By Paul Rony on 1/10/2008 7:35 AM

First a little background.  One of the new features of SplendidCRM 2.0 is the detection of a mobile-based browser.  Within days of release, a customer requested support for a BlackBerry, and iPhone and an iPod. 

 

Our first instinct was to search the UserAgent Request variable for any of the keywords found in the most common mobile browsers.  This seems to be a very popular technique for the PHP crowd. Digging a little deeper, we found the collection of .Net 2.0 browser files at C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\CONFIG\Browsers.  Then, we found that we could add our own application-specific to the App_Browsers folder.  The trick is to chain the app-specific profile to the last detected browser ID.

 

Once we knew what we were looking for, we were pleased to find a BlackBerry profile on CodeProject at http://www.codeproject.com/KB/aspnet/BlackberryASPNET.aspx, but we were surprised that we did not...

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By Paul Rony on 12/9/2007 12:04 AM

Have you tried Visual Studio 2008 yet?  Microsoft recently released it to MSDN subscribers http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/default.aspx.  You can even download the free Express version http://www.microsoft.com/express/download/default.aspx.

 

We had a customer that was having trouble compiling, so we decided to retest on all supported versions of Visual Studio.  While we were at it, we decided to include all versions of Visual Studio 2008.  You can review our support matrix that was a direct result of these tests.

 

Loading SplendidCRM 1.4 into Visual Studio 2008 was completely uneventful.  The project was automatically and it compiled without any errors on Express, Standard and Professional versions.  We have not tested the Team edition, but we do not expect any problems...

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By Paul Rony on 12/3/2007 2:40 PM

By Paul Rony on 11/18/2007 1:31 PM

A customer recently inquired about our support of a mobile browser.  My immediate answer was no, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that this was one of the features we wanted to add after migrating to .NET 2.0 MasterPages.  Feature creep is a terrible thing, so I'm not going to call this feature creep.  I'm going to call it a re-prioritization of a planned feature.

 

The cool thing is that we were able to create a new master page for the mobile browser.  This means that 95% of our code went unchanged.  We did need to modify our dynamic view generation to separate fields by rows instead of columns and we were compelled to create new search controls.  We had to touch a much of files, but most of the edits were minor.  Since our list, edit and detail views are all data driven, we created new mobile versions of the views for all supported modules.  This means that you can dynamically configure the layout for the mobile users.

 

We have tested the new system on a PocketPC...

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By Paul Rony on 10/24/2007 7:27 PM

We have a number of big projects that occupy our time, but we were able to slip-in one long-overdue feature.  When we designed the reporting engine in SplendidCRM to be based on Microsoft's Report Definition Language (RDL), we knew that we would one day be able to import RDL files created by the SQL Server Business Intelligence Development Studio.  That day has arrived.

I'm happy to report that we are testing a build that allows you to create invoices using a full-fledged report designer, and import the report files into SplendidCRM for execution.  SplendidCRM has a basic built-in report designer, but it is only useful to create tabular reports.  With the ability to import report files, you can create freeform reports, like the kind typically used to generate quotes or invoices.  These reports can even embed images so that your invoices would be nothing less than stunning.

By Paul Rony on 8/22/2007 10:05 PM

By Paul Rony on 8/10/2007 2:46 AM

The day started with the goal of posting a new VHD that includes Visual Studio 2005 Pro configured to compile and debug the latest SplendidCRM build.  The day ended with migration to Amazon S3 (Simple Storage Service). 

 

http://www.amazon.com/S3-AWS-home-page-Money/b/ref=sc_fe_l_2/105-7259275-4637243?ie=UTF8&node=16427261&no=3435361&me=A36L942TSJ2AJA

 

We were compelled to move our downloads from TimeWarner to Amazon because the new VHD was 4G and we were already bumping into the 3G limit on our existing file server.  TimeWarner has served us well, but they quoted an additional $100 per month to add the 4G.  By moving to Amazon S3, not only do we save the $100, but we expect to save an additional $50 per month.

 

If you are going to check out Amazon S3, you will also want to check out Sissle http://sissle.s3.amazonaws.com/index.htm. ...

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By Paul Rony on 6/27/2007 1:38 AM

We had a customer that was having trouble with the prerequisites to load and debug the SplendidCRM project.  First you start with Visual Studio 2005 Professional, then you add the Web Application Projects add-in, which incidentally requires a patch before it will install.  It seems simple enough but this person was still unable to load the project without the pesky Convert dialog appearing.  If configured properly, the SplendidCRM project should load with just a warning about being unable to attach to our version control system, so the presence of the Convert dialog suggests that the Web Application Projects add-in was not functioning.

 

Instead of wasting countless hours trying to get VS 2005 Pro to work, we though we would research what it would take to migrate SplendidCRM to the Web Site style of projects.  The big advantage to being a Web Site Project is that our customers can use the free Visual Studio Express Editions http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/downloads/....

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By Paul Rony on 6/12/2007 1:43 PM

eWeek just posted a podcast between Mike Vizard and myself.  Straight from the horse's mouth, you might say.

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2144741,00.asp

By Paul Rony on 5/1/2007 12:41 AM

In honor of the SplendidCRM 1.4 release, I’m going to post an email that I sent to John Roberts, CEO of SugarCRM.

-----Original Message-----From: Paul Rony Sent: Thursday, November 04, 2004 1:26 PMTo: john@sugar.comSubject: Introduction to SplendidCRM

John Roberts,

I'm working on a project that might interest you.  As a personal challenge, I've decided to port your SugarCRM application from a LAMP implementation to a Microsoft .NET 2.0 implementation.  My original goal was to learn the new features of .NET 2.0 and, in most cases, the only way to learn is to create a real and complete application.  It then occurred to me that the results could be a showcase on how to convert a LAMP project to .NET and how much better, in my opinion, the application would be because of it. 

I simply don't agree with your SourceForge.net statement that LAMP is "the least complex, most portable, and most cost-efficient platform to run a CRM application on".  Although...

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