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Summary of the best practices of REST API with a huge mind map.
"REST API Design Rulebook" is a book by Mark Masse that provides guidelines for designing REST APIs. Here I used it as a reference to define my rule set and the best practices.

Introduction

As a developer, you may find yourself needing to build or consume a REST API at some point in your career. REST APIs are a popular way for systems to communicate with each other over the web, and they offer many benefits such as being easy to use and maintain. However, it's important to follow best practices when designing and building a REST API to ensure it is reliable, scalable, and easy to use for clients.

Unfortunately, not all developers follow best practices when building an API. This can lead to issues such as confusing or inconsistent URL conventions, which can make the API more difficult to use and understand. In this blog post, we'll cover the most important best practices for designing and building a REST API from a developer's perspective. Here I  introduced a set of rules to remember well. As well I designed a huge mind map to store the rules in your brain. By following these best practices, you can build an API that is easy to use and understand, and avoid common pitfalls that can lead to frustration for API users.

"REST API Design Rulebook" is a book by Mark Masse that provides guidelines for designing REST APIs. Here I used it as a reference to define my rule set and the best practices.

REST API Design Rulebook

In todayâ??s market, where rival web services compete for attention, a well-designed REST API is a must-have feature. This concise book presents a set of API design rules, drawn primarily … - Selection from REST API Design Rulebook [Book]

O’Reilly Online LearningMark Masse

REST API Mindmap sharable image

1. What is REST API

Here we are discussing, "What is REST?", main constraints, and benefits.  Furthermore here shows how to communicate with clients and servers through HTTP. I am hoping to deep dive into this soon in another blog post.

2. URI Definition

A URI (Uniform Resource Identifier) is a string of characters that identifies a resource on the web. In the context of a REST API, it is common to use URLs to identify resources, as they specify both the name and location of the resource.

In this section, I put some best practices for using URI. We can discuss this in a more informative way in the near future.

3. URI  Authority Design

In a URI, the authority is the part of the URI that specifies the location of the resource. According to the PDF, there are 4 archetypes for modeling resources in URI. We will discuss this topic in the future more descriptively. Keep in touch with my blog.

4. URI Path Design

The path portion of a URI is the part of the URI that follows the authority and specifies the name and location of the resource being accessed. It is important to follow best practices when designing the path of a URI to ensure it is easy to use and understand.
This is the most critical section for a backend developer who designs well REST API. I plan to write a blog post on this section soon.

5. URI Query Design

The query portion of a URI is the part of the URI that follows the path and specifies additional information about the resource being accessed. The query is typically made up of one or more key-value pairs separated by an ampersand (&).

Here are some best practices for designing the query portion of a URI. I put them much as, possible into this section. Go through the mind map and follow these practices in your code base.

6. HTTP Methods

In the context of a REST API, HTTP methods (also known as "verbs") are used to specify the desired action to be performed on a resource. This section is the most important one for the developer's life. Keep in touch with descriptive blog posts on this in the future.

7. Response Codes

In a REST API, HTTP response codes are used to indicate the status of a request. They provide information about whether the request was successful or encountered an error and provide additional information about the nature of the error.

Here I put most high-level error patterns and usage. We can discuss the most important response codes and other codes in the next couple of blogs.

8. Versioning

9. Client Concerns

10. Documentation

Documentation is an important part of any REST API. It provides information about the API's functionality, resources, and available operations, as well as any requirements or restrictions. We will discuss more tools and techniques near future.

11. HATEOS

12. Resources

"REST API Design Rulebook" is a book by Mark Masse that provides guidelines for designing REST APIs. Here I used it as the main reference to improve my best practices on REST API.

I hope this information has been helpful! Let me know if you have any further questions. I will plan to discuss the above topics from a REST API blog series. Keep in touch on my blog site. Happy Coding!!

The benchmarking technique aids in calculating the performance metrics of a single or multiple sections of code in your application. Benchmark can assist you in identifying the parts of your source code that require optimization.

What's a Benchmark?

A benchmark is a basic test that delivers a set of quantifiable statistics that can assist you in determining whether or not a modification to your code has increased, decreased, or had no influence on the overall performance. It is essential to have an understanding of the performance metrics that are associated with the methods that make up your application to make use of them during the process of code optimization.

Benefits of Benchmarking a source code

• Benchmarking is the process of comparing the performance of code snippets, usually against a predefined baseline.
• Benchmarking can assist in identifying performance bottlenecks in an application. (By identifying bottlenecks, you can determine the changes needed in your source code to improve the application's performance and scalability.)

GitHub - dotnet/BenchmarkDotNet: Powerful .NET library for benchmarking

Powerful .NET library for benchmarking. Contribute to dotnet/BenchmarkDotNet development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubdotnet

BenchmarkDotNet helps you to transform methods into benchmarks, track their performance, and share reproducible measurement experiments.

This is an open-source library that can convert your.NET methods into benchmarks, monitor those methods, and gain insights into the performance data collected. It is compatible with both.NET Framework and.NET Core applications. BenchmarkDotNet can quickly convert your methods into benchmarks, run those benchmarks, and retrieve the benchmarking results. An operation in BenchmarkDotNet terminology involves executing a method decorated with the Benchmark attribute.

Steps for benchmarking code using BenchmakDotNet

To run BenchmarkDotNet in your .NET Framework or .NET Core application, you must follow these steps:

1. Add the necessary NuGet package
2. Add Benchmark attributes to your methods
3. Create a BenchmarkRunner instance
4. Run the application in Release mode

Practical

Now we can see how to config BenchmarkDotNet library in your asp.net core project and try to retrieve some measurements on the selected Scenario.

Considering Scenario - string builder vs. string performance.

To learn the BenchmarkDotNet library with the asp.net core project, a simple development scenario is utilized here.

First, let's create a console application and install the BenchmarkDotNet NuGet package.

Create Dotnet 6 Console project and add BenchmarkDotNet library

Let’s open Visual Studio 2022 and create a .NET 6 based console application. I named it "StringBuilderVsStringBenchmarkDotnet".

This is the time to install the BenchmarkDotNet NuGet package into my console application. You can use the command given below to add the package to the console app. This command should be executed from the project directory path.

dotnet add package BenchmarkDotNet

You can also add NuGet references using Manage NuGet Packages. It will open the dialog as shown below. Search for BenchmarkDotNet and install the package.
Note: Here, I am using Rider as my main IDE.

Benchmark Code

This is the complete code for the run benchmark methods. Here we implemented two scenarios of methods.

Running benchmark project

Running the benchmarking application in release configuration is a requirement for benchmarking. When building the project, you should ideally have the optimize option set to true in csproj or the CSC command line.

Additionally, the process shouldn't have a debugger attached to it. This implies that we have two choices whenever we want to run the benchmarking application.

• Run the application from Visual Studio/Rider using Debug -> Start Without Debugging (keyboard shortcut CTRL + F5 ). The configuration should be set to release.

• OR the other option is to run the application using .Net CLI. While using .Net run command, we should ensure that we add -c release switch to the command.

dotnet run -p StringBuilderVsStringBenchmarkDotnet.csproj -c Release

Running this straightforward app might take a few seconds. This is due to BenchmarkDotNet's repeated launch of the benchmark process.

Result of the test

We can then look at the outcomes below. Here is the summary I received on my computer for your reference.

Considering the result set, we should consider two parameters:

1. Mean parameter
2. Allocated parameter

The mean parameter describes the average time it takes the method to run.
An allocated parameter describes the average allocation of the heap in memory while the method is running.

Conclusion

As we know, in programming technics,  We get the expected result from the application.

This article does not cover all of the available features and customization options. However, it should help you get started with this package. If you want to learn more, check out their documentation.

Overview | BenchmarkDotNet

BenchmarkDotNet

Sample repository

GitHub - csandun/StringBuilderVsStringBenchmarkDotnet: StringBuilder Vs String BenchmarkDotnet

StringBuilder Vs String BenchmarkDotnet. Contribute to csandun/StringBuilderVsStringBenchmarkDotnet development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubcsandun

Resources

1. Intro to Benchmark.net - How To Benchmark C# Code

Intro to Benchmark.net - How To Benchmark C# Code

How efficient is your code? Is the change you just made going to improve your application or not? How do you know? How important was that change? These are q...

YouTube

2. Documentation

Overview | BenchmarkDotNet

BenchmarkDotNet

3. GitHub Repo

GitHub - dotnet/BenchmarkDotNet: Powerful .NET library for benchmarking

Powerful .NET library for benchmarking. Contribute to dotnet/BenchmarkDotNet development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubdotnet

It's the end of 2022, and coming to a new year in your career. Many developers stay in their comfort zone with CRUD operations and basic development technologies. It is time to move with new Dotnet technologies and current industry trends and challenges in 2023.

Comfort Zone of a developer

As a developer, our comfort zone refers to the set of technologies, tools, and practices that a developer is familiar with and comfortable using. It's natural for us to feel more comfortable and confident when working within our comfort zone, as we are already familiar with the technologies and have had the opportunity to develop our skills in those areas.

However, we must also be willing to step outside of our comfort zone and learn new technologies and approaches. This can help us stay with current industry trends and expand our skillset, leading to more significant growth.

To step outside our comfort zone, we can learn new technologies,  tools, practices, and patterns and collaborate with colleagues with different skill sets. It is also helpful to seek opportunities to work on projects that require new technologies or approaches, as this can provide a structured and supported way to learn and grow.

Step outside our comfort zone with a Roadmap

For the above, we can learn new things in the coming year, set out of our comfort zone, and gain new challenges. As a Dotnet developer, I created a roadmap that is helping my thoughts and my opinions. I am doing REST Api-based developments using dot net core. And also I followed cloud technologies and microservices patterns in my carrier. My ideas entirely propose this roadmap; anyone can agree or disagree with me. Also open to suggestions for this.

NickChapsas(@nickchapsas)  inspire me to create a roadmap for this year. Based on his roadmap, I update my roadmap and I put my opinions into it.

Roadmap

Coming to the roadmap, here is my proposed mind map for Dotnet developers can follow next year.

Here red means a must know, yellow means a good to know, and a grey means maybe, and I will explain why it is a perhaps as I goand keep in mind that this is very I opinionated. This is my take it doesn't mean that everyone will agree with this. It's okay; we can disagree, but this is how I would work this, how I would hire and there is room for that.

CSandun’s .NET Backend Developer Roadmap in 2023 (1)

Xmind is the most professional and popular mind mapping tool. Millions of people use Xmind to clarify thinking, manage complex information, brainstorming, get work organized, remote and work from home WFH.

Mind Mapping AppXmind Ltd.

Shareable Roadmap Image

How to give you contribute to improving the roadmap

Please share your thoughts and changes for this. I can update this with your suggestions.

GitHub repository

GitHub - csandun/dotnet-roadmap-2023

Contribute to csandun/dotnet-roadmap-2023 development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubcsandun

Thoughts

Cheers, It is time to move with new Dotnet technologies and current industry trends and challenges in 2023. Let's do it in 2023.

My inspiration repositories and roadmaps.

1. My .NET backend developer roadmap for 2022

My .NET backend developer roadmap for 2022

Check out my courses: https://nickchapsas.comBecome a Patreon and get source code access: https://www.patreon.com/nickchapsasHello everybody I’m Nick and in ...

YouTube

2. Nick's .NET Backend Developer Roadmap for 2022

GitHub - Elfocrash/.NET-Backend-Developer-Roadmap: Nick’s Roadmap for a .NET Backend Developer working with Microservices

Nick's Roadmap for a .NET Backend Developer working with Microservices - GitHub - Elfocrash/.NET-Backend-Developer-Roadmap: Nick's Roadmap for a .NET Backend Developer working with Microser...

GitHubElfocrash

3. ASP.NET Core Developer Roadmap

GitHub - MoienTajik/AspNetCore-Developer-Roadmap: Roadmap to becoming an ASP.NET Core developer in 2022

Roadmap to becoming an ASP.NET Core developer in 2022 - GitHub - MoienTajik/AspNetCore-Developer-Roadmap: Roadmap to becoming an ASP.NET Core developer in 2022

GitHubMoienTajik

Block Element Modifier (BEM) is a naming convention for classes in CSS. It is a method for naming CSS classes in a way that makes it easy to understand the relationship between HTML and CSS in a project. It is often used in front-end web developments.

Intro

While working on some CSS work last week, I noticed some unfamiliar symbols are used in CSS files in my current project. I am a bit confused, and I asked our UI Engineer about this. He said it is a naming convention called "BEM". OH! BEM? What is BEM?

Why do you want a proper CSS naming convention?

Class naming has always been a challenging part of CSS. Understanding the functions of developer-specified classes can be difficult for outside developers. When working with a team and repeatedly reworking code, naming conventions can easily spiral out of control. The below cases are the most problematic.

• Overriding classes accidentally.
• Hard to read both CSS and HTML has no clear scoping and structure in naming.
• New team members waste time learning about or trying to find already created classes.
• It's unclear how to handle nesting.

How can we avoid this headache problem? Is these suitable naming conventions? YES. BEM will help you to manage your CSS classes properly and well maintained.

What is BEM (Block Element Modifier)

Block Element Modifier (BEM) is a naming convention for classes in CSS. It is a method for naming CSS classes in a way that makes it easy to understand the relationship between HTML and CSS in a project.

There are three main parts of BEM.

1. Block: which holds everything (elements) inside and acts as a scope.

.card {} and .button{}

2. Element: which acts as a specific part of the component.

.card__title{}, .card__description{}, .card__image{} ...

3. Modifier: which adds additional styles to a specific element(s).

.card__buttons--primary{}, .card__buttons--secondery{}, .card__buttons--disabled{} ...

The block represents a high-level component, such as a "card" or a "button." The element represents a part of the block, such as the "card title" or "card button" on a card. The modifier represents a variation on the block or element, such as a "primary button" or a "large button."

Benefits of using BEM

Using BEM you can address most of the above CSS-level naming problems to some extent. Some benefits of using BEM include:

• Improved code readability and maintainability: By using strict naming conventions and clear rules for defining blocks, elements, and modifiers, BEM makes it easier for developers to understand and work with CSS code.
• Reusability and modularity: Because BEM blocks are standalone entities that can be used in multiple contexts, it's easy to reuse them on different pages or in different projects. This can save time and make it easier to build and maintain complex, scalable websites.
• Consistency and predictability: By using BEM, you can create a consistent, predictable system for naming and organizing your CSS classes. This can make it easier to work on a project as a team and can also make it easier to learn and understand the codebase.

Example

Here I am going to develop a card using a BEM naming convention.

According to the defined class names, I developed a sample in codepen below

Throughs

Overall, BEM is a valuable tool for organizing CSS classes, and it can be especially useful for large, complex projects. However, it's not the only approach, and it's not necessarily the best fit for every project. It's up to you to decide whether BEM is the right choice for your specific needs.

References

1. Documentation

BEM — Introduction

Block Element Modifier is a methodology, that helps you to achieve reusable components and code sharing in the front-end.

Vsevolod Strukchinsky, Vladimir Starkov and contributors

2. BEM Visually Explained 🌟 (recomonded)

BEM Visually Explained

BEM (Block, Element, Modifier) methodology for naming CSS styles explained with visual examples

Keeping Up To Date

After a couple of busy weeks, I am beginning a new blog series about Auditing a Web API. Here we go ....

Introduction

If you wanted to track every change that occurs in an entity in your domain classes,: for example, you wanted to record when an entity is created, when it is modified, who deleted the entity, and also maybe who was the user who made the change in this practice is called AUDITING.

Here I will show you how you can implement auditing in your application with minimal effort and how to make it reusable. Apart from that, I plan to examine the activities in domain values and behavior changes.

I decide to write a couple of articles to fulfill this requirement.

1. Make my domain models auditable using EF core Change Tracker
2. With Audit.Net, generate audit logs with evidence for reconstruction and examine activities that have affected specific operations or procedures.

This article is the first one of the audit logging series. Let's integrate the audit properties into domain models.

Audit properties and Audit events

As discussed in the Intro paragraph, We can define

Audit events

• Insert
• Modify
• Delete

The below properties help to track our audit events in the domain model.

Audit properties

• CreatedBy
• CreatedOnUtc
• ModifiedBy
• ModifiedOnUtc
• DeletedBy
• DeletedOnUtc

Note: DeletedBy and DeletedOnUtc properties are always inter-connection with the soft delete functionality.
* Check out my Soft delete feature blog post for good connectivity with this article.

What is the ChangeTracker in EfCore

The ChangeTracker class in Entity Framework Core starts tracking all the entities as soon as they are retrieved using DbContext until they go out of scope.

And EF keeps track of all the changes applied to all the entities and their properties so that it can build and execute appropriate DML statements to the underlying data source.

The ChangeTracker needs to know about the "state" of each object - whether it is new, an existing object that has been modified somehow, or whether it is scheduled for deletion.

ChangeTracker tracks your entity state, whether it is new, modified, or deletion.

The Change Tracker records the current state of an entity using one of five values:

• Added
• Modified
• Deleted
• Unchanged
• Detached

Implementation

First of all, our first step is creating a web API with Entity Framework Core as our base code. Usually, I use a TodoItem project template as the startup sample project. You can find the project template here and check out this blog post that shows how to set it up and how to work.

Based on the sample Todo Item project, you can continue with me.

1. Create a base class including audit properties

As discussed earlier, I am going to define a standard interface, including audit fields.

2. Inherit and implement all properties in entity classes

I want to audit the TodoItem class. Here I am implementing from the IAuditableEntity interface.

3. Intercept the SaveChange method to track the above ChangeTracker states.

I implement from SaveChangeInterceptor and override SavingChangesAsync() method. It is Called at the start of DbContext.SaveChanges.

Here I am processing all of the auditable entities available in the change tracker and setting the appropriate values for the modified on the date.'

In the switch statement, identify the actual state of the entities and assign proper values for auditable fields.

4. Register Interceptor and inject to DbContext configurations

In program.cs we can add these configurations

5. Testing the application and getting results

Last, we can create a request from PostMan and check the result in database tables.

6. Note:  Add User Service to get UserId

I am using a UserMockSerivce Class to get UserId and UserDetails who are making changes. You can use your own logic to get user details (Ex: HTTPContextAccessor with authentication mechanism)

Though

Auditing is an essential cross-cutting feature you should implement on your production product. You wanted to record every action on every entity. It is a must. If you implement Interceptor, you can easily and commonly use it in your distributed applications and entities. Also, you do not need to assign values in every place for the auditable properties.

Source Code

You can find the entire code repository below.

GitHub - csandun/CSandunWebApiAuditTrail

Contribute to csandun/CSandunWebApiAuditTrail development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubcsandun

References

• Change Tracking in EF Core | Microsoft Documentation

Change Tracking - EF Core

Overview of change tracking for EF Core

Microsoft Learnajcvickers

• Audit.Net

GitHub - thepirat000/Audit.NET: An extensible framework to audit executing operations in .NET and .NET Core.

An extensible framework to audit executing operations in .NET and .NET Core. - GitHub - thepirat000/Audit.NET: An extensible framework to audit executing operations in .NET and .NET Core.

GitHubthepirat000

• EF Core Interceptor

Interceptors - EF Core

Interception for database operations and other events

Microsoft Learnajcvickers

• Audit Logging | Milan Jovanovic | Youtube

How To Track Entity Changes With EF Core | Audit Logging

Support me on Patreon to access the source code:https://www.patreon.com/milanjovanovicTracking entity changes can be cumbersome to implement. However, with E...

YouTube

Entity framework core is a very feature-rich library, and one of the lesser-known features I want to share with you today is Global Query Filters.

Introduction

Query filters allow us to specify a Boolean expression that will always be applied when we are querying the entity we have. Specifying the query filter on the entity will significantly simplify our code. And the significant benefit is that you can never forget to specify the necessary condition in the where statement because any framework will automatically apply it.

UseCases

Some typical applications of this feature are:

• Soft delete - An Entity Type defines an IsDeleted property.
• Multi-tenancy - An Entity Type defines a TenantId property.

How do I introduce the Global Query Filter for Soft Delete?

In my career, I used to SoftDelete feature in database entities for audit purposes in my projects.

Soft-Delete means
This means the entity is not actually deleted from the database, but it is updated, and a property "IsDeleted" is marked as true.

In such applications, in most of the queries which read the data from the database, I always use a where clause with filter, not deleted values in the Query by checking IsDeleted the property is not true. It is a massive headache because I sometimes forget to put in a query.

Below is my sample application proposing the soft delete feature by defining every read query. You see, it is a lazy way to handle every Query.

Here we are going to examine the SQL statement that the Entity framework has generated and sent to the database. Highlighted condition is generated from the isDelete state.

I used GetTodoItems endpoint. Throughout this blog, I am checking this to generate SQL queries.

You can download starting stage code in git TAG.

To avoid this robust way now, I habited to use the Global Query Filter feature available in Entity framework core to specify the same condition and going to be applied in all the queries that any reference sends to the database for the entity.

How we use the Global Query Filters

You can configure query filters to an entity in two ways.

• In OnModelCreating method of the DbContext.
• In the EntityTypeConfiguration<T> class related to entity T.

Here I am defining soft delete filter negation in the DbContext against to TodoItem entity. I used to HasQueryFilter method to register the condition with the entity.

Now we can check again GetTodoItems endpoint SQL query.

Here we can see IsDelete condition is in the Query.

How do we get rid of the implicitly applied Query Filter?

It is more straightforward than you think. You need to chain a call to the IgnoreQueryFilters() method; what this method is going to do is it going to tell the framework that this Query should not have any query filters applied to it.

Checking again GetTodoItems endpoint SQL query.

Notice that in the where statement here, there is no longer the condition that the IsDelete condition ignores from the Query. The Entity Framework is not applying the query filter to this specific Query. But the other queries are filtered with the query filter.

Another Usecase

Another usage can be in a multi-tenant application, where each query should return the data associated with the current tenant only.

My thoughts

Most of the time, there are business query patterns that will apply globally to some entities in your application by employing Query Filters of EF Core, you could simply and easily implement the such requirement.

Source Code

GitHub - csandun/CSandunBlogQueryFilterEfCoreApi

Contribute to csandun/CSandunBlogQueryFilterEfCoreApi development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubcsandun

I tagged this repository for each stage that I explained here. You can check each tag and get some experience at each stage.

References

Global Query Filters Documentation

Global Query Filters - EF Core

Using global query filters to filter results with Entity Framework Core

Microsoft Learnmaumar

I hope you find this content helpful. Keep touching my diaries. Learn something new. Comment your thoughts and share the content.

Happy coding!!

See you again soon. ✌✌

The shortcuts app boosts your productivity in day-to-day life tasks quickly. As developers, we would like to do things quickly and easily in our lives. I believe that time logging is a hectic and horrible task for every developer at the end of his working day. If you have some easy mechanism, you will be happy with that.

I will show you how I log my time automatically using the Jira app and the iOS shortcuts app in apple.

‎Shortcuts

‎Siri Shortcuts deliver a quick way to get things done with your apps with just a tap or by asking Siri. The Shortcuts app enables you to create personal shortcuts with multiple steps from your favorite apps. Start from hundreds of examples in the Gallery or drag and drop to create your own. Short…

App StoreApple

‎Jira Cloud by Atlassian

‎Track tasks, manage projects, collaborate on-the-go. Create, update, edit, plan, track, analyze – all in the palm of your hand with the Jira mobile app by Atlassian. It’s the accelerated collaboration tool for teams, including software teams, service delivery teams, ITSM teams, and DevOps. MOVE W…

App StoreAtlassian

What is the Shortcuts app?

A shortcut is a quick way to get one or more tasks done with your apps. The Shortcuts app lets you create your shortcuts with multiple steps.

Shortcuts can automate your various occasions.

What you can be made from Jira and Shortcuts apps

• Issue template: Do you create similar Jira issues for each new sprint? Build a shortcut that creates the issues automatically for you.
• Generate and attach reports: Download the latest analytics data, convert it to a PDF and attach it to the selected Jira issue with the tap of a button.
• Log time: You can log time from Siri dictating or several small clicks
• View Issues: You can view assigned issues and export your to-do app.
• Run JQL: Known as Jira Query Language. The advanced search allows you to build structured queries using the Jira Query Language (JQL) to search for issues.

And many.

Jira supports these actions also combined with shortcut apps.

Today I am using Run JQL and Log work actions in my shortcut.

Usecase of my work log shortcut

Jira's time-tracking functionality is crucial for many users. The precise amount of time spent on a ticket can be utilized for billing, to improve future job estimates, or simply as a general feedback mechanism.

As a developer, every day, I should log my work at the end of the day for the Jira task that is assigned to me. Every day I went to the Jira web portal and searched for my assigned tickets, and logged time for each and everyone I worked. This was very repetitive and habited work for me every day.

Think  I have assigned a list of Jira tasks for today. From the list, you want only select the issue on which you log the work. That's it; automatically add an 8-hour time record for the selected ticket; how it is simple.

This is my basic shortcut which is used to log work in Jira.

How do I create shortcut

Here I am using JQL to list down my tasks.

JQL - Known as s Jira Query Language. The advanced search allows you to build structured queries using the Jira Query Language (JQL) to search for issues.
I have 3 tickets assigned to me. They are currently in To-Do and In-progress status.

1.  Create a Starter Shortcut

From the starter shortcut section, create a new one.

2. Add starter action with JQL and get the ticket list.

Then press Add Action button.

From the app list, search the Jira app and choose it. Then you will meet the available actions. From actions, the Run JQL action is our starter action.

Also, you need to add the correct JQL query from your Jira web portal. You can get the JQL from Navigate.

Project > Filters > My open issues > Switch to JQL

Put your JQL into action and set your account and site details below.

You can see the assigned ticket list below when you run the shortcut.

3. Then add the "Choose from List" action

You can select the "Choose from List"  action.
Add the Issues variable to the list.

You can see the assigned ticket list in a selectable menu when you run the shortcut.

4. Add the "Log Work" action.

Give a selected item as a task, and you can put hours and comments as below.

5. Added an information dialog at last

After that auditing purpose, I added an information dialog at last.

It will help to execute the shortcut at once efficiently.

6. Tip:   You can add this shortcut as a Home item

Lastly, Jira tickets are updated with an 8-hour time entry.

This is an essential starter shortcut I have introduced. Many actions will help you to enhance your requirements smartly. Try to build your shortcut using the actions and apps. You can use Siri to dictate/input the workflow. Also, you can integrate a time log app with this shortcut. Open your mind and create workflows smartly and spend your time productively.

References

• Feature sneak peek: Create Jira shortcuts using Apple’s Shortcuts app

Feature sneak peek: Create Jira shortcuts using Apple’s Shortcuts app

Who doesn’t like a good shortcut? (Unless we’re talking about an unintentional slip of the hair clippers.) At Atlassian, we strive to create software that gets out of your way, lets you do stuff faster, and makes your work-life easier. So with that in mind, let us show you a sneak peek of a feature…

Atlassian CommunitySimon Stiefel

If you create a new shortcut, please share it with us.

As a So SriLankan 90's kid, this is a most loving 😍 advertisement of mine about the difference between the goose (පාත්තයා) vs. the duck (තාරාව).

The goose has some unique properties vs. the duck. Most of the properties differ from them. let's identify and compare the duck's properties list vs. the goose's using ChangeTracker class😁

Caption :

"එකෙක් තාරාවෙක් අනිකා පාත්තයෙක්. තාරවට බෑ පාත්තයා වෙන්න. පාත්තයට බෑ තාරාව වෙන්න" 😁😂😄😃

Back to topic

I created ChangeTracker class two or two three months back. But unfortunately, I forgot to write a blog regarding this. I am writing this blog post about how I use the ChangeTracker class in my project.

Some types of query operations in C#, such as Except, Distinct, Union, and Concat, can do the job (Microsoft doc guidance). But I want to build a standard interface to track changes between two lists using Linq and predicates.

UseCase

Widely I applied these scenarios in database Linq queries. I have one list that retrieves from a database table. Then this old data list should be updated top of the new list.

Considering two lists:

• I used the AddedItem list to insert into the database table
• Also, the RemovedItem list is used to delete from the database using Linq.
• The UpdateItem list helped to update my data in the table.

Thinking and Implementation

There are two collections: one database list called "oldValues" and one new list called "newValues." I receive items from time to time in the "newValues" collection. I  want to know which elements were added, removed, or altered. I can compare identity id/ids in the generic Object.

Here is the proposed code snippet of the ChangeTracker<T1, T2> class.

As I said above, you must identify how the Object is unique. You can use an equals predicate, shown below.

In this example, It uses two int arrays. No big deal, We can equal elements using the Equals method or == operator.

But in this example, we use custom object arrays. We can use predicate using properties to identify equal values from identity properties.

Finally, you received newPersonItems , removedPersonItems , updatedPersonItems individual three lists, and now you can manipulate them your way.

Do you still believe you should always throw domain exceptions from a .Net API? I followed many tutorials and blog posts, and they always encouraged us to throw exceptions from controllers and services. Here their point is the usage of the Custom Exception Middleware with the capability of global exception handling. Yes, it is correct; 👌 it helps to maintain a clean and reliable code base. We can handle all exceptions without defining an ugly huge try-catch block in every method.

Intro

But in some scenarios, you cannot always throw exceptions. So how can we handle exceptions explicitly?

It is time to reveal how I accomplish this requirement using handle exceptions. It is explicit handling.

The ways I can handle exceptions in code

The old-school way adding an exception to the global list and returning a null value in the catch block. It is an awful solution when it comes to the domain-driven paradigm. You should always check null values at all places you use it. As well as unintentionally, you will meet NullPointExceptions through your code

Another way to use the combined result object. With returning value and exception together.

Much nicer. But I want more than this.
Apart from the above, I used a special class called Either<TLeft, TRight> Class.

Introducing Either<T1, T2>

Instead of returning Both with nullable properties, let's return Either with just one of them. When constructing an object, you can specify either a 'left' or a 'right' argument, but not both.

That's two types of parameters TLeft and TRight. You can then decide what to do if either situation occurs or return.

You can use Either class like this,

Using LeftOrDefault() or RightOrDefault()

You can specifically return the result object or an exception as a left or right value. Using LeftOrDefault() or RightOrDefault() you can get the returning value from this Either class.

Using match

A functional programming concept develops this Match method; you can call a function using the Match function according to your returning value type.

Enhancing for DoRight() action

Widely I used TRight value for returning exceptions. In some occurrences, I wanted to throw the returned exception immediately. Then I used DoRight() using action functionality in C# as below.

There is a simple, readable, no conditionals, no null checks, and no way to ignore the fact that exceptions may fail silently.

You can find the full code repository below.

GitHub - csandun/HandlingDomainExceptionsExplicitly

Contribute to csandun/HandlingDomainExceptionsExplicitly development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubcsandun

Thoughts

You can use both Global Exception handling with throwing exceptions and handling explicitly. In handling exceptions, Either<TLeft, TRight> class is so clean and very nice in Domain-driven design exception handling.

Seeding is a necessary evil for a lazy developer every day. When unit testing, we are messing with what I should use for names, emails, paragraphs, etc. With Bogus, they become slightly more manageable.

Bogus is a lovely library from Brian Chavez to use in automated tests to generate test data of different kinds automatically. Brian says,

"A simple fake data generator for C#, F#, and VB.NET. Based on and ported from the famed faker.js."

In my day-to-day coding life, I work with Proof Of Concepts (PoCs), Sample projects for my blog posts, and research tasks. For them, Bogus is the more robust data generator for me, with a realistic looking at the data.

Here is the Bogus GitHub repository link. Please make ⭐ a star ⭐ for the repository. It will encourage the author.

GitHub - bchavez/Bogus: A simple fake data generator for C#, F#, and VB.NET. Based on and ported from the famed faker.js.

:card_index: A simple fake data generator for C#, F#, and VB.NET. Based on and ported from the famed faker.js. - GitHub - bchavez/Bogus: A simple fake data generator for C#, F#, and VB.NET. Based o...

GitHubbchavez

Popularity

How to install

You can easily install it using the NuGet package manager console using.

NuGet Package

Install-Package Bogus

As well as .Net CLI

dotnet add package Bogus

Examples

Here I am creating a Dotnet console application using .Net 6. Then I add Bogus NuGet dependency using the above command.

Here I am creating a Customer POCO class that fills the data randomly.

The plan is to seed realistic Customer data to the Customer object.

In this seeding journey, we should first create a faker object via our POCO class. Then map our properties using the Rules concept like in the FluenntValidator library. The property of the Review object may be provided as the first argument to the RuleFor() methods, and the second argument indicates how the property value should be generated.

Here we generate an address list like a sub-class for the main Customer class. It is another faker object. The rest of both fakers are generating individually at once.

Then we can generate our Customer data and Address data using Generate() the method.

We can then serialize this object into JSON and write it to the console:

This blog post is recommended to refer with marvelous and informative.

Generating Test Data with Bogus

Playground for the mindVolkan Paksoy

Supported Entities by Bogus

There is a vast range of test data types supported. Below I put some supported areas and properties. Apart from this, you can get a massive idea from here | Bogus Documentation

GitHub - bchavez/Bogus: A simple fake data generator for C#, F#, and VB.NET. Based on and ported from the famed faker.js.

:card_index: A simple fake data generator for C#, F#, and VB.NET. Based on and ported from the famed faker.js. - GitHub - bchavez/Bogus: A simple fake data generator for C#, F#, and VB.NET. Based o...

GitHubbchavez

Summary

A fluent interface into a world of random realistic data, Bogus is a mandatory tool for any programmer. Please give him a star for his contribution and share your thoughts via tweet.

Source code - All in one

Repository Link

GitHub - csandun/BogusLibraryTesting

Contribute to csandun/BogusLibraryTesting development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubcsandun

Were you familiar with the "The result contains no elements." exception with "First()" and "Single()" methods? How did you resolve this exception? What does done with the underhood of these methods with Linq? I faced this error last week in my code. So it encouraged me to discover what is happening in First, FirstOrDefault, Single, and SingleOrDefault.

Here I am going to explain how they work on a surface level but also how they function behind the scenes and take a deeper look into their

performance. As well as I am going to bring up the exceptions that happen in these methods.

This is the first part of the explanation of First, FirstOrDefault, Single, and SingleOrDefault. Here I am trying to say only the differences between each other using a mind-blowing summary table.

Keep in touch with my second post of this; I will discuss these points using examples. Mainly performances(Benchmark test) and exceptions are occurring.

Summarizing the differences between these methods

LINQ provides element operators that return a single or specific element from a collection. The element operators are Single, SingleOrDefault, First, and FirstOrDefault.

Documentations and many blogs are described more clearly. I will put the best references for you.

But today, I am summarizing all points using a table for easy understanding.

My Suggestion

I always tend to use FirstOrDefault. If you want to be picky with performance, you should use FirstOrDefault in EF. And it is encouraging me to reduce the exceptions that we discussed above.

Keep in touch with my second part, and I will prove what you should tend between these methods.

I hope you find this content helpful. Keep touching my diaries. Learn something new. Comment your thoughts and share the content.

Hi, greet; today's  (14/07/2022)  subject has related to Angular Pipe and shows an image in a table based on base64binarystring.

Use Case

Working on the angular project, today's task was to populate images in an HTML table with data. The backend service received these images as Base64BinaryArray converted strings with the content types (The database did this conversion). The target is to populate the image base64 string in the table.

Below is a sample of the received data and expected UI result.

pipe-for-byte-string-convert-to-image - StackBlitz

Application example built with Angular 13 and adding the Bootstrap CSS framework using the bootstrap and @ng-bootstrap/ng-bootstrap libraries.

StackBlitz

Problem-solving thoughts

• It should be reusable anywhere easily in an HTML template. (Reusability)
• I can use a simple method, service, or angular specified Pipe for this.

Mmmmmm ... thinking .....  🤔🤔🤔

Parameterize Pipe to transform the base64array string to a base64 image. The logic is simple.  Let's do it.

Solution

I introduced an Angular Pipe to transform a string into a base64 image. The content type is a parameter to it.

How to use the above the pipe

As I mentioned above, this is a parameterized pipe. I recommend referring to pipes, parameterized pipes, and custom pipes (Documentation). It will make your code more reusable.

The working solution is put here

pipe-for-byte-string-convert-to-image - StackBlitz

Application example built with Angular 13 and adding the Bootstrap CSS framework using the bootstrap and @ng-bootstrap/ng-bootstrap libraries.

StackBlitz

Final thought

Using a parameterized pipe/ pipe is a comprehensive reusable, and straightforward solution for accomplishing tranasform data one shape to another shape in Angular HTML templates.

Hope this will help you. Will meet one another.
Thank you 👍. Happy coding👏

DevToyes 💚💙 - An offline Windows app that helps developers with daily tasks like Converters,  Encoders / Decoders, Formatters, Generators, etc

How I met this Swiss Army knife - DevToys

A Swiss Army knife for developers.

DevToys helps in daily tasks like formatting JSON, comparing text, testing RegExp.

DevToys

Since I found DevToys, I have worked with Redgate SQL Formater as my day-to-day SQL formations for the last few months.

I already mentioned this in another blog post here. But I saw a considerable drawback: it cannot capitalize on some SQL keywords (Select, Join, On, Where, etc.). So I decided to find a better solution to overcome my requirements.

Then I found this swiss army knife called the DevToys windows app.

What is DevToys

DevToys is an offline Windows app that helps developers with daily tasks like Converters, Encoders / Decoders, Formatters, Generators, etc.

@Etienne BAUDOUX 💓initiates this. DevToy is a perfect application for developers who are working on backend developments.

As a developer, I do not need to use many untruthful websites to do simple tasks with my data. Also, a close overlay lets you keep the app small and on top of other windows. Also, I can use multiple instances of the app at once.

Prerequisite

You need Windows 10 build 1903+ or later.

Microsoft Store

Search for DevToys in the Microsoft Store App or click here.

Get DevToys from the Microsoft Store

An Open-Source Swiss Army knife for developers. DevToys helps in everyday tasks like formatting JSON, comparing text, testing RegExp. No need to use many untruthful websites to do simple tasks with your data. With Smart Detection, DevToys is able to detect the best tool that can treat the data you…

DevToys features

According to their website, these features are currently being released. Also, 27+ tools are available.

• Converters

  • JSON <> YAML
  • Timestamp
  • Number Base
  • Cron Parser

• Encoders / Decoders

  • HTML
  • URL
  • Base64 Text & Image
  • GZip
  • JWT Decoder

• Formatters

  • JSON
  • SQL
  • XML

• Generators

  • Hash (MD5, SHA1, SHA256, SHA512)
  • UUID 1 and 4
  • Lorem Ipsum
  • Checksum'

• Text

  • Escape / Unescape
  • Inspector & Case Converter
  • Regex Tester
  • Text Comparer
  • XML Validator
  • Markdown Preview

• Graphic

  • Color Blindness Simulator
  • Color Picker & Contrast
  • PNG / JPEG Compressor
  • Image Converter

My favorite features

SQL Formatter

SQL Formatter is my most favorable feature. SQL Formatter can format my query and convert SQL words to all upper cases.

JSON Formatter

Text Diff

Markdown Preview

Regex Tester

Footnote

Nothing to say; Definitely, DevToy is a swiss army knife for my day-to-day developments. This application must tryout if you are a developer. Worthful. 😀

Try the above links and share your experience with others. Please comment with your thoughts and share the content. 😀

Thank you.!
Have an incredible coding journey.
See you soon. ✌✌✌

Story

These days I am working on creating a custom dropdown menu using kendo-dropdown. I should correct CSS modifications in that dropdown menu using Inspect Elements. Currently, I am using Google Chrome.

I ran into this issue with dropdown input menus depending on the menu element type. The reason it's disappearing when I inspect it is that a blur event is always triggered on the element when I click anywhere outside the element. Thanks to our UI engineer's secret, today, I am inspecting my dropdown menu easily.

Solution

1. Go to Chrome Inspect element window using right-click context menu or  F12.

2. Then go to the "Customize and control Dev tool" menu by clicking three    (3) doted on the right side in the inspect element window.

3. Go to the "More tools" and then the "Rendering" option.

4. Then find & check the "Emulate a focused page" option.

See you again with solutions or tech updates or coding practices, or anything in my day-to-day life. ✌✌