Pacweb Internet

ASP.NET Membership Encrypted Passwords

To keep your passwords secure but still be able to retrieve the password via the ASP.NET membership provider you will need to implement the password type as Encrypted.

To do this you need to provide a machine key in the web.config of machine.config.

You can find a machine key generator at:  http://www.developmentnow.com/articles/machinekey_generator.aspx

The membership code looks like:

<membership defaultProvider="BfssSqlMembershipProvider">
  <providers>
    <!-- Add a customized SqlMembershipProvider -->
    <add name="BfssSqlMembershipProvider"
    type="System.Web.Security.SqlMembershipProvider"
    connectionStringName="cstrBFSS"
    enablePasswordRetrieval="true"
    enablePasswordReset="true"
    requiresQuestionAndAnswer="true"
    applicationName="BusinessForSaleSpain"
    requiresUniqueEmail="false"
    passwordFormat="Encrypted"
    maxInvalidPasswordAttempts="5"
    minRequiredPasswordLength="7"
    minRequiredNonalphanumericCharacters="0"
    passwordAttemptWindow="10"
    passwordStrengthRegularExpression=""/>
  </providers>
</membership>
<machineKey
  validationKey="7D69B8F7D5D4A9D6CC9776D6972877FC1ACA7669
    650687987EBF3C2A1709E0065AAA13ECABF4193A65920A027588
    42EF9EA97FDAC57C2F40F808AD1FFD9145"
  decryptionKey="CB0CE75BFD315E2108A96F95384BA8E28AE2AF97
    03F42B7D369EE44C09C394A6"
  validation="SHA1" decryption="AES"
/>

Please make sure you generate your own machine key.

For further information about ASP.NET Membership please visit: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff648345.aspx

Web site optimisation and debugging

Google GWT 2.0 Speed Tracer as seen in .net magazine issue 202 on page 124 looks like a great tool to identify bottlenecks and bugs in your website or web application.

I am currently using FireFox with developer toolbar, firebug, yslow and pagespeed to debug, but the article claims that Speed Tracer offers hidden insights not found in other tools.

read more about speed tracer for website optimisation

ASP.NET 2 LoginView Inside FormView Data Binding Problem

I was recently working on an ASP.NET 2 application which uses the SQL Membership Provider for User Role Management.  While customising the output of the forms in the admin area using the LoginView I encountered a bug in asp.net 2.  This bug wasted a lot of time debugging and scratching my head wondering what was wrong.

Read More …

Free Flash Charting Control for ASP.NET, PHP and More

I have recently been working on a management dashboard for an e-commerce website and needed a good charting control to display an overview of sales, registrations etc.

After a brief crawl on the web I came across Fusion Charts. The controls are as neat and easy to use as any of the premium solutions I could find, but best of all, the basic package is completely free, even for commercial use.

read more about fusion charts

ie6 png transparency

ie6 png transparency problem example image

I recently encountered an issue regarding png transparency on older browsers whilst developing a website targeted at schools.

The web site used png transparency to display rounded corders and tabs over a sky background.  It worked well in all modern browsers but in ie6 and lower the png transparency was replaced by an ugly grey box.

Due to the project specifications identifying ie6 in the browser compatibility list it was necessary to find a solution to the problem.

I spent some time researching possible solutions and tried a few out, some worked, some were difficult to implement and others just didn’t seem to work at all.  After some time I settled upon a solution and have documented it with the following example:

ie6 png transparency problem

The solution involves 2 methods for dealing with png transparency, one to handle img tags in the html and one to handle css background images.  I have also documented how to overcome the issue with non clickable links after implementing the css only png transparency solution.