2009 is Here!

posted by Max on 31 December 2008, 16:01
Aurigma X-mas tree :)

2009 is Here!!!

Finally, 2009 has arrived. 2008 was marked with many accomplishments and happy moments. Sure, more are about to come in 2009.

I hope everyone reading this post shares the same feeling about lots of good things coming in 2009. This surely applies to new versions of stuff from Aurigma to be released in the oncoming year :)

Stay positive and be happy!

Image Uploader 6.0 ASP.NET Control Library

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posted by Fedor on 19 December 2008, 10:16

As I have mentioned in my Aurigma Image Uploader 6.0 Concepts post, we plan to include ASP.NET Control Library in the version 6.0 release. The library will wrap and simplify the most common operations.

The ASP.NET control library will include the following controls:

  • Visual controls, which are actually wrappers around corresponding ActiveX/Java objects:
    • ImageUploader
    • UploadPane
    • Thumbnail
    • ShellComboBox
  • Non-visual extenders of ImageUploader control, which simplify common operations:
    • AmazonS3Extender
    • NirvanixExtender 

Visual Controls

You can just drop Image Uploader on Web form and then configure all properties using smart-tag or property grid, or just specify properties in code. Another nice feature is that there is no need to deply manually CAB, JAR, and JavaScript files now. You need just deploy Aurigma.ImageUploader.dll on server.

Using smart-tag you can apply localization in one click: 

As well, you can change all properties using property grid:

You can add event handler in which you can implement saving files to disk:

protected void ImageUploader1_FileUploaded(object sender, FileUploadEventArgs e)
{
    ImageUploader.SaveToFolder(e.SourceFile, Server.MapPath("/Gallery/"));
    ImageUploader.SaveToFolder(e.Thumbnails[1], Server.MapPath("/Gallery/Thumbnails/"));
}

Moreover, you have typed access to all file metadata (Description, Angle, FileSize, and so on) sent to server.

Non-visual extenders

Recently many of our customers have requested support of cloud computing and cloud storages. Rigt now the most popuplar storage is Amazon S3 storage, however we also have implement the support of their less popular competitor - Nirvanix. AmazonS3Extender allows you easily upload to cloud storage:

<aur:ImageUploader ID="ImageUploader1" runat="server" width="600" height="400"
     UploadThumbnail1FitMode="Off">
</aur:ImageUploader>

<aur:AmazonS3Extender ID="AmazonS3Extender1" runat="server"
    ImageUploaderID="ImageUploader1"
    AWSAccessKeyId="<%$ AppSettings:Amazon_AWSAccessKeyId %>"
    Bucket="<%$ AppSettings:Amazon_Bucket %>"
    SecretAccessKey="<%$ AppSettings:Amazon_SecretAccessKey %>">

    <SourceFile Acl="private" Key="/${file_name}">
        <aur:CustomMetaProperty Name="Author" Value="John Smith" />
        <aur:PredefinedMetaProperty Name="Comments" Field="Description" />            
    </SourceFile>
    
</aur:AmazonS3Extender>

As you see, you just need to declare ImageUploader and AmazonS3Extender controls. Then you should link AmazonS3Extender to ImageUploader and specify some of its properties. You can also define source file meta properties. In the above code sample we have specified Author and Comments meta properties. The last one  will be automaticlly extracted from the description specified by user. 

We will include detailed instructions and feature list in the documentation. 

IT vs. Global Economic Recession

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posted by Max on 7 December 2008, 22:31

Today while browsing at Techrepublic, I've stumbled upon a sketch that's demonstrating a somewhat very appealing perspective for IT during the global economic recession. The author also puts forward 5 major trends in IT. Here goes the link .

By far, what appealed the most was the motivator quote by Jerry Luftman, the director of the Society of Information Management:

“Companies are looking at IT as a lever to cut costs in other parts of the business… Here is IT’s chance to shine. Here’s their chance to make lemonade out of lemons.”

So, hail the IT, hail Web 2.0, hail virtualization :)