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• Desktop Fun: Triple Monitor Wallpaper Collection Series 1

  - by Asian Angel

  Triple monitor setups provide spacious amounts of screen real-estate but can be extremely frustrating to find good wallpapers for. Today we present the first in a series of wallpaper collections to help decorate your triple monitor setup with lots of wallpaper goodness. Note: Click on the picture to see the full-size image—these wallpapers vary in size so you may need to crop, stretch, or place them on a colored background in order to best match them to your screen’s resolution. Special Note: The screen resolution sizes available for each of these wallpapers has been included to help you match them up to your individual settings as easily as possible. All images shown here are thumbnail screenshots of the largest size available for download. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, 4800*1200, 5040*1050, and 5760*1200. Available in the following resolutions: 4800*1200. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, and 4800*1200. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, and 4800*1200. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, 4800*1200, 5040*1050, and 5760*1200. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, and 4800*1200. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, 4800*1200, and 5040*1050. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, 4800*1200, and 5040*1050. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, and 4800*1200. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, 4800*1200, and 5040*1050. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4800*1200, and 5040*1050. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, 4800*1200, 5040*1050, 5760*1200, and 7680*1600. Available in the following resolutions: 3840*960, 3840*1024, 4096*1024, 4320*900, 4800*1200, 5040*1050, and 5760*1200. Available in the following resolutions: 5760*1200. Available in the following resolutions: 5760*1200. More Triple Monitor Goodness Beautiful 3 Screen Multi-Monitor Space Wallpaper Span the same wallpaper across multiple monitors or use a different wallpaper for each. Dual Monitors: Use a Different Wallpaper on Each Desktop in Windows 7, Vista or XP For more wallpapers be certain to see our great collections in the Desktop Fun section. Latest Features How-To Geek ETC How to Upgrade Windows 7 Easily (And Understand Whether You Should) The How-To Geek Guide to Audio Editing: Basic Noise Removal Install a Wii Game Loader for Easy Backups and Fast Load Times The Best of CES (Consumer Electronics Show) in 2011 The Worst of CES (Consumer Electronics Show) in 2011 HTG Projects: How to Create Your Own Custom Papercraft Toy Firefox 4.0 Beta 9 Available for Download – Get Your Copy Now The Frustrations of a Computer Literate Watching a Newbie Use a Computer [Humorous Video] Season0nPass Jailbreaks Current Gen Apple TVs IBM’s Jeopardy Playing Computer Watson Shows The Pros How It’s Done [Video] Tranquil Juice Drop Abstract Wallpaper Pulse Is a Sleek Newsreader for iOS and Android Devices

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• Force.com presents Database.com SQL Azure/Amazon RDS unfazed

  - by Sarang

  At the DreamForce 2010 event in San Francisco Force.com unveiled their next big thing in the Fat SaaS portfolio "Database.com".  I am still wondering how would they would've shelled out for that domain name. Now why would a already established SaaS player foray into a key building block like Database? Potentially allowing enterprises to build apps that do not utilize the Force.com stack! One key reason is being seen as the Fat SaaS player with evey trick in the SaaS space under his belt. You want CRM come hither, want a custom development PaaS like solution welcome home (VMForce), want all your apps to talk to a cloud DB and minimize latency by having it reside closer to you cloud apps? You've come to the right place sire! Other is potentially killing foray of smaller DB players like Oracle (Not surprisingly, the Database.com offering is a highly customized and scalable Oracle database) from entering the lucrative SaaS db marketplace. The feature set promised looks great out of the box for someone who likes to visualize cool new architectures. The ground realities are certainly going to be a lot different considering the SOAP/REST style access patterns in lieu of the comfortable old shoe of SQL. Microsoft suffered heavily with SDS (SQL Data Services) offering in early 2009 and had to pull the plug on the product only to reintroduce as a simple SQL Server in the cloud, SQL Windows Azure. Though MSFT is playing cool by providing OData semantics to work with SQL Windows Azure satisfying atleast some needs of the Web-Style to a DB. The other features like Social data models including Profiles, Status updates, feeds seem interesting as well. (Although I beleive social is just one of the aspects of large scale collaborative computing). All these features start "Free" for devs its a good news but the good news stops here. The overall pricing model of $ per Users per Transactions / Month is highly disproportionate compared to Amazon RDS (Based on MySQL) or SQL Windows Azure (Based on MSSQL). Roger Jennigs of Oakleaf did an interesting comparo based on 3, 10, 100, 500 users and it turns out that Database.com going by current understanding is way too expensive for the services on offer. The offering may not impact the decision for DotNet shops mulling their cloud stategy or even some Java/MySQL shops thinking about Amazon RDS, however for enterprises having already invested in other force.com offerings this could be a very important piece in the cloud strategy jigsaw. One which would address a key cloud DB issue of "Latency" for them at least it will help having the DB in the neighborhood. The tooling and "SQL like" access provider drivers (Think ODBC/JDBC) will be available later this year. Progress Software has already announced their JDBC driver stack for Database.com. It remains to be seen how effective the overall solutions proves to be in the longer run but for starts its a important decision towards consolidating Force.com's already strong positioning in the SaaS space. As always contrasting views are welcome! :)

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• Friday Fun: Play Tetris in Google Chrome

  - by Asian Angel

  Do you prefer playing classic games rather than the newer ones? Then get ready for some classic goodness with the JC-Tetris extension for Google Chrome. JC-Tetris in Action When you click on your new “JC-Tetris Toolbar Button” a new mini-Chrome window will open with the game displayed inside. This could be very convenient for those who would like or need to pause the game, minimize the window, and finish the game later. All that is needed to play are the four “Arrow Keys & the Space Bar”. Note: The text was small when the window first opened during our test so we used the “Ctrl +” keyboard shortcut twice to enlarge it. You may or may not experience similar text size results. Like any Tetris game things start out “quietly enough” but this one speeds up quickly, so be prepared! Notice that you do get a warning of what is waiting to drop onto the game board on the left side. Whenever you complete a game you will see this small window asking if you would like to enter a name for the score…you can easily ignore/bypass the window by clicking “Cancel”. Another game and a much better result. Do not be surprised if you feel that little burst of “rushed panic” at the end! Conclusion JC-Tetris is an enjoyable way to relax when you need a break. The ability to pause the game and minimize it for later makes it even better. Have fun! Links Download the JC-Tetris extension (Google Chrome Extensions) Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Friday Fun: Get Your Mario OnFriday Fun: First Person TetrisFriday Fun: Play MineSweeper in Google ChromeFriday Fun: Play 3D Rally Racing in Google ChromeHow to Make Google Chrome Your Default Browser TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Dark Side of the Moon (8-bit) Norwegian Life If Web Browsers Were Modes of Transportation Google Translate (for animals) Out of 100 Tweeters Roadkill’s Scan Port scans for open ports

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• Blender mesh mirroring screws up normals when importing in Unity

  - by Shivan Dragon

  My issue is as follows: I've modeled a robot in Blender 2.6. It's a mech-like biped or if you prefer, it kindda looks like a chicken. Since it's symmetrical on the XZ plane, I've decided to mirror some of its parts instead of re-modeling them. Problem is, those mirrored meshes look fine in Blender (faces all show up properly and light falls on them as it should) but in Unity faces and lighting on those very same mirrored meshes is wrong. What also stumps me is the fact that even if I flip normals in Blender, I still get bad results in Unity for those meshes (though now I get different bad results than before). Here's the details: Here's a Blender screen shot of the robot. I've took 2 pictures and slightly rotated the camera around so the geometry in question can be clearly seen: Now, the selected cog-wheel-like piece is the mirrored mesh obtained from mirroring the other cog-wheel on the other (far) side of the robot torso. The back-face culling is turned of here, so it's actually showing the faces as dictated by their normals. As you can see it looks ok, faces are orientated correctly and light falls on it ok (as it does on the original cog-wheel from which it was mirrored). Now if I export this as fbx using the following settings: and then import it into Unity, it looks all screwy: It looks like the normals are in the wrong direction. This is already very strange, because, while in Blender, the original cog-wheel and its mirrored counter part both had normals facing one way, when importing this in Unity, the original cog-wheel still looks ok (like in Blender) but the mirrored one now has normals inverted. First thing I've tried is to go "ok, so I'll flip normals in Blender for the mirrored cog-wheel and then it'll display ok in Unity and that's that". So I went back to Blender, flipped the normals on that mesh, so now it looks bad in Blender: and then re-exported as fbx with the same settings as before, and re-imported into Unity. Sure enough the cog-wheel now looks ok in Unity, in the sense where the faces show up properly, but if you look closely you'll notice that light and shadows are now wrong: Now in Unity, even though the light comes from the back of the robot, the cog-wheel in question acts as if light was coming from some-where else, its faces which should be in shadow are lit up, and those that should be lit up are dark. Here's some things I've tried and which didn't do anything: in Blender I tried mirroring the mesh in 2 ways: first by using the scale to -1 trick, then by using the mirroring tool (select mesh, hit crtl-m, select mirror axis), both ways yield the exact same result in Unity I've tried playing around with the prefab import settings like "normals: import/calculate", "tangents: import/calculate" I've also tired not exporting as fbx manually from Blender, but just dropping the .blend file in the assets folder inside the Unity project So, my question is: is there a way to actually mirror a mesh in Blender and then have it imported in Unity so that it displays properly (as it does in Blender)? If yes, how? Thank you, and please excuse the TL;DR style.

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• Using Pandora in Boxee

  - by Mysticgeek

  Boxee is a very cool multimedia app that lets you access and stream your digital media in many different ways. There’s also a lot of extra apps included with it, and today we take a look at the Pandora application in Boxee. Pandora has been a favorite free music streaming service that’s been around for some time now. Though there are new services like Grooveshark and Spotify that are competing, Pandora is still a reliable choice. It’s now included in Boxee, and here we take a look at using it. Create a Pandora Account If you don’t already have a Pandora account, you can easily create one at their website (link below). Pandora in Boxee To start using Pandora from Boxee, launch Boxee and from the main menu select Apps. Now from the My Apps section select Pandora. When the Pandora app menu comes up, select Start. Now you need to log into your Pandora account. After signing in you can starting listening to your stations, viewing artist info, and cover art. All while enjoying some cool visuals in the background. From the controls at the top you can control playback, skip songs, control volume, get information on why a song was picked, and give a song a thumbs up or down. Of course you can also pull up your stations and switch between them and add more. The same features you’ve come to expect from Pandora are available. One thing we noticed missing is not being able to click on the band or artist to get additional information about them –which you can do on the Pandora site and desktop app. But that isn’t a deal breaker by any means, and we’re hoping the feature will be added in the future. Then while you’re checking out other apps, shows, and setting within Boxee, the cool visuals continue and the songs from you stations keep playing. Conclusion Pandora is a great streaming music service and a welcome edition to Boxee. If you’re a fan of Pandora now you can listen to it on your home theater system. If you’re new to Boxee, make sure to check out our article on getting started with Boxee. Create a Pandora Account Download Boxee Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Integrate Boxee with Media Center in Windows 7Getting Started with BoxeePandora One is a Worthwhile Upgrade for Your Current Pandora AccountCreate Music Video Playlists with TubeRadio.fmSpotify is an Awesome Music Streaming Service TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Draw Online using Harmony How to Browse Privately in Firefox Kill Processes Quickly with Process Assassin Need to Come Up with a Good Name? Try Wordoid StockFox puts a Lightweight Stock Ticker in your Statusbar Explore Google Public Data Visually

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• Access Windows Home Server from an Ubuntu Computer on your Network

  - by Mysticgeek

  If you’re a Windows Home Server user, there may be times when you need to access it from an Ubuntu machine on your network. Today we take a look at the process of accessing files on your home server from Ubuntu. Note: In this example we’re using Windows Home Server with PowerPack 3, and Ubuntu 10.04 running on a home network. Access WHS from Ubuntu To access files on your home server from Ubuntu, click on Places then select Network. You should now see your home server listed in the Network folder as well as other Windows machines…double-click the server to access it. If you don’t see your server listed, you might need to go into Windows Network \ Workgroup and find it there. You’ll be prompted to enter in the correct credentials for WHS just as you would when accessing it from a Windows machine. It’s your choice if you want to have the password remembered or not…make your selection and click Connect. Now you will see the available folders on your home server. In this example we signed in with Administrator credentials, so we have access to everything. Double-click on the folder share you want to access content from…here we see MS Office documents on the server. Or, here we take a look at a music folder with various MP3 files which you can make Ubuntu play. You can access the files directly from the server, provided there is a Linux app that can handle the file type. In this example we opened a Word document in OpenOffice. Here we’re playing an MKV movie file from the server in Totem Movie Player.   You can easily search for files on the server as well… If you want to store your Ubuntu files on WHS it’s just a matter of dragging them to the correct WHS folder you want them in. If you’re using an Ubuntu computer on your home network and need to access files from Windows Home Server, luckily it’s a straight-forward process. You’ll often have to find the correct software to use Windows files, but even that’s getting much easier with version 10.04. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Share Ubuntu Home Directories using SambaCreate a Samba User on UbuntuGMedia Blog: Setting Up a Windows Home ServerRestore Files from Backups on Windows Home ServerInstall Samba Server on Ubuntu TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips HippoRemote Pro 2.2 Xobni Plus for Outlook All My Movies 5.9 CloudBerry Online Backup 1.5 for Windows Home Server Speed Up Windows With ReadyBoost Awesome World Cup Soccer Calendar Nice Websites To Watch TV Shows Online 24 Million Sites Windows Media Player Glass Icons (icons we like) How to Forecast Weather, without Gadgets

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• Silverlight Cream for April 04, 2010 -- #830

  - by Dave Campbell

  In this Issue: Michael Washington, Hassan, David Anson, Jeff Wilcox, UK Application Development Consulting, Davide Zordan, Victor Gaudioso, Anoop Madhusudanan, Phil Middlemiss, and Laurent Bugnion. Shoutouts: Josh Smith has a good-read post up: Design-time data is still data Shawn Hargreaves reported his MIX demo released From SilverlightCream.com: Silverlight MVVM: Enabling Design-Time Data in Expression Blend When Using Web Services Michael Washington has a tutorial up on MVVM and using a web service to get design-time data that works in Blend also... lots of information and screenshots. WP7 Transition Animation Hassan has a new WP7 tutorial up that demonstrates playing media and adding transition animation between pages. Tip: For a truly read-only custom DependencyProperty in Silverlight, use a read-only CLR property instead David Anson's latest tip is in response to comments on his previous post and details one by Dr. WPF who points out that a read-only DependencyProperty doesn't actually need to be a DependencyProperty as long as the class implements INotifyPropertyChanged. Template parts and custom controls (quick tip) Jeff Wilcox has posted a set of tips and recommendations to use when developing control development in Silverlight ... this is a post to bookmark. Flexible Data Template Support in Silverlight The UK Application Development Consulting details a 'problem' in Silverlight that doesn't exist in WPF and that is data templates that vary by type... and discusses a way around it. Multi-Touch enabling Silverlight Simon using Blend behaviors and the Surface sample for Silverlight Davide Zordan brought Multi-Touch to the Silverlight Simon game on CodePlex using Blend Behaviors. New Video Tutorial: How to Use a Behavior to Fire Methods from Objects in Styles Victor Gaudioso has a video tutorial up responding to a question from a developer. He demonstrates development of a Behavior that can be attached to objects in or out of Styles that allows you to specify what Method they need to fire. Creating a Silverlight Client for @shanselman ’s Nerd Dinner, using oData and Bing Maps Anoop Madhusudanan took Scott Hanselman's post on an OData API for StackOverflow, and has created a Silverlight client for Nerd Dinner, including BingMaps. A Chrome and Glass Theme - Part 2 Phil Middlemiss has the next part of his Chrome and Glass Theme up. In this one he creates a very nice chrome-look button with visual state changes. MVVM Light Toolkit V3 SP1 for Windows Phone 7 Laurent Bugnion has released a new version of MVVM Light for WP7. Included is an installation manual and information about what was changed. Stay in the 'Light! Twitter SilverlightNews | Twitter WynApse | WynApse.com | Tagged Posts | SilverlightCream Join me @ SilverlightCream | Phoenix Silverlight User Group Technorati Tags: Silverlight    Silverlight 3    Silverlight 4    Windows Phone MIX10

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• Challenges in multi-player Android Game Server with RESTful Nature

  - by Kush

  I'm working on an Android Game based on Contract Bridge, as a part of my college Summer Internship project. The game will be multi-player such that 4 Android devices can play it, so there's no BOT or CPU player to be developed. At the time of getting project, I realized that most of the students had already worked on the project but none of their works is reusable now (for variety of reasons like, undocumented code and design architecture, different platform implementation). I have experience working on several open source projects and hence I emphasis to work out on this project such that components I make become reusable as much as possible. Now, as the game is multi-player and entire game progress will be handled on server, I'm currently working on Server's design, since I wanted to make game server reusable such that any client platform can use it, I was previously confused in selecting Socket or REST for Game Server's design, but later finalized to work on REST APIs for the server. Now, since I have to keep all players in-sync while they make movements in game, on server I've planned to use Database which will keep all players' progress, specific for each table (in Bridge, 4 players play on single table, and server will handle many such game tables). I don't know if its an appropriate decision to use database as shared medium to track progress of each game table (let me know if there's an appropriate or better option). Obviously, when game is completed for the table, data for that table on server's database is discarded. Now the problem is that, access to REST service is an HTTP call, so as long as client doesn't make any request, server will remain idle, and consider a situation where A player has played a card on his device and the device requests to apply this change on the server. Now, I need to let rest of the three devices know that the player has played a card, and also update view on their device. AFAIK, REST cannot provide a sort-of Push-notification system, since the connection to the server is not persistent. One solution that I thought was to make each device constantly poll the server for any change (like every 56 ms) and when changes are found, reflect it on the device. But I feel this is not an elegant way, as every HTTP request is expensive. (and I choose REST to make game play experience robust since, a mobile device tends to get disconnected from Internet, and if there's Socket-like persistent connection then entire game progress is subject to lost. Also, portability on client-end is important) Also, imagining a situation where 10 game tables are in progress and 40 players are playing, a server must be capable to handle flooded HTTP requests from all the devices which make it every 56 ms. So I wonder if the situation is assumed as DoS attack. So, explaining the situation, am I going on the right track for the server design? I wanted to be sure before I proceed much further with the code.

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• Speech Recognition

  - by DesigningCode

  Today I was asked to write a wee application for someone so that they could turn pages on their ebooks without having to reach for their keyboard or mouse… that way they could do craft or knit or whatever they are doing while they are reading. I vaguely remember that windows has something built in, but have never really played with it before.   I have in the past turned on the screen reader and impressed my kids by making the computer saying “amusing” phrases along the lines of “Zac has a smelly bum”. So instead of firing up Visual Studio and getting stuck into the juciy task of writing a speech recognition program…. I typed “speech recognition” into the start menu of my windows 7 computer.   And wow!  I’ve been playing with it for the last 40 minutes or so and have been most impressed.   Dictation wise it certainly misses stuff or gets the wrong words, but I did the training and it certainly improved. But what I’m enjoying is controlling windows. for instance, to start this blog entry  I said “Open Writer”  and it worked no problem.    In fact after I muddled my way through getting going with speech recognition I enjoyed saying “Open notepad” … “close”  over and over again. It allows you to click anywhere on the screen, just say “mousegrid”   and a 1-9 numbered grid comes up,  say a number and it puts a smaller 1-9 numbered grid, and you hone in, till the middle square is on a place you want to click, then you say “click” or “double click”.  if you want to enter a key, say “Press Tab”  for example.   inside programs it understands menu entries.  In fact, while writing this I just said “File”  “Save” and it happily saved. I think I will play around with this for a while more and try it out in visual studio.   Might be quite good for being able to do menu entries instead of grabbing for my mouse…. can keep my hands on the keyboard. ok, wasn’t the first post I wanted to do on geeks with blogs! but hey…   will do some techy posts soon.

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• Emoti-phrases

  - by Tony Davis

  Surely the next radical step in the development of User-interface design is for applications to react appropriately to the rising tide of bewilderment, frustration or antipathy of the users. When an application understands that rapport is lost, it should respond accordingly. When we, for example, become confused by an unforgiving interface, shouldn't there be a way of signalling our bewilderment and having the application respond appropriately? There is surprisingly little in the current interface standards that would help. If we're getting frustrated with an unresponsive application, perhaps we could let it know of our increasing irritation by means of an "I'm getting angry and exasperated" slider. Although, by 'responding appropriately', I don't include playing a "we are experiencing unusually heavy traffic: your application usage is important to us" message, accompanied by calming muzak. When confronted with a tide of wizards, 'are you sure?' messages, or page-after-page of tiresome and barely-relevant options, how one yearns for a handy 'JFDI' (Just Flaming Do It) button. One click and the application miraculously desists with its annoying questions and just gets on with the job, using the defaults, or whatever we selected last time. Much more satisfying, and more direct to most developers and DBAs, however, would be the facility to communicate to the application via a twitter-style input field, or via parameters to command-line applications ("I don't want a wide-ranging debate with you; just open the bl**dy PDF!" or, or "Don't forget which of us has the close button"). Although to avoid too much cultural-dependence, perhaps we should take the lead from emoticons, and use a set of standardized emoti-phrases such as 'sez you', 'huh?', 'Pshaw!', or 'meh', which could be used to vent a range of feelings in any given application, whether it be SQL Server stubbornly refusing to give us the result we are expecting, or when an online-survey is getting too personal. Or a 'Lingua Glaswegia' perhaps: 'Atsabelter' ("very good") 'Atspish' ("must try harder") 'AnThenYerArsFellAff ' ("I don't quite trust these results") 'BileYerHeid' or 'ShutYerGub' ("please stop these inane questions") There would, of course, have to be an ANSI standards body to define the phrases that were acceptable. Presumably, there would be a tussle amongst the different international standards organizations. Meanwhile Oracle, Microsoft and Apple would each release non-standard extensions. Time then, surely, to plant emoti-phrases on the lot of them and develop a user-driven consensus. Send us your suggestions! The best one will win an iPod nano! Cheers! Tony.

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• Do I need to match hardware on a Mac to my PC to get the same user experience?

  - by Darth

  I've been playing around with the thought of moving from a PC to a Mac. if you don't want to read this, skip to the "upgrade options" My current setup Most of my time I spent moving back and forth between Linux and Windows. During the last upgrade to Vista, I got myself pc with Core 2 Quad, 8GB of RAM and GeForce 9800GTX+. Currently I'm running dual boot between Ubuntu 10.04 and Windows Vista x64. Most of my work, around 80%, I can do on Ubuntu, which is mostly Ruby/Java programming. If that was all I needed, Ubuntu would be really great. However, I also do quite a lot of Photography and Design, which forces me to use Adobe software (not only Photoshop). I also work with Wacom Intuos4 tablet, which doesn't really have great support on Linux machines. I've tried virtualization both ways (Linux in Win and Win in Linux), but neither was anywhere near satisfying. These are those of many many reasons I want to move to OS X. Upgrade options This is how I see my upgrade options: Mac Mini - cheapest solution, but worst performance iMac - more expensive, better performing with second LCD for free Mac Pro - could match my current PC performance, currently outside of the price range When I compare the Mac hardware vs my current PC, it will be always worse, unless I decide to pump in a lot of money. The question that comes to my head, do I need to match my current PC hardware to get the same user experience with a Mac? If I look at it from the Vista point of view, 2GB RAM is as low as it gets, 4GB is usable ... and the 8GB runs very smoothly. PC HW != Mac HW? If I bought the Mac Mini for roughly the same price I paid for my PC (Core 2 Quad with 8GB RAM), I'd get Core 2 Duo with 4GB RAM. But I don't want to run Vista on it, so I can't compare the hardware directly. Say that I want to do the same things on the Mac Mini as I do on my PC, eg. open up 50 tabs in Google Chrome and start working with a large PSD in Photoshop (couple hundred MB), would running on Mac OS X compensate for the lower hardware performance? My point is, that if I'm about to upgrade, I wouldn't like to upgrade to hardware that runs a lot slower. Good analogy for this is Vista vs Ubuntu, where you can run Ubuntu smoothly on a low end laptop, but in Vista, you'd be happy to open a browser. Does the same principle apply to OS X?

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• How to Make Ubuntu Play MP3 Files

  - by Trevor Bekolay

  Because of licensing issues, Ubuntu is unable to play MP3s out of the box. We’ll show you how to play MP3s and other restricted file formats in about four mouse clicks. The philosophy behind Ubuntu is that software should be free and accessible to all. Whether MP3 and other file formats are free is unclear in many countries, so Ubuntu does not include software to read these file formats by default. Fortunately, it does include a package that installs the most commonly used file formats all at once, including a Flash plugin for Firefox. Note: These instructions are for Ubuntu 10.04. There are small differences for earlier versions of Ubuntu. Play MP3 Files Open the Ubuntu Software Center, found in the Applications menu.   Click on View and ensure that All Software is selected. Type “restricted extras” into the search box at the top-right. Find the Ubuntu restricted extras package and click Install. Enter your password when prompted. Once the install is complete, close out of Ubuntu Software Center, and you’ll be able to play MP3 files! To confirm this, we’ll open up Rhythmbox, found in the Sound & Video section of the Applications menu. Our test MP3 plays with no problems! Note: If Rhythmbox tells you that MP3 plugins are not installed, close Rhythmbox and reopen it. You should not have to install anything extra through Rhythmbox.   Despite this extra step, playing the most common audio and video file formats – including Flash videos on the internet – is simple. All the software comes installed, you just have to teach them how to read your files. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips How to Play .OGM Video Files in Windows VistaView Hidden Files and Folders in Ubuntu File BrowserMake Ubuntu Automatically Save Changes to Your SessionInstalling PHP4 and Apache on UbuntuInstalling PHP5 and Apache on Ubuntu TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Xobni Plus for Outlook All My Movies 5.9 CloudBerry Online Backup 1.5 for Windows Home Server Snagit 10 How to Forecast Weather, without Gadgets Outlook Tools, one stop tweaking for any Outlook version Zoofs, find the most popular tweeted YouTube videos Video preview of new Windows Live Essentials 21 Cursor Packs for XP, Vista & 7 Map the Stars with Stellarium

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• Silverlight Cream for June 03, 2010 -- #875

  - by Dave Campbell

  In this Issue: Ben Hodson, Fons Sonnemans, SilverLaw, Mike Snow, John Papa, René Schulte, Walt Ritscher, and David Anson. Shoutouts: René Schulte announced a whole batch of new features for WriteableBitmap that are now available: Filled To The Bursting Point - WriteableBitmapEx 0.9.5.0 Check out John Papa's Sticky Seesmic Desktop Plugin ... download it, play with it... he's going to blog about building plugins later Tim Heuer reported a Silverlight 4 minor update–June 2010 Erik Mork and Crew have a new Podcast up: This Week in Silverlight: Redmond Exodus? From SilverlightCream.com: Tutorial for Configuring Silverlight 4, Entity Framework and WCF RIA Services in Separate Component Assemblies (DLL’s) Ben Hodson is a new author(to me) that submitted his post at SilverlightCream.com... this is a good-looking tutorial on configuring separate component assemblies for all your project pieces. SpiralText in Silverlight 4 Fons Sonnemans had a good time playing with the PathListBox in Blend and produced a demo of text on a Spiral... you can run it right on the post, then grab the code. How To: Starting A Storyboard Not Before The Application Has Completed Loading - Silverlight 4 SilverLaw takes a look at the problem of having a Storyboard start too early, and demonstrates code to avoid the problem. Silverlight Tip of the Day#27 – Displaying Special Characters in XAML Mike Snow's latest Tip of the day is on encoding 'special' characters for use in XAML... simple looking at it, frustrating to debug if you don't do it right. Diving into the RichTextBox (Silverlight TV #31) John Papa talks about the RichTextBox with Mark Rideout in this edition of Silverlight TV. Mark provides a great video tutorial for the control. Push and Pull - Silverlight Webcam Capturing Details Boy, René Schulte doesn't slow down does he?... his latest is (in his words from a section heading) "Silverlight Webcam 101" ... and he means it... this is one to save to OneNote or as a PDF! Looking for Silverlight BiDi or RTL? Use the FlowDirection property If you need RTL or BiDi in Silverlight and you haven't checked it out yet, Walt Ritscher has a nice intro up on using the FlowDirection property, with demos and code. How to: Show text labels on a numeric axis with Silverlight/WPF Toolkit Charting David Anson has another charting puzzle resolved on his site... putting text labels on the dependent axis. Stay in the 'Light! Twitter SilverlightNews | Twitter WynApse | WynApse.com | Tagged Posts | SilverlightCream Join me @ SilverlightCream | Phoenix Silverlight User Group Technorati Tags: Silverlight    Silverlight 3    Silverlight 4    Windows Phone MIX10

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• SQL SERVER – Manage Help Settings – CTRL + ALT + F1

  - by pinaldave

  It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. ~ Albert Einstein I have 3 years old daughter and she never misses any chance to play with the system. I have multiple computers and I always make sure that if I am working with production server, I never leave it open but when I am doing some experiment I often leave my computer open. My daughter loves the part when I have left the computer open and I am not observing her. Recently I had the same scenario, I got urgent call and I moved away from my computer and when I returned she was playing with SSMS left open my computer. Here is the screen which was visible on the screen. For a moment, I could not figure out what was this screen and what was about to get updated. I tried to ask her what keys she pressed the reaction was “I wanted – eya eya o”. Well, what more I expect from 3 years old. She is no computer genius – she just learned to use notepad and paint on my machine. Finally, when I saw the above screen in detail, I realize that this screen was from the help screen and something got updated. I have been using SQL Server for a long time but I never updated help on the screen. When I need to search something if I remember that I have written it earlier I will go to http://search.sqlauthority.com and will search there or will search on Google. As this computer was already updated I fired up Virtual Machine and tried to look recreate how my daughter was reached to above screen. Here are the steps which I have to do to reach to above screen. Go to SSMS >> Toolbar >> Help >> Manage Help Settings (or type CTRL+ALT+F1) and click it. Above click brought up following screen. I clicked on Check for update online brought following screen up. When I clicked on Update it brought me back to original screen which my daughter was able to bring up earlier. I found it so interesting that what took me 2-3 minutes to figure out and the screen which I have never come across in my career I learned from my curiosity like my daughter. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: Database, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• How to bill a client for frequently-interrupted time

  - by Greg

  I find that when I'm working on hourly-billable projects (in particular, those that are research/design/architecture-oriented as opposed to straight coding) that I'm easily distracted by any number of things (email, grab a drink (loss of focus, but nature happens), link off the webpage I was reading, wandering mind (easy when the job calls for a lot of thinking), etc.) This results in very fragmented time, far too incremental IMO to accurately track with a timeclock, and some time very gray. I frequently end up billing for only some fraction of the elapsed time I spent in order to feel fair, but sometimes it takes a really long time to put in an 8-hour day. By contrast, when I've worked for salary I've not worried about whether I'm actively working at any given minute, I just get the job done, and I've never had anything but stellar reviews/feedback from past salaried employers, so I think I get the job done well. I personally believe in an 80/20 cycle: I get 80% of my work done during an inspired 20% of my time. But I have to screw around the other 80% of the time in order to get that first 20%. So the question: what billing/time-tracking policy can I adopt in order to be fair to my hourly customers without having to write off my own less-productive 80% that a salaried employer is willing to overlook in light of the complete package? Note: This question is not about how to be more productive or focused. It's about how to work around whatever salient limitations that I have in a way that's both fair to me and to my customers. Update: A little clarification (to pre-emptively stop some righteous indignation): I currently have a half dozen different project/client groups. It's not a great situation and I'm working at reducing it down to two, but that's my current reality. It's very easy to get off on a thread related to a different project than the one I'm clocking, and I'm not always conscious of it at the time. [I did not intend the question to mean that I was off playing games or making personal calls, etc., and have adjusted wording above to be clearer. Most of the time. I am only human, and sometimes the mind does force you to take a break! :-)]

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• Best advice for setting up Ubuntu on my mother's computer

  - by idealmachine

  Intended use My mother had an old Compaq desktop computer running Windows 98, which she used for occasional Web browsing and playing cards. The name of her card game is Hoyle Card Games 3. Although I had to repair it several times over the last 10 years, it worked fine until it finally died at the end of last year. Hardware specifications A relative brought up a newer computer soon afterward: Operating system: Windows XP Asus K8N motherboard (with broken on-board sound; getting a sound card) Athlon 64? processor (don't remember the clock speed) 512 MB RAM Hope the graphics card works... Replacement sound card will be one of: Ensoniq ES1370 AudioPCI Diamond Monster Sound MX300 (Aureal chipset) Sound Blaster Audigy 2 SE Peripherals HP Scanjet 3400c scanner (USB connected) HP LaserJet multi-function printer (parallel port connected, and printing works with a PCL driver) Same serial mouse as old computer Question I had set up an SSH/VNC connection to allow for remotely working out problems. Or so I thought. A month later, the computer would not boot, rendering the SSH connection useless and an OS reinstall necessary. Unfortunately, I have neither the original Windows disc nor the product key. Unless I were to pay $200 for a full Windows 7 Home Premium license for my computer, I would not be able to re-install Windows XP on hers. I consider myself an advanced Linux user, having used Debian for years. So here are my questions. I have only one day to decide whether to use Ubuntu or buy Windows: A quick search leads me to believe all the hardware listed above is supposed to work with Linux, but am I mistaken? Would Ubuntu/Xubuntu suffice (specify which one if it matters), or would I be better off paying the $200 necessary for Windows XP? Is the card game likely to run on Wine? I believe the minimum system requirement is Windows 95. Failing Wine compatibility, will VirtualBox run fast enough on such a computer (Windows 98 as the guest OS)? Are there any free card games just as good? She plays mainly Bridge, Poker, and Solitaire. Is there any "Large Fonts" option for those with poor vision? The lack of it would be a big disadvantage. BONUS: Although I would probably replace the old mouse upon a move to Ubuntu, is it even possible to get a serial mouse working?

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• Initial Look: Storing SQL Compact Data on a Windows Phone 7 Series

  - by Nikita Polyakov

  Ok, the title is misleading – I’ll admit it, but there is a way to store your data in Windows Phone 7 Series. Windows Phone 7 Silverlight solutions have what is called Isolated Storage. [XNA has content storage as well] At this time there is no port of SQL Compact engine for Silverlight Isolated Storage. There is no wind of such intention. [That was a question way before WP7 was even rumored to have Silverlight.] There a few options: 1. Microsoft recommends you “simply” use client-server or cloud approach here. But this is not an option for Offline. 2. Use the new Offline/CacheMode with Sync Framework as shown in the Building Offline Web Apps Using Microsoft Sync Framework MIX10 presentation see 19:10 for Silverlight portion [go to 22:10 mark to see the app]. 3. Use XlmSerializer to dumb your objects to a XML file into the Isolated Storage. Good for small data. 4. Experiment with C#SQLite for Silverlight that has been shown to work in WP7 emulator, read more. 5. Roll your own file format and read/write from it. Think good ol’ CSV. Good for when you want 1million row table ;)   Is Microsoft aware of this possible limitation? Yes. What are they doing about it? I don’t know. See #1 and #2 above as the official guidance for now. What should you do about it? Don’t be too quick to dismiss WP7 because you think you’ll “need” SQL Compact. As lot of us will be playing with these possible solutions, I will be sure to update you on further discoveries. Remember that the tools [even the emulator] released at MIX are CTP grade and might not have all the features. Stay up to date: Watch the @wp7dev account if you are on Twitter. And watch the Windows Phone Dev Website and Blog. More information and detail is sure to come about WP7 Dev, as Windows Phone is planned to launch “Holidays” 2010. [For example Office will be discussed in June from the latest news, June is TechEd 2010 timeframe btw]

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• Make the Firefox Awesome Bar Semi-Transparent Like Google Chrome

  - by Matthew Guay

  Would you like to make the Firefox Awesome Bar drop-down menu semi-transparent like in Google Chrome?  Here’s a quick trick that can make your Firefox Awesome Bar a bit more awesome. When you type an address or search query into the address bar in Google Chrome, the drop-down list of history and search suggestions that appears is slightly transparent.  Nothing extreme, but it adds a nice touch. Firefox’s Awesome bar, on the other hand, is fully opaque by default. We can change that with a simple change.  Exit Firefox, then open your Firefox profile folder by entering the following in the address bar in Explorer or in the Run command: %appdata%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\ Open the default folder, and then open the Chrome folder in it. Now, open the userChrome.css file in an editor such as Notepad.  If you do not have a userChrome.css file, open the userChrome-example.css file instead. Now, add the following to the end of the file: #PopupAutoCompleteRichResult[type="autocomplete-richlistbox"]{    opacity: 0.9 !important;} You can change the opacity value, but 0.9 seemed the closest to Chrome’s transparency while keeping the text readable. Save the file as userChrome.css in that same folder.  If you’re editing with Notepad, make sure to select to save as All Files so the file won’t be saved with a .txt extension. Open Firefox, and now your Awesome Bar’s drop-down list will be transparent.  Actually, it may look even more awesome than Google Chrome’s address bar! Conclusion With this simple trick, you can make your Firefox Awesome bar a bit more awesome.  With tweaks like this, it’s no wonder Firefox is still so popular. Special thanks to Daniel Spiewak for the tip! Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Stupid Geek Tricks: Compare Your Browser’s Memory Usage with Google ChromeHow to Make Google Chrome Your Default BrowserEnable Vista Black Style Theme for Google Chrome in XPMake your Gnome Terminal Background (mostly)Transparent on UbuntuStop YouTube Videos from Automatically Playing in Chrome TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Xobni Plus for Outlook All My Movies 5.9 CloudBerry Online Backup 1.5 for Windows Home Server Snagit 10 Use ILovePDF To Split and Merge PDF Files TimeToMeet is a Simple Online Meeting Planning Tool Easily Create More Bookmark Toolbars in Firefox Filevo is a Cool File Hosting & Sharing Site Get a free copy of WinUtilities Pro 2010 World Cup Schedule

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• Finally home - and something fully off topic

  - by Mike Dietrich

  Arrived at Munich Pasing last night at 0:50am ... finally :-) On Sunday I've left the Dylan Hotel in Dublin (thanks to the staff there as well: you were REALLY helpful!!) around 7:30pm to go to the port - and came home on Tuesday morning 1:15am. So all together 29:45hrs door-to-door - not bad for nearly 2000km just relying on public transport. And could have been faster if there were seats in ealier TGV's left. But I don't complain at all ;-) Just checked the website of Dublin Airport - it says currently: 17.00pm: Latest on flight disruptions at Dublin Airport The IAA have advised us that based on the latest Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre London Dublin Airport will remain closed for all inbound and outbound commercial flights until 20.00hours. This effectively means that no flights will land or take off at Dublin Airport until then. A further update will be posted this afternoon. When traveling I have always my iPod with me. It has gotten a bit old now (I think I've bought it 3 years ago in November 2007) but it has a 160GB hard disk in it so it fits most of my music collection (not the entire collection anymore as I'm currently re-riping everything to Apple Lossless because at least for my ears it makes a big difference - but I listen to good ol' vinyl as well ...and I don't download compressed music ;-) ). The battery of my little travel companion is still good for more than 20 hours consistent music playback - and there was a band from Texas being in my ears most of the whole journey called Midlake. I haven't heard of them before until I asked a lady at a Munich store some few weeks ago what she's playing on the speakers in the shop. She was amazed and came back with the CD cover but I hesitated to buy it as I always want to listen the tunes before - and at this day I had no time left to do so. But in Dublin I had a bit of spare time on Saturday and I always enter record stores - and the Tower Records was the sort of store I really enjoy and so I've spent there nearly two hours - leaving with 3 Midlake CDs in my bag. So if you are interested just listen those tunes which may remind some people on Fleetwood Mac: As I said in the title, fully off topic ;-)

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• Remove the Lock Icon from a Folder in Windows 7

  - by Trevor Bekolay

  If you’ve been playing around with folder sharing or security options, then you might have ended up with an unsightly lock icon on a folder. We’ll show you how to get rid of that icon without over-sharing it. The lock icon in Windows 7 indicates that the file or folder can only be accessed by you, and not any other user on your computer. If this is desired, then the lock icon is a good way to ensure that those settings are in place. If this isn’t your intention, then it’s an eyesore. To remove the lock icon, we have to change the security settings on the folder to allow the Users group to, at the very least, read from the folder. Right-click on the folder with the lock icon and select Properties. Switch to the Security tab, and then press the Edit… button. A list of groups and users that have access to the folder appears. Missing from the list will be the “Users” group. Click the Add… button. The next window is a bit confusing, but all you need to do is enter “Users” into the text field near the bottom of the window. Click the Check Names button. “Users” will change to the location of the Users group on your particular computer. In our case, this is PHOENIX\Users (PHOENIX is the name of our test machine). Click OK. The Users group should now appear in the list of Groups and Users with access to the folder. You can modify the specific permissions that the Users group has if you’d like – at the minimum, it must have Read access. Click OK. Keep clicking OK until you’re back at the Explorer window. You should now see that the lock icon is gone from your folder! It may be a small aesthetic nuance, but having that one folder stick out in a group of other folders is needlessly distracting. Fortunately, the fix is quick and easy, and does not compromise the security of the folder! Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips What is this "My Sharing Folders" Icon in My Computer and How Do I Remove It?Lock The Screen While in Full-Screen Mode in Windows Media PlayerHave Windows Notify You When You Accidentally Hit the Caps Lock KeyWhy Did Windows Vista’s Music Folder Icon Turn Yellow?Create Shutdown / Restart / Lock Icons in Windows 7 or Vista TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Acronis Online Backup DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows Check these Awesome Chrome Add-ons iFixit Offers Gadget Repair Manuals Online Vista style sidebar for Windows 7 Create Nice Charts With These Web Based Tools Track Daily Goals With 42Goals Video Toolbox is a Superb Online Video Editor

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• VS.NET 2010 SP1, Win 7, Parallels, and a MBP&ndash;Hell, my friends&hellip;HELL!

  - by D'Arcy Lussier

  LightSwitch Beta 2 is out. That’s how all this started. All I wanted was to install it on my MBP’s Win7 Parallels VM. But as I’m finding with running a Win7 VM on a MBP, nothing is as easy as it should be. First my MBP froze during the SP1 installation. Not my VM crashing, the entire machine freezing…no mouse, nothing. Had to do a hard reset. BLECH. Then we’re back and I try to re-install SP1 (since the first try obviously failed). I get met with a dialog asking me where silverlight_sdk.msi was. It was *nowhere*! So I hit the net and download it from Microsoft’s site. Unfortunately, it only downloads an exe and not the individual files which would include the msi. Here’s what I did: - Download the tools for Silverlight 4 (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=b3deb194-ca86-4fb6-a716-b67c2604a139&displaylang=en) - Run it, but don’t hit the install or next button when the dialog comes up - Look in your file structure for a folder with a weird name…bunch of numbers and letters. This is a temp folder that the exe creates and dumps all the necessary setup files into, and clears away after its done. - Inside this folder you’ll find the silverlight_sdk.msi (hooray!). Just copy it to a different location on the C drive. You can then cancel installation. Ok, so that takes care of that…but then running the SP1 installer I get hit with *another* dialog asking for the WCF RIA Services SP1 msi. Now it looks like this MSI is part of the Silverlight Tools package because you’ll see the MSI, but the VS.NET 2010 SP1 installer will thumb its nose at this unworthy msi…for whatever reason. So instead, go here: http://www.silverlight.net/getstarted/riaservices/ …and click on the “Install WCF Ria Services Sp1…” option. This downloads the msi, which you should save to your C drive and direct the VS.NET 2010 SP1 installer to. Then, if you’ve done all that, been good all year, and not made any little children cry, you *might* just be able to install VS.NET 2010 SP1 on your Parallels VM. If you were playing that “Take a shot every time he writes VS.NET 2010 Sp1” drinking game, then you’re drunk…which is a better place to be than where I am right now: watching the installation progress bar slowly creep to completion, hoping there’s no more surprises in store. D

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• Friday Fun: Games that Look Like Productivity Apps

  - by Mysticgeek

  We’ve been showing you fun flash games to play during company time on a Friday afternoon. Hopefully while playing them, you haven’t received a “talking to”. Today we show you some cool games to play that look like productivity apps, so the boss will be none the wiser. The website cantyouseeimbusy.com has developed some very neat little games that look like productivity apps like Word and Excel. These apps look exactly like some project you would be working on, but are really neat little games. Here we take a look at three cool ones on the site called Breakdown, Leadership, and Cost Cutter. Leadership Leadership is a cool game that looks like something you would be working in Excel and is a spin off of the classic game Moon Lander. You navigate your ship through a variety of challenging line graphs. Breakdown This one is a knock off of the classic game Break Out. Use your mouse to scroll the racket at the bottom and bounce the ball off of the text in the document. Press the space bar to pause the game and the elements will disappear…good for when the boss comes around. Cost Cutter This one is a puzzle game where it looks like your working on some bar charts in Excel. You need to click combinations of two or more blocks that are the same color. Again, hit the spacebar and the game elements will disappear. If you’re looking for a way to goof off with some simple games without the boss knowing, these will definitely do the trick. Another cool game along these lines is Excit! which we covered previously. Play Cost Cutter, Breakdown, and Leadership at cantyouseeimbusy.com Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Friday Fun: Get Your Mario OnFriday Fun: Bricks Breaking & Cube CrashFriday Fun: Fancy Pants AdventuresFriday Fun: GemCraft is a Totally Addictive Tower Defense GameFriday Fun: Five More Time Wasting Online Games TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Download Microsoft Office Help tab The Growth of Citibank Quickly Switch between Tabs in IE Windows Media Player 12: Tweak Video & Sound with Playback Enhancements Own a cell phone, or does a cell phone own you? Make your Joomla & Drupal Sites Mobile with OSMOBI

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• How to become a solid python web developer [closed]

  - by Estarius

  Possible Duplicate: How do I learn Python from zero to web development? I have started Python recently with the goal to become a solid developer to make a web application eventually. However, as time goes by I am wondering if I am being optimal about how I will achieve my goal. I would compare it to a game for example, to be better you must spend time playing and trying new things... However, if you just log in and sit in the lobby chatting you are most likely not progressing. So far, this is my plan (feel free to comment or judge it): Review basic programmation concepts Start coding slowly in Python Once comfortable in Python, learn about web development in Python Learn about those things we heard about: SQLAlchemy, MVC, TDD, Git, Agile (Group project) To achieve these things, I started the Learn python the hard way exercises, which I am doing at the rate of 5 per days. I also started to read Think Python at the same time and planning to move on with Dive into python. As far as my research goes, these documentations along with Python documentation is usually what is the most recommended to learn Python. I consider this to get my point 1 and 2 done. While learning Python is really great, my goal remains to do quality web development. I know there are books about Django etc. however I would like to become comfortable with any Python web development. This means without Framework and with Framework... Any framework, then be able to choose the one which best fits our needs. For this I would like to know if some people have suggestions. Should I just get a book on Django and it should apply to everything ? What would be the best method to go from Python to Web Python and not end up creating crappy code which would turn into nightmares for other programmers ? Then finally, those "things we hear about". While I understand what they all do basically, I am fairly sure that like everything, there are good and wrong ways of making use of them. Should I go through at least a whole book on each before starting to use them or keep it at their respective online documentation ? Are there some kind of documentation which links their use to Python ? Also, from looking at Django and Pyramid they seems to use something else than MVC, while the Django model looks similar, the Pyramid one seems to cut a whole part of it... Is learning MVC still worth it ? Sorry for the wall of text, Thanks in advance !

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• How to stream H264 Video from camera over FTP?

  - by Jay

  I bought a h264 security camera system last year and set it up to ftp video to my computer. I was able to get the video to play (even though it played a little fast) on Ubuntu 11.04 using mplayer. A few months ago, I did a fresh install of 12.04 and I cannot seem to get the video to play with mplayer, smplayer or VLC. I have the restricted formats video packages installed and when playing with any of the players, all I get is a gray video. When calling mplayer from the command line to play the video with no options, I get a lot of these errors: [h264 @ 0x7f278c61f280]concealing 1320 DC, 1320 AC, 1320 MV errors No pts value from demuxer to use for frame! pts after filters MISSING I'm not a video expert and have been coming up with a lot of dead ends when Googling for this. Could someone offer some advice about how to play these videos? Here is the output of mediainfo for a sample file. mediainfo -f sec-cam01-m-20120921-212454.h264 General Count : 278 Count of stream of this kind : 1 Kind of stream : General Kind of stream : General Stream identifier : 0 Count of video streams : 1 Video_Format_List : AVC Video_Format_WithHint_List : AVC Codecs Video : AVC Complete name : sec-cam01-m-20120921-212454.h264 File name : sec-cam01-m-20120921-212454 File extension : h264 Format : AVC Format : AVC Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec Format/Url : http://developers.videolan.org/x264.html Format/Extensions usually used : avc h264 Commercial name : AVC Internet media type : video/H264 Codec : AVC Codec : AVC Codec/Info : Advanced Video Codec Codec/Url : http://developers.videolan.org/x264.html Codec/Extensions usually used : avc h264 File size : 1097315 File size : 1.05 MiB File size : 1 MiB File size : 1.0 MiB File size : 1.05 MiB File size : 1.046 MiB File last modification date : UTC 2012-09-22 01:27:12 File last modification date (local) : 2012-09-21 21:27:12 Video Count : 205 Count of stream of this kind : 1 Kind of stream : Video Kind of stream : Video Stream identifier : 0 Format : AVC Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec Format/Url : http://developers.videolan.org/x264.html Commercial name : AVC Format profile : [email protected] Format settings : 1 Ref Frames Format settings, CABAC : No Format settings, CABAC : No Format settings, ReFrames : 1 Format settings, ReFrames : 1 frame Format settings, GOP : M=1, N=3 Internet media type : video/H264 Codec : AVC Codec : AVC Codec/Family : AVC Codec/Info : Advanced Video Codec Codec/Url : http://developers.videolan.org/x264.html Codec profile : [email protected] Codec settings : 1 Ref Frames Codec settings, CABAC : No Codec_Settings_RefFrames : 1 Width : 704 Width : 704 pixels Height : 480 Height : 480 pixels Pixel aspect ratio : 1.000 Display aspect ratio : 1.467 Display aspect ratio : 3:2 Standard : NTSC Resolution : 8 Resolution : 8 bits Colorimetry : 4:2:0 Color space : YUV Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0 Bit depth : 8 Bit depth : 8 bits Scan type : Progressive Scan type : Progressive Interlacement : PPF Interlacement : Progressive Edit: Here is a sample video using the same encoding: https://www.dropbox.com/s/l5acwzy8rtqn9xe/sec-cam08-m-20121118-105815.h264 (not the same video as mediainfo output)

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• Using SurfaceFormat.Single and HLSL for GPGPU with XNA

  - by giancarlo todone

  I'm trying to implement a so-called ping-pong technique in XNA; you basically have two RenderTarget2D A and B and at each iteration you use one as texture and the other as target - and vice versa - for a quad rendered through an HLSL pixel shader. step1: A--PS--B step2: B--PS--A step3: A--PS--B ... In my setup, both RenderTargets are SurfaceFormat.Single. In my .fx file, I have a tachnique to do the update, and another to render the "current buffer" to the screen. Before starting the "ping-pong", buffer A is filled with test data with SetData<float>(float[]) function: this seems to work properly, because if I render a quad on the screen through the "Draw" pixel shader, i do see the test data being correctly rendered. However, if i do update buffer B, something does not function proerly and the next rendering to screen will be all black. For debug purposes, i replaced the "Update" HLSL pixel shader with one that should simply copy buffer A into B (or B into A depending on which among "ping" and "pong" phases we are...). From some examples i found on the net, i see that in order to correctly fetch a float value from a texture sampler from HLSL code, i should only need to care for the red channel. So, basically the debug "Update" HLSL function is: float4 ComputePS(float2 inPos : TEXCOORD0) : COLOR0 { float v1 = tex2D(bufSampler, inPos.xy).r; return float4(v1,0,0,1); } which still doesn't work and results in a all-zeroes ouput. Here's the "Draw" function that seems to properly display initial data: float4 DrawPS(float2 inPos : TEXCOORD0) : COLOR0 { float v1 = tex2D(bufSampler, inPos.xy).r; return float4(v1,v1,v1,1); } Now: playing around with HLSL doesn't change anything, so maybe I'm missing something on the c# side of this, so here's the infamous Update() function: _effect.Parameters["bufTexture"].SetValue(buf[_currentBuf]); _graphicsDevice.SetRenderTarget(buf[1 - _currentBuf]); _graphicsDevice.Clear(Color.Black); // probably not needed since RenderTargetUsage is DiscardContents _effect.CurrentTechnique = _computeTechnique; _computeTechnique.Passes[0].Apply(); _quadRender.Render(); _graphicsDevice.SetRenderTarget(null); _currentBuf = 1 - _currentBuf; Any clue?

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