Use HostingEnvironment.MapPath

When running a service under IIS, the HttpContext.Current object is not available, so HttpContext.Current.Server.MapPath will fail.

fileName = HttpContext.Current.Server.MapPath(fileName);

The solution is to use Hosting.HostingEnvironment.MapPath instead.

fileName = System.Web.Hosting.HostingEnvironment.MapPath(fileName);

Jul

24

2009

Fields to Properties

How to automatically have Visual Studio 2008 convert fields to properties. Read More...

Jul

10

2009

Outlook 2007 Panning Cursor

The outlook 2007 panning cursor can get “accidentally” enabled. When it does, It’s annoying at best and it interferes with copy / paste. Phil Wiffen has an excellent summary on how to turn it off and restore Outlook to the original cursor behavior, which by the way will also allow selecting text for copy / paste.

Outlook 2007 How To Disable The Hand Cursor Read More...

May

12

2009

Pretty URLs And IIS6

IIS7 can support pages without extensions without administrator configuration settings. IIS6 can also support URLs without extensions, but it requires an administrator setting. Here's a tip on how to configure IIS6 to support URLs without extensions.Read More...

May

11

2009

Pretty URLs And IIS7 Authentication

One side effect of using Pretty URLs in IIS7 is that IIS7 doesn’t authenticate these URLs because they don’t have the .aspx file extension. Here is a quick tip on how to fix it. Read More...

Apr

14

2009

Network Names For Systems

When you have five machines to keep track of, the naming format for those machines may not be important. When you have 500,000 in twelve countries, identifying and locating a machine or groups of machines becomes impossible if you haven’t planned ahead. Even if you have a simple home network, it doesn’t take long for iPods, routers, file servers, workstations, laptops to add up.

Here are some tips for naming physical device machine names so that they can easily be identified down the road. It may seem a bit obsessive compulsive at first, but there is logic behind the naming guidelines.

Font Tools

What The Font and Type Chart provide some useful interesting font tools.

What The Font does an image analysis and comes up with a list of potential fonts that are used in the image. Read More...

Jul

30

2008

Microsoft Product Support Lifecycle

Did you ever want a reason to upgrade? Before you start a new project on a mature stable Microsoft technology, you might want to check to see if it is still supported. Microsoft typically provides support five years after the product general availability.

For example, did you know that Microsoft .Net 1.1 mainstream support ends in October 2008?

For more information on currently supported products, refer to the Microsoft Support Lifecycle Index. Read More...

Jul

30

2008

ISP Speed Test

At the Raleigh office, we recently upgraded our Time Warner Road Runner business class plan to 5 Mbps down, 1.5 Mbps up. If you have to verify a speed test, the best site I've seen is at Speedtest.net.

Speedtest.net provides a very interesting looking graphic interface along with some very interesting comparison statistics.