2005-12-15

Setting where calculated members in an OLAP cube should be processed

This post says:
"Because, for example, if your query return less then 1000 members by dimension in your query, all the data is retrieve to the client and the calculated members are calculated on the client side."

So actually the calculated members are by default calculated by the client. This explains why so much CPU is used on the client when there are a lot of calculated members.

To set the location for calculating the members to the server, you can use this parameter in the query string:
Execution Location=3
AutoAccept Sink for Exchange

The AutoAccept Sink for Exchange is a tool for Exchange 2000 that allows resource mailboxes to automatically accept/decline meeting requests based on a combination of factors. These factors include the free/busy status of the resource, whether the requestor is authorized, and many other configurable settings.

2005-12-05

Using the Visual Studio .NET 2003 Debugger with ASP.NET Applications

A very annoing part of VS is debugging. Debugging always hangs after some steps... The article answers some of the questions around debugging. Except my solution still hangs after 3-5 steps...

2005-11-23

Performance Considerations for Making Web Service Calls from ASPX Pages: "At Your Service: Performance Considerations for Making Web Service Calls from ASPX Pages"

This article describes a way of connection to a web service asynchronously that is 8 times faster than the usual synchronous method.

2005-11-21

Simple Mail Transfer Protocol - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: "Simple Mail Transfer Protocol"

Shows how to run a manual mail session to test connectivity to a mail server.

2005-11-15

Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Analysis Services Performance Guide

OLAP Performance

Microsoft OLAP Technical Info (articles, whitepapers etc)

As you may have guessed, I am struggling with OLAP performance at the time being. These links provide some information on the subject.

2005-11-10

Rick LaPlante's WebLog

Today I'm meeting Rick LaPlante, who is responsible for the development of Microsofts new Team System (VSTS). Looking forward to it... Hope I can come up with some good questions.

2005-11-09

Mike Woodring's .NET Sample Page

Stumbled across this page... Nice samples.

2005-11-07

Microsoft Next Generation of Certifications: Frequently Asked Questions

Microsoft has changed the certifications. This is a quote from the FAQ:

The new Microsoft certification program is designed to emphasize both the primary technology skill set and the job role of the individual. By focusing on core technical or professional skills, individuals can work toward a certification that meets their needs.

This article describes the changes more in-debth.

2005-10-26

SQL Server 2000 Analysis Services Performance Tuning

Not really one of my areas of competence, but sometimes one have to try to do one's best. The article describes what one might do to improve performance for a data warehouse using MS OLAP / MS Analysis Services.

2005-10-24

Debugging timeouts in a SOA/Web environment

In a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), having some webservice methods that consume more than a minutes time, timeout can be a problem.

In this scenario there is also a web site acting as the webservice client. The webservice is getting its data from a database.

We know there is a timeout, but where?
a) Could be the connection to the database from the webservice.
b) Could be the connection between the webservice and the webservice client.
c) Could be a browser timeout.
d) Could be a .NET Framework/ASP.NET timeout.

a. The connection to the database
The timeout of a query can be set by a propery on the ADO.NET Command object. The default is 30 seconds.

OleDbCommand dbcmd = new OleDbCommand();
dbcmd.CommandTimeout = 600; //10 minutes should be enough?

b. The connection to the webservice
The timeout of the http connection of a synchronous call to a web service has a default timeout of 100 seconds. This can be set by a property on the web service proxy. You can set it in the constructor of the webservice proxy (remember that this may me overwritten when you update your webservice reference):

public WSMyWebservice() {
this.Credentials = System.Net.CredentialCache.DefaultCredentials;
this.Url = "http://localhost/webservice/WSMyWebservice.asmx";
this.Timeout = 450000; //wait for 7.5 minutes
}

c. The browser timeout
Not covered in this topic.

d. .Net Framework / ASP.NET timeout
There are a few places the timeout can be set in machine.config.
The executionTimeout in the httpRuntime section can be increased. In the .NET Framework versions 1.0 and 1.1, the default is 90:
<httpruntime
maxrequestlength="4096"
usefullyqualifiedredirecturl="false"
minfreethreads="8"
minlocalrequestfreethreads="4"
apprequestqueuelimit="100"
enableversionheader="true"
executiontimeout="90">

In the processModel section there are several timeouts that can be set:
<processmodel
username="machine"
password="AutoGenerate"
timeout="Infinite"
enable="true"
idletimeout="Infinite"
shutdowntimeout="0:00:05"
requestlimit="Infinite"
requestqueuelimit="5000"
restartqueuelimit="10"
memorylimit="60"
webgarden="false"
cpumask="0xffffffff"
loglevel="Errors"
clientconnectedcheck="0:00:05"
comauthenticationlevel="Connect"
comimpersonationlevel="Impersonate"
responsedeadlockinterval="0:03:00"
maxworkerthreads="20"
maxiothreads="20">

The above should show the default settings, although I can't guaratee it. The setting that may be changed to avoid timeout is the responseDeadlockInterval. MSDN states the following about the setting: Specifies the time interval, in standard process model format (hr:min:sec), after which the process is restarted, if the following conditions are met: 1) There are queued requests, and 2) There has not been a response during this interval.

2005-10-19

Logging with log4net stops when aspnet_wp is recycled

A collegue of mine just discovered this problem. The problem was that logging using log4net stops whenever the aspnet_wp process is recycled. The problem is caused by the way log4net and ASP.NET works.

First, whenever the aspnet_wp process has been idle for a while or has used more memory than it should (over 60% default), the process is recycled. This is done in a clever way so users should not be affected. A new aspnet_wp process is started in parallell with the old one, gradually taking over the workload by serving all new requests.

Second, log4net stops logging, even stops trying to log, as soon as it finds out that it can't write to the logfile. Essentially logging is then disabled.

These two facts together is causing logging to stop. When the second aspnet_wp process is started, it will try to log to the same file that the old aspnet_wp process is already logging to. The file will be locked by the old process, so log4net in the new process will detect that the file is not writeable, and disable logging.

2005-10-12

Well... now you can play World of Warcraft even when you sleep. Somebody had made a bot that plays for you and earns experience points even when you sleep... Cheating?

WELCOME TO WEALTHQ.COM!
How big is Visual Studio?

"Visual Studio is over 43 million lines of code, there are over 30 teams working on different pieces, with roughly 700 developers checking-in code to 11 different virtual build labs that are then integrated on a rotating schedule producing over 100 different builds of the product daily."

Mike Stall's .NET Debugging Blog : Size of Visual Studio

2005-09-30

Google-groups : What is VSWebCache?
Explains why there sometimes comes a 401 error and the "could not get files from the server" error, and how to fix the problem by simply deleting the VSWebCache folder.

2005-09-23

Thousands of players in WoW were killed by a virus from Zul Gurub...
Tusenvis drept av spillvirus Spillsonen (norwegian)

Story in English:
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3143959

2005-06-14

Nice Speedometer that also tells you your current IP address:
A BELTRONICA Telecom
Found a solution to a problem I had before, but didn't have the time to fix. Quite logical really that you have to create the EventSource in the registry before you can start logging messages from it.
PRB: "Requested Registry Access Is Not Allowed" Error Message When ASP.NET Application Tries to Write New EventSource in the EventLog

2005-05-03

The content management text editor used by DotNetNuke. Very nice, specially the registered version...
FreeTextBox
This picture series is from a Dan Test. Nice to know what one might have to go through on the test... Shouldn't there be some breaking of planks or even bricks?
Il-Dan Test

2005-04-20

Nice utility for cleaning up HTML.

HTML Tidy Project Page

2005-04-14

2005-04-11

2005-04-06

Free book online about WebServices... good stuff!
Book - Real World XML Web Services

2005-03-17

2005-02-15

Naming Guidelines
Guidelines and naming conventions...

2005-02-09

Microsoft ASP.NET Developer Center
: Security

2005-02-08

What are limitations in Active directory for older clients like NT4 and Windows 98?
Active Directory Client (dsclient) for Win98/NT

2005-01-30

The Code Project - Combo control - ASP.NET
This is a control which will help to generate Tabs , Menus, Slider bars, and Tree views. The controls are created Just in Time dynamically from XML.
The Code Project - The 30 Minute Regex Tutorial - .NET
Good tutorial on regular expressions. With link to an excellent program for trying out different RegEx expressions from Ultrapico.

2005-01-24

DPAPI Tools from Dominic Baier
ASPNET account and network access
Microsoft Certified Professional Magazine Online | Column: The Long and Short of Stub Zones: "Delegation has a disadvantage, though. The NS records created by the Delegation Wizard point at specific name servers by IP address. If an administrator in the child domain changes those IP addresses, or renames the DNS servers, or decommissions a server, this creates a lame delegation. "
DNS