CodeBank - A small centralized code repository built using the .NET framework.

• Download source and demo files - 163 Kb

Introduction

After first discovering CodeProject and using it, I was yet again amazed at the value that such sites provide developers. Reviewing the site and its features reminded me of all the times I had wished that I had not made personal code folders. When we all do this, teams of developers seem to write duplicate versions of code, whether it be a string splitter or something much more complicated. Being a beginner to .NET development, I decided to write a simple code repository and host it on the my website, so that I can paste my code snippets in a location that I can always gain access to, and so CodeBank was born.

Configuration

First we need to ensure your machine meets the following prerequisites:

• IIS is installed
• SQL Server 2000 is installed
• The .NET framework is installed
• Any patches are installed with respect to the above 3 items.

Note that if you installed Visual Studio in order to debug on this machine, and the machine is a PDC (Domain Server) you will not be able to use the interactive debugging. Microsoft disabled this feature for security reasons.

When you have downloaded the zip file to a temporary location, you should have a directory labeled codebank. Please follow the tasks in order for the site to be operational.

• Copy the CodeBank directory to your root web directory. e.g. d:\inetpub\wwwroot\codebank.
• Create an IIS virtual directory for the following:
  • Codebank - virtual directory for CodeBank.
  • ProjectCaseStudies - virtual directory where case studies are uploaded for each project you create.
  • ProjectUploads - virtual directory where code files are uploaded for each project you create.
• Ensure that IIS and ASPNET users have access to be able to write to projectcasestudies and projectuploads.
• Set these shares to Everyone initially. When the application uploads correctly, you can adjust the security accordingly.
• Start up SQL Server 2000 Enterprise manager and create a blank database named codebank
• Right click the newly created database codebank and select to restore a database from backup.
• Navigate to the codebank\sql directory and select the file named codebank.bak.
• Click OK to restore
• Navigate to the Web.Config file located in the root of codebank directory and make the appropriate changes to the <APPSETTINGS> entries

Web.config

In adherence with good coding standards, Microsoft recommends placing custom settings in the web.config file. I felt it was a relevant place for the database and other web settings. Please ensure that you change these according to your database username, password and respective file paths.

appSettings
  add key="CONNECTION_STRING" 
    value="server=servername or ip address;database=codebank;
                 user id=your username;password=your password" 
  add key="FILE_PATH" 
    value="x:\your web directory path\codebank\projectuploads\" 
  add key="FILE_VIRTUAL_DIRECTORY" 
    value="http://<your domain or machine name>/codebank/projectuploads/" 
  add key="CASE_PATH" 
     value="x:\<your web directory path>\codebank\projectcasestudies\" 
  add key="CASE_VIRTUAL_DIRECTORY" 
    value="http://<your domain or machine name>/codebank/projectcasestudies/" 
appSettings

Thanks

I would like to mention a thanks to CodeProject for inspiration and special thanks to my former colleague James Coleman for his direction.

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