Entries for 2010

DotNetNuke Growing Pains and You, How to Cope 

I have had this blog posting all ready to go now for a good three to four weeks, but have been in deep internal conversation in regards to the posting of the article.  I have decided that more than anything posting this publicly might stop some of the e-mails that I get bombarded with each and every day that start out with "what do I do" or "do you still believe in DNN".

Before I start the post I am NOT in any way, shape, or form pointing fingers or expressing any displeasure at the platform or any of the members involved.  I am still a DotNetNuke core team member, I believe fully in the platform, and I will continue to adopt and recommend usage of the platform for the foreseeable future.  The point of this post is very simple, to talk about what has been going on in the DotNetNuke community and my opinions on how to manage expectations and cope with the situation.  Please remember the disclaimer that is posted at the bottom of this blog, these thoughts are mine and mine alone.

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Creating a Custom Registration Page With DotNetNuke 5.2.3 and Later 

Users that are familiar with DotNetNuke administration are most likely familiar with the old way of creating a custom registration page within a DotNetNuke portal.  It was as simple as adding a new page, putting the modules you desired on the page including the "User Account" module to get the actual registration functionality.  From there a simple change in "Site Settings" for the "User Page" and you are set to go!  Well, for those of you working with DNN 5.2.3 and later (Possibly previous 5.x versions as well, I'm not 100% sure when the change was) will find out that the module definition I mention is no longer listed?  What do you do now?

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When and Why Backup Your DNN Site 

I just posted a new article on my business blog, Business Continuity - Backup Strategies, DotNetNuke, and you.  It covers the when/why of working with DotNetNuke from an administrators point of view.

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OpenForce 2010 Session Submissions 

For those of you that follow me on Twitter, you might have noticed my posting the other day noting that I have submitted my session topics for OpenForce 2010. I thought I'd share with you the topics that I submitted, if you have any ideas for other sessions feel free to post a comment, and I might try to get something proposed for it.

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First Chance Exception Event .NET 4.0 

I have been spending quite a bit of time recently working with Visual Studio 2010 and .NET 4.0, working to keep up to date with the rapid additions to the .NET framework.  In this blog posting I'll share one fun new addition to the .NET framework that can be very helpful when creating applications and looking for a method to log all exceptions for logging purposes.  Starting with .NET 4.0 there is a new event available from the AppDomain object "FirstChanceException".  The following explains a bit about this new feature and how it could be helpful.

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The DotNetNuke Object Qualifier - Why I Think it is Evil 

For those of you that have seen my comments on the DotNetNuke forums, my book, or the forum here on this site, you more than likely have noted my consistent notes that I recommend avoiding the "ObjectQualifier" setting within DotNetNuke at all costs.  Most of the time I have simply put, I don't use it and recommend that you don't either, but have not given a very detailed explanation as to why I'm not a fan.  Below I will share with you what the ObjectQualifer is, why it was created, and why I don't recommend using it.

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Selecting the Right .NET Language the VB or C# Debate 

Now first of all, before I get into the true content of this blog posting I do NOT want to start another round of the religious war that always seems to happen when you start talking about the usage of Visual Basic or C#.  The purpose of this blog posting is to put a little perspective into why I choose to work with a specific language for different projects, and the evaluation criteria that I use when making the choice for individual projects.  Yes, I'm a C# MVP, C# is my preferred .NET language, but I'll be the first to admit that there are times and places where VB is a necessary language.  In this article, I'll start out by providing a bit of background as to WHY I'm blogging about this, the evaluation criteria that I use when looking at a project and some other general information that I've found over the years.  Keep in mind the disclaimer found at the bottom of this posting, these are my thoughts, and mine alone, if you don't like them, which I'm sure many of you will not that is fine, but I wanted to put a bit of perspective on my take for the common argument.

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Future Blogging on MitchelSellers.com 

Over the next few weeks you will see a much larger effort for me to get back to this blog and getting new content out. In addition, I have made a few category additions and changes with hopes of expanding the content of this blog a bit more. There will still be plenty of DotNetNuke related content, but I am going to try and get more content in the C# and Visual Studio areas, trying to share some tips and tricks that I use on a daily basis to help speed the development process. The following is a quick list of topics that I am working on, and will be getting posted soon, these are NOT listed in any order, so they could appear in random intervals. If you have other suggestions, please post them to the comments.

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DNN 5.2.x Changes to Module Create Process 

In a few of the most recent versions of DotNetNuke, major changes have been completed in the way that a user manually imports a module definition to test a manifest file.  This is specifically the process that is mentioned in my book to test a module while developing, before it has been packaged for installation on another portal.  From what I gather, the behavior might change back a bit, but for now the process is slightly different that indicated in my book.  In this blog posting I'll document the changes, and a workaround solution.

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Dynamic User Directory Module Review 

I was recently given an opportunity to review the Dynamic User Directory module created by the folks at DataSprings. This module is a a great module for creating a user directory from a standard DotNetNuke installation, and works great for individuals that are using the Dynamic Registration module from DataSprings as well. At the most basic level, this module might seem to be a fairly simple module, it displays a list of users on the portal. However, it is important to not over-simplify the task at hand. Due to the nature of DotNetNuke and the data structures used it is very common for a "user directory" module to be a very complex setup, especially if you are looking to work against a large user base, or to support searching on profile values. This review will take a look at the module and provide some insight to some of the key findings from my testing.

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