Blog posts tagged with csharp, page 7

My Favorite Visual Studio 2005 and .NET 2.0 features

05-Aug-2005

C# 2.0
Class Designer
Unit Testing
Code Coverage
FXCop Integration
Debugging: DataTips, Visualizers and Viewers
Refactoring
Improved IntelliSense
Code Snippets
Profiles
Strongly-typed resource class generator
Improved (not perfect) Windows Forms controls

Binary Compatiblity

22-Jul-2005

Microsoft has released a free LibCheck tool that allows you to compare two versions of an assembly, and determine the differences. The tool reports the differences as a combination of 'removed' and 'added' APIs. The tool is limited to looking only at APIs (i.e, it can't check for behavioral changes), and only compares public differences, or changes which are deemed to be 'breaking'. The tool can be used to quickly determine what has changed between one version of your assembly and another, and can help ensure that you won't introduce any breaking changes to clients of your assembly. Instructions and intended use of the tool are described in the 'libcheck tool specification' document with the zip file.

This was a feature I always was missing. VB6 had this, VS.NET didn't. Thanks MS.

Microsoft has put my 'Dual List' .NET Magazine article online!

09-Apr-2005

Microsoft has put my Visueel programmeren met .NET: Dual List Control article online. It is published in the .NET Magazine #8 and it is free for Dutch developers.
They didn't publish the sourcecode (yet) but you can download it from my own site. The aricle is in Dutch. You can find an (old) English version of this article here. An even more advanced implementation that also supports Drag & Drop can be found here.

WaitCursor

10-Feb-2005

For a long time I thought that I only had to set the Cursor.Current to a WaitCursor before a long running operation, the .NET runtime would reset it back to the Default cursor. Turns out that this is only true when the mouse is moved. Bummer.

// Cursor.Current are automatically reset to Default when the
// mouse is moved and the application is idle!
Cursor.Current = Cursors.WaitCursor;

The solution for this problem is very easy. I created a helper class called WaitCursor which set the Cursor.Current and restores it to the original value when it it disposed.

public sealed class WaitCursor : IDisposable {   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbsp
   &nbspprivate Cursor _prev;

   &nbsppublic WaitCursor(){
   &nbsp   &nbsp_prev= Cursor.Current;
   &nbsp   &nbspCursor.Current = Cursors.WaitCursor;
   &nbsp}

   &nbsppublicvoid Dispose(){
   &nbsp   &nbspCursor.Current =_prev;
   &nbsp}
}

I create the instance of the WairCursor class inside a using statement. This will automatically call the Dispose() method when it goes out of scope.

Dispose Modal WinForm Dialogs

12-Dec-2004

There is a difference in disposing Modal and Non-Modal forms. In a training I gave last week I noticed that even experienced developers didn't know that Modal Dialogs don't dispose automatically, Non-Modal do.

private void buttonShowNonModalForm ( object sender , System.EventArgs e){
&nbspnew TestForm().Show();
}

privatevoidbuttonShowModalDialog(objectsender, System.EventArgs e){
&nbspnew Form2().ShowDialog();
}

The solution to this problem is very simple by creating the Form instance within a using block. This will dispose the Form when it is closed.

private void buttonShowModalDialog ( object sender , System.EventArgs e){
   &nbspusing(TestForm f =new TestForm()){
   &nbsp   &nbspf.ShowDialog();
   &nbsp}
}

An alternative solution uses a try/finnaly. Personally I prefer the previous, it is easier to read and write.

C# HandleWhiteSpace Add-In

23-Sep-2004

The C# code editor in Visual Studio.NET 2003 does not handle whitespaces automatically like the VB.NET code editor does. This Add-In solves this problem by adding the 'Handle WhiteSpace' menu option to the Visual Studio.NET 2003 Tools menu. This option formats the C# code of the active code editor. This includes:

Space before: method declaration parentheses, method call parentheses, statement parentheses, braces and brackets
Space after: comma and semicolon
Space around: operators
Double space

ToolboxBitmap workaround

03-Sep-2004

I have found a solution for a problem which I had for a long time. I was unable to set the ToolboxBitmap attribute for a component using the (type, string) constructor. I found the solution for this problem (using an internal ResFinder class) on www.bobpowell.net. This site has also some other Windows Forms Tips and Tricks. Great!

Visual C# 2005 Express Edition Beta is great

14-Jul-2004

I'm testing Visual C# 2005 Express Edition Beta and I really like it. It has all of the features which I need to build Windows Forms applications. The Editor has also all new IntelliSense, Refactoring and Code Snippets features. They work great and really can boost productivity.

I have tested it on a PC with only 256Mb of ram. This is for the beta not enough. You need at least 512Mb.

I'm using the Online MSDN Help, it works OK. The looks are good but I find it difficult to get to the 'overview' of a class.

For professional development I would advise to use Visual Studio. For hobby work use the Express versions.

String Array Sorting

27-Apr-2004

It took me today some time to figure out how to sort an array of strings case-sensitively. The default behavior of the Array.Sort() uses an default Comparer object which should be case-sensitive. When I tested this I found out that I had misinterpreted the definition of 'case-sensitive'. What I wanted was 'Oridinal' sorting. So I created an OrdinalStringComparer class which implements IComparer and I got what I wanted.

using System;
using System.Collections;

namespace ReflectionIT.Test {

   &nbspclass Class1{

   &nbsp   &nbsp[STAThread]
   &nbsp   &nbspstaticvoid Main(string[]args){

   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspTest(new CaseInsensitiveComparer());
   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspTest(Comparer.Default);   &nbsp   &nbsp
   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspTest(new OridinalStringComparer());
   &nbsp   &nbsp
   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspConsole.ReadLine();
   &nbsp   &nbsp}

   &nbsp   &nbspprivatestaticvoid Test(IComparer comparer){

   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspstring[]words=newstring[]{"c","a","A","aB","ab","Ab"};

   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspArray.Sort(words,comparer);
   &nbsp   &nbsp
   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspConsole.WriteLine(comparer.GetType().Name +":");
   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspforeach(stringwordinwords){
   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspConsole.WriteLine(word);
   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbsp}
   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspConsole.WriteLine();
   &nbsp   &nbsp}
   &nbsp   &nbsp
   &nbsp}
   &nbsp   &nbsp
   &nbsppublicclass OridinalStringComparer : IComparer {
   &nbsp   &nbsp
   &nbsp   &nbspint IComparer.Compare(object x,object y ){
   &nbsp   &nbsp   &nbspreturnstring.CompareOrdinal((string)x,(string)y);
   &nbsp   &nbsp}
   &nbsp   &nbsp
   &nbsp}
   &nbsp   &nbsp
}

And when you run this program you get the following output:

CaseInsensitiveComparer:
A
a
Ab
ab
aB
c

Comparer:
a
A
ab
aB
Ab
c

OridinalStringComparer:
A
Ab
a
aB
ab
c

System.Collections and System.Collections.Specialized

08-Mar-2004

This table gives you an overview of all collections in the System.Collections and System.Collections.Specialized namespaces.

Class	Key	Value	Remarks
System.Array		?	Predefined size, used for passing data around.
ArrayList		Object	Easy to work with, provides basic collection functionality and can easily be converted to an Array.
BitArray		Boolean	Manages a compact array of bit values, which are represented as Booleans
CollectionBase		?	Abstract base for building your own collection classes.
DictionaryBase	Object	?	Abstract base for building your own collection classes using a key-value pair.
HashTable	Object	Object	Provides high performance access to items in the key-value pair collection, by a specific key.
Queue		Object	Implements the FIFO mechanism.
ReadOnlyCollectionBase		Object	Abstract base for building your own read-only collection classes.
SortedList	Object (sorted)	Object	Provides access to items in the collection by a specific key or an index (GetByIndex(int)).
Stack		Object	Implements the LIFO mechanism.
Specialized.HybridDictionary	Object	Object	Uses internally a ListDictionary class when the collection is small, and switches automatically to a Hashtable class when the collection gets large.
Specialized.ListDictionary	Object	Object	Is designed to be used for collections with 10 or less items, while the Hashtable is designed to contain more items.
Specialized.NameObjectCollectionBase	String	?	Abstract base for building your own collection classes using a key-value pair.
Specialized.NameValueCollection	String (sorted)	String	NameValueCollection class is the strong type equivalent of the SortedList class, for the String class.
Specialized.StringCollection		Object	Strongly typed ArrayList for the String class.
Specialized.StringDictionary	String	String	Strongly typed Hashtable for the String class, not sorted.

Read also Jan Tielens article on the MSDN Belux website.

Reflection IT Blog

csharp tagged Blog posts