Amar Galla's Weblog » Miscellaneous

Virtual PC Guest OS Performance

Amar — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 17:50:00 +0000

Matt Hester has a nice set of tips for optimising your Virtual PC’s to get the best performance out of the base system. Check them out. They are definitely worth a look.

Matt Hester’s WebLog : Virtual PC Guest OS Performance Tips Part 1 of 3

[Virtual Server] could not be started because there is not enough physical memory or system resources available

Amar — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 17:40:00 +0000

I recently came across a very strange problem. Tried it with both Virtual PC and Virtual Server. It just refused to start a second VM saying that could not be started because there is not enough physical memory or system resources available. I had over 10GB disk space free, and over 1.4 GB ram free. So I was sure resources was not a problem.

After fiddling with it a bit, a quick net search did the trick. If you have InCD software installed ( comes with Nero ) then it somehow causes this problem. If you dont want to uninstall your Nero installation, just go to Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Services and stop the InCD Helper service and set it to manual start instead of automatic. This instantly solved my problem and all 3 Windows 2003 VM’s booted up perfectly.

Thanks to Angus Logan’s Blog and Benjamin Day’s Blog for the help.

O/R Mapping

Amar — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 15:34:00 +0000

While doing a research on O/R Mapping and what exactly it is, I came across an excellent post by Frans Bouma at http://weblogs.asp.net/fbouma/archive/2004/10/09/240225.aspx . A excellent piece and explained in a very practical way.

A must read for anyone who uses ADO and database access in the Microsoft world which unfortunately simply ignores these fantastic concepts to work with data applications. Will definitely broaden up your view and give you a new perspective to your application design.

Posted at DotNetJunkies on Tuesday, October 19, 2004 2:26 PM

Configuring Word Automation

Amar — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 15:32:00 +0000

I found some of these links valuable in trying to configure the server to support word automation.

INFO: Considerations for Server-Side Automation of Office
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/257757/EN-US/

How To Configure Office Applications to Run Under the Interactive User Account
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;288366

How to configure Office applications to run under a specific user account
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;288367

How to configure Office applications for automation from a COM+/MTS package
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;288368

Posted at DotNetJunkies on Wednesday, October 13, 2004 4:41 PM

Word Automation Code

Amar — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 15:30:00 +0000

Here is the sample code to get Word Automation working. Assuming that you have already added the reference to the Word dll’s to your project.

Create a datasource file (*.odc) in Word by choosing Mail Merge option, and when it asks to select a data source, choose to create a new one and save the .odc file to your web folder. Store the password in the file and do not select any specific table in it.

Word.Application wrdApp;
Word._Document wrdDoc;

object oMissing = System.Reflection.Missing.Value;
object oFalse = false;
object oTrue = true;

Word.MailMerge wrdMailMerge;

// Create an instance of Word
wrdApp = new Word.Application();
wrdApp.Visible = false;

// Open the template document.
string TemplateFile = TemplateFilePath + selectedTemplate;
object oFile = Server.MapPath(TemplateFile); wrdDoc = wrdApp.Documents.Open(ref oFile, ref oMissing,ref oTrue, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing, ref oMissing);

wrdDoc.Select();
wrdMailMerge = wrdDoc.MailMerge;

// Create a MailMerge Data file.
object oSql = “Select * from “ + viewName + ” where Account <> ‘NULL’”;
string ODCFile = Server.MapPath(System.Configuration.ConfigurationSettings.AppSettings["ODCFile"]); wrdDoc.MailMerge.OpenDataSource(ODCFile,ref oMissing,ref oMissing,ref oFalse,ref oMissing,ref oMissing,ref oMissing,ref oMissing,ref oMissing,ref oMissing,ref oMissing,ref oMissing,ref oSql,ref oMissing,ref oFalse,ref oMissing);

wrdMailMerge.SuppressBlankLines = true;

// Perform mail merge.
wrdMailMerge.Destination = Word.WdMailMergeDestination.wdSendToPrinter;
wrdMailMerge.Execute(ref oFalse);

if(wrdDoc != null)
{

wrdDoc.Saved = true;
wrdDoc.Close(ref oFalse,ref oMissing,ref oMissing);

}

if(wrdApp != null)
{

wrdApp.Quit(ref oFalse,ref oMissing,ref oMissing);

}

// Release References.
wrdMailMerge = null;
wrdDoc = null;
wrdApp = null;

Posted at DotNetJunkies on Wednesday, October 13, 2004 4:35 PM