.NET Developer Notes

remove/delete svn folders

Ryan Garaygay — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 16:40:00 +0900

Since I've been using SVN and stumbled upon this technique I've also been using since then

This is one of the many (but easiest way) to remove SVN folders (.svn) recursively from a given folder. Effectively "unbinding a folder from SVN"

Follow these easy steps:

1) download this registry file : DeleteSVNFolders.reg (313.00 bytes) - see below notes for more information (security issues/verification and code source). I urge you to review them but if you don't want to worry about the details and trust me enough then please go ahead and download.

2) double click on the file you downloaded

you will be prompted to confirm that you really want to perform the action (differs depending on your OS). just continue and should all go well you will have a successful message/dialog

3) then to see it work go to the folder you want to remove the .svn folders from, then right click it

you should see the "Delete SVN folders" menu item

4) Click the said menu item and the .svn folders will be removed (there will be a command window that will show up displaying progress too - though if the folder structure is not that deep enough it might disappear very quickly).

And you're done

** Notes

1) altering your registry not for the faint-hearted and you'd have to trust the author/publisher. In this case I do and I have been using it for years

and if you could also look into it (edit e.g. notepad or text editor) and understand what it does if you want to make sure you're not letting it do something you don't want

i have taken this from : Jon Galloway's Shell Command - Remove SVN Folder and simply created the reg file to be downloadable (for those who are not so confident on how to deal with reg files)

more sql performance tips

Ryan Garaygay — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 02:05:00 +0900

As most of you know the general rule in performance tuning is .....

"measure, measure, measure" and "measure again"

But it doesn't hurt to give out some warning signs from time to time. And here goes two:

1) be careful in doing anything fancy on JOIN predicates (that is the condition in the "ON" section)

most of the time anything more complex than comparing one columns from each of the tables being joined will have some performance impact.

again measure, but in experience I find that even creating a common table expression, or a subquery to come up with the derived column and use it to join is faster than doing it in the JOIN predicate.

also, the less columns involved in a JOIN the better.

2) always prefer set operations than row-by-row operations

for the same reason that cursors should be avoided

what many don't know however is that if you have a UDF (user-defined function) used in a SELECT query result set then that function will be called for every row and thus there will be an overheed. Again measure but for performance sensitive cases it will be significant.

so if you have to squeeze out any performance gain you can have then get rid of the function if you and although redundant have the logic on the query itself.

maintainability wise this is not advisable. so you have to feel the trade-off here

For example:

SELECT fullname = dbo.GetFullName(FirstName, LastName) FROM Employee (NOLOCK)

regardless of the complexity of the GetFullName function's implementation would be slower than having it handled in the query directly. say

SELECT fullname = FirstName + ' ' + LastName FROM Employee (NOLOCK)

Hope to share more soon. But again, don't forget, measure3x

adding custom SSIS transformation to visual studio toolbox fails

Ryan Garaygay — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 12:10:00 +0900

Just very recently I encountered an issue in deploying a custom SSIS component assembly where I cannot add a custom SSIS transformation to the Visual Studio toolbox.

It turns out to be a relative "no-brainer" error if only the clues were more straightforward. Basically after deploying the assembly I could not find my component listed in the "SSIS Data Flow Items" tab list.

There are a number of articles available online on creating custom SSIS objects (control flow tasks, source, destination, data transformation etc).

Here are a few :

Extending SSIS Part 1 - Creating a Custom Data Flow Transformation Component

Developing a Custom Data Flow Component

Developing a Custom Transformation Component with Synchronous Outputs and searching say using keyword "adding custom SSIS transformation" should return more.

At Agilone, we've been developing SSIS components to complement our products and one of the issues I've faced recently is when I was deploying the custom SSIS components (the assembly) and it's time to add it to the toolbox (Choose Items > SSIS data flow items tab (since the component was a data flow item)) I was unable to see the component (or any component on the assembly I just added to GAC and the PipelineComponents folders).

I tried these (in different orders and to no avail but for completeness including in the list):

1) close BIDS (Visual Studio Shell) or reset toolbox and close BIDS

2) uninstall the assembly in GAC and reinstall the assembly in GAC

3) make sure that assembly is on the correct folder (e.g. DTS\PipelineComponent - here are more details on deployment and testing - Deploying and Testing Custom SSIS Components)

4) restart SSIS service

5) reopen the project and try to re-add the component in the toolbox again.

As mentioned it didn't do the trick and took me sometime to figure it out.

It turns out that there was a problem with the assembly. I built the version referencing some SQL 2005 libraries (DLL), specific version = true and when I deployed it to that server (which only had SQL 2008 DLLs) it failed silently and simply didn't appear on the "SSIS Data Flow Items" tab.

There are more complex ways to figure out why it doesn't appear in the said tab but I would like to share the more straightforward one.

After the step where you clicked Choose Items (for toolbox) when the dialog window appears instead of changing to the "SSIS Data Flow Items" tab, stay on the .NET Components. And then click browse and browse for the assembly which contains your custom SSIS component

If the assembly chosen doesn't contain an SSIS component then it will say so.

However if the assembly contains errors (e.g. missing referenced assemblies among others) then it will also show an error dialog saying so.

That's it. I hope it helps and saves you some time (since I wasn't able to find this information quickly - for a good "googler")

And for the more "complex" method I believe you can you fuslogvw or similar assembly binding logger/monitoring tool to figure out any issues on assembly binding (missing references) such as the one I encountered. But I suggest doing he "browse" test first before exploring those debugging techniques.

And finally, of course as for any project check that you have the right assemblies referenced, whether you want specific version true/false and make sure that all dependencies are in place.

blog site update

Ryan Garaygay — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 18:43:00 +0900

I have recently consolidated some of the sites I maintain into one of my hosting accounts. (will post about the provider soon - so far so good)

And that includes this blog. Along with this move I have also updated to the latest version of BlogEngine.NET - guilty of not being up to date for a couple of reasons:

Anyways, here are some notable changes:

1) posts url are not longer timestamped - i.e. blog/post/yyyy/mm/* still works but new links are now just blog/post/*

- i just noticed earlier actually that when i upgraded to v1.6 i revised something to make the URL pattern yyyy/mm instead of the default yyyy/mm/dd. this caused all old post urls linked from outside to not work. good thing there is a setting in the BE.NET admin that indicates to not include timestamps in the URL. and as a side-effect the yyyy/mm pattern worked fine.

- along with the issue mentioned above, google's crawl also failed because of the missing pages and thus affected rankings and statistics. hopefully it should stabilize soon

- on this note, i had to manually set custom crawl rate in google webmaster site due to these changes

2) other BlogEngine.NET new stuff for version 1.6 - most important of which is the Akismet anti-spam comment filter. Clearly BE.NET users have been plagued by spam recently.

I have made changes but not to BlogEngine Core so hopefully future updates will be more seemless.

SQL Business Intelligence Developer Needed (Manila, Philippines)

Ryan Garaygay — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 07:56:00 +0900

We are currently looking for a SQL BI Developer Professional to work with us on exciting, high-profile/scale projects. Feel free to contact me or visit http://www.lwsmedia.com/contact.htm. Looking forward to work with you.

Company Profile:

Agilone LLC
Norwalk, CT USA, Los Gatos CA USA , Istanbul, Turkey and Manila, Philippines

Companies who can effectively understand, process and take value from their data gain a sizable competitive advantage. However, many fail to do so since the amount of data captured by organizations is growing more quickly than the capabilities of the tools to analyze it. Agilone solves this problem with proprietary, SAAS-based analytical tools that help them make data-driven marketing decisions that drive superior results.

Agilone’s goal is to help clients develop and execute data-driven marketing strategies. We provide clients with advanced technology and analytical marketing services to help identify and execute opportunities hidden in their data. Our approach is effective because we analyze more of their data than the competition and offer a customized solution.

Typical engagements are in areas of customer valuation, pricing, response modeling, segmentation, with follow-on implementation of technologies such as data warehousing, web-based application development, database management and business intelligence services.

We are headquartered in Norwalk, CT with a technology development and services center in Istanbul, Turkey. Recently, we have opened our new office in Silicon Valley (Los Gatos) California.

We are a high growth, entrepreneurial company and are always looking for intelligent hardworking people to join our company. Transfers between Istanbul office and US offices are possible and we do sponsor work visas and Greencards in US depending on tenure and performance of employees.

Job Description:
This position is for our Manila Office. Due to the increase in our business volume we need additional SQL developers with the following background and skill set:

Position Responsibilities:
- Be part of the developer team from Analysis to design, programming, testing and deployment
- Design and administer project related databases
- Create technical documentation
- Perform unit test of the codes
- Author user manuals and installation guides

Education:
Minimum: BS, BA or equivalent, very good command of written and spoken English

Required Skills and Experience:
1. Excellent communication skills both written and verbal
2. Competent in T-SQL, working knowledge of MS SQL 2005 and MS SQL 2008.
3. Experience in Dimensional Databases and OLAP Cubes.
4. Desire to learn new platforms and environments as the projects leads.
5. Strong analytical and problem solving skills with attention to detail.
6. Self-motivated - comfortable working in a fast paced environment with limited direction.
7. Ability to multi-task and work on for several different projects.
8. Holding a Microsoft certification is a plus.

Process:
We will conduct 2 tests before an interview. The first test would be a general aptitude test, after you pass this test you will be given a more specific T-SQL test. After these tests you will be invited for an interview with the Director of Business Intelligence and the Principal of the company.

Register for Visual Studio 2010 Beta Exams (.NET 4.0)

Ryan Garaygay — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 15:30:00 +0900

Time for (free) Beta Exams again

Information can be found from here

http://blogs.technet.com/betaexams/archive/2010/03/17/register-for-visual-studio-2010-beta-exams.aspx

For easier reference, exams available are listed below (along with PromoCode)

Exam 71-511, TS: Windows Applications Development with Microsoft .NET Framework 4 - 511BC
Exam 71-515, TS: Web Applications Development with Microsoft .NET Framework 4 - 515AA
Exam 70-513: TS: Windows Communication Foundation Development with Microsoft .NET Framework 4 - 513CD
Exam 70-516: TS: Accessing Data with Microsoft .NET Framework 4 - 516B1
Exam 70-518: Pro: Designing and Developing Windows Applications Using Microsoft .NET Framework 4 - 518PE
Exam 70-519: Pro: Designing and Developing Web Applications Using Microsoft .NET Framework 4 - 519ZS

And as always, word of advice, read and master the items in prep guide to increase your chances of passing the exams.

Good luck!

DTS_E_PROCESSINPUTFAILED. The ProcessInput method on component "Fuzzy Lookup" (60) failed with error code 0xC0202009 while processing input "Fuzzy Lookup Input" (61)

Ryan Garaygay — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 12:21:00 +0900

Encountered this error in one of recent tasks involving SSIS Fuzzy Grouping and Lookup.

[Fuzzy Grouping Inner Data Flow : SSIS.Pipeline] Error: SSIS Error Code DTS_E_PROCESSINPUTFAILED. The ProcessInput method on component "Fuzzy Lookup" (60) failed with error code 0xC0202009 while processing input "Fuzzy Lookup Input" (61). The identified component returned an error from the ProcessInput method. The error is specific to the component, but the error is fatal and will cause the Data Flow task to stop running. There may be error messages posted before this with more information about the failure.

[Fuzzy Grouping Inner Data Flow : SSIS.Pipeline] Error: SSIS Error Code DTS_E_PRIMEOUTPUTFAILED. The PrimeOutput method on component "OLE DB Source" (1) returned error code 0xC02020C4. The component returned a failure code when the pipeline engine called PrimeOutput(). The meaning of the failure code is defined by the component, but the error is fatal and the pipeline stopped executing. There may be error messages posted before this with more information about the failure.

[Fuzzy Grouping [800]] Error: A Fuzzy Grouping transformation pipeline error occurred and returned error code 0x8000FFFF: "An unexpected error occurred.".

This is the only relevant error message or code that I got and didn't seem quite helpful.

And it appears intermittently at first, until I noticed that the error occurs at a certain number of records and although not exactly repeatable, very close to that value. around 4M rows.

While troubleshooting, tried increasing available memory (released some memory locked for another application) and the error occurred when the number of input records increased.

Tested further and the behavior seemed consistent. And it seemed that the size of the input is proportional to the memory (RAM) used. Calculated estimated size of ever row I had to be at 1KB. Tried processing 10M rows and freed up at least 10GB of RAM and it worked fine.

I can try to work-around so that I will process smaller sets/batches so i push 10M in one pass but just needed to figure out what was causing it and although not very clear from the error message I think increasing free memory did the trick for me.

Sharing in case someone else runs into a similar error. Hope this helps

Safety settings on this machine prohibit accessing a data source on another domain

Ryan Garaygay — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 02:58:00 +0900

Encountered this message many times with sites using PivotTable component of OWC11 (office web components) "Safety settings on this machine prohibit accessing a data source on another domain"

This is a browser restriction (at least with IE). Before resolving this, make sure you are accessing a trusted site.

Resolution:

1. Add site to the zone (e.g. it is recommended that you only allow your trusted sites to be exempted from this restriction). So add the site (if you trust it) to your Trusted Zone. Internet Options > Security

2. Modify Security Level of that Zone (e.g. Trusted Zone). Custom Level button. A pop-up dialog should appear. Go the Miscellaneous Settings section. Then you should be a setting for "Access data sources across domains". Recommended to set it to Prompt. If that option is selected you will be prompted when a component requires this permission.

Hope that helps.

Philippine broadband connections affected by damaged pan Asian cable

Ryan Garaygay — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 23:39:00 +0900

From SMART/PLDT:
Telecom services provider Smart Communications said a pan-Asia cable cut early Wednesday caused adverse disruptions in its international and broadband services. In a statement, Smart stressed the disruption affected its international voice and SMS services. Its Smart Bro and Smart Bro Plug-It services are also affected by the cable cut, which was reported to have happened around 10 a.m. “We are still awaiting word on the cause of the fiber cuts,” the statement said. “In the meantime, Smart would like to assure the general public that close coordination is on-going with our network counterparts abroad to aid in restoring normal services as soon as possible.”
The affected undersea cable is the Asia-Pacific Cable Network 2 (APCN2), which runs between China and Taiwan but also connects to the Philippines, Hong Kong, South Korea, Japan, Singapore and Malaysia.

FROM GLOBE:
As of the morning of 12 August 2009, several undersea cable systems have been reported down. While harsh weather is suspected, the precise cause is being investigated. More specifically, the following cable systems are down: APCN1, APCN2 and SMW3. In the case of APCN2, this morning’s outage has completely impaired all traffic coming out of the Philippines due to a pre-existing fault in the process of restoration.
Other systems such as C2C, EAC and TGN-IA are not affected, and we have not received any outage advice from their respective network administrators. Customer circuits carried on APCN1, APCN2, SMW3 are affected. In addition, you will experience slow internet browsing because a significant portion of the internet bandwidth is carried by the affected cable systems.
We are currently working on restoring the affected circuits at the shortest possible time. We appreciate your patience and understanding of this catastrophic event affecting the

24 hours of high quality sql server training for free

Ryan Garaygay — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 13:16:00 +0900

The Professional Association for SQL Server or popularly known aka PASS, one, if not the most popular and biggest group of SQL Server professional in world will be having 24 hours of PASS - a series of online web meetings with the best speakers in the industry

**Join us online on September 2, 2009* for 24 hours of free, nonstop SQL Server training**

Join us for 24 Hours of PASS, a FREE community event featuring some of the top SQL Server and Business Intelligence (BI) speakers in the industry. Over the course of one 24-hour period—directly from your computer—our experts will:

Show you how to take better advantage of the SQL Server capabilities already at your fingertips
Give you an in-depth look at the hottest SQL Server and BI topics, including SQLCLR performance, relational database design, performance tuning and troubleshooting, SQL Server 2008 security, embedding Reporting Services in your apps, SSIS tips and tricks, working with spatial data, text mining, data warehousing foundations, and much more…
Take your questions directly and answer them live!

Check out all the great SQL Server sessions you can attend.

24 Hours of PASS is a series of live one-hour webcasts broadcast over a 24-hour period that focus on a host of SQL Server topics. The 24 one-hour presentations will begin at 00:00 GMT (UTC) on September 2, 2009.*

You can view all details from the event's official site : http://24hours.sqlpass.org/

If only I could attend all of them in 24 hrs I would :) Hopefully they would be able to make recordings this available. I will be trying to attend the Business Intelligence related ones so if we do make it, see you there. "virtually"

Free Web Hosting for Filipino Developers

Ryan Garaygay — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 11:37:00 +0900

If you are a Software Developer, Filipino (by nationality or by heart), looking for a little space for hosting your site or blog or simply for testing and practice purposes I might be able to offer you a few MB (starting at 200 MB, in my experience this is more than enough) and one unlimited size MSSQL/MySQL and probably 2GB/month of traffic.

I can offer .NET, PHP, ROR, Perl, Python with full Plesk/Control Panel access

You have the option to use an existing domain to that you have. Or if not I can provide you a subdomain of developer.ph

I ask nothing in return except to share your knowledge to the community when you can and no illegal activities (or those that will harm the domain and the host), and the passion and pride for Filipino Excellence.

I am yet to come up with better guidelines but if interested, feel free to contact me (Contact Link above - right) and we'd figure something out. Or if you might also want to help setting up this endeavor, all help is welcome.

Pay it forward,

Ryan

Upcoming Blog Topics

Ryan Garaygay — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 21:02:00 +0900

Some of the topics to watch out for soon (have been in my queue for sometime). In no particular order.

Soon, but if you have issues related to below and might need additional information feel free to contact me.

* AJAXControlToolkit ModalPopupExtender, Google Chrome and z-index
* delegate/anonymous method cannot be deployed to SQL (SQL CLR) * RedGate SQLDoc (this is pretty sleek - of course it's RedGate)
* Missing "Replace window" in Visual Studio
* assembly binding search and HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Fusion /v EnableLog
* MatchCollection.Count and delay execution/loading. evaluation is actually done here
* expand DDL resulting drop down width to length of longest item
* GoDaddy and email issues (relay limits etc)
* dot net nuke. domain pointing to a virtual directory (eg. GoDaddy setup)
     - portal alias
     - hostheader
* union and intersection
* performance of scalar functions
    - say in computed column (IsPersisted)
    - set vs row-by-row operation
* web.config conflict on modules (IIS 7)
* feedburner move to google feeds
* DNN password retrieval requires
1) a valid email account
2) if hosted at GoDaddy, they only allow the "from" field to be from a domain managed by them
* GoDaddy 250 relays per day (resets 1am alabama)
* webmail in GoDaddy saves the domain name in cookie so in subsequent logins you no longer need to enter them. However if you have multiple accounts (different domains) there is a clear cookies button/link

Let's Support Earth Hour 2009

Ryan Garaygay — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 10:15:00 +0900

Please support Earth Hour 2009.

Turn off your lights or reduce energy usage on March 28, 2009 (Saturday) 8:30 - 9:30 PM.

Or better yet, know and get involved and take action about climate changes and how to preserve our precious planet.

Earth Hour Official Website

philippine domains limited one year registration offer

Ryan Garaygay — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 03:42:00 +0900

** Philippine (.PH) domains are now available for one year registration (as opposed to being previously available in two-year registrations only). But only for a limited time so grab your .PH domains by clicking HERE now.

We are now offering one year domain registrations at $38.00 for a limited time (March 10, 2009 to April 30, 2009). This offer is for new registrations only and is not valid for renewals.

The lower cost will make it easier for you to get the .PH domain you want. And for those of you who have been earning commissions from referring PH domains, the lower cost makes it easier for you to earn from dotPH.

However, because of the lower price of a 1 year registration, commissions for any domains referred during the promo period will also be adjusted. All commissions earned before March 10, the date on which 1 year price was made available, will still be computed at $10.00 per successful referral. Any referrals during the promo period beginning March 10 will be commissioned at $5.00 per successful referral.

Reducing the cost of getting a .PH domain by half makes it easier for you to get your .PH domain and close referrals, and should more result in greater earnings for you.

If you need further information, please contact our Customer Support at helpdesk@dot.ph.

Best regards,
dotPH Team
http://www.domains.ph/

define programmer

Ryan Garaygay — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 09:58:00 +0900

1) proÂ·gramÂ·mer (n) An organism capable of converting caffeine into code.

2) Semi-sentient being who inexplicably survives an extremely unhealthy lifestyle. Usually found in confined spaces with low lighting, at a computer terminal.

3) One who can read the following example

if( !User.IsProgrammer ){
return "Everyone Else";
}

Taken from UrbanDictionary