Monthly Archives: February 2008
Return of SmartPart V1.3 released
Yesterday Jan Tielens released a new version of his famous SmartPart to the community. It is now at version 1.3 and here’s the changelog:
- Added a setup wizard to install the Return of SmartPart.
- Added sample user controls (including connectable user controls and AJAX user controls).
- Added localization support for ASP.NET AJAX user controls.
- Various minor bug fixes.
- Nice 2-minute screencast on how to deploy and test the SmartPart.
- 64 bit version available.
Great work, Jan! I also like the fact you’ve used Lars Fastrup‘s SharePoint Solution Installer for deploying SmartPart.
Vista SP1 setup language pack error
Right after I finished my previous blog post I started to install Vista SP1 myself. Unfortunately right after executing the installer I got a nice little messagebox, saying Vista Service Pack 1 setup couldn’t continue, because my version of Vista was unsupported. Now I run the English language version of Vista Ultimate (32 bit), so at first I couldn’t figure out why I got this error.
Then I looked at the error message more closely (unfortunately I cannot remember the exact words anymore) and noticed it said something about unsupported language packs being installed on the system (Vista SP1 is currently only available for the English, French, German, Japanese and Spanish language versions of Vista). I did remember seeing several language pack updates appear during a Windows Update session way back when I first installed Vista on this machine. However I couldn’t remember installing any of them.
To be sure I checked the Vista installed Programs and Features list for any installed language packs, but couldn’t find any. Using Google I found this article about Vista Language Packs and at the bottom of this article there were some instructions on how to remove a Vista language pack. It turned out installed Vista language packs aren’t listed in the Programs and Features list, but at a different location.
To cut a long story short, it turned out I had once installed the Dutch Vista language pack and had forgotten all about it. Unfortunately the mere presence of this Dutch language pack blocked the whole Vista SP1 installation! So I quickly uninstalled the language pack, which solved my problem.
For those interested, here are the instructions for uninstalling a Vista language pack:
- Click Start, and then click Control Panel.
- In Control Panel, click Clock, Language, and Region, click Regional and Language Options, and then click Change display language.
- On the Keyboard and Languages tab, click Install/uninstall languages under Display language. If you are prompted for an administrator password or for confirmation, type the password, or click Continue.
- In Choose to install or remove languages, click Remove languages.
Under Select the languages that you want to remove, select the language that you want to remove, and then click Next. - Click the language that you want to remove, and then click Remove.
Vista SP1 RTM now available for download!
There are going to be a lot of blog postings on this subject, so I thought I might do a short one too… 🙂
You’ve read the title: A couple of hours ago Microsoft has made Vista SP1 officially available for download for both MSDN and TechNet subscribers.
Here are the download links:
Have fun!
Update: I encountered a problem related to an installed Vista language pack, which prevented me from installing Vista SP1. Read more about it here.
Free e-book: The Developer Highway Code
Today I stumpled upon my TechEd 2007 goodie bag and found a little card I had picked up somewhere at the event. The card advertised a free prize draw (twenty copies of Vista Ultimate). All you had to do was download The Developer Highway Code, whatever that might be.
Ofcourse being Dutch means I’m always in for a free prize draw, so I immediately visited the URL printed on the card. It turned out The Developer Highway Code is a cool free e-book released by Microsoft (available in PDF and XPS format). It seems to have been around since 2006, but I hadn’t heard of it before. The book was written by Microsoft UK employee Paul Maher and Alex Mackman and has been revised in 2007 (probably right before TechEd). Here’s the official description, which you can find on the book’s website:
"To build software that meets your security objectives, you must integrate security activities into your software development lifecycle. This handbook captures and summarises the key security engineering activities that should be an integral part of your software development processes.
These security engineering activities have been developed by Microsoft patterns & practices to build on, refine and extend core lifecycle activities with a set of security-specific activities. These include identifying security objectives, applying design guidelines for security, threat modelling, security architecture and design reviews, security code reviews and security deployment reviews."
Unfortunately the free prize draw seems to be over, but the e-book is still available. I suggest every Microsoft developer to take a look at it, since it’s a very good summary of many things a developer should look at when developing secure applications.
Blurry WPF editor in Visual Studio 2008
A short post this time…
Ever wondered why Visual Studio 2008’s WPF editor shows up kinda blurry on your CRT monitor? It turns out it’s a WPF control itself (as you had probably already guessed). But did you know that this also means it makes use of ClearType, even if you haven’t got an LCD monitor hooked up? Read all about it at Todd Mancini’s blog.
LeonZandman.com 