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Creating Windows Installers Using WIX: The Journey Begins

December 7, 2007 We all use them. Installers. They help get that sexy, shiny, new software safely onto our PCs and into our lives letting us frolic and play. Later, if things go sour or if the thrill is gone the installer is still there to reverse the process to help arbitrate the separation and keep what's yours intact. Recently I needed to make an installer for a web application product we have called Bolt. Dovetail's own Gary Sherman created Bolt and it was good. It is a great too if you are a Clarify developer. Exciting things are in store for Clarify users regarding Bolt but I can't steal that thunder. Creating the installer for Bolt made me realize I have a lot locked up in my head about deploying software. This is the first in a series of posts that are…

Trailing wildcards fail to %MATCH% text at the end of the field on Oracle9i

December 4, 2007 Kevin ran into a weird Oracle issue this week in one of his tests.Setup: I have case id 275 with a case_history of "case is in queue SUPPORT" Query:select count(*) from table_case where id_number = '275' and case_history like %SUPPOR%'This query returns 1 row, as expected. Query:select count(*) from table_case where id_number = '275' and case_history like %SUPPORT%'This query returns 0 rows. I was expecting it to return 1 row.I don't understand why the 2nd query doesn't return the expected row.I would have expected that the percent character would have matched to zero or more characters.The problem happens on Oracle 9. Everything works as expected in Oracle 10.Can anyone explain this behavior? 

Trailing wildcards fail to %MATCH% text At the end of the field on Oracle9i

I have some software that generates SQL we support multiple versions of Microsoft SQL Server and Oracle. I ran into a failing test on Oracle today that was totally unexpected. [Test] public void Case_History_containing_a_queue_tag_should_be_destined_for_that_queue() { string queueName = "SUPPORT"; string caseHistory = String.Format("case is in queue {0}", queueName); string caseIDNumber = "275"; SetCaseHistoryForCase(caseIDNumber, caseHistory); string ruleText = String.Format(@"(case_history contains '{0}') -> ""{0}""", queueName); string[] queues = AutoDestRule.RunRule("case", ruleText, caseIDNumber); Assert.AreEqual(1, queues.Length); Assert.AreEqual(queueName, queues[0]); } The Gist There is a bit of noise in the test but the gist is that RunRule() generates and executes the following SQL: Here is what the database looks like for table_case: id_number case_history "275" "case is in queue SUPPORT" The test passes in Microsoft SQL Server but fails against Oracle. There is no difference in the SQL being generated between databases. I fired up Query…

Installing ShoZu on a T-Mobile Dash with Windows Mobile 6

December 3, 2007 If you have a smart phone and like to use Flickr to share your photos look into ShoZu. ShoZu is a great way to move the pictures taken on your phone to the Flickr. You take a picture and it asks, Send To Flickr? If you have a data plan or the next time you are online the image is uploaded directly to Flickr. Very cool. What happens when you assume? I ran into problems using ShoZu with my T-Mobile Dash that has been upgraded to Windows Mobile 6. It was crashing and causing all kinds of stability issues with my phone. This morning I decided to reinstall ShoZu and figured out a simple fix and had to share. When you install ShoZu they ask for your phone number and what model phone you have. A text message is sent…

New office, new phone number

November 30, 2007 We (Dovetail Software) moved offices this week. Of course we're still in Austin. We actually only moved a few miles from our old office. It's a much nicer space. The views are beautiful, and our agile development team rooms are much nicer than our old one. Once we get things unpacked and setup, I'll post some pics. We also changed phone systems. Our new main number is 512-610-5400. My new direct dial line is 512-610-5466.

Can I created a view that includes a calculated view column to be used in Dovetail Agent (Amdocs/Clarify CRM)?

Static image November 28, 2007 Summary: This question was asked by one of our Dovetail customers.  In this post I will explain the steps that we used to understand and implement a solution to satisfy the customers requirements. Question: Can I created a view that includes a calculated column? If so, can I query all the cases with the calculated number of open subcases related to each case, in one view? Requirement: Our customer needed a view to query for  1) all of the open cases and 2) all of the closed cases that have any open subcases – to be displayed in the same view. Solution:  See steps taken below.   Steps taken to get to our Solution. 1. Read and discussed the customers requirements. 2. Tested our understanding of the requirements and the existing views using SQL against the following databases: MSSQL and…

Testing Auto-Destination Rules?

November 27, 2007 Has anyone written a tool to test auto-destination rules?In the past, I've created a rule, imported it with dataex, and then had to manually create a workflow object (such as a case) that met the auto-dest criteria, and see if it worked in the clarify client.Then I would have to repeat for each branch of the rule.I've been thinking about some sort of testing tool to be able to do this, but wanted to see if anyone had already done something like this before.So, anyone?Thanks! 

Commitment warnings and escalations – only by email?

It seems like Rulemanager sends all commitment notifications (warnings and escalations) via email.It does not seem to honor the notification preferences of the user (Pager, Notifier, etc.).Is this true?If so, is there a way to have commitment notifications honor the user’s notification preferences?

Snackbyte: Implementation services should include source-code control

November 15, 2007 This is just a little snackbyte that I was thinking about today: Implementation services should include source-code control. Meaning, when a vendor helps a customer with implementation of the vendors product, part of the service should include source-code control. Not maybe. Not an extra cost. It's just part of the deal. Our implementations include custom web pages, config files, schema change files, dat files, etc. These should all be under version control. If the customer has an existing source code control system, great - use it. If not, put one in place. Subversion is free, is easy to use, and works great. Show the customer the value and ease of using a good source code control product. Just another way to add value to the customer. And when everyone starts doing this - take it to the next level. How…

Automatic Subcase Creation

November 14, 2007 While working with a customer this week, they asked about automatic subcase creation, similar to Clarify's Task Manager module.   For example, if a new case of type "New Employee" is created, then I want to automatically create 3 subcases: One subcase for setting up network accounts, dispatched to the network queue One subcase for ordering office furniture, dispatched to the furniture queue One subcase for ordering a new computer, dispatched to the hardware queue   This is easily accomplished with a business rule and a simple script. The script   A simple PowerShell script (my favorite new scripting environment) which takes 1 input parameter (a case id number), and then calls the CreateSubcase API that is part of the Dovetail SDK to create subcases and dispatch them to the appropriate queue.   $connectionString = "Data Source=moorea;Initial Catalog=dovetail;uid=gary;pwd=not4youris"; $databaseType =…