Easiest way of asp.net deployment

When it comes to deployment of asp.net projects there are several ways, as described for example on MSDN. Working with ASP.net for several years I’ve found the easiest way of deployment for myself is using zip / rar to pack an archive of updated files. This works very well in both company and personal webserver configuration:

  • In company I’m not allowed to deploy directly to the live server (as this is an admin job)
  • The admin needs to be able to easily deploy the changes to stage server and afterwards to live server.
  • The admin needs to be able to identify the changed files easily.
  • At home I upload the files to my IIS via FTP as that’s easier than connecting to the machine via RDP and starting an update installation.
  • Previously at home with shared hosting I only had access to my webspace via FTP and not via Remote Desktop of course.

Bearing these requests in mind I created a simple batchfile which does this job for me. Continue reading →

How to use NUnit with Visual Studio Express 2008

One of the important things missing in Microsofts Visual Studio Express Editions is the option to create Unit Tests. Fortunately there are some free Unit Test Tools, like xUnit.net,  ExpressUnit, and lots more. Undoubtedly the best-known Unit Test Tool is NUnit. It’s written in C# and works perfect with current .net Frameworks. Setting up the tests is easy and there are several examples on their webpage, but it’s a bit complicated to get it more convenient. After some hours I faced 2 main questions:

  1. How could I access my app.config for the TestProject dll?
  2. How could I debug my tests?

Fortunately both questions could be answered easily.

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How to change the xml documentation file name in Visual Studio Projects

If you haven’t used Sandcastle yet, please have a look at it. It’s easy to create developer documentation with it, especially for dlls you want to share with others. And the comment feature is already included in Visual Studio 2005, so why not use it?
Probably you also now the Sandcastle Help File Builder which will create a HTML-Help or Webpages including your help. Very convenient.
But now I had a problem: While my dll was called something like ‘Windows.Media.Audio.dll’, the xml documentation file was only ‘Windows.Media.xml’. Of course it contained all necessary elements, but it was not automatically found by Sandcastle Help File Builder (but it could be configured manually) and even more important, also Intellisense does not work with this file. I could manually change the filename of the documentation xml to ‘Windows.Media.Audio.xml’, but this could also be done automatically.
Continue reading →