Melissa - Presort Object Windows Dotnet

Purpose

This code showcases the Melissa Presort Object using C#.

Please feel free to copy or embed this code to your own project. Happy coding!

For the latest Melissa Presort Object release notes, please visit https://releasenotes.melissa.com/on-premise-api/presort-object/

For further details, please visit: https://docs.melissa.com/on-premise-api/presort-object/presort-object-quickstart.html

The console will ask the user for:

• A csv file that contains addresses you would like to presort

And return

• A csv file of presorted addresses

Tested Environments

• Windows 10 64-bit .NET 7.0, Powershell 5.1
• Melissa data files for 2024-03

Required File(s) and Programs

mdPresort.dll

This is the c++ code of the Melissa Data Object.

Data File(s)

• mdL004A.dat
• mdL004B.dat
• mdL004C.dat
• mdL005.dat
• mdL006A.dat
• mdL006B.dat
• mdL007.dat
• mdL008.dat
• mdL009A.dat
• mdL009B.dat
• mdL010.dat
• mdL011A.dat
• mdL011B.dat
• mdL012.dat
• mdL201A.dat
• mdL201B.dat
• mdL601.dat
• mdL602.dat
• mdL801A.dat
• mdL801B.dat
• mdPresort.lic
• mdValid5.dat
• PostalRatesFile.txt
• 3600r_T.pdf
• 3602c_T.pdf
• 3602n_T.pdf
• 3602r_T.pdf
• 8125_T.pdf
• mdCityState.dat
• mdDSF.DAT
• mdL001.dat
• mdL002A.dat
• mdL002B1.dat
• mdL002B2.dat
• mdL002C.dat

Getting Started

These instructions will get you a copy of the project up and running on your local machine for development and testing purposes.

Install the Dotnet Core SDK

Before starting, make sure that the .NET 7.0 SDK has been correctly installed on your machine (If you have Visual Studio installed, you most likely have it already). If you are unsure, you can check by opening a command prompt window and typing the following:

dotnet --list-sdks

If the .NET 7.0 SDK is already installed, you should see it in the following list:

As long as the above list contains version 7.0.xxx (underlined in red), then you can skip to the next step. If your list does not contain version 7.0, or you get any kind of error message, then you will need to download and install the .NET 7.0 SDK from the Microsoft website.

To download, follow this link: https://dotnet.microsoft.com/en-us/download/dotnet

Select .NET 7.0 and you will be navigated to the download page.

Click and download the x64 SDK installer for your operating system.

(IMPORTANT: Make sure you download the SDK, NOT the runtime. the SDK contains both the runtime as well as the tools needed to build the project.)

Once clicked, your web browser will begin downloading an installer for the SDK. Run the installer and follow all of the prompts to complete the installation (your computer may ask you to restart before you can continue). Once all of that is done, you should be able to verify that the SDK is installed with the dotnet --list-sdks command.

Set up Powershell settings

If running Powershell for the first time, you will need to run this command in the Powershell console: Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned. The console will then prompt you with the following warning shown in the image below.

• Enter 'A'.
  • If successful, the console will not output any messages. (You may need to run Powershell as administrator to enforce this setting).

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Download this project

$ git clone https://github.com/MelissaData/PresortObject-Dotnet
$ cd PresortObject-Dotnet

Set up Melissa Updater

Melissa Updater is a CLI application allowing the user to update their Melissa applications/data.

• Download Melissa Updater here: https://releases.melissadata.net/Download/Library/WINDOWS/NET/ANY/latest/MelissaUpdater.exe
• Create a folder within the cloned repo called MelissaUpdater.
• Put MelissaUpdater.exe in MelissaUpdater folder you just created.

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Different ways to get data file(s)

1. Using Melissa Updater
   • It will handle all of the data download/path and dll(s) for you.
2. If you already have the latest release zip, you can find the data file(s) in there
   • To pass in your own data file path directory, you may either use the '-dataPath' parameter or enter the data file path directly in interactive mode.
   • Comment out this line "DownloadDataFiles -license $License" in the powershell script.
   • This will prevent you from having to redownload all the files.

Run Powershell Script

Parameters:

• -file: a test file

  This is convenient when you want to get results for a specific file in one run instead of testing multiple files in interactive mode.

• -dataPath (optional): a data file path directory to test the Presort Object

• -license (optional): a license string to test the Presort Object

• -quiet (optional): add to the command if you do not want to get any console output from the Melissa Updater

When you have modified the script to match your data location, let's run the script. There are two modes:

• Interactive

  The script will prompt the user for a file path, then use the provided file to test Presort Object. For example:

  $ .\MelissaPresortObjectWindowsDotnet.ps1
  

  For quiet mode:

  $ .\MelissaPresortObjectWindowsDotnet.ps1 -quiet
  

• Command Line

  You can pass a file path in -file parameter and a license string in -license parameter to test Presort Object. For example:

  $ .\MelissaPresortObjectWindowsDotnet.ps1 -file ".\MelissaPresortObjectSampleInput.csv" 
  $ .\MelissaPresortObjectWindowsDotnet.ps1 -file ".\MelissaPresortObjectSampleInput.csv" -license "<your_license_string>"
  

  For quiet mode:

  $ .\MelissaPresortObjectWindowsDotnet.ps1 -file ".\MelissaPresortObjectWindowsDotnet\MelissaPresortObjectSampleInput.csv" -quiet
  $ .\MelissaPresortObjectWindowsDotnet.ps1 -file ".\MelissaPresortObjectWindowsDotnet\MelissaPresortObjectSampleInput.csv" -license "<your_license_string>" -quiet
  

This is the expected output from a successful setup for interactive mode:

Troubleshooting

Troubleshooting for errors found while running your program.

C# Errors:

Error	Description
ErrorRequiredFileNotFound	Program is missing a required file. Please check your Data folder and refer to the list of required files above. If you are unable to obtain all required files through the Melissa Updater, please contact technical support below.
ErrorLicenseExpired	Expired license string. Please contact technical support below.

Contact Us

For free technical support, please call us at 800-MELISSA ext. 4 (800-635-4772 ext. 4) or email us at tech@melissa.com.

To purchase this product, contact the Melissa sales department at 800-MELISSA ext. 3 (800-635-4772 ext. 3).