In December 2009, I'll be launching a new Portal for developers of Model/View/Controller (MVC) applications, called MVC Central.

It will allow developers of all programming languages to read articles, view video tutorials, download applications from other developers (you) that are based on the MVC model.

The site will start out very small but over time, with the developer community's participation, it will grow into the one-stop shop for everything MVC. 

And just to be clear, this site is not specific to Microsoft technologies such as ASP.NET MVC.  It is specific to anything MVC, that means if you are a PHP, C++, Ruby, Python, etc., developer and would like to post information you have about how to do something in MVC in your language, please feel free to do so.

Please check back here often as I will announce the launch date for the new site.

And if you are a seasoned MVC developer, please consider offering your knowledge in the form of posting an Article or Video tutorial for other to read.  If you have MVC code snippets or even a complete MVC application that you want to offer up Open Source to the community, please feel free to do so.

As always, the site will be FREE!  You only need to register to post articles or other contributions to the site.

If you have any questions about the site or you would like to know more about this, please contact me at info@mvccentral.net.

My Applications

These are applications I've built for the ASP.NET platform.  They will be available for sale (cheap) this fall!

Coming Soon!

Helm 4 Hosting Signup Application

This is a custom ASP.NET application built for web hosters who use the Helm 4 Control Panel.  The reason this application was built was primarily due to the inefficiencies of the Helm 4 built-in sign up process.  There were too many steps and it wasn't very flexible.  Many hosters including myself were not satisfied with the Helm 4 built-in sign up process.

So being a .Net developer, I decided to build one myself.  Thankfully, Helm 4 does have an API that I can access to execute specific functions such as Create Account, Add Package to Account, Create Domain, etc.

The primary feature with this application is that your customers sign up in three (3) steps.

1. Check Domain Availability
2. Enter Customer information, payment information and select hosting plan
3. Confirm your selection (optionally, enter a promo code) and submit!

That's it!  In three steps, your customers have signed up and you've been notified of the new hosting sign up.  Then you log into the Admin web site (also included) and view the new order and with a single button click, you can process the order.

To Process an Order, I've implemented the Microsoft Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) project to sequentially process any number of providers.

Here's what happens when you process a new order:

1. Helm Account is created - the Helm 4 account is created, the package is created and the domain is created based on the hosting plan the customer signed up for.
2. Payment Processor called - payment is made to your payment processor and a transaction ID is returned and stored with the order.
3. Domain Registration - (optional) if the customer wants you to register a new domain name, it sends the request to your registrar via your registrars API to process the new customer and order request.  It stores order responses with the order.
4. Billing - (optional) if you have a third-party billing service such as FreshBooks or QuickBooks Online, the account is created.  In the case of FreshBooks (included), the Client is created, the Invoice is create and email to the customer, recurring profiles are created for the hosting plan renewals, and any domain registrations.
5. Email Services - (optional) if you are using a third-party email service that is not built into Helm 4, you can use this provider to setup your customers email accounts.
6. Update the order - the order is updated to Completed status and an email is sent to the customer that their account was created and ready to use.  Also if the customer used a promo code, the order is updated with this information and the promo code usage is incremented.  And generally any other processing wrap up occurs here.

This entire process can take anywhere from 30 seconds, to 90 seconds depending on how many providers you are using.

Here are some of the features of the Helm Hosting Signup Application:

• Easy to use - simple three step process, check domain availability, enter customer info, payment info and select plan, confirm and finish.
• Provider Model - the flexible provider model is used to customers can easily add functionality to the application.
• Included Provider services - there are several provider services already built-into the application, including BillingProvider, PaymentProvider, RegistrarProvider, EmailProvider, DnsProvider...
• 3.5 .Net Framework - the latest Microsoft framework is used for use of Linq and WCF and WF among other reasons...
• Visual Studio 2008 - you can easily modify the source code
• Linq-To-Sql - I've used Linq-To-Sql classes to generate the database classes.  This makes modifying the database schema easy.
• jQuery routines - jQuery is used as well as other javascript custom routines in order to make the user experience more friendly.
• Custom Email templates - you can easily add or modify email templates that are sent to your customers when they signup.
• Comprehensive Admin site - there is a complete Admin site to manage new orders and customers.
• Promo Codes - assign promo codes for your advertising campaign that you can assign to plan types such as Annual Plans.
• Complete Source code - you receive the complete source code so you can extend the application for your particular needs.
• Provider Snap-in - you can create and manage your own providers and easily integrate them into the workflow.

This application will be available soon for an affordable price.  I've been using it on my web hosting company's website since March 2009.  Prior to that I was using my custom Helm 3 Hosting Signup Application.

Introductory price: TBD

Release Date: Fall 2009

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Password Vault

Password Vault is a simple web-based password manager for IIS.  If you are on a Windows operating system, like Windows XP or Windows Vista, you can easily use this application and it can be used by any members of your network.

Features:

• Easy installer - easily install this on your system with a web-based process.
• Primary Admin - one primary admin controls all the users and access to the application.
• Multi-user access - each user granted to access the system, can save passwords and no other user can access their passwords.
• Quick Search - quickly search all your passwords by different criteria to find them fast
• Unlimited passwords - each user can add an unlimited amount of passwords.
• Powerful Encryption - all the passwords are encrypted using 256 bit encryption supported by the Rijndael algorithm.
• Password Generator - a password generator is available so ensure that your passwords are strong.  You can change the length of the password to any number of characters.
• Export and Import - you can export your complete password database in UNENCRYPTED Xml format for backup and for password recovery.  The import feature allows you to quickly import a previously exported password database.
• Create New Password - if you've ever logged onto a web site and they've asked you to change your password, this is the feature that helps you handle this.  It creates a new password while retaining your old one until you successfully log into the web site.  Then you just save the new password and you're done!

There will be different versions available, each allowing a different number of users per application.

Prices: TBD

Release Date: Fall 2009

I'm slowly adding content to my site, so take a look at my Blog and see if any of my Downloads interest you.  And come back often, I plan on updating this with lots of C# projects and Movie and Film Score reviews.

If you are interested in the ASP.NET MVC Framework, I've started a new site that I plan on adding to in the coming months with many new MVC projects. http://www.mvcstarterkits.net.