Microsoft .Net For All

Web Compatibility and Performance Testing in a Multi-Browser World

2010-02-23T01:06:00.001-08:00

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Web Compatibility and Performance Testing in a Multi-Browser World

View more presentations from Samantha McGarry.

ASP.NET 4 "Quick Hit" - Chart Control

2010-01-15T15:55:00.001-08:00

How Do I: Create an Efficient and Standardized Approach for Implementing CSS Styles?

2010-01-15T15:53:00.000-08:00

Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4.0 Week!

2008-11-10T10:42:00.000-08:00

How To: Use Impersonation and Delegation in ASP.NET 2.0

2008-09-01T09:15:00.000-07:00

For my project I had a typical requirement wherein we were supposed to save PDF file generated on a separate server location which was outside the context of our web-directory. After searching through internet and asking some non-related questions [Please Read], it clicked me about impersonation and I came across this site. Click Here

Its not rocket science to achieve this especially when entire science is encapsulated for you by MS Guy.

Note: Never impersonate a powerful login id for entire web-site, use it as and when required and remove it. If you do not follow this there's always possibility of malicious code running against that powerful.

So, what you have to do for impersonation to work is create a less powerful login id and assign it access to shared folder where file needs to be saved and give everyone Read access.

.Net Framework 3.5 installation failure

2008-06-29T03:59:00.000-07:00

I was trying to install VS 2008 and suddenly i stumbled on issue with installation of .Net Framework 3.5. After doing lots of googling, here is my short list of possiblitis that may cause its failure:

1. Problem might be with installation of 3.0, and you have to install it by running windows in diagnostic mode with Plug and Play, windows installer service and System restore services running.

2. Then after checking i also found that IIS also had some role to play in installation failure and uninstalled the IIS also.
3. the in stumled upon error 1603. Well, to my rescue came below mentioned forum and vila now things are working fine.

http://forums.msdn.microsoft.com/en-US/netfxsetup/thread/5096affe-640a-47a4-a65c-d416bc7f266a/">
.NET Framework 3.5 installation fails

ModalPopup Extender redefined or not used

2008-05-09T10:47:00.000-07:00

Hi All,
There was a project requirement for which I was working and we were required to show the alert message to users based on the entries in database, which means a trip to server and then showing the alert box. For my R&D purpose I decided to create my own modal popup control logic which will not use either AJAX scripts or modal popup extender.

Most of the things that I've done are already avaiable on web site:
http://weblogs.asp.net/jeff/archive/2006/10/25/Modal_2D00_style-pops-in-Javascript-and-CSS.aspx

I've not modified the CSS and has been used as it is from above website for this example.

But my html contents part have been modified so that it can hide the drop-down controls. See Below:

<asp:panel runat="server" id="pnlMessage">
<div id="modalPage">
<div class="modalBackground">
</div>
<div class="modalContainer">
<div class="modal">
<div class="modalTop">
<table>
<tr>
<td style="width:80%">
Warning Message
</td>
<td style="width:20%">
<img alt="" src="Images/close.gif" onclick="hideModal('modalPage');" style="cursor:inherit" />
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<div class="modalBody" id="modalBody">
</div>
</div>
</div>
<span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);"> <iframe</span>
<span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);"> id="iTestFrame"</span>
<span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);"> class="modalBackground"</span>
<span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);"> ></span>
<span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);"> </iframe></span>
</div>
</asp:Panel>

I've added on extra Iframe between panel and div tag, so that when my div tag is over drop-down (in IE), it hides them.

Once this part was done logic needed to be developed to show this div after validating information on postback against database and show appropriate message attached to modalBody div.

If ValidateDatabaseInformation Then
Dim sbScriptBuilder As New System.Text.StringBuilder
sbScriptBuilder.Append("")

'register with ClientScript
Dim t As Type
t = Me.GetType()
If Not ClientScript.IsClientScriptBlockRegistered(t, "PopupScript") Then
ScriptManager.RegisterClientScriptBlock(Me, t, "PopupScript", sbScriptBuilder.ToString(), False)
End If
End If
End If

Once all the codes are in place, you can use it without modal popup extender

Loading DLL assembly with AppDomain

2008-02-02T11:32:00.000-08:00

Loads of time we come across third party components (free or paid subscription) and we use that component and deploy it at client-side (alright i know you would test it, but what if..) and a spammer or hacker identifies the vulnerability in third party component and starts the attack. Wow, client is now catching your throat since its your application that let hacker in and not 3rd party (as your client understands).

To overcome this risks, MS in .net came with AppDomain (read SDK for more info). Here, I'll show you how you can run a third party component with limited privileges. Before that you need to understand below mentioned classes:

I'll not get into explaining all the class, constructors or enums, since there are loads of documents already available, but, explanation will be given whereever required.

System.Security.policy.Evidence: Evidence is the information that runtime gathers to identify the group that assembly belongs to. Please refer the constructor of Evidence class. More can be found at http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.security.policy.evidence.aspx

AppDomainSetup: Used to provide configuration information to AppDomain

System.Security.SecurityZone: Define the Zone in which asembly will run. Below, are the zones and their explanantions:
Internet: Runs with minimal rights
Intranet: runs under local intranet security zone
MyComputer: maximum privileges in this zone
NoZone: you know it
Trusted: Assembly is from trusted zone
Untrusted: assembly is from untrusted zone means location/site

I guess enough of blah..blah.., lets get coding

AppDomainSetup setup = new AppDomainSetup();
setup.ApplicationBase = "file://" + Environment.CurrentDirectory;
object [] evidence = { new Zone(SecurityZone.Internet)};
Evidence evidence1 = new Evidence(evidence, null);

AppDomain domain = AppDomain.CreateDomain("Test Domain", evidence1, setup);

ClassLibrary1.LocalAccess la = (ClassLibrary1.LocalAccess)
domain.CreateInstanceAndUnwrap(typeof(ClassLibrary1.LocalAccess).Assembly.FullName,
typeof(ClassLibrary1.LocalAccess).FullName);
Console.Write(la.ReadFile());
Console.WriteLine(domain.Id.ToString());
Console.WriteLine(AppDomain.CurrentDomain.Id.ToString());
Console.ReadLine();

ClassLibrary1.LocalAccess- class just reads some information from a file located on C: drive.