I updated the post commit hook application, however, installation advice from the original blog entry Post Commit Hook for Subversion, the .NET way still applies. What's new? The revision info is parsed and more nicely presented in the commit mail message. Because of info parsing, one call to svnlook could be saved.

SvnPostCommitHook1.1.0.50410.zip (14.08 KB)

In the entry Subversion on Windows as a Service, plus Commit Hook and Backup Script I showed a batch file for hooking into the post commit event of a repository. This batch file annoyed me from the very beginning. During the Indigo Community Day on Thursday in Munich I decided that it was about time to get rid of it, and after yesterday's party, I thought it might be a nice pinky exercise to do the basic port to C# today.

And yes, it is very basic at the moment. All you need to do is take post-commit.exe and post-commit.exe.config from the \SvnPostCommitHook\Hook directory in the downloadable zip file and drop those two into the hooks directory of your repository. The .config file is your ticket to customization:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<configuration>
 <appSettings>
  <add key="SvnLookPath" value="C:\Program Files\Subversion\bin\svnlook" />
  <add key="MailTo" value="commitlist@yourdomain.com" />
  <add key="MailFrom" value="commithook@yourdomain.com" />
  <add key="MailSubject" value="Your project name rev {0}, {1}" />
  <add key="MailServer" value="localhost" />
 </appSettings>
</configuration>

Just as the batch file, post-commit.exe's task is to read the change log and commit message, and post it to a mailing list that distributes the information to the project stakeholders. Therefore, you need to configure the four Mail* settings to match your configuration and preferences. The SvnLookPath needs to point to your Subversion installation, however, most installations should be fine with this default.

How can you test the operation of post-commit.exe? This is the syntax:

post-commit <repository> <revision>

For example:

post-commit e:\subversion\fidalgo 1830

In the current version, testing is highly recommended as no logging or exception handling is implemented.

SvnPostCommitHook1.0.0.50409.zip (12.07 KB)

The source code is BSD-licensed. Future plans are to fully parse the svnlook output, as well as add a logging infrastructure to easily find configuration problems during normal operations of your Subversion server.

From the "Don't be too smart department": I am a long time user of ISA Server (since the NT4 days when it was Proxy Server). My domain setup always included a DHCP server, which was configured to not dish out option #3, the router (which obviously would be the ISA machine). This way, I could be sure that no client by default could establish an Internet connection. Define the proxy in your browser, you can surf. Install the firewall client, you can do whatever you please.

The "whatever you please" part is correct in respect to TCP and UDP plus the ports that are open on the ISA box. It is not true when it comes to other protocols, such as GRE. What is it used for, you ask? The Generic Route Encapsulation protocol (#47 for the record) is needed for PPTP (Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol) to connect to a virtual private network (VPN). And GRE doesn't work with the Firewall Client, your machine positively must be a SecureNAT client (routing packets directly to the router).

Therefore, either change the machines IP configuration to override the gateway setting, or change the DHCP zone. I did the latter.

The TechTalk I will be doing in June has been announced on the msdn TechTalk developer portal (German). Locations and dates are yet to be announced, thus no registration so far. The topic will be "Tools for successful software projects in .NET".

The IIS Diagnostics Toolkit is a combined release of popular tools used by today's IIS users. These tools include tools aimed at resolving problems related to Secure Socket Layer (SSL) issues, permission or security problems, gathering data for your SMTP server included with IIS, as well as the famous Log Parser utility used to sift through hundreds or thousands of log files very quickly.

The toolkit consolidates all the tools into a convienant download and is supplemented by updates every 90-days to ensure that users have the most current diagnostics tools at their fingertips. Download for x86

Last week, it was time for a well-deserved skiing vacation [vacation, defined: no computer (and related stuff like books), no radio, no television, and of course no Internet cafe]. As always [always, defined: nineteen times], this Austrian's winter destination is France - 3 Vallees, Meribel, Mottaret.

The heading of this post is motivated by the weather situtation we encountered, which can be described only as le ciel bleu. After six days of skiing we decided to call it a day (so to speak) and head home a day early (a good decision as it turned out on Saturday, which totalled 100+km of traffic standstill in Austria thanks to Easter holidays) - no one any longer able to put up with the prospect of yet another day of sun and blue sky. 71,000 (alti)meters downhill is sufficient anyways.

And now for some photos to prove my point:

Left-hand side: Verdon and Vizelle gondolalifts.

Mont de la Challe.

Saulire, looking in the direction of Mont de la Chambre and 3 Marches.