GuruStop.NET

the AjaxControlToolkit has a new release, the release includes bug fixes and new HTMLEditor, ComboBox, ColorPicker controls/extenders.

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  Check the release

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  Try the live demos

HTML Editor

I liked the HTMLEditor control so much from first sight. Pretty lightweight and customizable. I still need to check whether it works fine inside UpdatePanel and whether it can be used with RequiredFieldValidator or so.

http://www.asp.net/AJAX/AjaxControlToolkit/Samples/HTMLEditor/HTMLEditor.aspx

Color Picker

The ColorPicjker is just an extender to TextBox control. This means a lot of opportunities and promises less problems with validators, etc… It’s a very nice one too.

http://www.asp.net/AJAX/AjaxControlToolkit/Samples/ColorPicker/ColorPicker.aspx

Combo Box

The ComboBox is a control that is like a DropDownList with auto complete except that the user can enter a new text that is NOT in the existing items. This is good or bad based on your sole use.

I did not like how it’s not well styled in the example page. This means it’s going to be headache to style in my sites as well, which is one of the biggest problems with AJAXToolkit in general.

http://www.asp.net/AJAX/AjaxControlToolkit/Samples/ComboBox/ComboBox.aspx

This is problematic with ASP.NET AJAX. The main Script Components are NOT sent to the client when in :Legacy” mode. This is “By design” in ASP.NET AJAX, although it is a clear limitation!!

I’m investigating the problem for other solutions and will be sending an update soon.

Thank you, Iman Halawany, for making me note this. I’ve been working on WCF services and ASP.NET MVC stuff lately than normal webforms, so, didn’t realize this obvious showstopper.

To all my readers, I owe you a BIG apology.

The Problem

ASP.NET validators and ValidationSummary controls are rendered as SPAN tags that are shown and hidden based on validation state. The properties of the validators are written normally via JavaScript calls similar to these:

If you have ever thought that the famous if(Page_ClientValidate("validationGroup")) {/*JS Code*/}  and myValidator.ValidationGroup = "validationGroup"; are sure not enough client side capabilities in ASP.NET validators, you are right.

The list of client side API for ASP.NET Validators can be found on this MSDN page "ASP.NET Validation in Depth":

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa479045.aspx#aspplusvalid_properties

Look for subtitle: "Client-Side APIs".

Thanks Simone Chiaretta for mentioning the topic, Mohamed Tayseer for sharing the topic on facebook, and Richard Cook for his comment on the post making me search for the complete list.

With MIX, and meeting the announced MVC roadmap, the new versions of AS.NET Extensions are now publicly available.ASP.NET MVC Framework Preview 2 is available also as separate download, same as Silverlight 2.0 BETA 1 (and Expression studio, Silverlight VS 2008 Tools).

Download Links:

• ASP.NET 3.5 Extensions Preview 2
• ASP.NET MVC Preview 2
• Silverlight 2 Beta 1
  • Expression Studio 2.0 Beta
  • Silverlight 2.0 Tools Beta 1 for Visual Studio 2008
  • UPDATE: Silverlight 2.0 Beta 1 SDK
• UPDATE: Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 is also available for download

Additional Resources:

• UPDATE: ASP.NET 3.5 Extensions Quickstarts (Including MVC, Silverlight Controls)
• ASP.NET MVC
  • Official Videos Homepage
  • New Videos (More advanced than the earlier ones)
• Silverlight

• Feature Matrix: Silverlight 1.0 and 2.0
• Brad Abrams Silverlight Articles (including Expression Studio and ASP.NET Controls for Silverlight articles)
• Scott Guthrie Silverlight Articles (The latest two are focused on Silverlight 2.0)
• UPDATE: Silverlight 2.0 Video tutorials

Have fun :)

The Problem

In an N-tier application, you keep your logic in a business logic tier, typically a different VS project that can be used from a website, a windows service, or desktop application, and that should be valid to writ unit tests against on its own.

But how about if your requirements say that you need to to upload some file for the business logic to work? Think of a scanned image (signed contract maybe?) or just a comma separated value file containing some emails.  Typically the business logic tier will be the place to to handle this, but how can you send the uploaded file to it? You can get the file as "HttpPostedFile" from the "Request.Files" collection or the file upload control itself, but, to receive it in the business logic, project, the easiest way is to add reference to "System.Web" dll and accept the type "HttpPostedFile" as method argument or so, and when in need to save the file physically, you call the "SaveAs" method of "HttpPostedFile" … So simple right ?

This is also from an internal mail to SilverKey Tech Egypt office dev. team. Slightly modified this time! (Yes, I know. I should stop this habit of link collection and get back to writing – hopefully soon)

• Joe On .NET – Windows Workflow Foundation Tutorial Series
• SourceMaking (Design Patterns, Antipatterns, Refactoring)
• Brennan’s Blog » Blog Archive » Intellisense for jQuery in Visual Studio 2008
• Happy Coding: OOP and FOOP
• Linq to SQL DataContext Lifetime Management – Rick Strahl’s Web Log
• Dan Driscoll’s Blog : WSDAPI 101 Part 1: Web Services from 10,000 feet
• Mike Ormond’s Blog : Some ASP.NET 3.5 ListView Control Examples
• Video: Scrum Tuning: Lessons learned from Scrum implementation at Google
• ASPhere – free editor of web.config files
• Google Chart C# API
• MSDN: Introduction to Building Windows Communication Foundation Services
• GridViewGuy: Getting Started with the ASP.NET MVC Framework

hmm, how about more links as a blog readers bonus,..

• How I Explained REST to My Wife (warning: from an enthusiast guy)
• ASP.NET MVC vs ASP.NET(Webforms) vs Ruby On Rails – Mischa Kroon
• TDD for Beginners Series

This is a well commented example for a GridView with implementation of RowDataBound and DataBound events. I also demonstrate in it some of the important properties of GridView, like the slight diffrences when dealing with Grid Paging, Rows, Cells, and Columns. I prefered to heavily comment the code than to write separate paragraphs describing it as I do believe that the code is what gets the idea in a direct way.

The example is a simple page that uses SqlDataSource to connect to a SQL Server 2005 Express database and show the results on a GridView with paging capapility. Many parts of the code don’t show the best practices for their situation and those are only included for demonstration purpose as they are not the main focus of the example.

I’ll start with the code behind of the page as it’s the most important part: