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Thursday, September 15, 2016Print Subscribe

Calculating Values with C#/Visual Basic Business Rules

It is a common requirement for forms of the application to feature a custom calculation or operation that must be triggered by the user pressing a button visible on the screen.

For example, let’s use the Orders page of the Northwind sample project. It may be useful to have an action that will mark the order as shipped by populating the Shipped Date field, and setting a default value for Freight if it has not been specified.

The first step is to add an action to the form scope that the user will be able to press to trigger a business rule.

Start the Project Designer. In the Project Explorer, switch to the Controllers tab. Right-click on “Orders / Actions / ag2 (Form)”, and press New Action.

Set the following properties:

Property	Value
Command Name	Custom
CommandArgument	MarkAsShipped
Header Text	Mark as Shipped
When Last Command Name	Edit

Press OK to save the new action.

Next, let’s create a business rule that will perform the calculations. Right-click on “Orders / Business Rules” node, and press “New Business Rule”.

Specify the following values so that the business rule will be triggered by the action created above.

Property	Value
Type	C# / Visual Basic
Command Name	Custom
Command Argument	MarkAsShipped
Phase	Execute

Press OK to save the business rule. On the toolbar, press Browse to regenerate the application and ensure that the rule file is created.

When generation is complete, press “Edit Rule” on the action bar. This will open the business rule in Visual Studio.

Replace the contents of the file with the following code.

C#:

using System;
using System.Data;
using MyCompany.Data;
using MyCompany.Models;

namespace MyCompany.Rules
{
    public partial class OrdersBusinessRules : MyCompany.Data.BusinessRules
    {
        
        /// <summary>
        /// This method will execute in any view for an action
        /// with a command name that matches "Custom" and argument that matches "MarkAsShipped".
        /// </summary>
        [Rule("r100")]
        public void r100Implementation(OrdersModel instance)
        {
            instance.ShippedDate = DateTime.Now;
            if (!instance.Freight.HasValue || instance.Freight == 0)
                instance.Freight = 13.5m;

            PreventDefault();
        }
    }
}

Visual Basic:

Imports MyCompany.Data

Namespace MyCompany.Rules

    Partial Public Class OrdersBusinessRules
        Inherits MyCompany.Data.BusinessRules

        ''' <summary>
        ''' This method will execute in any view for an action
        ''' with a command name that matches "Custom" and argument that matches "MarkAsShipped".
        ''' </summary>
        <Rule("r113")>
        Public Sub r113Implementation(instance As OrdersModel)
            'This is the placeholder for method implementation.
            instance.ShippedDate = DateTime.Now
            If Not instance.Freight.HasValue OrElse instance.Freight = 0 Then
                instance.Freight = 13.5D
            End If
            PreventDefault()
        End Sub
    End Class
End Namespace

The code will set the ShippedDate field to the current date and time. It will then check if Freight has a value, and if the value is equal to 0. If so, then the Freight will be set to the decimal number 13.5. Finally, PreventDefault() is called in order to prevent the form from navigating back to the grid.

Save the file, and refresh the web browser. Navigate to Orders page and edit a record. Notice that the “Mark as Shipped” action is now available. Pressing this action will now populate the Shipped Date with the current date and time. If the Freight field was empty, then it will be set to $13.50.

Labels: Application Builder, ASP.NET, Code Generator, Tutorials, Web Application Generator

Friday, September 9, 2016Print Subscribe

Data View Fields

Every database entity contains a list of properties, stored as columns in the table. These columns are represented by fields in the model and controller. When an entity requires a repeated, varying amount of related information, these properties are externalized to a separate table. This detail entity must be defined as a model in the project, and a data view can be placed under the master entity to display a list of these items.

Let’s take the Northwind sample database as an example. Every order contains a discrete list of properties that are represented as columns in the database. Any number of details for the order can be added. Each order detail contains an OrderID foreign key column, which refers to OrderID primary key of the order record.

In the default app created by Code On Time app generator, a field is created for every column present in the database entity.

The natural next step is to display a list of details in the order form.

Make sure the sample project contains models for both Orders and Order Details database entities. Start the Project Designer. In the Project Explorer, switch to the Controllers tab. Right-click on the “Orders / Fields” node, and press “New Field”.

Enter the following properties:

Property	Value
Name	Details
Type	DataView
Data View Controller	OrderDetails
Data View	grid1
Filter Field #1	OrderID

Press OK to save the new field. Next, drag the new Details field onto “Orders / Views / editForm1” to create a data field in the order form.

On the toolbar, press Browse to generate the application. Navigate to the Orders page and select a record. Notice that a list of related details are displayed at the bottom of the form.

This data view field be placed in any position on the form, or placed in a custom location using a form template.

Labels: Application Builder, ASP.NET, Designer, Features, Tutorials, Web App Generator, Web Application Generator

Friday, August 26, 2016Print Subscribe

Deploying Web Site Factory Project to Azure

Microsoft Azure is composed of a collection of integrated cloud services. It enables easy storage of databases and deployment of web applications to the Internet, without having to deal with the hassle of infrastructure maintenance. When it comes time to offer your application to a larger number of users, your services can be scaled easily to fit your needs. Azure offers pay-as-you go services to scale up or down to match demand.

Let’s deploy a sample Northwind Web Site Factory project to Azure using Visual Studio 2015.

Start the app generator, click on the project name, and press “Develop” to open the project in Visual Studio.

In the Solution Explorer (F4), right-click on the “WebSite” node and press “Publish Web App”.

In the list of publish targets, select “Microsoft Azure App Service”.

If you have not logged into your Microsoft account, enter your credentials in the login window that appears and proceed to log in.

In the App Service window, press “New..” to create a new resource group for your application.

Assign a Web App Name to this deployment. Next to App Service Plan, press “New…”.

Select an app service plan suitable for your deployment. Every tier provides different compute capabilities and features at different price points.

Please note that a dedicated (non-shared) app service plan must be selected in order for reports to be generated. The smallest available size that enables the use of reporting is “Basic – 1” (B1).

Press “OK” to save the app service plan. Then, click “Create” to create the required Azure resources.

When the process is complete, the Publish screen will open with pre-filled values. Leave the values as default and press “Next” to configure settings.

Check the box next to “Remove additional files at destination”. This will ensure that the deployment directory will match the local directory.

Press “Publish” to deploy your application to the cloud. When publish is complete, the application will open in your default web browser.

Including Report Viewer DLLs

If Reporting is enabled in the web application, a server error will be displayed. ReportViewer DLLs must be included in the published app.

Open File Explorer by pressing Win+E, and navigate to

C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_MSIL\Microsoft.ReportViewer.WebForms

Open the folder for the version of Report Viewer required by your application. Applications using “.NET 4.6” require version 12.

Right-click on the DLL file and press “Copy”.

In Visual Studio’s Solution Explorer, right-click on “WebSite” project node and press “Add | New Folder”.

Assign the name “bin” to the folder. Right-click on the new folder and press “Paste”.

The DLL will copy into the “bin” folder.

Copy two more DLLs, found at these locations:

C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_MSIL\Microsoft.ReportViewer.Common
C:\Windows\assembly\GAC_MSIL\Microsoft.ReportViewer.ProcessingObjectModel

Next, re-publish the app by right-clicking on the “WebSite” node and pressing “Publish Web App”.

Then, press “Publish” to initiate the process. Once complete, the app will open in your web browser and open the home page of your application running in the cloud.

Labels: ASP.NET, Azure, Deployment, Features, Tutorials, Web Application Generator