Visual Studio Code was just released and I am using it on a project to see if I like it. I wanted to configure it to run Gulp Tasks just like I have done with other editors like Sublime Text, JetBrains Webstorm, etc. Turns out this is pretty easy to do since you can configure Gulp as a task runner in Visual Studio Code and it will display a list of Gulp tasks that you can run from the command palette.
Visual Studio Code 1.0 is released! I have been using it the past few days for web development ( particularly React.js development ), and I like it a lot. I plan to use it for the next month on a project to see if it can completely replace my use of Sublime Text and Atom.
Orchard CMS 1.9.3 and Orchard CMS 1.10 were released a few weeks ago. I upgraded my personal Orchard CMS Website to Orchard 1.9.3. If you need help upgrading your Orchard CMS Website, contact me.
Enjoying yoga class this morning when the conversation turned to mindfulness meditation and what iPhone app people use for a meditation timer. As a proud Dad I grab my iPhone and with a big grin show off a React.js web app my daughter and I built some time ago. There are plenty of great meditation timers on the App Store, but it's always more fun to use an app I built myself.
Orchard CMS 1.10 was just released and it offers a new feature called Parameterized Snippets for Orchard Layouts. Parameterized Snippets provide an easy method for including user data for Snippets in your Orchard Layouts. Parameterized Snippets also save you the burden of developing an Element for Orchard Layouts when you don't have any complex logic or external dependencies and only need the ability to add user data to the snippet. Parameterized Snippets are definitely a welcome sight and help bridge the large gap that was initially between Snippets and Elements in Orchard Layouts.
While working on an e-commerce store using Orchard CMS for a client I came across Snipcart. Snipcart is an HTML / JavaScript shopping cart that is very easy to add to any website, including static websites. At first I thought Snipcart's claims of being easy were too good to be true, but after integrating Snipcart into Orchard CMS I quickly became a fan.
There is a small "bug" in Orchard.Layouts in Orchard CMS 1.9.2 that doesn't allow you to see your layouts via the Admin Dashboard after you create them. If you create a new Layout in Orchard CMS and then click the Layouts Link on the Admin Menu nothing will display. They will not display in a list ( i.e. not listable ).
I've already mentioned a couple new features in C# 6: Auto-Property Initializers and String Interpolation. Another new feature introduced in C# 6 is the null-conditional operator, which helps us avoid verbose null reference checks and offers optional chaining.
Earlier I wrote a blog post on ASP.NET MVC 6 Dependency Injection, which showed how to use dependency injection in ASP.NET 5 and ASP.NET MVC 6 web applications using the built-in dependency injection container. In this ASP.NET 5 Tutorial I will show how to use that same example using a more feature-rich dependency injection container called Autofac. If you are unfamiliar with dependency injection in ASP.NET 5 and ASP.NET MVC 6, please read the other tutotial first as well as the tutorial ASP.NET MVC 6 view injection.
Dynamic Forms in Orchard CMS is a wonderful new feature, but using the Import Export Module to export dynamic forms data can be intimidating to clients. It feels so much more intuitive and powerful to just go to the dynamic form submissions and click on an Export to CSV Button. As an Orchard Developer I created such a button and feature, because exporting this information as a CSV file is pretty important to clients. In most cases they want to get that data as a CSV file to use in Microsoft Excel, SQL Server, or some other tool, and they want to do it easily.