Combined results for serializing / deserialzing a single row of each table in the Northwind database 1,000,000 times

from: https://github.com/ServiceStack/ServiceStack.Text

Serializer	Size	Peformance
Microsoft DataContractSerializer	4.68x	6.72x
Microsoft JsonDataContractSerializer	2.24x	10.18x
Microsoft BinaryFormatter	5.62x	9.06x
NewtonSoft.Json	2.30x	8.15x
ProtoBuf.net	1x	1x
ServiceStack TypeSerializer	1.78x	1.92x

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RavenDB tutorial

http://mookid.dk/oncode/archives/1627
http://mookid.dk/oncode/archives/1652
http://mookid.dk/oncode/archives/1689

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Rails on Windows, Part 3/4: MySQL2 gem

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Installing mysql2 gem on Windows 8 with Ruby2

This is what worked for me. Hopefully it’ll help someone else.

• Uninstall the 64 bit version of Ruby 2 (apparently, there are lot of libraries that haven’t been tested against 64 bit Ruby on Windows and it can lead to errors) 
• Download the latest 32 bit Ruby 2 version from here and install 
• Download the 32 bit version of the DevKit from the same link as above and follow these instructions to have it enhance your previously installed Ruby version 
• Download the 32 bit MySQL C connector (archive version) from here and unzip it to C:/mysql 
• Open a command prompt and enter gem install mysql2 --platform=ruby -- '--with-mysql-dir="C:/mysql" 
• Copy the file “libmysql.dll” from C:/mysql/lib to your Ruby bin folder 
• Optional: delete C:/mysql

Reference: https://github.com/oneclick/rubyinstaller/issues/191

Note: This solution not always works depending on the environment bit version.
Some other issues are noted below that could help.

(http://stackoverflow.com/questions/19014117/ruby-mysql2-gem-installation-on-windows-7)

1. Download the lastest MySQL Installer for windows 7 32 bits
2. Installed the gem with the following command: gem install mysql2 --platform=ruby -- '--with-mysql-dir="C:/Program Files/MySQL/MySQL Connector C 6.1 6.1.2/"'

One pitfall to be aware of is that I changed the backslashes (\) to normal slashes (/). I've tried the same procedure with backslashes and it didn't work.

The installer already includes the C connectors for MySQL at MySQL Connector C 6.1 6.1.2 directory. Therefore, passing only the --with-mysql-dir parameter without the --with-mysql-lib or --with-mysql-include parameters, makes the gem to look at the same directory for the lib and includedirectories

Another source of problem could be using 64 bit connector instead of 32 bit.
This may be evident from log files, like here:

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17866003/rails-installing-mysql-error-installing-mysql2-error-failed-to-build-gem-nat

This is lastily what helped me after tons of work trying to compile the gem:
Download 32 bit version connector and follow instruction like here:

https://medium.com/@frontlineutils/installing-the-mysql2-rubyonrails-gem-on-windows-7-8-a028f44d87f3

(Optional relevant link:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5732546/mysql2-gem-install-make-error-windows-7)

And the last solid solution is just:

gem install mysql2 -v '0.3.11'

In this case you will get the folowing message after successfull installation:

======================

  You've installed the binary version of mysql2.

  It was built using MySQL Connector/C version 6.0.2.

  It's recommended to use the exact same version to avoid potential issues.

  At the time of building this gem, the necessary DLL files where available

  in the following download:

  http://dev.mysql.com/get/Downloads/Connector-C/mysql-connector-c-noinstall-6.0

.2-win32.zip/from/pick

  And put lib\libmysql.dll file in your Ruby bin directory, for example C:\Ruby\

bin

Don't forget to pick up corresponding dll for that connector version.

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SetForegroundWindow Win32 API not always works on Windows 7

SetForegroundWindows has some remarks usage, which could be found here:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms633539%28v=vs.85%29.aspx

At least one of the following must be true:

• The process is the foreground process.
• The process was started by the foreground process.
• The process received the last input event.
• There is no foreground process.
• The foreground process is being debugged.
• The foreground is not locked.
• The foreground lock time-out has expired (see SPI_GETFOREGROUNDLOCKTIMEOUT in SystemParametersInfo).
• No menus are active.

Alternative solution is to use  AttachedThreadInputAction pattern:

http://www.shloemi.com/2012/09/solved-setforegroundwindow-win32-api-not-always-works

Other "classic" approaches using Mutexes and EventWaitHandle:

http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/32908/C-Single-Instance-App-With-the-Ability-To-Restore

http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/96359/Mutex-Process-Identifier

http://www.codeproject.com/Tips/702830/Single-Instance-Form-Application-in-Csharp

VB style approach:

using System;
using System.Windows.Forms;
using Microsoft.VisualBasic.ApplicationServices;    // Add reference to Microsoft.VisualBasic

namespace WindowsFormsApplication1 {
    class Program : WindowsFormsApplicationBase {
        public Program() {
            this.EnableVisualStyles = true;
            this.IsSingleInstance = true;
            this.MainForm = new Form1();
        }
        protected override void OnStartupNextInstance(StartupNextInstanceEventArgs e) {
            e.BringToForeground = true;
        }
        [STAThread]
        public static void Main(string[] args) {
            new Program().Run(args);
        }
    }
}

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The hard way

A nice set of light tutorials for some languages:
learncodethehardway.org

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Interface laws

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