Navigon TMC review

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I "recently" purchased a dedicated Navigon SatNav (2100) with TMC as I thought my Pocket PC Navigon software was good if the TMC was a bit of a damp squid. Today I had to go on a fairly long trip around the south-east portion of the M25 and then up the M1 to Scunthorpe. The routing was, as usual, great but since I was the passenger I could keep a watch on the TMC signal. This isn’t a very scientific experiment but these are my findings. 

First off the TMC signal was non-existent until we got past Rickmansworth, then we got a good 5 mins worth of signal. Lost it for the majority of the M25 until we got close to the M1. The M1 has a couple of longer signal windows, a couple towards Milton Keynes with the best around Derbyshire. A final little window near Scunthorpe itself. So although the coverage was sparse it was enough to give the unit time to download a reasonable amount of traffic information and it did report problems on the adjoining roads (fortunately nothing bad on the route itself).

So overall the TMC works but only in specific areas, if anyone reading this knows of these zones then please let me know, if you have anecdotal evidence of areas it works then please post a comment and perhaps we can compile a working map.

UX catalogue

pauliomLeave a comment
A bit of tenuous Silverlight post but hey it’s running in Silverlight. A nice application showing a large number of user experience "patterns".

Trouble selling Silverlight?

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Just read an interesting blog about Evangelising Silverlight. I didn’t realise it was realised in Windows Update, I’ll have to check that out.

Things to consider when developing with JavaScript

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I admit that I’m used to using JavaScript to provide the odd bit of client functionality and to plug gaps with CSS. However, the more complicated script I write the more problems I find with it. So I found this slide show by John Resig to be very interesting (if you get the chance to attend a seminar by him then do so).

Are you sure you want to create your own Custom membership provider?

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As you may have read in my previous posts I’ve been investigating the use of the ASP.NET membership provider with Silverlight. The next stage was to write my own custom membership provider because I’ve a requirement to have a two part user name, much like Domain\User Name rather than just User Name. The web has a number of tutorials about rolling your own provider but for me this seemed like over-kill, I’m quite happy with the SQL Provider I just want to enforce a few extra rules, store a couple of other facts, audit specific changes, etc. Although I could use a regular expression to help me out it wouldn’t fulfill all my requirements. So my solution is to just derive from the SQL Provider;
 

    public class MyOwnSqlProvider : SqlMembershipProvider          

    {

        public override bool ValidateUser(string username, string password)

        {

            System.Diagnostics.Debug.WriteLine(username + " – " + password);

            return base.ValidateUser(username, password);

        }

    }

 

There we have, I can intercept the calls, add my own rules, etc. The only other change is to the web config to tell the world about the new provider.

 

    <membership defaultProvider="MyAspNetSqlMembershipProvider">

      <providers>

        <add name="MyAspNetSqlMembershipProvider" type="MyMembershipDemo.Web.MyOwnSqlProvider" connectionStringName="LocalSqlServer" enablePasswordRetrieval="false" enablePasswordReset="true" requiresQuestionAndAnswer="true" applicationName="/" requiresUniqueEmail="false" passwordFormat="Hashed" maxInvalidPasswordAttempts="5" minRequiredPasswordLength="7" minRequiredNonalphanumericCharacters="1" passwordAttemptWindow="10" passwordStrengthRegularExpression=""/>

      </providers>

 

I’m not suggesting that this removes the need to write your own provider but if, like me, you only want to make a couple of subtle changes then this might save a lot of effort. BTW if you do want to delve deeper into writing your provider then you should take a look at Microsoft’s Provider Toolkit

Silverlight cross-domain policy helper

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One thing I didn’t mention in my last Silverlight post was about how to create a cross domain policy file to allow Silverlight to use a web service. I found this xml snippet post to be very helpful.

More on Integrating Silverlight with ASP.NET membership authentication

pauliom3 Comments
Ok, so strictly this should be entitled Integrating Web Services and ASP.NET membership authentication but it’s from a Silverlight client hence the title. So in my previous post I provided a link to a great article explaining how to get a Silverlight client to use ASP.NET membership features. The next step for me was how to a write a web service that will only allow calls from a Silverlight user who has signed in. Here is how I did it;

Assuming you have followed the previous post and now have a Silverlight client that can authenticate users via the membership providers then the next step is to write your web services.

1. Create Service
Although you can as a web service to the current ASP.NET site it’s probably more likely that you’ll want a separate web service project so Add->New Project->Web Service. If you’re using the default templates then you should see a HelloWorld web method created for you.

        [WebMethod]

        public string HelloWorld()

        {

            return "Hello World";

        }

2. Connect the Service to the same Membership database
As I mentioned in my previous post, you’re better off providing your own connection string for the membership store, so now you’ve created a new site you have to add the same connection string to the web service, something like;

  <connectionStrings>

    <remove name="LocalSqlServer"/>

    <add name="LocalSqlServer" connectionString="Data Source=.\MySQLServer;Initial Catalog=aspnetdb;Integrated Security=True" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient"/>

  </connectionStrings>

3. Add a reference from your Silverlight client to the service
In the Silverlight project Add Service Reference and press discover. If your service doesn’t show make sure you’ve built the project, VS sometimes won’t spot the new project until it has been built.

4. Add the code to call your service
Nothing special here except you may want to catch exceptions because the user isn’t authenticated (forgive the rubbish use of Execption here);

        private void TestService_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)

        {

            ServiceReference1.Service1SoapClient testService = new ApplicationServicesDemo.ServiceReference1.Service1SoapClient();

            testService.HelloWorldCompleted += new EventHandler<ApplicationServicesDemo.ServiceReference1.HelloWorldCompletedEventArgs>(testService_HelloWorldCompleted);

            testService.HelloWorldAsync();

        }

 

        void testService_HelloWorldCompleted(object sender, ApplicationServicesDemo.ServiceReference1.HelloWorldCompletedEventArgs e)

        {

            try

            {

                TestService.Content = "Test -" + e.Result;

            }

            catch (Exception)

            {

                TestService.Content = "Please sign in";

            }         

        }

To handle the exception correctly you need to delve into the inner exception but hopefully you get the idea.
5. Secure the web method
The easiest way to secure the method is to add a System.Security.Permissions attribute to the method;

        [WebMethod]

        [PrincipalPermission(SecurityAction.Demand, Authenticated = true)]

        public string HelloWorld()

        {

            return "Hello World";

        }

There you have it. One "secure" web service. If your user is authenticated via membership then they’ll have access, if they don’t then the service will tell a white lie and say the service doesn’t exist.

A couple of useful tools

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A quick heads-up to a couple of tools I’ve found useful. The first is Windows Live Writer, finally a easy way to get images into this rusty old blog. The second is Silverlight Spy, a really nice way to help get to grips with what happens when you finally run a Silverlight application.

Styling the Listbox Control with Blend

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Silverlight (and WPF) provides very powerful mechanisms to change the look and feel of standard controls. However, as I’ve discovered, it’s not always obvious how to let Blend help you affect the changes.

Blend – friend and (innocent) foe

Recently I wanted to both edit the style (change the basic properties such as colour and font) and template (change the layout and structure of a control) of a Listbox. The main change I was after was to make the list horizontal rather than vertical whilst retaining all the other Listbox features.

Creating sample data

So before we discover where to go to make the changes I want to see some example data in Blend rather than running the application. One method is to; in Visual Studio create the basic class that you’ll bind the Listbox to. Return to Blend and select the Listbox->Properties->Items (Collection)->Add Another Item. Select the class you created and enter in your example data. You then go into the Xaml view and copy and paste the sample data as you wish. So we have data but how to style it? Once you have your Listbox selected Blend has many options; Edit Style, Edit Other Styles, Edit Control Parts (Template), Edit Other Templates. So there you have it, not a confusing array of choices at all! So what do these options do for you?

<ListBox Margin="0,0,17,0" VerticalAlignment="Top" Height="100">

            <ListBoxItem Content="There was a monster from Leeds"/>

            <ListBoxItem Content="who ate a packet of seeds"/>

            <ListBoxItem Content="in less than hour, his nose was a flower"/>

            <ListBoxItem Content="and head was a garden of weeds"/>

        </ListBox>

        <ListBox Margin="0,115,17,85">

            <SLLB3:Lymeric Verse="There was a monster from Leeds"/>

            <SLLB3:Lymeric Verse="who ate a packet of seeds"/>

            <SLLB3:Lymeric Verse="in less than hour, his nose was a flower"/>

            <SLLB3:Lymeric Verse="and head was a garden of weeds"/>

        </ListBox>

Figure 1 Standard and Sample data Listboxes – Xaml

clip_image002

Figure 2 Standard and Sample data Listboxes

Edit Style

The main sub-menu here is Edit Copy. Essentially I want to steal the current style of the Listbox and make a few adjustments, so Edit Copy inserts the current template for you, good news. So we’re at the style level, lots of colours, fonts, etc. Inside the style is the setter for the template. So with Blend looking at the style you can then select Edit Control Parts (Template) and you’re ready to change the layout…well not quite. What I’d expected to see was a large chunk of Xaml describing the state changes for events such as mouse over, leave, etc. What I get was a very dry few lines showing a content presenter…hmm not much use.

clip_image004

Figure 3 Changing a copy of the default style

Edit Other Styles

The sub menu here ItemContainerStyle is the one I’m after. Translating Blend speak, this creates the Listbox Item Style (and template). Once you have a style for a Listbox item you’re free to edit its Control Parts (Template)…

clip_image006

Figure 4 Changing the Listbox Item style

Edit Control Parts (Template)

If you attempt this with the List Box selected you end up with the dry container style you get from Edit Style. However, you should select this after you’ve gone via Edit Other Styles->ItemContainerStyle, i.e. with the style selected. This will take you to the template of the Listbox item (or Control Part Template in Blendease). Finally we’re at the good stuff, Visual State Manager Xaml everywhere.

clip_image008

Figure 5 Changing the MouseOver state to a "nice" pink

Edit Other Templates

Other Templates has two menus; Edit Generated Items (ItemTemplate), Edit Layout of Items (ItemPanel).

Edit Generated Items (ItemTemplate)

Translating Blend this creates the Data Template, i.e. the controls to render the items of data you’re going to bind to. So for a standard Listbox this would be a TextBlock bound to toString. This is an important template if you want to display other data types, e.g. bound images and captions.

clip_image010

Figure 6 Data Template, at last the data

Edit Layout of Items (ItemPanel)

Item Panel means the control (or controls) that contain the items in the data template, i.e. think of it as the data repeater. In my case this is the template I needed to change in order to get the Listbox to display horizontally rather than vertically.

clip_image012

Figure 7 Changing the layout to a Horizontal StackPanel

 

So there you have it, the first steps in styling & templating a listbox. What I’m looking at doing next is to rearrange the scroll bar…

Getting the name of an Element in Silverlight (WPF)

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Quick post this, today I found myself wanting to get the name of element that raised an event, and as always the simpliest requests in Silverlight are often the hardest. Well ok, it wasn’t hard but perhaps not obvious so I thought I’d post it so at least I’ll be able to do it again…
 
So you put a click event on something and you want to know the name of the button…
<Button x:Name="Bob" />
 
Well the trick is knowing that name is a Framework Element property so…
 

private void Bob_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)

{

FrameworkElement frameworkElement = (FrameworkElement)sender;

string name = frameworkElement.Name;

}

Knowing that you could also use…

string name = ((UIElement)sender).GetValue(FrameworkElement.NameProperty).ToString();

…and knowing that you could e.OriginalSource depending upon the element you want to know the name of.