Web Essentials Goodness - Paste XML/JSON As Classes

I recently have been working on project where I have been evaluating some vendor APIs. Across the multiple vendors the responses have been in either XML or JSON. Since I am most familiar with .NET development, I have been creating my testing clients in C# after verifying the responses from the API with Fiddler. So in many cases once I have seen the XML/JSON output, I want to be able to download that data into my application as a class. Thankfully, the Web Essentials Visual Studio extension by Mads Kristensen, includes two excellent options. Paste XML As Classes and Paste JSON As Classes. With these two options ( from the File->Paste Special menu) when you have a class open you can paste any JSON or XML object and the extension will generate a class that corresponds to the document for you. In some cases (especially with XML) you may need to perform some additional clean up of local variable names, etc. But in the long run this has saved me lots of keystrokes. Below are a couple of examples.

JSON Object

	{
	"parameters":{
	"tbdb":"nasapoc",
	"service":"prefix",
	"template":"service.json",
	"term_prefix":"11"
	},
	"termHints":[
	{
	"name":"Soyuz T11",
	"id":"OMII0IIN2112985674",
	"index":"nasapoc",
	"values":[
	{
	"value":"T-11",
	"pre_em":"T-",
	"em":"11",
	"post_em":"",
	"nature":"NPT",
	"id":"OMII0II957832499"
	}
	],
	"facets":[
	{"id":"OMII0IIN417970619","name":"Programs & Missions"},
	{"id":"OMII0IIN708454495","name":"Organizations"}
	]},
	{
	"name":"Soyuz TM11",
	"id":"OMII0II1817708082",
	"index":"nasapoc",
	"values":[
	{
	"value":"TM-11",
	"pre_em":"TM-",
	"em":"11",
	"post_em":"",
	"nature":"NPT",
	"id":"OMII0IIN1708344299"
	}
	],
	"facets":[
	{"id":"OMII0IIN417970619","name":"Programs & Missions"},
	{"id":"OMII0IIN708454495","name":"Organizations"}
	]},
	{
	"name":"Soyuz TMA11",
	"id":"OMII0II402255746",
	"index":"nasapoc",
	"values":[
	{
	"value":"TMA-11",
	"pre_em":"TMA-",
	"em":"11",
	"post_em":"",
	"nature":"NPT",
	"id":"OMII0IIN564231465"
	}
	],
	"facets":[
	{"id":"OMII0IIN417970619","name":"Programs & Missions"},
	{"id":"OMII0IIN708454495","name":"Organizations"}
	]},
	{
	"name":"Apollo 11",
	"id":"OMII0IIN408999708",
	"index":"nasapoc",
	"values":[
	{
	"value":"Apollo 11",
	"pre_em":"Apollo ",
	"em":"11",
	"post_em":"",
	"nature":"PT",
	"id":"OMII0IIN408999708"
	}
	],
	"facets":[
	{"id":"OMII0IIN417970619","name":"Programs & Missions"}
	]},
	{
	"name":"Expedition 11",
	"id":"OMII0II1043857968",
	"index":"nasapoc",
	"values":[
	{
	"value":"Expedition 11",
	"pre_em":"Expedition ",
	"em":"11",
	"post_em":"",
	"nature":"PT",
	"id":"OMII0II1043857968"
	}
	],
	"facets":[
	{"id":"OMII0IIN417970619","name":"Programs & Missions"}
	]},
	{
	"name":"Group 11",
	"id":"OMII0II1304089265",
	"index":"nasapoc",
	"values":[
	{
	"value":"Group 11",
	"pre_em":"Group ",
	"em":"11",
	"post_em":"",
	"nature":"PT",
	"id":"OMII0II1304089265"
	}
	],
	"facets":[
	{"id":"OMII0IIN1655901465","name":"People"}
	]},
	{
	"name":"ISS Assembly Mission 11A",
	"id":"OMII0IIN1793710402",
	"index":"nasapoc",
	"values":[
	{
	"value":"ISS Assembly Mission 11A",
	"pre_em":"ISS Assembly Mission ",
	"em":"11",
	"post_em":"A",
	"nature":"PT",
	"id":"OMII0IIN1793710402"
	}
	],
	"facets":[
	{"id":"OMII0IIN417970619","name":"Programs & Missions"}
	]},
	{
	"name":"Lunar Module 11",
	"id":"OMII0II962622437",
	"index":"nasapoc",
	"values":[
	{
	"value":"Lunar Module 11",
	"pre_em":"Lunar Module ",
	"em":"11",
	"post_em":"",
	"nature":"PT",
	"id":"OMII0II962622437"
	}
	],
	"facets":[
	{"id":"OMII0IIN81023276","name":"Systems & Equipment"}
	]},
	{
	"name":"Mir expedition crew 11",
	"id":"OMII0II74828100",
	"index":"nasapoc",
	"values":[
	{
	"value":"Mir expedition crew 11",
	"pre_em":"Mir expedition crew ",
	"em":"11",
	"post_em":"",
	"nature":"PT",
	"id":"OMII0II74828100"
	}
	],
	"facets":[
	{"id":"OMII0IIN417970619","name":"Programs & Missions"},
	{"id":"OMII0IIN708454495","name":"Organizations"}
	]},
	{
	"name":"Orion 11",
	"id":"OMII0II800124355",
	"index":"nasapoc",
	"values":[
	{
	"value":"Orion 11",
	"pre_em":"Orion ",
	"em":"11",
	"post_em":"",
	"nature":"PT",
	"id":"OMII0II800124355"
	}
	],
	"facets":[
	{"id":"OMII0IIN417970619","name":"Programs & Missions"}
	]}
	],"total":10
	}

view raw JSON-Example hosted with ❤ by GitHub

Corresponding Class created with Paste JSON as Classes

	public class Rootobject
	{
	public Parameters parameters { get; set; }
	public Termhint[] termHints { get; set; }
	public int total { get; set; }
	}
	public class Parameters
	{
	public string tbdb { get; set; }
	public string service { get; set; }
	public string template { get; set; }
	public string term_prefix { get; set; }
	}
	public class Termhint
	{
	public string name { get; set; }
	public string id { get; set; }
	public string index { get; set; }
	public Value[] values { get; set; }
	public Facet[] facets { get; set; }
	}
	public class Value
	{
	public string value { get; set; }
	public string pre_em { get; set; }
	public string em { get; set; }
	public string post_em { get; set; }
	public string nature { get; set; }
	public string id { get; set; }
	}
	public class Facet
	{
	public string id { get; set; }
	public string name { get; set; }
	}

view raw JSON-Class hosted with ❤ by GitHub

XML Object

	<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
	<SEMAPHORE>
	<PARAMETERS>
	<PARAMETER NAME='TBDB'>nasapoc</PARAMETER>
	<PARAMETER NAME='SERVICE'>prefix</PARAMETER>
	<PARAMETER NAME='TEMPLATE'>service.xml</PARAMETER>
	<PARAMETER NAME='TERM_PREFIX'>11</PARAMETER>
	</PARAMETERS>
	<TERM_HINTS>
	<TERM_HINT NAME='Soyuz T11' ID='OMII0IIN2112985674' INDEX='nasapoc' WEIGHT='39.1393' CLASS='Missions'>
	<FACET NAME='Programs &amp; Missions' ID='OMII0IIN417970619'/>
	<FACET NAME='Organizations' ID='OMII0IIN708454495'/>
	<HINT NATURE='NPT' ID='OMII0II957832499'>
	T-<EM>11</EM>
	</HINT>
	</TERM_HINT>
	<TERM_HINT NAME='Soyuz TM11' ID='OMII0II1817708082' INDEX='nasapoc' WEIGHT='21.1928' CLASS='Missions'>
	<FACET NAME='Programs &amp; Missions' ID='OMII0IIN417970619'/>
	<FACET NAME='Organizations' ID='OMII0IIN708454495'/>
	<HINT NATURE='NPT' ID='OMII0IIN1708344299'>
	TM-<EM>11</EM>
	</HINT>
	</TERM_HINT>
	<TERM_HINT NAME='Soyuz TMA11' ID='OMII0II402255746' INDEX='nasapoc' WEIGHT='21.1928' CLASS='Missions'>
	<FACET NAME='Programs &amp; Missions' ID='OMII0IIN417970619'/>
	<FACET NAME='Organizations' ID='OMII0IIN708454495'/>
	<HINT NATURE='NPT' ID='OMII0IIN564231465'>
	TMA-<EM>11</EM>
	</HINT>
	</TERM_HINT>
	<TERM_HINT NAME='Apollo 11' ID='OMII0IIN408999708' INDEX='nasapoc' WEIGHT='17.612' CLASS='Missions'>
	<FACET NAME='Programs &amp; Missions' ID='OMII0IIN417970619'/>
	<HINT NATURE='PT' ID='OMII0IIN408999708'>
	Apollo <EM>11</EM>
	</HINT>
	<METADATA>
	<FIELD NAME='site_description'>The purpose of the Apollo 11 mission was to land men on the lunar surface and to return them safely to Earth.</FIELD>
	<FIELD NAME='site_title'>The Apollo 11 Mission</FIELD>
	</METADATA>
	</TERM_HINT>
	<TERM_HINT NAME='Expedition 11' ID='OMII0II1043857968' INDEX='nasapoc' WEIGHT='16.6638' CLASS='Missions'>
	<FACET NAME='Programs &amp; Missions' ID='OMII0IIN417970619'/>
	<HINT NATURE='PT' ID='OMII0II1043857968'>
	Expedition <EM>11</EM>
	</HINT>
	<METADATA>
	<FIELD NAME='site_description'>Commander Sergei Krikalev and Flight Engineer John Phillips lived and worked aboard the International Space Station from April 2005 through October 2005. Krikalev had served on the station previously as part of the Expedition 1 crew, and Phillips visited the station as part of the STS-100 crew.</FIELD>
	<FIELD NAME='site_title'>Expedition 11</FIELD>
	</METADATA>
	</TERM_HINT>
	<TERM_HINT NAME='Group 11' ID='OMII0II1304089265' INDEX='nasapoc' WEIGHT='17.8633' CLASS='Astronauts'>
	<FACET NAME='People' ID='OMII0IIN1655901465'/>
	<HINT NATURE='PT' ID='OMII0II1304089265'>
	Group <EM>11</EM>
	</HINT>
	</TERM_HINT>
	<TERM_HINT NAME='ISS Assembly Mission 11A' ID='OMII0IIN1793710402' INDEX='nasapoc' WEIGHT='18.3697' CLASS='Missions'>
	<FACET NAME='Programs &amp; Missions' ID='OMII0IIN417970619'/>
	<HINT NATURE='PT' ID='OMII0IIN1793710402'>
	ISS Assembly Mission <EM>11</EM>A
	</HINT>
	</TERM_HINT>
	<TERM_HINT NAME='Lunar Module 11' ID='OMII0II962622437' INDEX='nasapoc' WEIGHT='17.8589' CLASS='Systems and Equipment'>
	<FACET NAME='Systems &amp; Equipment' ID='OMII0IIN81023276'/>
	<HINT NATURE='PT' ID='OMII0II962622437'>
	Lunar Module <EM>11</EM>
	</HINT>
	</TERM_HINT>
	<TERM_HINT NAME='Mir expedition crew 11' ID='OMII0II74828100' INDEX='nasapoc' WEIGHT='18.3755' CLASS='Missions'>
	<FACET NAME='Programs &amp; Missions' ID='OMII0IIN417970619'/>
	<FACET NAME='Organizations' ID='OMII0IIN708454495'/>
	<HINT NATURE='PT' ID='OMII0II74828100'>
	Mir expedition crew <EM>11</EM>
	</HINT>
	</TERM_HINT>
	<TERM_HINT NAME='Orion 11' ID='OMII0II800124355' INDEX='nasapoc' WEIGHT='17.8689' CLASS='Missions'>
	<FACET NAME='Programs &amp; Missions' ID='OMII0IIN417970619'/>
	<HINT NATURE='PT' ID='OMII0II800124355'>
	Orion <EM>11</EM>
	</HINT>
	</TERM_HINT>
	</TERM_HINTS>
	</SEMAPHORE>

view raw XML-Example hosted with ❤ by GitHub

Corresponding Class created with Paste XML as Classes

	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = true)]
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlRootAttribute(Namespace = "", IsNullable = false)]
	public partial class SEMAPHORE
	{
	private SEMAPHOREPARAMETER[] pARAMETERSField;
	private SEMAPHORETERM_HINT[] tERM_HINTSField;
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlArrayItemAttribute("PARAMETER", IsNullable = false)]
	public SEMAPHOREPARAMETER[] PARAMETERS
	{
	get
	{
	return this.pARAMETERSField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.pARAMETERSField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlArrayItemAttribute("TERM_HINT", IsNullable = false)]
	public SEMAPHORETERM_HINT[] TERM_HINTS
	{
	get
	{
	return this.tERM_HINTSField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.tERM_HINTSField = value;
	}
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = true)]
	public partial class SEMAPHOREPARAMETER
	{
	private string nAMEField;
	private string valueField;
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public string NAME
	{
	get
	{
	return this.nAMEField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.nAMEField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlTextAttribute()]
	public string Value
	{
	get
	{
	return this.valueField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.valueField = value;
	}
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = true)]
	public partial class SEMAPHORETERM_HINT
	{
	private SEMAPHORETERM_HINTFACET[] fACETField;
	private SEMAPHORETERM_HINTHINT hINTField;
	private SEMAPHORETERM_HINTFIELD[] mETADATAField;
	private string nAMEField;
	private string idField;
	private string iNDEXField;
	private decimal wEIGHTField;
	private string cLASSField;
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlElementAttribute("FACET")]
	public SEMAPHORETERM_HINTFACET[] FACET
	{
	get
	{
	return this.fACETField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.fACETField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	public SEMAPHORETERM_HINTHINT HINT
	{
	get
	{
	return this.hINTField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.hINTField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlArrayItemAttribute("FIELD", IsNullable = false)]
	public SEMAPHORETERM_HINTFIELD[] METADATA
	{
	get
	{
	return this.mETADATAField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.mETADATAField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public string NAME
	{
	get
	{
	return this.nAMEField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.nAMEField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public string ID
	{
	get
	{
	return this.idField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.idField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public string INDEX
	{
	get
	{
	return this.iNDEXField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.iNDEXField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public decimal WEIGHT
	{
	get
	{
	return this.wEIGHTField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.wEIGHTField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public string CLASS
	{
	get
	{
	return this.cLASSField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.cLASSField = value;
	}
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = true)]
	public partial class SEMAPHORETERM_HINTFACET
	{
	private string nAMEField;
	private string idField;
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public string NAME
	{
	get
	{
	return this.nAMEField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.nAMEField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public string ID
	{
	get
	{
	return this.idField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.idField = value;
	}
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = true)]
	public partial class SEMAPHORETERM_HINTHINT
	{
	private byte emField;
	private string[] textField;
	private string nATUREField;
	private string idField;
	/// <remarks/>
	public byte EM
	{
	get
	{
	return this.emField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.emField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlTextAttribute()]
	public string[] Text
	{
	get
	{
	return this.textField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.textField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public string NATURE
	{
	get
	{
	return this.nATUREField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.nATUREField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public string ID
	{
	get
	{
	return this.idField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.idField = value;
	}
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = true)]
	public partial class SEMAPHORETERM_HINTFIELD
	{
	private string nAMEField;
	private string valueField;
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlAttributeAttribute()]
	public string NAME
	{
	get
	{
	return this.nAMEField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.nAMEField = value;
	}
	}
	/// <remarks/>
	[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlTextAttribute()]
	public string Value
	{
	get
	{
	return this.valueField;
	}
	set
	{
	this.valueField = value;
	}
	}
	}

view raw XML-Class hosted with ❤ by GitHub

As I stated earlier, the variable names in the classes created for this XML object could use a little clean up, but with a good refactoring tool, this should not be a difficult task and something that I find much more enjoyable than creating the entire file by hand.

Hope that you find this useful and that it can save you some time.

Web Api - Ninject & IHttpControllerActivator

I was reading through the following blog posts today by Mike Seemann:

• Dependency Injection and Lifetime Management with ASP.NET Web Api
• Dependency Injection in ASP.NET Web Api with Castle Windsor

In his posts, Mike shows how to use the IHttpControllerActivator to wire up Dependency Injection (DI) without using the built in IDependencyResolver in the Web Api bite. After reading through both of these, I was inspired to create the Ninject based equivalent DI leveraging the IHttpControllerActivator.

Here is the class that I created for this:

	using System;
	using System.Net.Http;
	using System.Web.Http.Controllers;
	using System.Web.Http.Dispatcher;
	using Ninject;
	namespace WebApiNinjectIHttpControllerActivator
	{
	public class NinjectKernelActivator: IHttpControllerActivator
	{
	private readonly IKernel _kernel;
	public NinjectKernelActivator(IKernel kernel)
	{
	_kernel = kernel;
	}
	public IHttpController Create(HttpRequestMessage request, HttpControllerDescriptor controllerDescriptor, Type controllerType)
	{
	var controller = (IHttpController) _kernel.Get(controllerType);
	request.RegisterForDispose( new Release(()=> _kernel.Release(controller)));
	return controller;
	}
	}
	internal class Release : IDisposable
	{
	private readonly Action _release;
	public Release(Action release)
	{
	_release = release;
	}
	public void Dispose()
	{
	_release();
	}
	}
	}

view raw NinjectKernelActivator.cs hosted with ❤ by GitHub

A complete sample application is available from https://github.com/paigecook/WebApiNinjectIHttpControllerActivator

ELMAH & ASP.NET MVC

If you are planning to use ELMAH - Error Logging Modules and Handlers with your MVC application , I would like to recommend the following resources to assist you.

• Logging Errors with ELMAH and MVC 3 - This is a great 5 part walk through of how to setup Elmah within your MVC 3 (and MVC 4) application and even includes a great way to log JavaScript errors as well. It covers the following:
• Setup
• Notifications
• Filtering
• HandleErrorAttribute
• JavaScript
• Elmah.MVC NuGet Package - "for painless integration of ELMAH into ASP.NET MVC". Provides the following:
• Custom route and Handler (uses /elmah by default instead of /elmah.axd), but you can specify your own  as well.
• Prebuilt HandleErrorAttribute
• Supports both C# & VB.NET applications
• Configurable authorization rules

So, if you are using ELMAH with ASP.NET MVC, please do yourself and favor and checkout these resources to make using ELMAH easier and better. And if you are not currently using ELMAH, I would urge to consider using it, as it provides easy and simple error logging for your MVC or WebForms ASP.NET applications. 

VS 2012 Color Theme Editor Extension & ReSharper 7.0

I just installed the excellent Visual Studio Extension - VS 2012 Color Theme Editor. This is the newly updated version that is compatible with VS 2012. I was running this on VS 2010 and loved being able to use some of the built in or create my own custom color theme. One of my favorite improvements with the VS 2012 version is the ability to mix the editor/IDE experience of the built in Light & Dark themes in VS 2012. Two of the available options in the Color Theme Editor are "Light with Dark Editor" and "Dark with Light Editor". I have chosen the "Light with Dark Editor" option and have been loving it so far.

One thing to be careful with right now however, is that there is an issue with the Theme menu that is added to the VS menu bar with this extension if you also have ReSharper 7.0 installed. The menu should show you all of the available built-in Color Themes and allow you select one, however, that list is not displaying properly when ReSharper 7.0 is installed. However, there is a workaround -- You can still access and select the themes by selecting Tools->Options->Environment->General and these new color themes are listed in the drop down menu there.Also the Editor behavior is a little off as well and it cannot properly show the available themes to allow you copy one of those as your starting point. Hopefully the author will work with JetBrains to figure out the issues and get this fixed before too long.

Update: This issue has been corrected with the release of version 2.1 of the extension. If you are running ReSharper, please make sure to update to this version or a later release.

WordPress on IIS 7

Today I installed WordPress on IIS 7.X (Windows 2008 R2 Server). The initial setup was very easy thanks to the use of the Web Platform Installer (WebPI) I selected the following options:

Products

• PHP 5.3.10
• MySQL Windows 5.1

Applications

• WordPress

It was very simple to setup and within about 10-15 minutes (including) download times, I had a WordPress site running with IIS 7.X on my Windows 2008 R2 server.

One thing of  note was that WordPress wanted to update to a later release and when I clicked the Update button, it kept failing with an error of being unable to unzip the update. After some searching I found this article - WordPress and Plugin Updates on IIS7 Fail a Lot that walked me through the steps to get the update working by modifying permissions for the IUSR and Network Service accounts on my server.

RegEx: Remove Line Numbers

Found this Regex to replace any line starting with one or more numbers followed by colon -

\b[0-9]*:

I used this today for removing line numbers from code a snippet I copied off of a web page.

NuGet Package Restore Tips

I recently have started using the NuGet Package Restore option in all of my .NET projects. This is a great new feature that was enabled with NuGet version 1.6. I followed this blog post Cleaning Up Your Git Repository for NuGet 1.6 and saw my repository size shrink drastically, a very good thing.

However, I noticed that when I enabled Package Restore that Git was excluding my NuGet.exe file in the solution .nuget folder. This was based on my having a *.exe entry in my .gitignore file. I was able to manually add the file by issuing the command git add -F NuGet.exe from the git command line. This worked but I wanted to find a better way. I tried a few different entries in the .gitignore file unsuccessfully. Then today, I had this issue again and did some more research and found this Answer on StackOverflow about putting an additional .gitignore file in the .nuget folder and explicitly including all executables via a !*.exe line. This worked great.