DotNetKicks.com : Stories kicked by orca

Papercut vs smtp4dev - Testing mail sending locally

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 07:07:57 GMT

Testing mail functionality in code using external mail servers has always been a hassle. If the mail manages to dodge antispam and various other mischievous services, it'll probably take several minutes to receive. On our Exchange servers it'll typically take 10-15 minutes before a locally sent mail actually arrives back in my inbox. We can do better!

Bundling image requests for increased performance

Mon, 07 Jun 2010 19:38:51 GMT

A common scenario in RIA's is to show a large amount of small pictures on a single page. Let's say we want to show 100 images in a grid. While the simplest approach is to just put in 100 image objects and load in the images one by one, I believe it can be done smarter...

Going Lazy<T> with System.Lazy

Tue, 25 May 2010 19:30:52 GMT

Taking a look at the how to use the System.Lazy namespace in .Net 4.0. One of the pretty cool new nuggets inside the .Net 4.0 framework is System.Lazy and System.Lazy. What System.Lazy brings to the table is a way to create objects which may need to perform intensive operations and defer the execution of the operation until it is 100% absolutely needed.

Writing a calculator in C# using SableCC

Thu, 01 Oct 2009 07:11:07 GMT

Writing a calculator is a simple task - just add nine buttons labeled 1-9 and add a plus and minus button and we're almost good to go. In this entry I'm going to write a calculator called SimpleCalc that does not have a GUI, instead it'll take in an arbitrary expression and calculate the results of it. The input I'll use as my immediate goal is: 25-37+2*(1.22+cos(5))*sin(5)*2+5%2*3*sqrt(5+2)

Combining paths with multiple parts

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 20:04:23 GMT

Improving on Path.Combine to more easily enable the combination of multiple path parts.

The cost of latent logging code

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 09:22:08 GMT

Logging is an integral part of most applications, whether it's for logging performance metrics or causality data. Avoiding performance hits due to logging can be tricky though as we don't want to spend CPU cycles on the logging infrastructure when logging is disabled, while still keeping the full logging ability when required.

More ASP.NET MVC Best Practices

Wed, 06 May 2009 19:16:02 GMT

In this post, I'll share some of the best practices and guidelines which I have come across while developing ASP.NET MVC web applications. I will not cover all best practices that are available, instead add some specific things that have not been mentioned in any blog post out there. Existing best practices can be found on Kazi Manzur Rashid's blog and Simone Chiaretta's blog.

How to test your multi-threaded code (part 1 of 3)?

Wed, 06 May 2009 23:01:04 GMT

CHESS is the answer. At least this is what we have best right now.

ASP.NET MVC Tip: Turn on compile-time View Checking

Mon, 04 May 2009 20:01:05 GMT

I like the compiler to catch as many errors as possible before I start debugging or release my application. This also applies to code nuggets in ASP.NET MVC views, especially since these are not unit-testable. This article shows how to enable compile-time View checking for ASP.NET MVC projects.

Implementing a simple genetic algorithm

Fri, 01 May 2009 17:01:02 GMT

In this blog post I'll give a quick introduction to what genetic algorithms are and what they can be used for. We'll implement a genetic algorithm that attempts to guess an RGB color by evolving upon a random set of initial guesses, until it at some point evolves into the correct RGB value.

NHibernate Unit Testing

Sat, 02 May 2009 21:31:14 GMT

Good introduction to unit testing with NHibernate and SqlLite from Ayende.

Static Method Interception in .NET with C# and Mono.Cecil

Sat, 02 May 2009 02:01:02 GMT

Interested in Mono.Cecil? A very short introduction to a very cool and powerful tool.

Solving deadlocks through locking hints

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 19:01:45 GMT

Deadlocks in any database can be a hard beast to weed out, especially since they may hide latently in your code, awaiting that specific moment when they explode. An API website, exposing a series of webservices, had been working fine for months, until I decided to run my client app with a lot more threads than usual.

Using Squid as a reverse proxy with a .NET url rewriter

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 04:17:55 GMT

Once you start receiving visitors from all over the world, a new kind of scaling issue arise. This article looks at how we can use the open source Squid proxy to alleviate the problem.

Sorting projects and solution folders in VS 2008

Thu, 26 Mar 2009 21:59:46 GMT

How to get projects & folders sorted correctly in VS2008!

Deciphering a SQL Server data page

Thu, 26 Mar 2009 19:44:29 GMT

SQL Server stores all of it's data in what is basically a large array of "pages". Each page is exactly 8kb and can contain various kinds of data, depending on the page type. In this entry we'll explore how to decipher a data page.

Query Optimization - A Case Study

Fri, 20 Mar 2009 15:29:57 GMT

What is the normal process of determining the need of an optimization, and how to actually do it? This is a case study from today.

Utilizing transactional NTFS through .NET

Sun, 08 Mar 2009 04:00:57 GMT

We're used to using transactions when dealing with the database layer. Transactions ensure we can perform multiple queries as one atomic event, either they all succed or they all fail, obeying the rules of ACIDity. Until Vista, performing transactional file operations haven't been possible.

Generic Dijkstra's Algorithm

Wed, 14 May 2008 03:22:11 GMT

Through various projects, I've had to do some shortest-path finding in a connected graph. An efficient and straight-forward way to do this is using Dijkstra's Algorithm. While I've used the algorithm on several occasions, it's only now that I've rewritten it in generic form.

Spawning threads in ASP.NET can be dangerous

Fri, 02 May 2008 05:35:13 GMT

In my earlier blog post about the dangers of using Response.TransmitFile, I gave an example of a workaround involving spawning a new thread in the ASP.NET page. While this does solve the issue at hand, it presents us with a new way to kill our application even quicker than last.

Mapping datareader to objects using Reflection.Emit

Fri, 02 May 2008 05:33:41 GMT

I've previously written of how to automatically map a DataTable into a strongly typed collection of objects. There's a problem though, it's not fast... I wanted to improve on it, and this is what I ended up with.

Response.TransmitFile + Close will kill your application

Thu, 10 Apr 2008 02:35:53 GMT

Just before last weekend I noticed that a website I'm responsible for started spitting out "Server is busy" messages, not something you want to see on a website with millions of visitors per day. The quickfix was to recycle the application pool, and thus I solved the symptoms by setting a 15 mins recycle cycle on all the application pools. Not exactly optimal, but sometimes pissing your pants is the way to go.

XmlOutput vs XmlSerializer performance

Sat, 29 Mar 2008 23:16:04 GMT

I got quite a lot of comments for my XmlDocument fluent interface, and I'm very glad I did. I'm always open towards new ways to solve problems, and I got a couple of suggestions to my post that I afterwards experimented with. One of those is using the XmlSerializer to serialize strongly typed classes (or structs - performance is the same) into XML. Here's a performance comparison.

Setting up and testing Active Directory failover

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 22:17:59 GMT

Shows how to setup an Active Directory failover machine and the effects it has on your AD dependent WCF services.

Why asp.net MVC is so awesome.

Fri, 29 Feb 2008 11:16:03 GMT

The number one reason why asp.net MVC is the best thing ever.