Single huge .css file vs. multiple smaller specific .css files?

Thursday, February 25, 2010 by Nate Bross

I asked this on Stack Overflow:

Is there any advantage to having a single monster .css file that contains style elements that will be used on almost every page?

I’m thinking that for ease of management, I’d like to pull out different types of CSS into a few files, and include every file in my main <link /> is that bad?

I’m thinking this is better

1. positions.css
2. buttons.css
3. tables.css
4. copy.css

vs.

1. site.css

Have you seen any gotchas with doing it one way vs. the other?

Marc Edwards answered (100 upvotes):

A CSS compiler like Sass or LESS is a great way to go. That way you’ll be able to deliver a single, minimised CSS file for the site (which will be far smaller and faster than a normal single CSS source file), while maintaining the nicest development environment, with everything neatly split into components.

Sass and LESS have the added advantage of variables, nesting and other ways to make CSS easier to write and maintain. Highly, highly recommended. I personally use Sass (SCSS syntax) now, but used LESS previously. Both are great, with similar benefits. Once you’ve written CSS with a compiler, it’s unlikely you’d want to do without one.

http://lesscss.org

http://sass-lang.com

If you don’t want to mess around with Ruby, this LESS compiler for Mac is great:

http://incident57.com/less/

Or you could use CodeKit (by the same guys):

http://incident57.com/codekit/

WinLess is a Windows GUI for comipiling LESS

http://winless.org/

Originally posted on Stack Overflow — 295 upvotes. Licensed under CC BY-SA.

Glowing WPF Buttons

Tuesday, February 16, 2010 by Nate Bross

Someone asked on Stack Overflow:

After clicking the WPF buttons in our app they glow blue, back to original color, back to blue, etc. This appears to be default behavior on Windows Vista/7. It does not happen on XP. Any advice?

I posted the following answer, which was chosen as the accepted answer and received 9 upvotes:

You need to override the default button template – http://mark-dot-net.blogspot.com/2007/07/creating-custom-wpf-button-template-in.html should get ya started.

Specifically Section 3:

<ControlTemplate.Triggers>
    <Trigger Property="IsMouseOver" Value="True">
        <Setter TargetName="border" Property="BorderBrush" Value="#FF4788c8" />
        <Setter Property="Foreground" Value="#FF4788c8" />
    </Trigger>
    <Trigger Property="IsPressed" Value="True">                   
       <Setter Property="Background" >
           <Setter.Value>
               <LinearGradientBrush StartPoint="0,0" EndPoint="0,1" >
                   <GradientStop Color="#FFFFD190" Offset="0.35"/>
                   <GradientStop Color="Orange" Offset="0.95"/>
                   <GradientStop Color="#FFFFD190" Offset="1"/>
               </LinearGradientBrush>
            </Setter.Value>
        </Setter>
        <Setter TargetName="content" Property="RenderTransform" >
            <Setter.Value>
                <TranslateTransform Y="1.0" />
            </Setter.Value>
        </Setter>
    </Trigger>
    <Trigger Property="IsDefaulted" Value="True">
       <Setter TargetName="border" Property="BorderBrush" Value="#FF282828" />
    </Trigger>
    <Trigger Property="IsFocused" Value="True">
       <Setter TargetName="border" Property="BorderBrush" Value="#FF282828" />
    </Trigger>
    <Trigger Property="IsEnabled" Value="False">
       <Setter TargetName="border" Property="Opacity" Value="0.7" />
       <Setter Property="Foreground" Value="Gray" />
   </Trigger>
</ControlTemplate.Triggers>

Originally posted on Stack Overflow — 9 upvotes (accepted answer). Licensed under CC BY-SA.

Building an ASP.NET MVC Master Page Menu Dynamically, Based on the current User's "Role"

Thursday, February 4, 2010 by Nate Bross

I asked this on Stack Overflow:

I’ve seen some similar questions, but none that look like what I’m trying to do.

This is my current implementation w/out any security:

<div id="menucontainer">
    <ul id="menu">              
        <li><%= Html.ActionLink("Main List", "Index", "AController")%></li>
        <li><%= Html.ActionLink("Product List", "Index", "BController")%></li>
        <li><%= Html.ActionLink("Company List", "Index", "CController")%></li>
        <li><%= Html.ActionLink("User List", "Index", "DController")%></li>
    </ul>
</div>

This is fine, and the above works. I have [Authorize] Attributes setup on the Actions for CController and DController to prevent unauthorized access – but I’d like to remove those items from the menu for users who don’t have the correct Role, because when they see it and click on it and it tells them they don’t have permission, they’ll want it. If they don’t know it’s there, that’s just better for everyone involved…

Something like this is ultimately the goal I’m trying to get at, but I’m looking for the more MVC Flavored aproach, where the “view” is “dumb”:

<div id="menucontainer">
    <ul id="menu">              
        <li><%= Html.ActionLink("Main List", "Index", "AController")%></li>
        <li><%= Html.ActionLink("Product List", "Index", "BController")%></li>
        <% If(Role = Roles.Admin) { %>
        <li><%= Html.ActionLink("Company List", "Index", "CController")%></li>
        <li><%= Html.ActionLink("User List", "Index", "DController")%></li>
        <% } %>
    </ul>
</div>

jeroenh answered (15 upvotes):

I have done something like this:

• use a common base class for my controllers (‘layer supertype’)
• in the BaseController, override OnActionExecuted (you could also define an ActionFilter attribute for this)

Something like this:

    protected override void OnActionExecuted(ActionExecutedContext filterContext)
    {
        // build list of menu items based on user's permissions, and add it to ViewData
        IEnumerable<MenuItem> menu = BuildMenu(); 
        ViewData["Menu"] = menu;
    }

In the master page:

    <% var model = ViewData["Menu"] as IEnumerable<MenuItem>; %>
    <% Html.RenderPartial("Menu", model); %>

(Note: in reality, I have a MasterViewModel that contains among others the menu model)

Originally posted on Stack Overflow — 15 upvotes. Licensed under CC BY-SA.

Relative Paths in Javascript in an external file

Tuesday, February 2, 2010 by Nate Bross

I asked this on Stack Overflow:

So I’m running this javascript, and everything works fine, except the paths to the background image. It works on my local ASP.NET Dev environment, but it does NOT work when deployed to a server in a virtual directory.

This is in an external .js file, folder structure is

Site/Content/style.css
Site/Scripts/myjsfile.js
Site/Images/filters_expand.jpg
Site/Images/filters_colapse.jpg

then this is where the js file is included from

Site/Views/ProductList/Index.aspx

$("#toggle").click(function() {
    if (left.width() > 0) {
        AnimateNav(left, right, 0);
        $(this).css("background", "url('../Images/filters_expand.jpg')");
    }
    else {
        AnimateNav(left, right, 170);
        $(this).css("background", "url('../Images/filters_collapse.jpg')");
    }
});

I’ve tried using '/Images/filters_collapse.jpg' and that doesn’t work either; however, it seems to work on the server if I use '../../Images/filters_collapse.jpg'.

Basically, I want have the same functionallity as the ASP.NET tilda – ~.

update

Are paths in external .js files relative to the Page they are included in, or the actual location of the .js file?

Juraj Blahunka answered (146 upvotes):

JavaScript file paths

When in script, paths are relative to displayed page

to make things easier you can print out a simple js declaration like this and using this variable all across your scripts:

Solution, which was employed on StackOverflow around Feb 2010:

<script type="text/javascript">
   var imagePath = 'http://sstatic.net/so/img/';
</script>

If you were visiting this page around 2010 you could just have a look at StackOverflow’s html source, you could find this badass one-liner [formatted to 3 lines :) ] in the <head /> section

Originally posted on Stack Overflow — 97 upvotes. Licensed under CC BY-SA.

Bind WPF control to SQL server through repository pattern

Tuesday, January 19, 2010 by Nate Bross

Someone asked on Stack Overflow:

How can I bind a wpf control to a SQL Server property. Like say a Listbox

 <ListView>
        <ListView.View>
            <GridView>
                <GridViewColumn Header="Name">
                <GridViewColumn Header="Date Assigned">
                <GridViewColumn Header="Date Due">
            </GridView>
        </ListView.View>
        <!-- iterate through all the Names in the database and output under GridViewColumn Name -->
        <!-- iterate through all the DateAssigned in the database and output under GridViewColumn Date Assigned -->
        <!-- iterate through all the DateDue in the database and output under GridViewColumn Date Due -->
    </ListView>

I am using the entity framework and the repository pattern. So I’d call all the names to a list by _repository.ToList();

I posted the following answer, which was chosen as the accepted answer and received 2 upvotes:

Try this: listViewName.ItemsSource = _repository.ToList();

I’d also simplify the Xaml, like this:

<ListBox x:Name="listViewName">
    <ListBox.Resources>
        <DataTemplate>
            <Grid Height="22" Width="Auto">
                <TextBlock Text="{Binding Name}" />
                <TextBlock  Text="{Binding DateAssigned}" />
                <TextBlock Text="{Binding DateDue}" />
            </Grid>
        </DataTemplate>
    </ListBox.Resources>
</ListBox>

Where the text after {Binding is the name of the property of the item in the collection you return from _repository.

Originally posted on Stack Overflow — 2 upvotes (accepted answer). Licensed under CC BY-SA.

C# Express: How to publish project for use with 3rd party installer (msi)?

Tuesday, January 19, 2010 by Nate Bross

Someone asked on Stack Overflow:

I want to publish my c# project (c# 2008 express edition) and create an (msi) installer with Inno Setup Compiler. How can I do this?

I posted the following answer, which was chosen as the accepted answer:

Set build mode to “Release” and then take everything inside the \bin directory and toss it into you MSI.

The VS Express editions do NOT include a built-in method for creating an MSI like the VS Pro/Ultimate do.

Originally posted on Stack Overflow — 0 upvotes (accepted answer). Licensed under CC BY-SA.

Can VSTO projects built using, for example, Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel be run on machines without Office installed?

Tuesday, January 12, 2010 by Nate Bross

Someone asked on Stack Overflow:

We’re currently using a thing from SoftArtisans to generate Excel spreadsheets from data the mainframe FTPs down to our document server.

The doc server has the .Net frameworks through 3.5 on it, as does my development box. The difference is my machine has Office 2007 as well.

So, I built a service this morning with a filewatcher using Interop.Excel to make the spreadsheets without the need for the SoftArtisans piece.

When I install and run on the document server, the app chokes when I drop a file in for conversion, saying “Could not load file or assembly ’Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel, Version=12.0.0.0”

Is there no redistributable package or something I can use? Management doesn’t want Office installed on the server.

I posted the following answer, which was chosen as the accepted answer and received 3 upvotes:

As far as I know, the only way to use the Office Interop assemblies, is to have full office client installed on the server.

Originally posted on Stack Overflow — 3 upvotes (accepted answer). Licensed under CC BY-SA.

REST api pagination: make page-size a parameter (configurable from outside)

Wednesday, January 6, 2010 by Nate Bross

Someone asked on Stack Overflow:

we are having a search/list-resource:

[http://xxxx/users/?page=1](http://xxxx/users/?page=1)

Internally the page-size is static and returns 20 items. The user can move forward by increasing the page number. But to be more flexible we are now thinking also to expose the size of a page:

[http://xxxx/users/?page=1&size=20](http://xxxx/users/?page=1&size=20)

As such this is flexible as the client can now decide network-calls vs. size of response, when searching. Of course this has the drawback that the server could be hit hard either by accident or maliciosly on purpose: [http://xxxx/users/?page=1&size=1000000](http://xxxx/users/?page=1&size=1000000)

For robustness the solution could be to configure an upper limit of page size (e.g. 100) and when it is exceeded either represent an error response or a HTTP redirect to the URL with highest possible page-size parameter.

What do you think?

I posted the following answer, which was chosen as the accepted answer and received 17 upvotes:

Personally, I would simply document a maximum page size, and anything larger than that is simply treated as the maximum.

Originally posted on Stack Overflow — 17 upvotes (accepted answer). Licensed under CC BY-SA.

Access Windows Share under Network Service account

Wednesday, December 23, 2009 by Nate Bross

Someone asked on Stack Overflow:

I have two computers with Windows Server 2003. One computer has some shared folders on the network, and the other has a Windows Service (written in C#, running under the Network Service account) that needs to access those shared folders.

The following code works fine as a logged-in user, but throws an exception when executed under the Network Service account.

File.WriteAllText(@"C:\temp\temp.txt", File.ReadAllLines(@"\\NetworkServer\Test\test.txt")[0]);

The exception message is Logon failure: unknown user name or bad password. How do I get this code to work under the Network Service account? Is it a setting in Windows Server 2003, or do I need to add some code to this to make it work?

I posted the following answer, which was chosen as the accepted answer and received 3 upvotes:

On the network share, you’ll need to add permissions for the “Network Service” account on the server running the service. While this will work, @nicholas points out that this may provide an overly broad group of users access to the share.

Another option, and in my opinion the better option, is to create a domain account and then give that account read/write permission on the share. Then you configure the service to “run as” the domain account with proper permissions.

Originally posted on Stack Overflow — 3 upvotes (accepted answer). Licensed under CC BY-SA.

Add row dynamically to table in ASP.NET?

Wednesday, December 23, 2009 by Nate Bross

Someone asked on Stack Overflow:

I’m trying to add rows dynamically to a System.Web.UI.WebControls.Table control in ASP.NET. I found some sample code that does what I’m seeking, but it only adds a single row.

It seems like the table row count does not carry from one page load to the next. The user should be able to add as many rows as desired, and I need to capture the data from each row.

What am I missing? Code below.

<%@ Page Language="VB" %>
<script runat="server">

    Sub btnAddEmail_Click(ByVal Sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs)

        Dim tr As New TableRow
        Dim tcLabel As New TableCell
        Dim tcTextBox As New TableCell
        Dim newLabel As New Label
        Dim newTextBox As New TextBox

        Dim i As Integer = Table1.Rows.Count + 1

        newLabel.ID = "Email" + Convert.ToString(i)
        newLabel.Text = "Email" + Convert.ToString(i)

        newTextBox.ID = "txtEmail" + Convert.ToString(i)

        tcLabel.Controls.Add(newLabel)
        tcTextBox.Controls.Add(newTextBox)

        tr.Cells.Add(tcLabel)
        tr.Cells.Add(tcTextBox)

        Table1.Rows.Add(tr)

    End Sub

</script>

<form id="form1" runat="server">
<div>
    <asp:Button runat="server" Text="Add Email" ID="btnAddEmail"
        onclick="btnAddEmail_Click" />
    <asp:Table ID="Table1" runat="server">
        <asp:TableRow>
            <asp:TableCell>
                <asp:Label ID="Email1" runat="server" Text="Email1"></asp:Label></asp:TableCell>
            <asp:TableCell>
                <asp:TextBox ID="txtEmail1" runat="server"></asp:TextBox></asp:TableCell>
        </asp:TableRow>
    </asp:Table>
</div>
</form>

I posted the following answer, which was chosen as the accepted answer and received 4 upvotes:

ASP.NET is stateless – you need to persist any data you want between pages loads into a Session variable.

You’ll need to store the DataTable/DataSet in a session variable, and assign the Datasource property of Table1 to that DataSet in your “PageLoad” event. Then, in your “Click” event, add the row to the DataSet in your Session variable.

update

You maybe able to set ViewState="true" on the control you wish to have persist data through postbacks.

Originally posted on Stack Overflow — 4 upvotes (accepted answer). Licensed under CC BY-SA.