The .Net coal face

Temp directories

2008-02-10T23:53:00.001+10:00

Sometimes you just need a temp directory to store stuff in. Pre-Vista this was easy; System.IO.Path.GetTempPath() however, like the documentation says, this is the System's temporary directory, not yours so it does not work so well in Vista.

I do not know what the BEST solution is but this seems to work well:

System.Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.InternetCache)

..and there a slim chance that any non-deleted temp file will occasionally get cleaned up too.

When is an Administrator not an Administrator

2008-02-10T23:25:00.001+10:00

I am attempting to get a little in house command line maintenance utility working tonight on a new Vista 64 machine.

The program appeared to be having some problems accessing a temp directory; more on that later. So I opened up VS 2008. Not really knowing what type of debugging I would be doing to solve the problem, I chose to run it as an Administrator.

The program needs to access a network drive in order to copy over some backup files. The program was returning false on Folder.Exists() call!?!?!

A bit of searching later I discover that under Vista and VS when it is run as an Administrator any network drives are automatically disconnected. The trick is to either 'activate' the network drives by simply navigating to one by attempting to open a file or the like.

Fortunately if you exit VS and run it again as an Administrator it will remember the connection. I have not tested it after a reboot though.

Interesting, if you run VS not as an Administrator then you do not have the problem.

Very annoying.

The problem with KPIs

2008-02-10T19:57:00.001+10:00

The Silverlight team proudly proclaim that the installation experience of Silverlight should be very simply and very short; 20 secs from the download to installation complete.

Hrmm.... on my laptop, after 2 min I lost interest. Fortunately after I returned from putting the kids to bed it was finished.

I checked out some of the examples on the community gallery site; It really makes you aware of how immature the technology is at the moment.

Having said that I am really excited about Silverlight. In time it should be great.

Frustrations upgrading from VS2003 to VS2008

2008-02-09T14:18:00.001+10:00

I have just upgraded one of my major projects from VS2003(!) ASP.NET to VS2008 Web Application Project. It went relatively well. One must remember to right click on the project and select 'Convert to Web Application' otherwise the designer.cs files are not created for the web pages.

When it was released it was throwing the following:

The type 'tcpIQ.Web.WebSite.LineSpeedMeter.Api.Soap.V401111.LsmSoapApi' is ambiguous: it could come from assembly 'c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\root\100c9fe3\aa17ce8c\App_Code.d11yv5mk.DLL' or from assembly 'C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\tcpiq.com\wwwroot\bin\TcpIQ.com.DLL'. Please specify the assembly explicitly in the type name.

There are lots of chatter about this exception and it appears that it can occur for a number of different reasons. In my case it was because in the conversion from 2003 to 2008 an 'App_Code' directory was created and some classes were placed in there. Files in this directory are dynamically compiled at run time and the DLLs are stored in the Temporary ASP.NET folder as opposed to the bin folder. Needless to say this trips up ASP.NET since it can see two different assemblies for the same class. The solution was to simply migrate the classes back out of the APP_Code folder and place them somewhere more suitable, recompile, re-release, recycle and it worked!

Vista x64 - "the disk is write-protected"!?

2008-02-06T09:35:00.001+10:00

I am the proud owner of a new Vista x64 8GB machine.

After a reboot this morning SQL Server had declared that all of my databases were suspect. After a bit of scratching around I discovered that my D:\ (RAID 10) where all of my data lives had become read only. This was not a permissions problem as it was working before the reboot. I rebooted and it was still the same.

After a bit of googling and reading between the lines I rebooted, pulled the power, went for a coffee, read the paper, powered it back up and it started working again.

For the record you may see ""the disk is write-protected" or "the media is write protected". Also, Vista SP1 has just gone to RTM so it is not installed but otherwise the computer is fully patched.

Internationalization support in Orcas Beta 1

2007-04-29T21:11:00.001+10:00

I have been doing a lot of Internationalization work in ASP.NET2 lately (in fact I am doing a presentation at QMSDNUG in May) and have in general been really impressed by the level of support VS and .Net 2 has for it. However you do not have to dig down too much to see the deficiencies as well. Fortunately for the most part if you are not happy with it then you can write your own custom resource provider (this is not fun – I have done it – be warned – but if you are really keen check out what Rick Strahl has been doing).

So with the release of Orcas Beta 1 I was keen to get in and see what new support there is. After the 5.5GB download I am sad to announce that the support for internationalisation does not appear to be very high on their list of priorities. Indeed, doing a Generate Local Resources actually fails in beta 1 with the message…

Start creating resource content and adding 'meta' attributes to server controls and directives.

A resource writer could not be found.Finished creating resource content and adding 'meta' attributes.

The Help makes no mention of anything "Whats new" to do with Internationalization.

Maybe this will change with the next beta.

This is a bit disappointing. I was really looking forward to getting in, having a play and blogging about my experiences.

Linking multiple Visio pages into Word

2007-04-25T11:55:00.001+10:00

I posted this question on AusDotNet the other day. I have reposted it here in case it may help someone...

At the risk of sounding like I am using Word for the first time today, how does one insert a DDE link from Word (aka Insert Object, Create From File, Link to File) to the second or third page of a Visio document? I can get the first page in just using the standard Link to File, but how do you tell it to link to the second page?

I have attempted to edit the links in Word where you can change the location of the source document and can even specify an "Item" in the source. I have entered the name of the page in question but that did not work. It seems to be very Excel specific.

I have also attempted to split the Visio into multiple documents but since I am editing UML diagrams I then lose the automatic update of other diagrams when a shared class is edited – not good.

I have attempted to define a named range in Visio (just like you do in Excel) but it does not exist in Visio.

I am using Office 2007.

The answer is simple but like some parts of Visio it is totally different to the rest of Office. In Visio, select Edit->Copy drawing and then in Word, select Paste-Paste Special->Paste Link. The Copy drawing feature does not appear to be in any other Office program. The DDE does not look like it is supported.

Thanks Ken!

Word 2007 Blog post test

2007-04-25T11:44:00.001+10:00

OK – this is a big step. Fed up with Blogger's editor, I have taken the plunge and am writing this post in Word 2007.

This is a MUCH nicer and convenient interface. I think I will use this in the future.

IE7 tabs - very stange

2007-04-25T11:19:00.000+10:00

In a legacy ASP application we have some web pages that do some routine maintenance - precalculating some tables, deleting old data, etc. We schedule the running of these pages through Windows Scheduler. Its a low tech and reliable solution.

One of the pages takes about 12 min to run. It required some maintenance today. So I navigated to the URL to test it - and waited. So I opened up a tab in IE7 to go to another part of the same web site expecting the home page of the site to come up instantly. But it sat there with the thumper thumping, the progress indicator ticking over and no page. Hmmmm.... I opened another web browser and navigated to the home page and it came up instantly.

Back to the first browser on the second tab. Clicked Stop and Go - still nothing. After about 3 min the home page eventually turned up. I created other tabs and navigated to other sites OK.

I reproduced it a second time.

Why would IE have a problem opening up a socket connection to web site that is being accessed on another tab - very, very strange.

Lock ness monster, Lost City of Atlantis and VS2005 keyboard shortcuts

2006-12-12T21:43:00.000+10:00

OK - so it has been a while between posts.

I am in that wonderful period between big jobs where you can take stock of things and research some of those IT nooks and crannies that get skipped everyday in the pressures to get the software out the door.

This afternoon my attention turned to the allusive keyboard shortcuts in VS2005. We have all seen those IDE gurus who can with a few keystrokes seemlingly do things that would otherwise take many mouse clicks and mouse meters to implement.

I know that the menus show the shortcut keys but my problem lay with the mysterious 'missing menu items'. eg, right click in the error window and you get a next/last error. Where is that in the menu? And what is the shortcut? It was in VS2003 in the View->Show Tasks menu and it appears to be in VS2005 under View->Next/Previous Task but it is disabled.

The help seemed confused with references to VS6.0 and VS2003 but nothing about 2005.

I chanced across the Microsoft Automation Samples http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=79C7E038-8768-4E1E-87AE-5BBBE3886DE8&displaylang=en that include a program (in C++) to interrogate all of the short cuts. The program barely works but I was able to man handle it into giving me the entire list on my VS2005 with Default options selected.

For the record here it is... and by the way, F12 is the Next Error or even CTRL + SHIFT + F12

(I have no idea what is wrong with this Blogger editor. The table can be found about 2km down this page.)

Build.BuildSelection	Shift+F6
Build.BuildSolution	Ctrl+Shift+B
Build.BuildSolution	F6
Build.Cancel	Ctrl+Break
Build.Compile	Ctrl+F7
ClassDiagram.Collapse	Num -
ClassDiagram.Expand	Num +
ClassViewContextMenus.ClassViewProject.Properties	Alt+Enter
Data.Column	Ctrl+L
Data.Execute	Ctrl+Alt+F5
Data.InsertColumn	Ins
Data.RunSelection	Ctrl+Q
Data.ShowDataSources	Shift+Alt+D
Data.StepInto	Alt+F5
Debug.ApplyCodeChanges	Alt+F10
Debug.Autos	Ctrl+Alt+V, A
Debug.Autos	Ctrl+D, A
Debug.Autos	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+A
Debug.BreakAll	Ctrl+Alt+Break
Debug.BreakatFunction	Ctrl+B
Debug.BreakatFunction	Ctrl+D, N
Debug.BreakatFunction	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+N
Debug.Breakpoints	Ctrl+Alt+B
Debug.Breakpoints	Ctrl+D, B
Debug.Breakpoints	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+B
Debug.CallStack	Ctrl+Alt+C
Debug.CallStack	Ctrl+D, C
Debug.CallStack	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+C
Debug.DeleteAllBreakpoints	Ctrl+Shift+F9
Debug.Disassembly	Ctrl+Alt+D
Debug.EnableBreakpoint	Ctrl+F9
Debug.Exceptions	Ctrl+Alt+E
Debug.Exceptions	Ctrl+D, E
Debug.Exceptions	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+E
Debug.Immediate	Ctrl+Alt+I
Debug.Immediate	Ctrl+D, I
Debug.Immediate	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+I
Debug.Locals	Ctrl+Alt+V, L
Debug.Locals	Ctrl+D, L
Debug.Locals	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+L
Debug.Memory1	Ctrl+Alt+M, 1
Debug.Memory1	Ctrl+D, Y
Debug.Memory1	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+Y
Debug.Memory2	Ctrl+Alt+M, 2
Debug.Memory3	Ctrl+Alt+M, 3
Debug.Memory4	Ctrl+Alt+M, 4
Debug.Modules	Ctrl+Alt+U
Debug.Modules	Ctrl+D, M
Debug.Modules	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+M
Debug.Processes	Ctrl+Alt+Z
Debug.Processes	Ctrl+D, P
Debug.Processes	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+P
Debug.QuickWatch	Ctrl+Alt+Q
Debug.QuickWatch	Shift+F9
Debug.QuickWatch	Ctrl+D, Q
Debug.QuickWatch	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+Q
Debug.Registers	Ctrl+Alt+G
Debug.Registers	Ctrl+D, R
Debug.Registers	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+R
Debug.Restart	Ctrl+Shift+F5
Debug.RunToCursor	Ctrl+F10
Debug.ScriptExplorer	Ctrl+Alt+N
Debug.SetNextStatement	Ctrl+Shift+F10
Debug.ShowNextStatement	Alt+Num *
Debug.Start	F5
Debug.StartWithoutDebugging	Ctrl+F5
Debug.StepInto	F11
Debug.StepIntoCurrentProcess	Ctrl+Alt+F11
Debug.StepOut	Shift+F11
Debug.StepOutCurrentProcess	Ctrl+Shift+Alt+F11
Debug.StepOver	F10
Debug.StepOverCurrentProcess	Ctrl+Alt+F10
Debug.StopDebugging	Shift+F5
Debug.Threads	Ctrl+Alt+H
Debug.Threads	Ctrl+D, T
Debug.Threads	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+T
Debug.ToggleBreakpoint	F9
Debug.ToggleDisassembly	Ctrl+F11
Debug.ToggleDisassembly	Ctrl+D, D
Debug.ToggleDisassembly	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+D
Debug.Watch	Ctrl+Alt+W, 1
Debug.Watch	Ctrl+D, W
Debug.Watch	Ctrl+D, Ctrl+W
Debug.Watch2	Ctrl+Alt+W, 2
Debug.Watch3	Ctrl+Alt+W, 3
Debug.Watch4	Ctrl+Alt+W, 4
DebuggerContextMenus.BreakpointsWindow.Delete	Alt+F9, D
DebuggerContextMenus.BreakpointsWindow.GoToDisassembly	Alt+F9, A
DebuggerContextMenus.BreakpointsWindow.GoToSourceCode	Alt+F9, S
Edit.BreakLine	Enter
Edit.BreakLine	Shift+Enter
Edit.BreakLine	Enter
Edit.BreakLine	Shift+Enter
Edit.BreakLine	Enter
Edit.CharLeft	Left Arrow
Edit.CharLeftExtend	Shift+Left Arrow
Edit.CharLeftExtendColumn	Shift+Alt+Left Arrow
Edit.CharRight	Right Arrow
Edit.CharRightExtend	Shift+Right Arrow
Edit.CharRightExtendColumn	Shift+Alt+Right Arrow
Edit.CharTranspose	Ctrl+T
Edit.ClearBookmarks	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+L
Edit.ClearBookmarks	Ctrl+B, C
Edit.ClearBookmarks	Ctrl+B, Ctrl+C
Edit.CollapseTag	Ctrl+M, Ctrl+T
Edit.CollapsetoDefinitions	Ctrl+M, Ctrl+O
Edit.CollapsetoDefinitions	Ctrl+M, O
Edit.CommentSelection	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+C
Edit.CommentSelection	Ctrl+E, C
Edit.CommentSelection	Ctrl+E, Ctrl+C
Edit.CompleteWord	Alt+Right Arrow
Edit.CompleteWord	Ctrl+Space
Edit.CompleteWord	Alt+Right Arrow
Edit.CompleteWord	Ctrl+Space
Edit.CompleteWord	Ctrl+K, W
Edit.CompleteWord	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+W
Edit.Copy	Ctrl+C
Edit.Copy	Ctrl+Ins
Edit.CopyParameterTip	Ctrl+Shift+Alt+C
Edit.Cut	Ctrl+X
Edit.Cut	Shift+Del
Edit.CycleClipboardRing	Ctrl+Shift+V
Edit.CycleClipboardRing	Ctrl+Shift+Ins
Edit.DecreaseFilterLevel	Alt+,
Edit.Delete	Del
Edit.Delete	Ctrl+Del
Edit.DeleteBackwards	Shift+Bkspce
Edit.DeleteBackwards	Bkspce
Edit.DeleteBackwards	Shift+Bkspce
Edit.DeleteBackwards	Bkspce
Edit.DeleteHorizontalWhiteSpace	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+\
Edit.DeleteHorizontalWhiteSpace	Ctrl+E, \
Edit.DeleteHorizontalWhiteSpace	Ctrl+E, Ctrl+\
Edit.DocumentEnd	End
Edit.DocumentEnd	Ctrl+End
Edit.DocumentEndExtend	Shift+End
Edit.DocumentEndExtend	Ctrl+Shift+End
Edit.DocumentStart	Home
Edit.DocumentStart	Ctrl+Home
Edit.DocumentStartExtend	Shift+Home
Edit.DocumentStartExtend	Ctrl+Shift+Home
Edit.EditCell	F2
Edit.EnableBookmark	Ctrl+B, E
Edit.EnableBookmark	Ctrl+B, Ctrl+E
Edit.ExpandCollapseBaseTypeList	Shift+Alt+B
Edit.Find	Ctrl+F
Edit.FindAllReferences	Ctrl+K, R
Edit.FindAllReferences	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+R
Edit.FindAllReferences	Shift+F12
Edit.FindinFiles	Ctrl+Shift+F
Edit.FindNext	F3
Edit.FindNextSelected	Ctrl+F3
Edit.FindPrevious	Shift+F3
Edit.FindPreviousSelected	Ctrl+Shift+F3
Edit.FindSymbol	Alt+F12
Edit.FormatDocument	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+D
Edit.FormatDocument	Ctrl+E, D
Edit.FormatDocument	Ctrl+E, Ctrl+D
Edit.FormatSelection	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+F
Edit.FormatSelection	Ctrl+E, F
Edit.FormatSelection	Ctrl+E, Ctrl+F
Edit.GenerateMethodStub	Ctrl+K, M
Edit.GenerateMethodStub	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+M
Edit.GoTo	Ctrl+G
Edit.GotoBrace	Ctrl+]
Edit.GotoBraceExtend	Ctrl+Shift+]
Edit.GoToDeclaration	Ctrl+F12
Edit.GoToDefinition	F12
Edit.GoToFindCombo	Ctrl+/
Edit.GoToNextLocation	F8
Edit.GoToPrevLocation	Shift+F8
Edit.HideSelection	Ctrl+M, Ctrl+H
Edit.IncreaseFilterLevel	Alt+.
Edit.IncrementalSearch	Ctrl+I
Edit.InsertSnippet	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+X
Edit.InsertSnippet	Ctrl+K, X
Edit.InsertTab	Tab
Edit.LineCut	Ctrl+L
Edit.LineDelete	Ctrl+Shift+L
Edit.LineDown	Down Arrow
Edit.LineDownExtend	Shift+Up Arrow
Edit.LineDownExtend	Shift+Down Arrow
Edit.LineDownExtendColumn	Shift+Alt+Down Arrow
Edit.LineEnd	End
Edit.LineEndExtend	Shift+End
Edit.LineEndExtendColumn	Shift+Alt+End
Edit.LineOpenAbove	Ctrl+Enter
Edit.LineOpenBelow	Ctrl+Shift+Enter
Edit.LineStart	Home
Edit.LineStartExtend	Shift+Home
Edit.LineStartExtendColumn	Shift+Alt+Home
Edit.LineTranspose	Shift+Alt+T
Edit.LineUp	Up Arrow
Edit.LineUpExtend	Shift+Down Arrow
Edit.LineUpExtend	Shift+Up Arrow
Edit.LineUpExtendColumn	Shift+Alt+Up Arrow
Edit.ListMembers	Ctrl+J
Edit.ListMembers	Ctrl+K, L
Edit.ListMembers	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+L
Edit.MakeLowercase	Ctrl+U
Edit.MakeUppercase	Ctrl+Shift+U
Edit.MoveControlDown	Ctrl+Down Arrow
Edit.MoveControlDown	Down Arrow
Edit.MoveControlDown	Ctrl+Down Arrow
Edit.MoveControlDownGrid	Down Arrow
Edit.MoveControlLeft	Ctrl+Left Arrow
Edit.MoveControlLeft	Left Arrow
Edit.MoveControlLeft	Ctrl+Left Arrow
Edit.MoveControlLeftGrid	Left Arrow
Edit.MoveControlRight	Ctrl+Right Arrow
Edit.MoveControlRight	Right Arrow
Edit.MoveControlRight	Ctrl+Right Arrow
Edit.MoveControlRightGrid	Right Arrow
Edit.MoveControlUp	Ctrl+Up Arrow
Edit.MoveControlUp	Up Arrow
Edit.MoveControlUp	Ctrl+Up Arrow
Edit.MoveControlUpGrid	Up Arrow
Edit.NavigateToLollipop	Shift+Alt+L
Edit.NewAccelerator	Ins
Edit.NewString	Ins
Edit.NextBookmark	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+N
Edit.NextBookmark	Ctrl+B, N
Edit.NextBookmark	Ctrl+B, Ctrl+N
Edit.NextKeyTyped	Ctrl+W
Edit.OpenFile	Ctrl+Shift+G
Edit.OvertypeMode	Ins
Edit.PageDown	PgDn
Edit.PageDownExtend	Shift+PgDn
Edit.PageUp	PgUp
Edit.PageUpExtend	Shift+PgUp
Edit.ParameterInfo	Ctrl+Shift+Space
Edit.ParameterInfo	Ctrl+K, P
Edit.ParameterInfo	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+P
Edit.Paste	Ctrl+V
Edit.Paste	Shift+Ins
Edit.PasteParameterTip	Ctrl+Shift+Alt+P
Edit.PreviousBookmark	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+P
Edit.PreviousBookmark	Ctrl+B, P
Edit.PreviousBookmark	Ctrl+B, Ctrl+P
Edit.QuickFindSymbol	Shift+Alt+F12
Edit.QuickInfo	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+I
Edit.QuickInfo	Ctrl+K, I
Edit.Redo	Ctrl+Y
Edit.Redo	Shift+Alt+Bkspce
Edit.Redo	Ctrl+Shift+Z
Edit.Remove	Del
Edit.RemovefromDiagram	Del
Edit.RemoveRow	Ctrl+Del
Edit.Replace	Ctrl+H
Edit.ReplaceinFiles	Ctrl+Shift+H
Edit.ReverseIncrementalSearch	Ctrl+Shift+I
Edit.ScrollColumnLeft	Ctrl+Left Arrow
Edit.ScrollColumnRight	Ctrl+Right Arrow
Edit.ScrollLineDown	Ctrl+Down Arrow
Edit.ScrollLineUp	Ctrl+Up Arrow
Edit.SelectAll	Ctrl+A
Edit.SelectCurrentWord	Ctrl+W
Edit.SelectCurrentWord	Ctrl+Shift+W
Edit.SelectionCancel	Esc
Edit.SelectNextControl	Tab
Edit.SelectPreviousControl	Shift+Tab
Edit.SelectToLastGoBack	Ctrl+=
Edit.ShowTileGrid	Enter
Edit.SizeControlDown	Ctrl+Shift+Down Arrow
Edit.SizeControlDown	Shift+Down Arrow
Edit.SizeControlDown	Ctrl+Shift+Down Arrow
Edit.SizeControlDownGrid	Shift+Down Arrow
Edit.SizeControlLeft	Ctrl+Shift+Left Arrow
Edit.SizeControlLeft	Shift+Left Arrow
Edit.SizeControlLeft	Ctrl+Shift+Left Arrow
Edit.SizeControlLeftGrid	Shift+Left Arrow
Edit.SizeControlRight	Ctrl+Shift+Right Arrow
Edit.SizeControlRight	Shift+Right Arrow
Edit.SizeControlRight	Ctrl+Shift+Right Arrow
Edit.SizeControlRightGrid	Shift+Right Arrow
Edit.SizeControlUp	Ctrl+Shift+Up Arrow
Edit.SizeControlUp	Shift+Up Arrow
Edit.SizeControlUp	Ctrl+Shift+Up Arrow
Edit.SizeControlUpGrid	Shift+Up Arrow
Edit.StopHidingCurrent	Ctrl+M, Ctrl+U
Edit.StopOutlining	Ctrl+M, Ctrl+P
Edit.StopOutlining	Ctrl+M, P
Edit.StopSearch	Alt+F3, S
Edit.SurroundWith	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+S
Edit.SurroundWith	Ctrl+K, S
Edit.SwapAnchor	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+A
Edit.SwapAnchor	Ctrl+R, Ctrl+P
Edit.SwapAnchor	Ctrl+E, A
Edit.SwapAnchor	Ctrl+E, Ctrl+A
Edit.TabLeft	Shift+Tab
Edit.ToggleAllOutlining	Ctrl+M, Ctrl+L
Edit.ToggleAllOutlining	Ctrl+M, L
Edit.ToggleBookmark	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+K
Edit.ToggleBookmark	Ctrl+B, T
Edit.ToggleBookmark	Ctrl+B, Ctrl+T
Edit.ToggleOutliningExpansion	Ctrl+M, Ctrl+M
Edit.ToggleOutliningExpansion	Ctrl+M, M
Edit.ToggleTaskListShortcut	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+H
Edit.ToggleTaskListShortcut	Ctrl+E, T
Edit.ToggleTaskListShortcut	Ctrl+E, Ctrl+T
Edit.ToggleWordWrap	Ctrl+E, Ctrl+W
Edit.ToggleWordWrap	Ctrl+R, Ctrl+R
Edit.ToggleWordWrap	Ctrl+E, W
Edit.UncommentSelection	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+U
Edit.UncommentSelection	Ctrl+E, U
Edit.UncommentSelection	Ctrl+E, Ctrl+U
Edit.Undo	Ctrl+Z
Edit.Undo	Alt+Bkspce
Edit.ViewBottom	Ctrl+PgDn
Edit.ViewBottomExtend	Ctrl+Shift+PgDn
Edit.ViewTop	Ctrl+PgUp
Edit.ViewTopExtend	Ctrl+Shift+PgUp
Edit.ViewWhiteSpace	Ctrl+R, Ctrl+W
Edit.ViewWhiteSpace	Ctrl+E, S
Edit.ViewWhiteSpace	Ctrl+E, Ctrl+S
Edit.WordDeleteToEnd	Ctrl+Del
Edit.WordDeleteToStart	Ctrl+Bkspce
Edit.WordNext	Ctrl+Right Arrow
Edit.WordNextExtend	Ctrl+Shift+Right Arrow
Edit.WordNextExtendColumn	Ctrl+Shift+Alt+Right Arrow
Edit.WordPrevious	Ctrl+Left Arrow
Edit.WordPreviousExtend	Ctrl+Shift+Left Arrow
Edit.WordPreviousExtendColumn	Ctrl+Shift+Alt+Left Arrow
Edit.WordTranspose	Ctrl+Shift+T
File.NewFile	Ctrl+N
File.NewProject	Ctrl+Shift+N
File.OpenFile	Ctrl+O
File.OpenProject	Ctrl+Shift+O
File.Print	Ctrl+P
File.SaveAll	Ctrl+Shift+S
File.SaveSelectedItems	Ctrl+S
Format.AlignBottoms	Ctrl+Shift+Down Arrow
Format.AlignCenters	Shift+F9
Format.AlignLefts	Ctrl+Shift+Left Arrow
Format.AlignMiddles	F9
Format.AlignRights	Ctrl+Shift+Right Arrow
Format.AlignTops	Ctrl+Shift+Up Arrow
Format.Bold	Ctrl+B
Format.ButtonBottom	Ctrl+B
Format.ButtonRight	Ctrl+R
Format.CenterHorizontal	Ctrl+Shift+F9
Format.CenterVertical	Ctrl+F9
Format.CheckMnemonics	Ctrl+M
Format.ConverttoHyperlink	Ctrl+L
Format.InsertBookmark	Ctrl+Shift+L
Format.Italic	Ctrl+I
Format.SizetoContent	Shift+F7
Format.SpaceAcross	Alt+Left Arrow
Format.SpaceAcross	Alt+Right Arrow
Format.SpaceDown	Alt+Down Arrow
Format.SpaceDown	Alt+Up Arrow
Format.TabOrder	Ctrl+D
Format.TestDialog	Ctrl+T
Format.ToggleGuides	Ctrl+G
Format.Underline	Ctrl+U
Help.Contents	Ctrl+Alt+F1
Help.Contents	Ctrl+F1, C
Help.Contents	Ctrl+F1, Ctrl+C
Help.DynamicHelp	Ctrl+F1, D
Help.DynamicHelp	Ctrl+F1, Ctrl+D
Help.F1Help	F1
Help.HelpFavorites	Ctrl+F1, F
Help.HelpFavorites	Ctrl+F1, Ctrl+F
Help.HowDoI	Ctrl+F1, H
Help.HowDoI	Ctrl+F1, Ctrl+H
Help.Index	Ctrl+Alt+F2
Help.Index	Ctrl+F1, I
Help.Index	Ctrl+F1, Ctrl+I
Help.IndexResults	Ctrl+F1, T
Help.IndexResults	Ctrl+F1, Ctrl+T
Help.Nexttopic	Alt+Down Arrow
Help.Previoustopic	Alt+Up Arrow
Help.Search	Ctrl+Alt+F3
Help.Search	Ctrl+F1, S
Help.Search	Ctrl+F1, Ctrl+S
Help.SearchResults	Shift+Alt+F3
Help.SearchResults	Ctrl+F1, R
Help.SearchResults	Ctrl+F1, Ctrl+R
Help.WindowHelp	Shift+F1
Image.AirbrushTool	Ctrl+A
Image.BrushTool	Ctrl+B
Image.CopyandOutlineSelection	Ctrl+Shift+U
Image.DrawOpaque	Ctrl+J
Image.EllipseTool	Alt+P
Image.EraseTool	Ctrl+Shift+I
Image.FilledEllipseTool	Ctrl+Shift+Alt+P
Image.FilledRectangleTool	Ctrl+Shift+Alt+R
Image.FilledRoundedRectangleTool	Ctrl+Shift+Alt+W
Image.FillTool	Ctrl+F
Image.FlipHorizontal	Ctrl+H
Image.FlipVertical	Shift+Alt+H
Image.LargerBrush	Ctrl+=
Image.LineTool	Ctrl+L
Image.MagnificationTool	Ctrl+M
Image.Magnify	Ctrl+Shift+M
Image.NewImageType	Ins
Image.NextColor	Ctrl+Right Arrow
Image.NextColor	Ctrl+]
Image.NextRightColor	Ctrl+Shift+Right Arrow
Image.NextRightColor	Ctrl+Shift+]
Image.OutlinedEllipseTool	Shift+Alt+P
Image.OutlinedRectangleTool	Shift+Alt+R
Image.OutlinedRoundedRectangleTool	Shift+Alt+W
Image.PencilTool	Ctrl+I
Image.PreviousColor	Ctrl+Left Arrow
Image.PreviousColor	Ctrl+[
Image.PreviousRightColor	Ctrl+Shift+Left Arrow
Image.PreviousRightColor	Ctrl+Shift+[
Image.RectangleSelectionTool	Shift+Alt+S
Image.RectangleTool	Alt+R
Image.Rotate90Degrees	Ctrl+Shift+H
Image.RoundedRectangleTool	Alt+W
Image.ShowGrid	Ctrl+Alt+S
Image.ShowTileGrid	Ctrl+Shift+Alt+S
Image.SmallBrush	Ctrl+.
Image.SmallerBrush	Ctrl+-
Image.TextTool	Ctrl+T
Image.UseSelectionasBrush	Ctrl+U
Image.ZoomIn	Ctrl+Up Arrow
Image.ZoomIn	Ctrl+Shift+.
Image.ZoomOut	Ctrl+Down Arrow
Image.ZoomOut	Ctrl+Shift+,
Layout.InsertColumntotheLeft	Ctrl+Alt+Left Arrow
Layout.InsertColumntotheRight	Ctrl+Alt+Right Arrow
Layout.InsertRowAbove	Ctrl+Alt+Up Arrow
Layout.InsertRowBelow	Ctrl+Alt+Down Arrow
NewFolder	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+F
Project.AddClass	Shift+Alt+C
Project.AddContentPage	Ctrl+M, Ctrl+C
Project.AddExistingItem	Shift+Alt+A
Project.AddNewItem	Ctrl+Shift+A
Project.Override	Ctrl+Alt+Ins
QueryDesigner.CancelRetrievingData	Ctrl+T
QueryDesigner.Criteria	Ctrl+2
QueryDesigner.Diagram	Ctrl+1
QueryDesigner.ExecuteSQL	Ctrl+R
QueryDesigner.GotoRow	Ctrl+G
QueryDesigner.JoinMode	Ctrl+Shift+J
QueryDesigner.Results	Ctrl+4
QueryDesigner.SQL	Ctrl+3
Refactor.EncapsulateField	Ctrl+R, Ctrl+E
Refactor.EncapsulateField	Ctrl+R, E
Refactor.ExtractInterface	Ctrl+R, Ctrl+I
Refactor.ExtractInterface	Ctrl+R, I
Refactor.ExtractMethod	Ctrl+R, Ctrl+M
Refactor.ExtractMethod	Ctrl+R, M
Refactor.PromoteLocalVariable	Ctrl+R, Ctrl+P
Refactor.PromoteLocalVariable	Ctrl+R, P
Refactor.RemoveParameters	Ctrl+R, Ctrl+V
Refactor.RemoveParameters	Ctrl+R, V
Refactor.Rename	Ctrl+R, Ctrl+R
Refactor.Rename	Ctrl+R, R
Refactor.Rename	F2
Refactor.ReorderParameters	Ctrl+R, Ctrl+O
Refactor.ReorderParameters	Ctrl+R, O
Resources.Audio	Ctrl+4
Resources.Files	Ctrl+5
Resources.Icons	Ctrl+3
Resources.Images	Ctrl+2
Resources.Other	Ctrl+6
Resources.Strings	Ctrl+1
Schema.Collapse	Ctrl+-
Schema.Expand	Ctrl+=
Tools.AttachtoProcess	Ctrl+Alt+P
Tools.CodeSnippetsManager	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+B
Tools.MacrosIDE	Alt+F11
Tools.RecordTemporaryMacro	Ctrl+Shift+R
Tools.RunTemporaryMacro	Ctrl+Shift+P
View.AutoCloseTagOverride	Ctrl+Shift+.
View.Backward	Alt+Left Arrow
View.BookmarkWindow	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+W
View.BookmarkWindow	Ctrl+W, B
View.BookmarkWindow	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+B
View.BrowseNext	Ctrl+Shift+1
View.BrowsePrevious	Ctrl+Shift+2
View.ClassView	Ctrl+Shift+C
View.ClassView	Ctrl+W, C
View.ClassView	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+C
View.ClassViewGoToSearchCombo	Ctrl+K, Ctrl+V
View.CodeDefinitionWindow	Ctrl+\, Ctrl+D
View.CodeDefinitionWindow	Ctrl+\, D
View.CodeDefinitionWindow	Ctrl+W, D
View.CodeDefinitionWindow	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+D
View.CommandWindow	Ctrl+Alt+A
View.CommandWindow	Ctrl+W, A
View.CommandWindow	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+A
View.Datasets	Ctrl+Alt+D
View.Details	Ctrl+Shift+Q
View.DocumentOutline	Ctrl+Alt+T
View.DocumentOutline	Ctrl+W, U
View.DocumentOutline	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+U
View.EditLabel	F2
View.EditMaster	Ctrl+M, Ctrl+M
View.ErrorList	Ctrl+\, Ctrl+E
View.ErrorList	Ctrl+\, E
View.ErrorList	Ctrl+W, E
View.ErrorList	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+E
View.FindSymbolResults	Ctrl+Alt+F12
View.FindSymbolResults	Ctrl+W, Q
View.FindSymbolResults	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+Q
View.Forward	Alt+Right Arrow
View.ForwardBrowseContext	Ctrl+Shift+7
View.FullScreen	Shift+Alt+Enter
View.MacroExplorer	Alt+F8
View.NavigateBackward	Ctrl+-
View.NavigateForward	Ctrl+Shift+-
View.NextError	Ctrl+Shift+F12
View.NextView	Ctrl+PgDn
View.NonVisualControls	Ctrl+Alt+Q
View.ObjectBrowser	Ctrl+Alt+J
View.ObjectBrowser	Ctrl+W, J
View.ObjectBrowser	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+J
View.Output	Ctrl+Alt+O
View.Output	Ctrl+W, O
View.Output	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+O
View.PendingCheckins	Ctrl+W, G
View.PendingCheckins	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+G
View.PopBrowseContext	Ctrl+Shift+8
View.PropertiesWindow	F4
View.PropertiesWindow	Ctrl+W, P
View.PropertiesWindow	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+P
View.PropertyPages	Shift+F4
View.ResourceView	Ctrl+Shift+E
View.ResourceView	Ctrl+W, R
View.ResourceView	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+R
View.ServerExplorer	Ctrl+Alt+S
View.ServerExplorer	Ctrl+W, L
View.ServerExplorer	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+L
View.ShowSmartTag	Shift+Alt+F10
View.ShowSmartTag	Ctrl+.
View.SolutionExplorer	Ctrl+Alt+L
View.SolutionExplorer	Ctrl+W, S
View.SolutionExplorer	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+S
View.TaskList	Ctrl+\, Ctrl+T
View.TaskList	Ctrl+\, T
View.TaskList	Ctrl+W, T
View.TaskList	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+T
View.Toolbox	Ctrl+Alt+X
View.Toolbox	Ctrl+W, X
View.Toolbox	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+X
View.ViewCode	Enter
View.ViewCode	F7
View.ViewDesigner	Shift+F7
View.ViewMarkup	Shift+F7
View.VisibleBorders	Ctrl+Q
View.WebBrowser	Ctrl+Alt+R
View.WebBrowser	Ctrl+W, W
View.WebBrowser	Ctrl+W, Ctrl+W
Window.ActivateDocumentWindow	Esc
Window.CloseDocumentWindow	Ctrl+F4
Window.CloseToolWindow	Shift+Esc
Window.MovetoNavigationBar	Ctrl+F2
Window.NextDocumentWindow	Ctrl+F6
Window.NextDocumentWindowNav	Ctrl+Tab
Window.NextPane	Alt+F6
Window.NextTab	Ctrl+PgDn
Window.NextToolWindowNav	Alt+F7
Window.PreviousDocumentWindow	Ctrl+Shift+F6
Window.PreviousDocumentWindowNav	Ctrl+Shift+Tab
Window.PreviousPane	Shift+Alt+F6
Window.PreviousTab	Ctrl+PgUp
Window.PreviousToolWindowNav	Shift+Alt+F7
Window.ShowEzMDIFileList	Ctrl+Alt+Down Arrow

VS2003 SP1 WTF

2006-08-20T10:19:00.000+10:00

I am a MSDN subscriber. DVDs turn up all the time. I have a working set of the most recent DVDs and the updated ones get buried deep in some cupboard.

Three years ago I installed Visual Studio 2003. Three years later a service pack is released. I install the service pack. After an eternity (I am not exaggerating) the installation appears to be complete and it asks for the DVD. I stick in the most recent VS2003 DVD and am presented with this...

WTF! This really really annoys me. Why is it based on the actual name? Why do they change the name? Why can't they have some type of product guid?

It will be faster to uninstall VS2003 and reinstall it and the SP rather than to find the original.

There goes that Sunday morning.

Dave.

FlowLayoutPanel Caveat emptor

2006-04-24T10:22:00.000+10:00

My first WinForms app in .Net2 was a relatively simple data entry/maintenance program. I took the opportunity to take the new FlowLayoutPanel for a spin. It would automatically expand and shrink as its internal element's visibility changed depending on the state of the program. The panel at the bottom of the FlowLayoutPanel containing the Save and Cancel button would then automatically change its vertical position.

It worked well and saved about a dozen lines of awful UI jiggery-pokery.

Thinking that I was now an expert in all things to do with the FlowLayoutPanel I chose to use it again in my second WinForms 2.0 app. What a mistake!

Without going into details I had a user control with an fully docked group box internally containing a floating FlowLayoutPanel with a couple of different combinations of autosize, autogrow, etc thrown in what seemed to be a sensible combination. The FlowLayoutPanel also internally contained user controls loaded dynamically that were anchored to its edges.

Although it seemed right the IDE somehow got itself horribly confused. The various combinations of autosizing, docking and achoring made itself trip so that whenever I adjusted the size of the user control on the form it would magically automatically grow by about 100 pixels. Any attempt to pull it back into size would work but only for a moment.

What a mess.

Two hours of mucking around later I pulled out most of the flow layout smarts and ended up writing most of the UI jiggery-pokery myself - but it worked.

Watch out!

Festoon - don't install it

2006-03-27T14:02:00.000+10:00

There is a utility called Festoon that allows you to have more than 5 people in a conference call with Skype.

Don't install it.

It asks to begin with who you would like to include in Festoon conversions. Despite only selecting 2 people it chose to tell EVERYONE in my contact list the following message:

Check it out. Now we can see each other on Skype.
Click here to get Festoon: http://www.festooninc.com

I am not very happy. It maybe in beta but this is totally unacceptable.

(Long time no post - been on holidays)

This is getting silly...

2006-01-20T08:17:00.000+10:00

This is my fourth positive post in a row - I must be sick.

You have got to check out the System.IO.File object.

It features AppendAllText(string path, string contents) that creates a file (if it does not already exist) and adds the text to the end. This was just annoying code that had to be written once every project and now we are free of those shackles.

Also check out the Open*() functions, Write*() and Read*() functions.

Cool.

I will find something to have a whinge about soon I am sure...

This camper is getting even happier...

2006-01-20T08:02:00.000+10:00

So I am fumbling around with VS2005 treating it like VS2003 and just stumbling across the new features (as opposed to reading the books or the help). Every now and then you find something that is really simple but is just excellent.

The output window now shows the statement the IDE has used to compile the project. This was not in VS2003 and to create some automated build/deployment script required some mucking around working out all of the damn command line arguments.

Not anymore - a copy and paste later and your done.

The command line to compile this relatively small WinForms app was 1671 characters long (an entire command prompt screen's worth). I am really happy that I did not have to type that in.

:)

Generics, Transactions, Nullable Types... all crap when compared to...

2006-01-19T19:52:00.000+10:00

I have just written my first 'serious' WinForms app in .Net2. Before going home for the day it was time to create the Deployment project. I hate doing Deployment projects. You have to worry about Framework boot strappers and the like to make it a seamless experience.....

Well not anymore!!!!

The new Setup Wizard in Setup and Deployment basically asked what type of deployment I wanted (WebForms, WinForms, etc) and whether I wanted any other files included. I created a shortcut to the project's main output (I think this is a lot easier in this version) and built it.

This was pretty similar to VS2003 up to this point.

In looking in the output directory there were two files. setup.exe and an MSI file. In a vanilla WinXP SP2 VPC I loaded the MSI file. It said politely that the Framework was required and would I like to download it from Microsoft's web site. This was pretty good but I was then faced with the web page asking what version of the framework that I wanted to download and whether it was the distributable or the SDK, etc. This is not a very good user experience.

I then thought to try the setup.exe. I am please I did! It comes up with a licensing agreement screen followed by a screen describing everything that needs to be downloaded and whether I would like it to proceed - you bet! It then downloaded the Framework V2, installed my application and it all worked and it didn't even require a reboot. I guess it would also download MDAC (maybe DirectX) if required but I have not looked into that yet.

This is now a really nice experience for both the developer and the user.

I am one happy camper. Well does MS!

The debugger is AWESOME

2006-01-14T22:21:00.000+10:00

I have had a play with the VS2005 mainly with WinForms and now some debugging.

The WinForms forms editor just rocks. I love the way the controls get sticky around the place they should be placed. No more emails from pesky users saying that a text box is a couple of pixels misaligned - I cannot delete those emails fast enough.

But the debugger is just the best. You can hover the mouse over a variable, drill into its data and even edit its values all from a little popup window. OK - sometimes you need the hand-eye coordination of a brain surgeon to move the mouse over the left hand side of the pop up window to expand its details but I enjoy the challenge. There will be a short cut key I am sure but it have not chanced across it yet.

I really love the text visualiser where you can see the contents of the variable displayed as text, html or XML. I would have loved to have seen a byte[] to string visualiser but alas. In this particular project I am moving around byte[] but they normally contain just ascii so such a visualiser would have been the cream on the cake.

I am impressed with this.

Thread Priority

2006-01-08T13:48:00.000+10:00

I am working on a multithreaded WinForms component in some spare cycles.

There are a heap of worker threads and to keep the UI responsive I set the priority of the worker threads to below normal. Its a technique that works really well.

The component raises events that the UI responds to. In testing the event handlers I checked the thread priority to make sure that it had bubbled up from the component in below normal priority. I discovered that it was in normal priority. Something was very strange.

It turns out in .Net when you start a thread it starts in normal priority, not the priority of the thread that launched it. To get around this you need a some class member that records what the thread priority should be and when a new thread starts it needs to check this member and set its own priority accordingly.

I can't help but think that this was a poor design decision.

Apparently Java's thread do inherit their priority from their parent.

Scroll bars - rant and some suggestions for Help

2006-01-06T12:33:00.000+10:00

I was working on a Pocket PC application this morning. I had a custom control consisting of a panel with a panel within it and a scroll bar on the right. It effectively created a scrollable canvas in which other controls could be placed.

I had all of the trouble in the world with getting the very bottom of the canvas to display. The scroll bar did not seem to be working correctly. Since there was a little maths to work out the max value, large increment and the panel's top property I figured that the problem lay there.

It was only after a bit of debugging that I found that the scroll bar was incapable of reaching its maximum value of 100. It would stop at 91 irrespective of whether it would be moved through a small change, large change, or manual drag.

A search of Google later revealed that the maximum value of a scroll bar is at most MaximumValue - (LargeChange + 1) as quoted from http://msdn.microsoft.com/smartclient/understanding/netcf/FAQ/default.aspx#5.40

This is actually incorrect. It is Maximum - LargeChange + 1 (the brackets stuff it up)

I checked it on WinForms and the same. There is even a passing note about it in the help: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/cpref/html/frlrfsystemwindowsformsscrollbarclassmaximumtopic.asp

There is not much chatter on the web about this problem so I figure it should be fleshed out a bit.

I checked in VB6 and this problem does not occur.

What a stuff up!

Two things:
1. This is going to be with us for the entire life of .Net.

Today I wrote code recognises this problem and takes it into account when calculating the 'real' maximum. If it were ever to be fixed in the framework then my program will no longer function correctly. Microsoft will never be able to fix it since if they do then software will break.

(I guess the could release a new scrollbar called ScrollBarEx while keeping the old one around for compatibility.)

2. Finding information about this was a little difficult. There is a note in the Maximum property field of the ScrollBar help. No mention the Value property and no mention in the ScrollBar class. In fact it only says:

To adjust the value range of the scroll bar control, set the Minimum and Maximum properties.

This is a bit misleading especially if you set the LargeChange to be the same as Maximum. The maximum value ever reached will be 1.

While I am at it, they were smart enough to recognise that the LargeChange could not exceed Maximum when in design mode and the LargeChange gets reset back to Maximum if it is exceeded - well you would think so. They stuffed this up too. The LargeChange value is reset back to Maximum + 1.

I have just finished reading the Framework Design Guidelines. I will post about this later. The refreshing aspect of this book is that Microsoft insiders add their comments and admit to mistakes that were made. This was great. When programming against those areas of the framework that contain these problems, rather then being frustrated I find myself being accepting of the issues in the knowledge that the designers themselves know that they could have done a better job - reading and writing a simple text file for example.

I think that this should be extended to the Help. Along with sections of Thread Safety, Remarks, Examples, Requirements and See Also there should be another section called "Narration" or "Background information" or "Editorial". This section would allow frank comments to be added by the Microsoft Team to express why things were done the way they were done, the history, the mistakes that were made, what influenced their design decisions, how to best use the class or property, etc.

This would be a very disarming and I think would provide for a much better help system.

In the example of the scrollbar I would except that they would say:

Editorial
We had the work experience student in that week so we gave them the scrollbar to write - how could they possibly stuff it up. We apologise.

:) That was a bit harsh.

A trap for beginners

2006-01-04T10:14:00.000+10:00

The icons in Visual Studio have not changed since VB3 (maybe even earlier). If I see that space shuttle, oscilloscope or bicycle one more time I am going to scream.

Fortunately the icons have been revamped in VS2005 - at least in some beta that I saw. Now that we have the final release I thought i would add some great icons to a test application that I was playing with.

In selecting a icon for the application I navigated to C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\Common7\VS2005ImageLibrary using Visual Studio - but nothing! Were they cut from the final product? I did the full install. Are we going to be forced to use the space shuttle forever?!??!?

Do not despair! They are not present in the IDEs file selection window because they are all zipped up in a file called VS2005ImageLibrary.zip and the file name filter is set to .ICO so it does not appear. A quick unzip later and you will have all of the icons that you will ever need - for about week anyway.

GZipStream and Deflate compression

2006-01-03T20:35:00.000+10:00

I have had a low priority project floating around for about 6 months that requires some analysis of various files and how well they have been compressed. Since VS2003 did not have any compression support and the fact that I did not want to evaluate, choose, buy and learn a third party compression library (this project is just not worth it) I chose to wait until VS2005 since it was to have some compression support.

As an aside, this was my very first VS2005 project. At first glance it really does look totally awesome. However I will reserve my final judgment until I get into my first big ASP2.NET application.

The Help is really good on the compression topic. I was not looking forward to all that mucking around with streams but the examples did exactly what I wanted and a quick copy and paste later my program was basically finished.

The first file that the program checked was a PDF. PDFs are inherently compressed so I wasn't expecting it to reduce in size my much. But I did not expect that it would INCREASE in size by 50%! A small check of the code later and it was no bug.

The compression in VS2005 has two flavors; one based on GZip and the other on the Deflate algorithm. The help says that GZip actually uses the same algorithm as Deflate but it can be extended to use other formats.

I did a bit of analysis to see how much the files would compress by. (The results of PDF file seen in this table are of a different PDF file that initially alerted me to these issues hence the discrepancy)

File	GZip	Deflate
1000000 spaces	0.86%	0.86%
A Word document	88.60%	88.57%
A Word document zipped	152.97%	152.90%
A PDF	92.76%	92.75%
A PDF zipped	153.35%	153.34%
An XML file	3.24%	3.24%
An XML file zipped	145.46%	145.46%

From these results that it is clear that it is not wise to use the .Net compression libraries on data that is already highly compressed. It will make the data 50% bigger then it was originally. If the data is somewhat compressed (PDF and Word) then there is little benefit in using these libraries.

However if the data is not at all compressed then the compression works well. For example if you are moving around XML data (ie SOAP, etc) then it may be a great idea to compress the stream. (caveat emptor - CPU load will go up and you will lose compatibility with computers not supporting the decompression algorithm. This is kind of against the spirit of SOAP)

Another point is that Help's claim that the GZip's algorithm is the same as Deflates appears to be totally true. The files come out to be slightly different sizes but I can only assume this has something to do with header sizes.

The compression libraries work on streams rather than 'block mode'. The libraries compress the data as it arrives from the stream rather then having an opportunity to examine the entire data file from beginning to end and then compressing as is done in programs like WinZip. Stream based compression apparently can never be as good as block compression.

So back to my problem. In determining whether a file is really well compressed I have resorted to checking whether the .Net GZip algorithm increased the size by more then 50%! If it does then it is really when compressed otherwise there maybe an opportunity for further compression.

New years resolution

2006-01-03T20:28:00.000+10:00

I have benefited hugely from the .Net community of bloggers. To such an extent that feel that it is time to give something back. This blog will explore some of the highlights, intricacies and frustrations of a professional developer who spends too much of his life in front of Visual Studio.