Mark Barto's Blog

Various: Howto create temporary files of specific size

mabarto — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 14:28:24 GMT

Sometimes you want to have a file with a specific size for testing purposes.

Easily you can do that with the following command:

fsutil file createnew c:\onegb.txt 1073741824

This will create a file with the name onegb.txt with a size of 1GB.

Framework: Mixed mode assembly is built against version 'v2.0.50727' of the runtime

mabarto — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 11:45:26 GMT

When we were upgraded our project to Framework 4 and compiled we were getting the following error:

Mixed mode assembly is built against version 'v2.0.50727' of the runtime and cannot be loaded in the 4.0 runtime without additional configuration information.

Microsoft Visual Studio 11 Developer Preview (ISO)

mabarto — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 09:36:12 GMT

Visual Studio 11 Developer Preview is an integrated development environment that seamlessly spans the entire life cycle of software creation, including architecture, user interface design, code creation, code insight and analysis, code deployment, testing and validation.

VS: Turn off repairing file when user delete/modify file

mabarto — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 16:02:30 GMT

Visual studio creates advertised shortcuts so that when you are starting the application it will check first of existence for each file and repair the file automatically if it is modified or deleted. But sometimes you don't want to have this behavior for each file so how to deal with that ?

Aspose.Words: Image file cannot be written to disk when using external images

mabarto — Fri, 13 May 2011 15:35:26 GMT

I have a .docx template and have defined some mail merge fields and included an image from the web as link included. When I'm trying to save the document as output for HTML I'm getting the following error:

Image file cannot be written to disk. When saving the document to a stream either Images Folder should be specified or custom streams should be provided via ImageSavingCallback.

SharePoint, Visual Studio 2010: Localization within WebPart

mabarto — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 12:35:49 GMT

We have created a WebPart within Visual Studio 2010 for SharePoint 2010. We want to use localization within this WebPart but the usage of getting a resource element works different.

Instead of using the Resources class you use the GetLocalizedString method within the SPUtility class.

VSTS, Visual Studio: Do not automatically check out

mabarto — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 16:07:00 GMT

When using Visual Studio Team System as source control environment it is very annoying when your solution/project or file is automatically checked out without knowing.

In Visual Studio it will automatically checked out without any prompt by default.

Apple: Joined iOS Developer Program

Mark — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 09:09:46 GMT

Yesterday I enrolled my Apple ID for joining the iOS Developer Program as individual. Today I received an e-mail from Apple that I was accepted and I'm now having access to a set of development tools and resources.

Visual Studio: Formatting XML

mark — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 13:34:53 GMT

When opening a XML file within Visual Studio you get the contents without any linefeeds. It's very annoying that the format is not automatically set by Visual Studio.

WPF, VS, XAML: Disable Design-Mode in Visual Studio

mark — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 10:22:43 GMT

It's very annoying when opening a XAML file the first time that it will start in design-mode for preview mode.

Visual Studio will render the XAML code but sometimes if you have a lot of controls in it it can take a long time too load.

But there is a option within Visual Studio to turn this feature off.

BizTalk: Windows could not start the Enterprise Single Sign-On Service service on Local Computer

Mark — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 08:26:48 GMT

Microsoft BizTalk 2009 and Enterprise Single Sign-On was running smooth on all the machines and after more investigation the following error was caused by an automatic update of Microsoft .NET Framework 4.0.

---------------------------
Services
---------------------------
Windows could not start the Enterprise Single Sign-On Service service on Local Computer.

Error 0x80131700: 0x80131700
---------------------------
OK
---------------------------

WCF, BizTalk: Root element is missing

Mark — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 12:04:33 GMT

We had a strange behavior when generating a WCF Service with the BizTalk Publishing Wizard. When we browse to the generated service in our browser we got the message "Root element is missing".

WCF, BizTalk: The signature is invalid

Mark — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 11:21:13 GMT

We have generated with the BizTalk WCF Publishing Wizard a WCF Service based on a Metadata only endpoint for a Receive Location. The receive location will be configured as a net-MSMQ transport type.

We have encountered a problem that the message will not be send to the queue but to the dead letter queue with the message "The signature is invalid".

Welcome Qurius, Bye OneDev

Mark — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 15:45:54 GMT

It's now publicly official: I'm a new employee of Qurius Netherlands as Solution Developer on the First of June.

Eight developers which worked for OneDev, including myself as BizTalk Engineer, is now taken over by Qurius Netherlands.

Visual Studio: randomly keyboard layout change

Mark — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 15:18:32 GMT

Sometimes when running in Visual Studio my keyboard layout randomly change.

This is very annoying when you are trying to use the = sign but it will translate it to °.

BizTalk,Oracle: ORA-24777: use of non-migratable database link not allowed

Mark — Thu, 27 May 2010 16:40:08 GMT

When using the WCF Oracle Adapter I was getting the following error message 'ORA-24777: use of non-migratable database link not allowed' when I want to execute a stored procedure.

ASP.NET, .NET, Visual Studio: MSDN Event - Scott Guthrie - Part 1

Mark — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 11:38:08 GMT

Yesterday I was attended at the talk from Scott Guthrie in Brussels. It was an interesting technical session about all the new features within .Net Framework 4.0, Silverlight 4, VS2010, ASP.NET MVC 2.0.

The final agenda for the event was as follow:

13:00 - 13:30: Welcome and registration
13:30 - 15:00: Visual Studio 2010, .NET 4 Web Development
15:00 - 15:20: Coffee Break
15:20 - 17:30: Silverlight and ASP.NET MVC 2 Beta
17:30 - 18:00: Q&A with Scott Guthrie

Silverlight: Menu disappearing after Silverlight application

Mark — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 11:52:49 GMT

When implementing a carousel with Silverlight on a webpage the menu was disappearing behind this Silverlight application.

By default the Silverlight application have its own rendering window useful when displaying high definition video content or complex animation.

Silverlight, C#: Cross domain security error

Mark — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 10:33:46 GMT

When trying to read an RSS feed within my Silverlight application I was getting a security error exception.

The reason for getting this security error was that by default unauthorized connections will not be allowed to prevent Denial of Service (DoS) attacks, DNS Rebinding attacks and Reverse tunnel attacks other then the host where you want to connect to.

BizTalk, Windows: After restarting BizTalk host instances services stayed disabled

Mark — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 12:13:08 GMT

We have discovered that after a restart the BizTalk host instance services stayed disabled even when the startup type is set to automatic.

The problem is that the BizTalk host instance service has a dependency with the Enterprise Single Sign-On Service which is not starting quickly enough. Because of this the BizTalk host instance services will not start.

SQL: Activity Monitoring missing within SSMS

Mark — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 15:35:10 GMT

When searching for the Activity Monitoring within SQL Server Management Studio 2008 under the management folder you determined that it isn't there anymore. After some research I came across an interesting article where is explained where you can find the Activity Monitor.

BizTalk: Missing context property ReceiveLocationName within orchestration

Mark — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 16:16:11 GMT

We have noticed that when you are transforming a message within an orchestration that the context properties of the original message will not be copied to the transformed message. You must declare this specific within your expression shape of your orchestration.

Because we are using ESB for exception handling we want to know the location where the message is coming from.

Unfortunately the ReceiveLocationName is missing in the standard BTS namespace.

C#, .NET: Current Directory for Windows Service

Mark — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 15:32:48 GMT

When calling for the current directory in a Windows Service with the Path.GetCurrentDirectory() you will probably not getting the correct directory but the C:\Windows\System32 directory.

BizTalk: Call Rules shape grayed out

Mark — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 12:35:50 GMT

When trying to use the call rules shape within my orchestration I have noticed that when right-clicking on your orchestration the call rules shape was grayed out.

SQL, SSIS: Execute SSIS Package within Stored Procedure

Mark — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 08:50:39 GMT

I have a stored procedure which returns data from a database. Before I want to return this data I want to execute a SSIS package which populate this data. Unfortunately there is not any SQL statement to start a SSIS package within a Stored Procedure. But there is a work-a-round for it.

Ziggo: New speed

Mark — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 19:34:26 GMT

Finally I have received today the new Eurodocsis 3.0 modem from our ISP: Ziggo. My connection speed was upgraded for free. My new download speed is upgraded from 20Mb to 50Mb and my new upload speed from 3Mb to 5Mb. In the nearby future they will upgrade the speed to 80Mb and later on over the 100Mb.

Windows Vista: Run as different user

Mark — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 14:14:11 GMT

A colleague was asking me how to run a program under a different account. My answer was to right-click on the shortcut and select the Run As . option in the context menu but unfortunately this behavior is only available on the Windows XP version and not under Windows Vista.

Outlook, Windows: Cannot start Microsoft Office Outlook. Cannot open the Outlook window.

Mark — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 22:44:21 GMT

I'm running Windows 7 x64 RC and Outlook 2007 but suddenly without any warning by starting Outlook i'm getting the following strange error message: "Cannot start Microsoft Office Outlook. Cannot open the Outook window."

BizTalk: Custom functoid in mapping return incorrect decimal

Mark — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 17:12:26 GMT

I have encountered a very strange problem by using a custom functoid in a mapping which converts a float to decimal where the returned value is not a decimal at all.

As value I was given the -4.9E-5 but when checking the returned value was -4.9E05 and not -0,000049 what i was expected. Why this happen i don't know but I found a solution.

.NET, Tools: Framework Configuration Tool (mscorcfg.msc)

Mark — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 11:51:47 GMT

Microsoft has removed the .NET Framework Configuration Tool from the standard framework installations. They have decided to remove this tool from the control panel because the average end-user don't need this tool. But me as Developer this tool is a must have.

If you want to use this tool Microsoft has decided to make it part of the SDK version.

Because I'm not happy to install the whole SDK version only for this tool I have found a workaround with an setup.

BizTalk, Tools: Microsoft BizTalk Server Best Practices Analyzer (BPA)

Mark — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 11:07:31 GMT

This tool created by Microsoft will examine your BizTalk Server deployment and configuration environment and verifies it against deployment and configuration best practices.

The Best Practices Analyzer performs configuration level verification, by reading and reporting only. For example, the Best Practices Analyzer gathers data from Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) classes, SQL Server databases, registry entries, and other parts of your deployment, and uses the gathered data to determine whether best practices are being followed. The Best Practices Analyzer does not modify any system settings, and is therefore not a self tuning tool.

ASP.NET: Index was outside the bounds of the array

Mark — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 20:10:24 GMT

When updating my blog with a new version I was encountering a strange asp.net error. When tried to updating / inserting or deleting data from my database I was getting the following message "Index was outside the bounds of the array".

BizTalk: Unit testing

Mark — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 08:46:12 GMT

In Microsoft BizTalk 2009 there is a new feature called Enable Unit Testing.

When setting this option to True it is possible to create an unit test for validating schemas or mappings.

In the following section I will explain how-to configure your BizTalk Project, Creating/Configuring a Test Project and explain the code snippet of a test method which test the map and validate the correctness of the output.

BizTalk: WCF-SQL Adapter not displayed on x64

Mark — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 18:37:53 GMT

When installing the SQL Adapter for x64 the adapter will not be displayed in BizTalk Administration when trying to add the adapter.

Because BizTalk Server Administration console runs as a 32-bit process and not in a 64-bit process it will not be displayed in the dropdown when registering the adapter in BizTalk Administration.

BizTalk: Solved - MessageType not promoted!

Mark — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 18:41:33 GMT

In my previous post MessageType not promoted I had a problem that the MessageType will not be promoted if there was an inbound mapping failure.

Unfortunately the MSDN Forum - BizTalk General also had no solution for this problem. Because of this problem I have contacted someone from Microsoft who may answer this question.

Windows 2008: Snipping Tool

Mark — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 08:45:30 GMT

There is a missing feature within Windows Server 2008 called Snipping Tool.

This tool enables you to capture screenshots, or snip, of any object on your screen, and then annotate, save, or sage the image.

BizTalk: WCF - SQL Adapter for BizTalk 2009

Mark — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 18:43:46 GMT

If you are using the standard SQL adapter what is part of BizTalk you must be known that this adapter in the nearby future will not be supported anymore by Microsoft.

Because of this reason it is a best-practice to replace this adapter to the new WCF-SQL adapter.

This adapter which is also part of the BizTalk Adapter Pack 2.0 is also available as stand-alone download.

BizTalk: MessageType not promoted !

Mark — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 18:37:15 GMT

On the Microsoft MSDN Forums I have asked a question why the MessageType is not promoted when an error occurred in the inbound mapping of the receiveport.

Unfortunately this was not the answer I was hoping for.

BizTalk, ESB: Microsoft ESB Toolkit 2.0

Mark — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 08:45:04 GMT

Finally the new ESB Toolkit 2.0 is available for download at the Microsoft website.
The name has also been changed from ESB Guidance to ESB Toolkit and this version will not be available on CodePlex anymore.

BizTalk, ESB: CDATA element incorrectly closed

Mark — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 08:44:24 GMT

We are using the Microsoft BizTalk Enterprise Server Bus (ESB) Guidance 2.0 CTP 2 as best practice within Microsoft BizTalk 2009. At the moment we are using especially the exception handling for fault handling.

We are not using the included ESB portal for resubmit the fault message but we have created a SharePoint Web Part which reads the EsbExceptionDB.

Unfortunately we have discovered that the Message Data that is written to the database is incorrectly when using CDATA elements in your original message.

SQL Server 2008: Change Data Capture (CDC)

Mark — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 08:43:06 GMT

Within SQL Server 2008 there is a new feature called Change Data Capture (CDC). This features makes it possible to track changes such as insert, update or delete of a specific table within a database.

It will read the transaction log within SQL Server by running a job and will write the changes in a new system table within the database which you can query to get the changes.

BizTalk, ESB: Error converting data type nvarchar to datetime

Mark — Mon, 25 May 2009 18:36:17 GMT

When using the Exception Handling within ESB (Enterprise Service Bus) for BizTalk 2009 there will be a Sendport All.Exception in the Microsoft.Practices.ESB Application. This sendport will be executed if there is a failed message generated in the messagebox, if you have checked the option Enable routing for failed messages.

FxCop: Suppress message generated code

Mark — Wed, 20 May 2009 18:35:20 GMT

When you make use of FxCop for checking your code on Microsoft coding standards you get messages if you make use of generated code.

Because you do not want to suppres these messages it is possible to configure this within FxCop.

Welcome to my new Blog

Mark — Sun, 17 May 2009 22:21:25 GMT

I want to welcome you on my new technical blog about the Microsoft .Net platform. On this blog you are going to find information about my technical expertise on the Microsoft .Net platform such as BizTalk, Asp.Net, C#, SQL, Silverlight, IIS and everything that surrounds it.

IIS 7.0 - HTTP Error 404.3 - Not Found when browsing for .svc file

Mark — Sun, 17 May 2009 21:44:06 GMT

When browsing on Windows Server 2008 with IIS 7.0 Installed and you want to browse to .svc file

you can get the following error:
The page you are requesting cannot be served because of the extension configuration. If the page is a script, add a handler. If the file should be downloaded, add a MIME map.

Issues regarding ESB 2.0 CTP 2 on BizTalk 2009

Mark — Sun, 17 May 2009 21:43:24 GMT

When installing ESB 2.0 CTP 2 on a BizTalk 2009 machine I'm facing with a couple of problems.

When running on a 64-bit machine with powerscript the script "Setup_src.cmd" in "Source\Exception Handling\Install\Scripts" will complain about ExplorerOM that this is not compatible with 64-bit.