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Blog moved to MSDN Blogs site...

Rex — Mon, 19 Mar 2007 05:00:00 GMT

This post announces the depreciation of Rexiology MSMVP blog (this site).

for new post updates please update your RSS reader to http://blogs.msdn.com/rextang ,

or you can also point to my main personal work blog site at http://rextang.net/blogs/work/ .

Thanks for reading...

Rex

CommunityServer 2.1 Tips: Gallery photo options, save to DB or save to file...

Rex — Wed, 25 Oct 2006 05:00:00 GMT

crosspost from http://rextang.net/blogs/work/

Just had a trace to the source code since I found some of my gallery photos were missing and not able to get them back while upgrading my blog site to CS 2.1 in my VM.

Later found that in .Text era, images were saving to DB only; later in CS 1.x era, images were changed to save to files to minimize DB space usage. now in CS 2.1 , it can now be set to either places, or both.

in CS 1.x , the default image saving location is at ~/photos/storage , while it's the same as in CS 2.1 , if you find your images missing to display on browser, remember to copy all the files in ~/photos/storage of CS 1.x web spaces.

in CS 2.1, now there are options to let you set where to save, DB or file, or both. refer to default CommunityServer.config file , like the following:

  <Gallery
   allowEncodedUnicodeCharsInMetadata="true"
   >
          <AttachmentSettings
              enableFileSystemStorage="true" fileSystemStorageLocation="~/photos/storage"
              enableDataStoreStorage="true" enableDirectLinks="false"
              extensions = "gif,jpg,jpeg,png,bmp,GIF,JPEG,JPG,PNG,BMP,Gif,Jpg,Jpeg,Png,Bmp" />
          <CacheSettings
              enableFileSystemStorage="true" fileSystemStorageLocation="~/photos/cache"
              enableDataStoreStorage="false" enableDirectLinks="false"
              />
  </Gallery>

AttachmentSettings is the place to toggle where to save images to. if set both enableFileSystemStorage and enableDataStoreStorage to true, not only image files will be create and save in ~/photos/storage folder, but also will be saved to database record binary field (cs_PostAttachment table). Refer to GalleryPosts.cs file of CommunityServerGalleries20 project (started from line 387):

  //TODO: work on new save attachement patterns
  private static void CreatePictureData(GalleryPost galleryPost, PostAttachment pictureData)
  {
   // Submit it to the database
   if (GalleryConfiguration.Instance().AttachmentSettings.EnableDataStoreStorage && pictureData.HasDateCreated)
    CommonDataProvider.Instance().AddPostAttachment(galleryPost, pictureData);
   else
   {
    PostAttachment noPictureData = new PostAttachment(pictureData);
    noPictureData.Content = null;
    CommonDataProvider.Instance().AddPostAttachment(galleryPost, noPictureData);
   }
   // If file system storage is enabled, we need to save it.
   if (GalleryConfiguration.Instance().AttachmentSettings.EnableFileSystemStorage)
    CreateDataFile(galleryPost, pictureData);
  }

basically this checks both flags to see if they are true, and then save to each places (DB and file). but if DataStoreStorage flag is false, then while saving the data record, will set Content binary field to null.

By default setting in CS 2.1 , it seems set both DB and file flags to true. To preserve the same usage as in CS 1.x , it's needed to change the enableDataStoreStorage to false.

CacheSettings also using the same setting pattern as AttachmentSettings, but actually DataStore support for Cache is currently not supported in this version, as stated in the comment of CommunityServer.config file.

Technorati Tags: communityserver , asp.net , programming

Tips: Installing sdk version of CommunityServer 2.1...

Rex — Wed, 25 Oct 2006 05:00:00 GMT

crosspost from http://rextang.net/blogs/work/

So I finally got some time to start the process of upgrading this blog site to CommunityServer 2.1. I downloaded the 2.1 SDK source, also requested a backup of currently running CS1.1 database from my web-hosting-provider, and started from here.

I had created a virtual machine as my development environment, with Windows 2003 R2 server and VisualStudio Team Suite installed. as this website is currently running under ASP.NET 1.1, I am trying to start running it under ASP.NET 2.0. The goal is to preserve all my blog posts, photo images, and comments and do the technology upgrade and version-up reconstruction.

After unpack the SDK, and trying to open 2.0 solution file from VisualStudio, the first problem will be that VS2005 won't be able to open the web project since VS2005 now has a new non-project model for website solution. to solve this, I need to download the new Web Application Project (WAP) from ScottGu's website and install it. while the WAP installation it will require another VS2005 updates prior it. After the installation of WAP, CS2.1's ASP.NET 2.0 web project can be opened without problems.

For the IIS part, first editing the hosts file (on windows folder) to point my domain name to localhost, then create a virtual website to point to SDK's web folder, refering to the documentation to set proper read/write priviledges to folders.

For the database part, follow SDK's sqlscript folder's readme file to upgrade database schema from CS 1.1 to CS 2.1.

I did a full rebuild from the source code to regenerate all necessary binaries, and then trying to open my test site in browser. error happaned.

ERROR: Could not load file or assembly 'MemberRole, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b7c773fb104e7562' or one of its dependencies

Doing a search from google, found that I need to switch to asp.net 2.0 version's web.config file to avoid this error. the files is under "ASP.NET2_configs" folder of SDK source. I did the replace and trying to run again, another error occured.

Login failed for user ''. The user is not associated with a trusted SQL Server connection

Doing a search from google, found that it is something related to trusted connection to SQL server. since I am running CS database in different SqlServer 2005 machine other then web application machine, I decided to avoid this problem by not using trusted connection but using usual SqlServer authentication. just edit the web.config file and change the sqlserver connection string to set Trusted_Connection from yes to no.

By setting all those above, I can get a running instance of CS 2.1 site under my dev VM. the next is to modify the themes and skins of my blogs, also need to modify the source code to support non-keyword searching to be able to search Chinese and Japanese. also need to check about the new url rewrite model to see if it fits my requests (out-site url rewrite).

still need some time to finish my CS2.1 blog site, will post other tips if I found any.

Technorati Tags: communityserver , asp.net , programming

CommunityServer 2.1 released...

Rex — Thu, 24 Aug 2006 05:00:00 GMT

crosspost from http://rextang.net/blogs/work/

I have to say that Japanese is working too hard!!! been here for more than 2 and half months, everyday working from 10AM to 10PM, occasionally have to work at weekend, annual salary, so no overworking fee. this should represent most of small/medium IT companies at Tokyo!

Because now my main job is working on Java programming, and too busy, it's been some time that not able to update the latest Microsoft releated technology news. I am taking one week off from working start from next week, to join TechEd 2006 here at Tokyo (Yokomaha), taking some rest, also update some new stuffs for later working.

This should not be a news, CommunityServer released 2.1 at 8/9, also got source code release (SDK) at 8/11 . wish I'll have some time at next week to upgrade my blog directly to this version.

Maybe I should find a job at Tokyo that's mainly on .Net solution development, instead of Java development...

Technorati Tags: communityserver , programming , asp.net

CommunityServer 1.1 DanBartels CS CAPTCHA control fix...

Rex — Tue, 15 Aug 2006 05:00:00 GMT

crosspost from http://rextang.net/blogs/work/

Although I am planning to upgrade my blog site to the latest version of CommunityServer 2.x, I was too busy to have few days to make the modifications and new skin design, and my site is on heavy attack of comment spam. I am thinking to put one more shelter to defend this, behind the already installed ReverseDOS.

DanBartels' CAPTCHA control can be downloaded from CommunityServer website. I downloaded it since last year, but can not install it successfully by following the ReadMe.doc file. everything seems to fit the settings but the image just don't show.

Today I did some more study about this and finally found that it's because of missing class reference in JpegCaptchaImage.aspx file, which should be copied to "images" folder of using skin. the original file had the control header like this:

<%@ Page language="c#" CodeBehind="JpegCaptchaImage.aspx.cs" AutoEventWireup="false" Inherits="DanBartels.CS.CAPTCHA.JpegCaptchaImage" %>

when directly run this aspx file, it will tell you that it can not find the type "DanBartels.CS.CAPTCHA.JpegCaptchaImage" , which in the bin folder, the dll name is "DanBartels.CS.CAPTCHA.dll" . that should be the reason that the image can not be shown to the comment form.

to solve this, simple clear those CodeBehind and Inherits settings, like this:

<%@ Page language="c#" AutoEventWireup="false" %>

save the file and done. now the comment form can display digits for user to type before submit the comments.

wish this can stop some spams before I upgrade my site to CS 2.x...

Technorati Tags: communityserver , programming , asp.net

ASP.NET 2.0 RSS Toolkit...

Rex — Fri, 24 Feb 2006 06:00:00 GMT

crosspost from http://rex.la/blogs/work/

[via Larkware][via Andrew Connell]

A nice asp.net 2.0 RSS toolkit by Dmitry Robsman to let your applications get RSS abilities.

Got pretty good tutorial from ScottGu's post.

Technorati Tags: blog , rss, progamming, asp.net

CommunityServer 2.0 Released...

Rex — Tue, 21 Feb 2006 06:00:00 GMT

crosspost from http://rex.la/blogs/work/

Finally, CommunityServer 2.0 was released couple minutes ago for public download , including Source Code couple hours later... will get busy upgrading again!

Congratulations to Telligent Systems!!

[via Rob Howard on CS Announcement]

Telligent and the Community Server team are very pleased to announce the immediate availability of Community Server 2.0 the platform that enables you to quickly and easily create online communities.

Download Community Server 2.0 MSI Now!
Download Community Server 2.0 Web Installer Now! (required if upgrading)
Learn more at CommunityServer.org

Community Server 2.0 is available in several editions:

Express Edition – The free Express Edition is perfect for people that need to get a community up-and-running on a budget. It is free, but has restrictions on use but can be used commercially.

Standard Edition – The Standard Edition is the entry level commercial platform and unlocks some features not available in the Express Edition.

Professional Edition – The Professional Edition is targeted at organizations that require many of the capabilities offered by Community Server 2.0 for running a high-traffic community.

Enterprise Edition – The Enterprise Edition unleashes the full potential of Community Server and has been designed for organizations that require all of the capabilities found in Community Server.

For more information on licensing Community Server 2.0, please read the Community Server 2.0 licensing guide.

Important: Community Server 2.0 Standard, Professional, and Enterprise Editions are available for purchase at the 1.1 price until March 20th 2006.

In addition to many improvements in Community Server 2.0 core features (forums, blogs, and photos) some of the new capabilities in Community Server 2.0 include:

File Gallery – Easily share files of any type and size. Supports comments, ratings, download counts as well as permissions for controlling how your files are accessed.

FTP Gateway – Easily enable drag-and-drop or even drive mapping for Community Server file or photo galleries.

Enterprise Search – Enables new options for data matching; RSS enabled search; and proximity searching

Email Gateway – Enables integration with Microsoft Exchange Server or stand-alone email support. Using the Mail Gateway enables blogging by email and using forums as an email distribution list.

RSS Aggregator – Easily combine multiple RSS sources into a combined/aggregated view.

RSS Reader – Enable each user to create his or her own custom RSS subscriptions as well as aggregating and ‘mashing-up’ related content in-and-outside of Community Server

Control Panel – Completely rewritten Control Panel which greatly simplifies management of Community Server.

…and more – Video blogging, Tablet PC ink support, simple content management, search engine optimization, basic social networking functionality, new reports, spam blocking tools, member points, new slideshow tool for photo gallery, updated polls system, forum personalization, RSS enabled search, secure RSS, better NNTP and Email integration, URL redirects/tracking, threaded UI for forums.

Please visit www.communityserver.org where you can download Community Server 2.0 today!

The Community Server core source code corresponding with today’s release will be published ~5PM CST Today as well.

Technorati Tags: dottext , blog , programming , dotnet , communityserver

New Taiwan Microsoft Technology Forums Announced...

Rex — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 06:00:00 GMT

crosspost from http://rex.la/blogs/work/

The official Microsoft Technology Community at Taiwan used to be running web-NNTP based forums to communicate with the public, answering questions and sharing information with each others. This year Microsoft Taiwan announced new forum based community system, established new way to interact with the public. Using a forum system (should be based on CommunityServer forum framework) enables all the content be searched by popular searching engines and thus enables information be exchanged and shared more efficient and wide.

This should be Chinese based Microsoft Technology Forums hosted by Taiwan Microsoft MVPs and I'll also help on building a good Microsoft Technology related content base to help more Chinese-reading people know more about Microsoft Technologies.

[This post in Chinese]

Technorati Tags: microsoft , community , technology , forum , chinese

Looking for suitable web-hosting service...

Rex — Sun, 12 Feb 2006 06:00:00 GMT

crosspost from http://rex.la/blogs/work/

As my blog site got enough content and daily bandwidth is averagely 200mb, I am started thinking about moving this site to a web-hosting service for long-term operation. The other reason for that is also because of that I might changing my job and moving to somewhere else soon. Thus I might need to move all my services (DNS, blog, email service) to some web-hosting services.

Actually it's not very easy to find a professional web-hosting service that provides Windows 2003 server , ASP.NET 1.1 / 2.0 , SQL Server 2000/2005 and others, which a professional Microsoft developer will likely to use and the price is acceptable. For a developer's needs, the hosting company must has strong background on hosting Microsoft technologies and should likely be more welcome that one hosting company is focus on only hosting Microsoft stuffs, comparing to most of hosting companies that usually host Unix/Linux as major and Windows as one of their services.

Most of the needs of a hosting service is likely as follows:

Simply web pages hosting with server side dynamic content
Web pages hosting and database support
Email hosting
Simple DNS hosting (route every names to root)
Advanced DNS hosting with self-defined records (A, MX, CNAME, etc)

As in my case, I'll need web pages hosting with database support, email hosting and also advanced dns hosting if I'll move all my services from my home server to a hosting company.

My colleague Chris Ho gave me some links of host search and comparing sites (here and here) that provides comprehensive information on overall hosting service markets (which is what I needed! thanks pal!). through the search of Google also find Frankarr's post about asp.net web-hosting and later found that there is a list of hosting services nominated by Microsoft ASP.NET Hosting Advantage program.

Some of the hosting companies provide low price targeted to user who only needs web pages hosting and provide less support on email and dns hosting. some others are half-half, some others might provide web page hosting functions not as comprehensive as others but they provides excellent support for users to manage domain name records and email accounts. so there will be a matrix of price, disk spaces, database spaces, technologies supported, email functions and dns functions on choosing a suitable hosting service based on one's needs.

I am still taking a deep look of the matrix every Windows hosting company provides in that Hosting Advantage Program and will try some of them in their "30 days money back guarantee" period to come out a result later for my hosting needs.

Technorati Tags: microsoft , asp.net, hosting

CommunityServer 1.1 , admin add links script error...

Rex — Sat, 07 Jan 2006 06:00:00 GMT

crosspost from http://rex.la/blogs/work/

It's a minor but annoying problem for CommunityServer 1.1 . solved couple weeks ago.

When adding links in administration page, there will always have client javascript error saying that it must have a ")" exist. the count of the same error had a pattern related to the link category added, means if there were 5 categories there, everytime entering the link admin page, there will be 5 script error poped up.

After a dig into the source code, found the problem is caused by resource file. when the link page is rendering , there will be a block of javascript using a resource file error message inside a string variable. this variable using " ' " to embrace the string and happened that the resource string also got " ' " inside it, thus caused that whole javascript statement incorrect and cause the error.

the recourse file used is English resource file, located in /communityserver-website/Languages/en-US/Resources.xml , there is a resource at line 2482 like this:

<resource name = "ManageLinks_ConfirmDeleteCategory">Are you sure you want to delete this category? All of it's child links will be deleted as well.</resource>

the code that cause error is at the category delete button onclick event. which is like this:

onclick="return confirm('Are you sure you want to delete this category? All of it's child links will be deleted as well.');"

as obviously, that is the "it's" inside the " ' " string that caused the error, which is the resource string above.

to solve this, just remove the " ' " of that "it's" to "its" or some other things that don't have a " ' " inside, then it's done, no source code modification is needed.

A better way to solve this should be modify the source code checking the output string to see if it conflict the string formation in javascript layout.

A mirror post to CommunityServer Forum about this issue is posted at http://communityserver.org/forums/508956/ShowThread.aspx#508956 . hope this helps...

Technorati Tags: communityserver , asp.net , programming