VS: Enable Ankh Add-in for VS 2008 solution

Post updated : Please check out the comments to download the installer..

1) Close all instances of VS 2008

2) Download the following file and copy the contents into notepad
    File:  RegFile

 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0\AddIns\Ankh]
“SatelliteDllPath”=”C:\\Program Files\\AnkhSVN\\“
“LoadBehavior”=dword:00000001
“CommandPreload”=dword:00000001
“AboutBoxIcon”=”"
“CommandLineSafe”=dword:00000000
“Description”=”Subversion addin for Visual Studio .NET 2008″
“FriendlyName”=”AnkhSVN”
“SatelliteDllName”=”BitmapDll.dll”
“AboutBoxDetails”=”Please visit http://ankhsvn.tigris.org for more information
Below is the version information for the various AnkhSVN components
AnkhSVN 1.0.2.2778
OpenSSL 0.9.8a
Neon 0.25.5
ZLib 1.2.3
Berkeley DB 4.4.20
Subversion 1.4.5
Ankh 1.0.2Final
apr-iconv 0.9.7
apr-util 0.9.12
apr 0.9.12″
“LoadBehavior”=dword:00000001

 

3) Save the file with .reg extention

4)  Execute the saved file à This shall add an entry to your registry

5)  Open VS 2008 and Ankh should be enabled for your solution.

 Happy coding

Entity framework: The learning guide

Here is a good learning guide on the Entity framework. All credit to my namesake Zeeshan. Good work mate

Learning guide: Click here (pdf)
Source code: Click here (source)

Happy learning

BizTalk 2009 Light and Easy Webcast Series

I haven’t had the chance to spread it across. Pasting it from the MSDN site..

Info:
During the recent months a group of world wide MVPs and Field Experts answered to create this series.

We call this series BizTalk 2009 Light and Easy Webcast Series and we cover 16 different topics all listed under the downloads page.

Contents:

Download page:  Click here

Special thanks to Mick Badran for taking the effort in getting the whole series published.

Happy learning

General : Dubai Metro 090909

Dubai has joined the world’s elite cities for transport and convenience with the inaugural run of its urban rail network. Although some of its stations are not completed yet, the Dubai Metro is the world’s longest driverless train system with more than 70km (43 miles) of track costing around $7.6 billion. The city inaugurated this on 09 09 09 (9th Sep 2009) ..

I can’t wait to get back for a ride.. Enjoy

BizTalk: Highlevel run on the WCF Adapter

The BizTalk Adapter (v2.0) pack provides several WCF adapters to connect to LOB systems. Looking at the SQL adapter to explain how does the magic happen

 

Follow the comments on the right marked in GREEN that describes how a call from BizTalk gets communicated with the SQL database (with ADO.Net as the intermediary). The concept would be pretty similar to other LOB adapters such as Siebel, SAP and Oracle. The fundamental concept is the translation of messages from our client (BizTalk) →WCF stack (SOAP calls) → Destination System (underlying API)

 

Hope it helps.. Happy learning

WCF: The WCF Model

Here is a good reference diagram for the WCF space. It shows the various entities involved while structuring your WCF service – a great way to model and build your WCF services/solutions.

Happy model-ling

General: iPhone vs iStone

Many say the initial version of Apple’s  iPhone was the “game” changer. Here is what exactly made it happen – comparing to something that was in the “market” centuries ago..

All in good fun

Wedding Entrance Dance

The Minnesota couple, both 28, decided to add a little flavour into their June 20 wedding day, so they choreographed a memorable entrance dance set to Chris Brown’s “Forever”

 

The entrance began with the bridesmaids and groomsmen then followed by the groom somersaulting his way to the altar before his bride strolled flashing her dance skills to the delight of the couple’s friends and family.

The couple’s wedding dance went viral soon after they posted it on YouTube, with more than 1 million having watched the clip.

Here it is:

To top it up, a video response came about too!   – this was hilarious (the divorce)

Happy tuning

General: MIX09 Web development competition

MIX09 is a conference to attract the latest and greatest in Microsoft web development and design skills. Now in its fourth year, the MIX conference is a gathering of designers and developers who are building the world’s most innovative web sites. 

What is interesting are some of the competition rules

1) Source files and embedded images for your web application cannot exceed a size of 10 kilobytes
2) Cannot include external libraries or assemblies
3) Your web application must either use Microsoft Silverlight™ or Windows Presentation Foundation

Overall, its a great insight on the possible interfaces and development options .. I personally like the Silver Rubix application (although I haven’t been able to solve the cube - ever!:) )

Here is a screen shot of some of the applications that participated

Also check out the winners:
Link: Click here

Happy coding

Generate code templates from your SQL database

 

T4 templates are yet another way to add generated code via templates into your projects. It plugs directly into VS 2005/ 2008. The idea is generate code output via templates which can then be used directly from your custom application.

 

 

 

 A common sample would be to generate a data-layer out of our SQL database. This data-layer (C# or VB code) is then used by our custom application. Here is a sample run to generate class objects from our SQL database.

Add the project type : TXT file with .tt extension

Add a text file

Initially the file does not appear as a template . Change the extension to .tt. Different blocks can be added to the template – more like ASP.Net

Intellisense is available as illustrated in the screen shot

Behind the .tt file a .cs is being generated. This is based on the template file being written (.tt extension). Using the “output extension directive” this can be changed to a VB if you like !

Here is a side-by-side comparion of writting a template file, and the output (.vb file) being produced as we type.

I’ve tested out two options to generate the output code:

1)     Direct inline code (also includes writting expressions as loops, etc)

2)     Call external source code and (sub) functions

Everything within the brace gets generated as an output

.tt template: Using loops

Output for the above template

Note: When accessing external assembly à we need to add the fully qualified name to the template

.tt template: Generate Database objects.Get the names of all the tables in the Northwind database and generate the respective class objects.

Sample output: Respective database classes generated

As an alternative – have a look into the Entity Framework and the WCF Adapters to generate the datalayer for your projects

 Reference:
Sample code and videos: http://www.visualt4.com/

Happy coding