Brian Low » 2006

Sat
Jul 1
2006

Custom Configuration Section (.Net 2.0)

To add a custom configuration section to a project:

Add a reference to System.Configuration.dll

Add to your app.config:

<configuration>
  <configSections>
    <section name="myConfiguration"
       type="MyProject.MyConfiguration, MyProject" />
  </configSections>
  <myConfiguration
    emailTo="MyEmailAddress@domain.com"
  />
</configuration>

Add the class MyConfiguration.cs:

using System;
using System.Configuration;
 
namespace MyProject
{
    class MyConfiguration : ConfigurationSection
    {
        public static MyConfiguration Current
        {
            get { return ConfigurationManager.GetSection("myConfiguration") 
                              as MyConfiguration; }
        }
 
        [ConfigurationProperty("emailTo")]
        public string EmailTo
        {
            get { return (string)this["emailTo"]; }
            set { this["emailTo"] = value; }
        }
 
    }
}

To use in code:

Trace.WriteLine(MyConfiguration.Current.EmailTo);

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Fri
Jun 30
2006

Quick XML Serialization

public void SaveXml(string filename)
{
    XmlSerializer xml = new XmlSerializer(this.GetType());
    using (FileStream fs = new FileStream(filename, FileMode.Create))
    {
        xml.Serialize(fs, this);
    }
}
 
public static Accounts LoadXml(string filename)
{
    XmlSerializer xml = new XmlSerializer(typeof(Accounts));
    FileInfo f = new FileInfo(filename);
    if (!f.Exists || f.Length == 0)
        return new Accounts();
    using (FileStream fs = new FileStream(filename, FileMode.Open))
    {
        return (Accounts)xml.Deserialize(fs);
    }
}

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Sun
Jun 25
2006

Syntax Highlighting in WordPress

Syntax highlighting with iG:Syntax Hiliter is mostly working now. This is the best excuse for hosting my own WordPress installation. I’ve found a few tweaks are needed to get this going:

I am not using a WYSIWYG editor. This is the biggest problem so far. The built-in rich editor collapses whitespace in my code so you lose indentation. I have been experimenting with other editors.
Updated the .syntax_hilite style in syntax_hilite_css.css with text-align:left since my current theme uses justified text. Also removed the fixed width statements.
Tweaked the C# color scheme to match Visual Studio.

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Sun
Jun 25
2006

Redirect Trace Messages to a TextBox

///
/// Outputs trace messages to a textbox. To use call
/// Trace.Listeners.Add(new TextBoxTraceListener(textBox1).
/// All subsequent calls to Trace.WriteLine() are copied
/// to textBox1.
///
public class TextBoxTraceListener : TraceListener
{
    private TextBox textBox;
 
    ///
    /// Constructor
    ///
    public TextBoxTraceListener(TextBox p_textBox)
    {
        textBox = p_textBox;
    }
 
    ///
    /// Write a message to the textbox
    ///
    public override void Write(string message)
    {
        textBox.Text += message.Replace("\n", "\r\n");
    }
 
    ///
    /// Write a message with newline to the textbox
    ///
    ///<param name="message" />
    public override void WriteLine(string message) 
    { 
        this.Write(message + "\n"); 
    } 
}

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Sun
Jun 25
2006

Setting up WordPress on WinXP

Getting WordPress running on WinXP was surprisingly easy. Here are my notes on the install.

WinXP SP2
PHP 5.1
MySQL 5.0
WordPress 2.0

Installing PHP on IIS

Download and install the PHP Windows installer package. I used all the default options.
Grant IUSR_ write access to c:\php\sessiondata and c:\php\uploadtemp
Added index.php as a default document in IIS (IIS Admin -> Default Web Site -> Properties -> Documents tab -> Add… -> index.php
To test the install create a file named c:\inetpub\wwwroot\test.php with the contents
[php]
phpinfo();
?>
[/php]and then use your browser to view the page at http://localhost/test.php
Open c:\windows\php.ini
Uncomment the line extension=php_mysql.dll
Change the extension_dir line to read: extension_dir = "./ext/"
Save the file.
Download the PHP binaries (not the windows installer version).
Extract libmysql.dll and ext/pgp_mysql.dll into c:\php and c:\php\ext

Installing MySql

Download and install MySQL. I used the complete version but in hindsight I probably only needed the essentials.
Download and install MySQL Administrator from the same site.

Create a WordPress database

In the Catalogs section, create a new schema named wordpress
In the User Administration section, create a user named wp_user, enter a password.
Right-click on the new user, Add Host From Which The User Can Connect, enter localhost.
Select localhost which should now appear under the new user on the left.
On the right-hand side, select the Schema Privileges tab, select the wordpress database.
Click the << button to assign this user full access to the wordpress database. Warning: Be sure to select the localhost node on the left when assigning privileges so the user only has permissions when connecting locally.

Setup WordPress

Download WordPress.
Extract to c:\inetpub\wwwroot\wordpress
In the new wordpress folder, rename wp-config-sample.php to wp-config.php.
Edit the file and change the database name, user name and password.
Open your browser to http://localhost/wordpress/wp-admin/install.php
Download themes and extensions.
I had to peform this fix before I was able to upload files.

Enable Permalinks in WordPress with IIS

Create a file wp-404-handler.php with the code
[php]
$my_wp_url = "http://" . $_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] . "";
$_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'] = substr($_SERVER['QUERY_STRING'], strpos($_SERVER['QUERY_STRING'], $my_wp_url)+strlen($my_wp_url));
$_SERVER['PATH_INFO'] = $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'];
include('index.php');
?>
[/php]
This code is from WordPress Permalinks on IIS. I have changed the code slightly (line 2) since I host my Wordpress installation in the root directory.
Configure IIS to redirect 404 errors to “/” (no quotes)
UrlScan, must be configured to allow periods in the URL. Open c:\windows\system32\inetsrv\urlscan\urlscan.ini. Change option to read AllowDotInPath=1
Turn on permalinks in the WordPress permalinks options
Restart IIS

Some other good articles on setting up WordPress, PHP, MySQL:
David Seah’s WIMP Notes
WordPress 5-minute install
Web Thang Installing PHP for IIS on Win XP
WordPress Permalinks on IIS
Easy Permalinks in IIS

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