Chui's Counterpoint

SQL Server Compact CE 4.0 Management Studio

Chui — Thu, 24 May 2012 10:11:54 +0000

While there isn’t a SQL Server Management Studio that is compatible with SQL Server CE 4.0, the SQL CE ToolBox http://sqlcetoolbox.codeplex.com/ project at CodePlex worked well for me. (via Matt)

Deploying SQL Server CE 4.0 privately

Chui — Sun, 20 May 2012 10:47:09 +0000

Thanks to Agile Tech

The System.Data.SqlServerCe and other binaries were already included and copied locally, but SqlServerCe.Entity wasn’t present. To get this deployment to work, the following needed to be done:

Make sure System.Data.SqlServerCe is referenced and set to “Copy local” in properties
Include the 7 needed SqlCe assembiles from Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server Compact Edition\v4.0, make sure to set as “Content” and “Copy if newer” in properties:
- sqlceca40.dll
- sqlcecompact40.dll
- sqlceer40EN.dll
- sqlceme40.dll
- sqlceoledb40.dll
- sqlceqp40.dll
- sqlcese40.dll
Install the following library package references using NuGet (right click References->Add Library Package Reference)
- EntityFramework
- EntityFramework.SqlServerCompact
- This will create packages that will contain lib directories for System.Data.SqlServerCe.Entity, reference and “Copy local” for this library
Add the following to app.config:

      
           invariant="System.Data.SqlServerCe.4.0"
           description=".NET Framework Data Provider for Microsoft SQL Server Compact"
           type="System.Data.SqlServerCe.SqlCeProviderFactory, System.Data.SqlServerCe, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=89845dcd8080cc91"/>

Google Group’s new design

Chui — Wed, 16 May 2012 22:46:18 +0000

I don’t like the new layout at Google Groups.

Here’s why:

Odd Silverlight Chart bug when printing

Chui — Fri, 04 May 2012 04:39:15 +0000

I came across the strangest bug in Silverlight to date. I had been using the Chart component from Silverlight Toolkit, and under particular conditions, specifically:

Use Silverlight 4
Navigate to a page containing the chart
Print the chart by pulling it out of the visual tree, and putting it back again
Navigate back
Navigate to the page containing the chart one more time
Print chart again

And boom, I get this error: “The name already exists in the tree: Breadcrumbs”. It turned out to be the Chart Title contains a named element.

The solution was to omit the x:Name i.e.

...

Custom Windows 8 controls with HTML + JS

Chui — Sat, 28 Apr 2012 10:12:27 +0000

One of my pet peeves about developing on the .NET platform prior to Silverlight 5 was the difficulty in binding to data where the schema is not known at compile time. Since then, we have ICustomTypeProvider which can direct the data binding machinery to bind to dictionaries or any custom data structure.

Unfortunately, ICustomTypeProvider is not available on WinRT. I asked Nick Hodges @nickhodgeMSFT at #WinDevAu today what were the options, and he suggested I have a look at HTML + js instead.

When asked whether MS was going to be restrictive about running downloaded code on a device, as Apple is, he suggested I try it.

For what it’s worth, the following code works in Consumer Preview.


eval("var myfunc = function() { return 'ab' + 'cd'; };
var result = myfunc();
document.getElementById("testLabel").innerText = result;

This led me to have a look at the JS samples more closely. The first thing that caught my attention was the following


    
        &nbsp;
        &nbsp;

What is this SdkSample.ScenarioOutput?

I dug a little further and this is what I found:

    var ScenarioOutput = WinJS.Class.define(
        function (element, options) {
        element.winControl = this;
        this.element = element;
        new WinJS.Utilities.QueryCollection(element)
                    .setAttribute("role", "region")
                    .setAttribute("aria-labelledby", "outputLabel")
                    .setAttribute("aria-live", "assertive");
        element.id = "output";

        this._addOutputLabel(element);
        this._addStatusOutput(element);
    }, {
        _addOutputLabel: function (element) {
            var label = document.createElement("h2");
            label.id = "outputLabel";
            label.textContent = "Output";
            element.parentNode.insertBefore(label, element);
        },
        _addStatusOutput: function (element) {
            var statusDiv = document.createElement("div");
            statusDiv.id = "statusMessage";
            element.insertBefore(statusDiv, element.childNodes[0]);
        }
    }
    );

You can construct a WinJS class in javascript! There are three parameters:

constructor – a function
instanceMembers – object – set of instance fields and methods on the class
staticMembers – object -set of static fields and methods

So in our example above, the function takes an element and the constructor creates new attributes
and adds any custom behaviors. The instance methods are used as a prototype for the constructed
instances.

Which leaves one last open question, how do static methods work in Javascript any way?

Task-related types not found. Are you missing a reference to AsyncCtpLibrary.dll?

Chui — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 06:07:59 +0000

I added AsyncCTP_Silverlight.dll to one of my solutions and I couldn’t build it, as the IDE kept erroring with the following message:

"Task-related types not found. Are you missing a reference to AsyncCtpLibrary.dll?"

The solution, as it turns out is in this post

…try deleting the suo file for the solution…

Build a house with a CNC machine and Open Source House Plans

Chui — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 04:57:42 +0000

This is very interesting. Wiki House – using CNC, plywood and old housebuilding techniques without using bolts. Still early days but I hope it goes somewhere.

Mobile Design Links

Chui — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 23:45:54 +0000

Responsive Wireframes
Touch-based javascript libraries

Fatal: git-http-push failed

Chui — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 13:28:56 +0000

I had trouble pushing changes to one of my git repositories. The error message was:

Fatal: git-http-push failed

Looking at server logs

60.xxx.xxx.205 - xxx.xxx [06/Mar/2012:21:37:56 -0500] "MKCOL /git/Test.git/objects/77/ HTTP/1.1" 403 489

It appears that file permissions were the issue.

In my case, the Git repository was created using virtualmin, and the owner was www-data. CGI programs were run under suexec, where the program was executed using the file owner’s permissions. For suexec to work, the owner needs write permissions to the directories. The following was sufficient to do the trick.

sudo chmod -R u+w Test.git

References:
Problem with HTTP Verbs
How to troubleshoot git server issues

How to block bots from seeking exploits on your web server with Fail2Ban

Chui — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 12:24:49 +0000

Source: Exploit scanner, secure your Apache

Steps:

sudo apt-get install fail2ban

edit /etc/fail2ban/jail.conf

[apache-nohome]
enabled = true
port    = http,https
filter  = apache-nohome
logpath = /var/log/apache*/*error.log
maxretry = 5

fix a bug in the filter /etc/fail2ban/filter.d/apache-nohome.conf
```
failregex = [[]client (?P\S*)[]] File does not exist:
```
Restart /etc/init.d/fail2ban restart

Check that fail2ban has started.

 sudo fail2ban-client status
Status
|- Number of jail:      2
`- Jail list:           apache-nohome, ssh