Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Using Local Database Cache for Occasionally Connected Data Synchronizing

After getting everything setup using the Visual Studio template and configuration wizards, I found that the server table was not being updated during the synchronization. Using SQL Server Profiler, I could see the SELECT queries that were interrogating the server instance to see if there were changes on the server, but I saw no indication of UPDATE or INSERT statements. I ran across a helpful blog post http://videoworld-rong.blogspot.com/2009/10/adonet-sync-services.html that indicated the default behavior of the Sync process is DownloadOnly where changes to the central database are downloaded to the local cached database. A simple change to OnInitialized event in the code-behind file of the .sync file resolved that issue easily.

   1: Private Sub OnInitialized()
   2:  ' ProductionHistoryDetail is
   3:  ' the name of the cached table
   4:  Me.ProductionHistoryDetail.SyncDirection = _
   5:     Microsoft.Synchronization.Data.SyncDirection.Bidirectional
   6:  
   7: End Sub

There were two other issues to overcome:



  1. While testing what would happen if the database was taken offline between synchronization, I found that the .Net SQLClient Data Provider connection that the sync framework provider was using would block the process where the command was issued to set the database offline (ALTER DATABASE <databasename> SET OFFLINE).
  2. Once the database went offline, the application would throw an exception when it attempted to connect to the server database to synchronize with the local SQL CE 3.5 database.

Solution:



  1. ?? Still investigating.
  2. Wrap the call to syncAgent.Synchronize() in a try/catch block. Surely there are methods to determine ability to connect to the db more efficiently than catching an exception.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Local Database Cache – Cached Table Add Button Grayed Out

I was experimenting with adding a Local Database Cache to a WPF client app I was working on when I ran into a situation where I could not configure the Cached table. There are a number of tutorials for how to set up the local database cache so I won’t go into much about those details except a brief introduction and where my experience differed.

The local database cache uses the Microsoft Synchronization Framework to synchronize tables between a local SQL Compact Edition .sdf file with a standard SQL Server database which is a really powerful feature for those occasionally connected scenarios. Visual Studio 2008 has a project template to make the process painless. See the photo below.

local database cache VS template

The step in the process that slowed me down was the point where you set connection to the client and server databases, then select the tables you want to keep synchronized. On my screen, the “Add” button below the Cached Tables list box was grayed out as in the following illustration.

local database cache table selection screen

After considerable searching and retries, I found a that I had neglected to set the primary key in the table I wanted to synchronize. I configured it as an Identity column, but forgot the click the key button in the SSMS table designer on the “Id” field. After correcting that, the “Add” button was no longer disabled on the table selection.

local-data-cache1

Monday, October 26, 2009

Code-behind Number Format Reference

This post is to save me some time looking up the format reference for some of the things I find myself looking up every once in a while.

Formatting numbers for display like minutes and seconds to have the preceding zero when the number is less than ten (10) as you would see on a digital clock or stopwatch display.

example: [3:07:10]

   1: ' format integers to have preceding zero if 
   2: ' integer is less than 10 (as in a digital
   3: ' clock or stopwatch display)
   4: ' tsElapsed is a TimeSpan
   5: ' lblElapsedTime is a WPF Label
   6: lblElapsedTime.Content = _
   7:     String.Format("{0}:{1}:{2}", _
   8:     tsElapsed.Hours, _
   9:     tsElapsed.Minutes.ToString("0#"), _
  10:     tsElapsed.Seconds.ToString("0#"))

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

NullReferenceException on String.IsNullOrEmpty in WPF

I really like the power of what can be done in WPF, but every time I turn around there is some trivial thing that gets in my way of being productive. This time it is a NullReferenceException being thrown when I do a String.IsNullOrEmpty check on the Label text (Content) in a button click event.

   1: If PlayButtonText = "Play" Then
   2:    SetValue(PlayButtonTextProperty, "Pause")
   3:    ' NullReferenceException thrown on following line
   4:    If String.IsNullOrEmpty(lblStartTime.Content.ToString) Then
   5:       lblStartTime.Content = DateTime.Now
   6:    End If
   7:    myTimer.Start()
   8:  
   9: Else
  10:    SetValue(PlayButtonTextProperty, "Play")
  11:    myTimer.Stop()
  12: End If

A similar bug was first reported in 2006 .Net 2.0 when used in a loop in a console app with an empty construct, and was subsequently fixed. It seems odd that I would experience a similar bug (or feature, if that is what it would be classified as) that has yet to be fixed as of .Net 3.5 SP1 in Visual Studio 2008. My usage above does not seem to be that uncommon.


Workaround


Replace the Label control with a TextBlock control, obviously replacing the lblStartTime.Content property with lblStartTime.Text property since there is no Content property on the TextBlock control.


Josh Smith wrote a good blog post explaining the differences between a WPF Label control vs. a TextBlock control.

WPF Binding app.config settings in XAML

I tried several different syntaxes for exposing an app.config MySettings property (VB.Net, not C#) for databinding in the XAML. I was met with several compile and/or designer load errors like:

  1. could not create an instance of type StaticExtension
  2. ‘MemberReferenceSerializer’ ValueSerializer cannot convert from ‘System.String’
  3. A TwoWay or OneWayToSource binding cannot work on the read-only property of ‘TargetShiftCount’ of type PacingChart.MySettings

The databinding syntax that worked was:

   1: <Window x:Class="Window1"
   2:     xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
   3:     xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
   4:     xmlns:p="clr-namespace:PacingChart"       
   5:     Name="window1"
   6:     Title="Pacer" Height="300" Width="300">
   7:     <Grid>
   8:         <TextBox Text="{Binding Source={x:Static p:MySettings.Default}, Path=TargetShiftCount, Mode=OneWay}" Name="txtShiftTarget" Margin="126,111,32,128"   />
   9:     </Grid>
  10: </Window>

On code snippet line 3, note the clr-namespace:<project root namespace> where <project root namespace> is PacingChart in this example. It did not work in my project with clr-namespace:PacingChart.Properties as some examples suggested. Those examples also indicated that the binding source should be "{Binding Source={x:Static p:Settings.Default}, Path=TargetShiftCount}". Using p:Settings.Default, not the p:MySettings.Default which worked in my example. Also note the lack of the Mode=OneWay attribute which caused the third error message listed above.


Most of the examples I attempted to follow were from people who asked the question about the correct VB.Net syntax, but the people responding were documenting the C# syntax. The Properties.Settings (in C#) and My.Settings (in Visual Basic) are helper classes. It is important to understand the syntax differences. In the VB.Net codebehind, you would access the settings using the syntax My.Settings.TargetShiftCount where in the XAML, you would use the MySettings class.


For completeness, I created the app.config property settings by double-clicking the “My Project” entry in the Solution Explorer and switching to the “Settings” tab, which created the following snippet in the app.config file.



   1: <applicationSettings>
   2:     <PacingChart.MySettings>
   3:         <setting name="TargetShiftCount" serializeAs="String">
   4:             <value>200</value>
   5:         </setting>
   6:     </PacingChart.MySettings>
   7: </applicationSettings>