Free subversion hosting

Found this cool website that allows you host up to 5 svn repositories, and supports xp agile project management.

The site is http://www.xp-dev.com

Convert XML to a DataSet and visa versa in C#

Simple... but for my own reference:

/// 

/// Convert the xml string into a DataSet object
/// 
/// The xml string to convert
/// The DataSet instance
public DataSet ConvertXmlToDataSet(string xml)
{
using (StringReader reader = new StringReader(xml))
{
using (XmlTextReader xmlReader = new XmlTextReader(reader))
{
DataSet dataSet = new DataSet();
dataSet.ReadXml(xmlReader);
return dataSet;
}
}
}

/// 

/// Converts a DataSet into an xml string representation
/// 
/// The DataSet to convert
/// The xml string representation of the DataSet
public string ConvertDataSetToXml(DataSet dataSet)
{
using (StringWriter writer = new StringWriter())
{
using (XmlTextWriter xmlTextWriter = new XmlTextWriter(writer))
{
dataSet.WriteXml(xmlTextWriter);
return writer.ToString();
}
}
}

JQuery and ASP.NET Ajax ready and pageLoad Solution

I had a problem the other day with the JQuery ready function not firing on an Aspc post back. I found this useful article

The problem seems to be that the jQuery ready function is not called on an async postback. The pageLoad() ASP.NET ajax method is called however.

It seems that ASP.NET ajax and jQuery don’t get along together when it comes to the DOM load event, and ASP.NET ajax takes preference to the jQuery ready function.

So in short replace all jQuery: $(document).ready() instances in your code with function pageLoad(). This I think is a more elegant solution then intercepting the end_request event and altering the master page.

Generic function to obtain data from a DataRow

Sometimes it may be useful to have one generic function that can parse data from a DataRow column into the type you require.

For example: Perhaps you have an Employee object with the properties Id, Name and Salary, of types int, string and decimal.

Here is an example of some code to populate a list of Employee objects using a generic function.

public void LoadData()
{
IList employees = new List();
DataTable result = // Get data from SP
foreach (DataRow row in result.Rows)
{
Employee employee = new Employee();
employee.Id = GetColumnData<int>("EMP_ID", row, null);
employee.Name = GetColumnData<string>("EMP_NAME", row, "Unknown");
employee.Salary = GetColumnData<decimal>("EMP_SALARY", row, null);
employees.Add(employee);
}
}

/// 

/// Gets data from a column checks it can convert it correctly if no data or invalid casting the default
/// value is returned
/// 
/// The type of data to convert too
/// The name of the column in the row
/// The row containing the data
/// The default value
/// The data or the default value
public static T GetColumnData<T>(string columnName, DataRow row, object defaultValue)
{
if (row.Table.Columns.Contains(columnName) && row[columnName] != DBNull.Value)
{
string value = row[columnName].ToString();
TypeConverter converter = TypeDescriptor.GetConverter(typeof(T));
object result = converter.ConvertFromString(value);
try
{
return (T)result;
}
catch (InvalidCastException)
{
return (T)defaultValue;
}
}
else
{
return (T)defaultValue;
}
}

TryParse functionality on Generic objects

John Liu has a nice code snippet on implementing the TryParse functionality on generic objects.

Using JavaScript or C# to calculate feet and inches to metres and visa versa

Here are some code snippets for JavaScript and C# that show how to convert from say for example 26' 5" into metres 8.05m. The snippets also show converting metres to foot and inches.;

HTML:

<input id="feet" type="text" onkeyup="calculate 'feet')" /> '
<input id="inches" type="text" onkeyup="calculate('inches')" /> "
<input id="metres" type="text" onkeyup="calculate('metres')" />

JavaScript:

<script type="text/javascript">
function calculate(src) {
switch (src) {
case feetCtrl:
calculateFeetAndInchesToMetres();
break;
case inchesCtrl:
calculateFeetAndInchesToMetres();
break;
case metresCtrl:
calculateMetresToFeetAndInches();
break;
}
}

function calculateFeetAndInchesToMetres() {
var feet = $get("feet").value;
var inches = $get("inches").value;
var totalInches = feet * 12;
totalInches = totalInches + (inches * 1);
var cm = totalInches * 2.54;
var metres = cm / 100;
$get("metres").value = metres.toFixed(2);
}

function calculateMetresToFeetAndInches() {
var metres = $get("metres").value;
var metreInches = metres * 39.370078740157477;
$get("feet").value = Math.floor(metreInches / 12);
$get("inches").value = Math.floor(metreInches % 12);
}
</script>

Same functionality in C#

/// 

/// Gets the feet and inches representation of a metric value
/// 
/// The metres to use
/// The correct display string
public static string GetFeetAndInches(double metres)
{
Hashtable values = GetFeetAndInchesValues(metres);
double feet = (double)values["Feet"];
int inches = (int)values["Inches"];
StringBuilder result = new StringBuilder();
string feetText = feet.ToString();
string[] data = feetText.Split('.');
if (data.Length > 0)
{
feetText = data[0];
}
result.Append(feetText);
result.Append("'");
if (inches > 0)
{
result.Append(" ");
result.Append(inches);
result.Append("\"");
}

return result.ToString();
}

/// 

/// Gets the feet and inches of a metric value
/// 
/// The metres to use
/// An array of feet, inches
public static Hashtable GetFeetAndInchesValues(double metres)
{
Hashtable result = new Hashtable();
double metreInches = metres * MetreToInchesRatio;
double feet = metreInches / 12;
int inches = Convert.ToInt32(metreInches % 12);
result.Add("Feet", feet);
result.Add("Inches", inches);

return result;
}

/// 

/// Gets the metre equivalent of feet and inches combination
/// 
/// The foot value
/// The inches value
/// The metre value
public static double GetMetresFromFeetAndInches(double feet, int inches)
{
// Sourced from: http://sg.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070403095853AA3FKJZ
double totalInches = feet * 12;
totalInches += inches;
double cm = totalInches * 2.54;
double metres = cm / 100;

return metres;
}

Got this error: syntax error. _getAbbrMonthIndex using auto complete extender

All the solutions I searched for suggested there was an error with my JavaScript or code. They were right!

My problem rose because I had a control on a page which had a script manager proxy control and a bunch of autocompleteextender control's, these extender controls used a scriptpath that pointed to a static web method (page method) on the page that retrieved the nessacary data.

The error arose becuase I was adding to my script manager proxy class a reference to the same page method programtically in the page load method. Anyway removing the programatic inclusion to the script manager solved the problem.

Thought this may help others debug any similar scenarios.