MonoDevelop+AspNetEdit Teaser
Thu, 2006-07-27 14:35 — Michael
Here's a shiny screenshot of AspNetEdit embedded in MonoDevelop. The code's not really ready for use yet, but I'm making good progress. It's been complicated by the fact that I'm running AspNetEdit and its property grid in a separate process so that the ASP.NET controls are isolated from the MD process.
In other news, apologies for the clashing colour scheme of my site. It's also completely broken in IE 7, despite working in IE6. I mean to fix both issues, but it's not a priority right now.
This is a personal website, and stated opinions may not represent the position of my employer. Except where noted otherwise, original text and images are copyright Michael Hutchinson. Code samples are released under the MIT X11 licence.
Comments
I like eyecandy
And this is THE damn shiniest diamond among all them eyecandies!
You've jost got yourself a fan, dude!
Btw. when are you planning to throw it into the SVN?
Can't wait to make it crash under my fingers, bwa ha ha :D ('tis the tester in me...)
I really like eyecandy :)
Looking good
Nice work Michael, it's looking fantastic. This is the one of the last key pieces missing from MonoDevelop and you look like you're well on the way to getting it done. Thanks for your efforts!
AspNetEdit
This is looking really nice, keep up the good work.
When to expect a svn release?
Greetings
Code is trickling in right now
I'm committing it bit by bit right now, and it should be usable by the end of next week. However, it's could be a lot longer before it can install the "chrome" for any version of Mozilla newer than 1.7.x.
I'll make a proper release at the end of Summer of Code, becuase I don't want to openly be supporting alpha code. But if you do want to try it from SVN, I can propably give you a hand getting it going -- catch me on #monodevelop IRC.
ASP.NET Template
I download the SVN version of MonoDevelop and enable the ASP.NET feature. The project template is incomplete. Don't have Web.config or Global.asax.
Do you have a new Template for ASP.NET projects? I've found this http://lists.ximian.com/pipermail/monodevelop-list/2004-March/000380.html
When do you intend to upload your changes in SVN? What is your nick in IRC? I'm intend to test and try your code. I will be there as Esqueleto.
Hope I can help
Paulo Aboim Pinto
Odivelas - Portugal
Working on other areas at the moment
Thanks for the link. I will add Web.config and global.asax to the templates.
At the moment I'm working on making it easy for AspNetEdit to install into Mozilla. Most changes I'm committing to SVN as sson as I can, but most of the AspNetEdit stuff is not enabled yet, and will not be anabled until I fix the Mozilla deployment. I don't know how long this will take.
I'm also working on deployment of web sites using GnomeVFS. After this task is complete, I will then start looking at more complete support for config files, references etc.
You can find me on #monodevelop, where my nick is "mikalh". I remeber seeing you there yesterday :)
ASP.Net Editor
Hi Michael
Just got the Designer running so I can have a look at it but I don't seem to be able to do anthing with it. Your screen shot shows a couple of controls (which I assumed you dragged from the tool box) on the white design area. In my version I have a grey design area that I cannot do anything with.
Is this the current situation or has somthing gone wrong in my build process?
I am on a Susse 10.1 distro with a SVN check out from last night.
Are you enjoying Durham? been there a couple of times, nice town
Pat.
An easy fix, but there's probably more to it
Fixing the lack of controls is quite easy; just add $PREFIX/lib/mono/2.0/System.Web.dll using the button on the toolbox toolbar. I'll make this happen automatically sometime soon. There are also a couple of other known issues listed in one of my more recent posts.
I'm really not sure why you have a grey design area without an error message coming up. You should at least be able to type into the design surface, but as you noticed, it should also be white. Did you 'sudo make install'? I've added a note regarding this to this list of known issues. If this isn't the problem, could you post the console trace and details of your Mono version and which Firefox/Mozilla you're using?
Durham's a really great place. The course is good, but it's really the town, the colleges and the people that make me glad I came here :)
ASP.Net Editor
Hi again
I reinstalled Mozilla last night into "/usr/local/mozilla" and set MOZILLA_FIVE_HOME="/usr/local/mozilla" This causes MD to crash within a second of it finishing loading.
The tail end of the stack trace is
Native stacktrace:
/usr/bin/mono(mono_handle_native_sigsegv+0xe6) [0x81594a6]
/usr/bin/mono [0x8143727]
[0xffffe440]
[0xb3df78ca]
[0xb3df7883]
[0xb2557776]
[0xb255741d]
[0xb3dfb6e1]
/usr/bin/mono [0x81435d0]
/usr/bin/mono(mono_runtime_invoke+0x27) [0x80db577]
/usr/bin/mono(mono_runtime_invoke_array+0x268) [0x80dcae8]
/usr/bin/mono [0x80ca240]
[0xb70d3ca2]
[0xb70d39d9]
[0xb7004adb]
[0xb25556b0]
[0xb48142b2]
[0xb481409b]
[0xb4813f93]
[0xb4814fbb]
[0xb6b03b72]
[0xb70de755]
[0xb74e9b42]
[0xb74e9a84]
/usr/bin/mono [0x81435d0]
/usr/bin/mono(mono_runtime_invoke+0x27) [0x80db577]
/usr/bin/mono(mono_runtime_exec_main+0xa3) [0x80dc773]
/usr/bin/mono(mono_runtime_run_main+0x182) [0x80dc312]
/usr/bin/mono(strftime+0x1bbe) [0x805c962]
/usr/bin/mono(mono_main+0x857) [0x805d347]
/usr/bin/mono(__fxstat64+0x137) [0x805bd0b]
/lib/libc.so.6(__libc_start_main+0xdc) [0xb7dbb87c]
/usr/bin/mono(sinh+0x4d) [0x805bc61]
My firefox is also upto date and setting MOZILLA_FIVE_HOME="/usr/lib/firefox" allows MD to run but I still have the grey design area that cannot be edited.
I have root access to this machine so I do not use sudo.
mono --version
Mono JIT compiler version 1.1.16.1, (C) 2002-2006 Novell, Inc and Contributors. www.mono-project.com
TLS: normal
GC: Included Boehm (with typed GC)
SIGSEGV: normal
Disabled: none
Mozilla Version: Mozilla 1.7.13
Firefox Version 1.5.0.6
Looks like the XUL addin is not installed
I think that the segfault is because you compiled jscall-sharp against Firefox, not Mozilla. This is not a problem -- you just have to make sure you use MD with the Gecko version against which you compiled jscall-sharp. Note that the addin works a little better with Mozilla 1.7 than with Firefox 1.5.
The most likely problem is that that Firefox XUL addin is not installed. If it is installed, the URL chrome://aspdesigner/content/aspdesigner.xul should give you a blank page, with a window title starting with "JSCall". It's installed when you install MD, although you can install just the addin by running "sudo make install" in the Extras/AspNetEdit directory. Could you give me the output of that command if it does not work?
ASP.Net Editor
Afraid I have lost the plot here what is Jscall?
"you compiled jscall-sharp against Firefox, not Mozilla." I have not knowingly complied it against anything!!!
It must be a case of there is something I need to intall but I don't know what??
I done this ./configure --with-gtkmozembed=mozilla
which give this
No package 'mozilla-gtkmozembed' found
No package 'mozilla-xpcom' found
chrome://aspdesigner/content/aspdesigner.xul does not do anything
make install in Extras/AspNetEdit directory.
gives
svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit # make install
Making install in chrome
make[1]: Entering directory `/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit/chrome'
make[2]: Entering directory `/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit/chrome'
make[2]: Nothing to be done for `install-exec-am'.
make install-data-hook
make[3]: Entering directory `/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit/chrome'
mkdir -p /usr/local/lib/monodevelop/AddIns/AspNetEdit; \
cp aspdesigner.jar /usr/local/lib/monodevelop/AddIns/AspNetEdit/
cp aspdesigner.manifest /usr/lib/xulrunner-1.8.0.1/chrome/
make[3]: Leaving directory `/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit/chrome'
make[2]: Leaving directory `/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit/chrome'
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit/chrome'
make[1]: Entering directory `/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit'
make[2]: Entering directory `/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit'
make[2]: Nothing to be done for `install-exec-am'.
test -z "/usr/local/lib/monodevelop/AddIns/AspNetEdit" || mkdir -p -- "/usr/local/lib/monodevelop/AddIns/AspNetEdit"
/usr/bin/install -c -m 644 '../../build/AddIns/AspNetEdit/AspNetEdit.dll' '/usr/local/lib/monodevelop/AddIns/AspNetEdit/AspNetEdit.dll'
/usr/bin/install -c -m 644 'AspNetEdit.addin.xml' '/usr/local/lib/monodevelop/AddIns/AspNetEdit/AspNetEdit.addin.xml'
make[2]: Leaving directory `/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit'
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit'
linux:/home/patrickb/downloads/tarballs/svn/monodevelop/Extras/AspNetEdit #
Well, I hadn't considered xulrunner
Firstly, you must have compiled and installed jscall-sharp, or aspnetedit would not have built. However, JSCall's configuration script decides which Mozilla to build against depending on which Mozilla dev packages are available. From the install trace it looks like it used xulrunner instead of Firefox or Mozilla. I haven't actually tested xulrunner myself, but as Miguel de Icaza added xulrunner to the list of Mozillas that JSCall detects, I assume it must be the default dev package on Suse.
Mozilla also detects which Mozilla to use in its launch script, but it does not depend on dev packages, so I assume it used Firefox instead of xulrunner. To sum up, the problem is that MonoDevelop is running against Firefox, while the XUL addin is installed into xulrunner.
Try running "export MOZILLA_FIVE_HOME=/usr/lib/xulrunner-1.8.0.1" before you run MonoDevelop (from the same terminal), as this will tell it to use xulrunner.
ASP.Net Editor
That was it.
export MOZILLA_FIVE_HOME=/usr/lib/xulrunner-1.8.0.1"
It has also been ages since I could see the welcome page as well!!
In my work life I mainly build database driven asp.net and winform applications. I would not have a clue where to start in what you have have been working on over the past few months, well done.
Have you got an idea of the time scales to it becoming usable?
pat.
It'll be a little while
I need to fix a couple of classlib bugs to make the designer work completely. This will almost definitely happen within the next month or two. I'll also see if I can find a way to override MD's browser detection when JSCall# is being used, and maybe even an automatic chrome installer, as these seem to be the two things that give people the most problems :)
Though I suspect that many people will not consider AspNetEdit to be "usable" until I add more features, I intend to focus on the IDE itself for the time being — code completion, deployment, text toolbox etc.
Just what i've been looking for :)
I've been looking for a good IDE for Mono to creating ASP.NET pages. Here it is. You're doing a great job.