Loading Error

Having an SSIS package loading error today. Can't figure out why it would get corrupted. Odd.

I'll try to post some screenshots a little later.

Five button combination

So, let's say you have a five button combination lock, and you want to generate a list of values to manually crack said combination. How would you do it?

First, assume that for mnemonic reasons, the buttons are labelled with "1/2", "3/4", and so on. This means that for coding purposes, you don't have to account for every value, only the odd-numbered ones.

Also, assume that, as shown in the last SQL statement, you only need non-sequential results. Interestingly, this isn't going to be true in the real world, as a customer may need the ability to set the combination with a duplicate value to be more easily recalled, but it works for this blog post. :)


-- to reduce all the "Inserted 1 row" messages
set nocount on;

declare @i int = 1;
declare @j int = 1;
declare @k int = 1;
declare @g int = 1;
declare @h int = 1;
declare @b table
(
push1 int, push2 int, push3 int, push4 int, push5 int
)

while @g <= 9
begin
while @h <= 9
begin
while @i <= 9
begin
while @j <= 9
begin
while @k <= 9
begin
insert into @b select @g, @h, @i, @j, @k
set @k += 2;
end
set @k = 1;
set @j += 2;
end
set @k = 1;
set @j = 1;
set @i += 2;
end
set @k = 1;
set @j = 1;
set @i = 1 ;
set @h += 2;
end
set @k = 1;
set @j = 1;
set @i = 1;
set @h = 1;
set @g += 2;
end

-- If you want to see everything, you can uncomment this . . .
-- select count(*) as raw_count from @b;

-- To elimate 1-1-1-1-1 and 3-3-3-5-5
select *
from @b
where push1 <> push2
and push2 <> push3
and push3 <> push4
and push4 <> push5;

Book List: Task 2.5 - SSIS

So, let's review:

You put in what essentially amounts to userid/password, along with some keywords, and out comes XML. SSIS's webservice component should be able to handle this no issue, right?

Turns out, it should be. Instead, what you actually get is a known issue with the error "the selected web method contains unsupported arguments"

Check out this URL to see what I mean:

http://www.bigresource.com/Tracker/Track-ms_sql-hskONpQF/

So, this bummed me out. I thought "There HAS to be a way to do this!"

In searching for an answer, I also came across the MSN WSDL file, to feed into the SSIS webservice task. This was useful to prove that it wasn't just Amazon's file. You can find it here:

http://soap.search.msn.com/webservices.asmx?wsdl

Book List: Task 2.5 - Introduction

Here's what I want to do:

• Take a string that I suspect is the title of a book, like "Huck Finn".
• Send this title to Amazon's Web Service, the Product Advertising API, to see if it's valid.
• Receive a response indicating the validity of this string as a title using number of matches to validate.

First, I want to do this manually. That, in and of itself, is not quick or easy. First, you have to sign up for an amazon account. That was simple, I already had one. My account was also already an associate, so that helped - I had poked around their site a bit already.

Then, you have to go to

https://aws.amazon.com

and get your amazon.com account registered for Product API access.

That done, you then go back to

https://aws-portal.amazon.com

Where you can now access your security credentials, under the heading of "Access Keys". From here, you grab your two string-based access ID's, and save them off someplace. You'll need them again in a minute.

Now, head to http://associates-amazon.s3.amazonaws.com/signed-requests/helper/index.html

This is a web page that will allow you submit requests manually. It's a syntax checker! Woohoo! A button I can push! :)

Now, I put in the information, and it spits back the various information about the URL. This is cool! Copy and paste the URL from the bottom-most text box labelled "Signed URL" into a spare browser window, and POOF! You have a fully formed amazon result right there! Success!

Most of this information is covered in one form or another in the official "Getting Started Guide":

http://s3.amazonaws.com/awsdocs/Associates/2010-06-01/prod-adv-api-gsg-2010-06-01.pdf

So, let's review:

You put in what essentially amounts to userid/password, along with some keywords, and out comes XML. SSIS's webservice component should be able to handle this no issue, right?