Most projects I work on need a list of countries at some point so I put together a snippet of SQL that I could reuse to create and populate a countries table in the database with all countries as given in ISO 3166-1. After recently writing a utility class to populate list controls with world currencies according to ISO 4217 it got me wondering if I could also do the same for countries using only the .Net Framework. And so I came up with the following utility class to do the job.

        /// <summary>
        /// Populates the list control with countries as given by ISO 4217.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="ctrl">The list control to populate.</param>
        public static void FillWithISOCountries(ListControl ctrl)
        {
            foreach (CultureInfo cultureInfo in CultureInfo.GetCultures(CultureTypes.SpecificCultures))
            {
                RegionInfo regionInfo = new RegionInfo(cultureInfo.LCID);
                if (ctrl.Items.FindByValue(regionInfo.TwoLetterISORegionName) == null)
                {
                    ctrl.Items.Add(new ListItem(regionInfo.EnglishName, regionInfo.TwoLetterISORegionName));
                }
            }

            RegionInfo currentRegionInfo = new RegionInfo(CultureInfo.CurrentCulture.LCID);

            //- Default the selection to the current cultures country
            if (ctrl.Items.FindByValue(currentRegionInfo.TwoLetterISORegionName) != null)
            {
                ctrl.Items.FindByValue(currentRegionInfo.TwoLetterISORegionName).Selected = true;
            }
        }

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Ever needed to know which ASP.Net worker process (w3wp.exe)  belongs to an App Pool? Well I did recently when I needed to attach to it for debugging and there was no obvious way to find out which process related to each app pool. A little bit of research led me to discover AppCmd.exe. I wrote a small batch file which will list them all for you and include the process id. Simply copy the following into a blank text file and save with a .bat extension and you can run it whenever you need to, alternatively just run the command through a standard command prompt.

cd %systemroot%\system32\inetsrv
appcmd list wps
pause

You should end up with a line like the following for each worker process on your machine:

WP "5528" (applicationPool:DefaultAppPool)

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I recently had a client who had some issues delivering mail from their site so I went to look at the SMTP logs only to find that there were none there (I am embarrassed to say). I notice that I had configured the logs to be written to a custom directory on a separate drive from the operating system and thought that may have been the issue however it turns out that there are some steps that needs to be taken in order for SMTP logging to work on Windows Server 2008. It’s odd enough that you need to use the legacy IIS 6 management console to administer your SMTP Server but there is also no obvious steps when setting up your server that indicate the requirements for SMTP logging.

To get logging working you need to install the ODBC Logging module by following these steps:

1. On the taskbar, click Start, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Server Manager.
2. In the Server Manager hierarchy pane, expand Roles, and then click Web Server (IIS).
3. In the Web Server (IIS) pane, scroll to the Role Services section, and then click Add Role Services.
4. On the Select Role Services page of the Add Role Services Wizard, select ODBC Logging, and then click Next.
5. 
   
6. On the Confirm Installation Selections page, click Install.
7. On the Results page, click Close.

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I am working on a Job File System (JFS) for a client and they had the requirement to include a drop down list of currencies on their Purchase Order and Invoice documents, at first I was going to manually put together a list control but on reflection I thought their must be a better way of doing this that is more reusable. So here I have a utility method I put together to populate a ListControl with currency options. I would be interested in any feedback on this and alternative/better methods of achieving the end result:

/// <summary>
/// Fills the ListControl with ISO currency symbols.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="ctrl">The ListControl.</param>
public static void FillWithISOCurrencySymbols(ListControl ctrl)
{
	foreach (CultureInfo cultureInfo in CultureInfo.GetCultures(CultureTypes.SpecificCultures))
	{
		RegionInfo regionInfo = new RegionInfo(cultureInfo.LCID);
		if (ctrl.Items.FindByValue(regionInfo.ISOCurrencySymbol) == null)
		{
			ctrl.Items.Add(new ListItem(regionInfo.CurrencyEnglishName, regionInfo.ISOCurrencySymbol));
		}
	}

	RegionInfo currentRegionInfo = new RegionInfo(CultureInfo.CurrentCulture.LCID);

	//- Default the selection to the current cultures currency symbol
	if (ctrl.Items.FindByValue(currentRegionInfo.ISOCurrencySymbol) != null)
	{
		ctrl.Items.FindByValue(currentRegionInfo.ISOCurrencySymbol).Selected = true;
	}
}

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Recently I had to do some work on a legacy application for a client and they were getting errors when trying to upload some files that I would consider to be of relatively small sizes of around 300kb.  It turns out that IIS 6 is configured by default to a maximum upload size of 204,800 bytes (200kb) which is of little use these days. The fix I implemented required me to open the metabase.xml file located in c:\Windows\System32\Inetsrv and locate the setting AspMaxRequestEntityAllowed and amend the value to something more suitable. For good measure I then did an IIS reset and the problem went away.

I later discovered a Microsoft Knowledgebase article (327659) with further details on this and an alternative method of making the same change described above that you may wish to read before implementing any changes yourself.

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This post is more of a note to myself but may save someone else a lot of wasted time trying to track down why they can no longer save selected nodes in Umbraco. In a recent project I created a number of custom user controls for the Umbraco Dashboard, these user controls contained validations controls but I had overlooked adding the validationgroup property on the validation controls so when attempts were made to save or publish a node containing one of these user controls that didn’t validate, the changes would not save as the page could not be posted back to the server. The problem is not always immediately obvious if the user control that is not valid is on a different tab to the one you are on when attempting to save or publish.

I guess an alternative or complimentary method would be to display a Javascript alert notifying the user that there are still controls that don’t validate.

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I have recently needed to use the Umbraco datePicker control in a usercontrol I was creating however I kept getting presented with an “Unknown server tag ‘umbraco:datePicker” exception. After some digging around in the Umbraco Source it is confusingly not in the assembly I would have expected but it was in fact located in the cms.dll and not controls.dll. As a couple of other Umbracians posted this query a day or so after I found the solution I thought I would post it up for the benefit of others.

Simply include the following in your usercontrol:

<%@ Register TagPrefix="umbraco" Namespace="umbraco.controls" Assembly="cms" %>

and then use it as follows:

<umbraco:datePicker ID="datePicker1" runat="server" ShowTime="true"></umbraco:datePicker>

I hope this is of help to others and can be refactored asap to avoid any further confusion.

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I was recently working in a clients office where they have very little IT Support and they had a new member of staff on board without a PC. The person that setup the IT infrastructure at the beginning had left a hard drive with an image and a CD to copy the image to any new machine that was added to the network. Sounds simple so I said I would help out. It took some time but eventually the image copied across and I disconnected the slave drive and booted the machine. I joined the machine to the SBS2003 domain and got a warning about another machine on the network with the same name(oops, the image had been built with a machine name currently in use!). Next thing I know is that the user of the first machine using this name can no longer login to the network and now the new machine can’t because of the clashing workstation names. After a lot of head scratching and some reading of various forum posts on similar topics it became apparent that the best solution was to remove both machines from the domain, rename them and rejoin them to the domain., and here is how I did it.

1. Remove the workstation from the domain by moving it to a workrgoup, no reboot required although it does ask you to
2. Change the machine name to something new and unique
3. Login to SBS2003 and remove the workstation from Active Directory
4. Rejoin the workstation to the domain
5. Reeboot

Once the machines had rebooted I was able to successfully log into the domain via both workstations. Hopefully this is of some help to others, I think I have covered all of the steps I performed however I do not claim to be a Small Business Server expert I just know what I need to know and try and learn it if I don’t so would be interested to hear of other solutions to this problem in case it crops up again.

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There was a time not so long ago, when website developers were treated with almost as much reverence as pilots and surgeons. After all, without a website, your business was just not a player, non-existent, invisible to the world. No one had any idea as to what they did, or how they did it, just that they were able, as if by magic, to put our business into cyberspace in full view of a global audience.

There were pictures and there were words too. It was marvellous. Who will ever forget the day our website went live. But, as is life, we wanted more. A new product range, a change in pricing perhaps, or maybe even some customer feedback comments. Suddenly things got a little tricky. We were told that there was no development time available for at least two weeks, or the site would have to be rewritten as expansion was not part of the initial brief, blah blah. Bottom line? It cost money. Every change or tweak became an uphill struggle and a nightmare scenario.

Luckily all this is now a thing of the past. The reason? Content Management Systems, or CMS for short. These little beauties have given us the power now. No longer beholden to our developers, we proudly add, tweak and change to our hearts content and glory and revel in our new found freedom. And best of all, there’s no extra costs. involved.

From humble beginnings as a simple textual template editor tool, CMS has now really come of age and is simply an essential ingredient in any website design. Today’s systems are dynamic tools that give you the power to produce high quality web content without any programming knowledge. In the main, used via a simple menu system, CMS will allow you to add new pages of content and images, format your page design, add titles and navigation, edit existing pages, put in SEO meta data, allow for multiple users and let you roll back to previous versions if you make a mistake.

There are however, some rules to this heavenly scenario that should be observed at all costs.

1. Now that you have free reign, your web content should be written to be informative to your visitors of course, but it also must be search spider friendly. This is crucial to getting your website successfully indexed and ranked high by Google.
2. CMS systems can be widely varying in cost which will be determined by the power and flexibility you are looking for. The cheapest option might sound appealing but could prove to be a serious mistake when you realise that you really need much more flexibility and there is no doubt you will, so try to future proof if possible by picking a system that will not restrict your progress.
3. Is the system secure. You will need, if you are allowing multiple user access, to ensure you have sufficient overall control.
4. Does it work across all platforms? These days websites need to be seen on different browsers and mobile technology too.
5. Is there comprehensive support for you, because one thing is sure, you will need it at the most unlikeliest of times.

With all these possibilities factored in, you will find that the freedom, speed and cost savings you experience through installing a versatile CMS on your site will more than justify the price tag.

Keep an eye out for part two of this series on the topic of Content Management Systems.

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I was contacted over the christmas and new year by Actually Digital to help out one of their clients who had been let down by another developer. The brief was clear and simple, to develop a custom WordPress theme from a design they had provided and to turn it around within 24 hours. I took up the challenge for two reasons:

1. I have been doing more and more work with WordPress recently so I was keen to take on any work that could keep my momentum going in this area.
2. I respect what the site owner is doing and the causes he is supporting over the coming months

If you would like to know more about Mark Bowness and his mission to give up alcohol for twelve months in order to develop his spirit, mind and body you can watch his introductory YouTube video below and checkout www.dontbuythismanapint.com. Mark is making maximum use of social media to support this challenge so you can also follow him via Twitter, Facebook, RSS and YouTube.

Click here to view the embedded video.

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