Best regular expression for phone number that accepts many variations

Here is a handy regular expression that will accept many variations of an U.S. phone number, allowing the input to be somewhat flexible.

^\s*[(]?\d{3}[).\-]?\s*\d{3}(\s*|[.\-]?)\d{4}\s*$

// accepted
8015551212
801 555 1212
(801)5551212
801.555.1212
801.555-1212
801-555-1212
(801)555-1212
(801) 555-1212
801-555.1212
(801 555 1212
(801 555 1212
801)5551212

// rejected
8015551212a
80155512122
801a5551212
8015;551212
(801))5551212

.NET async / await - Great article on best practices (must read)

This is probably the best article I've read on the best practices on using async and await in .NET. It does a great job of explaining return types, exceptions, SynchronizationContext (how I originally stumbled on the article), and the differences between console apps, web apps, and GUI apps.

Definitely worth a read...twice.

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/jj991977.aspx

I've also attached a PDF of the content in case you want to save that off.

Download PDF

Favorite Videos to watch...

I thought I should start a list of my favorite videos.

The surprising truth about what motivates us
https://youtu.be/u6XAPnuFjJc

Spotify Engineering Culture (Part 1)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mpsn3WaI_4k

Spotify Engineering Culture (Part 2)
https://youtu.be/X3rGdmoTjDc

Product Strategy in 7 Minutes
https://vimeo.com/81544164

TPL extension and samples library from Microsoft (Parallel Programming)

This is a repost to the Microsoft TPL (task parallel library) samples library at:

https://code.msdn.microsoft.com/ParExtSamples/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=4179

This sample includes example applications and library functionality that demonstrate, utilize, and augment this support (it is not production quality). This sample is a single .zip containing a single Visual Studio .sln file, which then contains multiple Visual Studio projects that highlight key capabilities provided by the .NET Framework 4 and the parallel programming support it provides. Below are descriptions of the included examples.

Specifically, if you are looking for the TPL extensions extras, visit the samples page and search for "ParallelExtensionExtras".

In case this page ever disappears, the samples download can also be downloaded here.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6o_2blMHEfRbmJaRklOUDhHR2s/view?usp=sharing

Raspberry Pi / Windows 10 Iot - Getting Started

Microsoft updated their Iot Windows 10 content for several platforms, including the Pi.  I started from scratch getting my Pi hardware installed with Windows 10 (core) on the Pi, then proceeded to use Visual Studio 2015 to get my lil' LED light blinking.  Surprisingly I was able to stay within Visual Studio the entire time to write the C# code (no Mono involved), compile, deploy, and execute the application remotely on the Pi (oh yes...even debug the code executing remotely on the Pi).  The latest help/instructions from the Microsoft side have been updated to walk you through the steps in enough detail to be successful without having to search to the end of the Internet for answers.

Here are a few links that lay out the short journey (all you need to have is your Pi assembled).  The last link is the new C# Microsoft GPIO (General Purpose Input/Output hardware pin headers) library which makes is really nice to interface to the hardware.

Download Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi
http://ms-iot.github.io/content/en-US/Downloads.htm

Getting Started (select Raspberry Pi)
http://ms-iot.github.io/content/en-US/GetStarted.htm

Raspberry Pi Source Code Examples
https://github.com/ms-iot/samples/archive/develop.zip

C# Windows.Device.Gpio namespace
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/apps/windows.devices.gpio.aspx

Powershell to add Read permission on all files in a directory

Recently I needed to update all the files in a specific directory, adding Read permission for the "Users" NTFS group.  Here is a Powershell script to do that.  It can be easily modified to update other users/groups or different permission sets.

$base = "C:\somefolder"

$files = get-childitem $base

foreach ($file in $files) {

    $Acl = Get-Acl $file.FullName

    $Ar = New-Object  system.security.accesscontrol.filesystemaccessrule("Users","Read","Allow")

    $Acl.SetAccessRule($Ar)

    Set-Acl $file.FullName $Acl

}

Basic rules for using ResolveClientUrl in master pages (ASP.NET)

When writing ASP.NET Web Forms, the basic rules for using ResolveClientUrl in master pages are:

<img src="<%= ResolveClientUrl("~/x/resource.jpg")%>" />

<script src="<%= ResolveClientUrl("~/x/resource.js")%>"></script>

If you want to use ResolveClientUrl in the master page <head> section for script tags:

<asp:PlaceHolder ID="PlaceHolder1" runat="server">
   <script src="<%= ResolveClientUrl("~/x/resource.js")%>"></script>
</asp:PlaceHolder>

You do not need to use ResolveClientUrl for CSS link elements in the <head> section (they will automatically be resolved by ASP.NET).

PowerShell: Get a unique list of file name extensions within a directory folder (and sub-folders)

Here is a basic PowerShell script that will provide you a nice list of unique file name extensions for a given directory path. Nothing fancy here, but comes in handle once and a while.

Notice the -Recurse parameter that will drill down every sub-directory as well; remove this if you only want the top level directory.

Get-ChildItem -Path C:\Scripts -Recurse | Select-Object Extension | Sort-Object Extension | Get-Unique -asString

Woo-hoo!

Microsoft OWIN: Getting base path for web services (C#)

In my recent post on using OWIN and WebApi, I described how to separate your controllers into a separate DLL. Often the controllers need to call other methods that may need access to the base path of the web service (e.g. the bin folder).

The code below can be used to find that base path from other classes, without having to always pass a path parameter from method to method.

OWIN hosting using a Separate WebApi Controller DLL

Here is a bare bones demonstration (4 minutes) showing you how to create a standalone class library of a WebApi controller, then hosting the controller in Microsoft's OWIN (in IIS). This is done using Visual Studio 2013 Update 3.

The video can be watched here: YouTube Watch

The source can be downloaded here: Download Source

What do you think?

WeightedRandom - Select content based on weights (C# / .NET)

Need to select content from a collection based on weights?  Here is a great .NET 4+ class that is very helpful.

The class can be used with just about any collection and you can pass in a delegate/lamda to determine what the weight is on each collection object.