PSKit: Replacing that pesky Lorem Ipsum text with dynamic content

2005-05-18T11:44:00.000-07:00

The Personal Website Starter Kit is a great resource for getting up and
running with asp.net 2.0 beta. I've been using it to check out some features
while waiting for other projects to get to a point where I feel like I can
contribute more than just criticism (sorry y'all :) That said, the default.aspx
page comes with a FormsView that rotates pictures from your PSKit albums, but
everything else is static content! That is, you're greeted on the front page
with something like:

Welcome to my Website!

On this site you will find lorem ipsum dolor sit amet...

Earlier, I had tried using one of the new data controls in asp.net -
namely the FormView. I ran into a few issues with this control, mostly having to
do with having to know what ID I was using in the database to set or edit the
FormView's contents - I'm sure I could have worked out a way to set the ID to
use in some clever way, but then I looked at the actual content that comes stock
with the PSKit and it hit me...

A DataList.

It's already separated by a horizontal rule - all I really need is to
bind a good old DataList to a couple of database entries and I've got something
that I can update, oh, say twice a year or whatever. heh.

I used a similar table structure to the one from before:

Content
ContentID
Heading
Content
IsVisible

I had to actually write code (gasp!) to get it working the way I
wanted it to, but it was pretty stock stuff thankfully. I just set up a
SqlDataSource pointing to this table's CRUD procedures:

                <asp:SqlDataSource ID="SqlDataSource1"
                 runat="server"
                 ConnectionString="<%$ ConnectionStrings:Personal %>"
                 ProviderName="System.Data.SqlClient"
                 SelectCommand="GetContents"
                 SelectCommandType="StoredProcedure"
                 DeleteCommand="RemoveContent"
                 DeleteCommandType="StoredProcedure"
                 InsertCommand="AddContent"
                 InsertCommandType="StoredProcedure"
                 UpdateCommand="EditContent"  
                 UpdateCommandType="StoredProcedure">
    <DeleteParameters>
      <asp:Parameter Name="Content_ID" Type="Int32" />
    </DeleteParameters>
    <UpdateParameters>
      <asp:Parameter Name="Content_ID" Type="Int32" />
      <asp:Parameter Name="Heading" Type="String" />
      <asp:Parameter Name="Content" Type="String" />
      <asp:Parameter Name="IsVisible" Type="Boolean" />
    </UpdateParameters>
    <InsertParameters>
      <asp:Parameter Direction="InputOutput" Name="Content_ID" Type="Int32" />
      <asp:Parameter Name="Heading" Type="String" />
      <asp:Parameter Name="Content" Type="String" />
      <asp:Parameter Name="IsVisible" Type="Boolean" />
    </InsertParameters>
               </asp:SqlDataSource>

Then the DataList itself:

   <asp:DataList ID="DataList1"
                          runat="server"
                         DataSourceID="SqlDataSource1"
                         Width="100%"
                         OnCancelCommand="DataList1_CancelCommand"
                         OnEditCommand="DataList1_EditCommand"
                         OnUpdateCommand="DataList1_UpdateCommand"
                         OnDeleteCommand="DataList1_DeleteCommand"
                         OnItemCommand="DataList1_ItemCommand"
                         RepeatLayout="Flow"  >
    <ItemTemplate>
    <asp:Panel ID="contentPanel"
                                 runat="server"
                                 Visible='<%# Eval("IsVisible") %>'>
     <h3><asp:Label ID="HeadingLabel"
                                             runat="server"
                                             Text='<%# Eval("Heading") %>'></asp:Label></h3>
     <asp:Label ID="ContentLabel"
                                         runat="server"
                                         Text='<%# Eval("Content") %>'></asp:Label>
                                       <asp:HiddenField ID="hdnContentID"
                                         runat="server"
                                         Value='<%# Eval("Content_ID") %>' />
     </asp:Panel>
     <asp:Panel ID="Panel1"
                                         Visible='<%# User.IsInRole("Administrators") %>'
                                         runat="server" Height="50px" Width="125px">
       <asp:LinkButton ID="LinkButton3"
                                           runat="server"
                                           CommandName="edit">Edit</asp:LinkButton> 
                                         <asp:LinkButton ID="LinkButton4"
                                           runat="server"
                                           CommandName="delete">Delete</asp:LinkButton></asp:Panel>
    </ItemTemplate>
    <SeparatorTemplate>
     <hr />
    </SeparatorTemplate>
    <EditItemTemplate>
     <asp:TextBox ID="txtHeading"
                                         runat="server"
                                         Text='<%# Bind("Heading") %>'></asp:TextBox>
     <asp:CheckBox ID="chkVisible"
                                         runat="server"
                                         Checked='<%# Bind("IsVisible") %>'
                                         Text="Visible" />

     ContentID:
                                       <asp:Label ID="lblContentID"
                                         runat="server"
                                         Text='<%# Eval("Content_ID") %>'></asp:Label>
     <asp:TextBox ID="txtContent"
                                         runat="server"
                                         Columns="40" Rows="20"
                                         Text='<%# Bind("Content") %>'
       TextMode="MultiLine"></asp:TextBox>
                                       <br />
     <br />
     <asp:LinkButton ID="LinkButton1"
                                         runat="server"
                                         CommandName="update">Update</asp:LinkButton>  
     <asp:LinkButton ID="LinkButton2"
                                         runat="server"
                                         CausesValidation="False"
                                         CommandName="cancel">Cancel</asp:LinkButton>  
     <asp:LinkButton ID="LinkButton5"
                                         runat="server"
                                         CommandName="add">Create as New</asp:LinkButton>
    </EditItemTemplate>
   </asp:DataList>

Several points of interest in the DataList declaration:

No more pesky DataBinder.Eval(Container.DataItem, "field") syntax - much
leaner and meaner Eval() syntax for one-way binding.
Two-way binding happens via the Bind() syntax - notice that Bind() only
happens in the EditItemTemplate, since the ItemTemplate is readonly.
I'm only showing the edit/delete buttons based on what role the current
user is in. I wasn't sure if this (#
User.IsInRole("Administrators")) would work at first because it's
deceptively simple. But yeah, it does work. Works great!
I did most of this visually - there is no longer a reason to fear the
designer in asp.net (thanks Venus team!)
I had to disable Page input validation because I want the Content to
contain html, and by default, it don't like that.

As for the codebehind, I guess I could have refactored it a little bit, but
since this is not a mission-critical application (it is just a personal site,
after all!) I just went the easy route and duplicated a lot of code. Probably
the best thing to do would be to handle just the ItemCommand because there is no
default handler for add and use a clever mix of a switch statement and
defaulting the value of EditItemIndex to -1. But this isn't about best
practices, it's about getting the stuff to work, ya know? Anyway, here's the
code:

  1  protected void DataList1_CancelCommand(object source, DataListCommandEventArgs e)
  2  {
  3   this.DataList1.EditItemIndex = -1;
  4   this.DataList1.DataBind();
  5  }
  6  protected void DataList1_UpdateCommand(object source, DataListCommandEventArgs e)
  7  {
  8   string heading = ((TextBox)e.Item.FindControl("txtHeading")).Text;
  9   string content = ((TextBox)e.Item.FindControl("txtContent")).Text;
 10   string isvisible = ((CheckBox)e.Item.FindControl("chkVisible")).Checked.ToString();
 11   string id = ((Label)e.Item.FindControl("lblContentID")).Text;
 12
 13   this.SqlDataSource1.UpdateParameters["Content_ID"].DefaultValue = id;
 14   this.SqlDataSource1.UpdateParameters["Heading"].DefaultValue = heading;
 15   this.SqlDataSource1.UpdateParameters["Content"].DefaultValue = content;
 16   this.SqlDataSource1.UpdateParameters["IsVisible"].DefaultValue = isvisible;
 17
 18   this.SqlDataSource1.Update();
 19
 20   this.DataList1.EditItemIndex = -1;
 21   this.DataList1.DataBind();
 22  }
 23  protected void DataList1_DeleteCommand(object source, DataListCommandEventArgs e)
 24  {
 25   string id = ((HiddenField)e.Item.FindControl("hdnContentID")).Value;
 26   this.SqlDataSource1.DeleteParameters["Content_ID"].DefaultValue = id;
 27
 28   this.SqlDataSource1.Delete();
 29
 30   this.DataList1.EditItemIndex = -1;
 31   this.DataList1.DataBind();
 32  }
 33  protected void DataList1_ItemCommand(object source, DataListCommandEventArgs e)
 34  {
 35   switch (e.CommandName)
 36   {
 37    case "add":
 38     string heading = ((TextBox)e.Item.FindControl("txtHeading")).Text;
 39     string content = ((TextBox)e.Item.FindControl("txtContent")).Text;
 40     string isvisible = ((CheckBox)e.Item.FindControl("chkVisible")).Checked.ToString();
 41
 42     this.SqlDataSource1.InsertParameters["Heading"].DefaultValue = heading;
 43     this.SqlDataSource1.InsertParameters["Content"].DefaultValue = content;
 44     this.SqlDataSource1.InsertParameters["IsVisible"].DefaultValue = isvisible;
 45
 46     this.SqlDataSource1.Insert();
 47
 48     this.DataList1.EditItemIndex = -1;
 49     this.DataList1.DataBind();
 50     break;
 51   }
 52  }

This is the quickest way I could figure out to make things work, and yeah, it
does work. So, there you have it - even though there are only two items
currently in the table, it's very easy to add content via in-place editing and
change what is currently there as well. You can view it live over at www.bluefenix.net.

[ Currently Playing : Voices - Godsmack - Other Side (3:44) ]

New PostXING coming soon

2005-01-28T16:37:00.000-08:00

With the help of Laurent Kempé,
I've traced down a bug in the PostXING FTP library (or rather my handling of it)
and ended up changing the underlying FTP library code to the open source edtFTPnet
library. This is a more complete library than the sample socket code that I
was using before, and since it's LGPL licensed, I can link it into my code
without affecting the license that PostXING is released under (which is
zlib/libpng).

I also plan to add proxy support soon - the only hold up right now is that I
like to at least dry run what I'm releasing before I put it out there, and I
have no idea how to test if proxy code is going to work. Is there a such thing
as a free proxy server that I can test against? I'm pretty resolved to, er,
'borrowing' the functionality for proxy support from RssBandit simply because the code works and has
been a good reference for me before. So, I'm not worried about how to implement
it, just on how to test it. Any ideas?

[ Currently Playing : Move On - Jet - Get Born (4:20)
]

[Currently Playing: Get Me Outta Here - Jet (2:56)]

New PostXING release

2005-01-17T15:51:00.000-08:00

I've gone ahead and uploaded a new build of PostXING. I
extended the plugin architecture a little bit to allow for posting to non-.Text
blog engines using IBlogExtension plugins, of which there are a few out there
already. Everything else is pretty much the same, but I had to give out some
credit for the plugin architecture - I didn't come up with that stuff on my own
and I'm all about giving credit where credit is due.

To test this IBlogExtension plugin architecture (really all you have to do is
drop the IBlogExtension dll/exe into PostXING's plugins subdirectory) I created
a blogger account that I could
use the NewsGator
blogger plugin to test against. Guess what? It works.

[Currently Playing: Sludge Factory - Alice in Chains (4:36)]

color bg

2005-01-17T15:26:00.000-08:00

Can change the
background color as well.

[Currently Playing: Time - Taproot (3:20)]

test

2005-01-17T15:24:00.000-08:00

Posting in color.

[Currently Playing: Time - Taproot (3:20)]

Blue Phoenix

2005-01-13T15:10:00.000-08:00

Blue Phoenix

IBlogExtension, from the other side

2005-01-13T14:04:00.000-08:00

I can now use the great IBlogExtension plugins for NewsGator
to post with PostXING. Thanks for
that idea, Joel.

The only problem with this method is that it's "push only" - I can only
publish with these plugins. No history management, and strictly speaking, not
manageable on the same level as using the Metablog API. So, I can't set an
account for IBlogExtension blogs - no navigating to the site without manually
opening a browser, basically no integration with the current UI. Categories seem
to be up to the plugin as well. But I can post. That's one step in the right
direction, right?

[Currently Playing: The Game - Trapt (5:04)]

RE: I am: Nerdier than Paul

2005-01-13T13:13:00.000-08:00

I am:
Not nerdy, but definitely not hip.

[Currently Playing: Time - Taproot (3:20)]

Testing IBlogExtension

2005-01-13T08:42:00.000-08:00

Move along, nothing to see here...

[Now Playing: Shinedown - Fly from the Inside (3:54)]

w00t.

2004-10-01T06:48:00.000-07:00

Hello.