How to get into SubSonic? - c#

A month ago I searched for some tools that will generate C# classes out for my SQL database/tables. So I don't have to write DAL classes manually and to save a lot of time.
I came across "ORM" and subsonic. I watched the webcasts on the homepage http://subsonicproject.com/ and was pretty impressed by it.
But I am still missing more documentation/knowledge to feel comfortable with subsonic to use it in our projects. Today I read about the "migration" feature somewhere - accidental.
How to get into subsonic? How to get more comfortable with it? How to know about all the features/possibilities it provides? Are there any good blogs/tutorials/whatever for subsonic?

Unfortunately, the best SubSonic "documentation" is in the form of screencasts, but they are very easy to follow.
Quite a lot about SubSonic on Rob Conery's (original creator) blog http://blog.wekeroad.com/tags/subsonic/.
Personally found the best thing is (like Matt said) to just use it, set it up in external tools in VS, get the connection string and a few other config settings sorted, and you're just about good to go. You can get the basics down in an afternoon.
The forum is quite active http://forums.subsonicproject.com/forums/, and a good place if you get stuck.

SubSonic is irritatingly short on documentation (which is one reason I abandoned it). Scott Kuhl wrote a "Getting Started with SubSonic" document (just Google his name and SubSonic) but parts of it appeared to be out of date.
Here is Scott's blog - a place to start at least.
Here is the document's home page. I was curious as to whether the document is indeed out of date and I think it is: the web page has a last updated date in 2006.
Unfortunately, I know of no other documentation and I did look for it.
Update: See the link to documentation that Rob Conery provided in his answer.

I admit it - our docs suck :(. I did try to put a site together:
http://subsonicproject.com
Hope this helps.

Just start using it.
It is very simple and pretty straight forward. There are several screencasts on how to generate your classes with sub commander, once you have that just hit . and see what you can do with them.

I put together a template project referencing SubSonic generated off the Northwind Database. A very simple project, but should easily be enough to get started on your first project. Check it out here:
http://ajondeck.net/post/2008/12/29/ASPNET-20-SubSonic-Project-Template-With-SQL-Server-2005-Northwind-DB.aspx

Related

Self-contained Hello World type example for NHibernate

I've been fussing around with NHibernate tutorials for months (yeah...literaly) with no success. I wanted to just get a basic "hello world" level example down pat so I could work with it and massage it into a proper use case but I can never get past the deprecated code or missing library files.
I can only assume that it is me who is at fault because of NHibernate's popularity. Would someone pleeeeeeasee lead me to a self-contained example that I can just download and run? I would absolutely appreciate it.
Many thanks to everyone (with the exception of Diego) for their help. Special thanks to Michael Buen for his suggestion with using Fluent NHibernate.
There is a great example of NHibernate 3.0 in action here that I got to work: http://www.d80.co.uk/post/2011/02/20/Linq-to-NHibernate-Tutorial.aspx
Now all I need to do is learn exactly what's going on and mold it to my uses.

how to use typed DataSets in c#?

I tried to google but didn't find a decent tutorial with snippet code.
Does anyone used typed DataSets\DataTable in c# ?
Is it from .net 3.5 and above?
To answer the second parts of the question (not the "how to..." from the title, but the "does anyone..." and "is it...") - the answer would be a yes, but a yes with a pained expression on my face. For new code, I would strongly recommend looking at a class-based model; pick your poison between the many ORMs, micro-ORMs, and raw ADO.NET. DataTable itself does still have a use, in particular for processing and storing unpredictable data (where you have no idea what the schema is in advance). By the time you are talking about typed data-sets, I would suggest you obviously know enough about the type that this no longer applies, and an object-model is a very valid alternative.
It is still a supported part of the framework, and it is still in use as a technology. It has some nice features like the diff-set. However, most (if not all) of that is also available against an object-based design, with classes and properties (without the added overhead of the DataTable abstraction).
MSDN has guidance. It really hasn't changed since typed datasets were first introduced.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/esbykkzb(v=VS.100).aspx
There are tons of videos available here: http://www.learnvisualstudio.net/series/aspdotnet_2_0_data_access_and_databinding/
And I found one more tutorial here: http://www.15seconds.com/issue/031223.htm
Sparingly.... Unless you need to know to maintain legacy software, learn an ORM or two, particularly in conjunction with LINQ.
Some of my colleagues have them, the software I work on doesn't use them at all, on account of some big mouth developer getting his way again...

Reading blogger entries from .NET

What is the best way to read entries programatically from Blogger using .NET/C#?
GData has a Blogger API. There is a C# library that can be downloaded. This is an official library from Google. I've used it in the past (though in PHP). The documentation is a bit light, but the code works very well.
The documentation is absolutely atrocious. It literally has zero pertinent information for anything valuable. Your best bet is to get your FeedQuery and then step through in debugger. Once in the debugger you can see all entities and pick out the ones you want. If you have any questions, post em here, I've been working with this API for the last two weeks.

authorize.net C# wrappers/library

Are there any good libraries or wrappers for Authorize.net? The code samples available from their site seem a little ... raw. I'm looking for an easy to use, object oriented API that I can simply set some properties, and it takes care of all the plumbing code under the hood.
I've found a few random blog posts of people offering their code that they've written, but code offered in a blog post doesn't give a high degree of confidence generally that it's been well tested. I mean, we'll consider these if we have to, but we'd prefer something that looks like it's gone through some sort of release/testing cycle ... even if it's just that it has been posted on codeplex or something.
Thanks! :-)
A little late answering, but perhaps this?
http://code.google.com/p/payment-processor/
I use SharpAuthorize.com on a few eCommerce sites. One of which makes around $10K / month...
MinimumCreditCard authNet = new MinimumCreditCard()
.Login("testdrive")
.Password("password")
.TransType(TransType.AUTH_CAPTURE)
.CardNum(_cardNumField.Text)
.ExpDate(_cardExpField.Text)
.CardCode(_cardCodeField.Text)
.Amount(8.00);
if (authNet.Authorize())
{
// Money in your pocket!
}
It is noted on the site, but you should use a transaction id instead of the username and password in real code.
See my answer here, it should help you out. In my answer, I point to a blog post as a reference. You may need to view the revisions to see my whole answer, though. For some reason it is getting cut off for me. Check out the Gateway Provider Implementations section of the blog post. It should help you out and get you going on implementing your own code for talking to the Authorize.Net API. I've used a similar implementation and it has worked well for me.

Learning about Hidden Features

Today I found out about an interface I'd never heard of before: IGrouping
IEnumerable<IGrouping<YourCategory, YourDataItem>>
I am fortunate to have access to some of the best programming books available, but seldom do I come across these kinds of gems in those books. Blogs and podcasts work, but that approach is somewhat scattershot. Is there a better way to learn these things, or do I need to sift through the entire MSDN library to discover them?
Eric Lippert's blog. The real guts of C# - why there are some limitations which might seem arbitrary at first sight, how design decisions are made, etc.
Alternatively, for more variety, look at the Visual C# Developer Center - there's a whole range of blogs and articles there.
Oh, and read the C# spec. No, I mean it - some bits can be hard to wade through (I'm looking at you, generic type inference!) but there's some very interesting stuff in there.
The best place to start is Jon Skeet's C# Coding blog: http://msmvps.com/blogs/jon_skeet/
He regularly covers stuff you won't see anywhere else.
How about the Hidden Features series of questions?
Hidden Features of C#
Hidden Features of ASP.NET
And many more...
I personally like the way of discovering hidden features on my own while solving a specific problem. In the end, a hidden feature that you never needed to get something done is of questionable value. It just adds clutter to the brain.
The way to do it is to use the MSDN library to look things up. Then take a little time to look around what you found.
That's especially important with the pure API documentation. For instance, I just browsed to http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.xml.xmlreader.aspx (note how that URL is formed). When I look in the Contents pane on the left, I see everything from XmlDocument (and XmlDocumentFragment) all the way down to XmlReader. In the middle are some things I rarely or never use, like XmlNamespaceScope and XmlNodeOrder.
From time to time, spend a little time on "abstract knowledge". Sometimes, it's good to look up from the trees to learn your way around the forest. You never know when you'll need something you've learned to get you out of the woods.
For the people who don't know IGrouping:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb344977.aspx
I often read useful stuff on the Viual Studio Startup page and start clicking around to other keywords/areas. Not too promote StackOverflow too much, but you'll find some hidden gems here as well, simply by looking at how other people write code.
For example:
Hidden Features of C#?

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