Hello Cathal!

Thnx for reply and explanation. THE SOURCE is really there, but I am still far from changing opinion on DNN source code packaging: it's hidden source project.

The right way to distribute open source packages (at least it is widely accepted by OSS community) is to include:

README - text file explaining what you have in package and how to use it - if it would be in there it would state that source code can be found in "ModuleName".resources file which is actually zip archive.

and many others useful to devs info files i.e. COPYING, CHANGELOG

I have read Shaoun Walker blog on DNN bad opinion in open source community and after looking into the distribution packages I admit its layout does not help in changing it.

Cheers to all who found THE SOURCE ;)

I wholeheartly agree that the Source package should include all the source code exactly where you'd expect to find it.  If there is some issue with compiling/changing the Desktop modules, then a readme.txt file should be in each directory with instructions on how to handle the issue.  If the Install or StarterKit packages want to have the source bundled into .resource files, that's fine - again with a readme.txt file that tells you this. 

Also, the .resource file is bundled inside of the <module>.zip file contained in the main dnn source package zip file and is not installed into the module's directory during site installation.  And the module.zip file is deleted so you have to go back to the original DNN package zip file to find it.

I ran into this issue when rebuilding the DNN solution and I had deleted all the DLLs in the bin folder of Website.  Hence deleting the core module dlls that are placed there during installation and not rebuilt with the DNN solution.

Also, the error I encountered was "Multiple controls with the same ID 'ctr' were found. FindControl requires that controls have unique IDs." in skin.vb which threw me for a loop since I hadn't changed any aspx/ascx files.

Just copying the DLLs from the <module>.zip files into Website\bin fixes the problem if all you need to do is build and run DNN and you're not changing the core module source code.  (I'm referring to the core Desktop modules here)  To work with core modules, you need to unzip the files from the <module>.resource file to get the source code and sln/vbproj files.

Some additional documentation and/or roadmap regarding the development environment for working with core modules and rebuilding the entire code base would be very helpful!

It took me a couple of hours of searching to even find this thread since I was sure someone had to have run into this issue.

Keywords: "source code missing", "vb missing", "core module source code missing","ascx.vb missing","ascx.vb source code", "Multiple controls with the same ID"

Thanks,

Toby

P.S. - sorry for the long post but there were several discoveries:

1 - core desktop modules install puts dlls in bin - don't delete them!

2 - source code for core modules squirrelled away in <module>.resource file inside of source package zip file in Install\Module directory.

3 - core modules are not included in dotnetnuke solution.

4 - error caused by missing module dlls is "multiple controls" error in skin.vb.

P.S. - the search function is lame because I have to reselect the forums every time I do a search.

As each new edition of Visual Studio, SQL Server and ASP.NET is released the core team applies super-hero efforts to make DotNetNuke work with bleeding and leading edge technology from Microsoft. When this process occurs, there is often no clear path to resolve every possible installation and development environment.

One must give Shaun and the core team considerable respect for even attempting to adhere to the Microsoft moving target; after all, they are considerate enough to make it work with multiple development environments and framework versions and they still keep pumping out new features and enhancements along with source code of tremendous quality and value.

Let us be honest here… Almost any person who uses any Open Source project expects far too much for far too little. They insist that each project should work out of the box, install itself properly, update and maintain itself, and it should do so forever. Of course it should include a complete instruction manual that configures itself based on your existing setup.

The reality is that DotNetNuke is a complex system worthy of much more than a few clicks to download and a 10 minute evaluation effort. If you have to invest some time and effort to make it work properly on your particular system – so be it. There are serious learning curves in this undertaking, not only with DotNetNuke, but with related Internet technologies, development environments and best coding practices.

I would estimate that if a company were to attempt to recreate DotNetNuke from scratch it would easily cost more than $1,000,000, when you involve real developers, real management, real years of man work, and real documentation.

If this is the case, then consider yourself very lucky today - you just hit the jackpot!

Visual Web Developer is free. Microsoft .NET is free. Microsoft IIS is free. DotNetNuke is free. The core team is busy trying to build your next release for free…

…so why don’t some of you lucky people get together using these free tools and contribute to this Open Source project by documenting the installation procedures and development environment setup for DotNetNuke?

Your input would be especially helpful from the point of view from a new user.

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Dwayne J. Baldwin