ExpressionMaximizer

30 October 2009

A bigger expression shape window is a feature that almost always appears on “next version of BizTalk wish lists”.

Every time Microsoft releases a new version of BizTalk we are all very disappointed that they did not make the expression window resizable or at least bigger.

There are rumors that this is done to discourage developers to write a lot of code in those windows and move to external assemblies with helper classes instead.

Although I agree with that I still think it would be very nice to have a bigger window occasionally.

Like the “Orchestration Variable Retriever Functoid” this was on my “experimental things to do list” for a long time. I never had or took the chance to try it until BizTalk king Stephen W. Thomas announced his competition for the best BizTalk tip or trick.

Of course I want to join this competition so I started coding. Now that it is finished I must admit it has become quite a hack but it seems to work :-) .

Anyway the “ExpressionMaximizer” will be my entry for the competition.

A quick walkthrough:

I have an orchestration with an expression shape containing a lot of code:

orchestration

I double click the expression shape to open it (in normal mode):

normal_expressionwindow

With expression window still open I press CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+M (nice key combination :-) ) and ……:

maximized_expressionwindow

I have a big expression window where I can type many long lines of code!!!!

Everything is back to normal when you close the window and open it again.

Note that you first have to open the expression shape before pressing the key combination.

Want to try it yourself?
(description below is based on Visual Studio 2008)

- Download this zip file and extract it somewhere.
- Click ‘Tools’ –> ‘External Tools…’
- Press the ‘Add’ button
- Type a title, e.g. ‘Expression Window Maximizer’
- Fill in the command text box by browsing to the extracted ‘ExpressionMaximizer.exe’

ExternalTools

- Press the ‘OK’ button
- Select ‘Tools’ –> ‘Customize…’
- Press the ‘Keyboard…’ button
- In the ‘Show commands containing:’ text box type ‘Tools.External’
- Select the correct ‘Tools.ExternalCommandX’ from the list. (You need to find out the correct entry by counting the external tools in the Tools menu).
- Click in the text box ‘Press shortcut keys:’ to set the focus to it.
- Press CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+M
- Click the ‘Assign’ button.

Customize

- Press the ‘Ok’ button.
- Press the ‘Close’ button.

I tried this on ‘Windows Server 2008 R2/VS2008′ and ‘Windows Server 2003 R2/VS2005’ without problems but I still take no responsibility for malformed windows or other disasters :-) After all it is a big hack!

If you’re interested you can find the (VS2008) source code here.

4 Comments | BizTalk | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Randal van Splunteren

BizTalk development on Server 2008 R2

30 September 2009

Microsoft recently RTM-ed a new release of their server operation system ‘Windows Server 2008 R2’. Although debatable I think they did the right thing when they decided to only release a 64 bit version.

From a developer perspective however there is a nasty side effect that you should be aware of. This is caused by the fact that there is no MS virtualization tool running on a client OS that supports 64 bit guests.

Most developers follow the best practice to do development in a virtual environment and use their host for e-mail, word processing, etc.

In my case the host was Windows 7. I used my server running hyper-v to initially build the a new virtual BizTalk 2009 development box running on Windows Server 2008 R2. After that was done I wanted to transfer the .vhd to my laptop and run it from there.

As far as I know the MS options for running the VM are:

  • Microsoft Virtual PC 2007
  • Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2
  • Microsoft Windows Virtual PC (currently RC)

As none of these options support 64 bit guest meaning I can’t use a Microsoft Virtualization tool to run my new Windows Server 2008 R2 development environment. Hyper-V supports 64 bit guest OS but doesn’t run on Windows 7.

The “not so nice” solutions left for me were:

  • Use a non MS virtualization tool (like sun virtual box or VMware) that support 64 bit guests.
  • Replace Windows 7 on my host with windows server 2008 hyper-V.
  • Rebuild the virtual machine and use another 32 bit OS.

6 Comments | BizTalk | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Randal van Splunteren