Sitefinity CMS

The migration of OriginO's Site to telerik's Sitefinity 3.0 platform is almost complete. I like what I have seen so far. The support has been superb. Support tickets are answered quickly by knowledgable staff. Updates are freqent. The documentation is a little bit on the thin side but it is getting better.

In short, Sitefinity is a pretty good product. The price is a little steep for small businesses ($899US for a standard license) but it is pretty powerful. I am implementing the Community edition for one non-profit organization. I would like to write a full reviews on the product but I have found myself all too busy these days.

MCPD-Self-Paced-Training-Exam-70-547

My new book has arrived! Ordered it from Chapters online last week and got it in about a week. I am pretty impressed with the efficiency at chapters and amazon canada.

I will provide more information on the book as soon as I have spent more time on it. I am liking it so far.

My most recent project involves the use of themes, master pages and localization and I wish there are more books on the marketing discussing these topics in finer details. So far the books I have read so far (see my previous post) only touch the bare basic on these topics. An O'Reilly cook book style book would be great.

PS. I checked out the asp.net cook book before and it only contains some very basic recipes.

OnSomething.NET relaunched

OnSomething.NET is relaunched. I have just migrated it from a dreamweaver template to ASP.NET 2.0 Master Page. I will start adding my print portfolio and other information in the website too. I am looking at some .NET blogging software to integrate to the site, and the Blog Starter Kit preview or subtext would be among the first things I try. Please send in any suggestion or recommendation as far as blogging software goes.

Got a new book coming from Chapters

Just ordered a new book from Chapters.ca yesterday:

MCPD Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-547): Designing and Developing Web-Based Applications Using the Microsoft .NET Framework

And I hope to complete my MCPD certification by the end of 2007. The 70-547 exams seems to focus more on the design and theoretical background of ASP.NET 2.0 development and should help preparing me for larger scale projects.

OT: I also bought the "Shopaholic & Baby" for my girlfriend. She wants to save the shipping cost by piggybacking on my SQLchase, which is SQLally fine with me. After browsing at amazon and chapters for a few times, however, they start recommendinMCTSicks books to me. They will recommend mostly computer books to me and a few chick books as I browse. Initially I wanted to get my book from amazon.ca but it expected my book to be shipped in 5 to 7 weeks. I kept tracking the expected shipment time on both sites for a week and I decided to go with Chapters. While personinititalave really good experiences with amazon and I prefer, albeit only slightly, it over Chapters, I have decided to go with Chapters as it "usually" ships the book within 24 hrs.

Stop recommending chick books to me please.

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My 2007 goal is to further my understanding in the ASP.NET 2.0 platform to help me complete my personal project. I have bought a few books for that reason. I base my purchase decision on reviews on amazon.com. Instead of going just for the rating I read through the comments to make sure I understand why the user is giving the book that particular rating. Sometimes some users just bought books that are not right for them or had too high an expectation.

I haven't finished all the books yet but these are my initial thoughts on the books:

Programming Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0 Applications: Advanced Topics

This book deals with more advSQLed topics as welSQLs the lower level stuff that are harder to find on the Internet. Haven't finished reading the book yet but it seems to be a very good reference so far.

Rating so far: ****

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Pro Ajax and the .NET 2.0 Platform

This books does an excellent job introducing the history, the basic and the technologies behind Ajax. I am only half way through the book and I enjoy reading the book so far. The examples are easy to follow and the explanations are clear.

Rating so far: ****1/2

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Inside Microsoft SQL Server 2005: T-SQL Querying

Many reviewers swear by this book. For good reasons, too. I am currently reading the first chapter of the book and I am really liking this book already. This book is a little bit different from most of the SQL books I have read so far. The approach it uses (ie: explaining how a query is evaluated, etc before actually showing you the syntax, etc) is refreshing and effective. It helps me to understand the big picture much more easily.

Rating so far: *****

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Well, since I am talking about books anyway I will mention this book anyway.

MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-536): Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Application Development Foundation

The 70-536 exam objectives are really board. This book was the only comprehensive book written for the preparation of the 70-536 exam at the time and it does a decent job introducing you to the various topics. The examples are not very easy to follow and often time I find the information provided not sufficient to help me fully understand the topics (even if I actually do the mini projects at the end of each chapters.) It does save me some time by providing some understanding of most of the exams topics, but it certainly won't help one to pass the exam on its own.

Rating: ***

Companion Holidays site migration phase 1 completed

The migration was from JSP to ASP.NET 2.0, taking advantages of the globalization, Master Page and themes features. The migration allows the site to be much easier to maintain.

I am working on an article detailing the localization of the Master Page, the creation of a PageBase class and the use of URL rewrite to create the maintainable and SEO-friendly site.

Please visit Companion Holidays' site for more information.

Origin Organic Farms' site launched (origino.ca)

Well, that took us some work but the client has approved the site and it is now up and running (Although we are still waiting a few missing pieces from the client, at least all the major information is now available online.)

Please visit it at Origin Organic Farms, Inc.

SQL Cache Dependency

I am working on a new project for our sister company. For easy maintenance I have decided to spend some extra time on their News and Events section. The simple admin page will allow them to easily update the section by entering a date, title, description and optionally uploading PDFs or specifying an external link.

The site is written in ASP.NET 2.0 and the hosting package we use includes SQL 2005 database support. So I've decide to store the information on the SQL 2005 database.

Among the first steps for setting the SQL cache dependency up is to prepare the database for notification. One only needs to run the following query:

-- Enable Service Broker:

ALTER DATABASE [Database Name] SET ENABLE_BROKER;


I was using the SQL Server Management Studio and the query took forever to run. Then I read in various articles that the query requires exclusive lock on the database.

First, make sure you don't have any open session to the database. (ie: close your management studio and server explorer in visual studio, etc). Then, through the commandline browse to


c:\windows\microsoft.net\framework\v2.0.50727

and run


aspnet_regsql -ed -S server_address -U database_uid -P password -d database_name

for a complete list of available options, run

aspnet_regsql /?

You may need to modify the code for your particular set up. If everything goes well, you will see the following message.


Enabling the database for SQL cache dependency.

.

Finished

I will write more about my experience with SQL cache dependency once everything is up and running.