HTML5 lets you deploy your applications everywhere

Embedding Windows Forms Applications in a WebBrowser using XBAP

In this post I will add references to other pages which do a great work on explaining how to use this approach to host a Windows Forms App inside a WebBrowser. 

The technique described here is a deployment solution to ease distribution of applications modernized from legacy technologies to Windows Forms, maybe using the Artinsoft\Mobilize.NET tools ;) 

NOTE: "This workaround of .NET Winforms to WPF and then hosting it in a browser isn't truly moving a Windows based application to a web based application. e.g. database calls will be made from inside the browser on the users PC to the database, not via the IIS server. Therefore this functionality is most useful if you have connected your Winforms UI to you back-end code using web services, then you can have a somewhat web based application."  

Adam Berent gives step by step instrutions:

http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/31429/Embedding-a-NET-WinForms-Application-in-an-Interne 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 1: Example of Windows Forms applications running inside FireFox browser using an XBAP wrapper.

 

Some details that are missing in this article are related to how to publish the application on IIS, and these can described as: 

1. Create a test Certificate within Visual Studio and sign it against the project.  

The following links provides information on how to sing the xbap with your own certificate. 

http://ahmadreza.com/2011/05/20/how-to-sign-the-xbap-with-your-own-certificate/ 
 

2. Within VS publish the application. 

3. Setup the MIME encoding on the IIS server. See http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms752346.aspx 
 

4. Install the certificate on the Client PCs 

The certificate must be added in the trusted publisher and in the trusted root authority. If this is not done correctly you get the error 'Trust not granted' 

Embedding Windows Forms Applications in a WebBrowser using XBAP

In this post I will add references to other pages which do a great work on explaining how to use this approach to host a Windows Forms App inside a WebBrowser. 

The technique described here is a deployment solution to ease distribution of applications modernized from legacy technologies to Windows Forms, maybe using the Artinsoft\Mobilize.NET tools ;) 

NOTE: "This workaround of .NET Winforms to WPF and then hosting it in a browser isn't truly moving a Windows based application to a web based application. e.g. database calls will be made from inside the browser on the users PC to the database, not via the IIS server. Therefore this functionality is most useful if you have connected your Winforms UI to you back-end code using web services, then you can have a somewhat web based application."  

Adam Berent gives step by step instrutions:

http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/31429/Embedding-a-NET-WinForms-Application-in-an-Interne 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 1: Example of Windows Forms applications running inside FireFox browser using an XBAP wrapper.

 

Some details that are missing in this article are related to how to publish the application on IIS, and these can described as: 

1. Create a test Certificate within Visual Studio and sign it against the project.  

The following links provides information on how to sing the xbap with your own certificate. 

http://ahmadreza.com/2011/05/20/how-to-sign-the-xbap-with-your-own-certificate/ 
 

2. Within VS publish the application. 

3. Setup the MIME encoding on the IIS server. See http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms752346.aspx 
 

4. Install the certificate on the Client PCs 

The certificate must be added in the trusted publisher and in the trusted root authority. If this is not done correctly you get the error 'Trust not granted' 

Silverlight as a mechanism for simplification of application deployment

Embedding Windows Forms Applications directly in a WebBrowser

Figure 1: Example of simple Hello Word Windows Forms App embedded in Browser

Figure 2: Example of a more complex Windows Forms App consuming data from a Web Service

" However before using Windows Forms controls in IE, you need to be aware of the benefits and limitations. The main benefits include: 

•          The ability to deliver dynamic rich user experience through the Web 

•          Automatic caching of compiled code on the client 

•          Seamless integration with .NET Code Access Security that allows you to leverage the .NET security model from within the client side 

•          Improved performance over Java applets 

•           It requires Windows operating system on the client side 

•           Internet Explorer 6.0-9.0 is the only browser that provides support for this type of hosting 

•           It requires .NET runtime to be installed on the client machine. 

•           It also requires Windows 2000 and IIS 5.0 or above on the server side" 

  
  

Using ClickOnce deployment over the web to simplify Windows Form Application deployment

Reset VNC password for Mac Mini from command line

We have some Mac Minis in our server room and I forgot the VNC password. 

I could connect physically to the machine but I needed a DVI monitor and I did not have one :(

Answer:

Connect thru putty.exe and use this excellent command:

sudo /System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/Resources/kickstart -activate -configure -access -on -clientopts -setvnclegacy -vnclegacy yes -clientopts -setvncpw -vncpw mypasswd -restart -agent -privs -all

Profiling and Couldn't open metabase error when profiling for ASP .NET in IIS

I was trying to profile an ASP.NET application that was hosted on my local IIS.

But everytime I started the profiler I got a message like:

"Could not start IIS"

"Couldn't open metabase ..." "account has reduced privileges..." bla bla.

I could not understand why? My account is in the administrator group and yes,

Visual Studio was running as Administrator

Solution:

1. Run cmd as Administrator

2. c:\windows\microsoft.net\framework\v4.0.30319

3. aspnet_regiis 

4. aspnet_regiis -ga Domain\User

And then log off and log in

Limit output in Android logcat for PhoneGap/Cordova debugging

I you are debugging an Android App you use the command

adb logcat to display all sort of output from the device. (And I mean it ALL SORT of output).

So if your are working with PhoneGap/Cordova and only want to see your console.log messages, just run something like this

adb logcat *:S CordovaLog:D

Mouse Events/ Touch Events/ Gesture Events!!! Is there a general solution for this problem. Well Pointer.js might help

Problem uploading large files in ASP.NET

If you try to upload large files you might get an exception like

HttpException: Maximum request lenght exceeded.

This problem occurs because the default value for the maxRequestLength parameter in the section 

of the machine.config or Web.config file is 4096 (4M).

So any file with a size bigger will fail.

However I think that the max size that you can write here is 2G 2097151

Some info can be found here: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;295626

So to change that for 512mb use something like:

<configuration>

    <system.web>

        <httpRuntime maxRequestLength="524288" /> 

    </system.web>

</configuration>

Crystal Reports in Windows Azure

If you ever wonder, if Crystal Reports can be used on the cloud in Windows Azure, well the answer is you can.

These two links provides some guidance on this matter:

http://scn.sap.com/people/coy.yonce/blog/2011/05/02/sap-crystal-reports-and-microsoft-sql-azure (this one is in English)

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/luispanzano/archive/2011/04/11/crystal-reports-en-windows-azure.aspx (this one is in Spanish but Bing and Google Translate do a nice work here ;) )

Use Crystal Reports in VS2010

Crystal Reports was a tool very used by VB6 developers.

Sometimes when you are migrating a VB6 applications, you find a lot of reports created with this tool.

What should you do? Should you rewrite them on another technology?

Well that really depends on project requirements, but Crystal Reports has good support for VS2010, both for 32 and 64 bit environments.

So you don't need to throw away your reports you can still use Crystal Reports.

However that hard thing to do is where to find Crystal Reports for VS. Do you need to buy some software for that?

I have found that you can download Crystal Reports for VS2010 is just that the links are a little hidden. My friend Victor send me the following information which has been very useful for this task:

Office Interop and Call was rejected by callee

This issue is mostly cause by timing issues when calling a multi-threaded app.

Some workarounds:

1. Set the application visible property to false. For example if using Word make word visible property false at the start of the method and set it back to true at the end.

This will delay some GUI changes avoiding timing issues.

2. Insert some Thread.Sleep calls (yes this is ugly)

3. Register and IOleMessageFilter. I have copied an implementation from the MSDN

Just copy this class in your code.

At the start of the method call 

            MessageFilter.Register();
            // This registers the IOleMessageFilter to handle any threading 
            // errors.

And at the end

MessageFilter.Revoke();

public class MessageFilter : IOleMessageFilter
{

        //
        // Class containing the IOleMessageFilter
        // thread error-handling functions.

        // Start the filter.
        public static void Register()
        {
            IOleMessageFilter newFilter = new MessageFilter(); 
            IOleMessageFilter oldFilter = null; 
            CoRegisterMessageFilter(newFilter, out oldFilter);
        }


        // Done with the filter, close it.
        public static void Revoke()
        {
            IOleMessageFilter oldFilter = null; 
            CoRegisterMessageFilter(null, out oldFilter);
        }


        //
        // IOleMessageFilter functions.
        // Handle incoming thread requests.
        int IOleMessageFilter.HandleInComingCall(int dwCallType, 
        System.IntPtr hTaskCaller, int dwTickCount, System.IntPtr lpInterfaceInfo) 
        {

            //Return the flag SERVERCALL_ISHANDLED.
            return 0;
        }


        // Thread call was rejected, so try again.
        int IOleMessageFilter.RetryRejectedCall(System.IntPtr 
        hTaskCallee, int dwTickCount, int dwRejectType)
        {

            if (dwRejectType == 2)
            // flag = SERVERCALL_RETRYLATER.
            {
                // Retry the thread call immediately if return >=0 & 
                // <100.
                return 99;
            }
            // Too busy; cancel call.
            return -1;
        }


        int IOleMessageFilter.MessagePending(System.IntPtr hTaskCallee, 
        int dwTickCount, int dwPendingType)
        {
            //Return the flag PENDINGMSG_WAITDEFPROCESS.
            return 2; 
        }


        // Implement the IOleMessageFilter interface.
        [DllImport("Ole32.dll")]
        private static extern int 
          CoRegisterMessageFilter(IOleMessageFilter newFilter, out 
          IOleMessageFilter oldFilter);
    }



    [ComImport(), Guid("00000016-0000-0000-C000-000000000046"), 
    InterfaceTypeAttribute(ComInterfaceType.InterfaceIsIUnknown)]
    interface IOleMessageFilter 
    {
        [PreserveSig]
        int HandleInComingCall( 
        int dwCallType, 
        IntPtr hTaskCaller, 
        int dwTickCount, 
        IntPtr lpInterfaceInfo);

        [PreserveSig]
        int RetryRejectedCall( 
        IntPtr hTaskCallee, 
        int dwTickCount,
        int dwRejectType);


        [PreserveSig]
        int MessagePending( 
            IntPtr hTaskCallee, 
            int dwTickCount,
            int dwPendingType);
    }

<label> ignoring width styling

label {
    display: block;
    float: left;
    width: 150px;
}

Problem with Windows Service that connect to Oracle

Today Joseph was creating a windows service, which had an schedule task to execute something on an Oracle Server.

Everything worked out of the Windows Service but as soon as he added it to the Windows Service, it fail.

He suspected it had something to do with the 64 bit platform so he made sure to compile for AnyCPU, but it did not work...

Answer: It was the OracleClient fault. The OracleClient for ADO.NET do not work for AnyCPU. You need to use the 64 or 32 bit version.

IE Compatibility issues

It happen to me that I had a website working perfectly in my IIS and when I went to publish it it looked completely distortionated.

Why !! The eternal why.

I ended finding that it had something to do with the compatibility mode of IE, but why was it changing. It looks like it has some relation with the IIS version. Not sure why.

But the fix is to do something like:

 <system.webServer>
    <validation validateIntegratedModeConfiguration="false" />
    <modules runAllManagedModulesForAllRequests="true" />
    <httpProtocol>       <customHeaders>         <add name="X-UA-Compatible" value="IE=edge" />       </customHeaders>     </httpProtocol>

 </system.webServer>

This meta tag instructs the IE to set the compatibility mode to the highest value. 

You can use other values as IE7 or IE8So just put that and your site will look nice again :)

GetUserDefaultLCID in .NET with no API calls

I was looking for a pure .NET equivalent of the Windows API function

GetUserDefaultLCID because I want my code to be free of pinvoke references

to avoid posible issues in 64 bits.

However after a lot of digging I found that there is not direct equivalent.

You could use Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture.LCID but it is not exactly the same.

So I found this great post in stackoverflow:

"

For some background information have a look here:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/michkap/archive/2010/03/19/9980203.aspx

So it seems this problem manifests itself on Vista as well as Windows 7. It occurs because Microsoft seems to be in the process of deprecating the Locale ID in favor of the Locale Name.

To summarize: The relevant API calls all operate on registry values that can be found at HKCU\Control Panel\International. The value "Locale" is maintained for backward compatibility reasons and under normal circumstances is kept in synch with its newer counterpart called "LocaleName". This synch process however doesn't work under some circumstances.

Anyway, the GetThreadLocale API call gets its return value from the "Locale" registry entry mentioned above, while the others (GetUserDefaultLCID, GetSystemDefaultLCID, etc) use the "LocaleName" registry entry.

Hence the confusion.

BTW, the solution mentioned by JP in a previous post should probably be extended to

initialization

  SetThreadLocale(GetUserDefaultLCID);

  GetFormatSettings;

because (if i'm reading it correctly!) according to the docco the GetUserDefaultLCID call will account for user customizations.

After a bit more research, Vista is not affected at all. I've got some more detail too ...

The relevant API calls all operate on registry values that can be found at HKCU\Control Panel\International. The value " Locale " is maintained for backward compatibility reasons and under normal circumstances is kept in synch with its newer counterpart called " LocaleName ". Under Windows 7 at least, this synch process however doesn't work where processes are being run as another user (i.e. RunAs or Impersonation). This seems to be the case during installation, where the installer is launched from an existing windows session. It does however seem to work correctly if you've booted from the install CD.

GetThreadLocale gets its value from Thread Information Block or Thread Environment Block (TIB or TEB) See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thread_Environment_Block For both Vista and Windows 7, the TIB is initialised with the HKCU\Control Panel\International\Locale registry entry at logon. This becomes the default Locale for all threads created during the session. Changing this registry value during a session has no effect on the value returned by the GetThreadLocale API call. The user must log out and log in again to see a change. This is the API call that Delphi uses as the basis to initialize all its locale format strings ( See SysUtils.GetFormatSettings method), from which all date fields are formatted.

GetUserDefaultLCID: in Vista, bases its return value on the HKCU\Control Panel\International\Locale registry entry. In Windows 7, bases its return value on the HKCU\Control Panel\International\LocaleName registry entry. The respective registry entry can be changed during a session and the result is immediately reflected in this API call return value.

SetThreadLocale updates the TIB to reflect the locale provided in the parameter to this call. Note that this only ever effects the thread the API call is executed from. The API calls SetThreadLocale(LOCALE_USER_DEFAULT) and SetThreadLocale(GetUserDefaultLCID) are functionally equivalent. They both derive the source locale as described in the GetUserDefaultLCID API call above."

With that information you could create a function to get that value from the Registry using just .NET framework calls. I do not love that approach either but at least is another alternative

CommandBarControl Click Event is not Working!!!!

Today I was doing a VS extention as part of my weekend relaxation activities ;)

Everything was great until succendly something was not happening as I expected.

 I was adding a context menu to the code window with a dynamic list of options.

And each option had a different click delegate, but my click events were

disrespectfully discarted.

 Luckily I found this post:  http://www.rauchy.net/blog/?cat=4&paged=2

 And now for a tricky part: since you ge\t your instance of CommandBarEvents inside the scope of a method, when the method ends, the Garbage Collector collects it, leaving all the event handlers orphaned. Unless you keep your instance safe from the jaws of the mighty Garbage Collector, your buttons will not respond to clicks.

To do so, just keep your CommandBarEvents instance(s) as member fields of your class. Once your class is disposed, they will be disposed as well.

 Thanks Rauchy you saved my day! (And my wife is happy because I'm finally getting out of the bathroom :P)

SQL SERVER Find and Kill User Session

I found this excellent post from Aasim adbullah

http://connectsql.blogspot.com/2010/12/sql-server-find-and-kill-specific-user.html

SELECT DISTINCT
        name AS database_name,
        session_id,
        host_name,
        login_time,
        login_name,
        reads,
        writes
FROM    sys.dm_exec_sessions
        LEFT OUTER JOIN sys.dm_tran_locks ON sys.dm_exec_sessions.session_id = sys.dm_tran_locks.request_session_id
        INNER JOIN sys.databases ON sys.dm_tran_locks.resource_database_id = sys.databases.database_id
WHERE   resource_type <> 'DATABASE'
--AND name ='YourDatabaseNameHere'
ORDER BY name