DateTime format string for inserting into SQL strings directly

To build an insert for a SQL string using datetime literals, the following format string can be used: "yyyy-MM-dd hh:mm:ss"

As in

DateTime.Now.ToString("yyyy-MM-dd hh:mm:ss")


FIX: Error message when you try to enlist two orchestrations at the same time in BizTalk Server 2006 or in BizTalk Server 2006 R2: "Value does not fall within the expected range"

When using Scott Colestock's excellent deployment framework for BizTalk, you start orchestrations by the assembly load. If these are bound to more than one host (fairly common), the first time you start them you'll run into the following error:

Value does not fall within the expected range

I read about a MS fix for this on Scott's site, duly downloaded it only to find that it wouldn't install - the fix was only for R1 of 2006 and hadn't been included in R2. A trip to MS support yielded a developed, tested and released hotfix in less than a month.

FIX: Error message when you try to enlist two orchestrations at the same time in BizTalk Server 2006 or in BizTalk Server 2006 R2: "Value does not fall within the expected range"

Also see Scott's blog on this.

BizTalk 2006 SQL jobs

This link: Database Structure and Jobs contains a list of all SQL jobs used by BTS2006 and a description.

You might have another few jobs in there;
bam_FRRView_ViewFRRMessagesIn_DelAlertHistJob
bam_FRRView_ViewFRRMessagesOut_DelAlertHistJob
bam_RepairView_ViewMessage_DelAlertHistJob

These are from the SWIFT accelerator - FRR stands for FIN Response Reconciliation.

I like this part best:

In the BizTalk Management (BizTalkMgmtDb) database, there's a stored procedure named dbo.adm_cleanupmgmtdb. DO NOT RUN THIS STORED PROCEDURE! If you do run this stored procedure, all the entries in the database will be deleted.

Brilliant! Don't install the procedure then!

From streams to strings...

The Absolute Minimum Every Software Developer Absolutely, Positively Must Know About Unicode and Character Sets (No Excuses!) - Joel on Software

An entertaining read on encodings that every pipeline component developer should read too!