Html5 Unobtrusive Form Validation for ASP.NET MVC

I have a project that I was able to make use of modern browsers HTML5 form validation. But I wanted to include the validation that also takes place from within aspnet mvc so there is a unified experience with the validating the form. I took the jquery.unobtrusive-validation.js and made some modifications to it to hook in to the aspnet mvc validation. It is not yet 100%, the “Required” aspnet mvc validation doesn’t seem to “trigger” unless the field is filled out, then attempted to be submitted, and then cleared again, but the default html5 “required” validation message still shows initially. Either way, I figured I would share this and maybe someone could build on it and improve it. Enjoy.

Here are some screenshots of the results.

Failed Regex Validation
 

Failed Minimum String Length Validation
 

Failed Remote Password Strength Validation


Failed Compare to Password Field Validation


Download from Skydrive

Visual Studio Achievements app for iPhone

A friend of mine liked the idea of the VSA app that I wrote for Android and decided to write an iOS version. It uses the exact same web API that the android version uses so it has the same features like the Leaderboard, viewing achievement details, user details, and marking users as a “favorite”. He also created the 9guy logo you see on the right for the iOS app.

The app will be available for free in iTunes once it passes the Apple approval process.

Now we just have to wait for the Channel9 Team to make the Visual Studio Achievements available to the public.

Update: The app has been approved by apple and should appear in the app store any time now.

Update 2: You can now get the iOS version of Visual Studio Achievements in iTunes

Visual Studio Achievements for Android

View Visual Studio Achievements right on your Android de vices. Don’t let those Windows Phone users have all the fun.

• View current leaderboard standings
• View user information on all completed and started achievements
• View information on each achievement

Once the service is fully launched, other features will come. Including the ability to monitor your achievements and progress, search and view other users achievements, and mark users as a favorite and easily monitor their progress to see if they are catching up to your score.

Now Available in the Android Market

Black Friday Web Hosting Sale

My host, Arvixe, is having a 48 hour Black Friday sale offering 50% off web hosting FOR LIFE. They offer the best options I have ever seen for Windows ASP.NET hosting then any other host for the cost. They also offer Linux hosting at even lower prices then the Windows ASP.NET hosting.

For example, I have unlimited disk space, monthly data transfer, dedicated application pools, domain aliases, subdomains, ftp accounts, pop3/imap email accounts, MySQL databases, ODBC DSNs, and MSSQL 2008 Databases. And I pay ~$8.00 a month. If you use the coupon code “Black Friday”, this will only cost you ~$4.00 a month!

Arvixe has LIVE customer service via phone available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. They also have Live Chat available as well. I have never had any issue reaching someone when I had an issue (that was usually my fault). They were always quick in resolving the issue as well as explaining what the cause was.

The coupon code “Black Friday” will be valid from 12:00AM PST Thursday, November 24th 2011 through 11:59:59PM PST Friday, November 25th 2011.

Arvixe Black Friday Sale

Mount Manager License 3 Day “Black Friday” Sale!

Following the strange times that all the stores seem to be having this Black Friday, I am having my own “Black Friday” sale on the license for Mount Manager. If you buy the license for Mount Manager between now and 11:59PM CST on Friday 11/25/2011, you will save $1.00 on the cost of the license.

If you do not yet see the lower price, try again later, the market has to push the changes out before it takes affect.

Purchase License from the Android Market

Eclipse Color Theme

To go along with the other themes that I have posted here in the past based on Coding Instinct, here is a Coding Instinct theme for Eclipse Color Theme. The site also has a download in EPF format (Eclipse Preferences).

Eclipse Color Theme (XML) – for Eclipse Color Theme Plugin
Eclipse Preferences (EPF) – for Eclipse Import

Connecting to Nook Color w/ CyanogenMod7 via ADB over USB

The Nook Color is a great device, especially when CyanogenMod is installed on the device. The only issue I was having with the device, I was unable to connect to the device via ADB over USB.

I followed the steps here, but was still unable to see the device via ADB. After looking through the “fix” that was linked from XDA, I noticed that it modifies, or creates a file in %USERPROFILE%\.android\ called adb_usb.ini. That file contains vendor id’s for the devices and it contains 0x2080. As I was digging around looking to fix this issue, I noticed that in the root of my Android SDK installation there is a folder called .android. In that folder, just like the one in my user profile, there is a file called adb_usb.ini. This file is empty, except a couple comments describing the file. I added the 0x2080 to this file, then I restarted adb by doing an adb kill-server, then an adb start-server.

Now when I do adb devices, I can see the Nook Color and I can perform any adb or shell commands on the device via adb over USB.

New version of Mount Manager available

I published a new version of Mount Manager last night that addresses some issues along with adding new functionality.

• Fixed bug when mounting / unmounting a share that contains a “space”
• Fixed bug when mounting / unmounting when mount point contains a “space”
• Fixed bug if the share path or mount point contains a trailing slash
• Changed the default mount point “base” to /sdcard/cifs/ instead of /mnt/cifs/. This eliminates the need to remount / as read/write. If you have mounts already defined to /mnt/cifs/, I suggest that you move them to /sdcard/cifs/ otherwise you will get errors when mounting and you will manually have to remount / as read/write.
• Added a built-in file/folder browser used for selecting the mount point or browsing for module files to load.
• Added ability to browse for network shares. Some machines are not browsable, depending on how the shares are set up. In these cases, you will just have to manually enter the share path.
• Updated the admob library to the latest version.

Getting GPS working again on the Vibrant w/ CM7 nightlies

I love CyanogenMod and I thank all of them for their hard work that they do for basically nothing except the “thrill”. I have been using that since the very first version on my HTC ADP1. Then I bought the Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant from T-Mobile and CM was not available for the device. I stuck with the “Stock” Samsung TouchWiz UI that I made some tweaks to here and there to get a better experience for myself. I did things like rooting the device, adding the CarDock, removing the crap software that I don’t ever use, removed the “WorldClock” and added the stock Alarm Clock and other things here and there.

The GPS on this device has always been a topic of discussion, as there were issues with it from launch. It would take up to 10 minutes or more, to get a lock, and once you got the lock, you would probably lose it. There were people much smarter then me that found ways to make the GPS usable on the Stock TouchWiz UI.

After some time, Team Whiskey released the Bionix ROM. This was/is a ROM still based off the TouchWiz version of Android at its core, but was a better experience as it included functionality that was not in stock TouchWiz, and it didn’t include the bloatware. The biggest thing that Team Whiskey brought to the Vibrant with Bionix was Voodoo. Now, I know they did not create Voodoo, and other ROMs had support too, but I am just babbling about what Bionix did for me. I ran this ROM for some time, and a mod that I created that brought the Gingerbread keyboard with working the hepatic feedback to FroYo ROM is even included in the distribution. But there was still something missing for me.

I believe, at least for me, that the Vanilla Android is a better user experience, and the CM modifications, is that experience, plus more for your “die-hard” android users. I would go to the CyanogenMod website often to see if there was any developments on getting a build of CM running on the Vibrant. Now, you may read this and say “It ran on the Vibrant for a while”, and that is true, but the steps needed to install it on the device was a pain in the ass, not to mention that there were a lot of things that were not working. These are the things that kept me on Bionix. Then the CM team that work on the Vibrant (and other Galaxy S devices too) got the install process to be a lot less of a pain. At that time, I decided to give it a try, and I knew that GPS, among some other bugs existed.

Then shortly after I started flashing these unofficial builds of CM, the nightlies started. At the time of this post, they have over 75 nightlies, but there are still some issues with it, including GPS. Which brings me to the actual title of this post. I found this thread over on XDA by stricklyrude27. He put together a set of scripts and files and steps that were created by other people (see thread for their credit) and placed them in to a single update.zip package.

I am running CM7.1-N76 with the GPSFix v1.4 and GPS works great. I get a lock in just a couple of seconds. If you are running CM7 on your Vibrant, head over to the thread and give it a try, at least until an official CM7 solution comes about.

Thank you to all that contribute to the CyanogenMod and especially to the SGS Team, also thanks to all that were involved in getting this fix working too. The android community is great and love that just about always, a solution to any issue is found.

Logitech Revue and Acoustic Research XSight Touch

Yesterday was a good gadget day for me. Both my Logitech Revue and Acoustic Research XSight Touch arrived in the mail.

So far I like the Revue. $99 is a much better price for that device, I don't know if I would have been too happy if I paid the $249 for it. What I really want is ADB access to it, or I would settle for the Android Market. It needs "more" apps. My TV has more apps then the Revue, but I really like Chrome and the Logitech Media Player (I think its just a DLNA client). It works well, I watched a couple videos streamed from my PC to the Revue and used TVersity to do the transcoding.

The Netflix app is what you would expect, actually, it is the exact same app that is on my Vizio TV. The gallery app will pull down your images from Picasa.

I also like the Queue, but I will probably use it more for NetCasts like TWiT and TWiG. The Queue does fall a little short when it comes to searching for NetCasts. There is no way to manually type in the RSS feed in the Queue, and some that I searched for, like TWiG, would only give me the audio feed. You can get around this limitation by opening up Chrome and visit the NetCast site and select the RSS icon in the Search bar, or open the RSS feed directly if it is available. This will open up the Queue subscription option screen.

I am very eager for the Market to come to the Revue. I can’t wait to start writing Android applications for this and other Google TV enabled devices.

I still have a lot of playing around to do with the Revue, but so far, I am of the opinion that it is well worth the $99. If you don't have one, and thought about getting one before, I say go get it now.

 

That brings me to the AR XSight Touch Universal Remote. I got the XSight Touch off Woot.com when they had it on there about a week or so ago. It was a good deal, they retailed for about $250, but Amazon has them now for about $75. Woot had them for $40 with shipping.

The remote will control up to 18 different devices and has a 2.2" Color LCD touch display. It has built in 433 MHz RF but requires an accessory to make use of that. The buttons are back-lit and are easy to see in the dark. The remote as an accelerometer of some sort, as it will automatically turn on the display and key lights when the device is picked up. It comes with a lithium-ion battery and a dock for charging the remote. The remote can "learn" from other IR remotes, programmed via the remote itself, or you can program it using an online tool with a huge collection of devices in their database.

Setup was pretty easy, I did one device from the remote, and 2 more from the website. The website tool did seem a little slow, but I hope it was because all the "wooters" were trying to setup their devices. The website saves your configuration so if the remote loses its configuration, it can be easily restored. You can also setup "key macros" so you can easily turn on/off a range of devices with one key press. It can even control some home automation stuff, like security systems, lighting, etc. I have mine set up to control my Vizio TV, Xfinity HD Cablebox and Xbox 360.

Overall, I am happy with the XSight, and I will be using that as my main remote for the TV/Cable, and the Revue keyboard will be when I want to actually make use of the Google TV functionality.

Logitech Revue w/ Google TV - http://amzn.to/pulB7a
XSight Touch Universal Remote - http://amzn.to/oFHrNE