Download source code of a website in C#

With the help of the follwing short C# snippet, you’re able to receive the html code / source of any website as string. Such a function is useful, for example, if you want to parse some information from a website for later use.
Thus the snippet works, you have to add the following two using directives to the header of your source.

using System.Net;
using System.IO;

The function itself looks like this:

public string getHTML(string url)
{
//Create request for given url
HttpWebRequest request = (HttpWebRequest)HttpWebRequest.Create(url);

//Create response-object
HttpWebResponse response = (HttpWebResponse)request.GetResponse();

//Take response stream
StreamReader sr = new StreamReader(response.GetResponseStream());

//Read response stream (html code)
string html = sr.ReadToEnd();

//Close streamreader and response
sr.Close();
response.Close();

//return source
return html;
}

A function call could look like this:

getHTML("http://www.code-bude.net");

If you’ve got suggestions or even problems with the snippet, just write a comment.

How to easily record from a webcam in C#

What is the easiest way to use a webcam in C# and record from it? If you search for an answer to this question you’ll find a lot of articles in the internet but most of them are many pages long and very confusing. However that isn’t really necessary. With the aid of the AForge.NET library you can do the given task really easy. Just a few lines of C# code are enough to drive your webcam and capture images from it. In the following I’ll show you how to handle the AForge library.
What do you need?

The AForge.Video.dll together with the AForge.Video.DirectShow.dll
Both dlls can be found on the AForge website inside the “(libs only)” zip-archive.
A simple winforms-application, with a picturebox on its gui
A webcam. For example this one:No products found.
Basic C#-knowledge. If not exists, read this: No products found.

At first you have to reference the both dlls and write the using-statements […]

Compress images with jpeg codec in C#

Today I’ll show you how to compress your images with help of the JPEG-codec in C#. You will be able to choose the grade of compression. So it’s your choice, if the function should produce smaller filesize or better quality of images.

private void CompressImage(Image sourceImage, int imageQuality, string savePath)
{
try
{
//Create an ImageCodecInfo-object for the codec information
ImageCodecInfo jpegCodec = null;

//Set quality factor for compression
EncoderParameter imageQualitysParameter = new EncoderParameter(
System.Drawing.Imaging.Encoder.Quality, imageQuality);

//List all avaible codecs (system wide)
ImageCodecInfo[] alleCodecs = […]

Capture a complete website in C#

To take a screenshot is one thing. One click on the print key or a small program, which uses the c# screenshot capture method, I showed you the last time, are enough to take a beautiful screenshot.
But what should you do, if you want to capture a whole website? The most websites are “longer” as your screen is high. Thereby most common ways to capture a screenshot will become useless.
But don’t fear – C# can of course solve this problem. If you want to capture a screenshot of a complete website, take a look at the following snippet.

private void WebsiteScreenshot(string url, string file)
{
//Create a webbrwoser object
WebBrowser browser = new WebBrowser();

//Deactivate scrollbars, unless you want them to
//appear on your screenshot
browser.ScrollBarsEnabled = false;

[…]