In LINQ 2 SP we work with a data context. By default a data context has the property ObjectTrackingEnabled = true. This property is crucial for all other operations in CRUD except Read. I performed a mini experiment. I created 20 000 items in my task list. Every seventh item contains “pärla”. Allright, here is what I found out:

2857 / 20 000 items

ObjectTrackingEnabled = true

The new interface of wp.com is great. For a while I had some considerations to migrate to tumblr, now I definitivly stay with wp. Now wp takes the best from itself, tumblr and twitter.

While working with Active Directory within SharePoint we probably don’t need to specify the domain or the root container. We can the current values. Here is a simple method from a console application just to demonstrate:

internal static void GetDomain()
{
	var context = new DirectoryContext(DirectoryContextType.Domain);
	var domain = Domain.GetDomain(context);
	Console.WriteLine("Full domain:");
	Console.WriteLine(domain.Name); //takana.local
	Console.WriteLine();
	Console.WriteLine("root container");
	var parts = domain.Name.Split(new\[\] {"."}, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);
	var dcParts = parts.Select(n => "dc=" + n).ToArray();
	var d = string.Join(",", dcParts); //dc=takana, dc=local
	Console.WriteLine(d);
}

First we get get the full domain, then we split and join them again.

[slideshare id=11031050&doc=sharepointhtml5-120113215236-phpapp02]   HTML5-and-CSS3-What-About-SharePoint.pdf (968 KB) by Kyle Schaefer

I use @-prefixed strings very often. You can use line breaks as much as you want. Very useful e.g. when I must create an xml in code. One thing I didn’t know was that you CAN use quotation marks inside @-strings. But you must write double quoutes like:

var t = @"säg ""hej""
		och ""hå""";

In one of my previous blogs I wrote about serializing of javascript objects. You can do it with JSON.stringify or Sys.Serialization.JavaScriptSerializer.serialize. Both methods work fine… almost. There is a big difference when it comes to datetime objects. MS treats dates a little bit different (like RegEx and much more). Let’s try this one:

var writer = { name: "Ajgi", birthdate: new Date(1934, 8-1, 21) };
var json = JSON.stringify(writer);
var msjson = Sys.Serialization.JavaScriptSerializer.serialize(writer);

What happens if we try to parse back msjson with JSON.parse: Well, the date isn’t a valid date anymore. How can we improve it. Rick Strahl gives a solution with custom functions for serializing and deserializing of ms date. But the thing is: we don’t need any custom functions for this, not if you run ASP.NET. The only thing we need is to use serialize and deserialize functions from Sys.Serialization.JavascriptSerializer namespace which you get automatically when you add ScriptManager in ASP.NET (and you get it even automagically in SharePoint). But what about $.ajax and functions I wrote about for retrieving list items and populating them, and updating list items with listdata.svc? Well, there comes the really nice tip from Rick Strahl: not to force $.ajax to parse the response. So instead of dataType: “json”, use the plain dataType: “text”. As the result we’ll get just a text, which we, of course, will deserialize with the native code for Microsoft:…. Use text when possible. When you define json as response format:

SPWebConfigModification. Some links to start with:

• http://panvega.wordpress.com/2009/09/02/using-spwebconfigmodification-within-a-feature-receiver/
• http://www.onedotnetway.com/get-name-of-current-executing-assembly-in-c/
• http://blogs.devhorizon.com/reza/?p=459 http://ikarstein.wordpress.com/2010/09/02/add-web-config-modification-with-powershell-spwebconfigmodification/
• http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb861909.aspx

public override void FeatureActivated(SPFeatureReceiverProperties properties)
{
	var webapp = parent as SPWebApplication;
	if (webapp != null)
	{
		var mod1 = GetWebControlsConfigMod();
		webapp.WebConfigModifications.Add(mod1);
		var mod2 = GetConStringConfigMod();
		webapp.WebConfigModifications.Add(mod2);
		SaveChanges(webapp);
	}
	else
	{
		Log.Warning("no modifications to webapp are done");
	}
}

public override void FeatureDeactivating(SPFeatureReceiverProperties properties)
{
	var webapp = parent as SPWebApplication;
	if (webapp != null)
	{
		var mod = GetWebControlsConfigMod();
		var modsCollection = webapp.WebConfigModifications;
		var modToDelete =
			(from m in modsCollection
			 where m.Value.Equals(mod.Value, StringComparison.InvariantCultureIgnoreCase)
			 select m).FirstOrDefault();
		if (modToDelete != null)
		{
			modsCollection.Remove(modToDelete);
			SaveChanges(webapp);
		}
	}
}
private static void SaveChanges(SPPersistedObject webapp)
{
	var service = webapp.Farm.Services.GetValue();
	service.ApplyWebConfigModifications();
	webapp.Update();
}

private static SPWebConfigModification GetWebControlsConfigMod()
{
	var assembly = System.Reflection.Assembly.GetAssembly(typeof(WebControls.OfficeEditor));
	var ass = assembly.FullName;
	var @namespace = assembly.GetName().Name + ".WebControls";
	var value = string.Format("", ass,
							  @namespace);
	const string path = "configuration/SharePoint/SafeControls";
	var mod = new SPWebConfigModification
	{
		Path = path,
		Name = "JustaName1",
		Sequence = 0,
		Owner = @namespace,
		Type = SPWebConfigModification.SPWebConfigModificationType.EnsureChildNode,
		Value = value
	};
	return mod;
}

private static SPWebConfigModification GetConStringConfigMod()
{
	const string name = "ContosoConString";
	const string conString =
		"Data Source=db.contoso.com;Initial Catalog=contoso\_db;Persist Security Info=True;User ID=contoso\_Contributor;Password=contoso";
	var mod = new SPWebConfigModification
	  {
		  Name = "JustaName2",
		  Path = "configuration/connectionStrings",
		  Owner = "contoso\_connectionstrings",
		  Type = SPWebConfigModification.SPWebConfigModificationType.EnsureChildNode,
		  Value = String.Format("", name, conString)
	  };
	return mod;
}

Powershell:

To get all users from an AD group is very simple:

groupName = "an\_ad\_group";
PrincipalContext ctx = new PrincipalContext(ContextType.Domain);
GroupPrincipal grp = GroupPrincipal.FindByIdentity(ctx, IdentityType.Name, groupName);
var principals = grp.GetMembers(true);
```But what about an OU? There is no OrganizationUnitPrincipal... [Well, there is a solution: to instantiate a context for your OU](http://stackoverflow.com/a/1927476/632117 "See the solution on Stack Overflow"): So if you want to check if a user in a OU:

internal static bool IsUserInOu(string ou, string name) { var domain = “takana.local”; var container = string.Format(“OU={0}, DC=takana, DC=local”, ou); var ctx = new PrincipalContext(ContextType.Domain, domain, container); var up = new UserPrincipal(ctx); var ps = new PrincipalSearcher(up);

If some javascript code takes too much time to execute, you probably want to see what time your code or a part of the code takes to run. I found an idea in Dave Cranes Ajax in Action. The book is a little bit old and the code provided below has been changed and simplified:

var stopwatch = {};
stopwatch.watches = \[\];
stopwatch.getWatch = function(id, startNow) {
	var watch = stopwatch.watches\[id\];
	if (!watch) {
		watch = new stopwatch.StopWatch(id);
	}
	if (startNow) {
		watch.start();
	}
	return watch;
};
stopwatch.StopWatch = function (id) {
	this.id = id;
	stopwatch.watches\[id\] = this;
	this.events = \[\];
	this.total = 0;
	this.count = 0;
};
stopwatch.StopWatch.prototype.start = function() {
	this.current = new stopwatch.TimedEvent();
};
stopwatch.StopWatch.prototype.stop = function() {
	if (this.current) {
		this.current.stop();
		this.events.push(this.current);
		this.count++;
		this.total += this.current.duration;
		this.current = null;
	}
};
stopwatch.TimedEvent = function () {
	this.start = new Date();
	this.duration = 0;
};
stopwatch.TimedEvent.prototype.stop = function() {
	var stop = new Date();
	this.duration = stop - this.start;
};

Want to add some tabs and new lines to your output in Powershell. Well, it works like \n and \t. But there is a little different syntax: `t and `n. Just a tip. An alternative way to add new line is to use [Environment]::NewLine:

$nl = \[Environment\]::NewLine
$var = "hej" + $nl
Write $var