Lunarmedia

JavascriptCompressor.com upgraded

Anders Vindberg — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 08:13:00 GMT

The increasingly visited website javascriptcompressor.com has been updated with the latest compression algorithm from Dean Edwards, now version 3.0. In addition, a forum for javascript discussion has been setup.

Translatorbay Online

Anders Vindberg — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 08:12:00 GMT

The first initiative of Lunarmedia's move into the translation business is complete. Translatorbay is online. It will feature tools and discussions relevant for translators. It will be a supporting website of the parent site Lingbay, which is in the first phase of development. Lingbay will be an auction house for translation jobs that freelance translators can bid on. It will be open and registration will be free.

A note on Divxstation, it has been archived due to old age. All activity has moved to Subscene.

Other news: A Graffiticms based website has been setup for a new Danish Sail Club - Sejlklubben Teglholmen. They still have available bådpladser ved Teglholmen.

Firefox 3.0 - im loving it!

Anders Vindberg — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 12:00:00 GMT

So today I upgraded to Firefox 3.0 RC2 - and what a wonderful idea that was. For anyone who is using Firefox 2.x and believes that it has become a bit bulky - shift to Firefox 3.0, it is fast, feels light, and rock solid!

In combination, I would also suggest that you tune in on FriskyRadio - the best technolounge in town!

CommunityServer - Enabling Language Selection for Anonymous Users

Anders Vindberg — Tue, 27 May 2008 14:22:00 GMT

I stumbled upon this great forum discussion today. It details different solutions to allowing anonymous users the option of choosing a website language - without being logged in. The best suggestion is to add new users to the Community Server database (setting "IsAnonymous" to true) one for each country, eg. AnonSpanish, AnonEnglish, etc. Then, adding the following code when the user selects a new language:

if (CSContext.Current.User.IsAnonymous)
            {
                HttpCookie formsAuthCookie; 

                if (CSContext.Current.User.Username.Equals("AnonymousSpanish"))
                {
                    formsAuthCookie = FormsAuthentication.GetAuthCookie("Anonymous", false);
                }
                else
                {
                    formsAuthCookie = FormsAuthentication.GetAuthCookie("AnonymousSpanish", false);
                }

                UserCookie userCookie = CSContext.Current.User.GetUserCookie();
                userCookie.WriteCookie(formsAuthCookie, 365, false);
            }
}

CommunityServer - Linking to an Url from SiteUrls.Config

Anders Vindberg — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 13:55:00 GMT

The first thought would be to use the CSControls:LinkData (or CSLinkData) control and specify the resourceName. The second logical solution would be using the ResourceControl defining that it should act as a link. None of this works.

The solution is to use the SiteUrl control and specify the UrlName:

<CSControl:SiteUrl UrlName="upload" Text="" runat="server" />

The example above refers to the SiteUrls/locations/location/url node in SiteUrls.Config with the name "upload".

Running a stored procedure from Windows Task Scheduler

Anders Vindberg — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 11:35:00 GMT

Rightclick in the Scheduled Tasks area and choose "New" -> "Scheduled Task". Then in the run field add the following:

sqlcmd -S .\SQLExpress -i c:\expressmaint.sql

In the sql file you can simply write: EXEC dbname.dbo.sp_AnyStoredProcedure.

Why don't just use SqlAgent you may ask. In SqlExpress the SqlAgent has been feature cut - because express is free.

FREETEXTTABLE not finding short words

Anders Vindberg — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 15:37:00 GMT

When using Full-Text Indexing in MS-Sql you may find that search results for "the" or "saw" doesn't return any results. To resolve the issue, go to "properties" of the Full-Text index select "Columns" and change the "Language for Word Breaker" setting to "Neutral". If "English" is selected, then common English words are not indexed.

CS - Only show content if user is SystemAdministrator

Anders Vindberg — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 13:17:00 GMT

Working with Community Server a common task is to show content specific for a certain role user. Here is a simple example using a placeholder:

<CSControl:PlaceHolder runat="server">
    <DisplayConditions>
        <CSControl:UserPropertyValueComparison
                ComparisonProperty="IsAdministrator"
                UseAccessingUser="true"
                Operator="isSetOrTrue"
                runat="server" />
    </DisplayConditions>
    <ContentTemplate>
        any content...
    </ContentTemplate>
</CSControl:PlaceHolder>

Instead of "IsAdministrator" you could insert "IsAnonymous" in order to show content for unregistered users.

IIS6 HTTP Compression in four quick and easy steps

Anders Vindberg — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 13:21:00 GMT

1. To enable HTTP Compression in IIS6 for all websites, open the IIS Manager, goto Properties of "Web Sites" and select the "Service" tab. Check the "Compress application files" and "Compress static files", and specify a location for the temp cache dir (if you want to). Maximum dir size is usually set to 1000MBs. Click "OK".

2. Then right-click on "Web Service Extensions" and add a new Web Service. Name it something like "HTTP Compression" and add the file "C:\WINDOWS\system32\inetsrv\gzip.dll". Check the "Set extension status to Allowed". Press "OK".

3. Then right-click on your server (local computer) and goto Properties. Check the "Enable Direct Metabase Edit". Press "OK".

4. Run this small batch - IIS6HttpCompressionSettings.zip (Made by me). It will add several common file extensions to the MetaBase.xml list so that e.g. css, js, axd, etc are included in the compression. And it will set compression level to 9 (is suggested by several .Net gurus).

In short, the batch runs several of these commands to make the appropriate changes: cscript C:\Inetpub\AdminScripts\adsutil.vbs set /w3svc/filters/compression/gzip/HcFileExtensions "css" "xml" "htm" "txt"

Once you have run the batch, simply do an iisreset and you are finished.

Alternatively, If you want to change the MetaBase file manually open the file "C:\WINDOWS\system32\inetsrv\MetaBase.xml" and search for the "IIsCompressionScheme" xmlnode. In the first two nodes (deflate and gzip) change the HcDynamicCompressionLevel to 9. If you want compression of aspx files (most likely), then add "aspx" to the HcScriptFileExtensions in both xmlnodes. Be sure to follow the format that is already used (e.g. not inserting any blank spaces). Save the file and do an iisreset.

For more detailed explanation of the different steps please goto: http://weblogs.asp.net/owscott/archive/2004/01/12/57916.aspx For information about enable or disabling compression of a single website see more at Microsoft's Technet article on HTTP compression.

Creating a customized theme in Community Server

Anders Vindberg — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 11:33:00 GMT

When customizing a theme in Community Server 2007.1 it is important to do a Find and Replace in the new Theme folder. E.g. If the leanandgreen theme is used as the basis of a new theme, do a Replace of "themes/leanandgreen" with "themes/mysitetheme". Unfortunately, several CS files still has hardcoded theme references which needs to be replaced with the new theme name.

In addition, it is important to edit the DynamicStyles.aspx file in the "style" folder of the new theme. It also contains hardcoded reference to the original theme. If this is not done, any Theme Configuration (from the control panel) will not have any effect on the website.

Silverlight will set content free!

Anders Vindberg — Sun, 02 Sep 2007 18:09:00 GMT

What Flash haven't been able to achieve is Silverlight's goal. Why haven't Flash replaced loosely structured HTML already!? Personally, I was expecting this to happen 10 years ago when I first saw a jumping ball made in Flash 2. Obviously, there were several barriers at that time, primarily the Shockwave Flash plug-in hadn't propagated the web yet. Further, competition has increased as HTML (the DOM) has evolved, CSS introduced and JavaScript enhanced. Flash simply wasn't up for the challenge of defining and laying out content in a accessible manor. Ohh well, maybe their focus was set differently - i guess they were, lets make games!

Having a browser-independent plug-in run on a platform-independent browser functioning as a platform for development is difficult enough to articulate so lets not even start to imagine how difficult it must be to develop. In the early days, 10 years ago, Flash was my candidate. Since then I found XHTML as the given choice. But seeing the latest version of Silverlight 1.1 portraying as a Windows-Mini downloadable plug-in for any browser on any OS (eventually) lifts my eyebrows. It is equal to mixing Java applets with Flash and most importantly setting content free! It is accessible in strict formatted XML, and so is most parts of the graphics (XAML) for development sharing (like HTML). In a way, you could say they are mimicking what's already happening on the open web with XHTML 2.0, so no credit to MS. But how big is this "threat"? They are doing everything by the book this time (given the fact that Google eventually will index Xaml files of course).

Safari/Webkit for Windows

Anders Vindberg — Wed, 23 May 2007 11:14:00 GMT

Are you in the need of testing your website in Safari (the WebKit layout engine), and sitting on windows machine, then look no further. First install the Apollo Runtime, and then grab the Apollo application called Scout, a small simplified browser that uses the WebKit layout engine. According to Adobe's FAQ, it uses the same layout engine as Safari on Mac OS X and KHTML Browser. For completeness, it should be noted that an early implementation of WebKit for windows called the Swift browser is no longer being developed on. Also, I have encountered a small layout divergence from Scout and older versions of Safari, so be aware of that.

Looking for a CSS Safari Hack (this in particular) I can inform this also works with Scout.

It seems that, as a web-developer, we need to compatibility-test with four chief engines:

Trident - Internet Explorer
Gecko - Mozilla Firefox
WebKit - Safari/Apollo
Presto - Opera

At least running on a windows machine we can now test each rendering engine in one go.

The overlooked benefits of anchor linking (to any website!)

Anders Vindberg — Sat, 12 May 2007 10:48:00 GMT

Lately I have changed several of my primary bookmarks. For instance, my link to Digg.com is now http://digg.com/#wrapper, iGoogle is https://www.google.com/ig#tabs and Noscope is http://noscope.com/#main - it takes me right to the content im interested in. It seems to be an overlooked benefit of hypertext that it is possible to anchor-link to element id's whether or not it the original purpose of these id's. Come to think about it, maybe we need a new attribute indicating that this specific HTML element is a anchorpoint on to which a user could link to (instead of looking in the source as I have). It could be implemented in the same way RSS-feeds are today - Mozilla are you reading this :)

Prototype - How to check several checkboxes

Anders Vindberg — Fri, 11 May 2007 10:42:00 GMT

Prototype is a somewhat complex JavaScript library though thoroughly documented it still misses out on some points. For instance, I have a list of checkboxes for which at least one has to be checked. If none of the checkboxes in the group are checked then the user should receive a message indicating the missing action. At first, the most intuitive solution was to use the form.getValues() method in combination with a find() enumerator. However, that method can only loop through an entire form. So I needed a function that could loop through element groups within a form. As always best illustrated with an example:

<ul id="FF_Microsoft">
   <li>
        <input name="FF_MicrosoftDislike" id="FF_MicrosoftDislike" value="1" type="checkbox" />
        <label for="FF_MicrosoftDislike">I generally dislike Microsoft</label>
   </li>
   <li>
        <input id="FF_MicrosoftNone" type="checkbox" value="1" />
        <label for="FF_MicrosoftNone">No, none of the above</label>
   </li>
</ul>

With the following Javascript:

function IsChecked(el) {
return $$('#' + el + ' input').find(
function(e) {return e.checked;});
};

And in order to use the function you simply:

if(IsChecked('FF_Microsoft') != null)
{
// Do something
};

The naming used in the example may seem a bit strange (its from my upcoming questionnaire).

IE6 Ajax error "object doesn't support this property..."

Anders Vindberg — Wed, 09 May 2007 18:22:00 GMT

Yes, it is often that IE doesn't performe as it should! And often it is difficult to debug the error. Lately I was receiving a "object doesn't support this property or method.." error in IE6 when the Ajax open() method was called. It works just fine in Firefox and IE7 but IE6 was not saving any data. It should be noted that I am using the Prototype library which automatically retrieves the correct XMLHTTP-REQUEST object. So far so good. The relevant part was in another place. Im on a Win 2003 box and I un-installed IE7. In short, the solution was to reset the security configuration of IE6 to Medium. Somehow, the settings left from the IE7 install had triggered a setting that caused the Ajax to fail.

I hope this helps someone, spend all day on it Grrh!

Heads-up on Silverlight

Anders Vindberg — Thu, 03 May 2007 12:41:00 GMT

Silverlight (formerly known as WPF/E) is on the move. If you need hosting for your Silverlight apps, Microsoft is supplying 4GB of free space at https://silverlight.live.com/?wa=wsignin1.0. For quick insight into development of Silverlight apps in Visual Studio see this video by Scutt Gu. With regard to Community Server, Bryant Likes is working on a Silverlight CSModule to ease the task of inserting Silverlight in blogposts.

The battleground has been defined by all contestants (Apollo/Flex, Silverlight), and the answer is untold, who will win the heart of developers? Who will win this API-war? And does it matter? When it comes to entertainment, maybe it does, but what concerns information I think HTML5/XHTML2 will prevail.

Http Compression using a Http Module

Anders Vindberg — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 12:38:00 GMT

It is easier than ever to enable http compression in dotnet 2.0 using an open Http Module from Blowery called HttpCompression. However, one should be aware to exclude a couple of files, in particular axd files as errors has been reported when compressing javascript files. Simply add this to the web.config:

<excludedPaths>
  <add path="WebResource.axd"/>
</excludedPaths>

A tutorial on how to use the compression module, see this article

Lunarmedia Renewed!

Anders Vindberg — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 21:43:00 GMT

About 3-4 months ago I decided to get a professional branding company to take on Lunarmedia. It is what has materialized into what you see now, the new Lunarmedia website and a dedicated direction towards becoming a true dot-com company. I will bring detailed information about the transformation on a later date. As of now, the progress below (four rockets) illustrates how the logo came into being:

Overall this has been a good experience but it always come as a surprise each time I endeavor on launching or upgrading a website - it takes a great deal of time to get all the pieces together, the database setup, the graphics, the markup, all the settings, and so forth. Not to mention the content - authoring - that needs to be formalized.

On a conclusive note, it is amazing to have brought Lunarmedia's new identity into life! Personally I think it looks great and have good feeling about it! What do you think?

FtpWebRequest Self Signed Certificate (Auth TLS)

Anders Vindberg — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 10:56:00 GMT

I recently installed Web Deployment Project (uses MSBuild which automatically comes with .Net 2.0) for Visual Studio 2005 to automate the website deployment process. A useful extension pack for MSBuild is called Community Tasks - in particular it includes Zip and FtpUpload tasks. Now we are getting to the point. If you need to make a SSL ftp connection (and approve a self-signed server certificate) using the FtpUpload task, you need to extend the current version of FtpUpload with the following (request is a FtpWebRequest instance, and EnableSSL is a public property):

 request.EnableSsl = EnableSSL;

// This approves any Server Certificate (self-signed)
ServicePointManager.ServerCertificateValidationCallback = delegate(Object obj, X509Certificate certificate, X509Chain chain, SslPolicyErrors errors)

{
 return true;
};

If you dont want to mess with the community.tasks.dll library you can download the new dll and accompanied schema files from here:MSBuild.Community.Tasks with SSL FtpUpload support

Thanks to the following: Using FtpWebRequest to do FTP over SSL

On a specific note, if using FTP Serv-U you need to set its security level to "Allow SSL/TLS and regular sessions" to enable Auth TLS.

Community Server Wiki

Anders Vindberg — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 10:38:00 GMT

The CS Wiki is online. For developers its most interesting to view the "Developers" section (from the left menu) - currently consisting of a well-written review of the Chameleon theming engine, worth a look (again look at the left menu).

Master's Thesis Registration RC 1

Anders Vindberg — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 16:13:00 GMT

Having been occupied with commercial work, this thesis has been on hold until now. The direction is similar to my preliminary thoughts. The first candidate for Thesis Registration follows below.

THE COMPETITIVENESS OF MOZILLA FIREFOX AND ITS PRESERVATION AND ELEVATION OF THE INTERNET AS AN OPEN PLATFORM
- a cross sectional study of the Mozilla Firefox web-browser -

Keywords: Open Source; Open Standards; Dominant designs; Hyper-Competition; Technological Innovation; Network Effects; The Internet, The World-Wide-Web.

What is the topic

A new browser war has emerged between proprietary Microsoft and open source Mozilla Corporation. It is a battle of Microsoft veteran Internet Explorer (IE) versus Mozilla Firefox. The situation is not unfamiliar to conglomerate Microsoft Corporation as this battle closely resembles previous struggles with pioneering Netscape Navigator – though the main difference being that Mozilla Firefox is open source, has an effective Application Program Interface (API), and most importantly a profitable business model.

This is a cross sectional study of the Mozilla Firefox web browser. First and foremost the question “What drives dispersion of Firefox?” is raised. In order to answer this, a historical review is conducted followed by a contemporary description of the competitive environment. Secondly, an online questionnaire survey addresses the relevance of product innovation, ideological views, and open standards with regard to the dispersion and success of Firefox.

Specifically the main research question can be broken up into three principal questions:

What drove the first cycle of dispersion?
Are there signs that indicate a decrease in dispersion?
Will the next cycle of innovation increase dispersion?

Each of these equally separates into a subset of questions that contain one or more operationalized hypotheses. In particular, the importance of technological innovation is assessed, the influence of savvy internet users, ideological views, and general propagation barriers are examined.

Why is it relevant

The web is changing. A multitude of new emerging websites are often cited as being Web 2.0 websites, a hypothetical versioning of web development that entails usage of new standardized technology, in particular asynchronous JavaScript calls also known as AJAX. In addition, the Web 2.0 definition goes beyond technological advances including new ways of structuring online communication, specifically with blogs, increased user interaction and customization, and XML-structured data services - the world-wide-web is changing. The technology behind, the web standards, the perception of the web are evolving. Reawakened, following several years of solitude – some would say that Microsoft is to blame – the internet is becoming a viable platform for development of increasingly sophisticated software applications.

The rapid dissemination of Mozilla Firefox is totalling at an average market share of 16% as of writing and has a trend signalling further growth. Mozilla Firefox is and will be an influential player in the development of an open and increasingly powerful world-wide-web.

Firefox is a platform for development on two levels: (1) it is an application that can be extended with third-party software modules. It is possible to develop software that runs on Firefox in similar ways that, for instance, Microsoft Word runs on Windows XP; (2) it is a platform for development and execution of websites.

In the next development phase of Firefox, version 3.0, Mozilla is striving to combine these two development paradigms so that interaction between web applications and the web browser are improved and generally closer connected. This opens new possibilities for offline execution of web applications. A practical example would be Google Spreadsheets: a web application that allows for entering, editing, and manipulation of structured tabular data. The spreadsheet is saved on Google’s servers and can only be retrieved and updated with an online connection to the internet. With version 3.0 of Firefox, Google Spreadsheets would be able to save spreadsheet input and configuration on the local computer, thus enabling offline usage.

These new guidelines for the future of Firefox and the Internet as an open platform are reliant on the continued dispersion of Firefox. It is therefore interesting to investigate the dynamics that control dispersion of Firefox, both from an academic perspective with regard to the importance of technological innovation and emergence of dominant designs, but also from a human point of view with regard to a free and open Internet.

How will I tackle it

The research strategy utilized includes both primary and secondary data. The latter has been conducted using a classic desktop research approach – primarily consisting of scholarly articles, writings of industry specialists, and key notes from online article and forum discussions. Primary data is collected through two separate sources. First, statistical data concerning historical web browser market shares are collected. Secondly, a quantitative online questionnaire survey is conducted.

The survey process is composed of several steps that may be iterated or circumvented in any order. However, the initial sequence follows this path: (1) a focus group of roughly 20 people is set to discuss the topic in a private internet forum. (2) Pilot testing of the questionnaire is conducted, first with 10-20 subjects who have no prior knowledge about the survey, and afterwards with the focus group. (3) Questionnaire data collection is executed through word-of-mouth marketing and website advertisement. An attempt to get this survey on the main website of Mozilla Firefox will also be made. (4) Analysis and interpretation of data: Summaries are developed, patterns identified, and statistical techniques applied. (5) Results are discussed with focus group – Are the results really showing what I think they are showing?

Combining these research approaches should result in a reliable conclusion that may guide the Mozilla Corporation or evidently suggest areas of research that may need more investigation and focus.

E-mail -> email -> mail

Anders Vindberg — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 08:48:00 GMT

It seems to become increasingly common to call "e-mail" or just "email" for simply "mail". Latest confirmation comes from Google Apps - accessing my lunarmedia.com emails (using Gmail interface) it struck my eyes to see "Mail" in the main navigation! Now that email is mail, mail will probably become post.

The web, the corporation, and people

Anders Vindberg — Sun, 28 Jan 2007 20:31:00 GMT

I though it would be interesting to bullet point the key take-aways from the Symposium ITxpo 2006 Webcast. Overall it summarizes the direction of how people and enterprises are and will be using, servicing and developing the web.

Focus areas of the future will be:

Deployment, configuration/management, and service of software.
Maintaining communities around products/services

The main reasons are commoditization of hard- and software, a shift in the balance of power toward the consumer and specifically toward the employees as their personal digital life becomes an increasing part of the corporate assets.

Firefox download: limited to two files at the same time

Anders Vindberg — Sun, 28 Jan 2007 15:24:00 GMT

Downloading multiple files in Firefox is possible, but limited. It only allows two consecutive connections (two files) at one instant. If you want to be able to download more than two files at a time, first type: about:config in the address bar. Then search for this: network.http.max-persistent-connections-per-server, double-click it and change the number 2 to e.g. 10.

Community Server CSModules - CreateUpdatePost

Anders Vindberg — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 11:14:00 GMT

Looking through the Cojax source viewer at code.cs.org I found the CSModule "WeblogTitleModule" empty - I actually needed an example of a WeblogPost event. As a result, I created one, here it is if you need it:

public class CreateBlogPost : ICSModule { #region ICSModule Event Wireup public void Init(CSApplication csa, XmlNode node) { csa.PrePostUpdate += new CSPostEventHandler(csa_PrePostUpdate); } private void csa_PrePostUpdate(IContent content, CSPostEventArgs e) { if (e.ApplicationType == ApplicationType.Weblog) { WeblogPost post = content as WeblogPost; if (e.State == ObjectState.Create && post != null) { // Do something! } } }