Using CCW, it's easy to expose a .NET object to the unmanaged world. This article goes a step further and does it the "manual" way, registering the Class Factory inside a C# windows service.

In the class factory, he creates a .NET object and hands back a COM usable pointer by using Marshal.GetComInterfaceForObject.

The *other* .NET user group. Some Interknowlogy guys are involved with this one.

At least this one is along the coast (down in Sorrento Valley) so I can have a chance to get there. The one I used to go to was moved to Poway area, so no chance.

San Diego .NET Developers Group

Just a good reference on how to use custom actions to tweak IIS during Web Setup Project deployment.

Shows things like custom user interface dialog box, custom actions, etc.

Article here

Thanks to Bruce at work for mentioning this tool.

It's like Firefox's "Live HTTP Headers" extension, but on steroids. Intercepts HTTP protocol messages to/from the browser by setting itself up as the proxy. Works automagically with IE by changing the settings for you, but you can manually setup Firefox to go through the "proxy" as well.

Not only can you view all the activity going and coming to/from the server, but you can set breakpoints in the pipeline to modify the contents of the headers and then let the message continue through! Even better, you can write handlers for certain messages to tweak the headers programatically on their way through.

Tool is here

MSDN article here

I never took the time to look at the EventLog implementation before. Coming from the C++ / Win32 world, I know there's a lot missing in the .NET EventLog class, such as the replacement strings and the use of the .mc (message compiler) file, etc.

Today, I decided to look into it a bit more, checking out what needs to be registered for my custom event log source messages to be viewed correctly.

When you call EventLog.CreateEventSource, (which I know you don't have to call, but the runtime does this for you when you first call EventLog.WriteEntry) it registers EventLogMessages.dll (from the .NET install dir) as the message file. See registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Eventlog\Application\YourEventSourceName

EventLogMessages.dll is the hack. It has the message file resource, and 65,535 entries, all with %1 as the message. So when you write a message via WriteEntry, it takes the entire string that you provide, and stores that as replacement #1.

Lame because:

1. entire message is stored instead of ID and replacement strings, so takes up much more space.
2. when READING the event log, you don't get the localized version of the message, you get what was created at runtime, since it's the only replacement string available.

In a news post I was reading somewhere, they were guessing that this is a hold over from the VB6 code - since that's pretty much exactly what VB6 does for event log messaging. Ugh.

Here's an article where a guy comes up with a replacement for EventLog class.

The Code Project - Enhanced EventLog writing for .NET Applications - C# Programming

Similar to the MSXML command line utility that came with MSXML downloads in the past. This one is based on the .NET Framework System.Xml classes.

.NET XSLT Command Line Utility

keywords: nxslt xslt xsl xpath

Thanks to Jeff Key, author of SnippetCompiler for these other small, simple, yet useful .net utilties.

.net stuff

Some examples: Ruler, XmlDocViewer, NetPing (ping a subnet)

Can't tell yet if she's a MS insider (haven't read many posts yet), but at least some interesting info about XBox 360.

Blog is here

Along with it, there is Sharepoint info...