[WIP] Contentment for Umbraco 9

[leekelleher]

Contentment for Umbraco 9

An Unexpected Journey

With the release of Umbraco 9 Beta (001), it is prime time for me to explore migrating current Contentment (for Umbraco 8) over to .NET 5, (TAFKA .NET Core).

Having never looked at .NET Core before, I have very little idea how this migration will pan out, so thought it worth documenting my journey. Wish me luck! ☘️🤞

I'm doing this as a discussion, as I'd can anyone jump in to comment, offer advice, bring me tea & biscuits. You are most welcome!

[leekelleher]

Following the Umbraco 9 Beta blog post, I followed the instructions and got a demo site up and running.

https://umbraco.com/blog/umbraco-9-beta-release/

Well, I had to do it twice as I wanted to use SQLCE, and the instructions about the --UseSqlCe came after the initial steps.

OK, cool, I had a demo test site up and running! 🌟

Now I need some kind of VS project for my package...

From reading @AndyButland's series of blog posts, I had no idea how to swap my current .NET Framework .csproj into a .NET SDK style .csproj, so decided to skip the same "false start" and go with a fresh new .NET 5 class library project.

https://www.andybutland.dev/2021/03/umbraco-package-migration-to-net-core.html

When I opened Visual Studio, there was a template for "Umbraco Package", which I kinda recall various people mentioning... okay, let's go with that. All good! 🌟

But hold on. How do I get my package code/file over to my test site? For all my old packages (including Contentment for Umbraco 8) I've used some post-build XCOPY hack to put files in the right place. But that didn't feel like a very modern way of doing it, and I didn't want to immediately fall into my old habits, so searched around. 🧐

I looked over @AndyButland's Personalisation Groups repo: https://github.com/AndyButland/UmbracoPersonalisationGroupsCore but didn't see anything obvious about copying files to a test site.

Ah yes, @KevinJump has been super-duper-quick to get a uSync 9 Beta released, surely he'll have something in his repo: https://github.com/KevinJump/uSync8/tree/core/main ... and his did! But I had no idea what was going on. I'm sure it makes sense, but it be simpler than having to dig deep into fellow developer's code. That's me falling straight into old habits again. 🧙

---

I start googling around for various Umbraco + .NET Core + Packages + Templates keywords. I eventually find this page on the Our Umbraco documentation...

https://our.umbraco.com/documentation/UmbracoNetCoreUpdates#package-development

Seems obvious now, but honestly, I hadn't thought of looking on there - even when there's a prominent message on the main documentation landing page pointing folk in the right direction. Again, old habits! 🤦‍♂️

---

OK, the documentation explains it all. Everything I'd done previous was a "false start" - I wiped it and followed instructions.

I used the "Full example" code snippet, provided here: https://our.umbraco.com/documentation/UmbracoNetCoreUpdates#full-example

But it failed, threw an error. Something was missing... various dotnet-new-nugety-packagey-thingymebob info. 🤷 Turns out that some of the instructions from the Umbraco 9 Beta blog post weren't quite right, I needed to add another NuGet source for the "Umbraco Nightly" and update the Umbraco templates.

OK cool, let's create a new Package project and associated test site! 🌟

dotnet new umbracopackage -n Contentment9
dotnet new umbraco --UseSqlCe -n Contentment9.TestSite -p Contentment9

Ah no, got another error! Something about the template, and to check dotnet new umbraco --help for more info. I did that, and spotted that the option for associating the test site was an uppercase -P not lowercase. I tried that... and it worked! 🌟

I took a pause, to go send a pull-request to update the documentation... umbraco/UmbracoDocs#3146

...the journey continues...

[KevinJump]

hi, the stuff in the uSync repo is a bit more complicated (and old) than it needs to be. but in essence i have a gulp script that watches the app_plugins folder and copies the files into the other project when i change them.

This means you don't need to build when you update front end files, infact you can have the site running and refreshing the browser is enough.

the scripts can be set to run on project open (in visual studio) so they aren't something you need to remember about.
(the top line '''/// '' tells vistual studio to run when it opens a project)

a simpler implimentation is in the (v8) package templates
https://github.com/umbraco/Package.Templates/blob/master/ProjectTemplates/UmbracoPackage.1/gulpfile.js

this version reads a paths.json file from the same folder - so in theory all you need do is change the paths in that file and the script will copy things where yo need them to be.

[leekelleher]

Thanks @KevinJump! Didn't mean to drag you into my ramblings, I'd "@'d" you more from a "standing on the shoulders of giants" perspective. 🤩

I'd been avoiding any use of Gulp/Grunt (or any other npm-powered task runner), mostly because I didn't want the extra dependency/maintenance. I ended up opt'ing for Microsoft's AjaxMinifier for bundling/minifying CSS/JS - there are a few folk who dislike it, but it's a single .exe, simples.

That said, given it's in the VS template, I'll consider trying it out. I wasn't aware of the /// <binding ProjectOpened='default' /> declaration, I can buy into that. 😄

---

Oh, @KevinJump whilst I've got you. In my experimenting, I was trying to figure out what the v9 equivalent of the ServerVariablesParser.Parsing event was, I had no idea, but found that you have this in uSync9: https://github.com/KevinJump/uSync8/blob/core/main/uSync.BackOffice/uSyncBackOfficeBuilderExtensions.cs#L74 ... so using INotificationHandler<ServerVariablesParsing>. Where did you learn this stuff? I can't find any docs about it, or is it more that you had to be closely following the RFCs? 😉

[KevinJump]

short answer - source code searching

I think docs are still emerging. - i did go through updating stuff in my DoStuff Repo https://github.com/KevinJump/DoStuffWithUmbraco/tree/NetCore mainly as a way to tackle them in discreet blocks, but again mainly through searching the source to see how it was done in core.

[leekelleher]

Thanks @KevinJump, good to know. That's pretty much my whole Umbraco package development experience over the years, digging through the source-code. 😆

[leekelleher]

... Day 2 (part 1) ...

Now with a working project for the package code and a test site to try it out on, I wanted to start off with something small, then work my way up.

First up, add custom CSS. Pretty straight forward, add a stylesheet, reference it in the package.manifest, build solution, does it load?

Stylesheet

.navigation-inner-container { background-color: pink; }

package.manifest

{
  "css": [ "~/App_Plugins/Contentment9/contentment.css" ]
}

Yup, works as expected. The left side nav panel is a lovely pink. 🌟

Next up, passing server-side data to CMS backoffice. In Contentment, I have a tree dashboard where I list various things about the package. In it's simplest state, if I wanted to pass the package's version number, I'd use the ServerVariablesParser.Parsing event to hook in. But in .NET 5 I'm told that there isn't a concept of event handlers. What to do? 🤔

For eager readers, you'll already know that I've been digging through @KevinJump's uSync9 codebase. I asked him about this in a comment above. #105 (reply in thread) (Kevin, do tell me if you're getting notification overload from my postings, I'll stop "@'ing" you. 😍 )

I couldn't find any docs about what to use instead of ServerVariablesParser.Parsing, but Kevin had already figured it out, so I followed his lead, by using an INotificationHandler<> - a new concept to me. 😬

The Composer pattern is still being used, I understand that one, so it goes like this...

Composer

internal sealed class ContentmentComposer : IUserComposer
{
    public void Compose(IUmbracoBuilder builder)
    {
        builder.AddNotificationHandler<ServerVariablesParsing, ContentmentServerVariablesParsing>();
    }
}

The INotificationHandler<> class

internal sealed class ContentmentServerVariablesParsing : INotificationHandler<ServerVariablesParsing>
{
    public void Handle(ServerVariablesParsing notification)
    {
        notification.ServerVariables.Add("contentment", "9.0.0-h5yr");
    }
}

...and when I check the CMS backoffice response using Chrome's DevTools, I search the Network tab for the "ServerVariables" request, check the JSON output and yup, the "contentment" entry is there! 🌟

Next up, add a property-editor. Still starting off small, I'm going with Notes first before working up to the more complex ones. I'll try this after lunch.

...the journey continues...

[KevinJump]

keep @'ing enjoying the read . 😄

[leekelleher]

... Day 2 (part 2) ...

Next up, add a property-editor. The simplest one is the read-only Notes editor. Despite it being a basic property-editor, the configuration is still done in C# as opposed to in the package.manifest file - it offers finer control for reuse (with other editors/labels).

My NotesDataEditor.cs class implements the IDataEditor interface directly, as I needed to have granular control over the ValueEditor. Most other property-editors will inherit from the 'DataEditor' class, which I took a quick look at... whoah, there are quite a few more parameters to be added to the constructor!

Everything was looking good, until I got down to my implementation of the GetValueEditor() method. Because I have my own ReadOnlyDataValueEditor, that inherits from the DataValueEditor class... and now that constructor takes several parameters, which aren't injectable, so it's a case of having them injected into the NotesDataEditor constructor, storing in a private field and passing them in within the GetValueEditor() method. It's all understandable, just a bit niggly about all these private field references lingering around. 🤷

Once all compiled and copied over, it ran file. I hit a few snags, mostly to do with resolving the path of the View. In v7/v8 if you set the path with a relative "~/App_Plugins/Contentment/notes.html", Umbraco would auto-resolve it for you. That doesn't happen in v9, I had to manually resolve the path.

View = _ioHelper.ResolveRelativeOrVirtualUrl("~/App_Plugins/Contentment9/notes.html")

Note: Here, _ioHelper is the injected instance of an IIOHelper. aka IOHelper in v7/v8.

Once the paths were all correct, the DataType could be created, configured, added to a DocType and used on Content nodes. 🌟

---

Next up, planting a Tree. 🌲 Contentment has a tree dashboard, where I list various information about the package itself. I took the code from ContentmentTreeController and copied it over to my new project. A few tweaks were required.

Firstly, the constructor for the TreeController base classed needed a few parameters - that's fine. Second, the return type for all the implemented methods were now wrapped in an ActionResult<T> - makes sense, as these are Controller classes. So a few tweaks and it compiled.

My tree was showing up in the Settings section! 🌟

---

Now that I have a feel for the types of changes that are required, I'm wondering whether I should take a stab at the whole package? Copy in all the existing code and see what doesn't compile, make the relevant amends - sounds like it's mostly adding constructor parameters - see how it goes. 🤔

See what I think in the morning.

...the journey continues...

[leekelleher]

... Day 3 (part 1) ... (probably the only part) 🤣

Yesterday evening I was thinking about my current Contentment repo, and would it be really that difficult to switch the .csproj over to the new SDK-style format? My initial concern was that @AndyButland tried it and chose a different route, so I didn't want to burn any time making the same mistakes, but something was niggling me - damn that "developer's itch"! I had another read over Andy's "False Start" blog post and decided to give it a try anyway.

By closely following the links from Andy's post, (this one and that one), I was able to reduce down the .csproj from...

https://github.com/leekelleher/umbraco-contentment/blob/1.4.2/src/Umbraco.Community.Contentment/Umbraco.Community.Contentment.csproj

...to...

<Project Sdk="Microsoft.NET.Sdk">
  <PropertyGroup>
    <TargetFramework>net5.0</TargetFramework>
    <Product>Umbraco.Community.Contentment</Product>
    <PackageId>Our.Umbraco.Community.Contentment</PackageId>
    <Title>Contentment for Umbraco</Title>
    <Description>Contentment, a collection of components for Umbraco 8.</Description>
    <PackageTags>umbraco</PackageTags>
  </PropertyGroup>
  <ItemGroup>
    <PackageReference Include="Umbraco.Cms.Web.Website" Version="9.0.0-beta001.20210427.20" />
    <PackageReference Include="Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice" Version="9.0.0-beta001.20210427.20" />
  </ItemGroup>
</Project>

Not bad, over 500 lines reduced down to about 15. 😀 🌟

OK, there was a little bit of trial-and-error on which <Compile> elements to include, etc. Turns out that I didn't have to, Visual Studio appears to make implied decisions.

Now, Visual Studio opens the solution... 🌟 let's hit F5 and see the body count...

❌ 646 errors, ⚠️ 0 warnings!

Okay, the ingredients are ready, let's get cooking! 🧑‍🍳

...the journey continues...

[AndyButland]

Nice one Lee... well apart from the 646 errors but I'm sure they won't take long to deal with :-),

Just wanted to clarify something though if it wasn't clear from my "false start" blog post... it wasn't actually the conversion to the new csproj format I aborted (which is worth doing I would say, and is what we've done at HQ for Forms and Deploy both for the V8 and V9 versions). As well as just being neater as you've shown, the idea too is that it'll make merges between "V8" and "V9" branches easier.

The aspect I gave up on was actually the multi-targetting the same code to V8 and V9. Others may still find some value in that, but as I had a package that already supported V7 and V8, attempting to find some way to share code between those and V9 just seemed a bit ridiculous, and so to make life a bit easier for myself I abandoned that, left the V7/V8 code untouched and started a new, clean project for V9.

[leekelleher]

@AndyButland ok, gotcha, thanks for clarifying about the branch merging. (I've probably misread parts, or been a bit too eager to jump to conclusions with my migration journey.) 🙏

[leekelleher]

... Quick update at the end of Day 3 (well, half day really)...

I'm down to... (drum roll please) 🥁 325 errors!

So far, there are many, many namespace amends. A lot of things that were under "Umbraco.Core" are now under "Umbraco.Cms.Core".

Another one that I've been changing is that GuidUdi.TryParse() has been removed, so changing to UdiParser.TryParse(str, out GuidUdi udi).

...and lastly (for today), I seem to use IOHelper.ResolveUrl() a LOT! Which needs the IIOHelper instance to be injected.

[leekelleher]

... Day 4 (part 1) ... (It's a public holiday in the UK, kids are busy so I had a little free time)

Worked through all of the errors! All gone! 🌟

---

Various pain points... in no particular order...

Seems that I use the SplitPascalCasing() string extension method quite a lot, which now requires an IShortStringHelper to be passed in. Added in quite a few references of that. This does make me question how Dependency Injection (in general) is meant to benefit the developer. I seem to be adding so much stuff to the constructors of inherited DataEditor classes, it's a lot of duplication!

In a my API controllers, I'd been using HttpResponseMessage as the return type. This gave me tighter control of the response, (well in my own mind at least) ... anyway, turns out that isn't something you do in .NET 5/Core, so replaced those bits with the relevant ActionResult type, mostly ObjectResult.

I'd noticed that an extension method for adding ConfigurationField was missing. It was purely syntax sugar, but something I'd submitted to Umbraco in PR umbraco/Umbraco-CMS#6264 (for v8.2.0). No idea why it was removed, just mean that I needed to write a bit more boilerplate code, or "syntax sour" as I'm going to call it from now on. 😄

All the assembly attributes, e.g. AssemblyTitle, AssemblyVersion, etc. had to go. I believe this is all in the .csproj now, but I hadn't seen any .NET documentation about that stuff. To be fair, I haven't looked, was more that Visual Studio complained at me, so I commented it out. I'll review it at a later stage, see if I've missed anything with it.

I had to exclude/comment-out a few classes for the Content Blocks preview feature, I was doing some funky stuff with the RazorEngine (probably deemed to be a hack), but I've zero idea how to port that code yet. Probably "super simple" once I've read up about how RazorPages work, (again, I've zero experience with them yet).

With my Telemetry code, I was using IUmbracoSettingsSection to get the Umbraco instance's ID. Took me a while to figure out, (well a fair amount of digging around Umbraco source code), this was now inside IOptions<GlobalSettings>.

---

Once I'd resolved all the errors, the project compiled successfully! 🌟

Next to try it on the test website.

Since I'd ended up migrating my existing Visual Studio .csproj to the new SDK-style format, I'd lost the auto-connection between the package project and test website that the "Umbraco Package" template provided. I needed a way to write them up. I still had my Powershell build script that took care of all the asset bundling/minification, etc. I gave that a try. All good, copied the correct files over to the test website! 🌟

The "App_Plugins" folder is in there (in the root) and the .dll + .pdb are in the "bin\Debug\net5.0" folder. I believe those are the correct locations?

But when I try to run the website with dotnet run, I get this error... 🙀

Unhandled exception. System.IO.FileNotFoundException: Could not load file or assembly 'Umbraco.Community.Contentment, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null, processorArchitecture=MSIL'. The system cannot find the file specified.
File name: 'Umbraco.Community.Contentment, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null, processorArchitecture=MSIL'
   at System.Reflection.RuntimeAssembly.InternalLoad(ObjectHandleOnStack assemblyName, ObjectHandleOnStack requestingAssembly, StackCrawlMarkHandle stackMark, Boolean throwOnFileNotFound, ObjectHandleOnStack assemblyLoadContext, ObjectHandleOnStack retAssembly)
   at System.Reflection.RuntimeAssembly.InternalLoad(AssemblyName assemblyName, RuntimeAssembly requestingAssembly, StackCrawlMark& stackMark, Boolean throwOnFileNotFound, AssemblyLoadContext assemblyLoadContext)
   at System.Reflection.Assembly.Load(AssemblyName assemblyRef)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.ReferenceResolver.ResolveAssemblies()
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.FindAssembliesWithReferencesTo.Find()
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.DefaultUmbracoAssemblyProvider.get_Assemblies()
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.TypeFinder.GetAllAssemblies()
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.TypeFinder.GetFilteredAssemblies(IEnumerable`1 excludeFromResults, String[] exclusionFilter)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.TypeFinder.get_AssembliesToScan()
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.TypeLoader.get_AssembliesToScan()
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.TypeLoader.<>c__DisplayClass50_0`1.<GetTypes>b__0()
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.TypeLoader.GetTypesInternalLocked(Type baseType, Type attributeType, Func`1 finder, String action, Boolean cache)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.TypeLoader.GetTypesInternal(Type baseType, Type attributeType, Func`1 finder, String action, Boolean cache)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.Composing.TypeLoader.GetTypes[T](Boolean cache, IEnumerable`1 specificAssemblies)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.DependencyInjection.UmbracoBuilderExtensions.AddAllCoreCollectionBuilders(IUmbracoBuilder builder)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.DependencyInjection.UmbracoBuilder.AddCoreServices()
   at Umbraco.Cms.Core.DependencyInjection.UmbracoBuilder..ctor(IServiceCollection services, IConfiguration config, TypeLoader typeLoader, ILoggerFactory loggerFactory)
   at Umbraco.Extensions.UmbracoBuilderExtensions.AddUmbraco(IServiceCollection services, IWebHostEnvironment webHostEnvironment, IConfiguration config)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.UI.NetCore.Startup.ConfigureServices(IServiceCollection services) in C:\path\to\my\umbraco\site\Startup.cs:line 43
   at System.RuntimeMethodHandle.InvokeMethod(Object target, Object[] arguments, Signature sig, Boolean constructor, Boolean wrapExceptions)
   at System.Reflection.RuntimeMethodInfo.Invoke(Object obj, BindingFlags invokeAttr, Binder binder, Object[] parameters, CultureInfo culture)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Hosting.ConfigureServicesBuilder.InvokeCore(Object instance, IServiceCollection services)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Hosting.ConfigureServicesBuilder.<>c__DisplayClass9_0.<Invoke>g__Startup|0(IServiceCollection serviceCollection)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Hosting.ConfigureServicesBuilder.Invoke(Object instance, IServiceCollection services)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Hosting.ConfigureServicesBuilder.<>c__DisplayClass8_0.<Build>b__0(IServiceCollection services)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Hosting.GenericWebHostBuilder.UseStartup(Type startupType, HostBuilderContext context, IServiceCollection services, Object instance)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Hosting.GenericWebHostBuilder.<>c__DisplayClass13_0.<UseStartup>b__0(HostBuilderContext context, IServiceCollection services)
   at Microsoft.Extensions.Hosting.HostBuilder.CreateServiceProvider()
   at Microsoft.Extensions.Hosting.HostBuilder.Build()
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.UI.NetCore.Program.Main(String[] args) in C:\path\to\my\umbraco\site\Program.cs:line 11

...and at that point, I have no idea what went wrong. Answers on a postcard please. 🙏

Guess I need to start removing code, re-compile, try it out, rinse-and-repeat!

Oh, does dotnet watch run mean that I can hot-copy my updated DLLs into the /bin folder? (asking for a friend) 😊

---

...the journey continues...

[leekelleher]

I gave @warrenbuckley's "Take_Out_The_Trash_2.0.0.zip" package a try, (downloaded from the issue) ... yup I get the exact same error. Checked the /bin folder, and "TakeOutTheTrash.dll" is there. Hmmm. 🤔

I saw earlier today that the Conditional Displayers package had been migrated for v9.
https://our.umbraco.com/packages/backoffice-extensions/conditional-displayers/
I'll give that package a try next, see what happens.

[leekelleher]

OK, the Conditional Displayers package puts the DLL file in the root of the "/bin" folder, as opposed to "/bin/Debug/net5.0".

I tried that instead, and now my test website loads! 🌟 I haven't checked any features yet, just that the dotnet run didn't error so far.

Next I'll try re-introducing the features back in. 😃

[leekelleher]

Bah, didn't work. 😕 I'd re-introduced a property-editor, (this time my Bytes editor). But it doesn't show up in the list of editors on the DataTypes.

I suspect that the assembly isn't being loaded in from the root "/bin" folder.

With the Conditional Displayers package... I suspect it's the same thing. The code in the DLL is only for a ValueConverter, (ConditionalCheckboxConverter.cs), which I suspect might not be working as the developer intends.

So I think umbraco/Umbraco-CMS#10190 still applies.

[leekelleher]

@AndyButland @KevinJump I'm wondering if you both experienced this? (it's bank holiday, so ignore replying, just wanted to note down my question)

[warrenbuckley]

Ok yes I think we need to do something for the package DLL loading @leekelleher

But for your testsite I would recommend you add a project reference to your testsite project, so you can test and be unblocked.

From my initial research with the DLL issue that this some kind of security thing in .NET core that you can roughly follow along here that only dependencies are allowed to be loaded in by default.

dotnet/runtime#13511

[leekelleher]

OK, figured out a workaround to the FileNotFoundException error. Chatted with @bergmania in the thread of my last update, turns out that @warrenbuckley experienced the same thing, see: umbraco/Umbraco-CMS#10190 (Warren probably mentions this in his how-to YouTube video, but I only watched 20 mins of it, as I'm more of a text-based kinda dev, // sorry Warren)

The issue has a reference to a .NET Core issue, with "probing paths", e.g. where the web-app will attempt to load in the assemblies from. Meaning that if the web-app isn't aware of the assembly, then it wont load it, (well at least not from using the Assembly.Load() method).

So, my workaround. The comments on the .NET Core issue mention the *.deps.json file - this in the "/bin/Debug/net5.0" folder, with the name of your web-app. (For me it was named "Umbraco900beta.deps.json").

The contents of the file will list all the dependencies of the web-app, including references to DLL paths, NuGet packages, etc. It's about 258Kb, so there's a fair amount of data in there.

So I added a references for my Contentment DLL, like so...

{

// <snip/>

    "targets": {
        ".NETCoreApp,Version=v5.0": {

// <snip/>

            "Umbraco.Community.Contentment/3.0.0.0": {
                "runtime": {
                    "Umbraco.Community.Contentment.dll": {}
                },
                "compile": {
                    "Umbraco.Community.Contentment.dll": {}
                }
            }

// <snip/>

        }
    },
    "libraries": {

// <snip/>

        "Umbraco.Community.Contentment/3.0.0.0": {
            "type": "referenceassembly",
            "serviceable": false,
            "sha512": ""
        }

// <snip/>

    }
}

Now, when I dotnet run, the web-app runs and my Contentment is loaded in! 🌟

Of course, this isn't an ideal scenario for ongoing package development, but at least it wasn't a complete show-stopper and I can continue with the migration/testing.

[leekelleher]

Urgh, when the assembly is loaded in, it becomes locked. So I can't do a hot recompile and copy over the updated DLL.
I needed to shut down the web-app, copy over the DLL, then restart the web-app.

Hope I'm missing something obvious there? Is this what the dotnet watch command is for? 🤷
If so, how do you do that with IIS Express?

[leekelleher]

Read up a little more about this, turns out it's a known issue. dotnet/aspnetcore#3793 (comment) Something the Shadow-copying feature in .NET 6 will resolve.

In the meantime, for .NET 5, the app_offline.htm shoe-swap is the recommended approach.

Update: Bah, I can't get the app_offline.htm approach to work, with IIS Express it doesn't restart the web-app once the file is removed. 🤷

[warrenbuckley]

You could try dotnet watch run which will recompile as needed but will use the Kestrel server
The DLL stuff for zip packages does need some thought, hopefully @bergmania or @Shazwazza are able to figure out the 'right' way we need to do it in CMS Core.

[leekelleher]

Thanks @warrenbuckley. I've tried dotnet watch run a few times, but it seems to terminate when I copy over the DLL. I'm not entirely sure what's going on with it - I'm still very new to the world of .NET 5/Core. I'm sure it'll all get ironed out. 👍

[leekelleher]

... Day 5 update ...

I mention in the comments of my previous update about the dev workflow of trying to XCOPY updates from my project to the target web-app have been quite painful. I'm at the point where testing out small incremental tweaks are taking a few minutes, not the ideal workflow. I'm hoping this is teething pains.

For anyone curious why I take the XCOPY approach, is that typically my packages can target different versions of Umbraco. e.g. with Contentment, v1.x is for v8.6+ and v2.x is for v8.13+ ... and I often switch between working on those versions, e.g. let's say for v1.x hot-fixes, etc. So my project/solution is associated with a single Umbraco instance to develop against. I have many Umbraco versions on my laptop. 😬

OK, so the great news is that the property-editors are working! 🌟
They load up in the DataTypes listing, they're configurable, they save, add to content nodes, save/publish, etc. All as you'd expect. 🌟

But I've hit a showstopper with the API Controllers. None of them want to load. I either get a 404 error, or this beautiful exception (for my tree dashboard)...

Unhandled controller exception occurred for request '/umbraco/backoffice/umbracotrees/applicationtree/GetApplicationTrees?application=settings&tree=&use=main'

🚨🚨🚨 Full exception stack-trace here... ⚠️ warning it's a biggie! ⚠️ 🚨🚨🚨

Unhandled controller exception occurred for request '/umbraco/backoffice/umbracotrees/applicationtree/GetApplicationTrees?application=settings&tree=&use=main'
System.InvalidOperationException: Sequence contains no matching element
   at System.Linq.ThrowHelper.ThrowNoMatchException()
   at System.Linq.Enumerable.First[TSource](IEnumerable`1 source, Func`2 predicate)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Trees.ApplicationTreeController.GetApiControllerProxy(Type controllerType, String action, FormCollection querystring)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Trees.ApplicationTreeController.GetRootNode(Tree tree, FormCollection querystring)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Trees.ApplicationTreeController.TryGetRootNode(Tree tree, FormCollection querystring)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Trees.ApplicationTreeController.GetApplicationTrees(String application, String tree, FormCollection queryStrings, TreeUse use)
   at lambda_method341(Closure , Object )
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ActionMethodExecutor.AwaitableObjectResultExecutor.Execute(IActionResultTypeMapper mapper, ObjectMethodExecutor executor, Object controller, Object[] arguments)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ControllerActionInvoker.<InvokeActionMethodAsync>g__Awaited|12_0(ControllerActionInvoker invoker, ValueTask`1 actionResultValueTask)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ControllerActionInvoker.<InvokeNextActionFilterAsync>g__Awaited|10_0(ControllerActionInvoker invoker, Task lastTask, State next, Scope scope, Object state, Boolean isCompleted)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ControllerActionInvoker.Rethrow(ActionExecutedContextSealed context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ControllerActionInvoker.Next(State& next, Scope& scope, Object& state, Boolean& isCompleted)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ControllerActionInvoker.InvokeInnerFilterAsync()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.<InvokeNextResourceFilter>g__Awaited|24_0(ResourceInvoker invoker, Task lastTask, State next, Scope scope, Object state, Boolean isCompleted)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Filters.MiddlewareFilterBuilder.<>c.<<BuildPipeline>b__8_0>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Filters.UnhandledExceptionLoggerMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.<InvokeNextResourceFilter>g__Awaited|24_0(ResourceInvoker invoker, Task lastTask, State next, Scope scope, Object state, Boolean isCompleted)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.Rethrow(ResourceExecutedContextSealed context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.Next(State& next, Scope& scope, Object& state, Boolean& isCompleted)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.InvokeFilterPipelineAsync()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.<InvokeAsync>g__Awaited|17_0(ResourceInvoker invoker, Task task, IDisposable scope)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Routing.EndpointMiddleware.<Invoke>g__AwaitRequestTask|6_0(Endpoint endpoint, Task requestTask, ILogger logger)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.Website.Middleware.PublicAccessMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Middleware.BackOfficeExternalLoginProviderErrorMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.Extensions.MapMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Session.SessionMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Session.SessionMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Localization.RequestLocalizationMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Authorization.Policy.AuthorizationMiddlewareResultHandler.HandleAsync(RequestDelegate next, HttpContext context, AuthorizationPolicy policy, PolicyAuthorizationResult authorizeResult)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Authorization.AuthorizationMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Authentication.AuthenticationMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at SixLabors.ImageSharp.Web.Middleware.ImageSharpMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Diagnostics.StatusCodePagesMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at StackExchange.Profiling.MiniProfilerMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context) in C:\projects\dotnet\src\MiniProfiler.AspNetCore\MiniProfilerMiddleware.cs:line 119
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.Common.Middleware.UmbracoRequestMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.Common.Middleware.UmbracoRequestMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.Common.Middleware.PreviewAuthenticationMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.Common.Middleware.UmbracoRequestLoggingMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at System.Runtime.CompilerServices.TaskAwaiter.HandleNonSuccessAndDebuggerNotification(Task task)
[11:16:49 ERR] An unhandled exception has occurred while executing the request.
System.InvalidOperationException: Sequence contains no matching element
   at System.Linq.ThrowHelper.ThrowNoMatchException()
   at System.Linq.Enumerable.First[TSource](IEnumerable`1 source, Func`2 predicate)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Trees.ApplicationTreeController.GetApiControllerProxy(Type controllerType, String action, FormCollection querystring)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Trees.ApplicationTreeController.GetRootNode(Tree tree, FormCollection querystring)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Trees.ApplicationTreeController.TryGetRootNode(Tree tree, FormCollection querystring)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Trees.ApplicationTreeController.GetApplicationTrees(String application, String tree, FormCollection queryStrings, TreeUse use)
   at lambda_method341(Closure , Object )
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ActionMethodExecutor.AwaitableObjectResultExecutor.Execute(IActionResultTypeMapper mapper, ObjectMethodExecutor executor, Object controller, Object[] arguments)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ControllerActionInvoker.<InvokeActionMethodAsync>g__Awaited|12_0(ControllerActionInvoker invoker, ValueTask`1 actionResultValueTask)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ControllerActionInvoker.<InvokeNextActionFilterAsync>g__Awaited|10_0(ControllerActionInvoker invoker, Task lastTask, State next, Scope scope, Object state, Boolean isCompleted)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ControllerActionInvoker.Rethrow(ActionExecutedContextSealed context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ControllerActionInvoker.Next(State& next, Scope& scope, Object& state, Boolean& isCompleted)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ControllerActionInvoker.InvokeInnerFilterAsync()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.<InvokeNextResourceFilter>g__Awaited|24_0(ResourceInvoker invoker, Task lastTask, State next, Scope scope, Object state, Boolean isCompleted)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Filters.MiddlewareFilterBuilder.<>c.<<BuildPipeline>b__8_0>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Filters.UnhandledExceptionLoggerMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.<InvokeNextResourceFilter>g__Awaited|24_0(ResourceInvoker invoker, Task lastTask, State next, Scope scope, Object state, Boolean isCompleted)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.Rethrow(ResourceExecutedContextSealed context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.Next(State& next, Scope& scope, Object& state, Boolean& isCompleted)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.InvokeFilterPipelineAsync()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc.Infrastructure.ResourceInvoker.<InvokeAsync>g__Awaited|17_0(ResourceInvoker invoker, Task task, IDisposable scope)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Routing.EndpointMiddleware.<Invoke>g__AwaitRequestTask|6_0(Endpoint endpoint, Task requestTask, ILogger logger)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.Website.Middleware.PublicAccessMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.BackOffice.Middleware.BackOfficeExternalLoginProviderErrorMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.Extensions.MapMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Session.SessionMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Session.SessionMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Localization.RequestLocalizationMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Authorization.Policy.AuthorizationMiddlewareResultHandler.HandleAsync(RequestDelegate next, HttpContext context, AuthorizationPolicy policy, PolicyAuthorizationResult authorizeResult)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Authorization.AuthorizationMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Authentication.AuthenticationMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at SixLabors.ImageSharp.Web.Middleware.ImageSharpMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Diagnostics.StatusCodePagesMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)
   at StackExchange.Profiling.MiniProfilerMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context) in C:\projects\dotnet\src\MiniProfiler.AspNetCore\MiniProfilerMiddleware.cs:line 119
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.Common.Middleware.UmbracoRequestMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.Common.Middleware.UmbracoRequestMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.Common.Middleware.PreviewAuthenticationMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Umbraco.Cms.Web.Common.Middleware.UmbracoRequestLoggingMiddleware.InvokeAsync(HttpContext context, RequestDelegate next)
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Builder.UseMiddlewareExtensions.<>c__DisplayClass6_1.<<UseMiddlewareInterface>b__1>d.MoveNext()
--- End of stack trace from previous location ---
   at Microsoft.AspNetCore.Diagnostics.DeveloperExceptionPageMiddleware.Invoke(HttpContext context)

I've tried to dig into the point of the error...
https://github.com/umbraco/Umbraco-CMS/blob/release-9.0.0-beta001/src/Umbraco.Web.BackOffice/Trees/ApplicationTreeController.cs#L346
...but I've no idea what the _actionDescriptorCollectionProvider is trying to do - I'd dig deeper, but I'm already burning (unpaid) hours/days on this migration. 😬

The weird thing is that I'd already successfully had a custom Tree node working in Day 2 (see above, #105 (comment)). But that was from a project referenced by Visual Studio. So whether that's an issue here, I'm unsure again.

I had a look in the "\umbraco\Data\TEMP\TypesCache\umbraco-types.{MachineName}.list" file, and I can see the Tree and API controllers are listed under IDiscoverable and UmbracoApiController. Not sure what to look for next.

---

If anyone is interested in digging into this any further, please - all help is welcome.

I've pushed my latest changes up to the dev/wip/umb9beta001 branch.

...right, time for me to do some paid work! 🤑

May the journey continue soon... 😄

[warrenbuckley]

Do you have a snippet @leekelleher of the controller you are trying to run so I can test something please?

The weird thing is that I'd already successfully had a custom Tree node working in Day 2 (see above, #105 (comment)). But that was from a project referenced by Visual Studio. So whether that's an issue here, I'm unsure again.

I think this may be related for the TypeFinder stuff in Umbraco not finding your types loaded in your DLL and I suspect if you use a project reference approach rather than copying the file in.

@bergmania & @AndyButland with the Forms & Deploy migration when you have been testing with an example site it has been with a project reference approach, I wonder if you just copy the DLLs into another Umbraco 9 site if the Forms & Deploy types for custom trees etc will be picked up. I would be curious to know.

[leekelleher]

@warrenbuckley The Tree controller didn't work, ContentmentTreeController.cs and same with the API controllers, here's one: EnumDataListSourceApiController.cs. I couldn't figure out if it was the Authorize attribute or something else.

I'll try the project reference approach again, (later today or tomorrow), see what happens. 🤞

[leekelleher]

...Day 6, a quick update...

The Tree controller is now working! 🌟

On my test website, opened the .csproj in Visual Studio, then added my Contentment .csproj as an "Existing project" to the solution - and included it as a Project Reference to the website. This wired up all that *.deps.json nonsense I had to do on Day 4 (part 2), so progress! 🌟 (I'm not convinced whether this is a good workflow for me yet, time will tell.) 🤞

Then after a full solution recompile, the Tree controller got picked up. Weird thing is that I checked the \umbraco\Data\TEMP\TypesCache\umbraco-types.{MachineName}.list again and the same references were there, I'm not sure what had changed... but zero actual code changes from me. 🤷

...the journey continues...

[leekelleher]

...Day 7... (includes some things that I did on Day 6, but I ran out of time before writing up my notes)

Having switched to using a Visual Studio solution for the test website and adding the project reference for Contentment's .csproj, development has been smoother. Although, I'm not completely happy with the set-up, and recompiles/reloads seem to take much longer than I'd like them to. I suspect it's either something to do with my post-build script (that bundles/minifies the CSS and JS), I may look at alternatives for that (e.g. grunty/gulpy/thingymebobby).

---

Having gone through the Contentment codebase, updated the various namespaces, successfully compiled, etc. Next it was time to go through all the features to see if they still worked.

First I created a DataType for each of the main property-editors. Found a few errors, related to the view paths - inject a few IIOHelper references, (with the .ResolveRelativeOrVirtualUrl() extension method), recompiled... and all good! 🌟

Next I went through all of the Data Sources and List Editors for the Data List property-editor. Again a bunch of view path errors, whacked in more IIOHelper references. 🌟 (With these injections, my classes are starting to look like pincushions!) 🙀

With the XML data-source, I noticed that Umbraco's UmbracoXPathPathSyntaxParser class had been marked as public, so I could remove my dodgy Reflection hack 🌟

Found a bug with the XML data-source too. I'm using XPathDocument to load in the URI directly, but found that this now throws an exception if the URL is on HTTPS. Regular HTTP is fine, but HTTPS errors with "SSL connection could not be established". Which is odd, as it worked on v8, and I also tried a HTTPS URL with the JSON data-source (which uses a WebClient object) and that was fine. 🤷 I may need to refactor the data-source.

Refactored the FileSystem data-source, as there was subtle changes to Umbraco's PhysicalFileSystem - all fine. 🌟

SQL data-source, I'm ended up commenting out the SQLCE specific code, as I don't want to have a dependency on a SQLCE NuGet. I tried looking through Umbraco source-code to see if there a was an agnostic approach I could take, but I got lost in the code. I've commented out the code for now. Will review later.

---

This afternoon, I've been looking at adding configuration settings - initially for disabling the Telemetry feature. I wasn't sure how to go about doing this, then remembered that @warrenbuckley has a YouTube video about it, so watched that - thank you Warren! 🌟 ref: "Configuration & Options in Umbraco package for .NETCore"

If you haven't seen Warren's first video about v9 migration, I watched that too (all the way through 😝). ref: "Porting an Umbraco Package from V8 to V9 .NETCore version" 🌟

I've got the basis of an injectable IOptions<ContentmentSettings> working now, so can enable/disable the Telemetry feature using standard .NET 5 approaches. 🌟

---

Next up, (well some time this week), I'll add all the DataTypes to DocumentTypes, and see how the content editing experience is. My expectation is that it'll work the same as v8 (from an AngularJS perspective). After that, it'll be frontend rendering + ModelsBuilder.

...the journey continues...

[leekelleher]

... tiny Day 8 update ... (not really a day, as I only had an hour to spare this afternoon ... gotta pay my mortgage, ya know 😉😆 )

Started adding the DataTypes to my DocumentType... and, gah, hit a snag! 😣
The view path for the majority of my property-editors is no longer resolve relative/virtual paths automatically. I've raised a ticket on the Umbraco repository: umbraco/Umbraco-CMS#10265

I can work around this for the time being - by setting an absolute View path - until we find out if this is a regression bug or not.

...the journey continues...

[leekelleher]

... Small update for Day 9 ... (I'm not sure whether I should be giving these updates day numbers anymore. It's pretty much when I can grab an hour or two at the moment.

Umbraco v9 Beta 2 is out today! 🎉🎉

I had a quick look to see what the Changes between beta 1 and beta 2 were. Looked fine, didn't look anything major.

Upgraded the "Umbraco.Cms" NuGet packages in my Visual Studio solution - for both Contentment and my test website. All fine.

Then...

Error	CS0246	The type or namespace name 'ServerVariablesParsing' could not be found (are you missing a using directive or an assembly reference?)

Hmmm, what is this? 🤔

I scratched my head, re-read the "Changes between beta 1 and beta 2" summary again. No mention of ServerVariablesParsing being removed. In Visual Studio, I press CTRL + . to see what intellisense suggests - no namespace suggestions, in case it'd been relocated. Just wanted me to create a new class file for it. Hmmm. 🤔

So next place I think is to dig through all the commits between "release-9.0.0-beta001" and "release-9.0.0-beta002" to see where ServerVariablesParsing went to.

Yup, time to roll your sleeves up, and get digging (in commits).

I soon find out that ServerVariablesParsing got renamed to ServerVariablesParsingNotification - and also changed namespaces. 🙄
Found the pull request for it: umbraco/Umbraco-CMS#10231 - 343 file changes! 😮

I update my code, all compiled, let's move on. 🌟

Well, before I do, this change niggled me a bit. I re-read the "Changes between beta 1 and beta 2" summary again and it wasn't immediately obvious to me that "All notifications moved to the same namespace to make them easily discoverable" affected the ServerVariablesParsing rename/move. 😕

Of course, I'm not expecting all 300+ file changes needed to be listed, but to me, in an Umbraco context, the word notifications is not something I'd cognitively associate with the old .NET Event Handlers. It's now an overloaded term... in an Umbraco context it could either mean:

1. Backoffice messages that appear after an action, e.g. content save & publish or validation errors
2. Workflow emails that are sent out (if configured) when a restricted user wants to publish content, etc.
3. ...and now I guess it means the old .NET Event Handlers too? 🤷

Of course, as the saying goes... naming things is hard.

Apologies that this became a bit of a ranty update. I'm trying to be honest and document my package migration journey, warts and all. Still lots of love and kudos to all involved. ✌️❤️🕊️

...the journey continues...

[bergmania]

Thanks, I updated the "Changes between beta 1 and beta 2" with the information about the rename too. Sorry I missed that.

[leekelleher]

Thanks @bergmania. Hope I didn't come across too moaning? 😆 I appreciate all the efforts! 🙏

[leekelleher]

...quick Day 10 update...

All the property-editors are working! 🌟

There are a few minor snags, but (currently) no other showstoppers. 😄

I got the Content Blocks preview feature working. Spent a fair amount of time figuring out how to render a partial-view to a string in .NET Core, found various StackOverflow answers. I had a quick look at using View Components, but I started to feel it was going to take more time that I had set aside. I'm lead to believe that View Components are the right approach for doing the Preview, but it's one of those "get it working now, fix up later". 🌟

Found a small snag with Content Blocks' Content Template (Blueprint) feature, I got an error for the Umbraco API endpoint. /umbraco/backoffice/umbracoapi/content/GetEmpty?blueprintId=1082&parentId=1076. I haven't looked into that yet, unsure whether it's me or Umbraco. Another one of those to review later. 🤷

There are a few other snags that I'd like to resolve before releasing an alpha version.
I'll write them up and post in the next update. 👍

---

Tried out the frontend parts. I could see from the contents of ~/umbraco/models/models.generated.cs that the existing Contentment code (ValueConverters) was working with ModelsBuilder. 🌟 But intellisense wasn't working in my .cshtml templates. 🤔

First I foolishly set the "models.generated.cs" file to Compile in Visual Studio - mistake! I got screamed at about duplicate AssemblyVersion attributes.

Then I tried configuring a different ModelsBuilder mode, here's my config...

  "Umbraco": {
    "CMS": {

      "ModelsBuilder": {
        "ModelsMode": "LiveAppData",
        "ModelsDirectory": "~/PublishedModels"
      },

// <snip/>

    }
  }

This now puts the generated C# classes into the "~/PublishedModels" folder, which can now be compiled. Intellisense works! 🌟
(I best not mention that the C# classes are effectively in the project twice, I know some folk get upset when things are wasteful! ☕😝)

...the journey continues...

[leekelleher]

Here's my (current) snag list.

So far, they're all related to Data List - Data Sources...

---

SQL data-source

SQLCE support. I've had to comment out the SQLCE parts, as I'm unsure how to tackle it.

https://github.com/leekelleher/umbraco-contentment/blob/dev/wip/umb9beta001/src/Umbraco.Community.Contentment/DataEditors/DataList/DataSources/SqlDataListSource.cs#L138-L147

The issue is that SQLCE support wont come natively with Umbraco for .NET Core, it's available as an extra (NuGet) dependency. So if I want to include it, that would add the dependency to Contentment - which isn't something I want.

Ideally, I'd like the SQL data-source code to be generic, agnostic to the database provider - enter a SQL query, select a connection string, job done. Of course, there is always more code under the hood. I've had a look at how Umbraco core handles this, but I got a bit lost (again).

If anyone has any bright ideas? 💡 I'm all ears.

---

XML data-source

Calling new XPathDocument() with a HTTPS URL throws a HttpRequestException exception. However it works fine for regular HTTP URLs.

https://github.com/leekelleher/umbraco-contentment/blob/dev/wip/umb9beta001/src/Umbraco.Community.Contentment/DataEditors/DataList/DataSources/XmlDataListSource.cs#L130-L131

The strange thing is that if I do the same with the JSON data-source, a HTTPS URL is fine. The difference is that I'm using the WebClient.DownloadString method.

https://github.com/leekelleher/umbraco-contentment/blob/dev/wip/umb9beta001/src/Umbraco.Community.Contentment/DataEditors/DataList/DataSources/JsonDataListSource.cs#L210

I'm only using the XPathDocument overload, as it accepts a URL string. My workaround would be to go get the string contents then load it into the XPathDocument. But it'd be nice to know what the underlying issue is.

---

Umbraco Members data-source

The call to PublishedSnapshot.Members.Get() requires an IMember, there used to be methods/overloads for int ID or Guid in v8.

My workaround is to call IMemberService.GetByKey() to get the IMember first. Which is probably what the v8 way was doing anyway.

https://github.com/leekelleher/umbraco-contentment/blob/dev/wip/umb9beta001/src/Umbraco.Community.Contentment/DataEditors/DataList/DataSources/UmbracoMembersDataListSource.cs#L142

[leekelleher]

Umbraco 9 beta 3 is out!

Upgraded the NuGet dependencies on Contentment, there were various API breaking-changes - mostly related to Dependency Inject - but I'd expected this, so no big surprises. If you're curious about the types of changes, see commit: c9013ad.

I'm not sure when to release an alpha of Contentment v3.0, as I'm unsure how many v9 beta releases there will be, and I don't want the pressure of immediately patching up any breaking-changes whilst still in beta. 🤔💭

... rejsen fortsætter ...

[leekelleher]

I'm using this as a reference that most folk don't understand the nuances between Umbraco v9 beta versions, in terms of breaking-changes and package support.

https://our.umbraco.com/forum/umbraco-9/106343-umbraco-9-usync-beta

I'll be waiting for v9-RC before releasing an alpha NuGet package of Contentment.

[leekelleher]

Umbraco 9 beta 4 is out! 🎉🎉🎉🎉

Upgraded the NuGet dependencies. No breaking-changes! (I'm happy to be wrong about the betas) 😆

I made a change to how the CSS/JS assets are registered, see commit: 8c23c87.
I no longer need to have a package.manifest file in the "/App_Plugins/Contentment/" folder.

[leekelleher]

With Umbraco 9 RC due out tomorrow, I've been working hard to get Contentment v3.0 (alpha001) ready for a pre-release on NuGet. In the Git repo, I've swapped the active branch to be dev/v3.0, (it was previously dev/wip/umb9beta001).

...I'll update again tomorrow!

[leekelleher]

Umbraco 9 RC is out ...and... Contentment v3.0.0-alpha001 has been released!

In terms of journalising today's efforts... I hit a snag with the Umbraco 9 RC upgrade, I suspect it was to do with using SQLCE, I chatted with @warrenbuckley about it, but I wanted to crack on with my release. The rest of my effort has been hours of faffing around with my build scripts (see commit 833ca9f) - error NETSDK1005 totally threw me - I'm sure there are simpler ways, I'll revisit it soon.

Congratulations to @bergmania and the rest of the Unicore Team on today's v9 milestone release! #h5yr 👏👏👏

[leekelleher]

The Umbraco 9.0.0-rc002 release had a few of breaking-changes, that @arknu quickly picked up on and sent me the fixes in #127 - I'm very grateful.

Unfortunately, due to heavy workload commitments, I haven't had much free time to focus on Contentment releases, so PR #127 has been sat in my inbox for the past 20 days. Staring at me, the guilt slowly building. 😬

After seeing @JasonElkin's issue #130 last night, I thought I best get a patch release out.

Contentment v3.0.0-alpha004 has been released!

[leekelleher]

Epilogue

I never got around to writing about the last chapter of my Contentment for Umbraco 9 journey.

I took a massive U-turn after chatting with other package developers (okay, Matt, Kevin and Marc) about ongoing support for both Umbraco v8 and v9. I decided to try out a multi-targeting approach to support both .NET 4.7.2 (Umbraco v8) and .NET 5 (Umbraco v9). I did talk a little bit about this in the release notes for v3.0.0-beta001 and v3.0.0.

The good news is that this approach should work better me in supporting future feature requests with Umbraco v8. Originally I'd discarded continuing with v8, but after conversations that felt that I was dismissive and short-sighted. Which didn't fit my friendly nature, so I'm happy to have corrected course. ☘️

One thing that I wanted to flag in this last part is the Git branches. Throughout this journal, I've linked to the dev/wip/umb9beta001 branch several times. But since I want to clean up the old branches (because they are done with), once I've deleted it, those links will be broken. Which sucks! So apologies to anyone who follows those broken links, please refer to the dev/v3.x branch instead, (which will be a long lived branch).

Thanks again to everyone who's been involved with the development of Contentment v3.0, it's been a journey! ✌️❤️🕊️