Visual Studio 2012- Disable All Caps Menu

If you open Visual Studio 2012, you can see all-caps interface.  Do you like it?  If you don’t like it, you can disable it in registry key. 

Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\General\

Add a DWORD (32-bit ) value ( in my Windows Server 2008 R2 X64)

Enter SuppressUppercaseConversion and Enter 1

Open Visual Studio 2012 and all-caps menu is disabled.

TFS 2010 Continuous Integration Build: One check-in will trigger multiple builds.

In TFS 2010 Build Definition, if I use Continuous Integration build and the source controls folder points to TEST Project in 3 different build definitions (DEV, TEST, and Stage), every time after I make some changes in my TEST Project and check in the code, don’t feel surprised that 3 builds will be triggered automatically.

Good Strategy: Set up Multiple TFS Build Definitions for Multiple Environments

In order to fully use TFS Build Automation for our multiple environments, currently we set up 3 TFS Build Dentitions as follows.  

Branch & Environment	TFS Build Definition
DEV	Source Control Folder points to DEV Project in DEV environment (Web.config and service reference points to DEV)
TEST	Source Control Folder points to DEV Project in TEST environment (Web.config and service reference points to TEST)
STAGE	Source Control Folder points to DEV Project in STAGE environment (Web.config and service reference points to STAGE)
PROD	We don’t set up definition in PROD because it is not allowed for us to do so.

In order to implement Unit Tests, WCF Tests, DB Tests and Coded Web Tests in TFS build definitions above, I need to create a TEST project that adds 3 different addresses (URLs) in service reference for multiple environments. I also need to add 3 Test lists called BVTDEV, BVTTEST and BVTSTAGE in Test List Editor and put required tests inside them separately.

Therefore, one TEST Project with different Test List is always available for all environments.

Branch & Environment	TFS build Definition
DEV	Source Control Folder points to DEV Project in DEV environment Source Control Folder points to TEST Project in DEV environment  (Test List to run: select BVTDEV)
TEST	Source Control Folder points to DEV Project in TEST environment Source Control Folder points to TEST Project in TEST environment (Test List to run: select BVTTEST)
STAGE	Source Control Folder points to DEV Project in STAGE environment Source Control Folder points to TEST Project in STAGE environment (Test List to run: select BVTSTAGE)
PROD	We don’t set up definition in PROD because it is not allowed for us to do so.

From our previous experience, when we push the code from DEV to TEST or from TEST to STAGE environment, DB changes always cause the issue and those BVTs can help us quickly capture if it is a good build or not.

I know some people would like to use 1 build definition for multiple environments. I don’t recommend it because different environment has different configuration and different service reference address. For TFS reporting, we can also know the build quality status for DEV /TEST / STAGE.

Setting up multiple TFS build definitions for multiple environments is a wonderful strategy for our current Silverlight 5 Project.

TFS 2010 Clone Build Definition

Last year I set up many TFS build dentitions for different environments (DEV, TEST and STAGE). When setting up different build dentition, I found TFS 2010 doesn't natively provide the feature of Clone Build Definition and it was really time consuming to set them up individually.

On Nov 26, 2012, I wrote a post entitled Fix the issue of Internal Error in Changeset in TFS 2010 . After installing TFS powerful tools 2011, the feature of Clone Build Definition appears in TFS 2010.

It is good news for me because I can clone many build definitions I want.

Silverlight does not support GIF images

Recently our tester tested one scenario in Silverlight 5: after uploading JPG, PNG, BMP or GIF file, the GIF/ BMP image didn’t appear in Silverlight 5 Application. Therefore, she logged the bug.

I told her that Silverlight does not natively support GIF image.  Our developer would like to fix the bug for displaying BMP image in Silverlight 5.

Don’t copy last name with Apostrophe from MS word 2010 to SQL Server 2008 R2

Today I use the following SQL command to see how many users have Apostrophe in the last name column. However, it only returns 1 row. I feel so surprised.

SELECT *

FROM from Table

where last_NM like '%''%'

After investigation, I notice one user’s last name has the special Apostrophe and that’s why the data is never returned.

This makes me think that someone used MS word 2010 , entered his last name and made a copy/paste to SQL Server 2008 R2.

Do you see the difference about Apostrophe ? The first one and the third one have the same Apostrophe .

If I use the following SQL query with special Apostrophe, the data is returned.

SELECT *

FROM from Table

where last_NM like '%’%'

Windows 8 Microsoft Account: The login screen always shows Other User after the reboot

I got my HP Windows 8 (Consumer) laptop recently and I used Microsoft account to set up this machine for my wife. “Microsoft account" is the new name for what used to be called a "Windows LiveID."

I also applied latest Windows 8 update.  After that, I added a user via my Microsoft account with admin right. I could not believe my wife and I  got truncatedusername_000 in the user profile as follows: 

After 1 day, my wife didn’t like Windows 8 and said she will not use it any more. Therefore,  I deleted her account.

I added a new language (Chinese Traditional), changed system locale to Chinese and it caused the reboot. After that, I could not believe I saw the other user login screen. When I clicked ok, it showed the login name – my wife Microsoft account (sun42_000), which was deleted already.

I also noticed: After I changed the system locale back to the US and still used my account in Windows 8, the latest Windows update caused the reboot and the login screen still showed the deleted Microsoft account (sun42_000)

This is a very basic scenario (BVT). I can’t believe Microsoft Windows Team shipped Windows 8 to customers. 

After that, I don’t like Windows 8 and I successfully upgraded Windows 8 to Windows 7. (Successfully upgrade Windows 8 to Windows 7 on HP Pavilion G7-2240US and fix the issue of Windows cannot be installed on this disk. The selected disk is of the GPT partition style)