london calling

watch out - here we come. tomorrow evening we're back in london again. awesome. it's been -way- to long since our last visit, so this trip feels extra special in many ways. camden town. soho. shoreditch. - bring it on. fry up. beer at lunchtime. walks along the thames. - bring it on. the white horse. the lock tavern. catch. - bring it on. this weekend is gonna rock! adios, P.

Visual Studio Code Name "Orcas"

for those of you interested, Visual Studio Code Name "Orcas" is now available in Beta 1 download - and even as VPC downloads for the people that like to try it without installing it.. download link: http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-GB/vstudio/aa700831.aspx whitepaper: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=17319EB4-299C-43B8-A360-A1C2BD6A421B&displaylang=en regards, P.

Sitecore 5.3.1 - UI changes

While a lot of changes took place in the config files Sitecore has really made improvements to the UI as well.

After first installing the 5.3.1 version what hits you right away is the new login page. With an improved appearance and additional features such as browser identification and phishing filter detection, along with the easy (and understandable) selections you can make this is really a step forward and will make many customers happy.

new login screens

(on a sidenote i personally find it a bit annoying that if you login to the content editor directly there's really no easy way to log out or access the sitecore 'start' menu, but hey - that's just me i suppose - you can always wait for it to time out or hit the sitecore logo and close the content editor)

Given i haven't yet had a chance to dig deeper into the new version i'll just leave you with some screenshots & comments. however, one thing i did notice (and really like) is that the ribbon is now easily configurable via both a context menu and it's very own wizard/application. good stuff!

ribbon context menu

developer ribbon (with options to copy Item ID or Path to the clipboard)

the ribbon editor

there is one more thing i noticed, and it really struck a curious nerve in me - there's now a __inherits security field on the edit user wizard.. for what i'm not sure, but it did indeed make me curious..

inherit security field in user editor

So what's the verdict? well.. given the improvements seen so far and the anticipation i have on future releases, i too will give this release an 8. Excellent work by the lads indeed.

well, that's it for now.

take care,

P.

Sitecore 5.3.1 - Config changes

Since there are -quite a lot more- changes from 5.3.0 to 5.3.1 than the actual release notes says, i thought i'd put together a list of what has happened in the web.config and commands.config files. All together the changes are very nice and there's a lot of new additions regarding various media parts. Commands.Config changes:

• clipboard:copyidtoclipboard command added
• clipboard:copypathtoclipboard command added
• webedit:edit command added
• webedit:save command added

Web.Config changes:

• forceDownload option added to the MimeTypes sections
• 2 new customHandlers: "~/rest/" for sitecore_rest.ashx "~/icon/" for sitecore_icon.ashx
• Hook for MemoryMonitorHook has the following added: <ClearCaches>true</ClearCaches> <GarbageCollect>true</GarbageCollect> <AdjustLoadFactor>true</AdjustLoadFactor>
• Agent added to clean up publishing queue: Sitecore.Tasks.CleanupPublishQueue
• renderLayout pipeline has the following processors added: InsertPlaceholders CreateDynamicChildControls BuildPage
• uiUpload pipeline has the following processor added: CheckSize
• <sites> configuration has an additional masterDatabase param that defines the database containing the data to be shown in preview and web edit modes.
• AutomaticDataBind setting changed from "true" to "false"
• Caching.DefaultClientDataCacheSize setting added
• EnableXslDocumentFunction setting added
• Login.SitecoreUrl setting added
• MaxItemNameLength setting added
• Media.BaseFolder setting added
• Media.IncludeExtensionsInItemNames setting added
• Media.InterpolationMode setting added
• Media.MaxSizeInDatabase setting added
• Media.MaxSizeInMemory setting added
• Media.UploadAsFiles setting added
• Media.UploadAsVersionableByDefault setting added
• Media.UseLegacyResizing setting added
• Media.UseResourceAssembly setting added
• Media.WhitespaceReplacement setting added
• Tasks.EmailReminderSubject setting added
• Tasks.EmailReminderText setting added
• Templates.DefaultTemplateEditor setting removed
• UI.CalendarTimeOfDay setting added
• Upload.UserSelectableDestination setting added
• UnlockAfterCopy setting added
• VersionFilePath setting added
• "sc" tagPrefix added to the <controls> section of <pages>
• 3 new httpHandlers added: sitecore_rest.ashx sitecore_xaml.ashx sitecore_icon.ashx
• System, System.Web, System.Configuration, System.Drawing, System.Xml, System.Data, System.Web.Services, System.DirectoryServices, System.DirectoryServices.Protocols, System.EnterpriseServices, System.Design, System.ServiceProcess, System.Windows.Forms, System.Web.RegularExpressions added to the compilation <assemblies>
• and last but not least - the MimeTypes.config file is now included in the App_Config folder