Team Foundation Server Error TF31002

Posted on January 22, 2013 by Jed

This post will discuss a solution for the Team Foundation Server that reads:

Microsoft Visual Studio

TF31002: Unable to connect to this Team Foundation Server:
https://libra:12303/tfs.
Team Foundation Server Url: https://libra:12303/tfs

Possible reasons for failure include:
– The name, port number, or protocol for the Team Foundation Server is incorrect.
– The Team Foundation Server is offline
– The password has expired or incorrect.

Technical information (for administrator):
The underlying connection was closed: Could not establish trust relationship for the SSL/TLS secure channel.

I received this error when I tried to Add my TFS Server to my Visual Studio 2010 Team Explorer.

The key piece of information that is mentioned in the error message is:

Technical information (for administrator):
The underlying connection was closed: Could not establish trust relationship for the SSL/TLS secure channel.

This key piece of information informs us that we need to create an SSL Certificate on the TFS server (in my case, the TFS server is on my machine named “Libra”).

Here’s a procedure for creating an SSL cert on the server and installing it on the client.

Log into the server and go to the IIS Manager, then double-click the Server Certificates icon.
Located in the “Actions” side-bar, click the “Create Self-Signed Certificate…” link.
Follow the on-screen instructions, then click “OK”.
Right-click on the SSL certificate, then select “Export…”.
Export the SSL Certificate to your Desktop and specify a password. After you export the SSL Certificate, move the certificate to the Desktop of the computer that is running Visual Studio.
From the computer that is running Visual Studio, right-click the SSL Certifcate then select “Install PFX”.
Follow the on-screen instructions using the default settings where applicable. However, when you get to the step of the Certificate Import Wizard that allows you to specify which store to save the certificate in, choose the “Trusted Root Certification Authorities” store.
Finish up the Certificate Import Wizard and you’re done.

Now that you have created and installed an SSL Certificate, you can add the TFS Server to your list of TFS Servers in your Visual Studio Team Explorer.

Quick-And-Dirty Example On ASP.NET MVC Client Side Validation

Posted on November 7, 2012 by Jed

This post will walk you through a very simple example on how you can implement Client-Side Validation using the unobtrusive validation support library for jQueryand jQuery Validate, and ASP.NET MVC using Visual Studio 2010.

Step 1: Using Visual Studio 2010, create a new “ASP.NET MVC 4 Web Application”. Give a name for the new Project – In this example I named it “ClientSideValidation”

Step 2: Select an “Empty” template for the Project

Step 3: Add a New Folder to the Project and name it “Resources”. Once done, create sub-folders (under Resources) and name them CSS, Javascript, and Resx.

Step 4: Add a new Style Sheet (.css file) to the “CSS” directory that you just created and name it “ValidationStyles.css”

Step 5: Copy/Paste these styles to your newly created “ValidationStyles.css” file (These styles will be used by the jQuery pack that does the client-side validation)

/* Styles for validation helpers
-----------------------------------------------------------*/
.field-validation-error
{
    color: #f00;
}

.field-validation-valid
{
    display: none;
}

.input-validation-error
{
    border: 1px solid #f00;
    background-color: #fee;
}

.validation-summary-errors
{
    border: 1px solid red;
    padding: 5px;
    margin: 2px;
    background-color: #FFE6E8;
    font-size: .9em;
    color: #f00;
}

.validation-summary-valid
{
    display: none;
}

Step 6: Go to http://www.jquery.com and download the latest jQuery pack and save the pack to your “\Resources\Javascript” directory (at the time of this post, the latest jQuery pack is version 1.8.2 and the name of the pack is “jquery-1.8.2.min.js“).

Step 7: In Windows Explorer, navigate to “C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft ASP.NET\ASP.NET MVC 4\Packages\jQuery.Validation.1.8.1\Content\Scripts\”, then copy/paste the jQuery pack named “jquery.validate.min.js” to the “\Resources\Javascript” directory in your Project.

Step 8: In Windows Explorer, navigate to “C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft ASP.NET\ASP.NET MVC 4\Packages\Microsoft.jQuery.Unobtrusive.Validation.2.0.20505.0\Content\Scripts”, then copy/paste the “jquery.validate.unobtrusive.min.js” file to your \Resources\Javascript directory in your Project.

Step 9: Add a new Resource file to your \Resources\Resx directory named “ValidationStrings.resx“. Then add the following Name and Values to your .resx file:

Name	Value
StringLengthRange	The string must be between {2} and {1} characters
NumberRange	The number range must be between {1} and {2}
StringMaximumLength	The string must not be more than {1} characters

Step 10: Add a new class to the “Models” directory. Name the class as “Person” and copy/paste the code below to your Person class:

public class Person
    {
        [Required]
        [StringLength(80,ErrorMessageResourceType=typeof(ValidationStrings),ErrorMessageResourceName="StringLengthRange",MinimumLength=6)]
        public string EmailAddress { get; set; }

        [Range(0,100,ErrorMessageResourceType=typeof(ValidationStrings),ErrorMessageResourceName="NumberRange")]
        public int FavoriteNumber { get; set; }

        [StringLength(15,ErrorMessageResourceType=typeof(ValidationStrings),ErrorMessageResourceName="StringMaximumLength")]
        public string FirstName { get; set; }
    }

Step 11: Build the Project by hitting “F6” or going to “Build > Build Solution”

Step 12: Add a new Controller to your “Controllers” directory and name it “homeController”

Step 13: In the “homeController” class, right-click inside of the “Index()” method, then select “Add View…”

Step 14: In the “Add View” window, select the checkbox for “Create a strongly-typed view”, then select the “Person” model that is located in the dropdown box. If you don’t see the Person model, you need run a Build (F6).

Step 15: Add the following Razor scripts to your Index.cshtml page:

@model ClientSideValidation.Models.Person
<html>
<head>
    <title>Clientside Validation Example</title>
    <link href="/Resources/CSS/ValidationStyles.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
    <script src="/Resources/Javascript/jquery-1.8.2.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
    <script src="/Resources/Javascript/jquery.validate.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
    <script src="/Resources/Javascript/jquery.validate.unobtrusive.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
</head>
<body>
    <h2>
        Clientside Validation</h2>
    @using (Html.BeginForm())
    {
        @Html.ValidationSummary()
        <br />

        @Html.LabelFor(m => m.FirstName)
        @Html.TextBoxFor(m => m.FirstName)
        @Html.ValidationMessageFor(m => m.FirstName)
        <br />

        @Html.LabelFor(m => m.EmailAddress)
        @Html.TextBoxFor(m => m.EmailAddress)
        @Html.ValidationMessageFor(m => m.EmailAddress)
        <br />

        @Html.LabelFor(m => m.FavoriteNumber)
        @Html.TextBoxFor(m => m.FavoriteNumber)
        @Html.ValidationMessageFor(m => m.FavoriteNumber)
        <br />

        <input type="submit" />
    }
</body>
</html>

Step 16: Ready to go! Run (F5) the MVC project and test out the client-side validation.

Step 17: Do yourself a favor and check out the rendered HTML (View Source). You’ll notice the auto-generated “data-val” (spoken as “data dash val”) attributes that are located within the HTML elements. These attributes are used by the “jquery.validate.unobtrusive.min.js” jQuery pack.

Here’s what the rendered HTML looks like:


<html>
<head>
    <title>Clientside Validation Example</title>
    <link href="/Resources/CSS/ValidationStyles.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
    <script src="/Resources/Javascript/jquery-1.8.2.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
    <script src="/Resources/Javascript/jquery.validate.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
    <script src="/Resources/Javascript/jquery.validate.unobtrusive.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
</head>
<body>
    <h2>Clientside Validation</h2>
<form action="/" method="post">
<div class="validation-summary-valid" data-valmsg-summary="true">

<ul><li style="display:none"></li></ul></div>

<br />

<label for="FirstName">FirstName</label>

<input data-val="true"
	data-val-length="The string must not be more than 15 characters"
	data-val-length-max="15"
	id="FirstName" name="FirstName" type="text" value="" />

	<span class="field-validation-valid"
	data-valmsg-for="FirstName"
	data-valmsg-replace="true"></span>

	<br />

<label for="EmailAddress">EmailAddress</label>

<input data-val="true"
	data-val-length="The string must be between 6 and 80 characters"
	data-val-length-max="80"
	data-val-length-min="6"
	data-val-required="The EmailAddress field is required."
	id="EmailAddress" name="EmailAddress" type="text" value="" />

	<span class="field-validation-valid"
	data-valmsg-for="EmailAddress"
	data-valmsg-replace="true"></span>

	<br />

<label for="FavoriteNumber">FavoriteNumber</label>

<input data-val="true"
	data-val-number="The field FavoriteNumber must be a number."
	data-val-range="The number range must be between 0 and 100"
	data-val-range-max="100"
	data-val-range-min="0"
	data-val-required="The FavoriteNumber field is required."
	id="FavoriteNumber" name="FavoriteNumber" type="text" value="" />

	<span class="field-validation-valid"
	data-valmsg-for="FavoriteNumber"
	data-valmsg-replace="true"></span>

		<br />
        <input type="submit" />
</form>
</body>
</html>

Could not load file or assembly or one of its dependencies.

Posted on June 27, 2012 by Jed

Here is a fix for an error that I received in Visual Studio 2010

The error reads:

Could not load file or assembly ‘file:/// [path to assembly]’ or one of its dependencies. An attempt was made to load a program with an incorrect format. Line 465, position 5.

To fix the problem, I did this:

Double-click the error (which was located in the VS2010 Error List Window)

After double-clicking the error, the cursor will be placed in an XML closing tag called </data>. From the closing </data> tag, scroll to the opening <data> tag. The <data> tag contents looked like this:

<data name="imageList.ImageStream" mimetype="application/x-microsoft.net.object.binary.base64">
    <value>
        AAEAAAD/////AQAAAAAAAAAMAgAAAFdTeXN0ZW0uV2luZG93cy5Gb3JtcywgVmVyc2lvbj0yLjAuMC4w

Manually make a change to a part of the string exactly as follows: Change the end of the string from
```
j00LjAuMC4w to j0yLjAuMC4w
```
Note that the only change is swapping out the second zero with a ‘y’
Rebuild the Visual Studio Solution

Notice! The stream data that you edited was derived from an ImageList that exists in your assembly. So, each and every time you make a change to the ImageList or open the Windows Form (that contains the ImageList) in Designer Mode, you will need to do the above procedure.

This problem occurs when your development machine is running a 64bit OS (I was running Windows Server 2008 RS 64bit). Apparently, what’s happening is Visual Studio is serializing ImageLists with a reference to .NET 4.0 instead of .NET 2. This information is specifically defined at the “j00” section of the serialized data. Changing the data to “j0y” informs ResGen.exe that the ImageList targets .NET 2.

<Select>’s Change() Event Doesn’t Fire Until Focus is Lost

Posted on June 6, 2011 by Jed

Using jQuery and Visual Studio, I was attempting to hide/show form elements based on the selection of a <select> element. The code was working fine other than the fact that the <select>’s change() event didn’t appear to fire until the focus was lost from the <select> element (i.e. I clicked the mouse somewhere else other than the <select> tag.

It turns out the the problem was due to how I placed the jQuery package and the Visual Studio Intellisense package. I found out the hard way that if you are going to use the Visual Studio jQuery Intellisense package you must place it in your HTML document BEFORE the jQuery package.

Notice in the HTML document below that the VS Intellisense package (jquery-1.5.1-vsdoc.js) is placed prior to the jQuery package (jquery-1.5.1.min.js). This is good.
It would be bad if you place the jquery-1.5.1-vsdoc.js package after the jquery-1.5.1.min.js. If you misplace the packages, the example below will not work properly when you change the Animal choice. What happens is the change() event doesn’t fire until after you move the focus from the <select> to somewhere else.

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
    <title>Test</title>
</head>
<body>
    <h2>
        Test</h2>
    <script src="/Scripts/jquery-1.5.1-vsdoc.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
    <script src="/Scripts/jquery-1.5.1.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
    <script type="text/javascript">
        $(document).ready(function () {
            $(".animal-speak").hide();

            $("#Animal").change(function () {
                $(".animal-speak").hide();
                var speaker = $("#Animal").val();
                switch (speaker) {
                    case "dog":
                        $("#bark").show();
                        break;
                    case "cat":
                        $("#meow").show();
                        break;
                    case "bird":
                        $("#chirp").show();
                        break;
                }
            });
        });
    </script>
    <form action="" method="post">
    <select name="Animal" id="Animal">
        <option value="dog">Dog</option>
        <option value="cat">Cat</option>
        <option value="bird">Bird</option>
    </select>
    <div id="bark" class="animal-speak">
        Barking</div>
    <div id="meow" class="animal-speak">
        Meowing</div>
    <div id="chirp" class="animal-speak">
        Chirping</div>
    </form>
</body>
</html>

jQuery Intellisense in Visual Studio 2008

Posted on April 1, 2011 by Jed

Scott Guthrie posted a helpful article on “jQuery Intellisense in VS 2008“.

I woulda been up and running with the jQuery intellisense in minutes if it hadn’t been for the fact that I overlooked his warning at:

Save the jquery-vsdoc.js file next to your jquery.js file in your project (and make sure its naming prefix matches the jquery file name)

In my particular case, my jQuery file was named jquery-1.5.1.min.js and the name for my associated Visual Studio jQuery Intellisense documentation file was named jquery-1.5.1-vsdoc.js.

Since the prefix of the two files didn’t match, the jQuery Intellisense didn’t work for me. To fix the problem, I renamed the jquery-1.5.1.min.js file to jquery-1.5.1.js. After I made the name change, Intellisense was working.

The syntax rules for the naming of the jQuery files are:

You can create any name you wish for the actual jQuery file. For example: “foobar.js“

The name of the Visual Studio jQuery Intellisense file must have the same name as the jQuery file with a suffix of “-vsdoc.js”. For example: If the name of the jQuery file is “foobar.js“, the jQuery Intellisense file must be named “foobar-vsdoc.js“

Connect to Team Foundation Server via Visual Studio 2008

Posted on March 31, 2011 by Jed

To connect to a Team Foundation Server (TFS) with Visual Studio 2008, you will need to download and install the “Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Explorer” plugin.

Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Explorer is a simplified Visual Studio Team System 2008 environment used solely to access Team Foundation Server services.

Once the Team Explorer is installed, open Visual Studio 2008 and go to Tools > Options > Source Control > Plug-in Selection. In the Current source control plug-in: drop-down box, select Visual Studio Team Foundation Server.

For convenient access to your TFS, you can dock the Team Explorer window to wherever you prefer. To do so, in Visual Studio, go to View > Team Explorer. Once the Team Explorer window appears, move and dock the window to your preference.

HTML Visualizer for StringBuilder Type in Visual Studio 2010

Posted on March 18, 2011 by Jed

Visual Studio 2010 removed the ability to “Visualize” a StringBuilder type unless you append the .ToString() method to the StringBuilder object you are debugging.

Seth Richards posted an article on this topic and, in addition, wrote a custom Visualizer (download Seth’s VS2010 solution here) to compensate for Visual Studio 2010’s lack of support for the StringBuilder visualization. Thanks, Seth!

Seth’s solution works fine and good in the sense that it does display a string visualizer for a StringBuilder type without the need to manually specifying the .ToString() method. However, it doesn’t support an HTML Visualizer – i.e. if the content of the StringBuilder contains HTML text, Seth’s StringBuilder Visualizer will display the raw HTML instead of rendering the HTML.

I’ve taken the liberty of updating Seth’s custom StringBuilder Visualizer to render HTML that may exist in the StringBuilder object. Working off of Seth’s code, I added a new Windows Form which contains a Web Browser control. Then I set the Web Browser control’s DocumentText property with the content of the StringBuilder object that is gettin’ debugged. Download the StringBuilder HTML Visualizer Solution here (this solution was originated by Seth Richards, then updated by me).

Here’s a screenshot of the StringBuilder HTML Visualizer in action:

Note: Due to restrictions by my host, you will need to rename the .xls extension to .zip.

Build/Deploy Instructions

Download the solution
Rename the extension “.xls” to “.zip”
Unzip the file
Build the solution
Copy the compiled dll to your VS2010 Visualizer directory – i.e. ..\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\Common7\Packages\Debugger\Visualizers
Improve the solution and share

Constant Special Item ID List (Windows Special Folders)

Posted on February 22, 2011 by Jed

CSIDL

The CSIDL variables are useful for deploying to embedded applications such as Windows CE. A typical scenario where you would implement the CSIDL variable is when you define the Deployment Options of your project – i.e. In Visual Studio, right-click your project, then go to Properties > Devices. You will notice the “Output file folder:” option which specifies the directory path that your project will be deployed to. The example screenshot below shows the “Output file folder” option set using the CSIDL_STARTUP (the Windows Startup directory).

CSIDL

Note As of Windows Vista, these values have been replaced by KNOWNFOLDERID values. See that topic for a list of the new constants and their corresponding CSIDL values. For convenience, corresponding KNOWNFOLDERID values are also noted here for each CSIDL value.

The CSIDL system is supported under Windows Vista for compatibility reasons. However, new development should use KNOWNFOLDERID values rather than CSIDL values.

CSIDL (constant special item ID list) values provide a unique system-independent way to identify special folders used frequently by applications, but which may not have the same name or location on any given system. For example, the system folder may be “C:\Windows” on one system and “C:\Winnt” on another. These constants are defined in Shlobj.h. A subset of them is also defined in Shfolder.h.

Constant/value	Description
CSIDL_ADMINTOOLS FOLDERID_AdminTools	Version 5.0. The file system directory that is used to store administrative tools for an individual user. The MMC will save customized consoles to this directory, and it will roam with the user.
CSIDL_ALTSTARTUP FOLDERID_Startup	The file system directory that corresponds to the user’s nonlocalized Startup program group. This value is recognized in Windows Vista for backward compatibility, but the folder itself no longer exists.
CSIDL_APPDATA FOLDERID_RoamingAppData	Version 4.71. The file system directory that serves as a common repository for application-specific data. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data. This CSIDL is supported by the redistributable Shfolder.dll for systems that do not have the Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 integrated Shell installed.
CSIDL_BITBUCKET FOLDERID_RecycleBinFolder	The virtual folder that contains the objects in the user’s Recycle Bin.
CSIDL_CDBURN_AREA FOLDERID_CDBurning	Version 6.0. The file system directory that acts as a staging area for files waiting to be written to a CD. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\CD Burning.
CSIDL_COMMON_ADMINTOOLS FOLDERID_CommonAdminTools	Version 5.0. The file system directory that contains administrative tools for all users of the computer.
CSIDL_COMMON_ALTSTARTUP FOLDERID_CommonStartup	The file system directory that corresponds to the nonlocalized Startup program group for all users. This value is recognized in Windows Vista for backward compatibility, but the folder itself no longer exists.
CSIDL_COMMON_APPDATA FOLDERID_ProgramData	Version 5.0. The file system directory that contains application data for all users. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data. This folder is used for application data that is not user specific. For example, an application can store a spell-check dictionary, a database of clip art, or a log file in the CSIDL_COMMON_APPDATA folder. This information will not roam and is available to anyone using the computer.
CSIDL_COMMON_DESKTOPDIRECTORY FOLDERID_PublicDesktop	The file system directory that contains files and folders that appear on the desktop for all users. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Desktop.
CSIDL_COMMON_DOCUMENTS FOLDERID_PublicDocuments	The file system directory that contains documents that are common to all users. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents.
CSIDL_COMMON_FAVORITES FOLDERID_Favorites	The file system directory that serves as a common repository for favorite items common to all users.
CSIDL_COMMON_MUSIC FOLDERID_PublicMusic	Version 6.0. The file system directory that serves as a repository for music files common to all users. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\My Music.
CSIDL_COMMON_OEM_LINKS FOLDERID_CommonOEMLinks	This value is recognized in Windows Vista for backward compatibility, but the folder itself is no longer used.
CSIDL_COMMON_PICTURES FOLDERID_PublicPictures	Version 6.0. The file system directory that serves as a repository for image files common to all users. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\My Pictures.
CSIDL_COMMON_PROGRAMS FOLDERID_CommonPrograms	The file system directory that contains the directories for the common program groups that appear on the Start menu for all users. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs.
CSIDL_COMMON_STARTMENU FOLDERID_CommonStartMenu	The file system directory that contains the programs and folders that appear on the Start menu for all users. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu.
CSIDL_COMMON_STARTUP FOLDERID_CommonStartup	The file system directory that contains the programs that appear in the Startup folder for all users. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs\Startup.
CSIDL_COMMON_TEMPLATES FOLDERID_CommonTemplates	The file system directory that contains the templates that are available to all users. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Templates.
CSIDL_COMMON_VIDEO FOLDERID_PublicVideos	Version 6.0. The file system directory that serves as a repository for video files common to all users. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\My Videos.
CSIDL_COMPUTERSNEARME FOLDERID_NetworkFolder	The folder that represents other computers in your workgroup.
CSIDL_CONNECTIONS FOLDERID_ConnectionsFolder	The virtual folder that represents Network Connections, that contains network and dial-up connections.
CSIDL_CONTROLS FOLDERID_ControlPanelFolder	The virtual folder that contains icons for the Control Panel applications.
CSIDL_COOKIES FOLDERID_Cookies	The file system directory that serves as a common repository for Internet cookies. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Cookies.
CSIDL_DESKTOP FOLDERID_Desktop	The virtual folder that represents the Windows desktop, the root of the namespace.
CSIDL_DESKTOPDIRECTORY FOLDERID_Desktop	The file system directory used to physically store file objects on the desktop (not to be confused with the desktop folder itself). A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Desktop.
CSIDL_DRIVES FOLDERID_ComputerFolder	The virtual folder that represents My Computer, containing everything on the local computer: storage devices, printers, and Control Panel. The folder can also contain mapped network drives.
CSIDL_FAVORITES FOLDERID_Favorites	The file system directory that serves as a common repository for the user’s favorite items. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Favorites.
CSIDL_FONTS FOLDERID_Fonts	A virtual folder that contains fonts. A typical path is C:\Windows\Fonts.
CSIDL_HISTORY FOLDERID_History	The file system directory that serves as a common repository for Internet history items.
CSIDL_INTERNET FOLDERID_InternetFolder	A virtual folder for Internet Explorer.
CSIDL_INTERNET_CACHE FOLDERID_InternetCache	Version 4.72. The file system directory that serves as a common repository for temporary Internet files. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files.
CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA FOLDERID_LocalAppData	Version 5.0. The file system directory that serves as a data repository for local (nonroaming) applications. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Local Settings\Application Data.
CSIDL_MYDOCUMENTS FOLDERID_Documents	Version 6.0. The virtual folder that represents the My Documents desktop item. This value is equivalent to CSIDL_PERSONAL.
CSIDL_MYMUSIC FOLDERID_Music	The file system directory that serves as a common repository for music files. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\User\My Documents\My Music.
CSIDL_MYPICTURES FOLDERID_Pictures	Version 5.0. The file system directory that serves as a common repository for image files. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\My Documents\My Pictures.
CSIDL_MYVIDEO FOLDERID_Videos	Version 6.0. The file system directory that serves as a common repository for video files. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\My Documents\My Videos.
CSIDL_NETHOOD FOLDERID_NetHood	A file system directory that contains the link objects that may exist in the My Network Places virtual folder. It is not the same as CSIDL_NETWORK, which represents the network namespace root. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\NetHood.
CSIDL_NETWORK FOLDERID_NetworkFolder	A virtual folder that represents Network Neighborhood, the root of the network namespace hierarchy.
CSIDL_PERSONAL FOLDERID_Documents	Version 6.0. The virtual folder that represents the My Documents desktop item. This is equivalent to CSIDL_MYDOCUMENTS. Previous to Version 6.0. The file system directory used to physically store a user’s common repository of documents. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\My Documents. This should be distinguished from the virtual My Documents folder in the namespace. To access that virtual folder, use SHGetFolderLocation, which returns theITEMIDLIST for the virtual location, or refer to the technique described in Managing the File System.
CSIDL_PRINTERS FOLDERID_PrintersFolder	The virtual folder that contains installed printers.
CSIDL_PRINTHOOD FOLDERID_PrintHood	The file system directory that contains the link objects that can exist in the Printers virtual folder. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\PrintHood.
CSIDL_PROFILE FOLDERID_Profile	Version 5.0. The user’s profile folder. A typical path is C:\Users\username. Applications should not create files or folders at this level; they should put their data under the locations referred to by CSIDL_APPDATA or CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA. However, if you are creating a new Known Folder the profile root referred to by CSIDL_PROFILE is appropriate.
CSIDL_PROGRAM_FILES FOLDERID_ProgramFiles	Version 5.0. The Program Files folder. A typical path is C:\Program Files.
CSIDL_PROGRAM_FILESX86 FOLDERID_ProgramFilesX86
CSIDL_PROGRAM_FILES_COMMON FOLDERID_ProgramFilesCommon	Version 5.0. A folder for components that are shared across applications. A typical path is C:\Program Files\Common. Valid only for Windows XP.
CSIDL_PROGRAM_FILES_COMMONX86 FOLDERID_ProgramFilesCommonX86
CSIDL_PROGRAMS FOLDERID_Programs	The file system directory that contains the user’s program groups (which are themselves file system directories). A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Start Menu\Programs.
CSIDL_RECENT FOLDERID_Recent	The file system directory that contains shortcuts to the user’s most recently used documents. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\My Recent Documents. To create a shortcut in this folder, use SHAddToRecentDocs. In addition to creating the shortcut, this function updates the Shell’s list of recent documents and adds the shortcut to the My Recent Documents submenu of the Start menu.
CSIDL_RESOURCES FOLDERID_ResourceDir	Windows Vista. The file system directory that contains resource data. A typical path is C:\Windows\Resources.
CSIDL_RESOURCES_LOCALIZED FOLDERID_LocalizedResourcesDir
CSIDL_SENDTO FOLDERID_SendTo	The file system directory that contains Send To menu items. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\SendTo.
CSIDL_STARTMENU FOLDERID_StartMenu	The file system directory that contains Start menu items. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Start Menu.
CSIDL_STARTUP FOLDERID_Startup	The file system directory that corresponds to the user’s Startup program group. The system starts these programs whenever any user logs on. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Start Menu\Programs\Startup.
CSIDL_SYSTEM FOLDERID_System	Version 5.0. The Windows System folder. A typical path is C:\Windows\System32.
CSIDL_SYSTEMX86 FOLDERID_SystemX86
CSIDL_TEMPLATES FOLDERID_Templates	The file system directory that serves as a common repository for document templates. A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Templates.
CSIDL_WINDOWS FOLDERID_Windows	Version 5.0. The Windows directory or SYSROOT. This corresponds to the %windir% or %SYSTEMROOT% environment variables. A typical path is C:\Windows.
Flags
CSIDL_FLAG_CREATE KF_FLAG_CREATE	Version 5.0. Combine with another CSIDL to force the creation of the associated folder if it does not exist.
CSIDL_FLAG_DONT_UNEXPAND KF_FLAG_DONT_UNEXPAND	Combine with another CSIDL constant to ensure the expansion of environment variables.
CSIDL_FLAG_DONT_VERIFY KF_FLAG_DONT_VERIFY	Combine with another CSIDL constant, except for CSIDL_FLAG_CREATE, to return an unverified folder path with no attempt to create or initialize the folder.
CSIDL_FLAG_NO_ALIAS KF_FLAG_NO_ALIAS	Combine with another CSIDL constant to ensure the retrieval of the true system path for the folder, free of any aliased placeholders such as %USERPROFILE%, returned by SHGetFolderLocation. This flag has no effect on paths returned by SHGetFolderPath.
CSIDL_FLAG_PER_USER_INIT
CSIDL_FLAG_MASK	A mask for any valid CSIDL flag value.

Go here for the original Microsoft Post on this topic.

Error Message: Could not load type SyncManager

Posted on February 16, 2011 by Jed

In Visual Studio 2008 Pro, I was attempting to add a new data source to my Windows CE Form application via the “Data Source Configuration Wizard”, but I received an error message during this wizard process. After selecting the database at the “Where will the application get data from?” step, the following error message popped up…

An unexpected error has occurred.

Error Message: Could not load type ‘Microsoft.VisualStudio.DataDesign.SyncDesigner.SyncFacade.SyncManager’ from assembly ‘Microsoft.VisualStudio.DataDesign.SyncDesigner.DslPackage, Version=9.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f74f11d50a3a’.

Per Microsoft, this error occurs because there are incompatible assemblies between VS2008 RTM and VS2008 SP1. The Microsoft.VisualStudio.DataDesign.SyncDesigner.DslPackage.dll is not successfully upgraded to the SP1 version.

To fix the problem, I reinstalled Visual Studio 2008 SP1. You can download VS2008 Service Pack 1 here.

After the VS2008 SP1 install, I was able to use the “Data Source Configuration Wizard” successfully.
The second screenshot below was the step where VS2008 threw the error message.

ASP.NET MVC 2: Basics, Introduction by Scott Hanselman

Posted on December 13, 2010 by Jed

Join Scott Hanselman as he explains ASP.NET MVC from File -> New Project. We’ll dig into the details and try to put MVC into perspective. Is WebForms going away? What’s better about MVC vs. WebForms? How does MVC sit on top of ASP.NET and how was it written? We’ll play with call stacks, and avoid PowerPoint slides! This is an introduction to ASP.NET, but it’s not a “basic” session. We assume you have some web development concepts or perhaps you’re a professional ASP.NET WebForms developers who is just starting out with ASP.NET MVC.

Watch the video over at Channel9

This session is presented by Scott Hanselman during Microsoft DevDays 2010 in The Hague in The Netherlands.