Introduction
ASP.NET
1. What is view state and the use of it?
btnSubmit.Attributes.Add("onMouseOver","someClientCode();")
11. What data type does the RangeValidator control support?
Integer, String and Date.
12. What are the various types of caching?
Caching is a technique widely used in computing to increase performance by keeping frequently accessed or expensive data in memory. In the context of a web application, caching retains the pages or data across HTTP requests and reuses them without the expense of recreating them. ASP.NET has 3 kinds of caching, strategiesOutput, CachingFragment and CachingData.
CachingOutput Caching:
Caches the dynamic output generated by a request. Some times it is useful to cache the output of a website even for a minute, which will result in a better performance. For caching the entire page the page should have OutputCache directive.<%@ OutputCache Duration="60" VaryByParam="state" %>
Fragment Caching:
Caches the portion of the page generated by the request. Some times it is not practical to cache the entire page, in such cases we can cache a portion of page<%@ OutputCache Duration="120" VaryByParam="CategoryID;SelectedID"%>
Data Caching: Caches the objects programmatically. For data caching ASP.Net provides a cache object for eg: cache["States"] = dsStates;
13. What do you mean by authentication and authorization?
Authentication is the process of validating a user on the credentials (username and word) and authorization performs after authentication. After Authentication a user will be verified for performing the various tasks, It access is limited it is known as authorization.
14. What are various types of directives in .NET?
- @Page:
Defines page-specific attributes used by the ASP.NET page parser and compiler. Can be included only in .aspx files <%@ Page AspCompat="TRUE" language="C#" %>
- @Control:
Defines control-specific attributes used by the ASP.NET page parser and compiler. Can be included only in .ascx files. <%@ Control Language="VB" EnableViewState="false" %>
- @Import:
Explicitly imports a namespace into a page or user control. The Import directive cannot have more than one namespace attribute. To import multiple namespaces, use multiple @Import directives. <% @ Import Namespace="System.web" %>
- @Implements:
Indicates that the current page or user control implements the specified .NET framework interface.<%@ Implements Interface="System.Web.UI.IPostBackEventHandler" %>
- @Register:
Associates aliases with namespaces and class names for concise notation in custom server control syntax.<%@ Register Tagprefix="Acme" Tagname="AdRotator" src="AdRotator.ascx" %>
- @Assembly:
Links an assembly to the current page during compilation, making all the assembly's classes and interfaces available for use on the page. <%@ Assembly Name="MyAssembly" %><%@ Assembly src="MySource.vb" %>
- @OutputCache:
Declaratively controls the output caching policies of an ASP.NET page or a user control contained in a page<%@ OutputCache Duration="#ofseconds" Location="Any | Client | Downstream | Server | None" Shared="True | False" VaryByControl="controlname" VaryByCustom="browser | customstring" VaryByHeader="headers" VaryByParam="parametername" %>
- @Reference:
Declaratively indicates that another user control or page source file should be dynamically compiled and linked against the page in which this directive is declared.
statement at the top of an ASPX file or a:
<COMPILATION debug="true" />
statement in a Web.config file.
16. Can a user browsing my Web site read my Web.config or Global.asax files?
No. The <HTTPHANDLERS> section of Machine.config, which holds the master configuration settings for ASP.NET, contains entries that map ASAX files, CONFIG files, and selected other file types to an HTTP handler named HttpForbiddenHandler, which fails attempts to retrieve the associated file. You can modify it by editing Machine.config or including a section in a local Web.config file.
17. What's the difference between Page.RegisterClientScriptBlock and Page.RegisterStartupScript?
RegisterClientScriptBlock is for returning blocks of client-side script containing functions. RegisterStartupScript is for returning blocks of client scripts, not packaged in functions. In other words, code that's to execute when the page is loaded. The latter positions script blocks near the end of the document so elements on the page that the script interacts with are loaded before the script runs. <%@ Reference Control="MyControl.ascx" %>
18. Is it necessary to lock application state before accessing it?
Only if you're performing a multi-step update and want the update to be treated as an atomic operation. Here's an example:
- Application.Lock ();
- Application["ItemsSold"] = (int) Application["ItemsSold"] + 1;
- Application["ItemsLeft"] = (int) Application["ItemsLeft"] - 1;
- Application.UnLock ();
By locking application state before updating it and unlocking it afterwards, you ensure that another request being processed on another thread doesn't read application state at exactly the wrong time and see an inconsistent view of it. If I update session state then should I lock it, too?
- MailMessage message = new MailMessage ();
- message.From = <email>;
- message.To = <email>;
- message.Subject = "Scheduled Power Outage";
- message.Body = "Our servers will be down tonight.";
- SmtpMail.SmtpServer = "localhost";
- SmtpMail.Send (message);
MailMessage and SmtpMail are classes defined in the .NET Framework Class Library's System.Web.Mail namespace. Due to a security change made to ASP.NET just before it shipped, you need to set SmtpMail's SmtpServer property to "localhost" even though "localhost" is the default. In addition, you must use the IIS configuration applet to enable localhost (127.0.0.1) to relay messages through the local SMTP service.
- <?xmlversion="1.0" ?>
- <dynamicDiscovery
- xmlns="urn:schemas-dynamicdiscovery:disco.2000-03-17">
- <excludepath="_vti_cnf" />
- <excludepath="_vti_pvt" />
- <excludepath="_vti_log" />
- <excludepath="_vti_script" />
- <excludepath="_vti_txt" />
- </dynamicDiscovery>
21. How does dynamic discovery work?
- <%@ Page Language="C#" %>
- <html>
- <body>
- <%
- Response.Cache.SetNoStore ();
- Response.Write (DateTime.Now.ToLongTimeString ());
- %>
- </body>
- </html>
SetNoStore works by returning a Cache-Controll; a private, no-store header in the HTTP response. In this example, it prevents caching of a Web page that shows the current time.
C#.
- <SESSIONSTATE
- StateConnectionString="tcpip=127.0.0.1:42424" =""
- sqlConnectionString="data source=127.0.0.1; user id=sa;" word=""
- cookieless="false" =""
- timeout="30" =""/>
You can specify mode as "stateserver" or "sqlserver".
- Communicating through a Firewall when building a distributed application with 100s or 1000s of users spread over multiple locations, there is always the problem of communicating between client and server because of firewalls and proxy servers. Exposing your middle tier components as Web Services and invoking them directly from a Windows UI is a very valid option.
- Application Integration When integrating applications written in various languages and running on disparate systems. Or even applications running on the same platform that have been written by separate vendors.
- Business-to-Business Integration. This is an enabler for B2B intergtation that allows one to expose vital business processes to authorized suppliers and customers. An example would be exposing electronic ordering and invoicing, allowing customers to send you purchase orders and suppliers to send you invoices electronically.
- Software Reuse. This takes place at multiple levels. Code Reuse at the Source code level or binary componet-based resuse. The limiting factor here is that you can reuse the code but not the data behind it. Webservice overcomes this limitation. A scenario could be when you are building an app that aggregates the functionality of serveral other Applicatons. Each of these functions could be performed by individual apps, but there is value in perhaps combining the the multiple apps to present a unifiend view in a Portal or Intranet.
- When not to use Web Services: Single-machine applicatons are applicatons running on the same machine and that need to communicate with each other using a native API. You also have the options of using component technologies such as COM or .NET Componets since there is very little overhead.
- Homogeneous Applications on a LAN. If you have Win32 or Winforms apps that want to communicate with their server counterpart. It is much more efficient to use DCOM in the case of Win32 apps and .NET Remoting in the case of .NET Apps.
42. Can you give an example of what might be most appropriately placed in the Application_Start and Session_Start events?
The Application_Start event is guaranteed to occur only once throughout the lifetime of the application. It's a good place to initialize global variables. For example, you might want to retrieve a list of products from a database table and place the list in application state or the Cache object. SessionStateModule exposes both Session_Start and Session_End events.
43. What are the advantages and disadvantages of viewstate?
The primary advantages of the ViewState feature in ASP.NET are:
- Simplicity. There is no need to write possibly complex code to store form data between page submissions.
- Flexibility. It is possible to enable, configure, and disable ViewState on a control-by-control basis, choosing to persist the values of some fields but not others.
There are, however a few disadvantages that are worth pointing out:
- Does not track across pages. ViewState information does not automatically transfer from page to page. With the session
approach, values can be stored in the session and accessed from other pages. This is not possible with ViewState, so storingdata into the session must be done explicitly.
- ViewState is not suitable for transferring data for back-end systems. That is, data must still be transferred to the back
end using some form of data object.
44. Describe session handling in a webfarm, how does it work and what are the limits?
ASP.NET Sessions support storing of session data in 3 ways, i] In-Process (in the same memory that ASP.NET uses) , ii] Out-of-Process using a Windows NT Service (in memory separate from ASP.NET) or iii] in SQL Server (persistent storage). Both the Windows Service and SQL Server solutions support a webfarm scenario where all the web-servers can be configured to share a common session state store.
1. Windows Service
We can start this service by "Start" | "Control Panel" | "Administrative Tools" | "Services". In that we service names ASP.NET State Service. We can start or stop a service manually or configure it to start automatically. Then we need to configure our web.config file as in the following:
- <CONFIGURATION>
- <configuration>
- <system.web>
- <SessionState
- mode = "StateServer"
- stateConnectionString = "tcpip=127.0.0.1:42424"
- stateNetworkTimeout = "10"
- sqlConnectionString="data source = 127.0.0.1; uid=sa;pwd="
- cookieless ="Flase"
- timeout= "20" />
- </system.web>
- </configuration>
- </SYSTEM.WEB>
- </CONFIGURATION>
Here ASP.Net Session is directed to use a Windows Service for state management on the local server (the address 127.0.0.1 is the TCP/IP loop-back address). The default port is 42424. We can configure it to any port but for that we need to manually edit the registry.
-
In a webfarm make sure you have the same config file in all your web servers.
-
Also make sure your objects are serializable.
-
For the session state to be maintained across various web servers in the webfarm, the application path of the web-site in the IIS Metabase should be identical in all the web-servers in the webfarm.
45. Which template must you provide to display data in a Repeater control?
- < ItemTemplate >
- < div class ="rItem" >
- < img src="images/<%# Container.DataItem("ImageURL")%>" hspace="10" />
- < b > <% # Container.DataItem("Title")%>
- < /div >
- < ItemTemplate >
- Control to Validate,
- Error Message.
51. What tags do you need to add within the asp:datagrid tags to bind columns manually?
- < asp:DataGrid id="dgCart" AutoGenerateColumns="False" CellPadding="4" Width="448px" runat="server" >
- < Columns >
- < asp:ButtonColumn HeaderText="SELECT" Text="SELECT" CommandName="select" >< /asp:ButtonColumn >
- < asp:BoundColumn DataField="ProductId" HeaderText="Product ID" >< /asp:BoundColumn >
- < asp:BoundColumn DataField="ProductName" HeaderText="Product Name" >< /asp:BoundColumn >
- < asp:BoundColumn DataField="UnitPrice" HeaderText="UnitPrice" >< /asp:BoundColumn >
- < /Columns >
- < /asp:DataGrid >
- Response.Cookies ("Name") = "Nigel"
- Response.Cookies ("Name"). Expires = DateAdd ("m", 1, Now ())
- What tag do you use to add a hyperlink column to the DataGrid?
- < asp:HyperLinkColumn > </ asp:HyperLinkColumn>
- <AUTHORIZATION>< authorization >
- < allow roles="Domain Name\Administrators" / > < !-- Allow Administrators in domain. -- >
- < deny users="*" / > < !-- Deny anyone else. -- >
- < /authorization >
- < configuration >
- < appSettings >
- < add key="ConnectionString"
- value="server=localhost;uid=sa;pwd=;database=MyDB" / >
- < /appSettings >
- < /configuration >
61. What are the advantages and benefits of viewstate?
When a form is submitted in classic ASP, all form values are cleared. Suppose you have submitted a form with a lot of information and the server returns an error. You will need to return to the form and correct the information. You click the back button, and what happens? All form values are cleared, and you will need to start all over again! The site did not maintain your ViewState. With ASP .NET, the form reappears in the browser window together with all form values. This is because ASP .NET maintains your ViewState. The ViewState indicates the status of the page when submitted to the server.
62. What tags do you need to add within the asp:datagrid tags to bind columns manually?
Set the AutoGenerateColumns Property to false on the datagrid tag and then use the Column tag and an ASP:databound tag as in the following:
- < asp:DataGrid runat="server" id="ManualColumnBinding" AutoGenerateColumns="False" >
- < Columns >
- < asp:BoundColumn HeaderText="Column1" DataField="Column1"/ >
- < asp:BoundColumn HeaderText="Column2" DataField="Column2"/ >
- < /Columns >
- < /asp:DataGrid >
- <asp:DataGrid id=ManualColumnBinding runat="server" AutoGenerateColumns="False">
- <COLUMNS> <asp:BoundColumn HeaderText="Column2" DataField="Column2"></asp:BoundColumn>
- </asp:DataGrid>
DataTextField and DataValueField
- BeginTranaction: only if the request is transacted
- Init: every time a page is processed
- LoadViewState: Only on postback
- ProcessPostData1: Only on postback
- Load: every time
- ProcessData2: Only on Postback
- RaiseChangedEvent: Only on Postback
- RaisePostBackEvent: Only on Postback
- PreRender: everytime
- BuildTraceTree: Only if tracing is enabled
- SaveViewState: Every time
- Render: Every time
- End Transaction: Only if the request is transacted
- Trace.EndRequest: Only when tracing is enabled
- UnloadRecursive: Every request
- Authentication/Authorization
- Encryption/Decryption
- Maintaining web servers outside the corporate firewall
- and so on.
7. What is the difference between in-proc and out-of-proc?
An inproc is one that runs in the same process area as that of the client giving tha advantage of speed but the disadvantage of stability because if it crashes then it takes the client application also with it. Outproc is one that works outside the client's memory, thus giving stability to the client, but we need to compromise a bit on speed.
8. When you're running a component within ASP.NET, what process is it running within on Windows XP? Windows 2000? Windows 2003?
On Windows 2003 (IIS 6.0) running in native mode, the component is running within the w3wp.exe process associated with the application pool that has been configured for the web application containing the component.
On Windows 2003 in IIS 5.0 emulation mode, 2000, or XP, it's running within the IIS helper process whose name I do not remember, it being quite a while since I last used IIS 5.0.
9. What does aspnet_regiis -i do?
Aspnet_regiis.exe is the ASP.NET IIS Registration tool that allows an administrator or installation program to easily update the script maps for an ASP.NET application to point to the ASP.NET ISAPI version associated with the tool. The tool can also be used to display the status of all installed versions of ASP. NET, register the ASP.NET version coupled with the tool, create client-script directories, and perform other configuration operations.
When multiple versions of the .NET Framework are executing side-by-side on a single computer, the ASP.NET ISAPI version mapped to an ASP.NET application determines which version of the Common Language Runtime is used for the application.
The tool can be launched with a set of optional parameters. Option "i" installs the version of ASP.NET associated with Aspnet_regiis.exe and updates the script maps at the IIS metabase root and below. Note that only applications that are currently mapped to an earlier version of ASP.NET are affected
10. What is a PostBack?
The process in which a Web page sends data back to the same page on the server.
11. What is ViewState? How is it encoded? Is it encrypted? Who uses ViewState?
ViewState is the mechanism ASP.NET uses to maintain server control state values that don't otherwise post-back as part of the HTTP form. ViewState Maintains the UI State of a Page.
ViewState is base64-encoded.
It is not encrypted but it can be encrypted by setting EnableViewStatMAC="true" and setting the machineKey validation type to 3DES. If you want to not maintain the ViewState then include the directive < %@ Page EnableViewState="false" % > at the top of an .aspx page or add the attribute EnableViewState="false" to any control.
12. What is the < machinekey > element and what two ASP.NET technologies is it used for?
Configures keys to use for encryption and decryption of forms authentication cookie data and view state data, and for verification of out-of-process session state identification.Therefore 2 ASP.Net techniques in which it is used are Encryption/Decryption and Verification.
13. What three Session State providers are available in ASP.NET 1.1? What are the pros and cons of each?
ASP.NET provides three distinct ways to store session data for your application: in-process session state, out-of-process session state as a Windows service, and out-of-process session state in a SQL Server database. Each has it advantages.
a. In-process session-state mode
Limitations
- When using the in-process session-state mode, session-state data is lost if aspnet_wp.exe or the application domain restarts.
- If you enable Web Garden mode in the < processModel > element of the application's Web.config file then do not use in-process session-state mode. Otherwise, random data loss can occur.
Advantage
- in-process session state is by far the fastest solution. If you are storing only small amounts of volatile data in session state, it is recommended that you use the in-process provider.
b. The State Server simply stores session state in memory when in out-of-proc mode. In this mode the worker process talks directly to the State Server
c. SQL mode, session states are stored in a SQL Server database and the worker process talks directly to SQL. The ASP.NET worker processes are then able to take advantage of this simple storage service by serializing and saving (using .NET serialization services) all objects within a client's Session collection at the end of each Web request
Both these out-of-process solutions are useful primarily if you scale your application across multiple processors or multiple computers, or where data cannot be lost if a server or process is restarted.
14. What is the difference between HTTP-Post and HTTP-Get?
As their names imply, both HTTP GET and HTTP POST use HTTP as their underlying protocol. Both of these methods encode request parameters as name/value pairs in the HTTP request.
The GET method creates a query string and appends it to the script's URL on the server that handles the request.
The POST method creates name/value pairs that are ed in the body of the HTTP request message.
15. Name and describe some HTTP Status Codes and what they express to the requesting client.
When users try to access content on a server that is running Internet Information Services (IIS) through HTTP or File Transfer Protocol (FTP), IIS returns a numeric code that indicates the status of the request. This status code is recorded in the IIS log, and it may also be displayed in the Web browser or FTP client. The status code can indicate whether a specific request is successful or unsuccessful and can also reveal the exact reason why a request is unsuccessful. There are 5 groups ranging from 1xx - 5xx of HTTP status codes that exist as in the following:
OutputCache is used to control the caching policies of an ASP.NET page or user control. To cache a page @OutputCache directive should be defined as follows < %@ OutputCache Duration="100" VaryByParam="none" % >
VaryByParam:
A semicolon-separated list of strings used to vary the output cache. By default, these strings correspond to a query string value sent with GET method attributes, or a parameter sent using the POST method. When this attribute is set to multiple parameters then the output cache contains a different version of the requested document for each specified parameter. Possible values include none, *, and any valid query string or POST parameter name.
VaryByHeader:
A semicolon-separated list of HTTP headers used to vary the output cache. When this attribute is set to multiple headers, the output cache contains a different version of the requested document for each specified header.
What is the difference between repeater over datalist and datagrid?
The Repeater class is not derived from the WebControl class, like the DataGrid and DataList. Therefore, the Repeater lacks the stylistic properties common to both the DataGrid and DataList. What this boils down to is that if you want to format the data displayed in the Repeater then you must do so in the HTML markup.
The Repeater control provides the maximum amount of flexibility over the HTML produced. Whereas the DataGrid wraps the DataSource contents in an HTML < table >, and the DataList wraps the contents in either an HTML < table > or < span > tags (depending on the DataList's RepeatLayout property), the Repeater adds absolutely no HTML content other than what you explicitly specify in the templates.
While using the Repeater control, if we wanted to display the employee names in a bold font then we'd need to alter the "ItemTemplate" to include an HTML bold tag. Whereas with the DataGrid or DataList, we could have made the text appear in a bold font by setting the control's ItemStyle-Font-Bold property to True.
The Repeater's lack of style properties can drastically add to the development time metric. For example, imagine that you decide to use the Repeater to display data that needs to be bold, centered, and displayed in a specific font-face with a specific background color. While all this can be specified using a few HTML tags, these tags will quickly clutter the Repeater's templates. Such clutter makes it much harder to change the look at a later date. Along with its increased development time, the Repeater also lacks any built-in functionality to assist in supporting paging, editing, or editing of data. Due to this lack of feature-support, the Repeater scores poorly on the usability scale.
However, The Repeater's performance is slightly better than that of the DataList's, and is noticeably better than that of the DataGrid's. The following figure shows the number of requests per second the Repeater could handle versus the DataGrid and DataList.
17. Can we handle the error and redirect to some pages using web.config?
Yes, we can do this, but to handle errors, we must know the error codes; only then we can take the user to a proper error message page, else it may confuse the user.
CustomErrors Configuration section in web.config file:
The default configuration is:
- 101: Switching protocols.
- 200: OK. The client request has succeeded
- 302: Object moved.
- 400: Bad request.
- 500.13: Web server is too busy.
- < customErrors mode="RemoteOnly" defaultRedirect="Customerror.aspx" >
- < error statusCode="404" redirect="Notfound.aspx" / >
- < /customErrors >
- Dim str As System.Text.StringBuilder
- str.Append("hi") ' Error Line as str is not instantiated
- Response.Write(str.ToString)
- End Sub
- < customErrors mode="On" defaultRedirect="Error.aspx"/ >
- ' a simple redirect will take the user to Error.aspx [user defined] error file.
- < customErrors mode="RemoteOnly" defaultRedirect="Customerror.aspx" >
- < error statusCode="404" redirect="Notfound.aspx" / >
- < /customErrors >
- Using the DataAdapter.fill method provides the value of the "Maxrecords" parameter
(Note:: Don't use it because the query will return all records but fill the dataset based on the value of the "maxrecords" parameter).
- For SQL Server databases, combine a WHERE clause and a ORDER BY clause with the TOP predicate.
- If data does not change often then just cache records locally in a DataSet and take some records from the DataSet to display.
19. What is the difference between Server.Transfer and Response.Redirect?
Server.Transfer():
Client is shown as it is on the requesting page only, but all the content is of the requested page. Data can be persisted across the pages using the Context.Item collection, that is one of the best ways to transfer data from one page to another keeping the page state alive.
Response.Dedirect(): the client knows the physical location (page name and query string as well). Context.Items loses the persistence when navigate to destination page. In earlier versions of IIS, if we wanted to send a user to a new Web page then the only option we had was Response.Redirect. While this method does accomplish our goal, it has several important drawbacks. The biggest problem is that this method causes each page to be treated as a separate transaction. Besides making it difficult to maintain your transactional integrity, Response.Redirect introduces some additional headaches. First, it prevents good encapsulation of code. Second, you lose access to all of the properties in the Request object. Sure, there are workarounds, but they're difficult. Finally, Response.Redirect necessitates a round trip to the client, which, on high-volume sites, causes scalability problems. As you might suspect, Server.Transfer fixes all of these problems. It does this by performing the transfer on the server without requiring a roundtrip to the client.
Response.Redirect sends a response to the client browser instructing it to request the second page. This requires a round-trip to the client, and the client initiates the Request for the second page. Server.Transfer transfers the process to the second page without making a round-trip to the client. It also transfers the HttpContext to the second page, enabling the second page access to all the values in the HttpContext of the first page.
20. Can you create an app domain?
Yes, we can create a user app domain by calling one of the following overload static methods of the System.AppDomain class:
- Public static AppDomain CreateDomain(String friendlyName)
- Public static AppDomain CreateDomain(String friendlyName, Evidence securityInfo)
- Public static AppDomain CreateDomain(String friendlyName, Evidence securityInfo, AppDomainSetup info)
- Public static AppDomain CreateDomain(String friendlyName, Evidence securityInfo, String appBasePath, String appRelativeSearchPath, bool shadowCopyFiles)
21. What are the various security methods that IIS Provides apart from .NET?
The various security methods that IIS provides are:
- Authentication Modes
- IP Address and Domain Name Restriction
- DNS Lookups DNS Lookups
- The Network ID and Subnet Mask
- SSL
22. What is Web Gardening? How would using it affect a design?
The Web Garden Model
The Web Garden model is configurable through the machine.config file. Notice that the section is the only configuration section that cannot be placed in an application-specific web.config file. This means that the Web Garden mode applies to all applications running on the machine. However, by using the node in the machine.config source, you can adapt machine-wide settings on a per-application basis.
Two attributes in the section affect the Web Garden model. They are webGarden and cpuMask. The webGarden attribute takes a Boolean value that indicates whether or not multiple worker processes (one per each affinitized CPU) need to be used. The attribute is set to false by default. The cpuMask attribute stores a DWORD value whose binary representation provides a bit mask for the CPUs that are eligible to run the ASP.NET worker process. The default value is -1 (0xFFFFFF), which means that all available CPUs can be used. The contents of the cpuMask attribute is ignored when the webGarden attribute is false. The cpuMask attribute also sets an upper bound to the number of copies of aspnet_wp.exe that are running.
Web Gardening enables multiple worker processes to run at the same time. However, you should note that all processes will have their own copy of application state, in-process session state, ASP.NET cache, static data, and all that is needed to run applications. When the Web Garden mode is enabled, the ASP.NET ISAPI launches as many worker processes as there are CPUs, each a full clone of the next (and each affinitized with the corresponding CPU). To balance the workload, incoming requests are partitioned among running processes in a round-robin manner. Worker processes get recycled as in the single processor case. Note that ASP.NET inherits any CPU usage restriction from the operating system and doesn't include any custom semantics for doing this.
All in all, the Web Garden model is not necessarily a big win for all applications. The more stateful applications are, the more they risk to pay in terms of real performance. Working data is stored in blocks of shared memory so that any changes entered by a process are immediately visible to others. However, for the time it takes to service a request, working data is copied in the context of the process. Each worker process, therefore, will handle its own copy of working data, and the more stateful the application, the higher the cost in performance. In this context, careful and savvy application benchmarking is an absolute must.
Changes made to the section of the configuration file are effective only after IIS is restarted. In IIS 6, Web Gardening parameters are stored in the IIS metabase; the webGarden and cpuMask attributes are ignored.
23. What is view state? Where is it stored? Can we disable it?
The web is a state-less protocol, so the page is instantiated, executed, rendered and then disposed of on every round trip to the server. The developer's code to add "statefulness" to the page by using server-side storage for the state or posting the page to itself. When required to persist and read the data in a control on a webform, the developer must read the values and store them in a hidden variable (in the form), that were then used to restore the values. With the advent of the .NET Framework, ASP.NET offers the ViewState mechanism that tracks the data values of server controls on an ASP.NET webform. In effect, ViewState can be viewed as "hidden variable managed by the ASP.NET framework!". When an ASP.NET page is executed, data values from all server controls on a page are collected and encoded as a single string that is then assigned to the page's hidden atrribute "< input type=hidden >", that is part of the page sent to the client.
The ViewState value is temporarily saved in the client's browser. ViewState can be disabled for a single control, for an entire page or for an entire web application. The syntax is:
Disable ViewState for control (Datagrid in this example).
- < asp:datagrid EnableViewState="false" ... / >
- Disable ViewState for a page, using Page directive
- < %@ Page EnableViewState="False" ... % >
- Disable ViewState for application through entry in web.config
- < Pages EnableViewState="false" ... / >
.NET FrameWork FAQ's
- Object-oriented programming model (inheritance, polymorphism, exception handling, garbage collection)
- Security model
- Type system
- All .NET base classes
- Many .NET framework classes
- Development, debugging, and profiling tools
- Execution and code management
- IL-to-native translators and optimizers
What this means is that in the .NET world, various programming languages will be more equal in capability than they have ever been before, although clearly not all languages will support all CLR services.
5. What is the CTS?
CTS = Common Type System. This is the range of types that the .NET runtime understands, and therefore that .NET applications can use. However note that not all .NET languages will support all the types in the CTS. The CTS is a superset of the CLS.
6. What is the CLS?
CLS = Common Language Specification. This is a subset of the CTS that all .NET languages are expected to support. The idea is that any program that uses CLS-compliant types can interoperate with any .NET program written in any language.
In theory this allows very tight interop between various .NET languages, for example allowing a C# class to inherit from a VB class.
7. What is IL?
IL = Intermediate Language. Also known as MSIL (Microsoft Intermediate Language) or CIL (Common Intermediate Language). All .NET source code (of any language) is compiled to IL. The IL is then converted to machine code at the point where the software is installed, or at run-time by a Just-In-Time (JIT) compiler.
8. What does "managed" mean in the .NET context?
The term "managed" is the cause of much confusion. It is used in various places within .NET, meaning slightly different things. Managed code: The .NET framework provides several core run-time services to the programs that run within it, for example
exception handling and security. For these services to work, the code must provide a minimum level of information to the runtime.
Such code is called managed code. All C# and Visual Basic.NET code is managed by default. Visual Studio 7 C++ code is not managed by default, but the compiler can produce managed code by specifying a command-line switch (/com+).
Managed data:
This is data that is allocated and de-allocated by the .NET runtime's garbage collector. C# and VB.NET data is always managed. Visual Studio 7 C++ data is unmanaged by default, even when using the /com+ switch, but it can be marked as managed using the __gc keyword. Managed classes: This is usually referred to in the context of Managed Extensions (ME) for C++. When using ME C++, a class can be marked with the __gc keyword. As the name suggests, this means that the memory for instances of the class is managed by the garbage collector, but it also means more than that. The class becomes a fully paid-up member of the .NET community with the benefits and restrictions that brings. An example of a benefit is proper interop with classes written in other languages, for example, a managed C++ class can inherit from a VB class. An example of a restriction is that a managed class can only inherit from one base class.
9. What is reflection?
All .NET compilers produce metadata about the types defined in the modules they produce. This metadata is packaged along with the module (modules in turn are packaged together in assemblies), and can be accessed by a mechanism called reflection. The System.Reflection namespace contains classes that can be used to interrogate the types for a module/assembly.
Using reflection to access .NET metadata is very similar to using ITypeLib/ITypeInfo to access type library data in COM, and it is used for similar purposes, for example determining data type sizes for marshaling data across context/process/machine boundaries.
Reflection can also be used to dynamically invoke methods (see System.Type.InvokeMember ) , or even create types dynamically at run-time (see System.Reflection.Emit.TypeBuilder).
10. What is the difference between Finalize and Dispose (Garbage collection) ?
Class instances often encapsulate control over resources that are not managed by the runtime, such as window handles (HWND), database connections, and so on. Therefore, you should provide both an explicit and an implicit way to free those resources. Provide implicit control by implementing the protected Finalize Method on an object (destructor syntax in C# and the Managed Extensions for C++). The garbage collector calls this method at some point after there are no longer any valid references to the object. In some cases, you might want to provide programmers using an object with the ability to explicitly release these external resources before the garbage collector frees the object. If an external resource is scarce or expensive, better performance can be done if the programmer explicitly releases resources when they are no longer being used. To provide explicit control, implement the Dispose method provided by the IDisposable Interface. The consumer of the object should call this method when it is done using the object.
Dispose can be called even if other references to the object are alive. Note that even when you provide explicit control by way of Dispose, you should provide implicit cleanup using the Finalize method. Finalize provides a backup to prevent resources from permanently leaking if the programmer fails to call Dispose.
11. What is Partial Assembly References?
Full Assembly reference: A full assembly reference includes the assembly's text name, version, culture, and public key token (if the assembly has a strong name). A full assembly reference is required if you reference any assembly that is part of the common language runtime or any assembly located in the Global Assembly Cache.
Partial Assembly reference: We can dynamically reference an assembly by providing only partial information, such as specifying only the assembly name. When you specify a partial assembly reference, the runtime looks for the assembly only in the application directory.
We can make partial references to an assembly in your code in one of the following ways:
- Use a method such as System.Reflection.Assembly.Load and specify only a partial reference. The runtime checks for the assembly in the application directory.
- Use the System.Reflection.Assembly.LoadWithPartialName method and specify only a partial reference. The runtime checks for the assembly in the application directory and in the Global Assembly Cache.
12. Changes to which portion of version number indicates an incompatible change?
Major or minor. Changes to the major or minor portion of the version number indicate an incompatible change. Under this convention, then version 2.0.0.0 would be considered incompatible with version 1.0.0.0. Examples of an incompatible change would be a change to the types of some method parameters or the removal of a type or method altogether.
Build. The Build number is typically used to distinguish between daily builds or smaller compatible releases.
Revision. Changes to the revision number are typically reserved for an incremental build needed to fix a specific bug. You'll sometimes hear this referred to as the "emergency bug fix" number in that the revision is what is often changed when a fix to a specific bug is shipped to a customer.
What is side-by-side execution? Can two applications, one using private assembly and the other using Shared assembly be started as side-by-side executables? Side-by-side execution is the ability to run multiple versions of an application or component on the same computer. You can have multiple versions of the Common Language Runtime, and multiple versions of applications and components that use a version of the runtime, on the same computer at the same time. Since versioning is only applied to shared assemblies, and not to private assemblies, two applications, one using private assembly and one using shared assembly cannot be started as side-by-side executables.
13. Why are strings called an immutable data type?
The memory representation of a string is an Array of Characters, so on re-assigning the new array of Char is formed and the start address is changed, thus keeping the old string in memory for the Garbage Collector to dispose.
14. What does assert() method do?
In debug compilations, assert takes in a Boolean condition as a parameter, and shows the error dialog if the condition is false. The program proceeds without any interruption if the condition is true.
15. What's the difference between the Debug class and Trace class?
The documentation looks the same. Use the Debug class for debug builds, use the Trace class for both debug and release builds.
16. Why are there five tracing levels in System.Diagnostics.TraceSwitcher?
The tracing dumps can be quite verbose. For applications that are constantly running you run the risk of overloading the machine and the hard drive. Five levels range from None to Verbose, allowing you to fine-tune the tracing activities.
17. Where is the output of TextWriterTraceListener redirected?
To the Console or a text file depending on the parameter ed to the constructor.
18. How do assemblies find each other?
By searching directory paths. There are several factors that can affect the path (such as the AppDomain host, and application configuration files), but for private assemblies the search path is normally the application's directory and its sub-directories. For shared assemblies, the search path is normally the same as the private assembly path plus the shared assembly cache.
19. How does assembly versioning work?
Each assembly has a version number called the compatibility version. Also each reference to an assembly (from another assembly) includes both the name and version of the referenced assembly.The version number has four numeric parts (for example 5.5.2.33). Assemblies with either of the first two parts different are normally viewed as incompatible. If the first two parts are the same, but the third is different, the assemblies are deemed as "maybe compatible". If only the fourth part is different then the assemblies are deemed compatible. However, this is just the default guideline, it is the version policy that decides to what extent these rules are enforced. The version policy can be specified via the application configuration file.
20. What is garbage collection?
Garbage collection is a system whereby a run-time component takes responsibility for managing the lifetime of objects and the heap memory that they occupy. This concept is not new to .NET. Java and many other languages/runtimes have used garbage collection for some time.
21. Why doesn't the .NET runtime offer deterministic destruction?
Because of the garbage collection algorithm. The .NET garbage collector works by periodically running through a list of all the objects that are currently being referenced by an application. All the objects that it doesn't find during this search are ready to be destroyed and the memory reclaimed. The implication of this algorithm is that the runtime doesn't get notified immediately when the final reference on an object goes away, it only determines during the next sweep of the heap.
Futhermore, this type of algorithm works best by performing the garbage collection sweep as rarely as possible. Normally heap exhaustion is the trigger for a collection sweep.
22. Is the lack of deterministic destruction in .NET a problem?
It's certainly an issue that affects component design. If you have objects that maintain expensive or scarce resources (for example database locks), you need to provide some way for the client to tell the object to release the resource when it is done. Microsoft recommends that you provide a method called Dispose() for this purpose. However, this causes problems for distributed objects, in a distributed system who calls the Dispose() method? Some form of reference-counting or ownership-management mechanism is needed to handle distributed objects, unfortunately the runtime offers no help with this.
23. What is serialization?
Serialization is the process of converting an object into a stream of bytes. Deserialization is the opposite process of creating an object from a stream of bytes. Serialization / Deserialization is mostly used to transport objects (for example during remoting), or to persist objects (for example to a file or database).
24. Does the .NET Framework have in-built support for serialization?
There are two separate mechanisms provided by the .NET class library, XmlSerializer and SoapFormatter/BinaryFormatter. Microsoft uses XmlSerializer for Web Services, and uses SoapFormatter/BinaryFormatter for remoting. Both are available for use in your own code.
24. Can I customise the serialization process?
Yes. XmlSerializer supports a range of attributes that can be used to configure serialization for a specific class. For example, a field or property can be marked with the [XmlIgnore] attribute to exclude it from serialization. Another example is the [XmlElement] attribute, that can be used to specify the XML element name to be used for a specific property or field.
Serialization via SoapFormatter/BinaryFormatter can also be controlled to some extent by attributes. For example, the [NonSerialized] attribute is the equivalent of XmlSerializer's [XmlIgnore] attribute. Ultimate control of the serialization process can be acheived by implementing the the ISerializable interface on the class whose instances are to be serialized.
25. Why is XmlSerializer so slow?
There is a once-per-process-per-type overhead with XmlSerializer. So the first time you serialize or deserialize an object of a given type in an application, there is a significant delay. This normally doesn't matter, but it may mean, for example, that XmlSerializer is a poor choice for loading configuration settings during startup of a GUI application.
26. Why do I get errors when I try to serialize a Hashtable?
XmlSerializer will refuse to serialize instances of any class that implements IDictionary, for example Hashtable. SoapFormatter and BinaryFormatter do not have this restriction.
27. What are attributes?
There are at least two types of .NET attributes. The first type I will refer to as a metadata attribute, it allows some data to be attached to a class or method. This data becomes part of the metadata for the class, and (like other class metadata) can be accessed via reflection.
The other type of attribute is a context attribute. Context attributes use a similar syntax to metadata attributes but they are fundamentally different. Context attributes provide an interception mechanism whereby instance activation and method calls can be pre- and/or post-processed.
28. How does CAS work?
The CAS security policy revolves around two key concepts, code groups and permissions. Each .NET assembly is a member of a specific code group, and each code group is granted the permissions specified in a named permission set.
For example, using the default security policy, a control downloaded from a web site belongs to the "Zone - Internet" code group, that adheres to the permissions defined by the "Internet" named permission set. (Naturally the "Internet" named permission set represents a very restrictive range of permissions.)
29. Who defines the CAS code groups?
Microsoft defines some default ones, but you can modify these and even create your own. To see the code groups defined on your system, run "caspol -lg" from the command-line. On my system it looks like this:
Level = Machine
Code Groups
1. All code: Nothing
1.1. Zone: MyComputer: FullTrust
1.1.1. Honor SkipVerification requests: SkipVerification
1.2. Zone: Intranet: LocalIntranet
1.3. Zone: Internet: Internet
1.4. Zone: Untrusted: Nothing
1.5. Zone: Trusted: Internet
1.6. StrongName: 0024000004800000940000000602000000240000525341310004000003
000000CFCB3291AA715FE99D40D49040336F9056D7886FED46775BC7BB5430BA4444FEF8348EBD06
F962F39776AE4DC3B7B04A7FE6F49F25F740423EBF2C0B89698D8D08AC48D69CED0FC8F83B465E08
07AC11EC1DCC7D054E807A43336DDE408A5393A48556123272CEEEE72F1660B71927D38561AABF5C
AC1DF1734633C602F8F2D5:
Note the hierarchy of code groups, the top of the hierarchy is the most general ("All code"), that is then sub-divided into several
groups, each of which in turn can be sub-divided. Also note that (somewhat counter-intuitively) a sub-group can be associated with a more permissive permission set than its parent.
30. How do I define my own code group?
Use caspol. For example, suppose you trust code from http://www.mydomain.com/ and you want it to have full access to your system, but you want to keep the default restrictions for all other internet sites. To do this, you would add a new code group as a sub-group of the "Zone - Internet" group, like this:
caspol -ag 1.3 -site http://www.mydomain.com/ FullTrust
Now if you run caspol -lg then you will see that the new group has been added as group 1.3.1:
1.3. Zone: Internet: Internet
1.3.1. Site: http://www.mydomain.com/: FullTrust
Note that the numeric label (1.3.1) is just a caspol invention to make the code groups easy to manipulate from the command-line. The underlying runtime never sees it.
31. How do I change the permission set for a code group?
Use caspol. If you are the machine administrator then you can operate at the "machine" level, which means that not only do the changes you make become the default for the machine, but also those users cannot change the permissions to be more permissive. If you are a normal (non-admin) user then you can still modify the permissions, but only to make them more restrictive. For example, to allow intranet code to do what it likes you might do this:
caspol -cg 1.2 FullTrust
Note that because this is more permissive than the default policy (on a standard system), you should only do this at the machine level, doing it at the user level will have no effect.
32. I can't be bothered with all this CAS stuff. Can I turn it off?
Yes, as long as you are an administrator. Just run:
caspol -s off
33. Can I look at the IL for an assembly?
Yes. Microsoft supplies a tool called Ildasm that can be used to view the metadata and IL for an assembly.
34. Can source code be reverse-engineered from IL?
Yes, it is often relatively straightforward to regenerate high-level source (for example C#) from IL.
35. How can I stop my code being reverse-engineered from IL?
There is currently no simple way to stop code being reverse-engineered from IL. In the future it is likely that IL obfuscation tools will become available, either from Microsoft or from third parties. These tools work by "optimising" the IL in such a way that reverse-engineering becomes much more difficult.
Of course if you are writing web services then reverse-engineering is not a problem as clients do not have access to your IL.
36. Is there built-in support for tracing/logging?
Yes, in the System.Diagnostics namespace. There are two main classes that deal with tracing, Debug and Trace. They both work in a similar way, the difference is that tracing from the Debug class only works in builds that have the DEBUG symbol defined, whereas tracing from the Trace class only works in builds that have the TRACE symbol defined. Typically this means that you should use System.Diagnostics.Trace.WriteLine for tracing that you want to work in debug and release builds, and System.Diagnostics.Debug.WriteLine for tracing that you want to work only in debug builds.
Can I redirect tracing to a file?
Yes. The Debug and Trace classes both have a Listeners property, that is a collection of sinks that receive the tracing that you send via Debug.WriteLine and Trace.WriteLine respectively. By default the Listeners collection contains a single sink, that is an
instance of the DefaultTraceListener class. This sends output to the Win32 OutputDebugString() function and also the System.Diagnostics.Debugger.Log() method. This is useful when debugging, but if you're trying to trace a problem at a customer site then redirecting the output to a file is more appropriate. Fortunately, the TextWriterTraceListener class is provided for this purpose.
37. What are the contents of an assembly?
In general, a static assembly can consist of the four elements:
-
The assembly manifest, that contains assembly metadata.
-
Type metadata.
-
Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL) code that implements the types.
-
A set of resources.
38. What is GC (Garbage Collection) and how it works
One of the good features of the CLR is Garbage Collection, that runs in the background collecting unused object references, freeing us from having to ensure we always destroy them. In reality the time difference between you releasing the object instance and it being garbage collected is likely to be very small, since the GC is always running.
[The process of transitively tracing through all pointers to actively used objects to locate all objects that can be referenced, and then arranging to reuse any heap memory that was not found during this trace. The Common Language Runtime garbage collector also compacts the memory that is in use to reduce the working space needed for the heap.]
Heap
A portion of memory reserved for a program to use for the temporary storage of data structures whose existence or size cannot be determined until the program is running.
39. Differnce between Managed code and unmanaged code?
Managed Code:
Code that runs under a "contract of cooperation" with the Common Language Runtime. Managed code must supply the metadata necessary for the runtime to provide services such as memory management, cross-language integration, code access security, and automatic lifetime control of objects. All code based on Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL) executes as managed code.
Un-Managed Code
Code that is created without regard for the conventions and requirements of the Common Language Runtime. Unmanaged code executes in the Common Language Runtime environment with minimal services (for example, no garbage collection, limited debugging, and so on).
40. What is MSIL, IL, CTS and, CLR ?
MSIL: (Microsoft Intermediate Language)
When compiling to managed code, the compiler translates your source code into Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL), that is a CPU-independent set of instructions that can be efficiently converted to native code. MSIL includes instructions for loading, storing, initializing, and calling methods on objects, as well as instructions for arithmetic and logical operations, control flow, direct memory access, exception handling, and other operations. Before code can be executed, MSIL must be converted to CPU-specific code, usually by a Just-In-Time (JIT) compiler. Because the Common Language Runtime supplies one or more JIT compilers for each computer architecture it supports, the same set of MSIL can be JIT-compiled and executed on any supported architecture.
When a compiler produces MSIL, it also produces metadata. Metadata describes the types in your code, including the definition of each type, the signatures of each type's members, the members that your code references, and other data that the runtime uses at execution time. The MSIL and metadata are contained in a Portable Executable (PE) file that is based on and extends the published Microsoft PE and Common Object File Format (COFF) used historically for executable content. This file format, that accommodates MSIL or native code as well as metadata, enables the operating system to recognize Common Language Runtime images. The presence of metadata in the file along with the MSIL enables your code to describe itself, that means that there is no need for type libraries or Interface Definition Language (IDL). The runtime locates and extracts the metadata from the file as needed during execution.
IL: (Intermediate Language)
A language used as the output of a number of compilers and as the input to a Just-In-Time (JIT) compiler. The Common Language Runtime includes a JIT compiler for converting MSIL to native code.
CTS: (Common Type System)
The specification that determines how the Common Language Runtime defines, uses, and manages types.
CLR: (Common Language Runtime)
The engine at the core of managed code execution. The runtime supplies managed code with services such as cross-language integration, code access security, object lifetime management, and debugging and profiling support.
41. What is Reference type and value type ?
Reference Type
Reference types are allocated on the managed CLR heap, just like object types. A data type that is stored as a reference to the value's location. The value of a reference type is the location of the sequence of bits that represent the type's data. Reference types can be self-describing types, pointer types, or interface types.
Value Type
Value types are allocated on the stack just like primitive types in VBScript, VB6 and C/C++. Value types that are not instantiated using new go out of scope when the function they are defined within returns. Value types in the CLR are defined as types that derive from system.valueType.
A data type that fully describes a value by specifying the sequence of bits that constitutes the value's representation. Type information for a value type instance is not stored with the instance at run time, but it is available in metadata. Value type instances can be treated as objects using boxing.
42. What is Boxing and unboxing ?
Boxing
The conversion of a value type instance to an object, that implies that the instance will carry full type information at run time and will be allocated in the heap. The Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL) instruction set's box instruction converts a value type to an object by making a copy of the value type and embedding it in a newly allocated object.
Un-Boxing
The conversion of an object instance to a value type.
43. What is JIT and how does it work?
An acronym for "Just-In-Time", a phrase that describes an action that is taken only when it becomes necessary, such as Just-In-Time compilation or Just-In-Time object activation.
44. What is Portable Executable (PE)?
The file format used for executable programs and for files to be linked together to form executable programs.
45. What is a strong name?
A name that consists of an assembly's identity; its simple text name, version number, and culture information (if provided) strengthened by a public key and a digital signature generated over the assembly. Because the assembly manifest
contains file hashes for all the files that constitute the assembly implementation, it is sufficient to generate the digital signature over just the one file in the assembly that contains the assembly manifest. Assemblies with the same strong name are expected to be identical.
46. What is Global Assembly Cache?
A machine-wide code cache that stores assemblies specifically installed to be shared by many applications on the computer. Applications deployed in the Global Assembly Cache must have a strong name.
47. What is the difference between constants, readonly and, static?
Constants: The value can't be changed
Read-only: The value will be initialized only once from the constructor of the class.
Static: Value can be initialized once.
48. What is difference between shared and public?
An assembly that can be referenced by more than one application. An assembly must be explicitly built to be shared by giving it a cryptographically strong name.
49. What is namespace used for loading assemblies at run time and name the methods?
System.Reflection
50. What are the types of authentication in .Net?
We have three types of authentication:
- Form authentication
- Windows authentication
- port
This has to be declared in the web.config file.
51. What is the difference between a Struct and a Class ?
The struct type is suitable for representing lightweight objects such as Point, Rectangle, and Color. Although it is possible to represent a point as a class, a struct is more efficient in some scenarios. For example, if you declare an array of 1000 Point objects, you will allocate additional memory for referencing each object. In this case, the struct is less expensive.
When you create a struct object using the new operator, it gets created and the appropriate constructor is called. Unlike classes, structs can be instantiated without using the new operator. If you do not use new then the fields will remain unassigned and the object cannot be used until all of the fields are initialized. It is an error to declare a default (parameterless) constructor for a struct. A default constructor is always provided to initialize the struct members to their default values.
It is an error to initialize an instance field in a struct.
There is no inheritance for structs as there is for classes. A struct cannot inherit from another struct or class, and it cannot be the base of a class. Structs, however, inherit from the base class Object. A struct can implement interfaces, and it does that exactly as classes do. A struct is a value type, while a class is a reference type.
52. How big is the datatype int in .NET?
32 bits.
53. How big is the char?
16 bits (Unicode).
54. How do you initiate a string without escaping each backslash?
Put an @ sign in front of the double-quoted string.
55. What's the access level of the visibility type internal?
Current application.
56. Explain encapsulation ?
The implementation is hidden, the interface is exposed.
57. What data type should you use if you want an 8-bit value that's signed?
sbyte.
58. Speaking of Boolean data types, what's different between C# and C/C++?
There's no conversion between 0 and false, as well as any other number and true, like in C/C++.
59. Where are the value-type variables allocated in the computer RAM?
Stack.
60. Where do the reference-type variables go in the RAM?
The references go on the stack, while the objects themselves go on the heap.
61. What is the difference between the value-type variables and reference-type variables in terms of garbage collection?
The value-type variables are not garbage-collected, they are just popped off the stack when they go out of scope, the reference-type objects are picked up by GC when their references go null.
62. How do you convert a string into an integer in .NET?
Int32.Parse(string)
63. How do you box a primitive data type variable?
Assign it to the object, an object.
64. Why do you need to box a primitive variable?
To it by reference.
65. What's the difference between Java and .NET garbage collectors?
Sun left the implementation of a specific garbage collector up to the JRE developer, so their performance varies widely, depending on whose JRE you're using. Microsoft standardized on their garbage collection.
66. How do you enforce garbage collection in .NET?
System.GC.Collect();
67. What's different about namespace declaration when comparing that to package declaration in Java?
No semicolon.
68. What's the difference between const and readonly?
You can initialize readonly variables to some runtime values. Let's say your program uses current date and time as one of the values that won't change. This way you declare public readonly string DateT = new DateTime().ToString().
69. What happens when you encounter a continue statement inside the for loop?
The code for the rest of the loop is ignored, the control is transferred back to the beginning of the loop.
70. What's the advantage of using System.Text.StringBuilder over System.String?
StringBuilder is more efficient in the cases where a lot of manipulation is done to the text. Strings are immutable, so each time it's being operated on, a new instance is created.
71. Can you store multiple data types in System.Array?
No.
72. What's the difference between the System.Array.CopyTo() and System.Array.Clone()?
The first one performs a deep copy of the array, the second one is shallow.
73. How can you sort the elements of the array in descending order?
By calling Sort() and then Reverse() methods.
74. What's the .NET datatype that allows the retrieval of data by a unique key?
HashTable.
75. What's class SortedList underneath?
A sorted HashTable.
76. Will a finally block be executed if the exception had not occurred?
Yes.
77. Can multiple catch blocks be executed?
No, once the proper catch code fires off, the control is transferred to the finally block (if there are any) and then whatever follows the finally block.
78. Why is it a bad idea to throw your own exceptions?
Well, if at that point you know that an error has occurred, then why not write the proper code to handle that error instead of ing a new Exception object to the catch block? Throwing your own exceptions signifies some design flaws in the project.
79. What's a delegate?
A delegate object encapsulates a reference to a method. In C++ they were referred to as function pointers.
80. What's a multicast delegate?
It's a delegate that points to and eventually fires off several methods.
81. How's the DLL Hell problem solved in .NET?
Assembly versioning allows the application to specify not only the library it needs to run (that was available under Win32), but also the version of the assembly.
82. What are the ways to deploy an assembly?
An MSI installer, a CAB archive, and XCOPY command.
83. What's a satellite assembly?
When you write a multilingual or multi-cultural application in .NET and want to distribute the core application separately from the localized modules, the localized assemblies that modify the core application are called satellite assemblies.
84. What namespaces are necessary to create a localized application?
System.Globalization, System.Resources.
85. What does assert() do?
In debug compilation, assert takes in a Boolean condition as a parameter, and shows the error dialog if the condition is false. The program proceeds without any interruption if the condition is true.
86. What's the difference between the Debug class and Trace class?
The documentation looks the same. Use the Debug class for debug builds, use the Trace class for both debug and release builds.
87. Why are there five tracing levels in System.Diagnostics.TraceSwitcher?
The tracing dumps can be quite verbose and for some applications that are constantly running you run the risk of overloading the machine and the hard drive there. Five levels range from None to Verbose, allowing to fine-tune the tracing activities.
88. Where is the output of TextWriterTraceListener redirected?
To the Console or a text file depending on the parameter ed to the constructor.
89. What namespaces are necessary to create a localized application?
System.Globalization, System.Resources.
90. What are three test cases you should go through in unit testing?
Positive test cases (correct data, correct output), negative test cases (broken or missing data, proper handling) and exception test cases (exceptions are thrown and caught properly).
91. Can you change the value of a variable while debugging a C# application?
Yes, if you are debugging via Visual Studio.NET then just go to the Immediate window.
92. What's the implicit name of the parameter that gets ed into the class' set method?
Value, and it's datatype depends on whatever variable we're changing.
93. How do you inherit from a class in C#?
Place a colon and then the name of the base class. Notice that it's a double colon in C++.
94. Does C# support multiple inheritance?
No, use interfaces instead.
95. When you inherit a protected class-level variable, who is it available to?
Derived Classes.
96. What's the top .NET class that everything is derived from?
System.Object.
97. How's method overriding different from overloading?
When overriding, you change the method behavior for a derived class. Overloading simply involves having a method with the same name within the class.
98. What does the keyword virtual mean in the method definition?
The method can be overridden.
99. Can you declare the override method static while the original method is non-static?
No, you can't, the signature of the virtual method must remain the same, only the keyword virtual is changed to keyword override.
100. Can you override private virtual methods?
No, moreover, you cannot access private methods in inherited classes, you need to be protected in the base class to allow any sort of access.
101. Can you prevent your class from being inherited and becoming a base class for some other classes?
Yes, that's what the keyword sealed in the class definition is for. The developer trying to derive from your class will get a message: cannot inherit from Sealed class WhateverBaseClassName. It's the same concept as final class in Java.
102. Can you allow a class to be inherited, but prevent the method from being overridden?
Yes, just leave the class public and make the method sealed.
103. Why can't you specify the accessibility modifier for methods inside the interface?
They all must be public. Therefore, to prevent you from getting the false impression that you have any freedom of choice, you are not allowed to specify any accessibility, it's public by default.
104. Can you inherit multiple interfaces?
Yes, why not?
105. And if they have conflicting method names?
It's up to you to implement the method inside your own class, so implementation is left entirely up to you. This might cause a problem on a higher-level scale if similarly named methods from different interfaces expect different data, but as far as the compiler cares you're okay.
106. What's the difference between an interface and abstract class?
In the interface all methods must be abstract, in the abstract class some methods can be concrete. In the interface no accessibility modifiers are allowed, which is ok in abstract classes.
107. How can you overload a method?
Different parameter data types, different number of parameters, different order of parameters.
108. If a base class has a bunch of overloaded constructors and an inherited class has another bunch of overloaded constructors, can you enforce a call from an inherited constructor to an arbitrary base constructor?
Yes, just place a colon, and then the keyword base (parameter list to invoke the appropriate constructor) in the overloaded constructor definition inside the inherited class.
109. What's the difference between the System.String and System.StringBuilder classes?
System.String is immutable, System.StringBuilder was designed for the purpose of having a mutable string where a variety of operations can be performed.
110. Does C# support multiple-inheritance?
No, use interfaces instead.
111. When you inherit a protected class-level variable, who is it available to?
The derived class.
112. Are private class-level variables inherited?
Yes, but they are not accessible. Although they are not visible or accessible via the class interface, they are inherited.
113. Describe the accessibility modifier "protected internal".
It is available to derived classes and classes within the same Assembly (and naturally from the base class it's declared in).
114. What's the top .NET class that everything is derived from?
System.Object.
115. What's the advantage of using System.Text.StringBuilder over System.String?
StringBuilder is more efficient in cases where there is a large amount of string manipulation. Strings are immutable, so each time it's being operated on, a new instance is created.
116. Can you store multiple data types in System.Array?
No.
117. What's the .NET class that allows the retrieval of a data element using a unique key?
HashTable.
118. Will the finally block get executed if an exception has not occurred?
Yes.
119. What's an abstract class?
A class that cannot be instantiated. An abstract class is a class that must be inherited and have the methods overridden. An abstract class is essentially a blueprint for a class without any implementation.
120. When do you absolutely have to declare a class as abstract?
- When at least one of the methods in the class is abstract.
- When the class itself is inherited from an abstract class, but not all base abstract methods have been overridden.
121. What's an interface?
It's an abstract class with public abstract methods all of which must be implemented in the inherited classes.
122. Why can't you specify the accessibility modifier for methods inside the interface?
They all must be public. Therefore, to prevent you from getting the false impression that you have any freedom of choice, you are not allowed to specify any accessibility, it's public by default.
123. What's the difference between an interface and abstract class?
In an interface class, all methods must be abstract. In an abstract class some methods can be concrete. In an interface class, no accessibility modifiers are allowed, which is ok in an abstract class.
124. How is method overriding different from method overloading?
When overriding a method, you change the behavior of the method for the derived class. Overloading a method simply involves having another method with the same name within the class.
125. Can you declare an override method to be static if the original method is non-static?
No. The signature of the virtual method must remain the same, only the keyword virtual is changed to keyword override.
126. Can you override private virtual methods?
No. Private methods are not accessible outside the class.
127. Can you write a class without specifying a namespace? Which namespace does it belong to by default?
Yes, you can, then the class belongs to the global namespace that has no name. For commercial products, naturally, you wouldn't want the global namespace.
128. What is a formatter?
A formatter is an object that is responsible for encoding and serializing data into messages on one end, and deserializing and decoding messages into data on the other end.
1. Differences between J2EE and the .NET Platform
Vendor Neutrality
The .NET platform is not vendor neutral, it is tied to the Microsoft operating systems. But neither are any of the J2EE implementations.
Many companies buy into J2EE believing that it will give them vendor neutrality. And, in fact, this is a stated goal of Sun's vision:
A wide variety of J2EE product configurations and implementations, all of that meet the requirements of this specification, are possible. A portable J2EE application will function correctly when successfully deployed in any of these products. (ref: Java 2 Platform Enterprise Edition Specification, v1.3, page 2-7 available at http://java.sun.com/j2ee/)
Overall Maturity
Since the .NET platform has a three year lead over the J2EE, it should be no surprise to learn that the .NET platform is far more mature than the J2EE platform. We have high volume and highly reliable web sites using .NET technologies (NASDAQ and Dell being among many examples).
Interoperability and Web Services
The .NET platform eCollaboration model is, as I have discussed at length, based on the UDDI and SOAP standards. These standards are widely supported by more than 100 companies. Microsoft, along with IBM and Ariba, are the leaders in this area. Sun is a member of the UDDI consortium and recognizes the importance of the UDDI standards. In a recent press release, Sun's George Paolini, Vice President for the Java Community Development, says:
"Sun has always worked to help establish and support open, standards-based technologies that facilitate the growth of network-based applications, and we see UDDI as an important project to establish a registry framework for business-to-business e-commerce
But while Sun publicly says it believes in the UDDI standards, in reality, Sun has done nothing whatsoever to incorporate any of the UDDI standards into J2EE.
Scalability
The following is a typical comparision of w.r.t Systems and their costs.
J2EE
Company System Total Sys. Cost
Differences between .NET and J2EE
Bull Escala T610 c/s 16,785 $1,980,179
IBM RS/6000 Enterprise Server F80 16,785 $2,026,681
Bull Escala EPC810 c/s 33,375 $3,037,499
IBM RS/6000 Enterprise Server M80 33,375 $3,097,055
Bull Escala EPC2450 110,403 $9,563,263
IBM IBM eServer pSeries 680 Model 7017-S85 110,403 $9,560,594
.NET platform systems
Company System Total Sys. Cost
Dell PowerEdge 4400 16,263 $273,487
Compaq ProLiant ML-570-6/700-3P 20,207 $201,717
Dell PowerEdge 6400 30, 231 $334,626
IBM Netfinity 7600 c/s 32,377 $443,463
Compaq ProLiant 8500-X550-64P 161,720 $3,534,272
Compaq ProLiant 8500-X700-64P 179,658 $3,546,582
Compaq ProLiant 8500-X550-96P 229,914 $5,305,571
Compaq ProLiant 8500-X700-96P 262,244 $5,305,571
Compaq ProLiant 8500-700-192P 505,303 $10,003,826
Framework Support
The .NET platform includes an eCommerce framework called Commerce Server. At this point, there is no equivalent vendor-neutral framework in the J2EE space. With J2EE, you should assume that you will be building your new eCommerce solution from scratch.
Moreover, no matter what [J2EE] vendor you choose, if you expect a component framework that will allow you to quickly field complete e-business applications, you are in for a frustrating experience.
Language
In the language arena, the choice is about as simple as it gets. J2EE supports Java, and only Java. It will not support any other language in the foreseeable future. The .NET platform supports every language except Java (although it does support a language that is syntactically and functionally equivalent to Java, C#). In fact, given the importance of the .NET platform as a language independent vehicle, it is likely that any language that comes out in the near future will include support for the .NET platform.
Some companies are under the impression that J2EE supports other languages. Although both IBM's WebSphere and BEA's WebLogic support other languages, neither does it through their J2EE technology. There are only two official ways in the J2EE platform to access other languages, one through the Java Native Interface and the other through CORBA interoperability. Sun recommends the later approach. As Sun's Distinguished Scientist and Java Architect Rick Cattell said in a recent interview.
Portability
The reason that operating system portability is a possibility with J2EE is not so much because of any inherent portability of J2EE, as it is that most of the J2EE vendors support multiple operating systems. Therefore as long as one sticks with a given J2EE vendor and a given database vendor, moving from one operating system to another should be possible. This is probably the single most important benefit in favor of J2EE over the .NET platform, that is limited to the Windows operating system. It is worth noting, however, that Microsoft has submitted the specifications for C# and a subset of the .NET Framework (called the Common Language Infrastructure) to ECMA, the group that standardizes JavaScript.
J2EE offers an acceptable solution to ISVs when the product must be marketed to non-Windows customers, particularly when the J2EE platform itself can be bundled with the ISV's product as an integrated offering.
If the primary customer base for the ISV is Windows customers then the .NET platform should be chosen. It will provide much better performance at a much lower cost.
Client device independence
The major difference is that with Java, it is the presentation tier programmer that determines the ultimate HTML that will be delivered to the client, and with .NET, it is a Visual Studio.NET control.
This Java approach has three problems. First, it requires a lot of code on the presentation tier, since every possible thin client system requires a different code path. Second, it is very difficult to test the code with every possible thin client system. Third, it is very difficult to add new thin clients to an existing application, since to do so involves searching through, and modifying a tremendous amount of presentation tier logic.
The .NET Framework approach is to write device independent code that interacts with visual controls. It is the control, not the programmer, that is responsible for determining what HTML to deliver, based on the capabilities of the client device.. In the .NET Framework model, one can forget that such a thing as HTML even exists!
Sun's J2EE vision is based on a family of specifications that can be implemented by many vendors. It is open in the sense that any company can license and implement the technology, but closed in the sense that it is controlled by a single vendor, and a self-contained architectural island with very limited ability to interact outside of itself. One of J2EE's major disadvantages is that the choice of the platform dictates the use of a single programming language, and a programming language that is not well suited for most businesses. One of J2EE's major advantages is that most of the J2EE vendors do offer operating system portability.
Microsoft's .NET platform vision is a family of products rather than specifications, with specifications used primarily to define points of interoperability. The major disadvantage of this approach is that it is limited to the Windows platform, so applications written for the .NET platform can only be run on .NET platforms. Their are several important advantages to the .NET platform:
Conclusion
- The cost of developing applications is much lower, since standard business languages can be used and device independent presentation tier logic can be written.
- The cost of running applications is much lower, since commodity hardware platforms (at 1/5 the cost of their Unix counterparts) can be used.
- The ability to scale up is much greater, with the proven ability to support at least ten times the number of clients any J2EE platform has shown itself able to support.
- Interoperability is much stronger, with industry standard eCollaboration built into the platform.
2. What are the Main Features of .NET platform?
The following are the features of the .NET Platform.
Common Language Runtime
Explains the features and benefits of the Common Language Runtime, a run-time environment that manages the execution of code and provides services that simplify the development process.
Assemblies
Defines the concept of assemblies, that are a collections of types and resources that form logical units of functionality. Assemblies are the fundamental units of deployment, version control, reuse, activation scoping, and security permissions.
Application Domains
Explains how to use application domains to provide isolation between applications.
Runtime Hosts
Describes the runtime hosts supported by the .NET Framework, including ASP.NET, Internet Explorer, and shell executables.
Common Type System
Identifies the types supported by the Common Language Runtime.
Metadata and Self-Describing Components
Explains how the .NET Framework simplifies component interoperation by allowing compilers to emit additional declarative information, or metadata, into all modules and assemblies.
Cross-Language Interoperability
Explains how managed objects created in various programming languages can interact with one another.
.NET Framework Security
Describes mechanisms for protecting resources and code from unauthorized code and unauthorized users.
.NET Framework Class Library
Introduces the library of types provided by the .NET Framework, that expedites and optimizes the development process and gives you access to system functionality.
3. What is the use of JIT ?
Just- In-Time (JIT) is a compiler that converts MSIL code to Native Code (in other words, CPU-specific code that runs on the same computer architecture).
Because the Common Language Runtime supplies a JIT compiler for each supported CPU architecture, developers can write a set of MSIL that can be JIT-compiled and run on computers with various architectures. However, your managed code will run only on a specific operating system if it calls platform-specific native APIs, or a platform-specific class library.
JIT compilation takes into account the fact that some code might never get called during execution. Rather than using time and memory to convert all the MSIL in a Portable Executable (PE) file to native code, it converts the MSIL as needed during execution and stores the resulting native code so that it is accessible for subsequent calls. The loader creates and attaches a stub to each of a type's methods when the type is loaded. On the initial call to the method, the stub es control to the JIT compiler, that converts the MSIL for that method into native code and modifies the stub to direct execution to the location of the native code. Subsequent calls of the JIT-compiled method proceed directly to the native code that was previously generated, reducing the time it takes to JIT-compile and run the code.
Assembly and Global Assembly Cache (GAC) and Metadata
Assembly:
An assembly is the primary building block of a .NET based application. It is a collection of functionality that is built, versioned, and deployed as a single implementation unit (as one or more files). All managed types and resources are marked either as accessible only within their implementation unit, or as accessible by code outside that unit. It overcomes the problem of "DLL Hell".The .NET Framework uses assemblies as the fundamental unit for several purposes:
- Security
- Type Identity
- Reference Scope
- Versioning
- Deployment
Global Assembly Cache:
Assemblies can be shared among multiple applications on the machine by registering them in the Global Assembly Cache (GAC). The GAC is a machine wide local cache of assemblies maintained by the .NET Framework. We can register the assembly to the Global Assembly Cache using the gacutil command.
We can navigate to the GAC directory, "C:\winnt\Assembly", in Windows Explorer. In the tools menu select the cache properties; in the windows displayed you can set the memory limit in MB used by the GAC
MetaData:
Assemblies have Manifests. This Manifest contains Metadata information of the Module/Assembly as well as detailed Metadata of other assemblies/modules referenced (exported). It's the Assembly Manifest that differentiates between an Assembly and a Module.
4. What are the mobile devices supported by the .Net platform
The Microsoft .NET Compact Framework is designed to run on mobile devices such as mobile phones, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), and embedded devices. The easiest way to develop and test a Smart Device Application is to use an emulator.
These devices are divided into the following two main divisions:
- Those that are directly supported by .NET (Pocket PCs, i-Mode phones, and WAP devices)
- Those that are not (Palm OS and J2ME-powered devices).
5. What are GUIDs and why and where do we use them?
GUID is an acronym for Globally Unique Identifier, a unique 128-bit number produced by the Windows OS or by some Windows applications to identify a specific component, application, file, database entry, and/or user. For instance, a Web site may generate a GUID and assign it to a user's browser to record and track the session. A GUID is also used in a Windows registry to identify COM DLLs. Knowing where to look in the registry and having the correct GUID yields a lot information about a COM object (in other words, information in the type library, its physical location, and so on). Windows also identifies user accounts by a username (computer/domain and username) and assigns it a GUID. Some database administrators even will use GUIDs as primary key values in databases.
GUIDs can be created in a number of ways, but usually they are a combination of a few unique settings based on a specific point in time (for example, an IP address, network MAC address, clock date/time, and so on).
6. Describe the difference between inline and code behind; which is best in a loosely coupled solution
ASP.NET supports two modes of page development: Page logic code that is written inside <runat="server"> blocks within an .aspx file and dynamically compiled the first time the page is requested on the server. Page logic code that is written within an external class that is compiled prior to deployment on a server and linked "behind" the .aspx file at run time.
7. Whats MSIL, and why should my developers need an appreciation of it if at all?
When compiling the source code to managed code, the compiler translates the source into Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL). This is a CPU-independent set of instructions that can efficiently be converted to native code. Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL) is a translation used as the output of a number of compilers. It is the input to a Just-In-Time (JIT) compiler. The Common Language Runtime includes a JIT compiler for the conversion of MSIL to native code.
Before Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL) can be executed, it must be converted by the .NET Framework Just-In-Time (JIT) compiler to native code. This is CPU-specific code that runs on the same computer architecture as the JIT compiler. Rather than using time and memory to convert all of the MSIL in a Portable Executable (PE) file to native code, it converts the MSIL as needed during execution, then caches the resulting native code so its accessible for any subsequent calls.
8. How many .NET languages can a single .NET DLL contain?
One
9. What type of code (server or client) is found in a Code-Behind class?
Server
10. What's an assembly?
Assemblies are the building blocks of .NET Framework applications; they form the fundamental unit of deployment, version control, reuse, activation scoping, and security permissions. An assembly is a collection of types and resources that are built to work together and form a logical unit of functionality. An assembly provides the Common Language Runtime with the information it needs to be aware of type implementations. To the runtime, a type does not exist outside the context of an assembly.
11. How many classes can a single .NET DLL contain?
Unlimited.
12. What is the difference between string and String ?
No difference.
13. What is manifest?
It is the metadata that describes the assemblies.
14. What is metadata?
Metadata is machine-readable information about a resource, or "data about data". Such information might include details on content, format, size, or other characteristics of a data
source. In .NET, metadata includes type definitions, version information, external assembly references, and other standardized information.
15. What are the types of assemblies?
The following are the four types of assemblies in .NET.
Static assemblies
These are the .NET PE files that you create at compile time.
Dynamic assemblies
These are PE-formatted, in-memory assemblies that you dynamically create at runtime using the classes in the System.Reflection.Emit namespace.
Private assemblies
These are static assemblies used by a specific application.
Public or shared assemblies
These are static assemblies that must have a unique shared name and can be used by any application.
An application uses a private assembly by referring to the assembly using a static path or through an XML-based application configuration file. While the CLR doesn't enforce versioning policies, in other words checking whether the correct version is used, for private assemblies, it ensures that an application uses the correct shared assemblies with which the application was built. Thus, an application uses a specific shared assembly by referring to the specific shared assembly, and the CLR ensures that the correct version is loaded at runtime.
In .NET, an assembly is the smallest unit of which you can associate a version number;
16. What are delegates?where are they used?
A delegate defines a reference type that encapsulates a method with a specific signature. A delegate instance encapsulates a static or an instance method. Delegates are roughly similar to function pointers in C++; however, delegates are type-safe and secure.
17. When to you use the virutal keyword?
When we need to override a method of the base class in the sub class, then we provide the virtual keyword in the base class method. This makes the method in the base class overridable. Methods, properties, and indexers can be virtual, which means that their implementation can be overridden in derived classes.
18. What are class access modifiers?
Access modifiers are keywords specifying the declared accessibility of a member or a type. This section introduces the four access modifiers:
- Public: Access is not restricted.
- Protected: Access is limited to the containing class or types derived from the containing class.
- Internal: Access is limited to the current assembly.
- Protected intetnal: Access is limited to the current assembly or types derived from the containing class.
- Private: Access is limited to the containing type.
19. What Is Boxing And Unboxing?
Boxing: Boxing is an implicit conversion of a value type to the type object type.
For example, consider the following declaration of a value-type variable:
int i = 123;
object o = (object) i;
Boxing Conversion
UnBoxing: Unboxing is an explicit conversion from the type object to a value type.
For example:
- int i = 123; // A value type
- object box = i; // Boxing
- int j = (int)box; // Unboxing
- Struct Type
- Enumeration Type
Reference Type:
Variables of reference types, referred to as objects, store references to the actual data. This section introduces the following keywords used to declare reference types:
- Class
- Interface
- Delegate
This section also introduces the following built-in reference types:
- object
- string
Note: A few of the references are taken from other sites/sources.
21. What is the difference between structures and enumerations?
Unlike classes, structs are value types and do not require heap allocation. A variable of a struct type directly contains the data of the struct, whereas a variable of a class type contains a reference to the data. They are derived from the System.ValueType class.
An enum type is a distinct type that declares a set of named constants. They are strongly-typed constants. They are unique types that allow declaration of symbolic names with integral values. Enums are value types, which means they contain their own value, can't inherit or be inherited from and assignments copy the value of one enum to another.
- public enum Grade
- {
- A,
- B,
- C
- }
- An Assembly is a logical unit of code
- Assembly physically exist as DLLs or EXEs
- One assembly can contain one or more files
- The constituent files can include any file types like image files, text files and so on. along with DLLs or EXEs
- When you compile your source code by default the exe/DLL generated is actually an assembly
- Unless your code is bundled as assembly it can not be used in any other application
- When you talk about version of a component you are actually talking about version of the assembly to which the component belongs.
- Every assembly file contains information about itself. This information is called as Assembly Manifest.
- Following steps are involved in creating shared assemblies:
- Create your DLL/EXE source code
- Generate unique assembly name using SN utility
- Sign your DLL/EXE with the private key by modifying AssemblyInfo file
- Compile your DLL/EXE
- Place the resultant DLL/EXE in Global Assembly Cache using AL utility
24. What is Global Assembly Cache?
Each computer where the Common Language Runtime is installed has a machine-wide code cache called the Global Assembly Cache. The Global Assembly Cache stores assemblies specifically designated to be shared by several applications on the computer.
There are several ways to deploy an assembly into the Global Assembly Cache:
- Use an installer designed to work with the Global Assembly Cache. This is the preferred option for installing assemblies into the Global Assembly Cache.
- Use a developer tool called the Global Assembly Cache tool (Gacutil.exe), provided by the .NET Framework SDK.
- Use Windows Explorer to drag assemblies into the cache.
25. What is MSIL?
When compiling to managed code, the compiler translates your source code into Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL), which is a CPU-independent set of instructions that can be efficiently converted to native code. MSIL includes instructions for loading, storing, initializing, and calling methods on objects, as well as instructions for arithmetic and logical operations, control flow, direct memory access, exception handling, and other operations. Before code can be run, MSIL must be converted to CPU-specific code, usually by a Just-In-Time (JIT) compiler. Because the Common Language Runtime supplies one or more JIT compilers for each computer architecture it supports, the same set of MSIL can be JIT-compiled and run on any supported architecture.
When a compiler produces MSIL, it also produces metadata. Metadata describes the types in your code, including the definition of each type, the signatures of each type's members, the members that your code references, and other data that the runtime uses at execution time. The MSIL and metadata are contained in a Portable Executable (PE) file that is based on and extends the published Microsoft PE and common object file format (COFF) used historically for executable content. This file format, that accommodates MSIL or native code as well as metadata, enables the operating system to recognize Common Language Runtime images. The presence of metadata in the file along with the MSIL enables your code to describe itself, that means that there is no need for type libraries or Interface Definition Language (IDL). The runtime locates and extracts the metadata from the file as needed during execution.
26. What is Jit compilers?.how many are available in clr?
Just-In-Time compiler- it converts the language that you write in .Net into machine language that a computer can understand. there are tqo types of JITs one is memory optimized and other is performace optimized.
27. What is tracing?Where it used.Explain few methods available
Tracing refers to collecting information about the application while it is running. You use tracing information to troubleshoot an application.
Tracing allows us to observe and correct programming errors. Tracing enables you to record information in various log files about the errors that might occur at run time. You can analyze these log files to find the cause of the errors.
In .NET we have objects called Trace Listeners. A listener is an object that receives the trace output and outputs it somewhere; that somewhere could be a window in your development environment, a file on your hard drive, a Windows Event log, a SQL Server or Oracle database, or any other customized data store.
The System.Diagnostics namespace provides the interfaces, classes, enumerations and structures that are used for tracing The System.Diagnostics namespace provides two classes named Trace and Debug that are used for writing errors and application execution information in logs.
All Trace Listeners have the following functions. Functionality of these functions is same except that the target media for the tracing output is determined by the Trace Listener.
Method Name
Result Fail Outputs the specified text with the Call Stack.
Write Outputs the specified text.
WriteLine Outputs the specified text and a carriage return.
Flush Flushes the output buffer to the target media.
Close Closes the output stream in order to not receive the tracing/debugging output.
28. How to set the debug mode?
Debug Mode for ASP.NET applications - To set ASP.NET appplication in debugging mode, edit the application's web.config and assign the "debug" attribute in < compilation > section to "true" as show below:
- < configuration >
- < system.web >
- < compilation defaultLanguage="vb" debug="true" / >
- ....
- ...
- ..
- < / configuration >
- XmlReader provides a fast, forward-only, read-only cursor for processing an XML document stream.
- XmlWriter provides an interface for producing XML document streams that conform to the W3C's XML standards.
Both XmlReader and XmlWriter are abstract base classes, that define the functionality that all derived classes must support.
31. Is it possible to use multipe inheritance in .net?
Multiple Inheritance is an ability to inherit from more than one base class in other words ability of a class to have more than one superclass, by inheriting from different sources and thus combine separately-defined behaviors in a single class. There are two types of multiple inheritance: multiple type/interface inheritance and multiple implementation inheritance. C# and VB.NET supports only multiple type/interface inheritance, in other words.
you can derive an class/interface from multiple interfaces. There is no support for multiple implementation inheritance in .NET. That means a class can only derived from one class.
32. What are the derived classes from xmlReader and xmlWriter?
Both XmlReader and XmlWriter are abstract base classes, that define the functionality that all derived classes must support.
There are three concrete implementations of XmlReader:
- XmlTextReader
- XmlNodeReader
- XmlValidatingReader
There are two concrete implementations of XmlWriter:
- XmlTextWriter
- XmlNodeWriter
XmlTextReader and XmlTextWriter support reading data to/from text-based stream, while XmlNodeReader and XmlNodeWriter are designed for working with in-memory DOM tree structure. The custom readers and writers can also be developed to extend the built-in functionality of XmlReader and XmlWriter.
33. What is managed and unmanaged code?
The .NET framework provides several core run-time services to the programs that run within it, for example exception handling and security. For these services to work, the code must provide a minimum level of information to the runtime. in other words., code executing under the control of the CLR is called managed code. For example, any code written in C# or Visual Basic .NET is managed code.
Code that runs outside the CLR is referred to as "unmanaged code." COM components, ActiveX components, and Win32 API functions are examples of unmanaged code.
How you deploy .NET assemblies?
One way is simply use xcopy. others are use and the setup projects in .net. and one more way is use of nontuch deployment.
34. What is Globalizationa and Localization ?
Globalization is the process of creating an application that meets the needs of users from multiple cultures. It includes using the correct currency, date and time format, calendar, writing direction, sorting rules, and other issues. Accommodating these cultural differences in an application is called localization.Using classes of System.Globalization namespace, you can set application's current culture.
This can be done by using any of the following 3 approaches.
- Detect and redirect
- Run-time adjustment
- Using Satellite assemblies.
35. Whate are Resource Files ? How are they used in .NET?
Resource files are the files containing data that is logically deployed with an application.These files can contain data in a number of formats including strings, images and persisted objects. It has the main advantage of If we store data in these files then we don't need to compile these if the data get changed. In .NET we basically require them storing culture specific informations by localizing application's resources. You can deploy your resources using satellite assemblies.
36. Difference between Dispose and Finallize method?
Finalize method is used to free the memory used by some unmanaged resources like window handles (HWND). It's similar to the destructor syntax in C#. The GC calls this method when it founds no more references to the object. But, In some cases we may need release the memory used by the resources explicitely.To release the memory explicitly we need to implement the Dispose method of IDisposable interface.
37. What is encapsulation ?
Encapsulation is the ability to hide the internal workings of an object's behavior and its data. For instance, let's say you have a object named Bike and this object has a method named start(). When you create an instance of a Bike object and call its start() method you are not worried about what happens to accomplish this, you just want to ensure the state of the bike is changed to "running" afterwards. This kind of behavior hiding is encapsulation and it makes programming much easier.
38. How can you prevent your class to be inherated further?
By setting Sealed - Key word
- public sealed class Planet
- {
- //code goes here
- }
- class Moon : Planet
- {
- //Not allowed as base class is sealed
- }
39. What is GUID and why we need to use it and in what condition? How this is created.
- Binary Serialization
- XML Serialization
- using System;
- namespace SampleMultiCastDelegate
- {
- classMultiCast
- {
- public delegate string strMultiCast(string s);
- }
- }
MainClass defines the static methods having same signature as delegate.
- using System;
- namespace SampleMultiCastDelegate
- {
- public class MainClass
- {
- public MainClass()
- {
- }
- public static string Jump(string s)
- {
- Console.WriteLine("Jump");
- return String.Empty;
- }
- public static string Run(string s)
- {
- Console.WriteLine("Run");
- return String.Empty;
- }
- public static string Walk(string s)
- {
- Console.WriteLine("Walk");
- return String.Empty;
- }
- }
- }
The Main class:
- using System;
- using System.Threading;
- namespace SampleMultiCastDelegate
- {
- public class MainMultiCastDelegate
- {
- public static void Main()
- {
- MultiCast.strMultiCast Run, Walk, Jump;
- MultiCast.strMultiCast myDelegate;
- ///here mydelegate used the Combine method of System.MulticastDelegate
- ///and the delegates combine
- myDelegate = (MultiCast.strMultiCast)System.Delegate.Combine(Run, Walk);
- }
- }
- }
- Use an installer designed to work with the Global Assembly Cache. This is the preferred option for installing assemblies into the Global Assembly Cache.
- Use a developer tool called the Global Assembly Cache tool (Gacutil.exe), provided by the .NET Framework SDK.
- Use Windows Explorer to drag assemblies into the cache.
GAC solves the problem of DLL Hell and DLL versioning. Unlike earlier situations, GAC can hold two assemblies of the same name but different version. This ensures that the applications that access a specific assembly continue to access the same assembly even if another version of that assembly is installed on that machine.
51. Describe what an Interface is and how it's different from a Class.
An interface is a structure of code that is similar to a class. An interface is a prototype for a class and is useful from a logical design perspective. Interfaces provide a means to define the protocols for a class without worrying about the implementation details. The syntax for creating interfaces follows:
interface Identifier {
InterfaceBody
}
Identifier is the name of the interface and InterfaceBody refers to the abstract methods and static final variables that make up the interface. Because it is assumed that all the methods in an interface are abstract, it isn't necessary to use the abstract keyword
An interface is a description of some of the members available from a class. In practice, the syntax typically looks similar to a class definition, except that there's no code defined for the methods — just their name, the arguments ed and the type of the value returned.
So what good is it? None by itself. But you create an interface so that classes will implement it.
But what does it mean to implement an interface. The interface acts as a contract or promise. If a class implements an interface, then it must have the properties and methods of the interface defined in the class. This is enforced by the compiler.
Broadly the differentiators between classes and interfaces is as follows
- Interface should not have any implementation.
- Interface can not create any instance.
- Interface should provide high level abstraction from the implementation.
- Interface can have multiple inheritances.
- Default access level of the interface is public.
52. What is the difference between XML Web Services using ASMX and .NET Remoting using SOAP?
ASP.NET Web services and .NET Remoting provide a full suite of design options for cross-process and cross-plaform communication in distributed applications. In general, ASP.NET Web services provide the highest levels of interoperability with full support for WSDL and SOAP over HTTP, while .NET Remoting is designed for Common Language Runtime type-system fidelity and supports additional data format and communication channels. Hence if we looking cross-platform communication than web services is the choice coz for .NET remoting .Net framework is requried that may or may not present for the other platform.
Serialization and Metadata
ASP.NET Web services rely on the System.Xml.Serialization.XmlSerializer class to marshal data to and from SOAP messages at runtime. For metadata, they generate WSDL and XSD definitions that describe what their messages contain. The reliance on pure WSDL and XSD makes ASP.NET Web services metadata portable; it expresses data structures in a way that other Web service toolkits on various platforms and with various programming models can understand. In some cases, this imposes constraints on the types you can expose from a Web service—XmlSerializer will only marshal things that can be expressed in XSD. Specifically, XmlSerializer will not marshal object graphs and it has limited support for container types.
.NET Remoting relies on the pluggable implementations of the IFormatter interface used by the System.Runtime.Serialization engine to marshal data to and from messages. There are two standard formatters, System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.BinaryFormatter and System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Soap.SoapFormatter. The BinaryFormatter and SoapFormatter, as the names suggest, marshal types in binary and SOAP format respectively. For metadata, .NET Remoting relies on the Common Language Runtime assemblies, that contain all the relevant information about the data types they implement, and expose it via reflection. The reliance on the assemblies for metadata makes it easy to preserve the full runtime type-system fidelity. As a result, when the .NET Remoting plumbing marshals data, it includes all of a class's public and private members; handles object graphs correctly; and supports all container types (for example, System.Collections.Hashtable). However, the reliance on runtime metadata also limits the reach of a .NET Remoting system—a client has to understand .NET constructs in order to communicate with a .NET Remoting endpoint. In addition to pluggable formatters, the .NET Remoting layer supports pluggable channels, that abstract away the details of how messages are sent. There are two standard channels, one for raw TCP and one for HTTP. Messages can be sent over either channel independent of format.
Distributed Application Design: ASP.NET Web Services visual Studio. .NET Remoting
ASP.NET Web services favor the XML Schema type system, and provide a simple programming model with broad cross-platform reach. .NET Remoting favors the runtime type system, and provides a more complex programming model with much more limited reach. This essential difference is the primary factor in determining which technology to use. However, there are a wide range of other design factors, including transport protocols, host processes, security, performance, state management, and support for transactions to consider as well.
Security
Since ASP.NET Web services rely on HTTP, they integrate with the standard Internet security infrastructure. ASP.NET leverages the security features available with IIS to provide strong support for standard HTTP authentication schemes including Basic, Digest, digital certificates, and even Microsoft® .NET port. (You can also use Windows Integrated authentication, but only for clients in a trusted domain.) One advantage of using the available HTTP authentication schemes is that no code change is required in a Web service; IIS performs authentication before the ASP.NET Web services are called. ASP.NET also provides support for .NET port-based authentication and other custom authentication schemes. ASP.NET supports access control based on target URLs, and by integrating with the .NET code access security (CAS) infrastructure. SSL can be used to ensure private communication over the wire.
Although these standard transport-level techniques to secure Web services are quite effective, they only go so far. In complex scenarios involving multiple Web services in different trust domains, you need to build custom ad hoc solutions. Microsoft and others are working on a set of security specifications that build on the extensibility of SOAP messages to offer message-level security capabilities. One of these is the XML Web Services Security Language (WS-Security), which defines a framework for message-level credential transfer, message integrity, and message confidentiality.
As noted in the previous section, the .NET Remoting plumbing does not secure cross-process invocations in the general case. A .NET Remoting endpoint hosted in IIS with ASP.NET can leverage all the same security features available to ASP.NET Web services, including support for secure communication over the wire using SSL. If you are using the TCP channel or the HTTP channel hosted in processes other than aspnet_wp.exe, you need to implement authentication, authorization and privacy mechanisms yourself.
One additional security concern is the ability to execute code from a semi-trusted environment without having to change the default security policy. ASP.NET Web Services client proxies work in these environments, but .NET Remoting proxies do not. In order to use a .NET Remoting proxy from a semi-trusted environment, you need a special serialization permission that is not given to code loaded from your intranet or the Internet by default. If you want to use a .NET Remoting client from within a semi-trusted environment, you have to alter the default security policy for code loaded from those zones. In situations where you are connecting to systems from clients running in a sandbox—like a downloaded Windows Forms application, for instance—ASP.NET Web Services are a simpler choice because security policy changes are not required.
53. Conceptually, what is the difference between early-binding and late-binding?
Early binding – Binding at Compile Time
Late Binding – Binding at Run Time
Early binding implies that the class of the called object is known at compile-time; late-binding implies that the class is not known until run-time, such as a call through an interface or via Reflection.
Early binding is the preferred method. It is the best performer because your application binds directly to the address of the function being called and there is no extra overhead in doing a run-time lookup. In terms of overall execution speed, it is at least twice as fast as late binding.
Early binding also provides type safety. When you have a reference set to the component's type library, Visual Basic provides IntelliSense support to help you code each function correctly. Visual Basic also warns you if the data type of a parameter or return value is incorrect, saving a lot of time when writing and debugging code.
Late binding is still useful in situations where the exact interface of an object is not known at design-time. If your application seeks to talk with multiple unknown servers or needs to invoke functions by name (using the Visual Basic 6.0 CallByName function for example) then you need to use late binding. Late binding is also useful to work around compatibility problems between multiple versions of a component that has improperly modified or adapted its interface between versions.
54. What is an Asssembly Qualified Name? Is it a filename? How is it different?
An assembly qualified name isn't the filename of the assembly; it's the internal name of the assembly combined with the assembly version, culture, and public key, thus making it unique.
for example (""System.Xml.XmlDocument, System.Xml, Version=1.0.3300.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089"")
How is a strongly-named assembly different from one that isn't strongly-named?
Strong names are used to enable the stricter naming requirements associated with shared assemblies. These strong names are created by a .NET utility – sn.exe
Strong names have three goals:
- Name uniqueness. Shared assemblies must have names that are globally unique.
- Prevent name spoofing. Developers don't want someone else releasing a subsequent version of one of your assemblies and falsely claim it came from you, either by accident or intentionally.
- Provide identity on reference. When resolving a reference to an assembly, strong names are used to guarantee the assembly that is loaded came from the expected publisher.
Strong names are implemented using standard public key cryptography. In general, the process works as follows: The author of an assembly generates a key pair (or uses an existing one), signs the file containing the manifest with the private key, and makes the public key available to callers. When references are made to the assembly, the caller records the public key corresponding to the private key used to generate the strong name.
Weak named assemblies are not suitable to be added in GAC and shared. It is essential for an assembly to be strong named.
Strong naming prevents tampering and enables assemblies to be placed in the GAC alongside other assemblies of the same name.
55. How does the generational garbage collector in the .NET CLR manage object lifetime? What is non-deterministic finalization?
The hugely simplistic version is that every time it garbage-collects, it starts by assuming everything to be garbage, then goes through and builds a list of everything reachable. Those become not-garbage, everything else doesn't, and gets thrown away. What makes it generational is that every time an object goes through this process and survives, it is noted as being a member of an older generation (up to 2, right now). When the garbage-collector is trying to free memory, it starts with the lowest generation (0) and only works up to higher ones if it can't free up enough space, on the grounds that shorter-lived objects are more likely to have been freed than longer-lived ones.
Non-deterministic finalization implies that the destructor (if any) of an object will not necessarily be run (nor its memory cleaned up, but that's a relatively minor issue) immediately upon its going out of scope. Instead, it will wait until first the garbage collector gets around to finding it, and then the finalisation queue empties down to it; and if the process ends before this happens, it may not be finalised at all. (Although the operating system will usually clean up any process-external resources left open, note the usually there, especially as the exceptions tend to hurt a lot.)
56. What is the difference between Finalize() and Dispose()?
Dispose() is called by the user of an object to indicate that he is finished with it, enabling that object to release any unmanaged resources it holds. Finalize() is called by the run-time to allow an object that has not had Dispose() called on it to do the same. However, Dispose() operates determinalistically, whereas there is no guarantee that Finalize() will be called immediately when an object goes out of scope, or indeed at all, if the program ends before that object is GCed, and as such Dispose() is generally preferred.
57. How is the using() pattern useful? What is IDisposable? How does it support deterministic finalization?
The using() pattern is useful because it ensures that Dispose() will always be called when a disposable object (defined as one that implements IDisposable, and thus the Dispose() method) goes out of scope, even if it does so by an exception being thrown, and thus that resources are always released.
58. What does this useful command line do? tasklist /m "mscor*"
Lists all the applications and associated tasks/process currently running on the system with a module whose name begins "mscor" loaded into them; that in nearly all cases in other words "all the .NET processes".
59. What's wrong with a line like this? DateTime.Parse(myString);
Therez nothing wrong with this declaration.Converts the specified string representation of a date and time to its DateTime equivalent.But If the string is not a valid DateTime,It throws an exception.
60. What are PDBs? Where must they be located for debugging to work?
A program database (PDB) files holds debugging and project state information that allows incremental linking of debug configuration of your program.There are several different types of symbolic debugging information. The default type for Microsoft compiler is the so-called PDB file. The compiler setting for creating this file is /Zi, or /ZI for C/C++(that creates a PDB file with additional information that enables a feature called ""Edit and Continue"") or a Visual Basic/C#/JScript .NET program with /debug.
A PDB file is a separate file, placed by default in the Debug project subdirectory, that has the same name as the executable file with the extension .pdb. Note that the Visual C++ compiler by default creates an additional PDB file called VC60.pdb for VisulaC++6.0 and VC70.PDB file for VisulaC++7.0. The compiler creates this file during compilation of the source code, when the compiler isn't aware of the final name of the executable. The linker can merge this temporary PDB file into the main one if you tell it to, but it won't do it by default. The PDB file can be useful to display the detailed stack trace with source files and line numbers.
61. What is FullTrust? Do GAC'ed assemblies have FullTrust?
Before the .NET Framework existed, Windows had two levels of trust for downloaded code. This old model was a binary trust model. You only had two choices: Full Trust, and No Trust. The code could either do anything you could do, or it wouldn't run at all.
The permission sets in .NET include FullTrust, SkipVerification, Execution, Nothing, LocalIntranet, Internet and Everything. Full Trust Grants unrestricted permissions to system resources. Fully trusted code run by a normal, nonprivileged user cannot do administrative tasks, but can access any resources the user can access, and do anything the user can do. From a security standpoint, you can think of fully trusted code as being similar to native, unmanaged code, like a traditional ActiveX control.
GAC assemblies are granted FullTrust. In v1.0 and 1.1, the fact that assemblies in the GAC seem to always get a FullTrust grant is actually a side effect of the fact that the GAC lives on the local machine. If anyone were to lock down the security policy by changing the grant set of the local machine to something less than FullTrust, and if your assembly did not get extra permission from some other code group, it would no longer have FullTrust even though it lives in the GAC.
62. What does this do? gacutil /l | find /i "Corillian"
The Global Assembly Cache tool allows you to view and manipulate the contents of the Global Assembly Cache and download cache.The tool comes with various optional params to do that.
""/l"" option Lists the contents of the Global Assembly Cache. If you specify the assemblyName parameter(/l [assemblyName]), the tool lists only the assemblies matching that name.
63. What does this do .. sn -t foo.dll ?
Sn -t option displays the token for the public key stored in infile. The contents of infile must be previously generated using -p.
Sn.exe computes the token using a hash function from the public key. To save space, the Common Language Runtime stores public key tokens in the manifest as part of a reference to another assembly when it records a dependency to an assembly that has a strong name. The -tp option displays the public key in addition to the token.
64. How do you generate a strong name?
.NET provides an utility called strong name tool. You can run this toolfrom the VS.NET command prompt to generate a strong name with an option "-k" and providing the strong key file name. in other words sn- -k < file-name >
65. What is the difference between a Debug and Release build? Is there a significant speed difference? Why or why not?
The Debug build is the program compiled with full symbolic debug information and no optimization. The Release build is the program compiled employing optimization and contains no symbolic debug information. These settings can be changed as per need from Project Configuration properties. The release runs faster since it does not have any debug symbols and is optimized.
66. Explain the use of virtual, sealed, override, and abstract.
Abstract: The keyword can be applied for a class or method.
- Class:
If we use abstract keyword for a class it makes the class an abstract class, which means it cant be instantiated. Though it is not necessary to make all the method within the abstract class to be virtual. ie, Abstract class can have concrete methods.
- Method:
If we make a method as abstract, we don't need to provide implementation of the method in the class but the derived class need to implement/override this method.
- classShape
- {
- int a
- public virtual void Display()
- {
- Console.WriteLine("Shape");
- }
- }
- class Rectangle:Shape
- {
- public override void Display()
- {
- Console.WriteLine("Derived");
- }
- }
67. Explain the importance and use of each, Version, Culture and PublicKeyToken for an assembly.
- public class MyBaseClass : Object
- {
- }
- public class MyDerivedClass : MyBaseClass
- {
- }
- public class Test
- {
- public static void Main()
- {
- MyBaseClass myBase = new MyBaseClass();
- MyDerivedClass myDerived = new MyDerivedClass();
- object o = myDerived;
- MyBaseClass b = myDerived;
- Console.WriteLine("mybase: Type is {0}", myBase.GetType());
- Console.WriteLine("myDerived: Type is {0}", myDerived.GetType());
- Console.WriteLine("object o = myDerived: Type is {0}", o.GetType());
- Console.WriteLine("MyBaseClass b = myDerived: Type is {0}", b.GetType());
- }
- }
- /*
- This code produces the following output.
- mybase: Type is MyBaseClass
- myDerived: Type is MyDerivedClass
- object o = myDerived: Type is MyDerivedClass
- MyBaseClass b = myDerived: Type is MyDerivedClass
- */
69. Can "this" be used within a static method?
- The first part is the URI used to identify the namespace
- The second part is the element type or attribute name itself.
Together they form a unique name. The various purpose of XML Namespace are
- Combine fragments from various documents without any naming conflicts. (See example below.).
- Write reusable code modules that can be invoked for specific elements and attributes. Universally unique names guarantee that such modules are invoked only for the correct elements and attributes.
- Define elements and attributes that can be reused in other schemas or instance documents without fear of name collisions. For example, you might use XHTML elements in a parts catalog to provide part descriptions. Or you might use the nil attribute defined in XML Schemas to indicate a missing value.
- < Department >
- < Name >DVS1< /Name >
- < addr:Address xmlns:addr="http://www.tu-darmstadt.de/ito/addresses" >
- < addr:Street >Wilhelminenstr. 7< /addr:Street >
- < addr:City >Darmstadt< /addr:City >
- < addr:State >Hessen< /addr:State >
- < addr:Country >Germany< /addr:Country >
- < addr:PostalCode >D-64285< /addr:PostalCode >
- < /addr:Address >
- < serv:Server xmlns:serv="http://www.tu-darmstadt.de/ito/servers" >
- < serv:Name >OurWebServer< /serv:Name >
- < serv:Address >123.45.67.8< /serv:Address >
- < /serv:Server >
- < /Department >
- Check up the total space if there's any free space on the declared list.
- If yes add the new item and increase count by 1 .
- If No Copy the entire thing to a temporary Array of Last Max. Size.
- Create new Array with size ( Last Array Size + Increase Value )
- Copy back values from temp and reference this new array as original array.
- Must doing Method updates too , need to check it up.
73. What is Boxing and unboxing? Does it occure automaatically or you need to write code to box and unbox?
Boxing: Process of converting a System.ValueType to Reference Type , Mostly base class System.Object type and allocating it memory on Heap .Reverse is unboxing , but can only be done with prior boxed variables.
Boxing is always implicit but Unboxing needs to be explicitly done via casting , thus ensuring the value type contained inside.
74. How Boxing and unboxing occures in memory?
Boxing converts value type to reference type , thus allocating memory on Heap. Unboxing converts already boxed reference types to value types through explicit casting , thus allocating memory on stack.
75. Why only boxed types can be unboxed?
Unboxing is the process of converting a Reference type variable to Value type and thus allocating memory on the stack . It happens only to those Reference type variables that have been earlier created by Boxing of a Value Type , therefore internally they contain a value type , that can be obtained through explicit casting . For any other Reference type , they don't internally contain a Value type to Unboxed via explicit casting . This is why only boxed types can be unboxed.
Com +
76. What are various transaction options available for services components ?
There are 5 transactions types that can be used with COM+. Whenever an object is registered with COM+ it has to abide either to these 5 transaction types.
- Disabled: There is no transaction. COM+ does not provide transaction support for this component.
- Not Supported:
Component does not support transactions. Hence even if the calling component in the hierarchy is transaction enabled this component will not participate in the transaction.
- Supported:
Components with transaction type supported will be a part of the transaction if the calling component has an active transaction.If the calling component is not transaction enabled this component will not start a new transaction.
- Required:
Components with this attribute require a transaction in other words either the calling should have a transaction in place else this component will start a new transaction.
- Required New:
Components enabled with this transaction type always require a new transaction. Components with required new transaction type instantiate a new transaction for themselves every time.
- .NET class should be implement its functionality through interface. First define interface in code, then have the class to imlpement it. This way, it prevents breaking of COM client, if/when .NET component changes.
- Secondly, .NET class, that is to be visible to COM clients must be declared public. The tools that create the CCW only define types based on public classes. The same rule applies to methods, properties, and events that will be used by COM clients.
Implementation Steps -
- Generate type library of .NET component, using TLBExporter utility. A type library is the COM equivalent of the metadata contained within
a .NET assembly. Type libraries are generally contained in files with the extension .tlb. A type library contains the necessary information to allow a COM client to determine which classes are located in a specific server, as well as the methods, properties, and events supported by those classes.
- Secondly, use Assembly Registration tool (regasm) to create the type library and register it.
- Lastly install .NET assembly in GAC, so it is available as shared assembly.
78. What is Runtime Callable wrapper?.when it will created?.
The Common Language Runtime exposes COM objects through a proxy called the runtime callable wrapper (RCW). Although the RCW appears to be an ordinary object to .NET clients, its primary function is to marshal calls between a .NET client and a COM object. This wrapper turns the COM interfaces exposed by the COM component into .NET-compatible interfaces. For oleautomation (attribute indicates that an interface is compatible with Automation) interfaces, the RCW can be generated automatically from a type library. For non-oleautomation interfaces, it may be necessary to develop a custom RCW that manually maps the types exposed by the COM interface to .NET-compatible types.
79. What is Com Callable wrapper?when it will created?
.NET components are accessed from COM via a COM Callable Wrapper (CCW). This is similar to a RCW, but works in the opposite direction. Again, if the wrapper cannot be automatically generated by the .NET development tools, or if the automatic behaviour is not desirable, a custom CCW can be developed. Also, for COM to "see" the .NET component, the .NET component must be registered in the registry.CCWs also manage the object identity and object lifetime of the managed objects they wrap.
80. What is a primary interop ?
A primary interop assembly is a collection of types that are deployed, versioned, and configured as a single unit. However, unlike other managed assemblies, an interop assembly contains type definitions (not implementation) of types that have already been defined in COM. These type definitions allow managed applications to bind to the COM types at compile time and provide information to the Common Language Runtime
about how the types should be marshaled at run time.
81. What are tlbimp and tlbexp tools used for ?
The Type Library Exporter generates a type library that describes the types defined in a Common Language Runtime assembly.
The Type Library Importer converts the type definitions found within a COM type library into equivalent definitions in a Common Language Runtime assembly. The output of Tlbimp.exe is a binary file (an assembly) that contains runtime metadata for the types defined within the original type library.
82. What benefit do you get from using a Primary Interop Assembly (PIA)?
PIAs are important because they provide unique type identity. The PIA distinguishes the official type definitions from counterfeit definitions provided by other interop assemblies. Having a single type identity ensures type compatibility among applications that share the types defined in the PIA. Because the PIA is signed by its publisher and labeled with the PrimaryInteroembly attribute, it can be differentiated from other interop assemblies that define the same types.
1. Explain what a diffgram is and its usage ?
A DiffGram is an XML format that is used to identify current and original versions of data elements. The DataSet uses the DiffGram format to load and persist its contents, and to serialize its contents for transport across a network connection. When a DataSet is written as a DiffGram, it populates the DiffGram with all the necessary information to accurately recreate the contents, though not the schema, of the DataSet, including column values from both the Original and Current row versions, row error information, and row order.
When sending and retrieving a DataSet from an XML Web service, the DiffGram format is implicitly used. Additionally, when loading the contents of a DataSet from XML using the ReadXml method, or when writing the contents of a DataSet in XML using the WriteXml method, you can select that the contents be read or written as a DiffGram.
The DiffGram format is divided into three sections: the current data, the original (or "before") data, and an errors section, as shown in the following example.
ADO.NET
- <?xmlversion="1.0"?>
- <diffgr:diffgram
- xmlns:msdata="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xml-msdata"
- xmlns:diffgr="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xml-diffgram-v1"
- xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">
- <DataInstance>
- </DataInstance>
- <diffgr:before>
- </diffgr:before>
- <diffgr:errors>
- </diffgr:errors>
- </diffgr:diffgram>
The DiffGram format consists of the following blocks of data:
-
Serialized Data read by a current transaction cannot be changed by another transaction until the current transaction finishes. No new data can be inserted that would affect the current transaction. This is the safest isolation level and is the default.
-
Repeatable Read Data read by a current transaction cannot be changed by another transaction until the current transaction finishes. Any type of new data can be inserted during a transaction.
-
Read Committed A transaction cannot read data that is being modified by another transaction that has not committed. This is the default isolation level in Microsoft® SQL Server.
-
Read Uncommitted A transaction can read any data, even if it is being modified by another transaction. This is the least safe isolation level but allows the highest concurrency.
-
Any Any isolation level is supported. This setting is most commonly used by downstream components to avoid conflicts. This setting is useful because any downstream component must be configured with an isolation level that is equal to or less than the isolation level of its immediate upstream component. Therefore, a downstream component that has its isolation level configured as Any always uses the same isolation level that its immediate upstream component uses. If the root object in a transaction has its isolation level configured to Any, its isolation level becomes Serialized.
5. How XML files and be read and write using dataset?.
DataSet exposes method like ReadXml and WriteXml to read and write XML
6. What are the various rowversions available?
There are four types of Rowversions.
Current
The current values for the row. This row version does not exist for rows with a RowState of Deleted.
Default
The row the default version for the current DataRowState. For a DataRowState value of Added, Modified or Current, the default version is Current. For a DataRowState of Deleted, the version is Original. For a DataRowState value of Detached, the version is Proposed.
Original
The row contains its original values.
Proposed
The proposed values for the row. This row version exists during an edit operation on a row, or for a row that is not part of a DataRowCollection
7. Explain acid properties?.
The term ACID conveys the role transactions play in mission-critical applications. Coined by transaction processing pioneers, ACID stands for atomicity, consistency, isolation, and durability.
These properties ensure predictable behavior, reinforcing the role of transactions as all-or-none propositions designed to reduce the management load when there are many variables.
Atomicity
A transaction is a unit of work in which a series of operations occur between the BEGIN TRANSACTION and END TRANSACTION statements of an application. A transaction executes exactly once and is atomic — all the work is done or none of it is.
Operations associated with a transaction usually share a common intent and are interdependent. By performing only a subset of these operations, the system could compromise the overall intent of the transaction. Atomicity eliminates the chance of processing a subset of operations.
Consistency
A transaction is a unit of integrity because it preserves the consistency of data, transforming one consistent state of data into another consistent state of data.
Consistency requires that data bound by a transaction be semantically preserved. Some of the responsibility for maintaining consistency falls to the application developer who must ensure that all known integrity constraints are enforced by the application. For example, in developing an application that transfers money, you should avoid arbitrarily moving decimal points during the transfer.
Isolation
A transaction is a unit of isolation, allowing concurrent transactions to behave as though each were the only transaction running in the system.
Isolation requires that each transaction appear to be the only transaction manipulating the data store, even though other transactions may be running at the same time. A transaction should never see the intermediate stages of another transaction.
Transactions attain the highest level of isolation when they are serializable. At this level, the results obtained from a set of concurrent transactions are identical to the results obtained by running each transaction serially. Because a high degree of isolation can limit the number of concurrent transactions, some applications reduce the isolation level in exchange for better throughput.
Durability
A transaction is also a unit of recovery. If a transaction succeeds, the system guarantees that its updates will persist, even if the computer crashes immediately after the commit. Specialized logging allows the system's restart procedure to complete unfinished operations, making the transaction durable.
Whate are various types of Commands available with DataAdapter ?
The SqlDataAdapter has SelectCommand, InsertCommand, DeleteCommand and UpdateCommand
8. What is a Dataset?
Datasets are the result of bringing together ADO and XML. A dataset contains one or more data of tabular XML, known as DataTables, these data can be treated separately, or can have relationships defined among them. Indeed these relationships give you ADO data SHAPING without needing to master the SHAPE language, that many people are not comfortable with.
The dataset is a disconnected in-memory cache database. The dataset object model looks like this:
Dataset
- DataTableCollection
- DataTable
- DataView
- DataRowCollection
- DataRow
- DataColumnCollection
- DataColumn
- ChildRelations
- ParentRelations
- Constraints
- PrimaryKey
- DataRelationCollection
- DataTableCollection: As we say that a DataSet is an in-memory database. So it has this collection, that holds data from multiple tables in a single DataSet object.
- DataTable: In the DataTableCollection, we have DataTable objects, that represents the individual tables of the dataset.
- DataView: The way we have views in database, same way we can have DataViews. We can use these DataViews to do Sort, filter data.
- DataRowCollection: Similar to DataTableCollection, to represent each row in each Table we have DataRowCollection.
- DataRow: To represent each and every row of the DataRowCollection, we have DataRows.
- DataColumnCollection: Similar to DataTableCollection, to represent each column in each Table we have DataColumnCollection.
- DataColumn: To represent each and every Column of the DataColumnCollection, we have DataColumn.
- PrimaryKey: Dataset defines Primary key for the table and the primary key validation will take place without going to the database.
- Constraints: We can define various constraints on the Tables, and can use Dataset.Tables(0).enforceConstraints. This will execute all the constraints, whenever we enter data in DataTable.
- DataRelationCollection: as we know that we can have more than 1 table in the dataset, we can also define relationship among these tables using this collection and maintain a parent-child relationship.
- Connection: Establishes a connection to a specific data source
- Command: Executes a command against a data source. Exposes Parameters and can execute within the scope of a Transaction from a Connection.
- DataReader: Reads a forward-only, read-only stream of data from a data source.
- DataAdapter: Populates a DataSet and resolves updates with the data source.
The .NET Framework includes the .NET Framework Data Provider for SQL Server (for Microsoft SQL Server version 7.0 or later), the .NET Framework Data Provider for OLE DB, and the .NET Framework Data Provider for ODBC.
The .NET Framework Data Provider for SQL Server: The .NET Framework Data Provider for SQL Server uses its own protocol to communicate with SQL Server. It is lightweight and performs well because it is optimized to access a SQL Server directly without adding an OLE DB or Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) layer. The following illustration contrasts the .NET Framework Data Provider for SQL Server with the .NET Framework Data Provider for OLE DB. The .NET Framework Data Provider for OLE DB communicates to an OLE DB data source through both the OLE DB Service component, that provides connection pooling and transaction services, and the OLE DB Provider for the data source
The .NET Framework Data Provider for OLE DB: The .NET Framework Data Provider for OLE DB uses native OLE DB through COM interoperability to enable data access. The .NET Framework Data Provider for OLE DB supports both local and distributed transactions. For distributed transactions, the .NET Framework Data Provider for OLE DB, by default, automatically enlists in a transaction and obtains transaction details from Windows 2000 Component Services.
The .NET Framework Data Provider for ODBC: The .NET Framework Data Provider for ODBC uses native ODBC Driver Manager (DM) through COM interoperability to enable data access. The ODBC data provider supports both local and distributed transactions. For distributed transactions, the ODBC data provider, by default, automatically enlists in a transaction and obtains transaction details from Windows 2000 Component Services.
The .NET Framework Data Provider for Oracle: The .NET Framework Data Provider for Oracle enables data access to Oracle data sources through Oracle client connectivity software. The data provider supports Oracle client software version 8.1.7 and later. The data provider supports both local and distributed transactions (the data provider automatically enlists in existing distributed transactions, but does not currently support the EnlistDistributedTransaction method).
The .NET Framework Data Provider for Oracle requires that Oracle client software (version 8.1.7 or later) be installed on the system before you can use it to connect to an Oracle data source.
.NET Framework Data Provider for Oracle classes are located in the System.Data.OracleClient namespace and are contained in the System.Data.OracleClient.dll assembly. You will need to reference both the System.Data.dll and the System.Data.OracleClient.dll when compiling an application that uses the data provider.
10. Choosing a .NET Framework Data Provider
.NET Framework Data Provider for SQL Server: Recommended for middle-tier applications using Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 or later. Recommended for single-tier applications using Microsoft Data Engine (MSDE) or Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 or later.
Recommended over use of the OLE DB Provider for SQL Server (SQLOLEDB) with the .NET Framework Data Provider for OLE DB. For Microsoft SQL Server version 6.5 and earlier, you must use the OLE DB Provider for SQL Server with the .NET Framework Data Provider for OLE DB.
.NET Framework Data Provider for OLE DB: Recommended for middle-tier applications using Microsoft SQL Server 6.5 or earlier, or any OLE DB provider. For Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 or later, the .NET Framework Data Provider for SQL Server is recommended. Recommended for single-tier applications using Microsoft Access databases. Use of a Microsoft Access database for a middle-tier application is not recommended.
.NET Framework Data Provider for ODBC: Recommended for middle-tier applications using ODBC data sources. Recommended for single-tier applications using ODBC data sources.
.NET Framework Data Provider for Oracle: Recommended for middle-tier applications using Oracle data sources. Recommended for single-tier applications using Oracle data sources. Supports Oracle client software version 8.1.7 and later. The .NET Framework Data Provider for Oracle classes are located in the System.Data.OracleClient namespace and are contained in the System.Data.OracleClient.dll assembly. You need to reference both the System.Data.dll and the System.Data.OracleClient.dll when compiling an application that uses the data provider.
11. Can you explain the difference between an ADO.NET Dataset and an ADO Recordset?
Let's have a look at the differences between ADO Recordset and ADO.Net DataSet:
-
Table Collection: ADO Recordset provides the ability to navigate through a single table of information. That table would have been formed with a join of multiple tables and returning columns from multiple tables. ADO.NET DataSet is capable of holding instances of multiple tables. It has got a Table Collection, that holds multiple tables in it. If the tables are having a relation, then it can be manipulated on a Parent-Child relationship. It has the ability to support multiple tables with keys, constraints and interconnected relationships. With this ability the DataSet can be considered as a small, in-memory relational database cache.
-
Navigation: Navigation in ADO Recordset is based on the cursor mode. Even though it is specified to be a client-side Recordset, still the navigation pointer will move from one location to another on cursor model only. ADO.NET DataSet is an entirely offline, in-memory, and cache of data. All of its data is available all the time. At any time, we can retrieve any row or column, constraints or relation simply by accessing it either ordinarily or by retrieving it from a name-based collection.
-
Connectivity Model: The ADO Recordset was originally designed without the ability to operate in a disconnected environment. ADO.NET DataSet is specifically designed to be a disconnected in-memory database. ADO.NET DataSet follows a pure disconnected connectivity model and this gives it much more scalability and versatility in the amount of things it can do and how easily it can do that.
-
Marshalling and Serialization: In COM, through Marshalling, we can data from 1 COM component to another component at any time. Marshalling involves copying and processing data so that a complex type can appear to the receiving component the same as it appeared to the sending component. Marshalling is an expensive operation. ADO.NET Dataset and DataTable components support Remoting in the form of XML serialization. Rather than doing expensive Marshalling, it uses XML and sent data across boundaries.
-
Firewalls and DCOM and Remoting: Those who have worked with DCOM know that how difficult it is to marshal a DCOM component across a router. People generally came up with workarounds to solve this issue. ADO.NET DataSet uses Remoting, through which a DataSet / DataTable component can be serialized into XML, sent across the wire to a new AppDomain, and then Desterilized back to a fully functional DataSet. As the DataSet is completely disconnected, and it has no dependency, we lose absolutely nothing by serializing and transferring it through Remoting.
12. How do you handle data concurrency in .NET ?
One of the key features of the ADO.NET DataSet is that it can be a self-contained and disconnected data store. It can contain the schema and data from several rowsets in DataTable objects as well as information about how to relate the DataTable objects-all in memory. The DataSet neither knows nor cares where the data came from, nor does it need a link to an underlying data source. Because it is data source agnostic you can the DataSet around networks or even serialize it to XML and it across the Internet without losing any of its features. However, in a disconnected model, concurrency obviously becomes a much bigger problem than it is in a connected model.
In this column, I'll explore how ADO.NET is equipped to detect and handle concurrency violations. I'll begin by discussing scenarios in which concurrency violations can occur using the ADO.NET disconnected model. Then I will walk through an ASP.NET application that handles concurrency violations by giving the user the choice to overwrite the changes or to refresh the out-of-sync data and begin editing again. Because part of managing an optimistic concurrency model can involve keeping a timestamp (rowversion) or another type of flag that indicates when a row was last updated, I will show how to implement this type of flag and how to maintain its value after each database update.
Is Your Glass Half Full?
There are three common techniques for managing what happens when users try to modify the same data at the same time: pessimistic, optimistic, and last-in wins. They each handle concurrency issues differently.
The pessimistic approach says: "Nobody can cause a concurrency violation with my data if I do not let them get at the data while I have it." This tactic prevents concurrency in the first place but it limits scalability because it prevents all concurrent access. Pessimistic concurrency generally locks a row from the time it is retrieved until the time updates are flushed to the database. Since this requires a connection to remain open during the entire process, pessimistic concurrency cannot successfully be implemented in a disconnected model like the ADO.NET DataSet, that opens a connection only long enough to populate the DataSet then releases and closes, so a database lock cannot be held.
Another technique for dealing with concurrency is the last-in wins approach. This model is pretty straightforward and easy to implement-whatever data modification was made last is what gets written to the database. To implement this technique you only need to put the primary key fields of the row in the UPDATE statement's WHERE clause. No matter what is changed, the UPDATE statement will overwrite the changes with its own changes since all it is looking for is the row that matches the primary key values. Unlike the pessimistic model, the last-in wins approach allows users to read the data while it is being edited on screen. However, problems can occur when users try to modify the same data at the same time because users can overwrite each other's changes without being notified of the collision. The last-in wins approach does not detect or notify the user of violations because it does not care. However the optimistic technique does detect violations. Contd....
In optimistic concurrency models, a row is only locked during the update to the database. Therefore the data can be retrieved and updated by other users at any time other than during the actual row update operation. Optimistic concurrency allows the data to be read simultaneously by multiple users and blocks other users less often than its pessimistic counterpart, making it a good choice for ADO.NET. In optimistic models, it is important to implement some type of concurrency violation detection that will catch any additional attempt to modify records that have already been modified but not committed. You can write your code to handle the violation by always rejecting and canceling the change request or by overwriting the request based on some business rules. Another way to handle the concurrency violation is to let the user decide what to do. The sample application that is shown in Figure 1 illustrates some of the options that can be presented to the user in the event of a concurrency violation.
Where Did My Changes Go?
When users are likely to overwrite each other's changes, control mechanisms should be put in place. Otherwise, changes could be lost. If the technique you're using is the last-in wins approach, then these types of overwrites are entirely possible.For example, imagine Julie wants to edit an employee's last name to correct the spelling. She navigates to a screen that loads the employee's information into a DataSet and has it presented to her in a Web page. Meanwhile, Scott is notified that the same employee's phone extension has changed. While Julie is correcting the employee's last name, Scott begins to correct his extension. Julie saves her changes first and then Scott saves his.Assuming that the application uses the last-in wins approach and updates the row using a SQL WHERE clause containing only the primary key's value, and assuming a change to one column requires the entire row to be updated, neither Julie nor Scott may immediatelyrealize the concurrency issue that just occurred. In this specific situation, Julie's changes were overwritten by Scott's changes because he saved last, and the last name reverted to the misspelled version.
So as you can see, even though the users changed various fields, their changes collided and caused Julie's changes to be lost. Without some sort of concurrency detection and handling, these types of overwrites can occur and even go unnoticed.When you run the sample application included in this column's download, you should open two separate instances of Microsoft® Internet Explorer. When I generated the conflict, I opened two instances to simulate two users with two separate sessions so that a concurrency violation would occur in the sample application. When you do this, be careful not to use Ctrl+N because if you open one instance and then use the Ctrl+N technique to open another instance, both windows will share the same session.
Detecting Violations
The concurrency violation reported to the user in Figure 1 demonstrates what can happen when multiple users edit the same data at the same time. In Figure 1, the user attempted to modify the first name to "Joe" but since someone else had already modified the last name to "Fuller III," a concurrency violation was detected and reported. ADO.NET detects a concurrency violation when a DataSet containing changed values is ed to a SqlDataAdapter's Update method and no rows are actually modified. Simply using the primary key (in this case the EmployeeID) in the UPDATE statement's WHERE clause will not cause a violation to be detected because it still updates the row (in fact, this technique has the same outcome as the last-in wins technique). Instead, more conditions must be specified in the WHERE clause in order for ADO.NET to detect the violation.
The key here is to make the WHERE clause explicit enough so that it not only checks the primary key but that it also checks for another appropriate condition. One way to accomplish this is to in all modifiable fields to the WHERE clause in addition to the primary key. For example, the application shown in Figure 1 could have its UPDATE statement look like the Stored Procedure that's shown in Figure 2.
Notice that in the code in Figure 2 nullable columns are also checked to see if the value ed in is NULL. This technique is not only messy but it can be difficult to maintain by hand and it requires you to test for a significant number of WHERE conditions just to update a row. This yields the desired result of only updating rows where none of the values have changed since the last time the user got the data, but there are other techniques that do not require such a huge WHERE clause.
Another way to ensure that the row is only updated if it has not been modified by another user since you got the data is to add a timestamp column to the table. The SQL Server(tm) TIMESTAMP datatype automatically updates itself with a new value every time a value in its row is modified. This makes it a very simple and convenient tool to help detect concurrency violations.
A third technique is to use a DATETIME column in which to track changes to its row. In my sample application I added a column called LastUpdateDateTime to the Employees table.
ALTER TABLE Employees ADD LastUpdateDateTime DATETIME
There I update the value of the LastUpdateDateTime field automatically in the UPDATE Stored Procedure using the built-in SQL Server GETDATE function.
The binary TIMESTAMP column is simple to create and use since it automatically regenerates its value each time its row is modified, but since the DATETIME column technique is easier to display on screen and demonstrate when the change was made, I chose it for my sample application. Both of these are solid choices, but I prefer the TIMESTAMP technique since it does not involve any additional code to update its value.
Retrieving Row Flags
One of the keys to implementing concurrency controls is to update the timestamp or datetime field's value back into the DataSet. If the same user wants to make more modifications, this updated value is reflected in the DataSet so it can be used again. There are a few various ways to do this. The fastest is using output parameters within the Stored Procedure. (This should only return if @@ROWCOUNT equals 1.) The next fastest involves selecting the row again after the UPDATE within the Stored Procedure. The slowest involves selecting the row from another SQL statement or Stored Procedure from the SqlDataAdapter's RowUpdated event.
I prefer to use the output parameter technique since it is the fastest and incurs the least overhead. Using the RowUpdated event works well, but it requires me to make a second call from the application to the database. The following code snippet adds an output parameter to the SqlCommand object that is used to update the Employee information:
- oUpdCmd.Parameters.Add(new SqlParameter("@NewLastUpdateDateTime",
- SqlDbType.DateTime, 8, ParameterDirection.Output,
- false, 0, 0, "LastUpdateDateTime", DataRowVersion.Current, null));
- oUpdCmd.UpdatedRowSource = UpdateRowSource.OutputParameters;
- private void txtLastName_TextChanged(object sender, System.EventArgs e)
- {
- // Get the employee DataRow (there is only 1 row, otherwise I could
- // do a Find)
- dsEmployee.EmployeeRow oEmpRow =
- (dsEmployee.EmployeeRow)oDsEmployee.Employee.Rows[0];
- oEmpRow.LastName = txtLastName.Text;
- // Save changes back to Session
- Session["oDsEmployee"] = oDsEmployee;
- }
This event retrieves the row and sets the appropriate field's value from the TextBox. (Another way of getting the changed values is to grab them when the user clicks the Save button.) Each TextChanged event executes after the Page_Load event fires on a postback, so assuming the user changed the first and last names, when the user clicks the Save button, the events could fire in this order: Page_Load, txtFirstName_TextChanged, txtLastName_TextChanged, and btnSave_Click.
- <DYNAMICDISCOVERY
- xmlns="urn:schemas-dynamicdiscovery:disco.2000-03-17">
- <EXCLUDE path="_vti_cnf" />
- <EXCLUDE path="_vti_pvt" />
- <EXCLUDE path="_vti_log" />
- <EXCLUDE path="_vti_script" />
- <EXCLUDE path="_vti_txt" />
- </DYNAMICDISCOVERY>
- public class Service1 : System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapHttpClientProtocol
- {
- public AuthToken AuthTokenValue;
- [System.Xml.Serialization.XmlRootAttribute(Namespace = "http://tempuri.org/", IsNullable = false)]
- public class AuthToken : SoapHeader { public string Token; }
- }
In this case, when you create an instance of the proxy in your main application file, you'll also create an instance of the AuthToken class and assign the string:
-
Right-click the Taskbar, and then click Task Manager. The Windows Task Manager dialog box appears.
-
Click the Processes tab of the Windows Task Manager dialog box.
-
Under Image Name, click the image name of the process that hosts the service that you want to debug. Note the process ID of this process as specified by the value of the corresponding PID field.
Method 2: Use the Task List Utility (tlist.exe)
-
Click Start, and then click Run. The Run dialog box appears.
-
In the Open box, type cmd, and then click OK.
-
At the command prompt, change the directory path to reflect the location of the tlist.exe file on your computerNote: The tlist.exe file is typically located in the following directory: C:\Program Files\Debugging Tools for Windows
-
d. At the command prompt, type tlist to list the image names and the process IDs of all processes that are currently running on your computer.
Note Make a note of the process ID of the process that hosts the service that you want to debug.
2. At a command prompt, change the directory path to reflect the location of the windbg.exe file on your computer.
Note: If a command prompt is not open, follow steps a and b of Method 1. The windbg.exe file is typically located in the following directory: C:\Program Files\Debugging Tools for Windows.
3. At the command prompt, type windbg –p ProcessID to attach the WinDbg debugger to the process that hosts the service that you want to debug.
Note ProcessID is a placeholder for the process ID of the process that hosts the service that you want to debug.
Use the image name of the process that hosts the service that you want to debug.
You can use this method only if there is exactly one running instance of the process that hosts the service that you want to run. To do this, follow these steps:
-
Click Start, and then click Run. The Run dialog box appears.
-
In the Open box, type cmd, and then click OK to open a command prompt.
-
At the command prompt, change the directory path to reflect the location of the windbg.exe file on your computer.
Note: The windbg.exe file is typically located in the following directory: C:\Program Files\Debugging Tools for Windows.
4. At the command prompt, type windbg –pn ImageName to attach the WinDbg debugger to the process that hosts the service that you want to debug.
NoteImageName is a placeholder for the image name of the process that hosts the service that you want to debug. The "-pn" command-line option specifies that the ImageName command-line argument is the image name of a process.
Back to the top
Start the WinDbg debugger and attach to the process that hosts the service that you want to debug
-
Start Windows Explorer.
-
Locate the windbg.exe file on your computer.Note: The windbg.exe file is typically located in the following directory: C:\Program Files\Debugging Tools for Windows.
-
Run the windbg.exe file to start the WinDbg debugger.
-
On the File menu, click Attach to a Process to display the Attach to Process dialog box.
-
Click to select the node that corresponds to the process that hosts the service that you want to debug, and then click OK.
-
In the dialog box that appears, click Yes to save base workspace information. Notice that you can now debug the disassembled code of your service.
Configure a service to start with the WinDbg debugger attached
You can use this method to debug services if you want to troubleshoot service-startup-related problems.
1. Configure the "Image File Execution" options. To do this, use one of the following methods:
Method 1: Use the Global Flags Editor (gflags.exe)
-
Start Windows Explorer.
-
Locate the gflags.exe file on your computer.Note: The gflags.exe file is typically located in the following directory: C:\Program Files\Debugging Tools for Windows.
-
Run the gflags.exe file to start the Global Flags Editor.
-
In the Image File Name text box, type the image name of the process that hosts the service that you want to debug. For example, if you want to debug a service that is hosted by a process that has MyService.exe as the image name, type MyService.exe.
-
Under Destination, click to select the Image File Options option.
-
Under Image Debugger Options, click to select the Debugger check box.
-
In the Debugger text box, type the full path of the debugger that you want to use. For example, if you want to use the WinDbg debugger to debug a service, you can type a full path that is similar to the following: C:\Program Files\Debugging Tools for Windows\windbg.exe
-
Click Apply, and then click OK to quit the Global Flags Editor.
Method 2: Use Registry Editor
-
Click Start, and then click Run. The Run dialog box appears.
-
In the Open box, type regedit, and then click OK to start Registry Editor.
-
Warning If you use Registry Editor incorrectly, you may cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that you can solve problems that result from using Registry Editor incorrectly. Use Registry Editor at your own risk.In Registry Editor, locate, and then right-click the following registry subkey:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options
-
Point to New, and then click Key. In the left pane of Registry Editor, notice that New Key #1 (the name of a new registry subkey) is selected for editing.
-
Type ImageName to replace New Key #1, and then press ENTER.Note ImageName is a placeholder for the image name of the process that hosts the service that you want to debug. For example, if you want to debug a service that is hosted by a process that has MyService.exe as the image name, type MyService.exe.
-
Right-click the registry subkey that you created in step e.
-
Point to New, and then click String Value. In the right pane of Registry Editor, notice that New Value #1, the name of a new registry entry, is selected for editing.
-
Replace New Value #1 with Debugger, and then press ENTER.
-
Right-click the Debugger registry entry that you created in step h, and then click Modify. The Edit String dialog box appears.
-
In the Value data text box, type DebuggerPath, and then click OK.Note: DebuggerPath is a placeholder for the full path of the debugger that you want to use. For example, if you want to use the WinDbg debugger to debug a service, you can type a full path that is similar to the following: C:\Program Files\Debugging Tools for Windows\windbg.exe
2. For the debugger window to appear on your Desktop, and to interact with the debugger, make your service interactive. If you do not make your service interactive, the debugger will start but you cannot see it and you cannot issue commands. To make your service interactive, use one of the following methods:
Method 1: Use the Services console
-
Click Start, and then point to Programs.
-
On the Programs menu, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Services. The Services console appears.
-
In the right pane of the Services console, right-click ServiceName, and then click Properties.Note: ServiceName is a placeholder for the name of the service that you want to debug.
-
On the Log On tab, click to select the Allow service to interact with Desktop check box under Local System account, and then click OK.
Method 2: Use Registry Editor
-
In Registry Editor, locate, and then click the following registry subkey:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ServiceNameNote Replace ServiceName with the name of the service that you want to debug. For example, if you want to debug a service named MyService, locate and then click the following registry key:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MyService
-
Under the Name field in the right pane of Registry Editor, right-click Type, and then click Modify. The Edit DWORD Value dialog box appears.
-
Change the text in the Value data text box to the result of the binary OR operation with the binary value of the current text and the binary value, 0x00000100, as the two operands. The binary value, 0x00000100, corresponds to the SERVICE_INTERACTIVE_PROCESS constant that is defined in the WinNT.h header file on your computer. This constant specifies that a service is interactive in nature.
3. When a service starts, the service communicates to the Service Control Manager how long the service must need to start (the time-out period for the service). If the Service Control Manager does not receive a "service started" notice from the service within this time-out period, the Service Control Manager terminates the process that hosts the service. This time-out period is typically less than 30 seconds. If you do not adjust this time-out period, the Service Control Manager ends the process and the attached debugger while you are trying to debug. To adjust this time-out period, follow these steps:
-
In Registry Editor, locate, and then right-click the following registry subkey:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control
-
Point to New, and then click DWORD Value. In the right pane of Registry Editor, notice that New Value #1 (the name of a new registry entry) is selected for editing.
-
Type ServicesPipeTimeout to replace New Value #1, and then press ENTER.
-
Right-click the ServicesPipeTimeout registry entry that you created in step c, and then click Modify. The Edit DWORD Value dialog box appears.
-
In the Value data text box, type TimeoutPeriod, and then click OKNote:TimeoutPeriod is a placeholder for the value of the time-out period (in milliseconds) that you want to set for the service. For example, if you want to set the time-out period to 24 hours (86400000 milliseconds), type 86400000.
-
Restart the computer. You must restart the computer for Service Control Manager to apply this change.
4. Start your Windows service. To do this, follow these steps:
-
Click Start, and then point to Programs.
-
On the Programs menu, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Services. The Services console appears.
-
In the right pane of the Services console, right-click ServiceName, and then click Start.Note: ServiceName is a placeholder for the name of the service that you want to debug.
Note: Few of the references are taken from other sites/sources
Now we have a many question at one single place and we can brush-up anytime when we need to.
Note: Some Contents are copied from various Interview Websites.

Ehsan SajjadPosted Mar 4, 2016, 7:15 AM
Great work
Amit AggarwalPosted Mar 4, 2016, 7:07 AM
Quick guide thanks
Upendra Pratap ShahiPosted Mar 3, 2016, 9:34 AM
nice share...thanks for sharing...
Jaipal ReddyPosted Mar 3, 2016, 7:55 AM
Nice share sir .
Navratna PawalePosted Mar 3, 2016, 7:53 AM
Nice...
Raja TPosted Mar 3, 2016, 6:51 AM
Nice, Thanks for sharing
Sibeesh VenuPosted Mar 3, 2016, 6:31 AM
Nice Share
Ammar ShaukatPosted Mar 3, 2016, 5:18 AM
I could't read it complete.
Humayun Kabir MamunPosted Mar 3, 2016, 4:41 AM
Nice...
Sr KarthigaPosted Mar 2, 2016, 7:21 AM
good one
Sr KarthigaPosted Mar 2, 2016, 7:21 AM
Nice explanation
Khan Abrar AhmedPosted May 25, 2014, 10:12 AM
Great Artical sir, thanks for posting
Sam HobbsPosted Sep 28, 2013, 6:46 PM
It is true that the VB .Net equivalent of the C# "using" statement is the "Imports" statement but I think the term "import" for this is very confusing. The VB .Net documentation says that the "Imports" statement "only removes the need to qualify names that are already available to your project". I think it would really help to add clarification such as that to this article too.
Sam HobbsPosted Sep 28, 2013, 5:30 PM
Instead of comparing J2EE and .NET, it is more relevant to compare J2EE to the Common Language Infrastructure (CLI), which is designed to be independent of any operating system. Also, Mono and Xamarin are worth mentioning in that context. Xamarin does implement .Net for other operating systems, at least iOS and Android. Also, earlier in this article it says that the "Mono project is attempting to implement the .NET framework". My understanding is that Mono is a success.
Pavan RamamurthyPosted Sep 18, 2013, 1:15 AM
gud collection......
Sam HobbsPosted Sep 17, 2013, 12:01 AM
Do all languages (such as VB) other than C plus plus use a colon to inherit from a class? If not then it seems confusing to say that C plus plus does not but not mention other languages.
Sam HobbsPosted Sep 16, 2013, 11:56 PM
I think it should be noted that non-managed compliers use the heap differently. Many non-managed compilers use the operating system's memory management as the heap.
Sam HobbsPosted Sep 16, 2013, 11:55 PM
I think the answer to the question "How can I stop my code being reverse-engineered from IL?" is out of date.
Sam HobbsPosted Sep 16, 2013, 11:53 PM
Is it not true that the C /CLI language is capable of mixing deterministic destruction and garbage collection? Therefore the garbage collection algorithm does not explain why the other languages do not offer deterministic destruction. I think that they do not because the decision was made to not support it but technically it is possible.
ad codersPosted Sep 12, 2013, 4:28 AM
Gr8 Collection,gud work.