VSTO - Getting a solution to run side-by-side with itself.

Problem:
When you post a new build of the same solution to a new share, the VSTO object tries to reference the same installed package as the existing solution.

In my case, I had released a demo version of my application to users and now I was releasing the full application. Any user that had installed the demo would first have to uninstall the demo to run the current solution.

Fix:
Modify the solution Id in the VSTO project to a new GUID

CONTAINSTABLE query shows error "..full-text query is too complex"

Problem:
I have found that using the sql ContainsTable statement which finds too many results returns the error message "Too many full-text columns or the full-text query is too complex to be executed".

SELECT * FROM CONTAINSTABLE(mytable,myFullTextColumn,N'"Starbucks *"')

The error message really doesn't tell you that there were too many results (the real problem here ) which caused me to bang my head against the wall for a few hours.

Solution:
Run a query with more details in the search string or change your query so the search string is more specific.

Google API SpreadsheetQuery doesnt work with at symbol (@)

I hate wasting time on stupid issues... and this was one of them. For the life of me, I couldn't figure out why I could not return a ListEntry when I was searching with an email address.

Problem:
ListQuery Lquery = new ListQuery(listFeedLink.HRef.ToString());
Lquery.SpreadsheetQuery = "user@google.com";

Solution:
ListQuery Lquery = new ListQuery(listFeedLink.HRef.ToString());
Lquery.SpreadsheetQuery = "\"user@google.com\"";


I figured it probably had something to do with the string delimiter, but the odd thing was that the google service would accept the full email address without throwing an error and just return no results. (Probably a bug) Regardless, it is still good to know that the string delimiter for the SpreadsheetQuery is a quotation mark since it isn't well documented.

TSD01261: The syntax check failed 'Incorrect syntax near ].' in the batch near '] '

Problem: Database Project fails to build with warning: The syntax check failed 'Incorrect syntax near ].' in the batch near ']. Project also fails to show the exact location of the error:

Source of the Problem:
I've found this to occur when the following two things happen together:

1. You have a variable defined for the project that isnt set.
2. You are using an ALTER AUTHORIZATION ON DATABASE statement with this variable.
   

Fix:
As you would expect, the fix here is to set the variable correctly since the real problem here is that visual studio doesn't tell you where the problem is occurring.

Getting browser scrollbar to scroll on silverlight content

Took me awhile to figure this one out.... probably because I didnt really understand how silverlight works. (hey, no better time to learn than when you are stuck on a problem, right?)

Problem:
The browser scrollbar doesnt appear when the silverlight control grows beyond the size of the page.

Solution:
The first point in finding the solution is realizing that the silverlight control itself resides WITHIN the asp.net control defined on your webpage and that this control's size doesnt change when the silverlight control changes. (When you first create a silverlight project, the size of the silverlight control is automatically set to 100%)

To overcome this we need to do 3 things:

1. Remove the Height="100%" attribute from the control in your hosting asp.net page.
2. Create a function that determines the height of all the controls within your root panel object.
3. Utilize the HtmlElement object to set the height of your ASP.NET silverlight control

Here is how I did it:

private void UpdatePageHeight()
{
double totalHeight = 0;
foreach (RowDefinition rd in ((Grid)(Content)).RowDefinitions)
totalHeight += rd.ActualHeight;

HtmlElement he = HtmlPage.Document.GetElementById("silverlightControl");
he.SetAttribute("height", totalHeight.ToString());
}

Notes:

• I'm using a Grid for my root panel, so I add up the height of all the rows to get my total height.
• I call this function whenever my grid size changes.... seems to cover all cases

Setting within your httpModules removes the HttpContext

I guess this makes sense now that I blog about it.... but it really had me stuck for a few hours yesterday when I stumbled across it.
When you use the node within your httpmodules section of your web.config, it will also clear out whatever is filling the Identity.Name value as well.

I was using this setting to eliminate some errors I was getting because my application is inheriting some modules from the parent application.

.xls is not a valid Win32 application with Windows Vista SP1

Annoying little problem I've been having with my office applications for a few weeks. At various times, I would try to open an Excel or word document and I would get the error:

"% is not a valid Win32 Application" or "This file does not have a program associated with it for performing this action..."

The only thing I knew for sure was that it would happen during the times I would hibernate my computer. (I hibernate my computer in the evening most of the time)

The actual problem turned out to be a Vista bug with running certain applications for a long period of time. Although not directly related to hibernate, by working all day and then hibernating my computer I was effectively leaving my computer running for a long period of time.

This is a known problem and it has been fixed with a Reliability update from Microsoft:
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=952709