The MSDN and TechNet teams have just released (on Monday) new versions of the BizTalk Developer and Tech Centers. Luke has a great summary of what you can expect to find on these great new sites.
-Kris
Our good friends at Two Connect have built a WSE 3.0 adapter and are giving a webcast on its capabilities tomorrow. Check out the details here.
-Kris
Have you heard of Consolas? Consolas has intentionally been developed for programmer’s needs and it will be bundled with Windows Vista. Many people seem to love it, but I think it isn’t allowed to distribute it themselves. I copied the font from the longhorn bits. But, now you can download and install it on the computer having Visual Studio 2005.
Thanks,
Young
Currently, I am installing BizTalk Server 2004 in a multi-server environment with a remote, clustered SQL Server. While installing Sharepoint Services 2.0, I encountered the following error after entering the database information:
“Device activation error. The physical file name “WSS_Config.mdf” may be incorrect (Error Code: 5105)”
After wasting a full day on figuring out the issue, the issue turned out to be an invalid configuration setting in the SQL Virtual Server settings. Once I got the SQL Administrator involved, he was able to determine the problem by the nature of the error. In this case, the path to the data file was missing a colon.
I think the BizUnit is a must tool for BizTalk developers. But, as for me, it isn’t easy to memorize the syntax for the steps. I had to switch back and forth between a working solution and the BizUnit sample solution to copy and paste the XML nodes. So..I made some code snippets for BizUnit 2006.
The following steps are the simple instructions for how to install the code snippets:
1. Download and extract the zip file on your local hard disk.
2. In Visual Studio 2005, on the Tools menu, click Code Snippets Manager.
3. In the Code Snippets Manager, select Visual C# in the Language drop-down list box, click Add, select the folder where you extracted the code snippets, and then click Open.
4. In the Code Snippets Manager, select XML in the Language drop-down list box, click Add, select the folder where you extracted the code snippets, and then click Open.
5. In the Code Snippets Manager, click OK to exit.
Hopefully, it will make it a little easier to use BizUnit..
Thanks,
Young
I thought WWF would be similar to HWS, but I was wrong. After spending some times to use WWF, I realized that it is so cool and I’m convinced that it will be great if the next version of BTS adopts the technology.
I think it provides a good programming model for human-based workflow as well as structured business process, and rule engine. (It should also be interesting to compare it with that of J2EE.)
By the way, I think the WWF APIs heavily use two design patterns named “dependency injection” and “dynamic service locator”. Some of you are already familiar with them. Otherwise, I think understanding those patterns can help to use the APIs. For more information about those patterns, see the Fowler’s article at http://www.martinfowler.com/articles/injection.html.
Thanks,
Young
Have you heard of Consolas? Consolas has intentionally been developed for programmer’s needs and it will be bundled with Windows Vista. Many people seem to love it, but I think it isn’t allowed to distribute it themselves. I copied the font from the longhorn bits. But, now you can download and install it on the computer having Visual Studio 2005.
Thanks,
Young
I thought WWF would be similar to HWS, but I was wrong. After spending some times to use WWF, I realized that it is so cool and I’m convinced that it will be great if the next version of BTS adopts the technology.
I think it provides a good programming model for human-based workflow as well as structured business process, and rule engine. (It should also be interesting to compare it with that of J2EE.)
By the way, I think the WWF APIs heavily use two design patterns named “dependency injection” and “dynamic service locator”. Some of you are already familiar with them. Otherwise, I think understanding those patterns can help to use the APIs. For more information about those patterns, see the Fowler’s article at http://www.martinfowler.com/articles/injection.html.
Thanks,
Young
I was stuck recently with what seemed like a pair of contradictory errors.
I had an application deployed which was exposed as a web service. To test the application we built a test harness which picked up a flat file and called the web service for us and then dumped the result on the file system to see the result.
This testing system worked fine until I needed to use that same deployed schema to do some additional messaging. I wanted to route a message via a receive port and have a send port subscribe to it, then map the message to a new format and deliver it to a destination. Pretty simple, right?
Well, no. When I have my project deployed I got the following error when routing:
There was a failure executing the receive pipeline: “Microsoft.BizTalk.DefaultPipelines.XMLReceive” Source: “XML disassembler” Receive Location: ” D:\dat\FileReceive\RoundTrip\*.xml Reason: Cannot locate document specification as multiple schemas match the message type “http://BO.Get.EV2#Method“.
That error left me scratching my head. It means I probably have the schema deployed twice, right? I didn’t, so I thought. When I undeployed the application the messaging engine could no longer match my message type:
There was a failure executing the receive pipeline: “Microsoft.BizTalk.DefaultPipelines.XMLReceive” Source: “XML disassembler” Receive Location: “D:\dat\FileReceive\RoundTrip\*.xml”
Reason: Finding document specification by message type “http://BO.Get.EV2#Method” failed. Verify that the schema is deployed properly.
When I deployed the project with the schemas, everything suddenly worked fine. That means that, somewhere, the schema was again deployed.
So I looked thru the BizTalk Server Assemblies viewer and discovered that the web reference which existed in my test harness was the culprit. The messaging engine recognized the web reference as a second deployment of my schema. This was technically accurate but rather frustrating to find. I’ve seen so many of these errors posted on the newsgroups that I thought I’d mention this as a possible cause.
If you are using test harnesses coupled with web services be aware that your schema is actually deployed twice.
Avanade, NPower NY and Microsoft invite New York/New Jersey nonprofits to apply for an “Xtreme Techover” organizational makeover, to help transform their community technology centers and administrative systems to better serve their communities. Organizations can apply online by May 26, 2006 at www.avanadeadvisor.com/xtremetechover.
One nonprofit will receive the grand prize, consisting of:
· Consulting services worth $150,000 – including two consultants for 4-6 weeks – from Avanade, the leading global integrator specializing in the Microsoft enterprise platform
· $50,000 in software licenses and $50,000 for physical improvements to a technology center or training from Microsoft
· Server and storage value of $150,000 from Network Appliances
Second and third place winners will receive an online Microsoft certification course and access to an online library of the latest technical and business books.
All applicants will receive a free one-year membership or auto-renewal to NPower NY, which includes access to discounted or free volunteer resources, software, hardware, workshops and Webinars. Winners will be announced at a June 20th breakfast for all applicants.
Deadline: May 26, 2006
Who’s Eligible: New York/New Jersey metro region nonprofit organizations that are registered as a 501(c)(3), have between 20 and 50 technology users, not affiliated with any school or hospital organization, and currently have an on-site community technology center delivering technology access to its constituents.