Update April 2011: This post and part 2 are now irrelevant for Sitecore 6.x See this post for details of important changes since this post was first published
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Problems with Sitecore and the staging module part 1.
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Author Archives: Paul
How to copy a project from VSS and remove bindings.
If you want to duplicate the solution to add to a new source control system.
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Sitecore with Gridview – rowupdating event doesn’t fire
Whenever using Databound server controls with Sitecore need to be aware that Sitecore meddles with some controls. This nasty issue which can have you banging your head against the wall for hours (days?) has been previously blogged by Mark Cassidy but I guess it depends on what symptom you’re having first, and wether you relate it back to this obscure setting. In my case, I was previously aware of this issue but only relating to apparent loss of viewstate on controls. Unfortunately I didn’t think of it as affecting events too.
In my case most features worked, Edit buttons would invoke row editing mode, cancel button works fine, rowCommand event generally worked, but it wasRowUpdating that simply wasn’t working. Adding System.Web.UI.WebControls.GridView to <typesThatShouldNotBeExpanded> in web.config resolves this issue. your web.config would then look like :
<typesThatShouldNotBeExpanded>
<type>System.Web.UI.WebControls.Repeater</type>
<type>System.Web.UI.WebControls.GridView</type>
<type>System.Web.UI.WebControls.DataList</type>
</typesThatShouldNotBeExpanded>
This issue does now have a fleeting mention on http://sdn.sitecore.net/Scrapbook….. but requires login to view it.
While looking for that link, I also came across another blog post detailing the same issue and frustrations I’ve had with Gridview events that may have more detail.
GridView problem – Item has already been added. Key in dictionary: ‘Timestamp’ Key being added: ‘Timestamp’
In general ASP.net, this can be caused by calling DataBind() more than once on a databound control. Also be aware that this is influenced by automatic databind being on too.
Relating this to Sitecore CMS, you should be aware that Sitecore ships with the following line in web.config:
<!– AUTOMATIC DATA BIND
Indicates if the data bind function is run automatically
–>
<setting name=“AutomaticDataBind“ value=“false“ />
This means that you will need to either call Databind whenever you need it, or you can simply set this value to true. This AutomaticDataBind setting will also cause problems with other types of databound controls, such as templated controls. It’s generally simpler to set it to ‘true’..
Sitecore preview bug – looking at web database
Sitecore v6 introduced another preview tool accessible from [Presentation] > [Preview] as opposed to [Publish] > [Preview]. The new preview mode opens another tab in the content editor which shows the preview of the current item.
This is all fine and well except that it is permanently looking at the web database rather than master database. This can be observed by creating a new item, saving it, and then selecting preview. You get a 404 error, unless you publish it first.
Unfortunately this nice feature is 80% broken and can only be used for looking at published content.
Update: This was a registered bug in February 2009 with a workaround available from Sitecore support, but this still has not been released and I believe the bug still exists in Sitecore 6.1
Sitecore – Could not load file or assembly System.Data.SQLite
After installing Sitecore v6, you get the following error when viewing the website or sitecore UI:
Sitecore Could not load file or assembly ‘System.Data.SQLite, Version=1.0.48.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=db937bc2d44ff139’ or one of its dependencies. An attempt was made to load a program with an incorrect format.
This is actually detailed in page 20 of the sitecore troubleshooting doc, but I missed it first time round. This is caused by the presence of System.Data.SqlLite in the bin folder when running on 64-bit OS. An alternative dll is available for 64bit OS from Sitecore.
Solution: If you’re are not using SQLite simply the delete the System.Data.SqlLite.dll from the bin folder and recycle your app to get back up and running. If you are using SQLite, download the alternative dll for 64bit OS.
Sitecore ContextItem.Database.SelectItems() and languages.
While poking around in the shared source RSS module for Sitecore, I found that several aspects of the “static feeds” feature loose language context during publishing. This only effects static feeds whereby the rss.xml file(s) are written to disk and linked-too directly. The processes is kicked-off my hooking into the publishing-end event.
While the similar method Context.Database.GetItem retrieves an item in the same language as the context item, it appears that SelectItems(selector, predicate) does not. So if you are in a language other than ‘en’ English, you will probably retrieve the ‘en’ version of your non-‘en’ language items, resulting in large areas of missing data.
I’m not sure if this only effects SelectItems() when run outside of the context of a web request, or if it happens all the time, but the work-around is to explicitly change your context.language before calling SelectItems().
ContextItem.Database.SelectItems(selector, predicate); …..will return ‘en’ language items regardless.
Instead you must use:
Sitecore.Globalization.Language.Current = ContextItem.Language;
ContextItem.Database.SelectItems(selector, predicate);
….which then retrieves items in the same language of contextItem.
Cannot install Sql server Express 2005 in Windows Server 2008 x64 “cannot continue because the installation package could not be opened….”
The standard lightweight version of SQL Express 2005 is missing files that are required to install on Sever 2008 x64. You cannot install the lightweight version on server 2008 / 64-bit windows OS. Instead you must simply download the full package including advanced features. This more complete version will install fine on Server 2008. Bear in mind that you don’t actually need to install the advanced features.
Silverlight web services cross domain warning
You get a cross-domain web services warning when debugging your silverlight application. This can be caused simply by leaving the wrong project highlighted when you hit F5. Select your .web project or the project that contains the aspx file hosting the application. If you run debugger with the silverlight project (containing your page.xaml) selected, you get this error.
Silverlight and LINQ problems: ‘YourDataClassesDataContext’ does not contain a constructor that takes ‘0’ arguments
After rebuilding my DBML file with SQL metal, my DataContext class no longer has a parameterless constructor. This is due to differences between the was that Visual studio generates the DBML (with SQL metal) and how SQLMetal command-line does by default.
The parameterless constructor simply takes the connection string from web.config rather than requiring one to be passed in as an argument. There may be switches for SQLMetal to handle this, but in the mean time here is a quick solution (which is simply what VS2008 adds when using the DBML builder) :
Add the following method to the DataClasses.designer.cs
public MyDataClassesDataContext() :
base(global::System.Configuration.ConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings[“MyConnectionString”].ConnectionString, mappingSource)
{
OnCreated();
}