Visual LINQ Query Builder - VS 2008 Add-In

Visual Linq Query Builder helps you create Linq to SQL queries for your programs(Support  for C# and VB projects is provided) and demonstrates how to create their own Visual Studio 2008 add-in by using WPF.

 

Here are some screenshots of Visual Linq Query Builder in designer mode

Download Visual LINQ Query Builder and documentation

 

Technorati Tags: linq,wpf,ui

JetBrains Omea goes Open Source

Great news for those of you who are interested in good blog reader

Jetbrains Omea - both source and companion files - is now distributed under GNU GPL v2 License http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.html

For technical details, visit the dedicated Confluence page: http://www.jetbrains.net/confluence/display/OMEA/this+link

 

Technorati Tags: blog,reader,jetbrains

System.Reflection - how to access and invoke private methods,fields or properties

For demonstration purpose I've created a class that contains only private methods,fields and properties

/// <summary>
/// Holds blog information
/// </summary>
public class Blog
{
    /// <summary>
    /// Gets the posts count.
    /// </summary>
    private static int PostsCount
    {
        get
        {
            return 10000;
        }
    }

    /// <summary>
    /// Gets the description.
    /// </summary>
    /// <returns></returns>
    private string GetDescription()
    {
        return @"A weblog dedicated to obsessively profiling 
reviewing new Internet products and companies";
    }


    /// <summary>
    /// Changes the name of the blog.
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="newName">The new name.</param>
    private string ChangeBlogName(string newName)
    {
        name = newName;
        return name;
    }


    string url = "http://techcrunch.com";
    string name = "Tech Crunch";
}

 

To access private fields I used the System.Reflection.FieldInfo class .For private properties I used System.Reflection.PropertyInfo .Note if you want to work with private members you should use System.Reflection.BindingFlags enum as shown in the example below .So for non-static class members the flags should looks like BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Instance .For static don't forget to add BindingFlags.Static .

class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {



            Blog blog = new Blog();
            Type type = typeof(Blog);
            //create reflection bindings - will be used to retrive private fields,methods or properties
            BindingFlags privateBindings = BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Instance;

            // retrive private fields from our class
            FieldInfo[] fieldInfos = type.GetFields(privateBindings);

            // retrive private fields metadata
            foreach (FieldInfo fieldInfo in fieldInfos)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(fieldInfo.Name +" "+ fieldInfo.GetValue(blog));
            }


            PropertyInfo [] propertyInfos = type.GetProperties(privateBindings|BindingFlags.Static);
            // retrive private static properties metadata
            foreach (PropertyInfo propertyInfo in propertyInfos)
            {
                // note that no instance need for static property to retrive it's value
                Console.WriteLine(propertyInfo.Name + " " + propertyInfo.GetValue(null,null) );
            }

            // call method using MethodInfo object
            MethodInfo miGetDescription = type.GetMethod("GetDescription", privateBindings);
            object retObj = miGetDescription.Invoke(blog, new object[]{});
            Console.WriteLine(retObj);

            // call method using MethodInfo object with input parameters
            MethodInfo miChangeBlogName = type.GetMethod("ChangeBlogName", privateBindings);
            retObj = miChangeBlogName.Invoke(blog, new object[] { "Yahoo blog" });
            Console.WriteLine(retObj);

            Console.ReadLine();



        }

 

The console output fallows

Technorati Tags: reflection,dotnet,development

Microsoft® Visual Studio Team System 2008 Database Edition Power Tools

Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2008 Database Edition Power Tools is a set of enhancements and tools that complement and improve the user experience of VSTS Database Edition 2008

Features
• ChecksumCondition – You can use this test condition to verify that the checksum of the data set returned by a database unit test matches the checksum of an expected data set.
• ExpectedSchemaTestCondition – You can use this test condition to verify that the column names and data types of the returned data set match expected values.
Data Generator Improvements
• New Data Generator Wizard – This new wizard creates a data generation plan that is configured to copy data from a source database. You can use this wizard when you need to copy most of your data from a live source, but need to make small changes to ensure privacy.
MSBuild Task Improvements
• SqlAnalysis Task – You can use this build task to run T-SQL Static Code Analysis from MSBuild.
TSQL Static Code Analysis
• Static Code Analysis - A precursor to the functionality that will be in future versions of VSTS that will allow you to perform Static Code Analysis on T-SQL code.
Refactoring
• “Move Schema” Refactoring - Allows a user to right click on an object and move it to a different but existing schema
• SP Rename Generation - Generate a new script that will contain sp_renames for all rename refactored objects that the user can then execute.
• Wildcard Expansion - Automatically expand the wildcard in a select to the appropriate columns.
• Fully-Qualified Name Support - Automatically inject fully-qualified names when absent in a script
• Refactoring extended to Dataset - Refactor into strongly typed dataset definitions
MSBuild Tasks
• Data / Schema Compare Build Tasks - MSBuild tasks that can generate scripts as if the user had run the Data / Schema compare UI
Schema View
• API Access to Schema View - Insert / Update / Delete to schema View and list schema objects and their associated files
Dependency Tool Window
• Dependency Tree - Show the dependencies ( incoming / outgoing ) for selected schema objects in a new tool window
Miscellaneous Tools
• Script Preprocessor - Expand SQLCMD variables and include files and command line version (sqlspp.exe) & an MSBuild version ( wraps the command line version )

 

Download Microsoft® Visual Studio Team System 2008 Database Edition Power Tools

 

 

Technorati Tags: microsoft,database,tools,vs2008

LINQ to Objects - 3 basic examples

 

The examples below show how you can use aggregate operators in "LINQ to Objects"

// our test data array
string[] names = { "Sara", "Bill", "Alex", "Don", "Tom", "David", "Dana" };

// Find names starts with with character 'D'
int namesStartsWithD = names.Count( name => name.StartsWith("d",
    StringComparison.CurrentCultureIgnoreCase ) );
Console.WriteLine("There are {0} names that start with character 'D' in the name list.", 
    namesStartsWithD);

// Find the longest name
int longestName = names.Max( name=>name.Length );
Console.WriteLine("The longest name is {0} characters long.", longestName);


// Find the first name that starts with  character 'D'
string firstStartsWithD = names.First(name => name.StartsWith("d",
   StringComparison.CurrentCultureIgnoreCase)  );
Console.WriteLine("The first name that start with 'D' - {0}.", firstStartsWithD);