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SuperWasp

Productivity tips, reviews, tools, software and gadgets.

 
Microsoft Web Platform Installer

Microsoft has released a new tool aimed at web developers: Microsoft Web Platform Installer. Although it’s still a beta, it’s already a one-stop shop to install all necessary tools, service packs and extensions, including IIS, ASP.NET, SQL Server 2008, Visual Web Developer 2008, all of the current IIS Extensions and more!

 ms-web-platform-installer

 
Once installed, this tool automatically discovers new additions and updates to the platform, keeping you up to date.

Additionally, Microsoft has launched a new website for web professionals (designers and developers): microsoft.com/web 

Go to: Microsoft Web Platform Installer site, or download wpilauncher.exe immediately.

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  Posted by oVan on Wednesday, October 08, 2008 | PermaLink | 0 comments
Visual Studio 2008 and .NET 3.5 are here!
The Wait for Visual Studio 2008 is Over!

On Monday, Nov. 19, Microsoft announced that Visual Studio 2008 and the .NET Framework 3.5 were released to manufacturing (RTM). With more than 250 new features,Visual Studio 2008 includes significant enhancements in every edition, including Visual Studio Express and Visual Studio Team System. Developers of all levels – from hobbyists to enterprise development teams – now have a consistent, secure and reliable solution for developing applications for the latest platforms: the Web, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, the 2007 Office system, and beyond.

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  Posted by oVan on Monday, November 19, 2007 | PermaLink | 0 comments
ResolveUrl with no Page or Control in sight
While working (sweating) on a client's website, I needed a reliable ResolveUrl method without making use of the Page or Control classes. A few quick Googles resulted in some working functions, although not all of them resulted in the same output as the real ResolveUrl.

Some solutions use the VirtualPathUtility for that, however it throws an HttpException when the url to be resolved contains a query string. The most elegant, and from what I can tell also the most correct function came from a comment by Richard Deeming on Rick Strahl's blog:

public static string ResolveUrl(string originalUrl)
{
if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(originalUrl) && '~' == originalUrl[0])
{
int index = originalUrl.IndexOf('?');
string queryString = (-1 == index) ? null : originalUrl.Substring(index);
if (-1 != index) originalUrl = originalUrl.Substring(0, index);
originalUrl = VirtualPathUtility.ToAbsolute(originalUrl) + queryString;
}

return originalUrl;
}


To resolve the full URL, he uses the Uri and UriBuilder classes:


public static string ResolveServerUrl(string serverUrl, bool forceHttps)
{
Uri result = HttpContext.Current.Request.Url;
if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(serverUrl))
{
serverUrl = ResolveUrl(serverUrl);
result = new Uri(result, serverUrl);
}
if (forceHttps && !string.Equals(result, Uri.UriSchemeHttps))
{
UriBuilder builder = new UriBuilder(result);
builder.Scheme = Uri.UriSchemeHttps;
builder.Port = 443;
result = builder.Uri;
}

return result.ToString();
}

This code works beautifully!

Source: read the original article and many interesting comments: ResolveUrl-without-page.

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  Posted by oVan on Monday, October 29, 2007 | PermaLink | 1 comments
Free screen capture tool: Cropper
A little known free screen capturing tool is Windows itself: push the PrtScn (the good ol' Print Screen button) and you have an instant copy of your entire desktop. Using Alt+PrtScn you'll get only the active window. This method works in all Windows versions since Windows 95 if I recall correctly.

However, this method is not so practical for a lot of people. If you want to use your screen grab in an email, you can only paste it via Outlook, not via Outlook Express. In that case you need to open MS Paint, or Paint Shop Pro, and paste it there as a new image, then save it as a jpeg, and then go back to your email to attach it as a file. Yuck.

Here's a powerful free screen capture tool called Cropper. The latest release also works on Windows Vista, and it contains screen capture capabilities to:
  • BMP format
  • PNG format
  • JPG format
  • clipboard (of course)
  • directly to printer
In addition, there are some great (free) plugins available on CodePlex that let you dump your screenshot to other formats or destinations:

  • Cropper.AnimatedGif

  • Cropper.AviFormat

  • Cropper.CountdownPng

  • Cropper.SendToEmail

  • Cropper.SendToFlickr

  • Cropper.SendToOneNote

  • Cropper.SendToTinyPic

Just grab your free downloads here:


ps: Cropper is written in C# on the Microsoft .NET platform.

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  Posted by oVan on Saturday, March 24, 2007 | PermaLink | 0 comments
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