There was something I was not grokking about creating a proxy file from a WCF service that could then be used in the client app. I didn’t know what to tell the svcutil.exe tool to build the proxy from. Finally it dawned on me. I needed to have the service running and then point to it’s endpoint. Then svcutil was able to find the service and create the proxy. This may have been a problem for me because I am so used to using VS add web service for proxy creation.

I still have a little more work to do to get this client/service Indigo app running…

Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org

First, proof that I really got it working! Although you can see that one of the messages got lost. (Note Ari doesn’t receive first “hello?” from Julie.) Guess I need to build some Reliable Messaging into this! This dropped first message was consistent every time I ran this. But looking back at the TechEd video from Ari Bixhorn’s Indigo talk, where my demo came from, I see he is having the same problem. I did get rid of the echo after I took these screen shots, just by filtering messages by the local chat member.

I posted previously on getting an Indigo Peer Chat written in Beta1 to run in Beta2. One of the references there is Kevin Ransom’s blog which has excellent info on Peer Chat in Indigo. However, I still had another problem and lucky for me (and you!), Harry Pierson had the same problem I was having and blogged his way through the solution. Phew! After using Kevin’s notes to get PNRP installed (it’s a Windows service), I was getting an error message when testing to see if it worked. Harry had the error too then someone told him that you need to actually START PNRP after you install it before you can run the test that Kevin explains. There is one tiny little problem with Kevin’s steps, but I easily got around it. So putting together Kevin’s and Harry’s information, here is how to get PNRP going on your computer.

From Kevin’s blog:

To enable PNRP you will need a computer running Windows XP Service Pack 2. PNRP is currently not available for Windows 2003 server.

• Select Add / Remove programs
• Select Add / Remove Windows components
• Select Networking Services and click on details
• ensure that the Peer to peer check box is ticked and then select Okay followed by Next
• The Windows installer will do its thing then you should select Next  followed by Finish

___________________________________________________________

From Harry’s blog (Harry has an entire P2P category)

From the DOS Prompt type: net start pnrpsvc

He also notes that this will now start automatically from now on
_______________________________________________________

Back to Kevin’s instructions!

To check that everything went well run a netsh command shell by:

• Select Start followed by Run
• enter netsh followed by the return key

In the command shell that appears enter the command:

• netsh p2p pnrp cloud (note from Julie, don’t retype netsh, that won’t work)

followed by the command

• show list

You should see output similar to:

Scope Id    Addr  State            Name

—– —– —– —————- —–

3     4     1     Virtual          LinkLocal_{XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX}

1     0     1     Virtual          Global_

netsh p2p pnrp cloud>

One other note, I started wtih a Beta1 version of the code and went through a tough (but very educational) process of getting it to work in Beta2. Kevin’s post on Peer Channel is a more efficient way to get started, since I basically ended up with code similar to his post. All of the mods I had to make were in the config file.

It’s pretty scary when you are so early in the game that there is only one result from Google when you are trying to solve a problem. But thank goodness, thank Kevin and thank Harry for their posts! One giant leap for Julie, one small step for demonstrating that Indigo is built for non-plumbers!

I suppose it’s great news for Richard Tarrant, who founded this company in Vermont in 1969, as he is making a bid for Senate (though he will likely be running against the ever-popular Bernie Sanders), but the news is causing major worry for many here. IDX employs 800 people in their Burlington headquarters, and another 1600 in offices in other states and in the U.K. It is a big source of pride in Vermont – one of the largest employers and a locally owned company (even though people like to tease Tarrant about his Rolls Royce – very un-Vermonty) – but no longer. And more worriesome is the fact that GE recently purchased Vermont’s Bombardier Capital, for 2.3 billion this summer and then began the process of closing the “Vermont office”.

IDX is definitely a Microsoft shop, too. They are finally shifting some of their VB6 development to .NET.

Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org