Sunday 21 June 2015

YouTube Comments and Commenting with YouTube API V3 (Google.Apis.YouTube.v3)




Google deprecated V2 of the YouTube API over a year ago, but as of last month, the URLs have been taken offline; forcing users to upgrade to V3 of the API. One of the last features requiring implementating on the V3 platform was the ability to comment on channels and videos. The following example shows how to leave a top level comment on a channel or video using V3 of the API with C#

Example
Code Snippet
  1.  
  2. YouTubeService youtube; // Init your service here - Make sure you include the new required scope: YouTubeService.Scope.YoutubeForceSsl
  3.  
  4. CommentThreadSnippet commentThreadSnippet = new CommentThreadSnippet();
  5. //commentThreadSnippet.ChannelId; Comment on a channel - leave video id blank if so
  6. commentThreadSnippet.VideoId = v.ID; // Comment on a Video by VideoID
  7.  
  8. // A top level comment is a new comment (Not a reply to an existing comment)
  9. commentThreadSnippet.TopLevelComment = new Comment() { Snippet = new CommentSnippet() { TextOriginal = comment }};
  10.  
  11. // Make an insert request and get result snippet
  12. CommentThreadsResource.InsertRequest commentReq = youtube.CommentThreads.Insert(new CommentThread() { Snippet = commentThreadSnippet}, "snippet");
  13. CommentThread commentRes = commentReq.Execute();
End of Code Snippet

Wednesday 25 March 2015

Silently Delete a File within a Windows Batch File (BAT File)


I have recently been preparing some custom install scripts lately and I found a few things that may prove to be of some use! This script deletes a file silently and will not report the result in the console window.

Code Snippet
  1. @echo off
  2. del /s randomtextfile.txt >nul 2>&1 REM Delete file silently
End of Code Snippet

How to get operating system 32bit or 64bit from a Windows Batch File (BAT File)


I have recently been preparing some custom install scripts lately and I found a few things that may prove to be of some use! This script uses a registry key to determine weather the host system is a 32bit or a 64bit system

Code Snippet
  1. @echo off REM Hide output from commands
  2. @echo Attempting to get operating system type (32bit or 64bit)...
  3.  
  4. REM -------------- Get 32bit or 64bit --------------
  5. Set RegQry=HKLM\Hardware\Description\System\CentralProcessor\0
  6. REG.exe Query %RegQry% > checkOS.txt
  7. Find /i "x86" < CheckOS.txt > StringCheck.txt
  8.  
  9. If %ERRORLEVEL% == 0 (
  10.     @echo This is 32 Bit Operating system!
  11.     SET ostype = "32bit"
  12. ) ELSE (
  13.     @echo This is 64 Bit Operating System!
  14.     SET ostype = "64bit"
  15. )
  16. del /s checkOS.txt >nul 2>&1 REM Clean up silently
  17. del /s StringCheck.txt >nul 2>&1 REM Clean up silently
End of Code Snippet

Monday 16 March 2015

YouTube Bulk Uploader for the Lazy - An Offline Auto-Tagger, Bulk Uploader and VMS for YouTube!


Being a hardcore videographer with very limited time in the world to share my vast collection of videos, I begun the search for an all encompassing video management system with the ability to auto-tag and upload my videos in bulk to YouTube. As I tend to travel lot and have a lot of time where I could be preparing my videos to upload, I found that I needed an internet connection to even tag them and place them into categories and apply the appropriate finishing details. I found a couple of programs which lightly touched on my requirements, but nothing stood up even close to my needs. Therefore I develped my own solution: "YouTube Bulk Uploader: For the Lazy!".



YouTube Bulk Uploader for the Lazy is your simple and fast solution for offline tagging and uploading videos to YouTube in Bulk. Save hours of time and effort today!

YouTube Bulk Uploader for the Lazy allows you to easily BULK UPLOAD and TAG 1000's of videos OFFLINE! The software provides bulk editing of videos (Tags, Categories, Descriptions, Titles etc) and provides a simple to use interface for uploading and managing videos. The software 'tags' each physical video on your drive so you can freely move and rename them and the software will be able to detect where they are at all times! This can all be done offline, so no need for an internet connection until you're ready to upload!

  • Supports ALL YouTube supported video file types. MP4, MOV, MKV, MPEG, 3GP, AVI and more
  • Allows bulk editing of video titles, descriptions, tags, categories, privacy and more
  • Supports multiple YouTube accounts
  • Ability to copy video information between multiple accounts
  • The Tag Manager allows you to pre-define a set of video tags to tag videos faster!
  • The Upload Queue allows to you prioritize your video uploads
  • The Video Database allows you to edit and manage video information
  • File Path Sync allows you to scan your hard drive for video files which have been moved or renamed
  • All features can be performed offline (WITHOUT AN INTERNET CONNECTION!!) (Apart from the uploading part!)
  • YouTube video titles, descriptions and video tags are automatically created using the videos file name!
  • 1 Full Year of Free Product Updates
  • Excellent Customer Support Service
  • All This for Only $19.95!

- See more at: http://ginkosolutions.com/youtube-bulk-uploader

Yellow Pages & Yelp Data Extraction - Crawler Spider Business Email List Capture Grabber Scraper


Developed by an old university friend. Very useful software to build your own business email lists and databases!



Web Contact Scraper is a fully automated software application for gathering targeted business contact information!

You can search and gather thousands of business details matching a chosen profession within any location worldwide! Build your own targeted Email Marketing Lists yourself! You can instantly retrieve 1000 Plumbers in New York or 10,000 Dance Instructors in Australia, the possibilities are endless! Export emails, phone numbers, websites, addresses to CSV and start your targeted business campaign today!

  • Search for multiple business key words (I.e. Construction, Dentist, Lawyer)
  • Search within multiple cities, states and countries!
  • See the search results appear in real-time!
  • In-built tool to remove duplicate contact information
  • Supports Yellow Pages and Yelp!
  • Export results to CSV
  • Proxy IP Support to scrape anonymously!
  • Lifetime Licence Key for up to 2 Computers
  • 1 Full Year of Free Product Updates
  • Excellent Customer Support Service
  • All This for Only $19.95!

- See more at: http://ginkosolutions.com/webcontactscraper

Saturday 14 March 2015

Getting and Setting File Tag Meta Information in C# and ASP.NET - With TagLib and DsoFile Examples


The Problem
I recently developed a video content management system, and rather than store hidden files to track versioning and movement of physical files, I wanted to modify the internal file meta information of the videos themselves. I planned to stuff a database ID into the comment tag within each video file, but this proved to be very challenging given the very disoraganised way in which various operating system handled different file types.

Possible Solutions
MediaInfo - http://sourceforge.net/projects/mediainfo/. Cool API, updated a lot, but there is no support for setting file meta information. The entire API is READ ONLY!

TagLib - https://taglib.github.io/. Again, good API with scope to set file tag meta information. So I decided to try this API out and see how far I could get with it. I started hitting it's limits when I couldn't set file meta information for a LOT of video file types: MKV, MOV, 3GP, ASF and more.

DsoFile - http://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/kb/224351. Microsoft's answer to tagging Microsoft Office file tag information. It's able to set Office file tags but also totally new custom properties within each file. You cannot see these values in Windows Explorer without a handy Powershell script plugin, but it works for ALL file types, not just office documents. It's written in C++ and includes the source code also. The downside is that it's a COM component, 32bit and no longer supported. However, somebody compiled a 64bit version here

The Ideal Solution
DsoFile seems like a great solution to the problem. TagLib works hard to achieve an ideal solution, but there are too many file types out there ever changing and the library finds it hard to keep up. I decided to use DsoFile for my project for the time being. I have provided some sample code below so you can see how TagLib and DsoFile libraries modify file meta tag information.

TagLib Sample Code - How to Get and Set the Comment File Meta Tag Field
Code Snippet
  1. using System;
  2. using TagLib;
  3.  
  4. /// <summary>
  5. /// (c) GinkoSolutions.com
  6. /// This sample class enables you to set meta file information within physical files.
  7. /// This is similar to EXIF information for picture files.
  8. /// TagLib doesn't seem to work for a lot of file types: MKV, MOV etc
  9. /// It seems to work ok for MP4 files though.
  10. /// </summary>
  11. public static class TagLibExample
  12. {
  13.     /// <summary>
  14.     /// Gets the comment tag from a files meta information
  15.     /// </summary>
  16.     /// <param name="filename">Path to the file</param>
  17.     /// <returns>Our custom value stored in the files comment tag</returns>
  18.     public static string GetCommentField(string filename)
  19.     {
  20.         string comment = string.Empty;
  21.         TagLib.File file = null;
  22.  
  23.         try
  24.         {
  25.             file = TagLib.File.Create(filename);
  26.             comment = file.Tag.Comment;
  27.         }
  28.         catch (Exception ex)
  29.         {
  30.             // This library works with limited file types, so unsupported file types are
  31.             // thrown here when trying to use "TagLib.File.Create()"
  32.         }
  33.         finally
  34.         {
  35.             if (file != null) file.Dispose(); // Clean up
  36.         }
  37.  
  38.         return comment;
  39.     }
  40.  
  41.     /// <summary>
  42.     /// Sets the comment tag within a files meta information
  43.     /// </summary>
  44.     /// <param name="filename">Path to the file</param>
  45.     /// <param name="value">Value to store in the comment tag</param>
  46.     public static void SetCommentField(string filename, string value)
  47.     {
  48.         TagLib.File file = null;
  49.  
  50.         try
  51.         {
  52.             file = TagLib.File.Create(filename);
  53.  
  54.             // Set comment tag
  55.             // NOTE: file.Tag.Comment cannot be an empty string, it defaults to null if empty
  56.             file.Tag.Comment = GetCommentField;
  57.             file.Save();
  58.  
  59.             // Check comment was added successfully.
  60.             // For some reason, TagLib won't throw an error if the property doesnt save
  61.             // for certain file types, yet they appear to be supported.
  62.             // So we have to check it actually worked...
  63.             file = TagLib.File.Create(filename);
  64.  
  65.             if (file.Tag.Comment != value)
  66.                 throw new Exception("Could not set comment tag. This file format is not supported.");
  67.         }
  68.         catch (Exception ex)
  69.         {
  70.             // Handle errors here
  71.         }
  72.         finally // Always called, even when throwing in Exception block
  73.         {
  74.             if (file != null) file.Dispose(); // Clean up
  75.         }
  76.     }
  77. }
  78.  
End of Code Snippet


DsoFile Sample Code - How to Store a Value into a Custom Property and Get it back!
Code Snippet
  1. using System;
  2. using DSOFile;
  3.  
  4. /// <summary>
  5. /// (c) GinkoSolutions.com
  6. /// This sample class enables you to set meta file information within physical files.
  7. /// This is similar to EXIF information for picture files.
  8. /// DSOFile works for every file type, not just office files.
  9. ///
  10. /// NOTE
  11. /// DsoFile is an unmnaged 32bit dll. We need to compile in x86 mode or we get 'class not registered exception'
  12. /// There is a third party 64bit version available online, or recompile the C++ source manually.
  13. /// </summary>
  14. public static class DSOFileExample
  15. {
  16.     /// <summary>
  17.     /// A property name that this sample code uses to store tag information.
  18.     /// </summary>
  19.     private static string FILE_PROPERTY = "CustomFileTag";
  20.  
  21.     /// <summary>
  22.     /// Gets value stored in a custom tag
  23.     /// </summary>
  24.     /// <param name="filename">Path to the file</param>
  25.     /// <returns>Our custom value stored in the custom file tag</returns>
  26.     public static string GetCustomPropertyValue(string filename)
  27.     {
  28.         string comment = string.Empty;
  29.         OleDocumentProperties file = new DSOFile.OleDocumentProperties();
  30.  
  31.         try
  32.         {
  33.             // Open file
  34.             file.Open(filename, false, DSOFile.dsoFileOpenOptions.dsoOptionDefault);
  35.             comment = GetTagField(file);
  36.         }
  37.         catch (Exception ex)
  38.         {
  39.             // Handle errors here
  40.         }
  41.         finally
  42.         {
  43.             if (file != null) file.Close(); // Clean up
  44.         }
  45.  
  46.         return comment;
  47.     }
  48.  
  49.     /// <summary>
  50.     /// Sets value stored in a files custom tag
  51.     /// </summary>
  52.     /// <param name="filename">Path to the file</param>
  53.     /// <param name="value">Value to store in the custom file tag</param>
  54.     public static void SetCustomPropertyValue(string filename, string value)
  55.     {
  56.         OleDocumentProperties file = new DSOFile.OleDocumentProperties();
  57.  
  58.         try
  59.         {
  60.             file.Open(filename, false, DSOFile.dsoFileOpenOptions.dsoOptionDefault);
  61.             SetTagField(file, value);
  62.         }
  63.         catch (Exception ex)
  64.         {
  65.             // Handle errors here
  66.         }
  67.         finally // Always called, even when throwing in Exception block
  68.         {
  69.             if (file != null) file.Close(); // Clean up
  70.         }
  71.     }
  72.  
  73.     /// <summary>
  74.     /// Gets the value of the file tag property
  75.     /// </summary>
  76.     /// <param name="file">Ole Document File</param>
  77.     /// <returns>Contents of the file tag property. Can be null or empty.</returns>
  78.     private static string GetTagField(DSOFile.OleDocumentProperties file)
  79.     {
  80.         string result = string.Empty;
  81.         foreach (DSOFile.CustomProperty property in file.CustomProperties)
  82.         {
  83.             if (property.Name == FILE_PROPERTY) // Check property exists
  84.             {
  85.                 result = property.get_Value();
  86.                 break;
  87.             }
  88.         }
  89.         return result;
  90.     }
  91.  
  92.     /// <summary>
  93.     /// Sets the value of the file tag property
  94.     /// </summary>
  95.     /// <param name="file">Ole Document File</param>
  96.     /// <param name="value">Value to set as the property value</param>
  97.     /// <param name="saveDocument">Saves document if set to true</param>
  98.     /// <param name="closeDocument">Closes the document if set to true</param>
  99.     private static void SetTagField(DSOFile.OleDocumentProperties file, string value, bool saveDocument = true, bool closeDocument = true)
  100.     {
  101.         bool found = false;
  102.         foreach (DSOFile.CustomProperty property in file.CustomProperties)
  103.         {
  104.             if (property.Name == FILE_PROPERTY) // Check property exists
  105.             {
  106.                 property.set_Value(value);
  107.                 found = true;
  108.                 break;
  109.             }
  110.         }
  111.  
  112.         if (!found)
  113.             file.CustomProperties.Add(FILE_PROPERTY, value);
  114.  
  115.         if (saveDocument)
  116.             file.Save();
  117.  
  118.         if (closeDocument)
  119.             file.Close();
  120.     }
  121. }
  122.  
End of Code Snippet

Wednesday 11 March 2015

How To Link To And Embed YouTube Videos In HD Or A Specific Quality Level


Here is a great post on how to change the default quality of an embedded YouTube video on a webpage.

http://www.h3xed.com/web-and-internet/link-directly-to-and-embed-hd-youtube-videos

Saturday 14 February 2015

Download ALL Old Versions of iTunes


Found a really great website that let's you download ALL older versions of iTunes for iOS, Windows 32bit and Windows 64bit!

Website: http://appstudio.org/itunes/

Wednesday 11 February 2015

C# - Serialize and Deserialize using BinaryFormatter with Strings (WITHOUT Files)


This code snippet will allow you to Serialize and DeSerialize any serializable object to a standard string and back. No need for binary files!

Usage:
Code Snippet
  1. // Inits
  2. CustomClass instance = new CustomClass();
  3.  
  4. // Serialize
  5. string data = SerializeObject<CustomClass>(instance);
  6.  
  7. // DeSerialize
  8. CustomClass instance = DeSerializeObject<CustomClass>(data);
End of Code Snippet


Code Snippet
  1. // NOTE: The result of serializing an object with BinaryFormatter is an octet stream, not a string.
  2. //       If we encode the serialized object with Base64, we will get our string.
  3. public static string SerializeObject<T>(T toSerialize)
  4. {
  5.     System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.BinaryFormatter formatter = new System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.BinaryFormatter();
  6.  
  7.     if (!toSerialize.GetType().IsSerializable)
  8.     {
  9.         throw new Exception("Object cannot be serialized in it's current state.");
  10.     }
  11.  
  12.     using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream())
  13.     {
  14.         new System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.BinaryFormatter().Serialize(ms, toSerialize);
  15.         return Convert.ToBase64String(ms.ToArray());
  16.     }
  17. }
  18.  
  19. public static T DeSerializeObject<T>(string data)
  20. {
  21.     byte[] bytes = Convert.FromBase64String(data);
  22.  
  23.     using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream(bytes))
  24.     {
  25.         return (T)new System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.BinaryFormatter().Deserialize(ms);
  26.     }
  27. }
End of Code Snippet

Friday 6 February 2015

Recursion and Recursive Methods for Dummies - Working C# Example


In Brief
What is Recursion: Very simply put... A method that calls itself.
Why use Recursion?: So we can repeat a methods logic any number of times with differing arguments.
What is an Example of Recursion?: Directories which contain directories which contain more directories and you would like to scan through all of the files within this directory chain. We can create ONE SINGLE method to do this by calling itself recursively. See below for full example.

Here is a working example of a recursive method in C#. It takes a file directory as an argument and recursively loops through all of the files which the WHOLE directory structure. It goes in deep, then works backwards. This is an example of backwards or tail recursion.

Code Snippet
  1. public void NameOfRecursiveMethod(string directoryToSearch)
  2. {
  3.     // Go in deep as far as possible, then work backwards.
  4.     // Find all the subdirectories under this directory.
  5.     foreach (string dir in Directory.GetDirectories(directoryToSearch))
  6.     {
  7.         // Recursive call for each subdirectory.
  8.         this.NameOfRecursiveMethod(dir);
  9.     }
  10.    
  11.     // Note: The First time we arrive here will be inside the deepest first directory
  12.     // Get all files in the directory
  13.     string[] files = Directory.GetFiles(directoryToSearch);
  14.  
  15.     foreach (string filename in files)
  16.     {
  17.         // Do something for each file here
  18.        
  19.     }
  20. }
End of Code Snippet

How to Deep Clone an Object by Value and not by Reference in C#


The following code snippet using serialization to deep clone an object in C#. Please note: ICloneable is a deprecated API. ICloneable is considered a poor API, since it does not specify whether the result is a deep or a shallow copy.

Code Snippet
  1. // Usage
  2. CLASSNAME clonedInstance = DeepClone<CLASSNAME>(instance);
  3.  
  4.  
  5. // Deep clones an object
  6. // Your class (and all sub-classes) MUST be marked as [Serializable] in order for this to work.
  7. public static T DeepClone<T>(T obj)
  8. {
  9.     using (var ms = new System.IO.MemoryStream())
  10.     {
  11.         var formatter = new System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.BinaryFormatter();
  12.         formatter.Serialize(ms, obj);
  13.         ms.Position = 0;
  14.  
  15.         return (T)formatter.Deserialize(ms);
  16.     }
  17. }
End of Code Snippet

Sunday 18 January 2015

SQL - Find Duplicate Data Column Values


Here is a quick snippet on how to find duplicate columns within your tables

Code Snippet
  1. select col1, col2, count(*)
  2. from TABLE
  3. group by col1, col2
  4. having count(*) > 1
End of Code Snippet

Tuesday 13 January 2015

Free DNS Tools: Ping, Lookup, Trace, Whois, DNS Records, Spam Blacklist Check, Network Lookup and more!


http://network-tools.com/ is a great website that allows you to perform an array of network and troubleshooting steps on any domain or IP address. I use it a lot when troubleshooting domain nameservers and other things that domain registrars should get right, but fail to do so!

Some of the sample operations that can be performed on a domain:
Express
Ping
Lookup
Trace
Whois (IDN Conversion Tool)
DNS Records (Advanced Tool)
Network Lookup
Spam Blacklist Check
URL Decode
URL Encode
HTTP Headers with optional SSL
Email Tests

Check it out!

Sunday 11 January 2015

Binding a DataGridView to a Collection - Notify Grid When Properties are Changed (BindingList and INotifyPropertyChanged)


When utilising a DataGridView or similar control within your windows and web applications, you may wish to bind to a collection (List, ArrayList etc). Binding is always great as you can maintain and manage your custom objects very easily. What can be tough to manage is when you may wish to edit the controls data (A cells contents within a DataGridView for example), so you have to edit the data within your data source (I.e. List of custom objects), then re-bind to reflect the new changes.

The method above would work, but utilising a more Observer Pattern approach to our programming, we can automatically notify the grid when we update any of our properties within our custom collection. You simply need to inherit from INotifyPropertyChanged within your custom object and bind to a DataGridView with a BindingList collection (Very similar to a List). Within the set properties for your custom object, simply raise an event.

A full example can be found here: http://tech.pro/tutorial/776/csharp-tutorial-binding-a-datagridview-to-a-collection

Free DataGrid / DataGridView for WinForms and ASP.NET MVC (SourceGrid)


SourceGrid is a .NET Windows Forms grid control written entirely in C# with managed code. SourceGrid can be used to visualize or to change data in a table format.



Features
- three sub-components, Grid, DataGrid, ArrayGrid
- Multi selection mode, Row Selection, Column selection, Free selection
- Cell and Row spanning
- MVC support
- Full feature list

Website: http://sourcegrid.codeplex.com
Code Project: http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/3531/SourceGrid-Open-Source-C-Grid-Control