I need to develop or obtain a reporting tool that will allow us to obtain information to answer the following questions:
Frequency of use (Must)
Usage of application on a person level (Must)
Successful pages/slides (frequency of use) (Must)
Who updated the application software (Must)
Who updated the application content (Must)
Popular in which regions (Must)
Number of people who download the app vs number of people who own a device Must)
Time spent using the app (Should)
Exit pages (Should)
Number of users of share function (Should)
Number of users of search function (Should)
Time taken to update the app (software) (Should)
Time taken to update the app (content) (Should)
Use of media types (video) (Should)
Use of media types (downloads) (Should)
Average number of pages/slides visited (Could)
Number of users of feedback button (Could)
Environment app is being used (customer, office, MyCompanysOffice) (Could)
The application is a simple installer that communicates with a REST service to download and install HTML and media content, which the user browses LOCALLY. The app provides a kind of on-demand service for downloading and viewing content.
Media formats include mp4, docx, pdf, ppt which are viewed by launching media player, adobe etc.
The use of Google Analytics has been put forward as reporting tool, but I'm not sure if this would be appropriate for the following reasons:
1. GA is a tool for monitoring website traffic rather than user activity
2. GA is not really intended for tracking local pages ie ones using the file:// protocol (although I think it may be possible with one or two hacks)
My specific questions are - would Google Analytics be appropriate for generating reports of the information I described?
Would it be better/simpler to obtain this information through the logging (eg via log4net) and generate a report from that?
Is there another, better tool I could be using to generate these reports?
I can recommend Application Insights for application telemetry (performance, user activity etc). It very flexible and configurable and i think you can make it fit your needed measurements.
You can read more about Microsofts Application Insights service here: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/application-insights/
Related
Is there any library in Xamarin which would store the pages that we browse in WKWebView?
Have to store the resources of the pages (CSS, fonts, js etc.) for offline viewing. The complexity is maintaining the folder structure and manage the resource Urls within the CSS and JS files. Any idea how the resources can be stored and loaded?
There are resources on how to save a html page and load the html in WKWebView.
Please note that this question is not about that. It is more about storing and managing the resources of the visited pages for offline viewing.
I don't think you're going to get your answer with a mobile only approach. It's not impossible to create one but I don't believe anything exists that will do what you want, happy to be proven wrong. I think you need to think outside the square a bit.
I can't give you the entire set of code because I don't own it (my company does) but I managed to take a website completely offline (with limitations of course) by using multiple resources to achieve the desired outcome.
I used a piece of software called Cyotek WebCopy in an Azure VM to scrape all of the website down to a folder. That folder was then zipped up and uploaded to Azure Blob Storage so it could be accessed from anywhere. The Xamarin app would then access the storage container, retrieve all of the blobs and then when a user clicks on a specific blob, it unzips down to the device and then opens up in a web view for the user to browse.
All of this was achieved using a web service and PowerShell scripts on the VM side and then of course your standard Xamarin based application for viewing.
Like I said, there are limitations to this but barring external links and database calls (like a submission page), it will work for you. It has worked for us.
It may sound like a lot of work but all in all, the VM side took me about 2 days and the Xamarin concept about 5 so all in all, not long to stand something up that is able to be built upon. I hope that helps.
we have a video file which we have to "webcast" on the website (ASP.NET MVC 4 C#) to about 1000 users. I have absolutely no idea how to do this. I'm looking for answers to the following questions:
How webcasts are implemented in general? what are keywords I should be googling for?
How to synchronize video streams sent to different users?
How much computing power do I need for 1000 users? Need a rough answer of course. One server, or tens of servers.
any links, blog articles etc would be appreciated.
Thank you.
In general webcasts are implemented where there is a client software that sends tcp packets of stream data to server and server represents those packets as moving pictures.
In theory they already should be synchronized since you don't send the full video, you only send the current packets that are then buffered and represented as moving pictures. There will always be inconstancy in milliseconds because you cannot control every users ping to server.
It all depends on quality of your video as well as your webserver. No one will give you straight answer, you should always profile your applications on your own and see what bests fits your needs.
Since you are using C# MVC it is coupled with IIS, and IIS has something they call IIS Media Services that does exactly what you need. Definitely check it out.
Also you should check out c# live streadming in google, I found very interesting approach right here.
Well, as a streaming media person, here are my suggestions.
You could do a "live" webcast or an on-demand webcast depending on your choice. Live means, if you have a video file, you could broadcast it to multiple users at once and all will see it as if watching in a TV. They cannot pause your video. Normally, only live events are being broadcasted like this, unless you have a specific reason to broadcast an existing video file as a "fake" live broadcast.
You could use Windows Media Server (Add the media role in Windows Server 2003/2008/2012). Configuring and starting a windows media server needs intermediate level of familiarity with the streaming process, server, firewalls, exceptions. You have a lot of configurations which you can manage in this way, and generally suggested if you are very serious about your streaming. RTSP saves a lot of bandwidth for you too.
You could use Flash Media Server/Wowza media Server, Real Streaming Server also inplace of Windows media server.
For limited number of users, you can download the free Windows media Encoder, and select your file to be streamed, and click to stream easily. This is the easiest.
You could use managed streaming services from few thirdparties, like Livestream, Brightcove etc to stream video files.. Once you signup with them, the will give you an FTP/web space to upload your files, and they provide a link to the file (streaming media link). This link, you could embed in any popular player (like JWPlayer or any of that kind), and embed your player in your webpage for your users to start seeing the media. This is the most easy way to set it up. Maybe you can even get a 15 day trial services from brightcove or Mogolous.
Hope this answers your question.
Currently I have a software installed on my computer. It is a time clock software whereby user scan their card and then I bring the scanner and connect to my computer and use the software to extract the information.
Is it possible for me to write a C# application to control the time clock software so that I can automate the process of extracting user's information?
The time clock software was bought from external vendor.
It depends on many things.
Does the external vendor provide an API to tap into the application or data? Maybe ask them if they do. Some developers don't give this information automatically. If so you can just look through the documentation.
Does the application save files you can open and take information from? If they save in a text format like txt or xml you can simply make a txt/xml parser that reads the file and do what-ever you want with it.
If not it gets nasty. Sniffing network to look at packages (if it sends them), hacking the software to make some changes. All in all not worth the trouble.
I am developing a ASP.NET web site where users will need to be able to create their own business cards. So, I'm looking for a tool (most likely Flash) that I can easily integrate into a web site and lets users add text and custom images to their cards and then create an image and/or PDF from their work.
is there a plugin that does this?
If you write your own business-card creator in flash, you can save the view to PDF files using AlivePDF.
You could have a look at this: http://www.shirtnetwork.com/en
It is less of a plugin and much more of a fully customizable software solution, with an administration backend, PDF export, billing etc. . I worked on the client and I must say it is a very mature and potent software and probably can do about anything you want, when it comes to customizing products. I don't know, whether you like the pricing model, OTOH to my knowledge, they also provide provision-free licences.
I don't know, whether there are reasonbly expensive components available, that do this for you, because you can get a load of money out of this business, so I wouldn't expect anyone to give them away for free.
greetz
back2dos
Migrating (rewriting) a whole portal originally made in .net to shareopoint doesn't seem like a very easy thing to do.
I've been assigned such task and now i'm just learning, planning and starting to get things practical in order to accomplish it faster.
It's not exactly a question, it should be a discussion about it and may help others who might get to do the same job further on.
1 - There's something like a "message board" in the current portal, which i'm planning on building with a blog site kind, what do you sugest?
2 - as asked in another question, i have to manage users, and the local active directory is organized and reliable, so i guess that's what i'm going to use
3 - There's got to be a way to store files, images, documents and having version controlling in some of them.
4 - There's got to be a customization in design and a cleaning in the default controls of sharepoint masterpage (which may be useless for the desired purposes)
5 - About 30 local users and being accessible from the internet (local server) in case our consultors have to access it from clients
6 - i have available a version of the Visual Studio 2010 (already with the graphical webpart designer) because the company i work is MS gold partner.
7 - I'm going to program webparts in c#, and the designing part is still a mistery to me, since i'm not that familiar to shareopint yet.
I'd like some tips, links and answers.. i'm going to be watching this question from now on and answering any other information.
1.) SharePoint 2007 has some blog/wiki/board functionality but it's very immature. I tried to get my team to use them but the user interface is lacking and it is challenging to enhance those elements. SP2010 might offer a better experience though.
2.) User management in SharePoint is easy to perform but difficult to manage. Establish processes for adding/modifying end users and keep the number of people with that ability to a minimum. Otherwise it gets out of control and you end up not knowing who has access to what. I would also suggest relying on AD groups as opposed to giving individuals specific access in sites.
3.) Document storage is SharePoint's forte, I think you'll be impressed.
4.) SharePoint branding will require some time but other people have it down to an art form. Note that some pages (referred to as Application pages) shouldn't be fully controlled. Also note that you don't want to remove controls from the master page as some functionality in SharePoint assumes the controls are there - rather it is better to hide them using CSS.
5.) This sounds like a bad idea. SharePoint exposed to the Internet is supposed to be severely locked down - but if you lock it down (i.e. remove access to Application pages), the functionality that you seek won't be available. Have you considered an intranet and separate extranet?
6.) Should be okay, VS2010 is supposed to be a better development experience with regards to SharePoint.
7.) Keep your branding and functionality separate and be sure to deploy them using solution files (as opposed to working directly with the file system). Also, never ever read/write the database directly.
I think you'll find that replacing a custom intranet with SharePoint is a common task but there will be a learning curve. The hard part will be branding and data migration. End users will reject the new system if it is slow - so be sure to get the architecture and configuration right before launch (might require a consultant).
1 - There's something like a "message
board" in the current portal, which
i'm planning on building with a blog
site kind, what do you sugest?
SharePoint discussions are perfect for what they are intended ... small targeted discussions. A forum is very different. It is a centralized area with multiple threads with different topics. You can try CodePlex (which is your friend)
SharePoint Forums
2 - as asked in another question, i
have to manage users, and the local
active directory is organized and
reliable, so i guess that's what i'm
going to use
AD is perfect if you already have it ... nice thing is that you can use the Profile page to update AD information which syncs ... you have a lot of capability with this. But, one of the main benefits is that SharePoint can support multiple authentications. You can extend a SharePoint site and plug in a different authentication (like SQL Auth) and then multiple sets of users can interact on the same sites with different permissions. Not to mention that SharePoint doesn't just provide site access but you can make security granular all the wat down to individual items in a list or library.
3 - There's got to be a way to store
files, images, documents and having
version controlling in some of them.
This is where SharePoint has the most capability OOB.
4 - There's got to be a customization
in design and a cleaning in the
default controls of sharepoint
masterpage (which may be useless for
the desired purposes)
We have a completely customized MasterPage complete with code behind. You need to know about Feature Stapling and Feature Receivers. Also use Heather Solomon's website
5 - About 30 local users and being
accessible from the internet (local
server) in case our consultors have to
access it from clients
SharePoint seems almost overkill for this number of users.
6 - i have available a version of the
Visual Studio 2010 (already with the
graphical webpart designer) because
the company i work is MS gold partner.
Get the Visual Studio Extensions for SharePoint
7 - I'm going to program webparts in
c#, and the designing part is still a
mistery to me, since i'm not that
familiar to shareopint yet.
Look into Application Pages instead of WebParts ... Application pages are way more flexible for custom forms than web parts. Web parts are only usefull for when functionality needs to be available on an ad hoc basis so that you can allow users to drag the functionality onto a page or if you need to restrict functionality to specific sets of users (since layout pages are available to all sites).
The answers to this person's similar but not identical question may be helpful: Sharepoint for a C# Asp.net Developer
There's a lot of help available in other existing SO questions. Just click on the "sharepoint" tag, then sort by votes, and you'll find a lot of interesting reading.
Regarding 7 - Programming web parts:
Have a look at SmartPart on CodePlex. This is a fairly easy way to create simple web parts especially if you have some ASP experience.