One of my VB.net applications started off to be fairly simple and (surprise) has grown significantly. I was using the Registry to save my limited number of settings, however that has now grown to where I felt I was abusing the Registry. I have converted most of my saved settings to XML files that have been working well. I would appreciate thoughts on saving the following to the Registry, I have been looking through threads on this and still am not sure if I should use files or the Registry:
Paths to the user settings files. Currently the application looks for an
XML file in a specific sub-folder of the users Documents folder for
an XML file containing the paths.
Window positions and sizes for forms (over 50 forms).
Licensing data (licensing per machine).
Application version.
Related
This suppose to be a simple issue; not to be posted as a question in stack overflow!
Following this article: How to: Create Embedded Resources
I had created a new and fresh Form1.vb to test in Visual Studio 2017 community edition.
Added a big testfile.WAV file as a test resource.
Checked the link type is set to default value: "Linked at compile
time" Default Value.
Clean/Build/Rebuild the application.
Still no matter what I do, the result.exe file is so big and reflect the big testfile.wav file size, and can't at any situation find the wav file as a linked resources in separate file in bin\Debug folder!
Tried to alter almost everything everywhere; yet no success!
What I expect is to have both result.exe and testfile.wav in bin\Debug folder separately linked and not embedded.
Looks very weird to me? is it a bug in VS or in app setting?
Thank you so much
Appreciated any hint
Note: What I was trying to reach is to create a different themes for my application, where users can chose the appearance; and my efforts break in the above scenario. It doesn't make sense that result.exe ends in 10s of MB if it will include resources inside it!
TL;DR: If you want it as a loose file then you need to have it as a loose file. Resources are always embedded in the application.
If you add the resource via Project Properties > Resources then it will always be embedded in your application.
If you want it as a loose file then you shall just import it to your project via Add Existing Item and set the Copy to Output Directory property of the item to Copy Always. Then you reference it by doing for example:
Dim WavPath As String = Path.Combine(Application.StartupPath, "yourfile.wav")
Dim WavFile As Byte() = File.ReadAllBytes(WavPath)
Linked vs Embedded only make a difference at design time. Linked resources are still embedded in your application, but at design time you may edit them and can easily add or remove other resources.
Embedded resources however are embedded in a .resx file even at design time, and to edit such resources you have to export them or change them into a linked resource. Embedded resources are mostly used when you need to share the same resources in multiple projects. The resources are then embedded in the .resx file so you only need to copy that and not every included file.
I am attempting to make an instructional app for the call canter that I work at. Part of the code allows users to display information through the use of several files in our directory with drop down combo boxes.
For instance, a small portion of the code is similar to this (I did not save the app and bring it home so I am going off memory):
If cboGlossaryTerm.SelectedItem("MSN")Then
Process.Start("S:\MSN.pdf")
End If
I put the pdf files in My Resources and the Word files are added under the Solution folder.
I am using filepaths in the code as well.
(I attempted to save the pdf files in the Solutions folder but the pdf was not compatible.
With me adding the files this way, will users who do not have access to the S drive folder be able to display the files? Also, will the files remain accessible in the program if they are deleted from the S drive? If not, how should I be referencing the files in my project? Do I have to reference the pdf files from My Resources? If so, how do I do that in an If-Then statement similar to the one above?
from what you have there it doesn't look like the pdfs in the S:\ would be available to anyone who doesn't have the drive mapped on their local machine.
as for if the files are deleted, if they are being loaded from the S:\ then when they are deleted from there the program will not be able to find them to load them.
if the program is being installed on the local machines you might want to look at just including the pdfs in the installer and accessing them through the program files path.
When setting up local synchronization with a Sharepoint 2010 site using Sharepoint Workspace, where are the local files stored? More importantly, how can I change the storage location?
There is a folder-like object created under username\Workspaces, but when checking the path in the explorer address bar, it shows simply username\Workspaces, unlike other folders that show as C:\Users\username\xxxx. Right clicking the folder only provides the option to open in new window - it can't even be deleted! There are no options for setting storage location within the Workspace application itself.
Using an SSD system drive, I don't have the space to put all this data on C:. Only part of my user profile has been relocated to other drives, so the default for new items is still C:. Without a knowledge of the real path where this is stored, I can't even use junction points to redirect.
Much web searching has revealed nothing on this subject. Your help is appreciated.
the data is stored within the users profile. I don't think taht you're able to relocated the synched database. The synchronized data isn't encrypted or password protected. So you should consider to activate profile encryption within your organization.
In addition to the location you aren't able to activate any kind of OOB protection for the local SQL CE which is responsible for storing the synched data!
The default location is %localappdata%\Microsoft\Office\14.0\OfficeFileCache.
The files in this location don't look like the actual files, and contain a lot of metadata.
Per Microsoft KB 2020636, you can change the location of the OfficeFileCache by adding an Expandable String Value named OfficeCacheLocation to registry subkey HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Common\Internet with the new path. (This key is for Office 2010 only.)
In my organization, we reviewed the option of using Workspace for making files available offline, but in the end opted for a third party SharePoint add-on.
Since all of out users have Outlook and use it on daily basis, it made sense to have an Outlook sidebar available with all the users' relevant files. It also can synchronize a SharePoint library or folder and makes its items available offline using Microsoft Outlook, so we opted to use it instead of the OOB feature, which was too limited and had various security problems.
Just came across this and I think this will do the trick: How to change the default location of the Office 2010 Document Cache (NB: I haven't actually done it myself yet).
I don't have enough "reputation" on this site to post additional links, but if you search on the following, you can find more background:
OfficeFileCache Folder Size 3-4x Larger than Actual Content (SharePoint Workspace 2010)
Sharepoint Workspace Fills Hard Drive – WTF?
Is there a way (via shell extension or registry setting) to tell Windows Explorer that it shouldn't read files in the folder being shown in order to extract metadata or create thumbnails?
The problem is that when the user navigates to the folder, Windows Explorer attempts to read all files in the folder and extract certain metadata from them. If the medium is slow, this takes ages and causes unnecessary load on the file system. This is especially true in case of thumbnails, when the whole graphic file is read.
I am looking for ways to do this (restrict Explorer) in code, so "don't use Thumbnail mode" is not an acceptable answer :).
Upd: per-user settings won't work unfortunately cause we as a disk provider can deal only with our own disk (and the user might want to have separate settings for regular disks and virtual disks). I believe there must be some way to "explain" the OS that the drive is slow.
Maybe there's some IRP on driver level that we need to handle to tell the OS that the medium is slow?
Is there a way (via shell extension or
registry setting) to tell Windows
Explorer that it shouldn't read files
in the folder being shown in order to
extract metadata or create thumbnails?
Not that I know off, but depending on the priorities regarding the use case details you outlined there might be two options still to approximate the desired result:
Via group policy
Note that this essential expands/details the network folder related aspect of Freds answer, which you dismissed in your update; however, you claim to be able to deploy shell extensions or registry settings and the following two group policies simply execute the latter by administrative means:
User Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> Windows Components -> Windows Explorer:
Turn off the display of thumbnails and only display icons **on network folders**
Turns off the caching of thumbnails in hidden thumbs.db files.
This boils down to the following registry settings:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer]
"DisableThumbnailsOnNetworkFolders"=dword:00000001
"DisableThumbsDBOnNetworkFolders"=dword:00000001
Of course this is still not per folder, but at least limited to network folders and ignores regular disks and virtual disks.
Via hackish workaround
Given your statement we as disk provider can deal only with our own disk there might be a hackish workaround, though I'm afraid it lacks the last mile (untested by myself).
Starting from Chris W. Reas own answer to How can I suppress those annoying Thumbs.db files in Windows Vista and Windows 7?:
Also worth knowing: In Vista and Windows 7, Thumbs.db applies to network folders only. For local folders, Vista and Windows 7 instead save thumbnail cache information to a database in a local folder at "%userprofile%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer"
Continuing from there, Wil claims the following potentially clever solution to work on a per folder basis:
Go to the drive and create a file called thumbs.db (in notepad or anything), then change the permissions on the file for everyone (including SYSTEM) to deny all.
Unfortunately, aside from the automation requirements to create the dummy thumbs.db in each folder, the outcome depends on how Explorer will react on the inaccessible file - because caching is optional as per group policy, it might as well display thumbnails without caching them, making the bandwidth issue even worse in turn ...
Good luck!
I'm not sure if you can disable thumbnail generation/display for certain folders but this article talks about a script which could quickly disable it via context menu.
The script modifies a value in the registry key HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\. I suppose you could find something similar in that key for the other metadata. ShowInfoTip sounds promising. There might be relevant information in other nearby keys.
This may be a complete non-answer depending on your needs, but how about storing the files without file extensions that the OS wants to make thumbnails of? Call it file.jpg.abc and it won't be reading thumbnails, for sure.
I'm building an application that needs to download web content for offline viewing on an iPad. At present I'm loading some web content from the web for test purposes and displaying this with a UIWebView. Implementing that was simple enough. Now I need to make some modifications to support offline content. Eventually that offline content would be downloaded in user selectable bundles.
As I see it I have a number of options but I may have missed some:
Pack content in a ZIP (or other archive) file and unpack the content when it is downloaded to the iPad.
Put the content in a SQLite database. This seems to require some 3rd party libs like FMDB.
Use Core Data. From what I understand this supports a number of storage formats including SQLite.
Use the filesystem and download each required file individually. OK, not really a bundle but maybe this is the best option?
Considerations/Questions:
What are the storage limitations and performance limitations for each of these methods? And is there an overall storage limit per iPad app?
If I'm going to have the user navigate through the downloaded content, what option is easier to code up?
It would seem like spinning up a local web server would be one of the most efficient ways to handle the runtime aspects of displaying the content. Are there any open source examples of this which load from a bundle like options 1-3?
The other side of this is the content creation and it seems like zipping up the content (option 1) is the simplest from this angle. The other options would appear to require creation of tools to support the content creator.
If you have the control over the content, I'd recommend a mix of both the first and the third option. If the content is created by you (like levels, etc) then simply store it on the server, download a zip and store it locally. Use CoreData to store an Index about the things you've downloaded, like the path of the folder it's stored in and it's name/origin/etc, but not the raw data. Databases are not thought to hold massive amounts of raw content, rather to hold structured data. And even if they can -- I'd not do so.
For your considerations:
Disk space is the only limit I know on the iPad. However, databases tend to get slower if they grow too large. If you barely scan though the data, use the file system directly -- may prove faster and cheaper.
The index in CoreData could store all relevant data. You will have very easy and very quick access. Opening a content will load it from the file system, which is quick, cheap and doesn't strain the index.
Why would you do so? Redirect your WebView to a file:// URL will have the same effect, won't it?
Should be answered by now.
If you don't have control then use the same as above but download each file separately, as suggested in option four. after unzipping both cases are basically the same.
Please get back if you have questions.
You could create a xml file for each bundle, containing the path to each file in the bundle, place it in a folder common to each bundle. When downloading, download and parse the xml first and download each ressource one by one. This will spare you the overhead of zipping and unzipping the content. Create a folder for each bundle locally and recreate the folder structure of the bundle there. This way the content will work online and offline without changes.
With a little effort, you could even keep track of file versions by including version numbers in the xml file for each ressource, so if your content has been partially updated only the files with changed version numbers have to be downloaded again.