Asp.net: How to Read Application Settings from the Web.config File at Runtime

This example reads an application setting identified by the key customsetting1 from a Web.config file. The appSettings element is a NameValueCollection collection of strings. Working with collection elements can be slightly more complicated than working with other configuration elements.

To obtain configuration settings for the root-level Web configuration, null is passed to the OpenWebConfiguration method.

To update a configuration setting, use the Save or SaveAs method of the configuration object. For more information, see Using the Configuration Classes. For additional code examples, see the AppSettingsSection class and related classes.

This example uses the non-static method of obtaining configuration data, which allows you to pull configuration data from any application. If you are going to obtain configuration information from the application in which your code resides, use the static method, which processes faster. For more information, see the Working with Local and Remote Configuration Settings section in ASP.NET Configuration API Overview.

Example:

C#:
System.Configuration.Configuration rootWebConfig1 = System.Web.Configuration.WebConfigurationManager.OpenWebConfiguration(null);
if (rootWebConfig1.AppSettings.Settings.Count > 0)
{
System.Configuration.KeyValueConfigurationElement customSetting = rootWebConfig1.AppSettings.Settings[“customsetting1”];

if (customSetting != null)
Console.WriteLine(“customsetting1 application string = \”{0}\””, customSetting.Value);
else
Console.WriteLine(“No customsetting1 application string”);
}

VB.Net:
Dim rootWebConfig1 As System.Configuration.Configuration
rootWebConfig1 = System.Web.Configuration.WebConfigurationManager.OpenWebConfiguration(Nothing)
If (rootWebConfig1.AppSettings.Settings.Count > 0) Then
Dim customSetting As System.Configuration.KeyValueConfigurationElement
customSetting = rootWebConfig1.AppSettings.Settings(“customsetting1”)
If Not (customSetting.Value = Nothing) Then
Console.WriteLine(“customsetting1 application string = {0}”, customSetting.Value)
Else
Console.WriteLine(“No customsetting1 application string”)
End If
End If

Robust Programming
Values read from the appSettings element of the Web.config file are always of type String. If the specified key does not exist in the Web.config file, no error occurs. Instead, an empty string is returned.

Security
The configuration file should be protected on the server by using Windows security settings to limit who can read the file. Avoid storing sensitive information such as user credentials in the appSettings element of the Web.config file. Also consider encrypting configuration settings.

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C# – Example when and why to use delegates

Why to use Delegate:
All of us have been exposed to event driven programming of some sort or the other. A delegate can be seen as a placeholder for a/some method(s) and used to pass methods as arguments to other methods. Event handlers are nothing more than methods that are invoked through delegates. You create a custom method, and a class such as a windows control can call your method when a certain event occurs.

Delegates in c# are type safe objects which are used to hold reference of one or more methods. Delegate represents references to methods with a particular parameter list and return type. When you instantiate a delegate, you can associate its instance with any method with a compatible signature and return type.

An interesting and useful property of a delegate is that it does not know or care about the class of the object that it references. Any object will do; all that matters is that the method’s argument types and return type match the delegate’s. This makes delegates perfectly suited for “anonymous” invocation.

What is the use of Delegates?
Suppose if you have multiple methods with same signature (return type & number of parameters) and want to call all the methods with single object then we can go for delegates.

Delegates are two types
–  Single Cast Delegates
–  Multi Cast Delegates

Single Cast Delegates:
Single cast delegate means which hold address of single method like as explained in above example.

Example:
public delegate int DelegatSample(int a,int b);

public class Sampleclass
{
public int Add(int x, int y)
{
return x + y;
}
public int Sub(int x, int y)
{
return x – y;
}
}
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
Sampleclass sc=new Sampleclass();

DelegatSample delgate1 = sc.Add;
int i = delgate1(10, 20);
Console.WriteLine(i);
DelegatSample delgate2 = sc.Sub;
int j = delgate2(20, 10);
Console.WriteLine(j);
}
}

Output:
Add Result : 30
Sub Result : 10

Multicast Delegates:
Multi cast delegate is used to hold address of multiple methods in single delegate. To hold multiple addresses with delegate we will use overloaded += operator and if you want remove addresses from delegate we need to use overloaded operator -=

Multicast delegates will work only for the methods which have return type only void. If we want to create a multicast delegate with return type we will get the return type of last method in the invocation list

Example:
public delegate void MultiDelegate(int a,int b);

public class Sampleclass
{
public static void Add(int x, int y)
{
Console.WriteLine(“Addition Value: “+(x + y));
}
public static void Sub(int x, int y)
{
Console.WriteLine(“Subtraction Value: ” + (x – y));
}
public static void Mul(int x, int y)
{
Console.WriteLine(“Multiply Value: ” + (x * y));
}
}
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
Sampleclass sc=new Sampleclass();
MultiDelegate del = Sampleclass.Add;
del += Sampleclass.Sub;
del += Sampleclass.Mul;
del(10, 5);
Console.ReadLine();
}
}

Output
Addition Value : 15
Subtraction Value : 5
Multiply Value : 50

Delegates have the following properties:

  1. Delegates are like C++ function pointers but are type safe.
  2. Delegates allow methods to be passed as parameters.
  3. Delegates can be used to define callback methods.
  4. Delegates can be chained together; for example, multiple methods can be called on a single event.
  5. C# version 2.0 introduced the concept of Anonymous Methods, which allow code blocks to be passed as parameters in place of a separately defined method. C# Version 3.0 introduced lambda expressions as a more concise way of writing inline code blocks. Both anonymous methods and lambda expressions (in certain contexts) are compiled to delegate types. Together, these features are now known as anonymous functions.

 

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Dot Net Coding Standard: UI Control Naming Conventions

UI controls would use the following prefixes.  The primary purpose was to make code more readable.

Control Type Prefix
Button btn
CheckBox chk
CheckedListBox lst
ComboBox cmb
ContextMenu mnu
DataGrid dg
DateTimePicker dtp
Form suffix: XXXForm
GroupBox grp
ImageList iml
Label lb
ListBox lst
ListView lvw
Menu mnu
MenuItem mnu
NotificationIcon nfy
Panel pnl
PictureBox pct
ProgressBar prg
RadioButton rad
Splitter spl
StatusBar sts
TabControl tab
TabPage tab
TextBox tb
Timer tmr
TreeView tvw
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C# – What is boxing and unboxing in .net it

Boxing_Unboxing-1When we move a value type to reference type the data is moved from the stack to the heap. When we move reference type to a value type the data is moved from the heap to the stack.

This movement of data from the heap to stack and vice-versa creates a performance hit.

When the data moves from value types to reference types its termed as ‘Boxing’ and the vice versa is termed as ‘UnBoxing’.

If you compile the above code and see the same in ILDASM you can see in the IL code how ‘boxing’ and ‘unboxing’ looks, below figure demonstrates the same.
Boxing_Unboxing-2

Performance implication of Boxing and unboxing

In order to see how the performance is impacted we ran the below two functions 10,000 times. One function has boxing and the other function is simple. We used a stop watch object to monitor the time taken.

The boxing function was executed in 3542 MS while without boxing the code was executed in 2477 MS. In other words try to avoid boxing and unboxing. In project you always need boxing and unboxing , use it when it’s absolutely necessary.
Boxing_Unboxing-3

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OOP – What is virtual method?

  • Virtual method is a method whose behavior can be overridden in derived class.
  • Virtual method allows declare a method in base class that can be redefined in each derived class.
  • When a virtual method is invoked, the run-time type of the object is checked for an overriding member.
  • The overriding member in the most derived class is called, which might be the original member, if no derived class has overridden the member.
  • By default, methods are non-virtual. You cannot override a non-virtual method.
  • You cannot use the virtual modifier with the static, abstract, private or override modifiers.
  • Virtual properties behave like abstract methods, except for the differences in declaration and invocation syntax.
  • It is an error to use the virtual modifier on a static property.
  • A virtual inherited property can be overridden in a derived class by including a property declaration that uses the override modifier.
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