My favorite tool for checking DNS entries recently created a subscription model for their site.  This is their right, of course, but I don't use their tool frequently enough to justify a subscription.  Looking for a good replacement, I ran across intoDNS which runs an excellent free DNS check.  I thought I'd link to them here in thanks.

I also like

I started coding DotNetNuke modules back in DNN 1.06 when you had to compile your module into the main source of the project.  So much of a DNN module will be the same from one module to the next that a code-generation tool makes a lot of sense.  I'd rather tweak and improve my base code in a template so that any best practice techniques can be automatically incorporated into my next module.  I won't say that creating a DNN module from scratch by hand is overwhelming--it certainly can be done, but the layers that have been added in DNN 2 & DNN 3 added functionality at the expense of additional code layers.

For DNN3, there are some great solutions:

• AppTheory's ATGen SDK (brainchild of DNN Core Team member and Trustee 

Recently I took several DNN installs from DNN 3.2 to DNN 4.  I ran into two issues after completing the installs that are worth a mention:

• Users were unable to use the core Documents module to download files
• Uploading files or installing modules broke

Fortunately, both of these issues are easy to solve.

The first error is caused by a change in how permissions are handled for accessing files in the portals/0/ directory (or whichever directory represents the current portal).  Previous to DNN 4.4 access to these directories was available to any user, any role.  In DNN 4.4 the File Manager page now gives control to the portal administrator to allow 'View Folder' (Read) and 'Write to Folder' (Upload) permissions to any role for any directory.  Checking the box next to All Users for 'View Folder' allowed my files to now be downloaded as before.  One interes ...

MyDNN.org released a new version of MyDNN TimeZones Pro on Feburary 28th, 2007.  The new release adds functionality for time zones which do not fall on an hour boundary (like India's +5:30 or Australia's +8:45) and Australia's Lord Howe Island (DST +0:30)).  The version 1.2 release also includes numerous bug fixes and small enhancements.

Be aware of the change in when the US moves to Daylight Saving Time.  Congress changed the date to March 11th through November 4th for 2007 (Energy Policy Act of 2005).  Both version 1.1.2 and 1.2.0 (newly released) recognize this change in the date.

Find it at SnowCovered or

If you are interseted in beta testing the TimeZones Pro module, please use the Feedback page to send me a note with the subject TimeZones Pro Beta Request.

Thanks!

Have you struggled trying to find a good calendar module? Is the built-in Events module too weak? Well there are a number of modules to choose from and some recent developments that lay a nice path forward.

The DNN Events module hasn't changed much from the DNN 1 version which was a simple port from the IBuySpy sample.

Alan Vance put together AVCalendar as a free alternative to the Events module in DNN 2. This module introduced recurring events and multiple views of the same calendar information. Master calendars allowed several calendars to be consolidated into one 'master' calendar to prevent redundant entry of data. Unfortunately AVanced Systems didn't update the module with the same energy for DNN 3. Eventually a port of the DNN 2 module for DNN 3 came out, but it the energy behind it was diminished. Don't get me wrong here, I really liked the module and have no rights to complain about someone volunteering their time. It began to seem that AVCalendar wouldn't be a ...

Today I upgraded a DotNetNuke installation and added compression (soon I'll get around to updating this install, too!).  Server-side compression will tell the web server to try to send compressed data to the web browser instead of the full HTML text of each page.  This can be quite a savings with DotNetNuke as there are several stylesheets and javascripts to download in addition to a rather large page payload (enhanced with viewstate at the bottom).  Fortunately, text (HTML, CSS, and Javascript in this case) all compress nicely, usually between 50% and 80%.

To enable compression on your DotNetNuke site (DNN3.2.2 in my case) you have to make one change to your /bin folder and three changes to your web.config.

First, download the Blowery HTTPCompression module (pick the Version 6, binary only version).  Blowery stands for Ben Lowery--a nice guy who has gene ...