Indika Rathnasekara's Blog

We are now 99X Technology

2012-01-04T16:59:00.005+05:30

In pursuit with the world’s largest jigsaw puzzle

2011-11-05T01:10:00.002+05:30

One of my ambitions is to do the worlds largest jigsaw puzzle (called LIFE) which is 24000 pieces in future.In doing so I have started the miniature version of LIFE which is 3000 pieces.Currently I have completed quarter of it which is around 700-800 pieces.Planning to complete this end of the year if time permits to do so.

Here is the full image of LIFE after you complete it.

Here is my last puzzle.

Configuring Forms Based Authentication (FBA) in SharePoint 2010

2011-10-21T23:02:00.002+05:30

One of my favorite configuration tasks from SharePoint 2007 is to configure multiple authentication providers. So I wanted to do the same thing in SharePoint 2010 too. Here I will be using the MSSQL database as the membership store for the users.
Steps

Create MSSQL membership store
Create the new web application
Configure support for FBA

In Central Administration
In new web application
In STS web service (new in SharePoint 2010)

Adding user policies to the web application
Login to the site

Step 1: Create MSSQL membership store
This is where all the user details going to be store.

Create the database

Run the ASP.NET SQL Server Setup Wizard located at C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\aspnet_regsql.exe and follows the instructions.

Once completed create a separate database user and assign that user and add the “db_owner” role.

Add users into the membership store

Launch the Visual Studio and create a web site project
Add a connection string pointing to the above created database
Launch the “ASP.NET Configuration” wizard in “Website” menu item.
Click on the “Security” link and select the “internet” option and add users in to the store.

Step 2: Create the new web application

Go to Central Administration > Manage web applications and click on the “New” in the ribbon
Set the settings in the dialog box as in the below images (Check the red boxes)

Once the web application created, create the site collection as well.

Step 3: Configure FBA support

Edit the web.config for the central administration in the virtual directories folder

Add the following entry just above the </system.web> node

<membership defaultProvider="AspNetSqlMembershipProvider">
<providers>
<remove name="AspNetSqlMembershipProvider" />
<add connectionStringName="AspNetSqlProvider" passwordAttemptWindow="10" enablePasswordRetrieval="false" enablePasswordReset="true" requiresQuestionAndAnswer="true" applicationName="/" requiresUniqueEmail="false" passwordFormat="Hashed" description="Stores and retrieves membership data from the Microsoft SQL Server database" name="AspNetSqlMembershipProvider" type="System.Web.Security.SqlMembershipProvider, System.Web, Version=2.0.3600.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a" />
</providers>
</membership>
<roleManager defaultProvider="AspNetWindowsTokenRoleProvider">
<providers>
<clear />
<remove name="AspNetSqlRoleProvider" />
<add connectionStringName="AspNetSqlProvider" applicationName="/" description="Stores and retrieves roles data from the local Microsoft SQL Server database" name="AspNetSqlRoleProvider" type="System.Web.Security.SqlRoleProvider, System.Web, Version=2.0.3600.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a" />
</providers>
</roleManager>

Add the below connectionString details just above the </configuration> node and put the corresponding values for the database,user id and password

<connectionStrings>
<add connectionString="Data Source=eccolw7ira;Initial Catalog=<database>;User ID=<user id>;Password=<password>" name="AspNetSqlProvider" />
</connectionStrings>

Edit the web.config for the corresponding site in the virtual directories folder

Add the following entry just above the </system.web> node.

Note : If the membership entry is already available , add only the missing entries (Highlighted in Yellow) from the bellow entry.

Add the below connectionString details just above the </configuration> node and put the corresponding values for the database,user id and password

<connectionStrings>
<add connectionString="Data Source=eccolw7ira;Initial Catalog=<database>;User ID=<user id>;Password=<password>" name="AspNetSqlProvider" />
</connectionStrings>

Edit the web.config located at C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\14\WebServices\SecurityToken

Add the following entry just above the </configuration> node

<system.web>
<membership defaultProvider="AspNetSqlMembershipProvider">
<providers>
<add name="i" type="Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.Claims.SPClaimsAuthMembershipProvider, Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" />
<remove name="AspNetSqlMembershipProvider" />
<add connectionStringName="AspNetSqlProvider" passwordAttemptWindow="10" enablePasswordRetrieval="false" enablePasswordReset="true" requiresQuestionAndAnswer="true" applicationName="/" requiresUniqueEmail="false" passwordFormat="Hashed" description="Stores and retrieves membership data from the Microsoft SQL Server database" name="AspNetSqlMembershipProvider" type="System.Web.Security.SqlMembershipProvider, System.Web, Version=2.0.3600.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a" />
</providers>
</membership>
<roleManager defaultProvider="AspNetSqlRoleProvider" enabled="true" cacheRolesInCookie="false">
<providers>
<add name="c" type="Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.Claims.SPClaimsAuthRoleProvider, Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" />
<remove name="AspNetSqlRoleProvider" />
<add connectionStringName="AspNetSqlProvider" applicationName="/" description="Stores and retrieves roles data from the local Microsoft SQL Server database" name="AspNetSqlRoleProvider" type="System.Web.Security.SqlRoleProvider, System.Web, Version=2.0.3600.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a" />
</providers>
</roleManager>
</system.web>
<connectionStrings>
<add connectionString="Data Source=eccolw7ira;Initial Catalog=<database>;User ID=<user id>;Password=<password>" name="AspNetSqlProvider" />
</connectionStrings>

Step 4: Adding user policies into the web application

Go to Central administration > Manage web applications and select the web application and click on the “User Ploicy” button in ribbon.
Click on the “Add users” link and select the “Default” as the zone and click on “Next”.
Type the user name in the “Users” text box and click on the People Picker icon.
If everything configured correctly you should see the user name get underlined in the “users” box. OR
Click on the “Browse” button under the users text box and type the user name in the search text box and click on the search button.
And you should see the user name in the search result.

Step 5: Login to the site

Open the site in browser and select the “Forms Authentication” from the drop down

Provide the user credentials and you should be redirected to the home page

Setting assembly version automatically when building in a Bamboo server

2011-05-18T19:50:00.005+05:30

Scenario :
How to instruct your msbuild script to set the correct “AssemblyVersion” of your libraries using “AssemblyInfo.cs” when building in a Bamboo server.In Puzzlepart it is vital to have the current build number and the current revision number in the assembly version of products.
Solution :
Assembly version syntax : <major version>.<minor version>.<build number>.<revision>
More info can be found here about the syntax.
Step 1 : First you need to make sure the corresponding Build-Specific Variable are passed into the build script.

How ?

In Bamboo build configuration under the “Builder” tab you have “Options” where you can pass msbuild command line switches.
example : /p:BuildKey=${bamboo.buildKey} /p:BuildPlanName=${bamboo.buildPlanName} /p:BuildNumber=${bamboo.buildNumber} /p:Revision=${bamboo.custom.svn.revision.number}

Step 2 : Accessing those variables from the msbuild script

<PropertyGroup>
    <MajorVersion Condition="'$(MajorVersion)' == ''">1</MajorVersion>
    <MinorVersion Condition="'$(MinorVersion)' == ''">0</MinorVersion>
    <BuildNumber Condition="'$(BuildNumber)' == ''">0</BuildNumber>
    <Revision Condition="'$(Revision)' == ''">0</Revision>
    <BuildPlanName Condition="'$(BuildPlanName)' == ''">LocalBuild</BuildPlanName>
    <BuildKey Condition="'$(BuildKey)' == ''">NOKEY</BuildKey>

</PropertyGroup>

Step 3 : Create the Assembly version using those properties

<PropertyGroup>
<ComputedAssemblyName>$(MajorVersion).$(MinorVersion).$(BuildNumber).$(Revision)</ComputedAssemblyName>
</PropertyGroup>

Step 4 : Use the assembly version in “AssemblyInfo” task

<AssemblyInfo CodeLanguage="CS"
      OutputFile="$(ApplicationName)\Properties\AssemblyInfo.cs"
      AssemblyTitle="ApplicationName"
      AssemblyDescription="Description"
      AssemblyCompany=""
      AssemblyProduct="$(ApplicationName)"
      AssemblyCopyright="Copyright © "
      ComVisible="false"
      CLSCompliant="false"
      Guid="248D49F7-BC5D-4413-8E4A-98B4654B1594"
      AssemblyVersion="$(ComputedAssemblyName)" />

Arctic SharePoint Challenge 2011

2011-02-14T11:38:00.003+05:30

The team Puzzlepart is sponsoring one of the most intriguing event you would ever going to experience during this winter.
Are you ready to take on the challenge ?
Visit http://arcticsharepointchallenge.com/ for more info and feel free to follow @SPChallenge (Dexter the Lynx challenge mascot) on twitter.

2010 Formula 1 world champion decider at Yas Marina circuit in Abu Dhabi

2010-11-14T14:35:00.004+05:30

What a cracking finale it will turn out to be in just a little less than 5 hours from the time I am writing this post, after the yesterday’s qualifying session at Yas Marina circuit.Theoretically all the top 4 driver’s has a chance to become the champion but I will put this as any one of them can lose it easily.

The table bellow will show you how tight the championship race can be as the current standings.

Pos	Driver	Nationality	Team	Points
1	Fernando Alonso	Spanish	Ferrari	246
2	Mark Webber	Australian	RBR-Renault	238
3	Sebastian Vettel	German	RBR-Renault	231
4	Lewis Hamilton	British	McLaren-Mercedes	222

Sebastian Vettel scripted it perfectly at yesterday’s qualifying session by securing the pole position while his team mate Mark Webber had a worst qualifying which he managed only the 5th place in the grid.Lewis Hamilton and current championship leader Fernando Alonso secured the 2nd and 3rd place respectively.

Unless something dramatic happen the stage has been set perfectly for the Fernando Alonso to take his 3rd championship title.

There will be lot of pressure on him and he can be a hero or a zero in a matter of milliseconds.And there are so many permutations on who going to be the champion by judging the current standings.Believe me, I don’t even thinking about those combinations right now.

I can’t wait to see the start of the race and first turn of the circuit where drivers at front rows will be itching to go pass each other and take the advantage.

Since I am a Ferrari fan, my money is on two times championed Fernando Alonso but you never know, I will keep my fingers crossed.

First ever series win in Australia

2010-11-06T11:30:00.004+05:30

What a performance by the the Sri Lankan cricket team down under making history to win the first ever series beating Aussies(Current number 1 ranked team in the world by ICC and see the full rankings) in their own backyard.It was a real professional effort by the team and they fully deserve that win with the brand of cricket they are playing at the moment.This performance will augurs well for them in 2011 cricket world cup which is going to be held in sub continent.

This performance reminds me that,we were doing well in down under in 1995/96 tour to Australia and went onto win the world cup in 1996 which also held in sub continent.I don’t know this is a coincident or not but believe me, history repeats itself.

All kick started with the Twenty 20 win at Perth where rest of the world thought will be an impossible task for Lankans to cope with purely because of the bouncier conditions.Against the all critics they won that game convincingly.In my opinion that really did make them believing, they have a real good opportunity to beat Australians in their own backyard.

Then came back to Melbourne for the 1st ODI and pull off a miracle to comeback from 8 wickets down for just 107 runs and chased down 240 to win the game by one wicket which is one of the greatest come back of ODI’s history by Lankans.In doing so Angelo Mathews and Lasith Malinga beat the 27 years old world record for the 9th wicket partnership held by Kapil Dev and Syed Kirmani.

And then in the 2nd ODI at Sydney they script another convincing win, hence the first ever series win in down under.This was too an all round performance by the Sri Lankans and Aussies were really down and out.

Now I am looking forward to the tomorrows game at Brisbane which is a dead rubber as far as the series is concern but Lankans have a real good chance to make it a clean sweep which is not an easy task by any means against the Aussies in Australia.I am wondering how many teams have done that before.

Wishing you all the best to you Sri Lankans to achieve that feat too.

GO Lankans GO.

Integrating ReSharper into Visual Studio 2010

2010-09-29T14:12:00.002+05:30

Scenario : I am running VS2008 and VS2010 in parallel in my development environment.And I had already installed ReSharper 5 before installing the VS 2010.Then I wanted to integrate the R# into VS2010.

Tried to find out how to do it by googling but to no avail.Only found out issues related to integration issues with VS2010.

Then suddenly came to my mind that will the re installing R# help.As I re run the installer it prompted with the nice little option of changing the integration with the Visual Studio as in the bellow image.

When you click on the “Change” button you will get this

Now it’s a matter of ticking the check box for VS2010 integration and clicking the “Install” button.

Here we go, R# is at your finger tips in VS2010 now.

SharePoint 2010 : First custom connector implementation for BCS

2010-09-05T14:59:00.002+05:30

Today, I managed to read on BCS a bit and wanted to try out some custom connector implementation for the external systems.
Found out this code snippet from MSDN for a connector to the file system.
Managed to complete this exercise and created an external list with the External Content Type and I did see the files from the file system in the list.See bellow images.
Folder contents in file system :

External list in SP context :

I am really impressed by this and it has already inspired me to go deep into this and hoping to create some more custom connectors for other external systems as well.
Found out lot of issues/problems while I am doing this and I just list down possible erroneous scenarios.

Business Data Connectivity Services issues
Assembly deployment to the GAC
Assembly information
Configure Business Data Connectivity access rights

Keep those things in mind if you also get into trouble.

Error accessing Business Data Connectivity Services in Windows 7

2010-09-05T13:23:00.001+05:30

While I was doing some research on BCS , wanted to import a BDC model from Central Administration > Manage service applications > Business Data Connectivity Services.

As I hit the link, following error message prompted.

As usual did a search on the Google and found out the following entries.

http://sensoft2000-sharepoint.blogspot.com/2010/08/error-access-services-is-unable-to.html

https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/Downloads/DownloadDetails.aspx?DownloadID=23806

Downloaded the above fix and installed.

problem solved. :)

More references on the issue :

http://blogs.technet.com/b/dahnesh/archive/2010/06/16/error-while-accessing-business-data-connectivity-services-on-windows-7.aspx

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/976462

http://support.microsoft.com/hotfix/KBHotfix.aspx?kbnum=976462&kbln=en-us

How to send Ctrl-Alt-Del key combination in remote desk top

2010-08-26T15:04:00.001+05:30

How many times I have to search web, to find out the correct key combination to send ctrl+alt+del into remote desk top.Here it is.This will be a self note to me on this regard.From here onwards I won’t be searching the web but in my blog only, if and only if I forgot it :)

CTRL + ALT + END

…

Sharepoint foundation 2010 on windows 7 x64

2010-07-12T23:14:00.005+05:30

Today,I installed Sharepoint Foundation 2010 on my laptop successfully according to this article.Downloaded the Sharepoint Foundation 2010 from here and started following the installation steps mentioned in this article.

The second step under “To set up a developer workstation” failed successfully because of this command “c:\SharePointFiles\SharePoint /extract:c:\SharePointFiles”
Here it referred to a file called “SharePoint” but the name of the downloaded application was “SharePointFoundation.exe”. So in order to pass this step I had to change the name from “SharePoint” to “SharePointFoundation” in the above command.

After that I continued with the installation steps and managed to launch the setup.exe after completing the installation of prerequisites mentioned.
In the 3rd step under the “Step 3: Install SharePoint 2010” I select the “Server Farm” option and in the next step I selected the standalone option.I had no clue what so ever why I selected that option, but it happened for some reason and it worked.

Then I had to wait for a quite a longer time to complete the installation and prompted to run the sharepoint configuration wizard.
And finally after the configuration wizard completed, it prompted the newly created sharepoint team site.(See image at top)

Now sharepoint foundation 2010 at my finger tips so that I can start playing with it.

My classical box guitar

2010-07-11T08:17:00.004+05:30

Yesterday, I finished repairing my guitar which was given to me by one of my colleague, Anura.Thank you very much for giving me that and hope you won’t ask it again from me when you see the new look one.

Images before refurbishing :

I have already started lessons.Hardest part as a beginner is the tuning.Need to learn the trade sooner than later.

Web services extensions option in IIS7

2010-07-06T16:47:00.000+05:30

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/rakkimk/archive/2007/08/17/iis7-where-is-the-web-services-extensions-option-which-was-there-in-iis6.aspx

Antique world map jigsaw puzzle

2010-05-10T10:07:00.003+05:30

Completed puzzle is framed by myself and now hanging on the wall.

Pool table in action

2010-04-28T12:38:00.004+05:30

It has been a long time that I managed to play a game.Today I tried to play a game for a much needed relax.Take my word, it is indeed take some doing to play a perfect game.You need lot of patience as well as skill.Today , I realized that you need to practice continuously in order to keep your shape in the game and handling the cue is not going to be an easy task if you lose the rhythm.Practice make perfect is the order of the day.This is applicable in any where whether you are doing office work or any other work.And finally it will give you more pleasure specially when you are playing on a table which is built on my own.

How many of you remember Upali Wijewardena

2010-04-10T08:37:00.005+05:30

Found this nice article about Upali Wijewardena.Thought of sharing with you all.

An article by CIO of Xtra personnel (http://xtra.no)

2010-04-09T22:30:00.004+05:30

Found this article ,here ,in Norwegian language.On behalf of my colleagues and others who follow my blog, check the Google Translation of it bellow.Enjoy reading.

---- Translated text removed from here -----

Since the Google translation of this article was a total mess, Christian himself has translated it and placed it under the original post.Thank you very much for the translation Christian.

Puzzlepart web site launched

2010-04-09T09:40:00.009+05:30

Formula 1 – 2010 Season

2010-03-06T10:12:00.003+05:30

Who would have thought once Michael Schumacher retired after 2006 season will be back in action in F1.He tried to return back last year in place of injured Felipe Massa at Ferrari but couldn’t make it due to his neck problem.But this time around it has indeed happened and I can’t wait to see him on the track in season opener at Gulf Air Bahrain on next week end representing the team Mercedes GP which was the title winner last year under the name of Brawn GP.

It will be fascinating to see the races with the new rule changes for this year.One of the biggest change is that there won’t be refueling during pit stops during the race which means the cars will have a much larger fuel tank which resulted to have a different weight distribution to the that of last year’s car.The other major change is the point system where first 10 finishers will get points as the number of teams are 13 this year hence 26 drivers.

Return of Michael Schumacher will really make this season interesting and will get to know whether he is still the master class in F1.

Antique world map jig saw puzzle

2009-11-15T11:57:00.009+05:30

Recently I completed assembling the 1500 pieces jig saw puzzle.Before this my first puzzle was a 500 pieces one.It was a gift from my good old friend Amila Jayaratne and this one was presented by my father-in-law, Mr. Gunatilake.
This new puzzle by no means a easy walk in the park as you can see in the image above.
Normally you start the puzzle by separating the border pieces.So I too stuck to that but to no avail.The reason being there are no contrasting images to identify the correct pieces(Its just a single color boarder ss you can see in the image ).Then I was thinking how I am going to tackle this new challenge.So I changed my strategy.

Since there are clear lines , circles and letters , I started to separate them out.That was indeed the way to go.Then I first assemble the circle area.
After that it became relatively easy till I getting closer towards the border area.It was very hard to find the correct pieces and it took a considerable amount of time too.
After spending around 30 hours within the span of 2 months, finally , I managed to completed this.

My ultimate goal is to complete the world’s largest jig saw puzzle which has 24000 pieces.I have already ordered the miniature version of that which has 3000 pieces.Nishad ayya will bring that for me from UK end of this month.
Waiting for that .

Hierarchical Nant builds

2009-11-14T21:41:00.001+05:30

Found this very good article while I am trouble shooting a Nant build file failure.

http://www.pluralsight.com/community/blogs/keith/archive/2008/03/07/50388.aspx

The 12 factors to turn ASP.NET developers to SharePoint 2010

2009-11-10T10:55:00.002+05:30

Found this article on Share point dev wiki.
http://www.sharepointdevwiki.com/display/sp2010/2009/11/04/The+12+factors+to+turn+ASP.NET+developers+to+SharePoint+2010

Bandaranayaka College past pupil’s association’s new look web site launched

2009-11-09T10:34:00.002+05:30

It is my pleasure to inform that the much awaited new look past pupils association’s web site lunched yesterday during the 2009 OBA day.

www.bandaranayakecollegeppa.com

I would like to take this opportunity to thank Rasika Mahindasiry for his valuable efforts for the design of this new site.And further I should mention the name of Roshan Sooriyarachchi who is behind this entire project and making it a success.Job well done.

And looking forward to introduce more features into this in future.

Share point 2010 Hands-on Labs in C# and VB

2009-11-03T14:59:00.001+05:30

Developer hands on labs can be found at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=C010FC68-B47F-4DB6-B8A8-AD4BA33A35C5&displaylang=en#filelist

Good luck !

Embedding YouTube videos in your blog

2009-10-29T23:33:00.005+05:30

Very simple to do this.Just open the video you want to embed in YouTube and then right click on the video and click on the “Copy embed html” and then copy that copied html code into your blog entry markup.

Here is the embedded video into this blog entry :

References : http://www.youtube.com/youtubeonyoursite

Event full weekend

2009-09-21T08:51:00.010+05:30

Saturday, yesterday , started the day by going to the service station at 6:30AM in the morning.As usual I was the first to the service station and I was walking up and down in the premises till they started.Then came the owner of the station and he opened the doors to the pump house and generator house.

After about 45 minutes , the service man started the work with my car.It took 3 hrs to finish the job.

Then I took the car to the Tissa Electricals to check my radiator fan.The problem I had was , it was boiled when I come to the office on last Monday and I thought this may be due to the fact that my AC condenser fan was not working, the clue was I saw my heat indicator going up and when i turned off the AC it came back to the normal.So that was the history.

I told that story to the technician who run the place and I told I need to lay a harness to my power doors.After the removal of manual doors last year I replaced them with power doors, which has the options of power shutters , power mirrors , central locking , but never had a chance to complete the laying of the harness.

Then owner asked one of his technicians to take a look at this and Sampth is the name of this guy.Very talkative guy.After spending few minutes with him , I realized that he is not only talkative but also competent which is the most important thing.

Then he started to explore the vehicle.

First what he did was took the Carman Scan II diagnostic tool (a hand held device) which can be connected to the ECU via the interface provided (OBD-II),see the image at left.

Using that device he turn on/off the radiator fan,that concludes the signal is correctly passed into the fan, from the control unit.Then he concludes that by judging the speed of the fan, it has to be replaced and further checking the AC condenser fan it also has to be replaced.

Found a original AC condenser fan and get the fan unit and put it into the existing bracket.And found a radiator fan and replace it.Since Tissa electricals had recondition items , it wasn’t a difficult job for me to get the required fans.That saved me a lot of time.

The story was not ended there.While inspecting the fan, learn that the two power transmission belts also need to be replaced.One belt was already started to break from the edge.He said better to replace both at the same time.If I drive another hundreds of Km’s with those two, I could well be sit on the edge of the road with hazards on.

He recommended two brands to me which I haven’t heard.Because I am new to this belts.One was “Brando” and the other one was “Mitsuboshi”.

Then they started to remove the belts from the engine and by no means that was an easy job.

While it was going on Sampath started to remove all the door covers(apostings) and and estimated the length of wires required for the wire harness.

Estimation was 30m from number 14 and 10m from number 9.The number indicates the number of threads in the wire.That is 14 threads and 9 threads respectively.Plus power mirror switch and 3 gum tapes.

I had to go to “Pathma Motors” at kadawatha to bring those belts plus others.It took 1.5hrs by bus.

Once they got the stuffs started working on the harness and the belts.The time was 6:00PM , and stumps of the day.

Sunday morning at 8:30AM commenced the laying the harness.

To be continued…

Internal names should be used in SPQuery

2009-09-15T14:58:00.004+05:30

Today I found out an interesting issue when I accidentally changed a field name used in a query used in SPQuery.

I wanted to change the display names of my fields and after doing that I renamed all the usages of that field name in my web part code.

After deploying the solution I got the error message "One or more field types are not installed properly. Go to the list settings page to delete these fields"

I had no clue what so ever when you read that error message.This is not the only error message that share point generates which we cannot figure out by looking at this.

I spent considerable amount of time debugging the solution until I decided to Google the error message.

Then found that in one of the msdn forums that the internal names of the fields should be used in the CAML queries.

reference : http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sharepointdevelopment/thread/a2c6bed0-eee1-4f9b-b468-fc57c2e45c16

And that was indeed the trick.

US Open 2009 Men’s single final

2009-09-14T13:35:00.007+05:30

Who would have thought, the world number 6 seed Juan Martin Del Porto , Argentinean, will storm into final , by beating Rafael Nadal in straight sets to face non other than world number one Roger Federer who never loss at US Open since 2004.Without a doubt Federer will do everything to make it 6 in a row at Flushing Meadows.

Even though Federer has a 6:0 winning ratio against Del Porto , he will be a tough opponent in this final.I cannot wait to see this match which is schedule at not before 16:00Hrs which is early tomorrow morning in my time.That’s a worrying sign for me.

more info at www.usopen.org

SharePoint 2007 and WSS 3.0 Dispose Patterns by Example

2009-09-09T15:08:00.001+05:30

It is a good practice to make sure your solution is free of memory leaks.

Check this out :

http://blogs.msdn.com/rogerla/archive/2008/02/12/sharepoint-2007-and-wss-3-0-dispose-patterns-by-example.aspx

Use the SPDisposeCheck utility to examine your code.

Further references on this subject

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa973248.aspx

http://furuknap.blogspot.com/2009/08/spdisposecheck-in-visual-studio.html

How to create active directory users programmatically

2009-09-02T16:07:00.006+05:30

Recently one of my colleagues wanted a piece of code which can be created 500 users in Active Directory for some testing purposes.Knowing that this won’t be a big challenge I said I will give it a try.

Frankly speaking, initially I thought this will be a easy walk in the park.Creating the user in AD part was a piece of cake but the created user was not enabled by default.

I had to figure out how to enable a user account programmatically.That was the only tricky part.

Check the user enabling code segment in the code.(Setting the "userAccountControl" property of the user)

Here is the code

string ldapPath = "LDAP://" + server + "/cn=Users,dc=ec,dc=test";

DirectoryEntry entry = new DirectoryEntry(ldapPath, user, pwd);

for (int i = 0; i < userCount; i++)
{
string tempName = userPrifix + i;
DirectoryEntry newUser = entry.Children.Add("CN=" + tempName, "user");
newUser.Properties["givenName"].Add(tempName);
newUser.Properties["userPrincipalName"].Add(tempName + "@ec.test");
newUser.Properties["sAMAccountName"].Add(tempName);
newUser.Password = userPwd;

newUser.CommitChanges();

// Enabling the above created account
int flags = (int)newUser.Properties["userAccountControl"].Value;
newUser.Properties["userAccountControl"].Value = flags & ~0x2;

newUser.CommitChanges();

newUser.Close();
entry.Close();
}

References :

http://www.codeproject.com/KB/system/everythingInAD.aspx

http://www.computerperformance.co.uk/Logon/LDAP_attributes_active_directory.htm

How to change the default DispForm,NewForm and EditForm in SharePoint

2009-08-20T17:21:00.001+05:30

Read it here.

How to avoid recursive calls in list item event receivers in SharePoint

2009-08-18T19:35:00.014+05:30

I wanted to insert a value into a column in a list when adding and updating items in the same list.

First I registered the item event receiver into the list.

SPList list = web.Lists[listName];
list.EventReceivers.Add(eventType, assemblyName, className);

Then in the actual event receiver class I override the “ItemAdded” and “ItemUpdated” methods.



 public override void ItemAdded(SPItemEventProperties properties)
 {
 SPListItem item = properties.ListItem;
 string itemStatusValue = string.Format("Item added @ {0} by {1}", DateTime.Now.ToLocalTime(),
 properties.UserLoginName);
 item["columnName"] = itemStatusValue;

 item.Update();
 }

 public override void ItemUpdated(SPItemEventProperties properties)
 {
 SPListItem item = properties.ListItem;
 string itemStatusValue = string.Format("Item updated @ {0} by {1}", DateTime.Now.ToLocalTime(),
 properties.UserLoginName);
 item["columnName"] = itemStatusValue;

 item.Update();
 }

But when I debug this in VS2008 I noticed that, as the item get updated or added it always calling to the “ItemUpdated” method.Of course that is understandable since I am updating a column in the same list.

But I didn’t want that to happen.Then I found out that you can enable/disable event firing.

So the solution for that is ,

DisableEventFiring();
item.Update();
EnableEventFiring();

It is pretty straight forward once you get to know it.

More references on this : Visit BinaryJam

How to avoid inline codes in user controls in SharePoint web parts

2009-08-14T17:56:00.009+05:30

When I was at the beginning of developing web parts for SharePoint , I wanted to find a way of reducing the time consume to develop web parts using Web User Controls (*.ascx) as web parts.Otherwise you will have to write all the mark ups in the CreateChildControls method.

Check here how to use web application projects to develop web parts.

So I was very fond of that method till I figured out, this is not going to inline with the SharePoint deployment techniques.Especially if you are using wsp solution packages and 12 hive structure in Visual Studio with WSPBuilder.

Recently in a project that I was working with, I used a slightly different approach to which I was used to.That is not using web application projects but I used the user control(*.ascx file) with inline codes for the web part in the templatecontrol folder.

There are pros and cons having inline codes.

The code is visible to a person who has access to the server directly.

If it is a complex web part your lines of code will be very high and which will lead to readability and maintainability issues.

Today I managed to figure out how to move inline code into your main assembly of your SharePoint solution and I thought of sharing that with you.

SampleWebPartControl.ascx (user control)

What is important here is that the entry in the RED box in above image.That is the way you specify where the code behind can be found for this user control.

SampleWebPartCOntrol.cs(code behind)

The initialization of user controls you are using is paramount(check the RED box in this image).I had all sorts of problems till I sorted that out.

Solution Structure

Check where the items in the RED box in this image.

Subscribe to RSS feed of my blog

2009-08-13T09:04:00.006+05:30

Now you can subscribe to my blog using RSS.

Steps

Go to this RSS Feed.
Select the “Subscribe to this feed using” as you need.My recommendation is “Microsoft Office Outlook”.
Click on the “Subscribe Now” button.
Click on the Advanced… button.
Change the details as you want.
Click Ok and then click on Yes.

Now you have my blog feeds at your finger tips.

OR you can add the "Feed" gadget into your blog with the given feed url.

List content type troubleshoot

2009-08-07T08:29:00.007+05:30

Recently I had a problem with the default content types that are bind with a custom list.

I created an Announcement list and I have bind my own content type into it.Then I wanted to hide the default content type which is the “Announcement”.Initially I used the name to get the content type from the list but later I had to re factor it simply because, if we are to support multilingual we should not use names but id’s.

Then I thought this should be a piece of cake and I re factored it like bellow.

SPList list = web.Lists[listName];
SPContentType item = list.ContentTypes[SPBuiltInContentTypeId.Announcement];
item.Hidden = true;
item.Update();
list.Update();

To my amazement , as I activated the updated feature I got the error “Object reference not set to an instance of an object”.

And then I open this list from the SharePoint Manager and checked the ID of the content type “Announcement” and it is totally different one to the default content type id which is the “0x0104”.

Then I got some expert help on this and got to know that this is because what ever the bind content types in lists are a copy of the site content type.Thank you Bjorn for letting me know about it.

So here is the new code of doing it.

SPContentType item = list.ContentTypes[list.ContentTypes.BestMatch(contentTypeId)];

It was that simple once you got to know it.

So what you need to understand here is that adding a content type to a list means that you actually adding a copy of the content type.

SharePoint 2010 Sneak Peak

2009-07-28T15:54:00.003+05:30

Are you wondering about how will SharePoint 2010 look like.Here we go click on SharePoint Sneak Peek.

My new digital camera – Sony DSC-W270

2009-07-07T14:03:00.004+05:30

Time had come to change my very good old HP digital camera which is still working well apart from the noise in the image when took pictures with flash on.It really has a very good video recording without any issues.

The new one , Sony DSC-W270 looks really a good one and looking forward to the new experience with this.In a nutshell this camera has a 5x optical zoom and 12.1M pixels.More details on this camera can be found here.

SharePoint tools for developers

2009-06-20T02:47:00.003+05:30

There are very important tools that you can use while you are working with SharePoint development work.

I thought of putting down very important tools that you can use when comes to developing SharePoint projects.Those tools are really handy on reducing your development time as well as troubleshooting time.

WSP Builder – This is a VS extension which is fully cable of deploying sharepoint solutions.This is a dream tool you can think of the problem you are facing when comes to deploying SharePoint solutions.

Hats off to Carsten Keutmann

SharePoint Manger – This is a very useful tool to explore the every item in your SharePoint installation.

BareTail – This is also very important tool that can be used to view the SharePoint log files which lies in the 12 Hive.And you can use this tool to monitor any log file for that matter

Interesting article on Murali

2009-06-20T01:43:00.002+05:30

Image Copy right : © Ashish Padlekar

Very interesting article on Murali.

Read it here.

Document Template Management in SharePoint

2009-06-16T14:31:00.001+05:30

Very good article on SharePoint document template management.

Read it here.

Terminator Salvation

2009-06-14T23:19:00.003+05:30

I watched the move today @ Colosseum in Oslo.It was a great experience in that cinema.It is one of the few cinemas which has got THX CERTIFIED.Unbelievable sounds and high quality images.Truly a great cinema experience.It felt like you are a part of the film because of these surround sounds and high quality pictures.

More details on THX can be found at here.

You can view THX trailers here.First one is the one Colosseum showed before starting the movie today.

As a fan of Terminator film series I loved this one and it is indeed a action packed movie.Every time after watching a Terminator film, I am thinking in mind that there will be another one.Time will tell you.It becomes a reality in 3 times so far.

French Open 4th Round match - Rafael Nadal Vs Robin Soderling

2009-05-31T22:21:00.006+05:30

What a match it turning out to be.I am watching World no. 1 taking on Swede(23 seeded) on Star Sports.I am sure no one has bet against Nadal for this match.To date he has won 32 straight matches in Roland Garros in doing so won four French open titles consecutively(2005-2008).

At the time of writing this entry Nadal was 2 sets to 1 down (6-2,6-7,6-4)against the Swede and 2 all in 4th set and Nadal to serve.This could well be go down to the fifth set if Nadal do manage to win this set and if that happens it will be the first time Nadal has played a five setter in Roland Garros.That shows you how tougher customer the world no. 1.

It will take some doing against the Swede who is so powerful in serve as well as ground stokes.His display of ground strokes is amazing to watch and normally I have seen such serenity only from Nadal himself.Nadal has done that to so many opponents here in Roland Garros.But today its his turn to face the music from Swede.

But still Nadal is hanging out there with Swede.Now 4 all in 4th set and Nadal to serve.Absolutely fantastic game to watch.

Now the 4th set is in the tiebreaker and things not looking good for Nadal, 2-0 down with Swede serivng.2-1 Nadal to serve.Breath taking stuff out there.

Now the score is 6-1 in the tiebreaker and the 4 times defending champion is about to bow out from the 2009 French Open.Oh my god , Swede has done it.He has defeated the king of clay Rafeal Nadal who has never been beaten here in Roland Garros.What a major upset in French open 2009.Well played Swede.

Match statistics

Localization of web parts in SharePoint

2009-05-23T20:29:00.004+05:30

My colleague Sanjaya has posted a fantastic article on localizing SharePoint web sites and web parts.

One of the major problem when comes to localizing web parts is that you have to have all translations relates to the locale you are using, if you are to build the embedded resources.

So I would prefer let the customer do the translations rather than we do it.In that case if you can send the set of resources files ( *.resx ) to the customer he can easily open those files and he can do the translation as he needs.

What my colleague mentioned in his article is totally alright but it is not entirely to my likings when comes to localizing web parts because of the above mentioned reason.

So I just used the resources files (*.resx) but not deployed them as embedded resources.

How to do it ?

Add the relevant resource files in to your web part.
Use the following fragment of code to access the resource strings from the resource files as required in your controls.
HttpContext.GetGlobalResourceObject("<resource file name>", "<resource key>").toString()
Make sure to have the resource files in the “App_GlobalResources” directory of the corresponding web application project.

More can be read from the following references :

http://tomblog.insomniacminds.com/2008/02/25/sharepoint-internals-resources/

http://www.mikhaildikov.com/2007/03/sharepoint-resources-types-use-and_2163.html

One Flag One Sri Lanka - The dream of united land becomes a reality

2009-05-20T11:04:00.007+05:30

After 30 years of sufferings the Sri Lanka has become a terror free nation of the world.There are lots of celebrations going on SL these days.Yes it is indeed something to cheer about at this moment.We all know how we, as Sri Lankans ( Not only Sinhalese but also Tamils , Muslims as well ) suffer due to this terrorist activities.

IMHO now SL will face the real WAR of uplifting the standard of living of the civilians who caught up in this war.There are thousands of internally displaced people out there and the utmost thing to be done is to relocate them and let them live peacefully.

If we are to keep the ever lasting peace in SL it is paramount to address the issues they are having. And without doing that I don’t think we will ever live peacefully in our country.

SharePoint and Women

2009-05-12T09:33:00.002+05:30

I read a very interesting blog entry published by Bjørn Furuknap and I should definitely share this with you.Read it here.

Sri Lanka cricket At The High Table

2009-04-23T08:45:00.004+05:30

Currently I am reading the book of “Sri Lanka Cricket At The High Table” by Mahinda Wijesinghe none other than who proposed the concept of 3rd umpire to ICC.Read more about him from here.

I found there were so many unheard stories plus the records we have achieved so far from this book and it is worth reading.I recommend this book to all of the Sri Lankan cricket lovers.Not only cricket lovers but others too.

It is indeed unbelievable what Sri Lanka have achieved during the last 27 years after getting the Test status in 1982.

8 Characteristics of successful UIs

2009-04-17T08:34:00.004+05:30

Read a very very good article on things to consider when designing user interfaces.

8 characteristics are :

1. Clear
2. Concise
3. Familiar
4. Responsive
5. Consistent
6. Attractive
7. Efficient
8. Forgiving

Read the full article here.

Thank you very much Uchitha for sharing this wonderful article with us.

Fiddler to capture request from Firefox

2009-04-03T12:40:00.004+05:30

Fiddler to capture requests from Firefox you need to do a small configuration in Firefox.

In Firefox 3.0.8 (one I am using) follow the steps bellow

Go to Tools > Options > Advanced > Settings
Set the “Automatic proxy configuration URL” to “C:\Users\<user name>\Documents\Fiddler2\Scripts\BrowserPAC.js”.(NOTE : change the BrowserPAC.js path accordingly)
Click Ok
Close the Fiddler and open if you have already opened the fiddler.

Reference : http://www.fiddlertool.com/Fiddler/help/hookup.asp

Behind the scene :

What happens here is that , when you open the fiddler, the function “FindProxyForURL” in the “BrowserPAC.js” will change to this

function FindProxyForURL(url, host){
return 'PROXY 127.0.0.1:8888';
}

When you closes the fiddler it will change to

function FindProxyForURL(url, host){
return 'DIRECT';
}

Since you have configured the Firefox to look at this file, it will pick the proxy configuration automatically.

Problems I encountered :

After closing the Fiddler I wanted to browse some sites in Firefox but it didn’t work.It says “Connection Interrupted”.

Then I changed the proxy configuration to “No proxy” and it works.

Conclusion :

After using the fiddler make sure to revert the proxy settings back to the original in Firefox.

Worth looking at how IE handled this scenario.

Australian Grand Prix - 2009

2009-03-29T17:49:00.004+05:30

I am just watching the Race Day program on Star Sports and 20 minutes to start the race.What a qualification we had yesterday and no F1 giants (Ferraries,McLeraens,Williams, etc) in the front row of the grid.

P1 – Jenson Button from team Brawn GP ( Honda old team last year)
P2 – Rubens Barrichello from team Brawn GP
P3 – Sebastian Vettel from team Red Bull

Who would have thought that the old Honda team mates will be in the front row of the grid today.This is the old Honda package with a Mercedes engine in it.Honda will be kicking them selves if they do manage to win this opening race of the season after this performance by the new team Brawn GP.What a start to the new kid on the block.

Oh my god , power goes off, will I be able to watch the much waited start of the season.

Power is back :) hoorey. How dejected I was.

About to start the race, five red lights are illuminated and off they go and hence the race started.

Wonderful start by the Jenson Button and poor start by the team mate though.

3 laps to go and started the drama.Jenson Button is the race leader and 3 rd placed Robert Kubica tried to over take Sebastian Vettel and paid the ultimate prize , both crashed into each other and both hit the side wall after damaged to the left front suspension.Safety car was deployed and Sebastian Vettel tried desperately to drive the car through to the pit lane by 3 wheels but to no avail.

All these drama fell very well into Rubens Barichello’s hand who was in 4th place before this drama, he finished the race 2nd after his team mate Jenson.

What a start to the new team Brawn GP, and Team Principal Ross Brawn is the man who behind this team and pulled off this stunning performance which finished 1st and 2nd by a rookie team in his first appearance after 1954 French Grand Prix.

What a start to the F1 season and what a race to watch on live and I don't have words to explain the entertainment I got today.

Who says F1 is boring after this start to the season.Now the question is can the team Brawn continue in the same vein.From what I witness today they will really be a great threat to other front runners.Will keep my fingers crossed on this.

Formula 1 – 2009 season

2009-03-23T18:22:00.003+05:30

I am really looking forward to seen the F1 2009 season with all the changes to the rules and regulations which starts on this Friday with the practice sessions at Albert Park in Melbourne.See this preview. This year, most of the teams have done so many technical changes to their package.

One of the new features included into this year was the KERS(Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems).

This year it is going to have only 17 races and the Yas Marina Circuit being the new comer will host the final race of the season.

Visit Formula 1 official web site for more information those who are curious about what’s all about this sport.

Enabling anonymous access in MOSS

2009-03-12T18:28:00.002+05:30

Recently I wanted to enable anonymous access to one of my sites in Share Point.I enabled the anonymous access to the web application from the IIS 7.Unfortunately it didn't work.

Then only I started googling on this and found out this wonderful blog post by Sven Gillis.

It indeed save my time and sharing with you all too.

Keeping your cool while driving

2009-03-05T10:49:00.004+05:30

This is something that I always had in my mind, how to keep your composure ( or cool in another word ) while you are driving.I am pretty clear that we all have come across situations where you totally get frustrated while driving with those totally out of mind drivers.The "frustration" is not the ideal word to show you how badly you felt it, "p..... off" is the right phrase I feel.Sorry for being very offensive.

Who are the notorious drivers in our country? Number one is the bus drivers, and two , 3 wheeler drivers and at last but not the least, motorcyclists in my opinion. Out of those, bus drivers are the most insane.Totally out mind , bunch of idiots who has taken the responsibility of taking commuters to their destination.Who would have wanted to be on board with such a stupid in control.

I know for sure that you don't need any examples of how they drive on the road.

So the question is how you keep your cool while driving.Following are the things I have tried out to keep my stress level to a minimum.In a way it worked really well for me.

Don't ever try to retaliate if the driver in front of you do something stupid while you are driving.That is the cardinal mistake you could have done.I know your adrenalin is pumping and you are furious to over take that bugger and learn a lesson to him.By doing this you will be putting yourself in greater danger, because you are not focusing on your driving and you are just thinking about learning a lesson to that idiot.I have experienced that and I know how was it like.
Let pedestrians to cross over when ever you have the chance to do so.That will really cool you down for a few seconds and let you gather your breath.That doesn't mean that you have to do it all the time.But I have few situations where you can , let them go by.

if you are not in that much of a hurry just put on breaks and let them cross.
if there is a long queue behind you then just stop and let them cross, because they (pedestrians) don't have to wait for a long time to cross.Otherwise just keep on going because they can cross after you pass the crossing.

Don't ever be restless while you are driving.I know you are in a hurry to go to office or any other work then you are trying to over take others.Then of course you in hot seat.So be patient and take you time to over take.
Never ever try to overtake at bends.I have done so couple of times and avoided some close shaves.
Try to avoid honking your horn like a crazy.I know for sure you have experienced the driver behind you is honking like a crazy, no need to explain what is your feeling at that time.So it is the same feeling the driver in front of you get if you do the same.So try to use it less and see.Of course you have to use your horn in situations where you have to let the others know about your presence.

I know, you readers also have different styles of driving.And I would like to know about those and reactions to what I have mentioned here.

Visual Studio 2008 extensions for SharePoint

2009-02-16T11:26:00.004+05:30

I wanted to install VS 2008 extensions for SharePoint in my Vista box.I downloaded the package from here and started installing and got the following message

"This product can be installed if Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 has been installed first."

As usual searched in Google and found this blog entry on how to resolve the issue.

It was indeed save lots of time for me. Thanks goes to who ever contributed to this thread.

Sanomee mark her first birth day @ an orphanage

2009-02-10T18:02:00.006+05:30

To mark the first birth day of our daughter , we decided to pay a visit to an orphanage and provide an alms giving to them.

It was indeed a fantastic feeling when you see those children enjoyed the occasion.And you felt that you have done something very very important to bring a smile to their faces.

It was a small place, well organized and taking care of 27 children.All of them are bellow the age of 15 years and all are girls.

As we finished preparing the dining room, the bell was rang by a child and then came all the children and was in a queue in front of the door.

Then one by one entered in to the room and took their respective seats.After having the meal they return to the main area.

There were lots of things in my mind when I noticed their behavior.

Most of them were very shy and reluctant to make eye contact with us.That showed the state of the mind they were in.Must have felt alone and neglected by their parents for what ever reason for that matter.I was felt really sorry for them.In a way they are lucky, they have been raised in this orphanage.Unless otherwise they are no more in this world in my opinion.I had no clue what might have gone in their mind.It must be very complicated to them.

Finally one of the children delivered a speech.She did thank us for what we did for them and made well wishes to my daughter to be a strong one in this society.

It was a very touchy one for me to listen.I was wondering how she made her composure while delivering that speech. She must have had so many things in her mind.It may have been a common thing to her, to deliver such speech to the people who comes to visit them in such occasions.I can still feel what I felt at bottom of my heart at that time.

Thought of sharing this with you all and if we can help such people in any means that really help them to live another day with a great smile in their faces.

Ajax with Share Point

2009-01-15T16:06:00.002+05:30

Recently I had to integrate Ajax with Share Point in order to provide much needed user experience in my current project.One of the main concern was when ever a user submit a request in a page the page get refreshed.For some users it is indeed a frustrating experience.

As every one of you do ,tell me if not, I searched in Google with the term "Integrating ASP.NET AJAX with SharePoint". Bingo.... here comes the results and I read the preview of the first search result and opened the entry.

It was from the "Mike Ammerlaan's Blog " and I started reading the post and realized that this is exactly what I wanted and no need to look for a better post for the job at my hand.

I followed all the steps for the "Adding Microsoft ASP.NET AJAX Technology to SharePoint Pages" and after about hour and so I managed to integrate Ajax to my sharepoint installation.

So I thought of blogging this wonderful post for those who are reading my blog.

Link : Integrate ASP.NET Ajax with SharePoint

Then I modified one of my web part used in the project with an update panel which takes care of your asynchronous postbacks.And then I deployed the web part in the integration server , to my embarrassment the web part was not working.Actually nothing got displayed.Started scratching my head and figuring out what went wrong.

Going back to drawing board and started every web.config entry for Ajax integration and that was fine.Then suddenly I saw in the top of the ascx page the version of the "System.Web.Extensions" assembly is 1.0.61025.0 which is the version I have installed in my development environment.Then I checked the version in the sharepoint environment.That is 3.5.0.0 which comes with the .Net Framework 3.5.And that was that. I changed the version and here comes the details.

In this page I have a list of items in a one list box and you can add selected items to another list.So started to check whether it was working.I selected an item from the source list and click on the button to move and it worked like a charm.ie the item get moved to the destination list without page getting refreshed. I was really happy with it.

But then I wanted to move another item from the list and nothing happened.Mission failed. :(

So I started looking back at the post I mentioned above and it stated that, there is a hack you need to do because of the way windows sharepoint services works.

So that was the trick and I managed to do that trick with the help of the following blog entry.

Link : Easy ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX Extensions 1.0 and Office SharePoint Server 2007

Finally I managed to integrate Ajax with sharepoint and used an update panel in my web parts.

Credit goes to those two blogs.

Looking back at year 2008

2009-01-03T12:27:00.003+05:30

It has been a fantastic year to me and my family.There were some critical moments in my family life as well as in my work.I would like to list down some of the key moments of the past year for me.

The first one was the best in the lot. Which was the birth of my lovely little daughter.It was a fantastic moment in my life to see her coming out in to this world , and I did witness it from the theater beside my lovely wife and the first cry my daughter made was still echoing in my ears.Everybody who were in the theater was amazed of the loud of it.It was a fantastic feeling and really hard to put into words.

The second one being the delivery of xtracare portal for Xtra.When I took over the project, it was challenging simply because of the time frame for the delivery which was merely a 2 months or so.Had to cope with a dev team which consists of a SE and an intern which made your life bit tougher to transfer the domain knowledge as well as learning curve for the new comer especially with the timeframe we had.Ultimately we pulled it off in a style with the fantastic team effort.Hats off to the entire team which includes dev team , QA team BA and the PM.

The third one was a bit of a scare to my life.It almost took my life unless my seat belt came to the party.It was a very hard day at office and after releasing the xtracare build to the QA and the dev team set to leave the office.I still remember the time we left the office was exactly 00:00 hrs.I told one of my colleague Sudheera, "look at the time we are leaving the office..." and we had a laugh.It could well have been the last laugh, but luckily not to be.

I was bit sleepy as I getting closer to home and I told my self, hang on for a second I am almost there no need to stop and have a nap or a glass of water.The last moment remember was passing the 20th mile post and then to realized that my car went out of the road (to my right) and hit a fence and rolled over and landed on the road facing towards where I was coming. That was very freakish and I had no clue how did it happen.Luckily for me not a single vehicle or a person was on the road at the time of the accident.If that was the case , the incident could have been tragic.When you saw the car aftermath, it was hard to believe that how did I escape from that fatal accident.Answer to that question was wearing the seat belts.Very simple.

So I still use to do it no matter how shorter your journey is, wear your seat belts.Food for thought for you readers, make a habit of it.

The fourth one was moving to an annex closer to my wife's office.The reason was my wife had to resume her work after maternity leave and needed to find a way to feed my daughter during the day time.It is highly unlikely that we staying at Yakkala and come to feed during the luncheon interval from her office at Bellantota, simply impossible.

So we took the decision to move to a place which within the closer range to my wife's office so that she can pay a visit during the luncheon interval and feed the baby.

Credit must go to my parents who volunteered to look after our daughter and joined with us to stay at Borelesgamuwa.I am sure that was a tough call to them.Thank you mom and dad for your support in big time.

Finally I would like to take this opportunity to thank my wife for all the support given to me during my difficult moments.She helped me all the time when it was required and always ready to listen and come up with the best possible answer to the situation.That is one of the most admirable aspect of her.And thank you for every thing you did for me.

Infragistics 2006 vol 3 CLR 2 installation failed in Vista

2008-10-24T20:22:00.004+05:30

I have successfully installed the Infragistics 2007 Vol 1 CLR 2 in Vista.But I wanted to install the previous version of Infragistcs.

First I removed the latest version and then started installing the previous version.Then I got the following error message "Error 1606. Could not access network location %SystemDrive%\inetpub\wwwroot\"

After searching the web, found the following entry from Infragistics.

http://devcenter.infragistics.com/Support/KnowledgeBaseArticle.aspx?ArticleID=9983

But I did only the registry entry change value of the key "PathWWWRoot" from "%SystemDrive%\inetpub\wwwroot" to "C:\inetpub\wwwroot".

Not needed to disable the UAC as suggested in the above article.

After installing I reverted the registry entry value back to the original value.

SharePoint development tips

2008-10-20T19:29:00.002+05:30

Since I am working with SharePoint I thought of posting some development tips and tricks as I found so that I can easily recall them if I need it again for any reason.

How to retrieve a list from an existing site and iterate items in the list

SPSite _site = SPContext.Current.Site;
SPWeb _web = _site.OpenWeb();
SPList myList = _web.Lists["<List name>"];
foreach (SPListItem item in myList.Items)
{
String title = item["Title"];
// your implementation
}

Retrieve a list using SPQuery

Here the "Office" is a lookup field in the "Personnel" list.
So you need to use "FieldRef" and "Lookupid".
Check the implementation bellow.
SPQuery query = new SPQuery();
query.Query = "<Where><Eq><FieldRef Name='Office' LookupId='TRUE' /><Value Type='Lookup'>1</Value></Eq></Where>";
foreach (SPListItem personnel in teams.GetItems(query))
{
// your implementation
}

How to use "AND" property in SPQuery

Here I need to select items where Office = 1 and Team = 2.
Query looks like this.And note that the reference fields are lookup type.
SPQuery query = new SPQuery();
query.Query = "<Where>
<And>
<Eq><FieldRef Name='Office' LookupId='TRUE' /><Value Type='Lookup'>1 </Value></Eq>
<Eq><FieldRef Name='Team' LookupId='TRUE' /><Value>Type='Lookup'>2</Value></Eq>
</And>
</Where>";

Blog it from Windows Live Writer (WLW)

2008-10-20T19:07:00.001+05:30

Today when I was inspecting my tool bars in Windows Internet Explorer , I just found a drop down called "Blog It" in the windows tool bar.I curiously clicked on the "New Post" option in the list and got a set up wizard for creating a new blog or to connect to an existing blog.

Since I already have a blog, I selected the last option and provided the credentials of my blog.That is that and I am ready to post from WLW.

This is very easy since you don't have to log into you blog account every time you need to do a post or edit a post , etc.It's just a matter of selecting the option from the "Blog It" drop down in windows tool bar.

I haven't used any other posting tools so far.Any one who has done this using any other tool do not hesitate to comment about comparison with WLW.

Title winner for 2008 edition of Formula 1

2008-10-17T10:24:00.009+05:30

The penultimate race , 2008 FORMULA 1 SINOPEC CHINESE GRAND PRIX will begin on this Sunday (19th Oct).And every F1 fans will keen to watch this race as McLaren's Lewis Hamilton can clinch the title on his second appearance after debut last year.He almost made history last year by being the first ever rookie driver to win the title, but he failed to do so.Will he be able to keep that away from his mind and do it on this Sunday.

With the current standings only 3 drivers have the chance to fight for the title, namely

1. Lewis Hamilton - 84 points -Team McLaren
2. Felipe Massa - 79 points -Team Ferrari
3. Robert Kubica - 72 points -Team BMW Sauber

Sadly for me, after my favourite Ferrari's driver Michael Schumacher, Kimi Raikkonen is out of the championship contenders with 63 points so far.

There are so many permutations for the title contender and all above mentioned drivers have a chance to become the champion.
But there is very little window of oppertunity for Robert Kubica to become the champion given the condition of the car (BMW Sauber) he has.

Lewis can do it on this sunday if he keeps his cool head.But should not by any means be under estimate the red Scarlet of Felipe.He will do every bit to become the champion.

It is interesting to read into the comments made by Renaults's Fernando Alonso who has a rivalry between Lewis Hamilton who was the teams mate last year in McLarens.

During this week end it is interesting to watch the start of the race and the turn 1 of the cercuit.We might see the safty car deployed very early stage of the race.

I am really looking forward to watch this race on this Sunday on Star Sports.

I would love to see Lewis pull it off this time even though I am a Ferrari fan.

Windows media player 11 cannot play the movie - codec missing ??

2008-10-16T17:39:00.007+05:30

Couple of weeks back I got the movie "Death Race" ( http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0452608/ ) from one of my co employees( Savindu ).

Since I was busy with the project work I thought of watching it after the release.
Just after the release I got my new laptop with Windows Vista installed and was working with setting up my development environment in it.So further delays of watching the movie.

After that I wanted to watch that movie and I opened it with the Windows Media Player in my new laptop.
To my amazement I could only hear the sounds but no visuals. I was scratching my hair and thinking what could be the reason for it.

Then I realized that one of the codec is missing and needed to install the codec.Then I start Googling and search for codecs for Media player in Vista.Non found which relates to Windows Vista in Microsfot sites.

Then I forget about searching for codecs and installed Real Audio player 10 Gold and tried to play the movie(.avi) file.

Bad to worst, got the same error and luckily it mentioned about the component that could be missing in order to play this file which is "ICM.XVID".

Then I Googled with that name and found the following link http://www.divxmovies.com/software/

Then I downloaded the XviD codec v1.1.3 and installed it.
Official site : http://www.divx.com/

Bingo here we go , at last I can see visuals and sooner than later I am going to watch the movie.

But my worry is why Microsoft cannot ship Windows Vista with all the codecs OR at least make avilable those codecs in their support sites.

This is rediculous.......

Microsoft Visio 2007 Trouble shoots

2008-10-11T22:33:00.004+05:30

I had a problem with Microsoft Visio 2007 installed in Vista.

When I was closing the Visio application a message popup saying that the "Visio is not responding" and having a problem with COM add-in.

After doing some googling, find out that the problem could be on of the add-ins you have installed in Visio.

Then I opened the add-in manager in Visio and disabled the only add-in I had which is the "Sent to Bluetooth".I hadn't install this adding but it is coming with the default installation.

I have already disabled the blue tooth in my box, so that could be the reason to this issue.

But I havent tried out the other way round which is enabling the blue tooth and then closing the visio before disabling the add-in.

Setting up dev environment in Vista

2008-10-11T22:14:00.006+05:30

Things I have done in Windows Vista while creating my development environment.

1. Installed the SP1.
2. Disabled the Business Contact Manager in Outlook with Business Contact Manager.
Reference : http://support.microsoft.com/kb/903094

Thanks goes to my co-developer Chatura for providing me the link.

3. Installing VS 2005 and VS 2008 side by side

First install VS2005 and then VS2008

Step 1 : Installed VS 2005 ( Team server architect )
Step 2 : Installed VS2005 SP1
Step 3 : Installed VS2005 Vista SP
Step 4 : Installed VS2008

4. Installing SQL Server 2005 developer edition

Step 1 : Run the owc11.exe

This will install the MS Office web components 2003

Step 2 : Make sure to remove the express edition ( MS Sql Server Mobile )

I did install without removing it and finally intallation failed. :(

Once again thanks goes to Chatura for helping me to trouble shoot the issue.

Step 3 : Install SQL Server 2005 dev edition

5. Installing Nant

Step 1 : Extract the nant bundle into a folder
Step 2 : Add the Nant.exe path into the environment variables (path).

6. Adding the Nant Addin into VS2005

Step 1 : Extract the zip contents into [User Name]\Documents\Visual Studio 2005\Addins
Step 2 : Start VisualStudio
Step 3 : In Tools>Addin Manager check NAntAddin and Startup columns
Step 4 : Now activate the Add-in in Tools>NAntAddin
Step 5 : The Add-in should now be visible (you can dock it and resize as desired)

So far so good, I need to see how the box going to perform when I start developing again in full throttle.

New Operating System - Windows Vista

2008-10-09T11:10:00.003+05:30

I got my new laptop with windows Vista installed.My first reaction to that is not that good simple because the bad user stories I have heard from my co-workers as well as others.

But I decided to take that challenge and start working with it.Then only you can figure it out all the speculations are correct or not.

Time will let me know about my decision.

The very first thing I did with it was installing the SP1. Thanks for my co-worker Chatura for the tip.

Many more to follow since I have to create the same development environment I had with the Windows XP which used for a long time.

I will post all the steps which I had to follow to create my development environment in my next post.

Site in production

2006-10-16T09:43:00.001+05:30

Today I am very happy about the fact that, my first project using the DNN technology is in production - www.xtra.no
It has been a Herculean effort from all the team members and finally it paid rich dividends to all parties.
Customer,Company - Eurocenter DDC and the team itself.

My First Blog

2005-10-21T11:46:00.000+06:00

This is my very first blog which was published year ago and I have modified it since I got my own domain name www.itrathnasekara.com

Thank you very much Chamindu ( www.chamindu.com ) who is my co developer for telling me how to get my own domain name from www.godaddy.com