Using Certificate Authentication for Cross Domain Communication

I have addressed couple of posts on logic behind certificates , how to use them with WCF in both transport and message security contexts.

In this post i try to present the basic idea and implementation of using certificates for communication between different parties in realtime scenario. Dont worry about the screenshots of config files, you can download the sample and get all the settings you required for copy.

There are many scenarios which demand certificates authentication mechanism. Common examples are
#1. Banking web application which do their transactions using FBA and Certificate authentication
#2. Server to Server calls.
#3. Service to Service calls
#4. Application to service calls.
and so on covering most of the high security requirments.

But everything boils down to "A cross domain communication or we can say Domain independent communication".

Sharepoint DDD / TDD Code Testing Tip

In this post i would like to demonstrate a small tip in writing SharePoint code, which can make testing a bit easy.

Now before going into further details lets talk about 2 concepts DDD and Unit Test Vs Integration Test.

#1. DDD & TDD : Domain Driven Development  targets at unrelenting Domain layer from technology, thus making it flexible to be accessed by any technology for re-usability.

On the other hand TDD targets at implementing the functionality based on scenarios. For example, lets consider Agile implementation. Each sprint will target a couple of scenarios, which may not comprises of complete functionality. So, we will write the test cases for those scenarios and will write the code against to the test cases until they are success.

In both the cases, the main idea is separation of concerns and increasing the testability of the code.

#2. Unit Test is a test that will be executed in isolation, means no dependency on any other factor. In SharePoint , the unit test should be executed even without Sharepoint dlls, and Sites, and any other factor.
We have several frameworks like Moles, TypeMock which will give you ability to mock complete SP Object model thus execute your code in isolation.

On the other hand Integration testing is running the code in coordination with various layers that actually perform tasks on the site.

Feature Stapling in Sharepoint

CodeProject

Feature Stapling is a concept using which a specific feature will be stappled to site template.

What we gona acheive with it?

There will be scenario where certain resource has to be populated to every site collection that was / will be created on a farm.

Eg : I am dealing a client who is a owning a chemical lab. He want complete list of "Elements and their Atomic weights" to be present in every site that was already created, and any site that will be created in future.

In this scenario, Feature stappling will be used.
Lets see how to demonstrate it.

Demo of PhoneGap on an Android

CodeProjectIn earlier post we have seen "Basics of PhoneGap". In this post we will see how to transform simple web application (Html 5, Css3, Javascript) into a native android App using PhoneGap.

First i have a simple web application to show the current location based on your devices Geological position. It was written in simple Html 5, Css 3, and Javascript.

Introduction to PhoneGap

CodeProject What is PhoneGap?
With increasing demand of Application access on Portable devices like Mobiles and Tablets, the Application development has been divided into two streams.

Web Applications and Apps 

Well, there are pros and cons of both the approaches.

Using Delegate Control in Sharepoint

CodeProject Before jumping to actual development, lets know which scenarios demand the usage of Delegate Controls in sharepoint.

I have designed header image for my blog, and i want to have it on top of my sharepoint site.

So how to add it to all the pages in my sharepoint site.

Deploying Custom Master Page Using a sharepoint Feature

In this module, we will see how to deploy a Custom master page to a sharepoint site, using a sharepoint feature.

Step 1: Create a sharepoint project. Add a Module to it. I named it as "MasterModule". By default the module will be created with 2 files,  Elemnts.xml and Sample.txt.

Step 2: You can add / create a Custom Masterpage file as per your requirment. For my purpose, i am trying to reuse the existing V4.Master.

If you are trying to export the master page from Sharepoint Designer, you may end up with error

http://server/_catalogs/masterpage/v4_Modified.master(26): error CS0030: Cannot convert type 'Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.ScriptLink' to 'System.Web.UI.IAttributeAccessor'

Granting Anonymous Access to Sharepoint List / Library Programtically

CodeProject In this post we will see how to enable and disable Anonymous access to a List or Document library from a sharepoint feature (C# code).

There are 3 different steps involved in granting Anonymous access to a List/Library in a right way.

Step 1: Enabling the anonymous accesss to the Web application from Central Admin. This does not mean that the whole web application is now anonymous. This step signifies that, this web application has ability to host resources that can be accessed by Anonymous user.

Multi Tab App with Async Task

CodeProject Objective: To create an android app, with multiple tabs catering different types of questions, in which data will be saved to SQL-Lite using Asynchronous approach (Async Tasks concept.)

This post will be covering only a part of the actual objective.
I created a Multi Tab application and each tab pointing to  a different fragment.
Now in every tab click the data has to be saved without blocking the user actions.
For this i have chosen Async Task concept.
As of now i just put up a simple dialog display demonstrating the Async actions while user navigates between the tabs.
In up coming post, i will finish the code for even saving the data to SQL-Lite database, thus completing the actual intent.

Shared Preferences and Yes/No Alert Dialog in Android

CodeProject In this post, my intent is to use the internal memory of an android and save / retrieve the data from different views.

We have several options to save data on a Android device, like Compact SQL, Files and Shared Preferences.

So, i have a One Page Application, which will accepts name and save it to the internal memory and then retrieves the data to display i on second screen.