Does anyone know of a good tool for refactoring resources in a visual studio 2008 solution?
We have a number of resource files with translated text in an assembly used for localizing our application. But they have gotten a bit messy... I would like to rename some of the keys, and move some of them into other resource files. And I would like those changes be done in my code, and the translated versions of the resource files as well. Maybe a some analysis on what strings are missing in the translated versions, and what strings have been removed from the original as well...
Does anyone know of a good visual studio extension or ReSharper plugin that can help me with this? Right now it is kind of a pain, because I have to first rename the key in the base resource file, then in the localized versions. And then compile to get all the compile errors resulting from the key which now have a different name, and then go through and fix them all... very annoying =/
I just stumbled across this question which prompted me to blog about what I use for this problem here Moving and renaming resource keys in a .resx file.
I have two PowerShell scripts, one which renames a resource key and one which moves a resource key from one resource file to another.
Using these scripts I am able to rename a resource key:
.\RenameResource.ps1 oldKey newKey
And I can move a resource with key “keyName” from a file named “ResourceFile1.resx” to “ResourceFile2.resx”:
.\MoveResource.ps1 ResourceFile1 ResourceFile2 keyName
RGreatEx is suitable when you need to move a lot of strings in code to resources. But in this case it can't help.
There are no such plugin (*this means that I have never seen such and didn't found in google, but there are some localizators which can help to translate to new language - http://www.peoplewords.com/download/ResxEditor.aspx and http://sourceforge.net/projects/resx/ and http://www.resx-localization-studio.net/ and http://madskristensen.net/post/A-NET-resource-editor-application-for-resx-files.aspx). But you easily (may be) can do this without it.
All you need is to write some small tool which will generate common dictionary of strings for a selected language for several selected resx files and store it somewhere. Another tool you need to create is a tool which will generate new resx files (after your changes) using changed resxs as templates and using the dictionary generated by previous tool.
Of course all new and changed strings will be missing but this can be fixed manually. This will take not so much time (especially when you'll add functionality to write a log of missing strings during generation new resx) .
Were looking into Sisulizer to localize our software, and I think it accomplishes what you're asking for (a bit overkill perhaps?)
Seems to be some new features in ReSharper 5 that helps with this
Localizing your Applications with ReSharper 5
This demo shows how ReSharper 5 helps you make strings in your code localizable quickly, without breaking your regular workflow. Working with resource files is no more a developer's nightmare with ReSharper 5.
Related
I am not new to coding and I know I have never had this issue.
In Visual Studio if I just create a .cs file and check it's intellisense nothing works. auto complete for using. does not work, nor does simple syntax checking work (see image)
Am I crazy? Can someone else try this out, what am I missing?
NOTE this only happens when I just have a .cs file for an external script. I just need simple auto complete and syntax checking to work
A C# file is somewhat meaningless without a project file. Versions, references, etc… all depend upon having a build system. This is a somewhat pedantic truth, but it is how VS works. Pathologically, I could have a CS file Console.WriteLine(“Hello world!”); which in one project results in hello world, and in another results in the program formatting a disk.
Add the CS file to a project, or create one. If you frequently come across this issue in some unique use case, visual studio may not be the best editor for the job. VS Code or another more lightweight tool may be better suited.
I need to make a ClassLibrary, to contain different Resource Files (resx). This needs to be done, so I can reuse these resources on multiple projects.
After reading for quite a while on how to achieve this, I'm still nowhere near close to an answer.
Note that i need to achieve this in a way that I don't have to recompile the proyect if I want to change a value
Is there a simple way to achieve this that I'm missing?
Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I'm afraid you're trying to use RESX files for something other than what they're designed to do. RESX files are compiled into .resources files, which are then embedded into the assembly during the build. In other words, if you don't recompile, you won't see any changes that are made to the resx file reflected in the module.
The benefits of RESX files extends far beyond providing compiled cultural/language text tightly coupled to a deployed solution. They have the potential to provide a simple and flexible set of content managed outside the software development process. Some views here:
What are the benefits of resource(.resx) files?
Yes you can work with your RESX files without having to compile them. See here:
Edit ASP.NET MVC 3 resx files in deployment server without recompiling
Yes you can share RESX files between different projects and even roll your own resource manager. You can maintain alternate sets of resources, serving up alternate content depending on for example the user context. I have been involved in a project where we implemented something along these lines to great affect, in my case the solution was used to provide white labeling. Some detail to get you started here:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa905797.aspx
I'm maintaining a WinForms application which was not written using any development patters conducive to localizing the classes in the project which were not directly associated with forms, or the code-behind partials of the forms.
Thus, there is MessageBox() code with English text in it in almost every code file. I'd like to find a tool which will "scrape" those strings from the code, insert the strings in a resource file, and substitute a call to the resource with the substituted string in a comment.
Does such a tool exist?
See ReSharper 5 Internationalization Features
When ReSharper finds a localizable
string, it helps you move it to a
resource file with only a couple of
clicks. You can optionally search for
identical strings and refactor them to
use the new resource item.
Hope it helps.
The Visual Localizer projects focuses on this very issue and is free.
Resharper can do it. There is a Resharper plugin called RGreatEx that has a lot of localization refactorings for strings. I'm guessing you are looking for something free though, and both of these cost money. RGreatEx also hasn't seen updates in more than two years.
EDIT: Did some more searching, and found this tool on CodePlex. It doesn't supporting pulling strings into resources, but it does have side-by-side editing of multiple resource files to ease writing string translations.
ReSharper is of course the best in this field, as it can scan all strings in your code base and let you know which can be placed into resources.
But if you intend to use a free tool, Microsoft does have an open source one here,
http://resourcerefactoring.codeplex.com/
You have to manually scan all files using this tool as it is not as smart as ReSharper.
You can also use T4 templates to do this kind of thing. They're built into Vis Studio as of 2005 I think.
I am working with a very big project (a solution that contains 16 projects and each project contains about 100 files).
It is written in C++/C# with Visual Studio 2005.
One of the projects has around 2000 resources out of which only 400 are actually used.
How do I remove those unused resources?
I tried to accomplish the task by searching for used ones.
It worked and I was able to build the solution, but it broke at runtime.
I guess because enums are used. (IMPORTANT)
How can I make sure that it doesn't break at runtime?
EDIT:
I think one method could be to generate the resource (that is not found) on the fly at runtime (somehow).
But I have no idea about ... anything.
NOTE: It's okay if a few unnecessary resources are still there.
What I would do is write a custom tool to search your source code.
If you remove a resource ID from a header file (i.e. possibly called resource.h) and then recompile and get no warnings: then that's a good thing.
Here is how I would go about writing the app. Take as input the resource file (resource.h) you want to scrutinize. Open the header file (*.h) and parse all the resource constants (Or at least the onces you are interested in). Store those in a hash table for quick look up later.
For each code file in your project, search the text for instances of each of your resource ID's. When a resource ID is used, increment the value in the hash table otherwise leave it at zero.
At the end, dump all the resource ID's that are zero out a log file or something. Then test that indeed you can remove those specified resource ID's safely. Once you do that, then write another tool that removes the specified resource ID's given the results of your log file.
You could write such a tool in perl and it would execute in about 0.3 seconds: But would take days to debug. :)
Or you could write this in .NET, and it would execute a little slower, but would take you an hour to debug. :)
You can use third party plug-in for Visual Studio as ReSharper. This add-in will analyze your C# code and point out unused resources. But it only works with C#.
For C++ projects, check out The ResOrg from Riverblade.
"The Resource ID Organiser (ResOrg for short) is an Add-in for Visual C++ designed to help overcome one of the most annoying (and unnecessary) chores of developing/maintaining Windows applications - maintaining resource symbol ID values"
http://www.riverblade.co.uk/products/resorg/index.html
I've never had one that bad. My method in compiled programs is to use a REXX script which emulates GREP looking for references to source that I suspect is not being used, remove them from the program and see what breaks. I use the REXX script because I can pre-filter the list of files I want to search. Which allows me to do a search across folders and computers.
If your code contains dynamic loading of resources (e.g. via strings) at runtime, then there is no way to automatically determine which resources can be safely removed from the source. A dynamic loading statement could load any resource.
Your best bet is to start with your trimmed down version of the app, run it, and identify which resources are missing when you test it. Then add them back in and retest.
You may want to take a look at the tool Reflector (free), not to be confused with ReSharper (expensive). It can show you which DLLs are dependent on another. Then if you want you may be able to remove the DLL that is not being referenced by anything else. Watch out if you are using dependency injection or reflection which then could break your code without your knowledge.
Reflector:
http://www.red-gate.com/products/reflector/.
This add-in draws assembly dependency graphs and IL graphs:
http://reflectoraddins.codeplex.com/Wiki/View.aspx?title=Graph.
In the "Resources View" of the Solution Explorer, right-click and select "Resource Symbols". Now you get a list where you can see which resources constants are used in the .RC-file. This help you might be a bit on the way to cleanup your Resource.h (although it does not show you which resources are not used in the actual C++ code).
Maybe Find Unused Resources in a .NET Solution helps here? Basically, you'll have to check which resources are used (e.g. by comprehensive code coverage checks) and remove the unused ones.
And probably you should not be afraid by using the trail-and-error approach to cleaning up.
In the Solution Explorer, right click and on a Reference and click on the menu item Find Dependent Code.
If it can't find any dependent code then you can remove this reference from the project. (The Remove operation is also under the right-click menu.)
EDIT: For a large project, the Find Dependent Code operation will take a long time. So since you have 2000 resources and most likely value your time this probably is not a viable option....
For C++ resources, did you try right-clicking the project in "Resource View" and then deleting the ones which do not have a tick mark next to them? It is unsafe to delete unused dialog resources since they are referenced as "enum"s in code (like the following).
enum { IDD = IDD_ABOUTBOX };
..however for all the others it should be safe.
Alright, so I'm working on programming my own installer in C#, and what I'd like to do is something along the lines of put the files in the .exe, so I can do
File.Copy(file, filedir);
Or, if this isn't possible, is there another way of doing what I am attempting to do?
I wouldn't code my own installer, but if you truely want to embed files into your assembly you could use strongly typed resources. In the properties dialog of your project open up the "Resources" tab and then add your file. You'll then be able to get the file using:
ProjectNamespace.Properties.Resources.MyFile
Then you'll be able to write the embedded resource to disk using:
System.IO.File.WriteAllBytes(#"C:\MyFile.bin", ProjectNamespace.Properties.Resources.MyFile);
Honestly, I would suggest you NOT create your own installer. There are many many issues with creating installers. Even the big installer makers don't make their own actual installers anymore, they just create custom MSI packages.
Use Mirosoft Installer (MSI). It's the right thing to do. Make your own custom front-end for it, but don't recreate the already very complex wheel that exists.
UPDATE: If you're just doing this for learning, then I would shy away from thinking of it as "an installer". You might be tempted to take your "research" and use it someday, and frankly, that's how we end up with so many problems when new versions of Windows come out. People create their own wheels with assumptions that aren't valid.
What you're really trying to do is called "packaging", and you really have to become intimately familiar with the Executable PE format, because you're talking about changing the structure of the PE image on disk.
You can simulate it, to a point, with putting files in resources, but that's not really what installers, or self-extractors do.
Here's a link to Self-Extractor tutorial, but it's not in C#.
I don't know enough about the .NET PE requirements to know if you can do this in with a managed code executable or not.
UPDATE2: This is probably more of what you're looking for, it embeds files in the resource, but as I said, it's not really the way professional installers or self-extractors do it. I think there are various limitations on what you can embed as resources. But here's the like to a Self-Extractor Demo written in C#.
I'm guessing here, but if you are trying to store resources in your application before compilation, you can in the Project Explorer, right click a file you would like to add, chose properties and change the type to Embedded Resource.
You can then access the embedded resources later by using the instructions from this KB:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/319292
in case you simply want to store multiple files in a single file storage (and extract files from there, interact etc.) you might also want to check out NFileStorage, a .net file storage. written in 100% .NET C# with all sources included. It also comes with a command line interpreter that allows interaction from the command line.