. AS am using blogger I faced that problem when trying to paste some c# code into one of my posts.The problem came from the html validation that blogger makes.So whenever you have some html character like "<,> and &" you will need to html encode them otherwise you will get an error. Postable is a simple site allowing you to paste your code and generates a friendly output code by converting all the special characters to their HTML Encodes. After converting your code using Postable you would probably use the <code> tag to distinguish your post text from your code.

Kayak != Kayak API

2008-05-03T09:27:00.000-07:00

Have You used Kayak, You should. As I was surfing the web I was refered to a kayak web site. Kayak provide search services for Flights"most interesting", Hoteles, Cars and Cruises. I really enjoyed the flight search on It. Not only did I enjoy the data it returns but also the way it graps and displays it. Suddenly I remembered I am a developer, really :D . I have to look to the other side of the picture, which is ?!?!?! You are right API. Any site or entity have a valuable huge set of data must have an API or webservice to expose it to developers, I said to myself. So I start looking for that API. I expected to see it in the Labs section but I didn't. So with a simple Google search I found that Kayak API . Unfortunatly Their API is not as much accurate nor reliable as their service.The Api has some limitations like it allows only 1000 request per day spreaded over the day which means 41 request per hour. Moreover the system is not reliable "not yet", when you see this error "anonymous access to kayak API denied"don't panic. There is one way to solve that problem which is acquire your token "developer key" when you are logged in other wise the key won't be valid. if you do so and still get this friendly error "you are gonna see a lot" just keep making requests cause they seem to have a problem with sessions.

Anyway, since I spent a couple of hours traying to get familiar with the system I decided to share it with you.

The API is so simple, just send few GET HttpRequest and Handle the Xml response.The squencve is as follows:

- Send request with the developer key to get the sessionID.
- Make another request using that sessionID to get the searchID.
- Make last request using both sessionID, searchID and search criteria in the query string.

The Url for each request and query string paramaters are documented in the API Specs .

Here is a simple page with a gridview and a button to grab some data using this API. I didn't consider error handling in the code since you all can do. This is a very simple implementation for the API to be able to get started.

You will need to change the DEVELOPERKEY in the first url with the key you get from the site.

using System; using System.Configuration; using System.Data; using System.Web; using System.Web.Security; using System.Web.UI; using System.Web.UI.HtmlControls; using System.Web.UI.WebControls; using System.Web.UI.WebControls.WebParts; using System.Net; using System.IO; using System.Xml; using System.Collections.Generic; public partial class _Default : System.Web.UI.Page { protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e) { } protected void Button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e) { string xmlResult = MakeRequst("http://api.kayak.com/k/ident/apisession?token=YOUR TOKEN"); string sid = GetRequiredId(xmlResult, "sid"); xmlResult = MakeRequst("http://www.kayak.com/s/apisearch?basicmode=true&oneway=n&origin=BOS&destination=SFO&destcode=&depart_date=05/09/2008&depart_time=a&return_date=05/13/2008&return_time=a&travelers=2&cabin=b&action=doflights&apimode=1&_sid_=" sid); string searchId = GetRequiredId(xmlResult, "searchid"); xmlResult = MakeRequst("http://www.kayak.com/s/basic/flight?searchid=" searchId "&c=10&apimode=1&_sid_=" sid); List<Leg> legs = GetAllLegs(xmlResult); if (legs != null) { GridView1.DataSource = legs; GridView1.DataBind(); } } //Get sessionId and searchId private string GetRequiredId(string xml, string idName) { string id = ""; XmlDataDocument doc = new XmlDataDocument(); doc.LoadXml(xml); XmlNodeList nodes = doc.GetElementsByTagName(idName); if (nodes != null && nodes.Count > 0) id = nodes[0].InnerText; return id; } //Make required request private string MakeRequst(string requestUrl) { System.Net.HttpWebRequest request = (HttpWebRequest)HttpWebRequest.Create(requestUrl); HttpWebResponse response = (HttpWebResponse)request.GetResponse(); Stream stream = response.GetResponseStream(); StreamReader reader = new StreamReader(stream); string xmlText = reader.ReadToEnd(); return xmlText; } //Get a list of Leg objects. private List<Leg> GetAllLegs(string responseXml) { XmlDataDocument doc = new XmlDataDocument(); doc.LoadXml(responseXml); List<Leg> legs = new List<Leg>(); XmlNodeList legNodes = doc.GetElementsByTagName("leg"); foreach (XmlNode legNode in legNodes) { Leg leg = new Leg(); for(int i=0;i<legNode.ChildNodes.Count;i ) { if (legNode.ChildNodes[i].Name == "airline_display") leg.AirLine = legNode.ChildNodes[i].InnerText; else if (legNode.ChildNodes[i].Name == "orig") leg.Origin = legNode.ChildNodes[i].InnerText; else if (legNode.ChildNodes[i].Name == "dest") leg.Dest = legNode.ChildNodes[i].InnerText; else if (legNode.ChildNodes[i].Name == "depart") leg.Depart = Convert.ToDateTime(legNode.ChildNodes[i].InnerText); else if (legNode.ChildNodes[i].Name == "arrive") leg.Arrive = Convert.ToDateTime(legNode.ChildNodes[i].InnerText); else if (legNode.ChildNodes[i].Name == "stops") leg.Stops = Convert.ToInt32(legNode.ChildNodes[i].InnerText); else if (legNode.ChildNodes[i].Name == "duration_minutes") leg.Duration = Convert.ToInt32(legNode.ChildNodes[i].InnerText); else if (legNode.ChildNodes[i].Name == "cabin") leg.Cabin = legNode.ChildNodes[i].InnerText; } legs.Add(leg); } return legs; } } // Leg class represents part of the returned XML class Leg { private string airLine, origin, dest, cabin; int stops, duration; private DateTime depart, arrive; public string AirLine { get { return airLine; } set { airLine = value; } } public string Origin { get { return origin; } set { origin = value; } } public string Dest { get { return dest; } set { dest = value; } } public string Cabin { get { return cabin; } set { cabin = value; } } public int Stops { get { return stops; } set { stops = value; } } public int Duration { get { return duration; } set { duration = value; } } public DateTime Depart { get { return depart; } set { depart = value; } } public DateTime Arrive { get { return arrive; } set { arrive = value; } } }

Godaddy + Windows + IIS7 = PHP

2008-05-02T08:01:00.000-07:00

My last article about godaddy windows hosting seemed to attract somebody in godaddy so they respond to the post sending me a comment on windows hosting plans on godaddy regrading PHP.So to be honest I have to redirect readers to this article to get Godaddy point of view. After all everybody is a winner from a better service.

Regards,

Want to Install Wordpress on Godaddy ? You won't ...

2008-04-29T09:16:00.000-07:00

Last night I spent few hours trying to install the 5 minutes installation wordpress on godaddy windows hosting but all was in vain. So I gave up and decided to email their customer support asking what's is wrong "after all I did all configurations required". Their response came with a surprise " Godaddy no longer supports PHP scripting on windows hosting ". The solution is to upgrade/downgrade your hosting plan to linux . I did upgrade to linux hosting "what would work better with PHP, They are a family !!!" . Anyway guys no more PHP CMSs on godaddy windows hosting So save your time or just look for other hosting if you are such a windows loyal.

Regards,

.NET really ROCKS

2008-04-24T07:53:00.000-07:00

2 days ago while reading some topics in my google reader I found a cool link to .net rocks. To be honest, that was the first time I visit the site and even knowing of its existance. Knowing that It has been there since 2002 shocks me "How this is myfirst time to see that cool site?!!, I guess I need to get out more". So I thought of blogging it to those who are just like me and didn't know about It. .Net Rocks introduces weekly podcast talk in .net and related topics. The interesting thing about it is that its fun and technical at the same time. I even thought to download the talks on my MP3 and listen to them while driving, that came after subscribing to the site feed which provide the talks directly to my RSS reader.

Microsoft IE8 - Will we make a new css file or just using some hacks??

2008-03-11T15:20:00.000-07:00

Microsoft had realsed IE8 Beta1 for developers and designers.It comes with new features especially for developers and designers. What I was excited about was The ability to Emulate The IE7 whenever you want.Another cool feature is the ability to view your site in Ie5,Ie7 and IE8 which is a cool feature when developing as you can check the compatibility of your CSS with those versions. You can go and discover more.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/ie/ie8/getitnow.mspx

Code Snippets in VS 2005

2007-07-23T09:46:00.000-07:00

Code Snippets is a really cool feature in microsoft visual studio 2005.It enables you to store pieces of code to use in a later time givinning you the chance to store, share, publish and reuse that code.The idea is simple you store your code in an xml file with a predefined scheme and save it with .snippet extention.

Visual studio Itself comes with many code snippet written for you and ready to use.You can see all code snippets from the Code Snippets Manager of the Tools menu where you can add your own folders of code snippets.
In these steps I'll show you how to create code snippets in visual studio and introduce you to the schema and later on how to use snippets from visual studio

Crate a code snippet:

1- Add an xml file from add new item menu.
2- change the extension from .xml to .snippet
3- Under the processing instruction line of the xml file (which is the first line containg the version) write
4- you will find the schema craeted for you.all you need to understand It and replace the place holders with your own.

Understanding The Scheme
The xml scheme for code snippet is very easy:

The root elment is CodeSnippet which contains a version an a namespace. This tag contains two main tags (elements) which we will do our changes in, Header and Snippet.

Header
contains the following elements:

Title
The name of the element.

Author
The author of the code (may be your company name or your name)

Shortcut
The shortcut that you will use to reach your snipppet faster by typing your shortcut and press TAB key twice.

Description
The help alt text that will appear when user select the snippet.

SnippetTypes
Indicates how visual studio iserts the code snippet, at the cursor or surrounding a selected code.

Snippet
contains elements that includes the actual code

Imports
Imports the specified namespace when the code snippet is inserted.

Declarations
Contains Literal elements which acts as varables for the place holders used in your code snippet.
Each Literal contains ID which is the placeholder variable,Default which is the default value for that placeholder and a ToolTip which is the alt help text for that place holder.

Code
That's where our code goes.It has a lnguage attribute to specift the language which may be C#,VB,JScript or XML.

[CDATA]
here you can put your code and place the Literals ($placeholders$) between $ dollar signs or any other character you specify in the delimiter attribute of the Code element.

here is a print screen of default Scheme:

Now you have created your Code Snippet, How can you use It in Visual Studio:
1-Save your Code snippet file in a folder.
2-From Tools select Code Snippet Manager.
3-In Code Snippet Manager window choose your language and then click Add button and choose your folder.

Like that:

4-Whenever you want to use your piece of code you have two ways:

Right click your mouse in the code window where you want your code, select insert snippet , choose your folder and then your code which named as you put in the title element.

OR

write the shortcut(as specified in the shortcut element of the scheme) of your snippet and press
TAB key twice.

Visual studio comes with many snippets ready made for you like if statement.
Try It out,write down an if and then Press TAB twice and you will see.

And That's It...
Enjoy...

Sql Caching in .Net 2.0

2007-07-20T16:11:00.003-07:00

Caching has always been a powerfull feature in Asp.Net, However in Asp.Net 2.0 It's even more powerfull.Asp.Net 2.0 has different kinds of Caching, One of most interest is SqlCaching which enables you cach your pages depending on changes in database Not only on page level but also on SqlDataSource Level.Am gonna take you in a simple steps on how to configure an use this powerfull feature and put you on the road.

In the examples I used the popular Northwind database and two of Its tables "Categories and Products".

To use SqlCaching you need to play in Three places:

1- Your DataBase.
2- Your web.config.
3- your Page ".aspx" (Note that you can use sqlcaching from your .net code and thus you don't need to configure your web.config nor your .aspx but this works only with sqlservers 2005 cause It uses Notification services.).

Configuring DataBase

To configure you database you will use the aspnet_regsql.exe utility that comes with .net sdk and enables you to install many asp.net 2.0 features like membership, sessionstate and Caching (use aspnet_regsql.exe /? to list all options of that tool)

1-from your start menu open Programms/VisualStudio 2005/VisualStudio Tools/VisualStudio Command Prompt.

2-To enable your database"Northwind " for caching use this aspnet_regsql.exe -E -d Northwind -ed
where -E means use windows authentication when connecting to the database server, -d is the database switch and -ed means Enable database Caching

Then write this
aspnet_regsql -E -d Northwind -t Categories -et
here -et means Enable table Caching.

Now if you go to your Northwind database you will find a new table called AspNet_SqlCacheTablesForChangeNotification along with multiple stored Procudures and a Trigger on the Categories table that will be triggered each time a change happen to that table which in turn will invalidate the cache.

Configure wen.config

1- Add a connectionString to the ConnectionStrings section like that

2- Add Caching section to your web.config System.web section like that

In the caching section we added a sqlCacheDependency enabled = true and poll time to one second since it's in milleseconds."Poll time determines how often will asp.net go to sql to check if the data has been changed. Inside the sqlCacheDependency is a databases section that you use to define the database for this sql caching "yopu can provide as many as you want since the name is different".

Configure you page

Add the outputCache directive in your page as follows

Note The SqlDependency attribute value consists of name of SqlDependency from web.config, colon and then the table name on which caching is work. and that's It in Its simplest implementation. Note that I didn't intended to cover everything here, It's only a starting point for you on how to use It and there are many other features and tricks on how to use SqlCaching in ASP.Net 2.0.

The main idea is that:

when you run the aspnet_regsql tool It creates a table with 3 columns : tablename,notificationcreated and changeID and some stored procedures and a trigger on the table you provided gor caching. Whenever a change occur in the table the trigger is fired and update the changeID field in the corresponding record for that table in the generated table. when you request a page that sqlCache enabled for, It check the poll time in web.config and if It expired it goto database and check the changeID field and if its value was changes it invalidates the cache. Understanding that infrastructure gives you flexibility on using this fetaure like making cache based on subsets of data rather than the whole table by making your own trigger and inserting the record yorself in the generated table.

Enjoy...

Interview puzzle

2007-07-08T07:24:00.000-07:00

Many people who had several interviews may have faced this puzzle as I faced It and I thought of sharing the solution with you.

Puzzle: We have 8 balls with the same size.7 balls hve the same weight and the remaining one is heavier.Having a balance, how can you determine the heavier ball with only 2 weightings.

Answer:
take 6 balls and weight them (3 balls in each side) "First weighting".

If the two sides are equal then none of the 6 balls is the heavier:
- Weight the remaing 2 balls "second weighting" so you can get the heavier one.

Else If the two sides are not equal so the heavier ball will be in the heavier side and that makes 3 remaining balls with equal probability of being heavier than each other.

-Take one in hand and weight the other two "second weighting":
If they are equal so the hevier one is in your hand.
else sure the balance will tell youuuuuuuuuuuu.

Enjoy..........

Hello World

2007-06-29T08:32:00.000-07:00

Hello Everybody........

Welcome to my newly born blog.I hope It would be beneficial for all of you and to contribute even with a little to visitors experience.

Enjoy the coming...