Search Results

Search found 7010 results on 281 pages for 'learning curve'.

Page 105/281 | < Previous Page | 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112  | Next Page >

  • Oracle Announces Release of PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Feature Pack 2

    - by Jay Zuckert
    Big things sometimes come in small packages.  Today Oracle announced the availability of PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Feature Pack 2 which delivers a new HR self service user experience that fundamentally changes the way managers and employees interact with the HCM system.  Earlier this year we reviewed a number of new concept designs with our Customer Advisory Boards.  With the accelerated feature pack development cycle we have adopted, these innovations are  now available to all 9.1 customers without the need for an upgrade.   There are no new products that need to be licensed for the capabilities below. For more details on Feature Pack 2, please see the Oracle press release. Included in Feature Pack 2 is a new search-based menu-free navigation that allows managers to search for employees by name and take actions directly from the secure search results.  For example, a manager can now simply type in part of an employee’s first or last name and receive meaningful results from documents related to performance, compensation, learning, recruiting, career planning and more.   Delivered actions can be initiated directly from these search results and the actions are securely tied to HCM security and user role.  The feature pack also includes new pages that will enable managers to be more productive by aggregating key employee data into a single page.  The new Manager Dashboard and Talent Summary provide a consolidated view of data related to a manager’s team and individual team members, respectively.   The Manager Dashboard displays information relevant to their direct reports including team learning, objective alignment, alerts, and pending approvals requiring their attention.  The Talent Summary provides managers with an aggregated view of talent management-related data for an individual employee including performance history, salary history, succession options, total rewards, and competencies.   The information displayed in both the Manager Dashboard and Talent Summary is configurable by system administrators and can be personalized by each of your managers. Other Feature Pack 2 enhancements allow organizations to administer Matrix or Dotted-Line Relationship Management, which addresses the challenge of tracking and maintaining project-based organizations that cut across the enterprise and geographic regions.  From within the Company Directory and Org Viewer organization charts, managers now have access to manager self-service transactions from related actions.  More than 70 manager and employee self-service transactions have been tied into the related action framework accessible from Org Viewer, Manager Dashboard, Talent Summary and Secure Enterprise Search (SES) results.  In addition to making it easier to access manager self-service transactions, the feature pack delivers streamlined transaction pages making everyday tasks such as promoting an employee faster and more efficient. With the delivery of PeopleSoft HCM 9.1 Feature Pack 2, Oracle continues to deliver on its commitment to our PeopleSoft customers.  With this feature pack, HCM 9.1 customers will be able to deploy the newest functionality quickly, without a major release upgrade, and realize added value from their existing PeopleSoft investment.    For customers newly deploying 9.1, a new download with all of Feature Pack 2  will be available early next year.   This will aslo include recertified upgrade paths from 8.8, 8.9 and 9.0, for customers in the upgrade process.

    Read the article

  • How to plot survey results on Excel?

    - by Mulone
    Hi all, I would like to plot the average of these data sample: 1. Contribution to the project 2. Affiliation with project owners 3. Level of expertise 4. Learning Curve Yes No 3 2 No No 3 2 No No 4 3 No No 5 3 No No 3 3 Yes Yes 5 4 No No 4 3 No No 3 2 No Yes 2 4 No No 5 2 No Yes 5 No answer No No 2 2 No No 3 3 ... Basically I know how to do the average of each numeric column, but I have a few questions for you: If the column contains non numeric values (e.g. "no answer") the average doesn't work. Is there a workaround for this? How can I count the yes/no results and plot only a percentage? Thanks for any hints! Mulone

    Read the article

  • Which shopping cart / ecommerce platform to choose?

    - by fabien7474
    I need to build an ecommerce website within a tight budget and schedule. Of course, I have never done that before, so I have googled out what my solutions are and I have concluded that the following were not valid candidates anymore : Magento : Steep learning curve osCommerce : old, bad design, buggy and not user-friendly Zencart, CRE Loaded, CubeCart : based on osCommerce Virtuemart, uberCart, eCart : based on CMS (Joomal, Drupal, WordPress) that is not necessary for my use-case So I finally narrowed down my choices to these solutions : PrestaShop : easy-to-use, great templating engine (smarty) but many modules are not free buy yet indispensable OpenCart : security issues and not a great support from the main developer. See here and here. So, as you can see, I am a little bit confused and if you can help me choosing an easy-to-use, lightweight and cheap (not-necessarily free) ecommerce solution, I would really appreciate. By the way, I am a Java/Grails programmer but I am also familiar with PHP and .NET. (not with Python or Ruby/Rails) EDIT: It seems that this question is more appropriate for the Webmaster StackExchange site. So please move this question to where it belongs (I cannot do that) instead of downvoting it. BTW, I have found out a question quite similar on SO (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3315638/php-ecommerce-system-which-one-is-easiest-to-modify) which is quite popular.

    Read the article

  • Bacula vs. BackupPC [closed]

    - by ujjain
    I have been googling about the differences between them. Bacula has lots of roles BackupPC is easier to configure Bacula works with agent, not rsync (great for Windows backups) It seems that Bacula is most often compared to Amanda though, while BackupPC seems a perfectly lovely and popular backup distribution to. I currently backup my servers with rsnapshot, but I am looking for a professional scalable solution that could also back-up 50 hosts without problems. Preferably a solution that can offer bare metal restores for my Linux servers. I am not looking to reinstall the exact same version of Plesk, the software, etc... Update: I see this ranks high in Google, I found a good article: http://www.serverfocus.org/backuppc-vs-bacula-vs-amanda. I personally think that BackupPC is good for smaller environment, but Bacula, despite the high learning curve, is better for environments that requilre scaling.

    Read the article

  • Share internet with my phone?

    - by Kenneth Cochran
    Most people want to use their cellphone as a modem for their computer, commonly referred to as 'tethering'. I'm actually interested in doing the opposite: Sharing my landline internet connection(which is much faster than any 3G service) with by cellphone. My phone is a Verizon BlackBerry Curve 8330 and it has USB and bluetooth connections. I know both USB and Bluetooth are capable of supporting tcp/ip traffic what's not so clear is: Is IP over USB or Bluetooth standardized? Is it supported on my phone? Has my cellphone company crippled my phone to prevent me from using it?

    Read the article

  • Nagios Check_hpjd giving me problems!

    - by Mister IT Guru
    When I run the following [root@host plugins]# ./check_hpjd -H printer1.mydomain.com : Timeout from host printer1.mydomain.com I have Net-snmp installed on my system, I noted that i didn't have net-snmp-utils installed, and then I was able to run [root@host plugins]# snmpwalk -Os -c public -v 1 printer1.mydomain.com system sysDescr.0 = STRING: HP ETHERNET MULTI-ENVIRONMENT sysObjectID.0 = OID: enterprises.11.2.3.9.1 sysUpTimeInstance = Timeticks: (325408663) 37 days, 15:54:46.63 sysContact.0 = STRING: sysName.0 = STRING: printer1 sysLocation.0 = STRING: sysServices.0 = INTEGER: 72 So I know that the printer is working as expected, (as far as SNMP is concerned). But when I run [root@host plugins]# ./check_hpjd -H printer1.mydomain.com -C public Error in packet () I get this error - From what I've tried so far, I know my host can communicate via SNMP, I know the printer responds via SNMP, so I guess I'm left to look at the plug-in, which I will be checking up on. I'm new to SNMP, I am investigating this with my good friend Google search, but I am on a learning curve here, so please forgive my questions if they sound stupid,

    Read the article

  • Big Data – ClustrixDB – Extreme Scale SQL Database with Real-time Analytics, Releases Software Download – NewSQL

    - by Pinal Dave
    There are so many things to learn and there is so little time we all have. As we have little time we need to be selective to learn whatever we learn. I believe I know quite a lot of things in SQL but I still do not know what is around SQL. I have started to learn about NewSQL recently. If you wonder what is NewSQL I encourage all of you to read my blog post about NewSQL over here Big Data – Buzz Words: What is NewSQL – Day 10 of 21. NewSQL databases are quickly becoming popular – providing the scale of NoSQL with the SQL features and transactions. As a part of learning NewSQL database, I have recently started to learn about ClustrixDB. ClustrixDB has been the most mature NewSQL database used by some of the largest internet sites in the world for over 3 years, with extensive SQL support. In addition to scale, it provides fast real-time analytics by bringing massively parallel processing (MPP), available only in warehousing databases, to the transactional database. The reason I am more intrigued about learning ClustrixDB is their recent announcement on Oct 31. ClustrixDB was only available as an appliance, but now with their software release on Oct 31, everyone can use it. It is now available as forever free for up to 12 cores with community support, and there is a 45 day trial for unlimited cluster sizes. With the forever free world, I am indeed interested in ClustrixDB now. I know that few of the leading eCommerce sites in the world uses them for their transactional database. Here are few of the details I have quickly noted for ClustrixDB. ClustrixDB allows user to: Scale by simply adding nodes to the cluster with a single command Run billions of transactions a day Run fast real-time analytics Achieve high-availability with recovery from node failure Manages itself Easily migrate from MySQL as it is nearly plug-and-play compatible, use MySQL drivers, tools and replication. While I was going through the documentation I realized that ClustrixDB also has extensive support for SQL features including complex queries involving joins on a dozen or more tables, aggregates, sorts, sub-queries. It also supports stored procedures, triggers, foreign keys, partitioned and temporary tables, and fully online schema changes. It is indeed a very matured product and SQL solution. Indeed Clusterix sound very promising solution, I decided to dig a bit deeper to understand who are current customers of the Clustrix as they exist in the industry for quite a few years. Their client list is indeed very interesting and here is my quick research about them. Twoo.com – Europe’s largest social discovery (dating) site runs 4.4 Billion Transactions a day with table sizes over a Terabyte, on a 168 core cluster. EngageBDR – Top 3 in the online advertising category uses ClustrixDB to serve 6.9 billion ads a day through real-time bidding platform. Their reports went from 4 hours to 15 seconds. NoMoreRack – Top 2 fastest growing e-commerce company in US used ClustrixDB for high availability and fast growth through Amazon cloud. MakeMyTrip – India’s leading travel site runs on ClustrixDB with two clusters running as multi-master in Chennai and Bangalore. Many enterprises such as AOL, CSC, Rakuten, Symantec use ClustrixDB when their applications need scale. I must accept that I am impressed with the information I have learned so far and now is the time to do some hand’s on experience with their product. I want to learn this technology so in future when it is about NewSQL, I know what I am talking about. Read more why Clustrix explains why you ClustrixDB might be the right database for you. Download ClustrixDB with me today and install it on your machine so in future when we discuss the technical aspects of it, we all are on the same page. The software can be downloaded here. Reference : Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com)Filed under: Big Data, MySQL, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL Tagged: Clustrix

    Read the article

  • Mobile App Notifications in the Enterprise Space: UX Considerations

    - by ultan o'broin
    Here is a really super website of UX patterns for Android: Android Patterns. I was particularly interested in the event-driven notification patterns (aka status bar notifications to developers). Android - unlike iOS (i.e., the iPhone) - offers a superior centralized notifications system for users.   (Figure copyright Android Patterns)   Research in the enterprise applications space shows how users on-the-go, prefer this approach, as: Users can manage their notification alerts centrally, across all media, apps and for device activity, and decide the order in which to deal with them, and when. Notifications, unlike messages in a dialog or information message in the UI, do not block a task flow (and we need to keep task completion to under three minutes). See the Anti-Patterns slideshare presentation on this blocking point too. These notifications must never interrupt a task flow by launching an activity from the background. Instead, the user can launch an activity from the notification. What users do need is the ability to filter this centralized approach, and to personalize the experience of which notifications are added, what the reminder is, ability to turn off, and so on. A related point concerning notifications is when used to provide users with a record of actions then you can lighten up on lengthy confirmation messages that pop up (toasts in the Android world) used when transactions or actions are sent for processing or into a workflow. Pretty much all the confirmation needs to say is the action is successful along with key data such as dollar amount, customer name, or whatever. I am a user of Android (Nexus S), BlackBerry (Curve), and iOS devices (iPhone 3GS and 4). In my opinion, the best notifications user experience for the enterprise user is offered by Android. Blackberry is good, but not as polished and way clunkier than Android’s. What you get on the iPhone, out of the box, is useless in the enterprise. Technorati Tags: Android,iPhone,Blackerry,messages,usablility,user assistance,userexperience,Oracle,patterns,notifications,alerts

    Read the article

  • Podcast Show Notes: The Fusion Middleware A-Team and the Chronicles of Architecture

    - by Bob Rhubart
    If you pay any attention at all to the Oracle blogosphere you’ve probably seen one of several blogs published by members of a group known as the Oracle Fusion Middleware A-Team. A new blog, The Oracle A-Team Chronicles, was recently launched that combines all of those separate A-Team blogs in one. In this program you’ll meet some of the people behind the A-team and the creation of that new blog. The Conversation Listen to Part 1: Background on the A-Team - When was it formed? What is it’s mission? 54) What are some of the most common challenges A-Team architects encounter in the field? Listen to Part 2 (July 3): The panel discusses the trends - big data, mobile, social, etc - that are having the biggest impact in the field. Listen to Part 3 (July 10): The panelists discuss the analysts, journalists, and other resources they rely on to stay ahead of the curve as the technology evolves, and reveal the last article or blog post they shared with other A-team members. The Panelists Jennifer Briscoe: Senior Director, Oracle Fusion Middleware A-Team Clifford Musante: Lead Architect, Application Integration Architecture A-Team, webmaster of the A-Team Chronicles Mikael Ottosson: Vice President, Oracle Fusion Apps and Fusion Middleware A-Team and Cloud Applications Group Pardha Reddy: Senior director of Oracle Identity Management and a member of the Oracle Fusion Middleware A-team Coming Soon Data Warehousing and Oracle Data Integrator: Guest producer and Oracle ACE Director Gurcan Orhan selected the topic and panelists for this program, which also features Uli Bethke, Michael Rainey, and Oracle ACE Cameron Lackpour. Java and Oracle ADF Mobile: An impromptu roundtable discussion featuring QCon New York 2013 session speakers Doug Clarke, Frederic Desbiens, Stephen Chin, and Reza Rahman. Stay tuned:

    Read the article

  • Migration of PowerBuilder application to multiplatform

    - by Alex Bibiano
    I developed a client/server application with PowerBuilder in the past for medical clinics and done maintenance for it until now. Now, some clients are asking me to develop a release for Mac/Linux and need some advice about what programming language/technology is best suited for it and the learning curve. It’s not a very very big program but I’m the only developer and have done it in my spare time. PowerBuilder is very productive for this kind of projects (database centric), but it’s not multiplatform and it’s hard to sell PowerBuilder application now days (web, .NET, java sells a lot better with his marketing). My programming skills: - I studied C and C++ in the past (university) but never used it on real projects - Have some Java experience but not in desktop applications - Some experience with Ruby on Rails for web projects - Good skills with PowerBuilder and C# (.NET) (there are my main developing languages) My first dilemma is if I change the desktop application to a web interface, but I think the user will lose some user-experience, and some doctors don’t have a clinic (they are alone at home with my software). I think installing a web application (with webserver) for one user will be overwhelming. If I continue developing desktop application, what is at the moment a good framework/toolset to learn having my skills? Somebody has had similar experiences? A lot of thanks

    Read the article

  • How to Draw Lines on the Screen

    - by Geertjan
    I've seen occasional questions on mailing lists about how to use the NetBeans Visual Library to draw lines, e.g., to make graphs or diagrams of various kinds by drawing on the screen. So, rather than drag/drop causing widgets to be added, you'd want widgets to be added on mouse clicks, and you'd want to be able to connect those widgets together somehow. Via the code below, you'll be able to click on the screen, which causes a dot to appear. When you have multiple dots, you can hold down the Ctrl key and connect them together. A guiding line appears to help you position the dots exactly in line with each other. When you go to File | Print, you'll be able to preview and print the diagram you've created. A picture that speaks 1000 words: Here's the code: public final class PlotterTopComponent extends TopComponent { private final Scene scene; private final LayerWidget baseLayer; private final LayerWidget connectionLayer; private final LayerWidget interactionLayer; public PlotterTopComponent() { initComponents(); setName(Bundle.CTL_PlotterTopComponent()); setToolTipText(Bundle.HINT_PlotterTopComponent()); setLayout(new BorderLayout()); this.scene = new Scene(); this.baseLayer = new LayerWidget(scene); this.interactionLayer = new LayerWidget(scene); this.connectionLayer = new LayerWidget(scene); scene.getActions().addAction(new SceneCreateAction()); scene.addChild(baseLayer); scene.addChild(interactionLayer); scene.addChild(connectionLayer); add(scene.createView(), BorderLayout.CENTER); putClientProperty("print.printable", true); } private class SceneCreateAction extends WidgetAction.Adapter { @Override public WidgetAction.State mousePressed(Widget widget, WidgetAction.WidgetMouseEvent event) { if (event.getClickCount() == 1) { if (event.getButton() == MouseEvent.BUTTON1 || event.getButton() == MouseEvent.BUTTON2) { baseLayer.addChild(new BlackDotWidget(scene, widget, event)); repaint(); return WidgetAction.State.CONSUMED; } } return WidgetAction.State.REJECTED; } } private class BlackDotWidget extends ImageWidget { public BlackDotWidget(Scene scene, Widget widget, WidgetAction.WidgetMouseEvent event) { super(scene); setImage(ImageUtilities.loadImage("org/netbeans/plotter/blackdot.gif")); setPreferredLocation(widget.convertLocalToScene(event.getPoint())); getActions().addAction( ActionFactory.createExtendedConnectAction( connectionLayer, new BlackDotConnectProvider())); getActions().addAction( ActionFactory.createAlignWithMoveAction( baseLayer, interactionLayer, ActionFactory.createDefaultAlignWithMoveDecorator())); } } private class BlackDotConnectProvider implements ConnectProvider { @Override public boolean isSourceWidget(Widget source) { return source instanceof BlackDotWidget && source != null ? true : false; } @Override public ConnectorState isTargetWidget(Widget src, Widget trg) { return src != trg && trg instanceof BlackDotWidget ? ConnectorState.ACCEPT : ConnectorState.REJECT; } @Override public boolean hasCustomTargetWidgetResolver(Scene arg0) { return false; } @Override public Widget resolveTargetWidget(Scene arg0, Point arg1) { return null; } @Override public void createConnection(Widget source, Widget target) { ConnectionWidget conn = new ConnectionWidget(scene); conn.setTargetAnchor(AnchorFactory.createCircularAnchor(target, 10)); conn.setSourceAnchor(AnchorFactory.createCircularAnchor(source, 10)); connectionLayer.addChild(conn); } } ... ... ... Note: The code above was written based on the Visual Library tutorials on the NetBeans Platform Learning Trail, in particular via the "ConnectScene" sample in the "test.connect" package, which is part of the very long list of Visual Library samples referred to in the Visual Library tutorials on the NetBeans Platform Learning Trail. The next steps are to add a reconnect action and an action to delete a dot by double-clicking on it. Would be interesting to change the connecting line so that the length of the line were to be shown, i.e., as you draw a line from one dot to another, you'd see a constantly changing number representing the current distance of the connecting line. Also, once lines are connected to form a rectangle, would be cool to be able to write something within that rectangle. Then one could really create diagrams, which would be pretty cool.

    Read the article

  • Preferred OS for hosting Tomcat servlet container

    - by dacracot
    I know that I'm taking a risk, pitting the differing OS religions against each other, but I would like professional opinions about hosting a servlet container. In my case the container is set, we will be using Tomcat. But what is in question is the hosting operating system. We have administrators experienced in Windows Server 2003. We have developers experienced in Solaris, OSX, and Linux. There is no warring between these groups, just a question of who will ramp up through the learning curve necessary to use the OS that they are unfamiliar with. So given all the cooperative spirit, we are struggling with how to find the most efficient path. I had already cross-posted this question here.

    Read the article

  • Social HCM: Is Your Team Listening?

    - by Mike Stiles
    Does integrating Social HCM into your enterprise make sense? Consider Sam and Christina. Sam is a new hire at a big company. On the job 3 weeks, a question has come up on how to properly file an expense report to get reimbursed. It was covered in the onboarding session, but shockingly enough, Sam didn’t memorize or write down every word of the session. The answer is probably in a handout, in a stack of handouts 2 inches thick. It also might be on the employee web site…somewhere. Christina is a new hire at a different big company. She has the same question. She logs into her company’s social network, goes to the “new hires” group, asks her question and gets an answer in seconds. Christina says, “Cool!” Sam says, “Grrrr.” It’s safe to say the qualified talent your company wants is accustomed to using social platforms to communicate and get quick answers. As such, Christina is comfortable at her new company, whereas Sam is wondering what he’s gotten himself into. Companies that cling to talent communication and management systems that don’t speak to talent’s needs or expectations put themselves at risk. Right from the recruiting stage, prospects can determine if a company has embraced the communications tools of the 21st century. If they don’t see it, alarm bells go off. With great talent more in demand than ever, enterprises should reconsider making “this is the way we do it, you adapt to us” their mantra. Other blogs have clearly outlined that apart from meeting top recruits’ expectations, Social HCM benefits the organization itself in terms of efficiency, talent performance & measurement. Recruiting: Jobvite shows 64% of companies hired using social. 89% of job seekers are using social in their search. Social can give employers access to relevant communities of prospects and advance the brand. Nucleus Research found general hiring software can provide over 1,000% ROI by reducing churn and improving screening. Social talent acquisition should perform at least as well. Learning & Development:Employees, learning from the company or from peers, can be kept on top of the latest needed skillsets and engage in self-paced training so as to advance within the company. Performance Management:Just as gamers are egged on by levels and achievements, talent can reach for workplace kudos, be they shout-outs from peers & managers or formally established milestones. Plus employee reviews become consistent and fair as managers have access to the cumulative feedback social offers. Workflow and Collaboration:With workforces dispersing in terms of physical location, social provides a platform that helps eliminate drawbacks that would have brought just 10 years ago. Finding and connecting with just the right colleague to get the most relevant info at any given time has never been more possible…or expected. While yes, marketing has taken the social lead inside the enterprise, HCM (with the word “human” right there in its name) is the obvious locale for the next big integration of social in business. The technology is there. At Oracle, Fusion HCM apps are deeply embedded with Social HCM…just one example of systems taking social across the enterprise. Christina’s company is communicating with her in ways she’s used to. Sam’s company may as well be trying to talk to him using signal flags. @mikestilesPhoto via stock.xchng

    Read the article

  • Distributed Rendering in the UDK and Unity

    - by N0xus
    At the moment I'm looking at getting a game engine to run in a CAVE environment. So far, during my research I've seen a lot of people being able to get both Unity and the Unreal engine up and running in a CAVE (someone did get CryEngine to work in one, but there is little research data about it). As of yet, I have not cemented my final choice of engine for use in the next stage of my project. I've experience in both, so the learning curve will be gentle on both. And both of the engines offer stereoscopic rendering, either already inbuilt with ReadD (Unreal) or by doing it yourself (Unity). Both can also make use of other input devices as well, such as the kinect or other devices. So again, both engines are still on the table. For the last bit of my preliminary research, I was advised to see if either, or both engines could do distributed rendering. I was advised this, as the final game we make could go into a variety of differently sized CAVEs. The one I have access to is roughly 2.4m x 3m cubed, and have been duly informed that this one is a "baby" compared to others. So, finally onto my question: Can either the Unreal Engine, or Unity Engine make it possible for developers to allow distributed rendering? Either through in built devices, or by creating my own plugin / script?

    Read the article

  • Practical tips when transitioning to xmonad?

    - by meder
    I like the idea and concept of xmonad, however I still keep going back to gnome after an hour or so. This feels like when I first tried to learn vim, but I've gotten past the learning curve point and can't live without vim nowadays. I'm sure the time will come for xmonad too, but I was wondering if current xmonad users can provide transitional tips? FYI, I'm on dual monitors ( 19 inch and 17 inch ). Example of an issue I'm having while in this "transitional" stage: How do you manage keeping the browser and other programs that are most commonly used in full screen mode, since by default I think it opens up in a small tile that takes up a portion of the screen? Do you just shortcut it to make it open full screen, or do you actually not maximize it? Or are there advanced methods through preferences in the conf file, making certain programs take up X space?

    Read the article

  • Small business VPN solution

    - by Crash893
    I've been looking for a while but I'd like to to implement a vpn solution for anywhere from 1-5 employees at a time (possibly 10 in a year or so) edit: Basically I would like outside users to fire up a client or open a web page and be able to access things inside the company network (share drives / printers/ webapps /etc) I've looked at Astaro Gateway but im not sure if that's the right tool for the job. I know "best" is a subjective term so i would like to break it into to different suggestions 1) what is the cheapest solution given the criteria above 2) what solution will result in the least amount of headaches from the point of view of maintenance and learning curve.

    Read the article

  • Per-vertex animation with VBOs: Stream each frame or use index offset per frame?

    - by charstar
    Scenario Meshes are animated using either skeletons (skinned animation) or some form of morph targets (i.e. per-vertex key frames). However, in either case, the animations are known in full at load-time, that is, there is no physics, IK solving, or any other form of in-game pose solving. The number of character actions (animations) will be limited but rich (hand-animated). There may be multiple characters using a each mesh and its animations simultaneously in-game (they will be at different poses/keyframes at the same time). Assume color and texture coordinate buffers are static. Goal To leverage the richness of well vetted animation tools such as Blender to do the heavy lifting for a small but rich set of animations. I am aware of additive pose blending like that from Naughty Dog and similar techniques but I would prefer to expend a little RAM/VRAM to avoid implementing a thesis-ready pose solver. I would also like to avoid implementing a key-frame + interpolation curve solver (reinventing Blender vertex groups and IPOs). Current Considerations Much like a non-shader-powered pose solver, create a VBO for each character and copy vertex and normal data to each VBO on each frame (VBO in STREAMING). Create one VBO for each animation where each frame (interleaved vertex and normal data) is concatenated onto the VBO. Then each character simply has a buffer pointer offset based on its current animation frame (e.g. pointer offset = (numVertices+numNormals)*frameNumber). (VBO in STATIC) Known Trade-Offs In 1 above: Each VBO would be small but there would be many VBOs and therefore lots of buffer binding and vertex copying each frame. Both client and pipeline intensive. In 2 above: There would be few VBOs therefore insignificant buffer binding and no vertex data getting jammed down the pipe each frame, but each VBO would be quite large. Are there any pitfalls to number 2 (aside from finite memory)? Are there other methods that I am missing?

    Read the article

  • What Color is your Jetpack ?

    - by JoshReuben
    I’m a programmer, Im approaching 40, and I’m fairly decent at my job – I’ll keep doing what I’m doing for as long as they let me!   So what are your career options if you know how to code? A Programmer could be ..   An Algorithm developer Pros Interesting High barriers of entry, potential for startup competitive factor Cons Do you have the skill, qualifications? What are working conditions n this mystery niche ? micro-focus An Academic Pros Low pressure Job security – or is this an illusion ? Cons Low Pay Need a PhD A Software Architect Pros: strategic, rather than tactical Setting technology platform and high level vision You say how it should work, others have to figure out why its not working the way its supposed to ! broad view – you are paid to learn (how do you con people into paying for you to learn ??) Cons: Glorified developer – more often than not! competitive – everyone wants to do it ! loose touch with underlying tech in tough times, first guy to get the axe ! A Software Engineer Pros: interesting, always more to learn fun I can do it Fallback Cons: Nothing new under the sun – been there, done that Dealing with poor requirements, deadlines, other peoples code, overtime C#, XAML, Web - Low barriers of entry –> à race to the bottom A Team leader Pros: Setting code standards and proposing technology choices Cons: Glorified developer – more often than not! Inspecting other peoples code and debugging the problems they cannot fix Dealing with mugbies and prima donas Responsible for QA of others A Project Manager Pros No need for debugging other peoples code Cons Low barrier of entry High pressure Responsible for QA of others Loosing touch with technology A lot of bullshit meetings Have to be an asshole A Product Manager Pros No need for debugging other peoples code Learning new skillset of sales and marketing Cons Travel (I'm a family man) May need to know the bs details of an uninteresting product things I want to work with: AI, algorithms, Numerical Computing, Mathematica, C++ AMP – unfortunately, the work here is few & far between. VS & TFS Extensibility, DSLs (Workflow , Lightswitch), Code Generation – one day, code will write code ! Unity3D, WebGL – fun, fun, fun ! Modern Web – Knockout, SignalR, MVC, Node.Js ??? (tentative – I'll wait until things stabilize as this area is undergoing a pre-Cambrian explosion) Things I don’t want to work with: (but will if I'm asked to !) C# – same old, same old – not learning anything new here Old code – blech ! Environment with code & fix mentality , ad hoc requirements, excessive overtime Pc support, System administration – even after 20 years, people still ask you to do this sometimes ! debugging – my skills are just not there yet Oracle Old tech: VB 6, XSLT, WinForms, Net 3.51 or less Old style Web dev Information Systems: ASP.NET webforms, Reporting services / crystal reports, SQL Server CRUD with manual data layer, XAML MVVM – variations of the same concept, ad nauseaum. Low barriers of entry –> race to the bottom.  Metro – an elegant API coupled to a horrendous UX – I'll wait for market penetration viability before investing further in this.   Conclusion So if you are in a slump, take heart: Programming is a great career choice compared to every other job !

    Read the article

  • Application toolkits like QT versus traditional game/multimedia libraries like SFML

    - by Aaron
    I currently intend to use SFML for my next game project. I'll need a substantial GUI though (RPG/strategy-type) so I'll either have to implement my own or try to find an appropriate third party library, which seem to boil down to CEGUI, libRocket, and GWEN. At the same time, I do not anticipate doing that many advanced graphical effects. My game will be 2D and primarily sprite-based with some sprite animations. I've recently discovered that QT applications can have their appearance styled so that they don't have to look like plain OS apps. Given that, I am beginning to consider QT a valid alternative to SFML. I wouldn't have to implement the GUI functionality I'd need, and I may not be taking advantage of SFML's lower-level access anyway. The only drawbacks I can think of immediately are the learning curve for QT and figuring out how to fit game logic inside such a framework after getting used to the input/update/render loop of traditional game libraries. When would an application toolkit like QT be more appropriate for a game than a traditional game or multimedia library like SFML?

    Read the article

  • Comparing Apples and Pairs

    - by Tony Davis
    A recent study, High Costs and Negative Value of Pair Programming, by Capers Jones, pulls no punches in its assessment of the costs-to- benefits ratio of pair programming, two programmers working together, at a single computer, rather than separately. He implies that pair programming is a method rushed into production on a wave of enthusiasm for Agile or Extreme Programming, without any real regard for its effectiveness. Despite admitting that his data represented a far from complete study of the economics of pair programming, his conclusions were stark: it was 2.5 times more expensive, resulted in a 15% drop in productivity, and offered no significant quality benefits. The author provides a more scientific analysis than Jon Evans’ Pair Programming Considered Harmful, but the theme is the same. In terms of upfront-coding costs, pair programming is surely more expensive. The claim of productivity loss is dubious and contested by other studies. The third claim, though, did surprise me. The author’s data suggests that if both the pair and the individual programmers employ static code analysis and testing, then there is no measurable difference in the resulting code quality, in terms of defects per function point. In other words, pair programming incurs a massive extra cost for no tangible return in investment. There were, inevitably, many criticisms of his data and his conclusions, a few of which are persuasive. Firstly, that the driver/observer model of pair programming, on which the study bases its findings, is far from the most effective. For example, many find Ping-Pong pairing, based on use of test-driven development, far more productive. Secondly, that it doesn’t distinguish between “expert” and “novice” pair programmers– that is, independently of other programming skills, how skilled was an individual at pair programming. Thirdly, that his measure of quality is too narrow. This point rings true, certainly at Red Gate, where developers don’t pair program all the time, but use the method in short bursts, while tackling a tricky problem and needing a fresh perspective on the best approach, or more in-depth knowledge in a particular domain. All of them argue that pair programming, and collective code ownership, offers significant rewards, if not in terms of immediate “bug reduction”, then in removing the likelihood of single points of failure, and improving the overall quality and longer-term adaptability/maintainability of the design. There is also a massive learning benefit for both participants. One developer told me how he once worked in the same team over consecutive summers, the first time with no pair programming and the second time pair-programming two-thirds of the time, and described the increased rate of learning the second time as “phenomenal”. There are a great many theories on how we should develop software (Scrum, XP, Lean, etc.), but woefully little scientific research in their effectiveness. For a group that spends so much time crunching other people’s data, I wonder if developers spend enough time crunching data about themselves. Capers Jones’ data may be incomplete, but should cause a pause for thought, especially for any large IT departments, supporting commerce and industry, who are considering pair programming. It certainly shouldn’t discourage teams from exploring new ways of developing software, as long as they also think about how to gather hard data to gauge their effectiveness.

    Read the article

  • Set up a root server using Ubuntu and Virtualization

    - by Daniel Völkerts
    Hello, I'd like to setup a fresh root server and install a linux based virtualization on it. My thoughts are on: Intel VTs Hardware Ubuntu 9.10 KVM based virt. The access to the root server will only be SSH for Administration. Has anybody done this before, what was your glues discovered in the daily use? My requirements are: very secure, so the root server only has ssh to the dom-0 and minimalistic ports for the guest (e.g. http/s). good monitoring of host/guest (my idea is to using zabbix for it) easy and fast administration (how are the command line tools working for you? cryptiv? high learning curve?) I'm pleased to learn from your suggestions. Regards, Daniel Völkerts

    Read the article

  • Learn Many Languages

    - by Jeff Foster
    My previous blog, Deliberate Practice, discussed the need for developers to “sharpen their pencil” continually, by setting aside time to learn how to tackle problems in different ways. However, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, a contested and somewhat-controversial concept from language theory, seems to hold reasonably true when applied to programming languages. It states that: “The structure of a language affects the ways in which its speakers conceptualize their world.” If you’re constrained by a single programming language, the one that dominates your day job, then you only have the tools of that language at your disposal to think about and solve a problem. For example, if you’ve only ever worked with Java, you would never think of passing a function to a method. A good developer needs to learn many languages. You may never deploy them in production, you may never ship code with them, but by learning a new language, you’ll have new ideas that will transfer to your current “day-job” language. With the abundant choices in programming languages, how does one choose which to learn? Alan Perlis sums it up best. “A language that doesn‘t affect the way you think about programming is not worth knowing“ With that in mind, here’s a selection of languages that I think are worth learning and that have certainly changed the way I think about tackling programming problems. Clojure Clojure is a Lisp-based language running on the Java Virtual Machine. The unique property of Lisp is homoiconicity, which means that a Lisp program is a Lisp data structure, and vice-versa. Since we can treat Lisp programs as Lisp data structures, we can write our code generation in the same style as our code. This gives Lisp a uniquely powerful macro system, and makes it ideal for implementing domain specific languages. Clojure also makes software transactional memory a first-class citizen, giving us a new approach to concurrency and dealing with the problems of shared state. Haskell Haskell is a strongly typed, functional programming language. Haskell’s type system is far richer than C# or Java, and allows us to push more of our application logic to compile-time safety. If it compiles, it usually works! Haskell is also a lazy language – we can work with infinite data structures. For example, in a board game we can generate the complete game tree, even if there are billions of possibilities, because the values are computed only as they are needed. Erlang Erlang is a functional language with a strong emphasis on reliability. Erlang’s approach to concurrency uses message passing instead of shared variables, with strong support from both the language itself and the virtual machine. Processes are extremely lightweight, and garbage collection doesn’t require all processes to be paused at the same time, making it feasible for a single program to use millions of processes at once, all without the mental overhead of managing shared state. The Benefits of Multilingualism By studying new languages, even if you won’t ever get the chance to use them in production, you will find yourself open to new ideas and ways of coding in your main language. For example, studying Haskell has taught me that you can do so much more with types and has changed my programming style in C#. A type represents some state a program should have, and a type should not be able to represent an invalid state. I often find myself refactoring methods like this… void SomeMethod(bool doThis, bool doThat) { if (!(doThis ^ doThat)) throw new ArgumentException(“At least one arg should be true”); if (doThis) DoThis(); if (doThat) DoThat(); } …into a type-based solution, like this: enum Action { DoThis, DoThat, Both }; void SomeMethod(Action action) { if (action == Action.DoThis || action == Action.Both) DoThis(); if (action == Action.DoThat || action == Action.Both) DoThat(); } At this point, I’ve removed the runtime exception in favor of a compile-time check. This is a trivial example, but is just one of many ideas that I’ve taken from one language and implemented in another.

    Read the article

  • Looking at desktop virtualization, but some users need 3D support. Is HP Remote Graphics a viable solution?

    - by Ryan Thompson
    My company is looking at desktop virtualization, and are planning to move all of the desktop compute resources into the server room or data center, and provide users with thin clients for access. In most cases, a simple VNC or Remote Desktop solution is adequate, but some users are running visualizations that require 3D capability--something that VNC and Remote Desktop cannot support. Rather than making an exception and providing desktop machines for these users, complicating out rollout and future operations, we are considering adding servers with GPUs, and using HP's Remote Graphics to provide access from the thin client. The demo version appears to work acceptably, but there is a bit of a learning curve, it's not clear how well it would work for multiple simultaneous sessions, and it's not clear if it would be a good solution to apply to non-3D sessions. If possible, as with the hardware, we want to deploy a single software solution instead of a mishmash. If anyone has had experience managing a large installation of HP Remote Graphics, I would appreciate any feedback you can provide.

    Read the article

  • NVIDIA X Server TwinView isses with 2 GeForce 8600GT cards

    - by Big Daddy
    Full disclosure, I am relatively new to Linux and loving the learning curve but I am undoubtedly capable of ignorant mistakes I have a rig I am building for my home office desktop. The basics: Gigabyte MB AMD 64bt processor Ubuntu 12.04 64bit two Nvidia GeForce 8600GT video cards using a SLI bridge two 22" DVI input HP monitors So here is my issue (it is driving me nuts) with X Server. If I plug both monitors into GPU 0 X Server auto configures TwinView and all is grand, works like a charm, though both are running off of GPU 0. If I plug one monitor into GPU 0 and one monitor into GPU 1, X Server enables the monitor on GPU 0, sees but keeps the monitor on GPU 1 disabled. My presumption (we all know the saying about presumptions) is that all I would have to do is select the disabled monitor on GPU 1 and drop down the Configure pull down and select TwinView...problem is when the monitors are plugged in this way, the TwinView option is greyed out and can not be selected. What am I not understanding here? Is there some sort of configuration I need to do elsewhere for Ubuntu to utilize both GPU's? Any help will be most appreciated, thanks in advance.

    Read the article

  • GUI frontend for octave on Linux

    - by Homunculus Reticulli
    I recently installed Octave on my Ubuntu 10.0.4 LTS box. Out of the box, this is a console only app. This makes the learning curve a bit steeper than what I would like it to be, and I am looking for a GUI frontend that looks more like Matlab. I have seen a few project (QtOctave etc), but most of them seem either discontinued, no longer under active development, or are no longer free. Can anyone recommend a good open source/free GUI for Octave on Linux? Preferably, one that is as close as possible to Matlab's GUI.

    Read the article

< Previous Page | 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112  | Next Page >