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  • Setting up RADIUS + LDAP for WPA2 on Ubuntu

    - by Morten Siebuhr
    I'm setting up a wireless network for ~150 users. In short, I'm looking for a guide to set RADIUS server to authenticate WPA2 against a LDAP. On Ubuntu. I got a working LDAP, but as it is not in production use, it can very easily be adapted to whatever changes this project may require. I've been looking at FreeRADIUS, but any RADIUS server will do. We got a separate physical network just for WiFi, so not too many worries about security on that front. Our AP's are HP's low end enterprise stuff - they seem to support whatever you can think of. All Ubuntu Server, baby! And the bad news: I now somebody less knowledgeable than me will eventually take over administration, so the setup has to be as "trivial" as possible. So far, our setup is based only on software from the Ubuntu repositories, with exception of our LDAP administration web application and a few small special scripts. So no "fetch package X, untar, ./configure"-things if avoidable. UPDATE 2009-08-18: While I found several useful resources, there is one serious obstacle: Ignoring EAP-Type/tls because we do not have OpenSSL support. Ignoring EAP-Type/ttls because we do not have OpenSSL support. Ignoring EAP-Type/peap because we do not have OpenSSL support. Basically the Ubuntu version of FreeRADIUS does not support SSL (bug 183840), which makes all the secure EAP-types useless. Bummer. But some useful documentation for anybody interested: http://vuksan.com/linux/dot1x/802-1x-LDAP.html http://tldp.org/HOWTO/html_single/8021X-HOWTO/#confradius UPDATE 2009-08-19: I ended up compiling my own FreeRADIUS package yesterday evening - there's a really good recipe at http://www.linuxinsight.com/building-debian-freeradius-package-with-eap-tls-ttls-peap-support.html (See the comments to the post for updated instructions). I got a certificate from http://CACert.org (you should probably get a "real" cert if possible) Then I followed the instructions at http://vuksan.com/linux/dot1x/802-1x-LDAP.html. This links to http://tldp.org/HOWTO/html_single/8021X-HOWTO/, which is a very worthwhile read if you want to know how WiFi security works. UPDATE 2009-08-27: After following the above guide, I've managed to get FreeRADIUS to talk to LDAP: I've created a test user in LDAP, with the password mr2Yx36M - this gives an LDAP entry roughly of: uid: testuser sambaLMPassword: CF3D6F8A92967E0FE72C57EF50F76A05 sambaNTPassword: DA44187ECA97B7C14A22F29F52BEBD90 userPassword: {SSHA}Z0SwaKO5tuGxgxtceRDjiDGFy6bRL6ja When using radtest, I can connect fine: > radtest testuser "mr2Yx36N" sbhr.dk 0 radius-private-password Sending Access-Request of id 215 to 130.225.235.6 port 1812 User-Name = "msiebuhr" User-Password = "mr2Yx36N" NAS-IP-Address = 127.0.1.1 NAS-Port = 0 rad_recv: Access-Accept packet from host 130.225.235.6 port 1812, id=215, length=20 > But when I try through the AP, it doesn't fly - while it does confirm that it figures out the NT and LM passwords: ... rlm_ldap: sambaNTPassword -> NT-Password == 0x4441343431383745434139374237433134413232463239463532424542443930 rlm_ldap: sambaLMPassword -> LM-Password == 0x4346334436463841393239363745304645373243353745463530463736413035 [ldap] looking for reply items in directory... WARNING: No "known good" password was found in LDAP. Are you sure that the user is configured correctly? [ldap] user testuser authorized to use remote access rlm_ldap: ldap_release_conn: Release Id: 0 ++[ldap] returns ok ++[expiration] returns noop ++[logintime] returns noop [pap] Normalizing NT-Password from hex encoding [pap] Normalizing LM-Password from hex encoding ... It is clear that the NT and LM passwords differ from the above, yet the message [ldap] user testuser authorized to use remote access - and the user is later rejected...

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  • OpenCV install problems on Studio 12.04 - broken dependencies

    - by Will
    I'm trying to follow the Ubuntu OpenCV documentation at OpenCV. The provided script has a line which executed for some time, taking away more packages than I expected (such as ubuntu-studio video); sudo apt-get -qq remove ffmpeg x264 libx264-dev When the script gets to the line below, it bombs; sudo apt-get -qq install libopencv-dev build-essential checkinstall cmake pkg-config yasm libtiff4-dev libjpeg-dev libjasper-dev libavcodec-dev libavformat-dev libswscale-dev libdc1394-22-dev libxine-dev libgstreamer0.10-dev libgstreamer-plugins-base0.10-dev libv4l-dev python-dev python-numpy libtbb-dev libqt4-dev libgtk2.0-dev libfaac-dev libmp3lame-dev libopencore-amrnb-dev libopencore-amrwb-dev libtheora-dev libvorbis-dev libxvidcore-dev x264 v4l-utils ffmpeg The error msg is; E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages. I've since run Update-Manager, run sudo apt-get updates, rebooted, tried the above script line manually, and still no change. I've just run sudo apt-get install -f and nothing seemed to change. It did mention that some packages were no longer needed and could be removed by apt-get autoremove, so I ran that. It removed a number of packages, so I reran the install command above. Still same problem of held broken packages. I just ran sudo apt-get -u dist-upgrade Part of the response was; The following packages have been kept back: gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg I'm not sure what that means. I do know that it shows up in my Update-Manager and cannot be checked I then ran sudo dpkg --configure -a and then reran sudo apt-get -f install and the package was still not upgraded, though there was this very interesting comment; Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable distribution that some required packages have not yet been created or been moved out of Incoming. The following information may help to resolve the situation: The following packages have unmet dependencies: gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg : Depends: libavcodec53 (< 5:0) but it is not going to be installed or libavcodec-extra-53 (< 5:0) but 5:0.7.2-1ubuntu1+codecs1~oneiric2 is to be installed E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages. Then I ran sudo apt-get -u dist-upgrade It showed I had one held package, so I ran; sudo apt-get -o Debug::pkgProblemResolver=yes dist-upgrade It also exited without upgrading the package, so I ran; sudo apt-get remove --dry-run gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg:i386 And it gave me; *The following packages will be REMOVED: arista gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg 0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 2 to remove and 0 not upgraded. Remv arista [0.9.7-3ubuntu1] Remv gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg [0.10.12-1ubuntu1]* But when I reran sudo apt-get -u dist-upgrade It showed the package was still there. *The following packages have been kept back: gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg 0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 1 not upgraded.* Update: Just went into Synaptic PM and completely removed gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg Reran sudo apt-get -u dist-upgrade And was told; 0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded. However, when I ran the original apt-get to install opencv (first code at the top of this question), it still gave me the same broken package errors. So I tried $ cat /etc/apt/sources.list # # deb cdrom:[Ubuntu-Studio 11.10 _Oneiric Ocelot_ - Release i386 (20111011.1)]/ oneiric main multiverse restricted universe # deb cdrom:[Ubuntu-Studio 11.10 _Oneiric Ocelot_ - Release i386 (20111011.1)]/ oneiric main multiverse restricted universe # See http://help.ubuntu.com/community/UpgradeNotes for how to upgrade to # newer versions of the distribution. deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise main restricted deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise main restricted ## Major bug fix updates produced after the final release of the ## distribution. deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates main restricted deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates main restricted ## N.B. software from this repository is ENTIRELY UNSUPPORTED by the Ubuntu ## team. Also, please note that software in universe WILL NOT receive any ## review or updates from the Ubuntu security team. deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise universe deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise universe deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates universe deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates universe ## N.B. software from this repository is ENTIRELY UNSUPPORTED by the Ubuntu ## team, and may not be under a free licence. Please satisfy yourself as to ## your rights to use the software. Also, please note that software in ## multiverse WILL NOT receive any review or updates from the Ubuntu ## security team. deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise multiverse deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise multiverse deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates multiverse deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates multiverse ## N.B. software from this repository may not have been tested as ## extensively as that contained in the main release, although it includes ## newer versions of some applications which may provide useful features. ## Also, please note that software in backports WILL NOT receive any review ## or updates from the Ubuntu security team. deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu precise-security main restricted deb-src http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu precise-security main restricted deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu precise-security universe deb-src http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu precise-security universe deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu precise-security multiverse deb-src http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu precise-security multiverse ## Uncomment the following two lines to add software from Canonical's ## 'partner' repository. ## This software is not part of Ubuntu, but is offered by Canonical and the ## respective vendors as a service to Ubuntu users. deb http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu precise partner # deb-src http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu oneiric partner ## Uncomment the following two lines to add software from Ubuntu's ## 'extras' repository. ## This software is not part of Ubuntu, but is offered by third-party ## developers who want to ship their latest software. # deb http://extras.ubuntu.com/ubuntu oneiric main # deb-src http://extras.ubuntu.com/ubuntu oneiric main # deb http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/popinet/xUbuntu_11.04 ./ # disabled on upgrade to precise and then; $ cat /etc/apt/sources.list.d/* But I don't have enough reputation to post the results here (it says I need at least 10 reputation points to post more than 2 links), so I don't know how to provide the requested feedback. Then tried; $ sudo apt-get check [sudo] password for <abcd>: Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done However, no resolution of the problem yet. What else do I need to do? Will an upgrade to Ubuntu Studio 13.xx solve this problem (or compound it)?

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  • How I do VCS

    - by Wes McClure
    After years of dabbling with different version control systems and techniques, I wanted to share some of what I like and dislike in a few blog posts.  To start this out, I want to talk about how I use VCS in a team environment.  These come in a series of tips or best practices that I try to follow.  Note: This list is subject to change in the future. Always use some form of version control for all aspects of software development. Development is an evolution.  Looking back at where we were is an invaluable asset in that process.  This includes data schemas and documentation. Reverting / reapplying changes is absolutely critical for efficient development. The tools I use: Code: Hg (preferred), SVN Database: TSqlMigrations Documents: Sometimes in code repository, also SharePoint with versioning Always tag a commit (changeset) with comments This is a quick way to describe to someone else (or your future self) what the changeset entails. Be brief but courteous. One or two sentences about the task, not the actual changes. Use precommit hooks or setup the central repository to reject changes without comments. Link changesets to documentation If your project management system integrates with version control, or has a way to externally reference stories, tasks etc then leave a reference in the commit.  This helps locate more information about the commit and/or related changesets. It’s best to have a precommit hook or system that requires this information, otherwise it’s easy to forget. Ability to work offline is required, including commits and history Yes this requires a DVCS locally but doesn’t require the central repository to be a DVCS.  I prefer to use either Git or Hg but if it isn’t possible to migrate the central repository, it’s still possible for a developer to push / pull changes to that repository from a local Hg or Git repository. Never lock resources (files) in a central repository… Rude! We have merge tools for a reason, merging sucked a long time ago, it doesn’t anymore… stop locking files! This is unproductive, rude and annoying to other team members. Always review everything in your commit. Never ever commit a set of files without reviewing the changes in each. Never add a file without asking yourself, deep down inside, does this belong? If you leave to make changes during a review, start the review over when you come back.  Never assume you didn’t touch a file, double check. This is another reason why you want to avoid large, infrequent commits. Requirements for tools Quickly show pending changes for the entire repository. Default action for a resource with pending changes is a diff. Pluggable diff & merge tool Produce a unified diff or a diff of all changes.  This is helpful to bulk review changes instead of opening each file. The central repository is not your own personal dump yard.  Breaking this rule is a sure fire way to get the F bomb dropped in front of your name, multiple times. If you turn on Visual Studio’s commit on closing studio option, I will personally break your fingers. By the way, the person(s) in charge of this feature should be fired and never be allowed near programming, ever again. Commit (integrate) to the central repository / branch frequently I try to do this before leaving each day, especially without a DVCS.  One never knows when they might need to work from remote the following day. Never commit commented out code If it isn’t needed anymore, delete it! If you aren’t sure if it might be useful in the future, delete it! This is why we have history. If you don’t know why it’s commented out, figure it out and then either uncomment it or delete it. Don’t commit build artifacts, user preferences and temporary files. Build artifacts do not belong in VCS, everything in them is present in the code. (ie: bin\*, obj\*, *.dll, *.exe) User preferences are your settings, stop overriding my preferences files! (ie: *.suo and *.user files) Most tools allow you to ignore certain files and Hg/Git allow you to version this as an ignore file.  Set this up as a first step when creating a new repository! Be polite when merging unresolved conflicts. Count to 10, cuss, grab a stress ball and realize it’s not a big deal.  Actually, it’s an opportunity to let you know that someone else is working in the same area and you might want to communicate with them. Following the other rules, especially committing frequently, will reduce the likelihood of this. Suck it up, we all have to deal with this unintended consequence at times.  Just be careful and GET FAMILIAR with your merge tool.  It’s really not as scary as you think.  I personally prefer KDiff3 as its merging capabilities rock. Don’t blindly merge and then blindly commit your changes, this is rude and unprofessional.  Make sure you understand why the conflict occurred and which parts of the code you want to keep.  Apply scrutiny when you commit a manual merge: review the diff! Make sure you test the changes (build and run automated tests) Become intimate with your version control system and the tools you use with it. Avoid trial and error as much as is possible, sit down and test the tool out, read some tutorials etc.  Create test repositories and walk through common scenarios. Find the most efficient way to do your work.  These tools will be used repetitively, so inefficiencies will add up. Sometimes this involves a mix of tools, both GUI and CLI. I like a combination of both Tortoise Hg and hg cli to get the job efficiently. Always tag releases Create a way to find a given release, whether this be in comments or an explicit tag / branch.  This should be readily discoverable. Create release branches to patch bugs and then merge the changes back to other development branch(es). If using feature branches, strive for periodic integrations. Feature branches often cause forked code that becomes irreconcilable.  Strive to re-integrate somewhat frequently with the branch this code will ultimately be merged into.  This will avoid merge conflicts in the future. Feature branches are best when they are mutually exclusive of active development in other branches. Use and abuse local commits , at least one per task in a story. This builds a trail of changes in your local repository that can be pushed to a central repository when the story is complete. Never commit a broken build or failing tests to the central repository. It’s ok for a local commit to break the build and/or tests.  In fact, I encourage this if it helps group the changes more logically.  This is one of the main reasons I got excited about DVCS, when I wanted more than one changeset for a set of pending changes but some files could be grouped into both changesets (like solution file / project file changes). If you have more than a dozen outstanding changed resources, there should probably be more than one commit involved. Exceptions when maintaining code bases that require shotgun surgery, in this case, it’s a design smell :) Don’t version sensitive information Especially usernames / passwords   There is one area I haven’t found a solution I like yet: versioning 3rd party libraries and/or code.  I really dislike keeping any assemblies in the repository, but seems to be a common practice for external libraries.  Please feel free to share your ideas about this below.    -Wes

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  • Getting Started with Prism (aka Composite Application Guidance for WPF and Silverlight)

    - by dotneteer
    Overview Prism is a framework from the Microsoft Patterns and Practice team that allow you to create WPF and Silverlight in a modular way. It is especially valuable for larger projects in which a large number of developers can develop in parallel. Prism achieves its goal by supplying several services: · Dependency Injection (DI) and Inversion of control (IoC): By using DI, Prism takes away the responsibility of instantiating and managing the life time of dependency objects from individual components to a container. Prism relies on containers to discover, manage and compose large number of objects. By varying the configuration, the container can also inject mock objects for unit testing. Out of the box, Prism supports Unity and MEF as container although it is possible to use other containers by subclassing the Bootstrapper class. · Modularity and Region: Prism supplies the framework to split application into modules from the application shell. Each module is a library project that contains both UI and code and is responsible to initialize itself when loaded by the shell. Each window can be further divided into regions. A region is a user control with associated model. · Model, view and view-model (MVVM) pattern: Prism promotes the user MVVM. The use of DI container makes it much easier to inject model into view. WPF already has excellent data binding and commanding mechanism. To be productive with Prism, it is important to understand WPF data binding and commanding well. · Event-aggregation: Prism promotes loosely coupled components. Prism discourages for components from different modules to communicate each other, thus leading to dependency. Instead, Prism supplies an event-aggregation mechanism that allows components to publish and subscribe events without knowing each other. Architecture In the following, I will go into a little more detail on the services provided by Prism. Bootstrapper In a typical WPF application, application start-up is controls by App.xaml and its code behind. The main window of the application is typically specified in the App.xaml file. In a Prism application, we start a bootstrapper in the App class and delegate the duty of main window to the bootstrapper. The bootstrapper will start a dependency-injection container so all future object instantiations are managed by the container. Out of box, Prism provides the UnityBootstrapper and MefUnityBootstrapper abstract classes. All application needs to either provide a concrete implementation of one of these bootstrappers, or alternatively, subclass the Bootstrapper class with another DI container. A concrete bootstrapper class must implement the CreateShell method. Its responsibility is to resolve and create the Shell object through the DI container to serve as the main window for the application. The other important method to override is ConfigureModuleCatalog. The bootstrapper can register modules for the application. In a more advance scenario, an application does not have to know all its modules at compile time. Modules can be discovered at run time. Readers to refer to one of the Open Modularity Quick Starts for more information. Modules Once modules are registered with or discovered by Prism, they are instantiated by the DI container and their Initialize method is called. The DI container can inject into a module a region registry that implements IRegionViewRegistry interface. The module, in its Initialize method, can then call RegisterViewWithRegion method of the registry to register its regions. Regions Regions, once registered, are managed by the RegionManager. The shell can then load regions either through the RegionManager.RegionName attached property or dynamically through code. When a view is created by the region manager, the DI container can inject view model and other services into the view. The view then has a reference to the view model through which it can interact with backend services. Service locator Although it is possible to inject services into dependent classes through a DI container, an alternative way is to use the ServiceLocator to retrieve a service on demard. Prism supplies a service locator implementation and it is possible to get an instance of the service by calling: ServiceLocator.Current.GetInstance<IServiceType>() Event aggregator Prism supplies an IEventAggregator interface and implementation that can be injected into any class that needs to communicate with each other in a loosely-coupled fashion. The event aggregator uses a publisher/subscriber model. A class can publishes an event by calling eventAggregator.GetEvent<EventType>().Publish(parameter) to raise an event. Other classes can subscribe the event by calling eventAggregator.GetEvent<EventType>().Subscribe(EventHandler, other options). Getting started The easiest way to get started with Prism is to go through the Prism Hands-On labs and look at the Hello World QuickStart. The Hello World QuickStart shows how bootstrapper, modules and region works. Next, I would recommend you to look at the Stock Trader Reference Implementation. It is a more in depth example that resemble we want to set up an application. Several other QuickStarts cover individual Prism services. Some scenarios, such as dynamic module discovery, are more advanced. Apart from the official prism document, you can get an overview by reading Glen Block’s MSDN Magazine article. I have found the best free training material is from the Boise Code Camp. To be effective with Prism, it is important to understands key concepts of WPF well first, such as the DependencyProperty system, data binding, resource, theme and ICommand. It is also important to know your DI container of choice well. I will try to explorer these subjects in depth in the future. Testimony Recently, I worked on a desktop WPF application using Prism. I had a wonderful experience with Prism. The Prism is flexible enough even in the presence of third party controls such as Telerik WPF controls. We have never encountered any significant obstacle.

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  • F# for the C# Programmer

    - by mbcrump
    Are you a C# Programmer and can’t make it past a day without seeing or hearing someone mention F#?  Today, I’m going to walk you through your first F# application and give you a brief introduction to the language. Sit back this will only take about 20 minutes. Introduction Microsoft's F# programming language is a functional language for the .NET framework that was originally developed at Microsoft Research Cambridge by Don Syme. In October 2007, the senior vice president of the developer division at Microsoft announced that F# was being officially productized to become a fully supported .NET language and professional developers were hired to create a team of around ten people to build the product version. In September 2008, Microsoft released the first Community Technology Preview (CTP), an official beta release, of the F# distribution . In December 2008, Microsoft announced that the success of this CTP had encouraged them to escalate F# and it is now will now be shipped as one of the core languages in Visual Studio 2010 , alongside C++, C# 4.0 and VB. The F# programming language incorporates many state-of-the-art features from programming language research and ossifies them in an industrial strength implementation that promises to revolutionize interactive, parallel and concurrent programming. Advantages of F# F# is the world's first language to combine all of the following features: Type inference: types are inferred by the compiler and generic definitions are created automatically. Algebraic data types: a succinct way to represent trees. Pattern matching: a comprehensible and efficient way to dissect data structures. Active patterns: pattern matching over foreign data structures. Interactive sessions: as easy to use as Python and Mathematica. High performance JIT compilation to native code: as fast as C#. Rich data structures: lists and arrays built into the language with syntactic support. Functional programming: first-class functions and tail calls. Expressive static type system: finds bugs during compilation and provides machine-verified documentation. Sequence expressions: interrogate huge data sets efficiently. Asynchronous workflows: syntactic support for monadic style concurrent programming with cancellations. Industrial-strength IDE support: multithreaded debugging, and graphical throwback of inferred types and documentation. Commerce friendly design and a viable commercial market. Lets try a short program in C# then F# to understand the differences. Using C#: Create a variable and output the value to the console window: Sample Program. using System;   namespace ConsoleApplication9 {     class Program     {         static void Main(string[] args)         {             var a = 2;             Console.WriteLine(a);             Console.ReadLine();         }     } } A breeze right? 14 Lines of code. We could have condensed it a bit by removing the “using” statment and tossing the namespace. But this is the typical C# program. Using F#: Create a variable and output the value to the console window: To start, open Visual Studio 2010 or Visual Studio 2008. Note: If using VS2008, then please download the SDK first before getting started. If you are using VS2010 then you are already setup and ready to go. So, click File-> New Project –> Other Languages –> Visual F# –> Windows –> F# Application. You will get the screen below. Go ahead and enter a name and click OK. Now, you will notice that the Solution Explorer contains the following: Double click the Program.fs and enter the following information. Hit F5 and it should run successfully. Sample Program. open System let a = 2        Console.WriteLine a As Shown below: Hmm, what? F# did the same thing in 3 lines of code. Show me the interactive evaluation that I keep hearing about. The F# development environment for Visual Studio 2010 provides two different modes of execution for F# code: Batch compilation to a .NET executable or DLL. (This was accomplished above). Interactive evaluation. (Demo is below) The interactive session provides a > prompt, requires a double semicolon ;; identifier at the end of a code snippet to force evaluation, and returns the names (if any) and types of resulting definitions and values. To access the F# prompt, in VS2010 Goto View –> Other Window then F# Interactive. Once you have the interactive window type in the following expression: 2+3;; as shown in the screenshot below: I hope this guide helps you get started with the language, please check out the following books for further information. F# Books for further reading   Foundations of F# Author: Robert Pickering An introduction to functional programming with F#. Including many samples, this book walks through the features of the F# language and libraries, and covers many of the .NET Framework features which can be leveraged with F#.       Functional Programming for the Real World: With Examples in F# and C# Authors: Tomas Petricek and Jon Skeet An introduction to functional programming for existing C# developers written by Tomas Petricek and Jon Skeet. This book explains the core principles using both C# and F#, shows how to use functional ideas when designing .NET applications and presents practical examples such as design of domain specific language, development of multi-core applications and programming of reactive applications.

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  • Do You Develop Your PL/SQL Directly in the Database?

    - by thatjeffsmith
    I know this sounds like a REALLY weird question for many of you. Let me make one thing clear right away though, I am NOT talking about creating and replacing PLSQL objects directly into a production environment. Do we really need to talk about developers in production again? No, what I am talking about is a developer doing their work from start to finish in a development database. These are generally available to a development team for building the next and greatest version of your databases and database applications. And of course you are using a third party source control system, right? Last week I was in Tampa, FL presenting at the monthly Suncoast Oracle User’s Group meeting. Had a wonderful time, great questions and back-and-forth. My favorite heckler was there, @oraclenered, AKA Chet Justice.  I was in the middle of talking about how it’s better to do your PLSQL work in the Procedure Editor when Chet pipes up - Don’t do it that way, that’s wrong Just press play to edit the PLSQL directly in the database Or something along those lines. I didn’t get what the heck he was talking about. I had been showing how the Procedure Editor gives you much better feedback and support when working with PLSQL. After a few back-and-forths I got to what Chet’s main objection was, and again I’m going to paraphrase: You should develop offline in your SQL worksheet. Don’t do anything in the database until it’s done. I didn’t understand. Were developers expected to be able to internalize and mentally model the PL/SQL engine, see where their errors were, etc in these offline scripts? No, please give Chet more credit than that. What is the ideal Oracle Development Environment? If I were back in the ‘real world’ of database development, I would do all of my development outside of the ‘dev’ instance. My development process looks a little something like this: Do I have a program that already does something like this – copy and paste Has some smart person already written something like this – copy and paste Start typing in the white-screen-of-panic and bungle along until I get something that half-works Tweek, debug, test until I have fooled my subconscious into thinking that it’s ‘good’ As you might understand, I don’t want my co-workers to see the evolution of my code. It would seriously freak them out and I probably wouldn’t have a job anymore (don’t remind me that I already worked myself out of development.) So here’s what I like to do: Run a Local Instance of Oracle on my Machine and Develop My Code Privately I take a copy of development – that’s what source control is for afterall – and run it where no one else can see it. I now get to be my own DBA. If I need a trace – no problem. If I want to run an ASH report, no worries. If I need to create a directory or run some DataPump jobs, that’s all on me. Now when I get my code ‘up to snuff,’ then I will check it into source control and compile it into the official development instance. So my teammates suddenly go from seeing no program, to a mostly complete program. Is this right? If not, it doesn’t seem wrong to me. And after talking to Chet in the car on the way to the local cigar bar, it seems that he’s of the same opinion. So what’s so wrong with coding directly into a development instance? I think ‘wrong’ is a bit strong here. But there are a few pitfalls that you might want to look out for. A few come to mind – and I’m sure Chet could add many more as my memory fails me at the moment. But here goes: Development instance isn’t properly backed up – would hate to lose that work Development is wiped once a week and copied over from Prod – don’t laugh Someone clobbers your code You accidentally on purpose clobber someone else’s code The more developers you have in a single fish pond, the greater chance something ‘bad’ will happen This Isn’t One of Those Posts Where I Tell You What You Should Be Doing I realize many shops won’t be open to allowing developers to stage their own local copies of Oracle. But I would at least be aware that many of your developers are probably doing this anyway – with or without your tacit approval. SQL Developer can do local file tracking, but you should be using Source Control too! I will say that I think it’s imperative that you control your source code outside the database, even if your development team is comprised of a single developer. Store your source code in a file, and control that file in something like Subversion. You would be shocked at the number of teams that do not use a source control system. I know I continue to be shocked no matter how many times I meet another team running by the seat-of-their-pants. I’d love to hear how your development process works. And of course I want to know how SQL Developer and the rest of our tools can better support your processes. And one last thing, if you want a fun and interactive presentation experience, be sure to have Chet in the room

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  • Help me solve my problem with NPR Media Player

    - by Calcipher
    First of, let me apologize for this getting a bit technical. Several weeks ago, I found that while using NPR's media player (e.g. click on 'Listen to the Show' - this is what I've been using as a test) the stream would suddenly halt after a minute or three. I could not get the stream to restart without reloading the page. Now, I assumed this was an issue with NPR's player and Linux (or just a bug in their stuff in general) so I began to dig, the following is what I have tried to date (please note, the tldr; option is to skip to the latest thing as I think I know what is causing the problem). Note: All testing has been done, for consistency purposes, on a clean install of Chromium with no pluggins running. My machine is Ubuntu 10.10x64. First thing I always try, I disabled all firewall stuff on the system (UFW, default deny all, allow ssh). No change, firewall back up for all additional tests unless otherwise noted. In any case, UFW is stateful, so connections it started on a non-specified on different ports will continue to work. I deleted my ~/.macromeda and ~/.adobe folders, restarted (just to be sure) and tried. Program still froze. I decided the problem might be with my install of flash, so I purged the version I had (and the home folders again). I installed the x64 version of flash from a PPA. This had no effect. I decided that the problem might be with the version of flash, so I purged the x64 version and installed the standard x32 version that comes with Ubuntu. No luck. Back to the x64 version for consistency, I decided to set up a 64-bit mini 'clone' of my system in VirtualBox. I was able to run the media player with no problem. I rsynced (in archive mode) my home directory from my real machine to the virtual machine (with bridged networking, so it was fully visible on the network). I also used a few tricks to install ALL of the same software (and repositories) from the real machine to the virtual machine. I was still able to listen to the player. I decided that the problem was with my install (after all, it had gone through two major version upgrades). As I have /home/ on a separate partition it was easy to reinstall and use the same trick from #6 to have my system up and running again within about an hour. I continue to have issues with the NPR Media Player. By this point the weekend had come. At work, I use a wired connection while at home I use a wireless connection. For some reason I forgot that I was having problems and used the NPR Media Player over the weekend. Low and behold it worked just fine at home on wireless (note: for various reasons, I could not test this on wired at home). Following from #6, I decided that the problem was either something with the network at work or still something with my account. As the latter was easier to test, I created a new account on my system and used that at work. The Media Player worked. At a loss, I decided to watch the traffic with tshark (the text based brother of wireshark) - X's to protect the innocent, I am the XXX.24.200.XXX: sudo tshark -i eth0 -p -t a -R "ip.addr == XXX.24.200.XXX && ip.addr == XXX.166.98.XXX" As you would expect, there were tons and tons of packets, but each and every time the player froze, this is what I got 08:42:20.679200 XXX.166.98.XXX - XXX.24.200.XXX TCP macromedia-fcs 56371 [PSH, ACK] Seq=817686 Ack=6 Win=65535 Len=1448 TSV=495713325 TSER=396467 08:42:20.718602 XXX.24.200.XXX - XXX.166.98.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindow] 56371 macromedia-fcs [ACK] Seq=6 Ack=819134 Win=0 Len=0 TSV=396475 TSER=495713325 08:42:21.050183 XXX.166.98.XXX - XXX.24.200.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbe] macromedia-fcs 56371 [ACK] Seq=819134 Ack=6 Win=65535 Len=1 TSV=495713362 TSER=396475 08:42:21.050221 XXX.24.200.XXX - XXX.166.98.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbeAck] [TCP ZeroWindow] 56371 macromedia-fcs [ACK] Seq=6 Ack=819134 Win=0 Len=0 TSV=396508 TSER=495713362 08:42:21.680548 XXX.166.98.XXX - XXX.24.200.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbe] macromedia-fcs 56371 [ACK] Seq=819134 Ack=6 Win=65535 Len=1 TSV=495713425 TSER=396508 08:42:21.680605 XXX.24.200.XXX - XXX.166.98.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbeAck] [TCP ZeroWindow] 56371 macromedia-fcs [ACK] Seq=6 Ack=819134 Win=0 Len=0 TSV=396571 TSER=495713425 08:42:22.910354 XXX.166.98.XXX - XXX.24.200.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbe] macromedia-fcs 56371 [ACK] Seq=819134 Ack=6 Win=65535 Len=1 TSV=495713548 TSER=396571 08:42:22.910400 XXX.24.200.XXX - XXX.166.98.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbeAck] [TCP ZeroWindow] 56371 macromedia-fcs [ACK] Seq=6 Ack=819134 Win=0 Len=0 TSV=396694 TSER=495713548 08:42:25.340458 XXX.166.98.XXX - XXX.24.200.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbe] macromedia-fcs 56371 [ACK] Seq=819134 Ack=6 Win=65535 Len=1 TSV=495713791 TSER=396694 08:42:25.340517 XXX.24.200.XXX - XXX.166.98.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbeAck] [TCP ZeroWindow] 56371 macromedia-fcs [ACK] Seq=6 Ack=819134 Win=0 Len=0 TSV=396937 TSER=495713791 08:42:30.170698 XXX.166.98.XXX - XXX.24.200.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbe] macromedia-fcs 56371 [ACK] Seq=819134 Ack=6 Win=65535 Len=1 TSV=495714274 TSER=396937 08:42:30.170746 XXX.24.200.XXX - XXX.166.98.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbeAck] [TCP ZeroWindow] 56371 macromedia-fcs [ACK] Seq=6 Ack=819134 Win=0 Len=0 TSV=397420 TSER=495714274 08:42:39.801738 XXX.166.98.XXX - XXX.24.200.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbe] macromedia-fcs 56371 [ACK] Seq=819134 Ack=6 Win=65535 Len=1 TSV=495715237 TSER=397420 08:42:39.801784 XXX.24.200.XXX - XXX.166.98.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbeAck] [TCP ZeroWindow] 56371 macromedia-fcs [ACK] Seq=6 Ack=819134 Win=0 Len=0 TSV=398383 TSER=495715237 08:42:59.032648 XXX.166.98.XXX - XXX.24.200.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbe] macromedia-fcs 56371 [ACK] Seq=819134 Ack=6 Win=65535 Len=1 TSV=495717160 TSER=398383 08:42:59.032696 XXX.24.200.XXX - XXX.166.98.XXX TCP [TCP ZeroWindowProbeAck] [TCP ZeroWindow] 56371 macromedia-fcs [ACK] Seq=6 Ack=819134 Win=0 Len=0 TSV=400306 TSER=495717160 08:43:00.267721 XXX.24.200.XXX - XXX.166.98.XXX TCP 56371 macromedia-fcs [FIN, ACK] Seq=6 Ack=819134 Win=0 Len=0 TSV=400430 TSER=495717160 08:43:00.267827 XXX.24.200.XXX - XXX.166.98.XXX TCP 56371 macromedia-fcs [RST, ACK] Seq=7 Ack=819134 Win=65535 Len=0 TSV=400430 TSER=495717160 So, as you can see, my machine is sending out a ZeroWindow packet (which I think means some buffer or another filled up) which causes the Media Player to halt (unfortunately, terminally - no controls on it really do anything anymore). Any ideas, at all, what would cause this? Why only on eth0 under my main account?

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  • SQL Saturday 43 in Redmond

    - by AjarnMark
    I attended my first SQLSaturday a couple of days ago, SQLSaturday #43 in Redmond (at Microsoft).  I got there really early, primarily because I forgot how fast I can get there from my home when nobody else is on the road.  On a weekday in rush hour traffic, that would have taken two hours to get there.  I gave myself 90 minutes, and actually got there in about 45.  Crazy! I made the mistake of going to the main Microsoft campus, but that’s not where the event was being held.  Instead it was in a big Microsoft conference center on the other side of the highway.  Fortunately, I had the address with me and quickly realized my mistake.  When I got back on track, I noticed that there were bright yellow signs out on the street corner that looked like they said they were for SOL Saturday, which actually was appropriate since it was the sunniest day around here in a long time. Since I was there so early, the registration was just getting setup, so I found Greg Larsen who was coordinating things and offered to help.  He put me to work with a group of people organizing the pre-printed raffle tickets and stuffing swag bags. I had never been to a SQLSaturday before this one, so I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect even though I have read about a few on some blogs.  It makes sense that each one will be a little bit different since they are almost completely volunteer driven, and the whole concept is still in its early stages.  I have been to the PASS Summit for the last several years, and was hoping for a smaller version of that.  Now, it’s not really fair to compare one free day of training run entirely by volunteers with a multi-day, $1,000+ event put on under the direction of a professional event management company.  But there are some parallels. At this SQLSaturday, there was no opening general session, just coffee and pastries in the common area / expo hallway and straight into the first group of sessions.  I don’t know if that was because there was no single room large enough to hold everyone, or for other reasons.  This worked out okay, but the organization guy in me would have preferred to have even a 15 minute welcome message from the organizers with a little overview of the day.  Even something as simple as, “Thanks to persons X, Y, and Z for helping put this together…Sessions will start in 20 minutes and are all in rooms down this hallway…the bathrooms are on the other side of the conference center…lunch today is pizza and we would like to thank sponsor Q for providing it.”  It doesn’t need to be much, certainly not a full-blown Keynote like at the PASS Summit, but something to use as a rallying point to pull everyone together and get the day off to an official start would be nice.  Again, there may have been logistical reasons why that was not feasible here.  I’m just putting out my thoughts for other SQLSaturday coordinators to consider. The event overall was great.  I believe that there were over 300 in attendance, and everything seemed to run smoothly.  At least from an attendee’s point of view where there was plenty of muffins in the morning and pizza in the afternoon, with plenty of pop to drink.  And hey, if you’ve got the food and drink covered, a lot of other stuff could go wrong and people will be very forgiving.  But as I said, everything appeared to run pretty smoothly, at least until Buck Woody showed up in his Oracle shirt.  Other than that, the volunteers did a great job! I was a little surprised by how few people in my own backyard that I know.  It makes sense if you really think about it, given how many companies must be using SQL Server around here.  I guess I just got spoiled coming into the PASS Summit with a few contacts that I already knew would be there.  Perhaps I have been spending too much time with too few people at the Summits and I need to step out and meet more folks.  Of course, it also is different since the Summit is the big national event and a number of the folks I know are spread out across the country, so the Summit is the only time we’re all in the same place at the same time.  I did make a few new contacts at SQLSaturday, and bumped into a couple of people that I knew (and a couple others that I only knew from Twitter, and didn’t even realize that they were here in the area). Other than the sheer entertainment value of Buck Woody’s session, the one that was probably the greatest value for me was a quick introduction to PowerShell.  I have not done anything with it yet, but I think it will be a good tool to use to implement my plans for automated database recovery testing.  I saw just enough at the session to take away some of the intimidation factor, and I am getting ready to jump in and see what I can put together in the next few weeks.  And that right there made the investment worthwhile.  So I encourage you, if you have the opportunity to go to a SQLSaturday event near you, go for it!

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  • What Apache/PHP configurations do you know and how good are they?

    - by FractalizeR
    Hello. I wanted to ask you about PHP/Apache configuration methods you know, their pros and cons. I will start myself: ---------------- PHP as Apache module---------------- Pros: good speed since you don't need to start exe every time especially in mpm-worker mode. You can also use various PHP accelerators in this mode like APC or eAccelerator. Cons: if you are running apache in mpm-worker mode, you may face stability issues because every glitch in any php script will lead to unstability to the whole thread pool of that apache process. Also in this mode all scripts are executed on behalf of apache user. This is bad for security. mpm-worker configuration requires PHP compiled in thread-safe mode. At least CentOS and RedHat default repositories doesn't have thread-safe PHP version so on these OSes you need to compile at least PHP yourself (there is a way to activate worker mpm on Apache). The use of thread-safe PHP binaries is considered experimental and unstable. Plus, many PHP extensions does not support thread-safe mode or were not well-tested in thread-safe mode. ---------------- PHP as CGI ---------------- This seems to be the slowest default configuration which seems to be a "con" itself ;) ---------------- PHP as CGI via mod_suphp ---------------- Pros: suphp allows you to execute php scipts on behalf of the script file owner. This way you can securely separate different sites on the same machine. Also, suphp allows to use different php.ini files per virtual host. Cons: PHP in CGI mode means less performance. In this mode you can't use php accelerators like APC because each time new process is spawned to handle script rendering the cache of previous process useless. BTW, do you know the way to apply some accelerator in this config? I heard something about using shm for php bytecode cache. Also, you cannot configure PHP via .htaccess files in this mode. You will need to install PECL htscanner for this if you need to set various per-script options via .htaccess (php_value / php_flag directives) ---------------- PHP as CGI via suexec ---------------- This configuration looks the same as with suphp, but I heard, that it's slower and less safe. Almost same pros and cons apply. ---------------- PHP as FastCGI ---------------- Pros: FastCGI standard allows single php process to handle several scripts before php process is killed. This way you gain performance since no need to spin up new php process for each script. You can also use PHP accelerators in this configuration (see cons section for comment). Also, FCGI almost like suphp also allows php processes to be executed on behalf of some user. mod_fcgid seems to have the most complete fcgi support and flexibility for apache. Cons: The use of php accelerator in fastcgi mode will lead to high memory consumption because each PHP process will have his own bytecode cache (unless there is some accelerator that can use shared memory for bytecode cache. Is there such?). FastCGI is also a little bit complex to configure. You need to create various configuration files and make some configuration modifications. It seems, that fastcgi is the most stable, secure, fast and flexible PHP configuration, however, a bit difficult to be configured. But, may be, I missed something? Comments are welcome!

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  • CodePlex Daily Summary for Monday, May 31, 2010

    CodePlex Daily Summary for Monday, May 31, 2010New ProjectsAndrew's XNA Helpers: A collection of simple, yet useful methods and ways of accessing crucial variables such as the ContentManager or SpriteBatch from anywhere in your ...BASIC-DOS: BASIC-DOS OS Makes It Easier For People To Use DOS As It Comes With An Graphical User Interface That Loads Up During Boot Up. No Need To Type Any C...Chirpy - Visual Studio Add In For Handling Js, Css, and DotLess Files: Mashes, minifies, and validates your javascript, stylesheet, and dotless files.fprparser: Fortify XML Report parser in the form of an Excel Add-inHL7ToXmlConverter: Class library to transform HL7 Version 2.x to HL7Xml Version 2 depends on the used HL7 grammar.imdb movie downloader: basically download info from imdb and it s realy FAST ! need some development about thread pooling and webclient issues.. just try ;) for it run ...IMIfmoOptimisation: Задание по оптимизацииMarketView: MarketViewMediaStreamSources: 这是 CodePlex 上第一个可以呈现视频的 MediaStreamSource 项目。Migrate User Profile Values: A tool to move values between SharePoint 2007 User Profiles. The console application MigrateUserProfileValues.exe will export User Profile values ...Nexus6Studio Development Space: This is a working repository for development efforst of the Nexus6studio team.Project BlueLabel: BlueLabelSergioTools: SergioTools is a collection of tools and sample codes to help C# developers to improve your productivity and skills.SharePoint Property Bag Settings 2010: The Property Bag Settings can store any metadata as Key-Value pairs such as connection strings, server names, file paths, and other miscellaneous s...Silverlight Isolated Storage Cache: IsoCache is a small framework the make it easy to store dll's and xap files in the isolated storage so they can be use to speed up the startup of t...StackPivot: StackPivot is an app which can generate Microsoft Pivot "Collections" on-the-fly based on the data collected from the Stack Exchange APIs. Its d...Suspension Calculator: The Suspension Calculator aims to help people who are building race cars perform suspension related calculations. The calculations vary from motion...TFS Timesheets: A custom work item control for Team Foundation Server that allows timesheet data to be captured against a work item.Umbraco Membership infrastructure: Improvements to the Umbraco membership API implemented as a package. Includes user properties and improved membership API support.VolgaTransTelecomClient: VolgaTransTelecomClient makes it easier for clients of "Volga TransTelecom" company to get info about account. It's developed in C#.Wouter's SharePoint Demo Land: This site contains many of the SharePoint demos that I create while training or hobbying, both for the 2007 and the 2010 release. Please click the...New ReleasesAgUnit - Silverlight unit testing with ReSharper: AgUnit 0.1: Initial release of AgUnit. Copy the extracted files from AgUnit-0.1-ReSharper5.0.zip into the "Bin\Plugins\" folder of your ReSharper installatio...Andrew's XNA Helpers: Andrew's XNA Helpers v1: My first version of my Library of XNA Helpers. Includes: Variables class - A static class that can be accessed anywhere throughout your project -...Clean your Database: Database Cleaner Setup: Database Cleaner SetupClean your Database: Database Cleaner Source: Database Cleaner Source codeCommunity Forums NNTP bridge: Community Forums NNTP Bridge V16: Release of the Community Forums NNTP Bridge to access the social and anwsers MS forums with a single, open source NNTP bridge. This release has add...Community Forums NNTP bridge: Community Forums NNTP Bridge V17: Release of the Community Forums NNTP Bridge to access the social and anwsers MS forums with a single, open source NNTP bridge. This release is prim...Folder Bookmarks: Folder Bookmarks 1.5.8: The latest version of Folder Bookmarks (1.5.8), with new GUI improvements and 'Help' feature - all the instructions needed to use the software (If ...HL7ToXmlConverter: HL7ToXmlConverter Version 0.0.0.9: First distribution on codepleximdb movie downloader: 0.9 Fist Tryout of MyImdb SourceCode: Fist Tryout of MyImdb SourceCodeLightweight Fluent Workflow: Objectflow 1.0.0.2: The features of this release take advantage of .Net 3.5 featrures; Lamda support is back for Constraints and Functions can now be used in workflows...MDownloader: MDownloader-0.15.16.59384: Fixed password detector in context of .rar files. Fixed FileFactory provider implementation. Fixed detection of internet connection failures.MediaStreamSources: MediaStreamSources 1.0 Beta1: 1.0 Beta1Mongodb Management Studio: Mongodb Management Studio v1.1: MongodbManagementStudio v1.1 1.服务器管理功能 添加服务器,删除服务器 2.服务器,数据库,表,列,索引,树形显示和状态信息查看 3.查询分析器功能. 支持select,insert,Delete,update 支持自定义分页函数 $rowid(1,5) 查询...Multiplayer Quiz: Release 1_7_1_0: Latest Release. .NET 4.0 required to run server, and recommended for client. Download: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=9cf...SCSM PowerShell Cmdlets: SCSM PowerShell Cmdlets Version 0.1.1: First release! This is a minimal build with limited funcitonallity. Should be handled as a preview of what's to come. Included Cmdlets are: New-...SharePoint Property Bag Settings 2010: PropertyBagSettings2010.wsp: The SharePoint Property Bag Settings is a reusable component that you can include in your own SharePoint applications. It can store simple types, s...Sharp Tests Ex: Sharp Tests Ex 1.0.0RTM: Project Description #TestsEx (Sharp Tests Extensions) is a set of extensible extensions. The main target is write short assertions where the Visual...Silverlight Testing Automation Tool: StatLight V1.1: FeaturesApplied some UnitDriven specific changes from justncase80/StatLight Updated to the 0.0.5 release over on rul:UnitDriven.codeplex.com Upda...SQL Server 2005 and 2008 - Backup, Integrity Check and Index Optimization: 30 May 2010: This is the latest version of my solution for Backup, Integrity Check and Index Optimization in SQL Server 2005, SQL Server 2008 and SQL Server 200...Suspension Calculator: SuspensionCalculator_V1.0.0.29: The Suspension Calculator aims to help people who are building race cars perform suspension related calculations. The calculations vary from motion...Svn2Svn: copy, sync, replay or reflect changes across SVN repositories: 1.2 (Beta): Build 1.2.8932.0. Added /incremental (/i) mode, svn2svn detects all previously synced revisions and starts at the latest revision that has not bee...VCC: Latest build, v2.1.30530.0: Automatic drop of latest buildVolgaTransTelecomClient: V.1.0.2.0: v.1.0.2.0 releaseWatchersNET.SkinObjects.ModulActionsMenu: ModulActionsMenu 01.00.01: changes CSS Fixed for the Microsoft Internet ExplorerWouter's SharePoint Demo Land: Navigation Service Basic: This sample shows how to create a simple Service Application for SharePoint 2010. You can read up on the how and why on my blog series about Serv...Most Popular ProjectsRawrWBFS ManagerAJAX Control ToolkitMicrosoft SQL Server Product Samples: DatabaseSilverlight ToolkitWindows Presentation Foundation (WPF)patterns & practices – Enterprise LibraryMicrosoft SQL Server Community & SamplesPHPExcelASP.NETMost Active ProjectsCommunity Forums NNTP bridgeAStar.netpatterns & practices – Enterprise LibraryBlogEngine.NETGMap.NET - Great Maps for Windows Forms & PresentationMirror Testing SystemIonics Isapi Rewrite FilterCustomer Portal Accelerator for Microsoft Dynamics CRMN2 CMSpatterns & practices: Windows Azure Security Guidance

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  • A New Threat To Web Applications: Connection String Parameter Pollution (CSPP)

    - by eric.maurice
    Hi, this is Shaomin Wang. I am a security analyst in Oracle's Security Alerts Group. My primary responsibility is to evaluate the security vulnerabilities reported externally by security researchers on Oracle Fusion Middleware and to ensure timely resolution through the Critical Patch Update. Today, I am going to talk about a serious type of attack: Connection String Parameter Pollution (CSPP). Earlier this year, at the Black Hat DC 2010 Conference, two Spanish security researchers, Jose Palazon and Chema Alonso, unveiled a new class of security vulnerabilities, which target insecure dynamic connections between web applications and databases. The attack called Connection String Parameter Pollution (CSPP) exploits specifically the semicolon delimited database connection strings that are constructed dynamically based on the user inputs from web applications. CSPP, if carried out successfully, can be used to steal user identities and hijack web credentials. CSPP is a high risk attack because of the relative ease with which it can be carried out (low access complexity) and the potential results it can have (high impact). In today's blog, we are going to first look at what connection strings are and then review the different ways connection string injections can be leveraged by malicious hackers. We will then discuss how CSPP differs from traditional connection string injection, and the measures organizations can take to prevent this kind of attacks. In web applications, a connection string is a set of values that specifies information to connect to backend data repositories, in most cases, databases. The connection string is passed to a provider or driver to initiate a connection. Vendors or manufacturers write their own providers for different databases. Since there are many different providers and each provider has multiple ways to make a connection, there are many different ways to write a connection string. Here are some examples of connection strings from Oracle Data Provider for .Net/ODP.Net: Oracle Data Provider for .Net / ODP.Net; Manufacturer: Oracle; Type: .NET Framework Class Library: - Using TNS Data Source = orcl; User ID = myUsername; Password = myPassword; - Using integrated security Data Source = orcl; Integrated Security = SSPI; - Using the Easy Connect Naming Method Data Source = username/password@//myserver:1521/my.server.com - Specifying Pooling parameters Data Source=myOracleDB; User Id=myUsername; Password=myPassword; Min Pool Size=10; Connection Lifetime=120; Connection Timeout=60; Incr Pool Size=5; Decr Pool Size=2; There are many variations of the connection strings, but the majority of connection strings are key value pairs delimited by semicolons. Attacks on connection strings are not new (see for example, this SANS White Paper on Securing SQL Connection String). Connection strings are vulnerable to injection attacks when dynamic string concatenation is used to build connection strings based on user input. When the user input is not validated or filtered, and malicious text or characters are not properly escaped, an attacker can potentially access sensitive data or resources. For a number of years now, vendors, including Oracle, have created connection string builder class tools to help developers generate valid connection strings and potentially prevent this kind of vulnerability. Unfortunately, not all application developers use these utilities because they are not aware of the danger posed by this kind of attacks. So how are Connection String parameter Pollution (CSPP) attacks different from traditional Connection String Injection attacks? First, let's look at what parameter pollution attacks are. Parameter pollution is a technique, which typically involves appending repeating parameters to the request strings to attack the receiving end. Much of the public attention around parameter pollution was initiated as a result of a presentation on HTTP Parameter Pollution attacks by Stefano Di Paola and Luca Carettoni delivered at the 2009 Appsec OWASP Conference in Poland. In HTTP Parameter Pollution attacks, an attacker submits additional parameters in HTTP GET/POST to a web application, and if these parameters have the same name as an existing parameter, the web application may react in different ways depends on how the web application and web server deal with multiple parameters with the same name. When applied to connections strings, the rule for the majority of database providers is the "last one wins" algorithm. If a KEYWORD=VALUE pair occurs more than once in the connection string, the value associated with the LAST occurrence is used. This opens the door to some serious attacks. By way of example, in a web application, a user enters username and password; a subsequent connection string is generated to connect to the back end database. Data Source = myDataSource; Initial Catalog = db; Integrated Security = no; User ID = myUsername; Password = XXX; In the password field, if the attacker enters "xxx; Integrated Security = true", the connection string becomes, Data Source = myDataSource; Initial Catalog = db; Integrated Security = no; User ID = myUsername; Password = XXX; Intergrated Security = true; Under the "last one wins" principle, the web application will then try to connect to the database using the operating system account under which the application is running to bypass normal authentication. CSPP poses serious risks for unprepared organizations. It can be particularly dangerous if an Enterprise Systems Management web front-end is compromised, because attackers can then gain access to control panels to configure databases, systems accounts, etc. Fortunately, organizations can take steps to prevent this kind of attacks. CSPP falls into the Injection category of attacks like Cross Site Scripting or SQL Injection, which are made possible when inputs from users are not properly escaped or sanitized. Escaping is a technique used to ensure that characters (mostly from user inputs) are treated as data, not as characters, that is relevant to the interpreter's parser. Software developers need to become aware of the danger of these attacks and learn about the defenses mechanism they need to introduce in their code. As well, software vendors need to provide templates or classes to facilitate coding and eliminate developers' guesswork for protecting against such vulnerabilities. Oracle has introduced the OracleConnectionStringBuilder class in Oracle Data Provider for .NET. Using this class, developers can employ a configuration file to provide the connection string and/or dynamically set the values through key/value pairs. It makes creating connection strings less error-prone and easier to manager, and ultimately using the OracleConnectionStringBuilder class provides better security against injection into connection strings. For More Information: - The OracleConnectionStringBuilder is located at http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/B28359_01/win.111/b28375/OracleConnectionStringBuilderClass.htm - Oracle has developed a publicly available course on preventing SQL Injections. The Server Technologies Curriculum course "Defending Against SQL Injection Attacks!" is located at http://st-curriculum.oracle.com/tutorial/SQLInjection/index.htm - The OWASP web site also provides a number of useful resources. It is located at http://www.owasp.org/index.php/Main_Page

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  • Patch an Existing NK.BIN

    - by Kate Moss' Open Space
    As you know, we can use MAKEIMG.EXE tool to create OS Image file, NK.BIN, or ROMIMAGE.EXE with a BIB for more accurate. But what if the image file is already created but need to be patched or you want to extract a file from NK.BIN? The Platform Builder provide many useful command line utilities, and today I am going to introduce one, BINMOD.EXE. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee504622.aspx is the official page for BINMOD tool. As the page says, The BinMod Tool (binmod.exe) extracts files from a run-time image, and replaces files in a run-time image and its usage binmod [-i imagename] [-r replacement_filename.ext | -e extraction_filename.ext] This is a simple tool and is easy to use, if we want to extract a file from nk.bin, just type binmod –i nk.bin –e filename.ext And that's it! Or use can try -r command to replace a file inside NK.BIN. The small tool is good but there is a limitation; due to the files in MODULES section are fixed up during ROMIMAGE so the original file format is not preserved, therefore extract or replace file in MODULE section will be impossible. So just like this small tool, this post supposed to be end here, right? Nah... It is not that easy. Just try the above example, and you will find, the tool is not work! Double check the file is in FILES section and the NK.BIN is good, but it just quits. Before you throw away this useless toy, we can try to fix it! Yes, the source of this tool is available in your CE6, private\winceos\COREOS\nk\tools\romimage\binmod. As it is a tool run in your Windows so you need to Windows SDK or Visual Studio to build the code. (I am going to save you some time by skipping the detail as building a desktop console mode program is fairly trivial) The cbinmod.cpp is the core logic for this program and follow up the error message we got, it looks like the following code is suspected.   //   // Extra sanity check...   //   if((DWORD)(HIWORD(pTOCLoc->dllfirst) << 16) <= pTOCLoc->dlllast &&       (DWORD)(LOWORD(pTOCLoc->dllfirst) << 16) <= pTOCLoc->dlllast)   {     dprintf("Found pTOC  = 0x%08x\n", (DWORD)dwpTOC);     fFoundIt = true;     break;   }    else    {     dprintf("NOTICE! Record %d looked like a TOC except DLL first = 0x%08X, and DLL last = 0x%08X\r\n", i, pTOCLoc->dllfirst, pTOCLoc->dlllast);   } The logic checks if dllfirst <= dlllast but look closer, the code only separated the high/low WORD from dllfirst but does not apply the same to dlllast, is that on purpose or a bug? While the TOC is created by ROMIMAGE.EXE, so let's move to ROMIMAGE. In private\winceos\coreos\nk\tools\romimage\romimage\bin.cpp    Module::s_romhdr.dllfirst  = (HIWORD(xip_mem->dll_data_bottom) << 16) | HIWORD(xip_mem->kernel_dll_bottom);   Module::s_romhdr.dlllast   = (HIWORD(xip_mem->dll_data_top) << 16)    | HIWORD(xip_mem->kernel_dll_top); It is clear now, the high word of dll first is the upper 16 bits of XIP DLL bottom and the low word is the upper 16 bits of kernel dll bottom; also, the high word of dll last is the upper 16 bits of XIP DLL top and the low word is the upper 16 bits of kernel dll top. Obviously, the correct statement should be if((DWORD)(HIWORD(pTOCLoc->dllfirst) << 16) <= (DWORD)(HIWORD(pTOCLoc->dlllast) << 16) &&    (DWORD)(LOWORD(pTOCLoc->dllfirst) << 16) <= (DWORD)(LOWORD(pTOCLoc->dlllast) << 16)) So update the code like this should fix this issue or just like the comment, it is an extra sanity check, you can just get rid of it, either way can make the code moving forward and everything worked as advertised.  "Extracting out copies of files from the nk.bin... replacing files... etc." Since the NK.BIN can be compressed, so the BinMod needs the compress.dll to decompress the data, the DLL can be found in C:\program files\microsoft platform builder\6.00\cepb\idevs\imgutils.

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  • How to Use Steam In-Home Streaming

    - by Chris Hoffman
    Steam’s In-Home Streaming is now available to everyone, allowing you to stream PC games from one PC to another PC on the same local network. Use your gaming PC to power your laptops and home theater system. This feature doesn’t allow you to stream games over the Internet, only the same local network. Even if you tricked Steam, you probably wouldn’t get good streaming performance over the Internet. Why Stream? When you use Steam In-Home streaming, one PC sends its video and audio to another PC. The other PC views the video and audio like it’s watching a movie, sending back mouse, keyboard, and controller input to the other PC. This allows you to have a fast gaming PC power your gaming experience on slower PCs. For example, you could play graphically demanding games on a laptop in another room of your house, even if that laptop has slower integrated graphics. You could connect a slower PC to your television and use your gaming PC without hauling it into a different room in your house. Streaming also enables cross-platform compatibility. You could have a Windows gaming PC and stream games to a Mac or Linux system. This will be Valve’s official solution for compatibility with old Windows-only games on the Linux (Steam OS) Steam Machines arriving later this year. NVIDIA offers their own game streaming solution, but it requires certain NVIDIA graphics hardware and can only stream to an NVIDIA Shield device. How to Get Started In-Home Streaming is simple to use and doesn’t require any complex configuration — or any configuration, really. First, log into the Steam program on a Windows PC. This should ideally be a powerful gaming PC with a powerful CPU and fast graphics hardware. Install the games you want to stream if you haven’t already — you’ll be streaming from your PC, not from Valve’s servers. (Valve will eventually allow you to stream games from Mac OS X, Linux, and Steam OS systems, but that feature isn’t yet available. You can still stream games to these other operating systems.) Next, log into Steam on another computer on the same network with the same Steam username. Both computers have to be on the same subnet of the same local network. You’ll see the games installed on your other PC in the Steam client’s library. Click the Stream button to start streaming a game from your other PC. The game will launch on your host PC, and it will send its audio and video to the PC in front of you. Your input on the client will be sent back to the server. Be sure to update Steam on both computers if you don’t see this feature. Use the Steam > Check for Updates option within Steam and install the latest update. Updating to the latest graphics drivers for your computer’s hardware is always a good idea, too. Improving Performance Here’s what Valve recommends for good streaming performance: Host PC: A quad-core CPU for the computer running the game, minimum. The computer needs enough processor power to run the game, compress the video and audio, and send it over the network with low latency. Streaming Client: A GPU that supports hardware-accelerated H.264 decoding on the client PC. This hardware is included on all recent laptops and PCs. Ifyou have an older PC or netbook, it may not be able to decode the video stream quickly enough. Network Hardware: A wired network connection is ideal. You may have success with wireless N or AC networks with good signals, but this isn’t guaranteed. Game Settings: While streaming a game, visit the game’s setting screen and lower the resolution or turn off VSync to speed things up. In-Home Steaming Settings: On the host PC, click Steam > Settings and select In-Home Streaming to view the In-Home Streaming settings. You can modify your streaming settings to improve performance and reduce latency. Feel free to experiment with the options here and see how they affect performance — they should be self-explanatory. Check Valve’s In-Home Streaming documentation for troubleshooting information. You can also try streaming non-Steam games. Click Games > Add a Non-Steam Game to My Library on your host PC and add a PC game you have installed elsewhere on your system. You can then try streaming it from your client PC. Valve says this “may work but is not officially supported.” Image Credit: Robert Couse-Baker on Flickr, Milestoned on Flickr

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  • How could I stop ssh offering a wrong key?

    - by Alvaro Maceda
    (This is a problem with ssh, not gitolite) I've configured gitolite on my home server (ubuntu 12.04 server, open-ssh). I want an special identityfile to administer the repositories, so I need to access throught ssh to my own host ussing two different identity keys. This is the content of my .ssh/config file: Host gitadmin.gammu.com User git IdentityFile /home/alvaro/.ssh/id_gitolite_mantra Host git.gammu.com User git IdentityFile /home/alvaro/.ssh/id_alvaro_mantra This is the content of my hosts file: # Git 127.0.0.1 gitadmin.gammu.com 127.0.0.1 git.gammu.com So I should be able to communicate with gitolite this way to access with the "normal" account: $ssh git.gammu.com and this way to access with the administrative account: $ssh gitadmin.gammu.com When I try to access with the normal account, all is ok: alvaro@mantra:~/.ssh$ ssh git.gammu.com PTY allocation request failed on channel 0 hello alvaro, this is gitolite 2.2-1 (Debian) running on git 1.7.9.5 the gitolite config gives you the following access: @R_ @W_ testing Connection to git.gammu.com closed. When I do the same with the administrative account: alvaro@mantra:~$ ssh gitadmin.gammu.com PTY allocation request failed on channel 0 hello alvaro, this is gitolite 2.2-1 (Debian) running on git 1.7.9.5 the gitolite config gives you the following access: @R_ @W_ testing Connection to gitadmin.gammu.com closed. It should show the administrative repository. If I launch ssh with verbose option: ssh -vvv gitadmin.gammu.com ... debug1: SSH2_MSG_SERVICE_REQUEST sent debug2: service_accept: ssh-userauth debug1: SSH2_MSG_SERVICE_ACCEPT received debug2: key: /home/alvaro/.ssh/id_alvaro_mantra (0x7f7cb6c0fbc0) debug2: key: /home/alvaro/.ssh/id_gitolite_mantra (0x7f7cb6c044d0) debug1: Authentications that can continue: publickey,password debug3: start over, passed a different list publickey,password debug3: preferred gssapi-keyex,gssapi-with-mic,publickey,keyboard-interactive,password debug3: authmethod_lookup publickey debug3: remaining preferred: keyboard-interactive,password debug3: authmethod_is_enabled publickey debug1: Next authentication method: publickey debug1: Offering RSA public key: /home/alvaro/.ssh/id_alvaro_mantra debug3: send_pubkey_test debug2: we sent a publickey packet, wait for reply debug1: Server accepts key: pkalg ssh-rsa blen 279 ... It's offering the key id_alvaro_mantra, and it should'nt!! The same happens when I specify the key with the -i option: ssh -i /home/alvaro/.ssh/id_gitolite_mantra -vvv gitadmin.gammu.com ... debug1: SSH2_MSG_SERVICE_REQUEST sent debug2: service_accept: ssh-userauth debug1: SSH2_MSG_SERVICE_ACCEPT received debug2: key: /home/alvaro/.ssh/id_alvaro_mantra (0x7fa365237f90) debug2: key: /home/alvaro/.ssh/id_gitolite_mantra (0x7fa365230550) debug2: key: /home/alvaro/.ssh/id_gitolite_mantra (0x7fa365231050) debug1: Authentications that can continue: publickey,password debug3: start over, passed a different list publickey,password debug3: preferred gssapi-keyex,gssapi-with-mic,publickey,keyboard-interactive,password debug3: authmethod_lookup publickey debug3: remaining preferred: keyboard-interactive,password debug3: authmethod_is_enabled publickey debug1: Next authentication method: publickey debug1: Offering RSA public key: /home/alvaro/.ssh/id_alvaro_mantra debug3: send_pubkey_test debug2: we sent a publickey packet, wait for reply debug1: Server accepts key: pkalg ssh-rsa blen 279 debug2: input_userauth_pk_ok: fp 36:b1:43:36:af:4f:00:e5:e1:39:50:7e:07:80:14:26 debug3: sign_and_send_pubkey: RSA 36:b1:43:36:af:4f:00:e5:e1:39:50:7e:07:80:14:26 debug1: Authentication succeeded (publickey). ... What the hell is happening??? I'm missing something, but I can't find what. These are the contents of my home dir: -rw-rw-r-- 1 alvaro alvaro 395 nov 14 18:00 authorized_keys -rw-rw-r-- 1 alvaro alvaro 326 nov 21 10:21 config -rw------- 1 alvaro alvaro 137 nov 20 20:26 environment -rw------- 1 alvaro alvaro 1766 nov 20 21:41 id_alvaromaceda.es -rw-r--r-- 1 alvaro alvaro 404 nov 20 21:41 id_alvaromaceda.es.pub -rw------- 1 alvaro alvaro 1766 nov 14 17:59 id_alvaro_mantra -rw-r--r-- 1 alvaro alvaro 395 nov 14 17:59 id_alvaro_mantra.pub -rw------- 1 alvaro alvaro 771 nov 14 18:03 id_developer_mantra -rw------- 1 alvaro alvaro 1679 nov 20 12:37 id_dos_pruebasgit -rw-r--r-- 1 alvaro alvaro 395 nov 20 12:37 id_dos_pruebasgit.pub -rw------- 1 alvaro alvaro 1679 nov 20 12:46 id_gitolite_mantra -rw-r--r-- 1 alvaro alvaro 397 nov 20 12:46 id_gitolite_mantra.pub -rw------- 1 alvaro alvaro 1675 nov 20 21:44 id_gitpruebas.es -rw-r--r-- 1 alvaro alvaro 408 nov 20 21:44 id_gitpruebas.es.pub -rw------- 1 alvaro alvaro 1679 nov 20 12:34 id_uno_pruebasgit -rw-r--r-- 1 alvaro alvaro 395 nov 20 12:34 id_uno_pruebasgit.pub -rw-r--r-- 1 alvaro alvaro 2434 nov 21 10:11 known_hosts There are a bunch of other keys which aren't offered... why id_alvaro_mantra is offered and not the other keys? I can't understand. I need some help, don't know where to look....

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  • A new SQL, a new Analysis Services, a new Workshop! #ssas #sql2012

    - by Marco Russo (SQLBI)
    One week ago Microsoft SQL Server 2012 finally debuted with a virtual launch event and you can find many intro sessions there (20 minutes each). There is a lot of new content available if you want to learn more about SQL 2012 and in this blog post I’d like to provide a few link to sessions, documents, bits and courses that are available now or very soon. First of all, the release of Analysis Services 2012 has finally released PowerPivot 2012 (many of us called it PowerPivot v2 before this official name) and also the new Data Mining Add-in for Microsoft Office 2010, now available also for Excel 64bit! And, of course, don’t miss the Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Feature Pack, there are a lot of upgrades for both DBAs and developers. I just discovered there is a new LocalDB version of SQL Express that can run in user mode without any setup. Is this the end of SQL CE? But now, back to Analysis Services: if you want some tutorial on Tabular, the Microsoft Virtual Academy has a whole track dedicated to Analysis Services 2012 but you will probably be interested also in the one about Reporting Services 2012. If you think that virtual is good but it’s not enough, there are plenty of conferences in the coming months – these are just those where I and Alberto will deliver some SSAS Tabular presentations: SQLBits X, London, March 29-31, 2012: if you are in London or want a good reason to go, this is the most important SQL Server event in Europe this year, no doubts about it. And not only because of the high number of attendees, but also because there is an impressive number of speakers (excluding me, of course) coming from all over the world. This is an event second only to PASS Summit in Seattle so there are no good reasons to not attend it. Microsoft SQL Server & Business Intelligence Conference 2012, Milan, March 28-29, 2012: this is an Italian conference so the language might be a barrier, but many of us also speak English and the food is good! Just a few seats still available. TechEd North America, Orlando, June 11-14, 2012: you know, this is a big event and it contains everything – if you want to spend a whole day learning the SSAS Tabular model with me and Alberto, don’t miss our pre-conference day “Using BISM Tabular in Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services 2012” (be careful, it is on June 10, a nice study-Sunday!). TechEd Europe, Amsterdam, June 26-29, 2012: the European version of TechEd provides almost the same content and you don’t have to go overseas. We also run the same pre-conference day “Using BISM Tabular in Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services 2012” (in this case, it is on June 25, that’s a regular Monday). I and Alberto will also speak at some user group meeting around Europe during… well, we’re going to travel a lot in the next months. In fact, if you want to get a complete training on SSAS Tabular, you should spend two days with us in one of our SSAS Tabular Workshop! We prepared a 2-day seminar, a very intense one, that start from the simple tabular modeling and cover architecture, DAX, query, advanced modeling, security, deployment, optimization, monitoring, relationships with PowerPivot and Multidimensional… Really, there are a lot of stuffs here! We announced the first dates in Europe and also an online edition optimized for America’s time zone: Apr 16-17, 2012 – Amsterdam, Netherlands Apr 26-27, 2012 – Copenhagen, Denmark May 7-8, 2012 – Online for America’s time zone May 14-15, 2012 – Brussels, Belgium May 21-22, 2012 – Oslo, Norway May 24-25, 2012 – Stockholm, Sweden May 28-29, 2012 – London, United Kingdom May 31-Jun 1, 2012 – Milan, Italy (Italian language) Also Chris Webb will join us in this workshop and in every date you can find who is the speaker on the web site. The course is based on our upcoming book, almost 600 pages (!) about SSAS Tabular, an incredible effort that will be available very soon in a preview (rough cuts from O’Reilly) and will be on the shelf in May. I will provide a link to order it as soon as we have one! And if you think that this is not enough… you’re right! Do you know what is the only thing you can do to optimize your Tabular model? Optimize your DAX code. Learning DAX is easy, mastering DAX requires some knowledge… and our DAX Advanced Workshop will provide exactly the required content. Public classes will be available later this year, by now we just deliver it on demand.

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  • MySQL for Excel 1.1.0 GA has been released

    - by Javier Treviño
    The MySQL Windows Experience Team is proud to announce the release of MySQL for Excel version 1.1.0 GA, one of our newest products contained in the MySQL Installer suite. You can download it from our official Downloads page at http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/installer/. The 1.1.0 release of MySQL for Excel introduces the following features: Edit MySQL Data. Edit MySQL Data This may be the coolest feature so far; users will be able to edit the data in a MySQL table using MS Excel in a very friendly and intuitive way.  Edit Data supports inserting new rows, deleting existing rows and updating existing data as easy as playing with data in an Excel’s spreadsheet and pushing changes back to the server.  Also this version contains the following bug fixes: Enabled the following checkboxes in the Append Data's Advanced Options dialog and added code in the Append Data dialog to use the checkboxes as follows: Automatically store the column mapping for the given table     If checked the current mapping will be stored automatically after clicking the Append button if the append operation is successful and there is no mapping for the current connection.schema.table already; the new mapping is stored with a proposed name of Mapping. Reload stored column mapping for the selected table automatically     If checked the first Stored Mapping found where all column names in the source grid match all column names in the target grid is automatically selected and applied when the Append Data dialog is loaded. Fixed code in Append Data that applies a stored column mapping to skip target columns where the associated mapping is empty (saved as a -1). Enclosed the Add-In's startup code in a try-catch block in order to log any possible error thrown during startup; and added information messages to the log at the beginning of the Add-In's startup code and at the end of the shutdown code.  Also changed the wrapper method that calls the MySQLUtility to write messages to the log to make logging easier, thus changed the log call throughout all the code that contains a try-catch block. Added code to the main wix configuration file to check if a newer version is already installed and if so abort the installation Fixed code to refresh the Import Procedure Form's preview grid's data source to repaint its contents every time the Call button is pressed. Added code to re-pull connections after connections are migrated from Excel to Workbench. Fixed code so when the Append Data's Automatic Mapping is performed any subsequent change on a mapping resets the mapping to a Manual Mapping. Added code to the InfoDialog class to set the button text to "Show Details" or "Hide Details" depending on the status of the Details text container. Fixed a GUID in the main wix configuration file so now previous versions are uninstalled during a new installation. Added an option to the Export Data's Advanced Options dialog to remove columns with no data, by default the Export Dialog will only flag those columns as Excluded. Added code to display a warning and paint a column red if the column name in the Export Data dialog is not set, display a warning if the table name is not set, and stack warnings but not display them if a column is Excluded, warnings are displayed normally for columns if they are not Excluded anymore.  Added code to prevent the Append and Export of Data if more than 1 selection is made (selecting more than 1 area holding the Ctrl key while selecting Excel cells). Fixed problem that prevented MySQL for Excel from loading when Display settings in Windows 7 is set to Adjust to Best Performance (Oracle bug 14521405 - UNHANDLED EXCEPTION IS THROWN WHEN LOADING MYSQL FOR EXCEL). Fixed code that renames the auto-generated Primary Key column when the Table name changes since it was not detecting if a column with the same name already existed in the table. The column duplication was not actually happening, it looked that way because the automatically generated PK column was not detecting a column had that same name. Fixed code in Export Data dialog to always set an empty string instead of null to the MySQLDataColumn properties that stores MySQL data types (MySQLDataType, RowsFrom1stDataType and RowsFrom2ndDataType). Added code to display a warning and color red a column which Data Type has not been set by the user or has been manually cleared. Added code to output to the application log exception messages consistently in all places where exceptions are catched. A series of blog posts explaining the new Edit MySQL Data feature and the other existing features are coming in this blog. You can access the MySQL for Excel documentation at http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.5/en/mysql-for-excel.html You can also post questions on our MySQL for Excel forum found at http://forums.mysql.com/. You can also post questions on our MySQL for Excel forum found at http://forums.mysql.com/. Enjoy and thanks for the support!

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  • A new SQL, a new Analysis Services, a new Workshop! #ssas #sql2012

    - by Marco Russo (SQLBI)
    One week ago Microsoft SQL Server 2012 finally debuted with a virtual launch event and you can find many intro sessions there (20 minutes each). There is a lot of new content available if you want to learn more about SQL 2012 and in this blog post I’d like to provide a few link to sessions, documents, bits and courses that are available now or very soon. First of all, the release of Analysis Services 2012 has finally released PowerPivot 2012 (many of us called it PowerPivot v2 before this official name) and also the new Data Mining Add-in for Microsoft Office 2010, now available also for Excel 64bit! And, of course, don’t miss the Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Feature Pack, there are a lot of upgrades for both DBAs and developers. I just discovered there is a new LocalDB version of SQL Express that can run in user mode without any setup. Is this the end of SQL CE? But now, back to Analysis Services: if you want some tutorial on Tabular, the Microsoft Virtual Academy has a whole track dedicated to Analysis Services 2012 but you will probably be interested also in the one about Reporting Services 2012. If you think that virtual is good but it’s not enough, there are plenty of conferences in the coming months – these are just those where I and Alberto will deliver some SSAS Tabular presentations: SQLBits X, London, March 29-31, 2012: if you are in London or want a good reason to go, this is the most important SQL Server event in Europe this year, no doubts about it. And not only because of the high number of attendees, but also because there is an impressive number of speakers (excluding me, of course) coming from all over the world. This is an event second only to PASS Summit in Seattle so there are no good reasons to not attend it. Microsoft SQL Server & Business Intelligence Conference 2012, Milan, March 28-29, 2012: this is an Italian conference so the language might be a barrier, but many of us also speak English and the food is good! Just a few seats still available. TechEd North America, Orlando, June 11-14, 2012: you know, this is a big event and it contains everything – if you want to spend a whole day learning the SSAS Tabular model with me and Alberto, don’t miss our pre-conference day “Using BISM Tabular in Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services 2012” (be careful, it is on June 10, a nice study-Sunday!). TechEd Europe, Amsterdam, June 26-29, 2012: the European version of TechEd provides almost the same content and you don’t have to go overseas. We also run the same pre-conference day “Using BISM Tabular in Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services 2012” (in this case, it is on June 25, that’s a regular Monday). I and Alberto will also speak at some user group meeting around Europe during… well, we’re going to travel a lot in the next months. In fact, if you want to get a complete training on SSAS Tabular, you should spend two days with us in one of our SSAS Tabular Workshop! We prepared a 2-day seminar, a very intense one, that start from the simple tabular modeling and cover architecture, DAX, query, advanced modeling, security, deployment, optimization, monitoring, relationships with PowerPivot and Multidimensional… Really, there are a lot of stuffs here! We announced the first dates in Europe and also an online edition optimized for America’s time zone: Apr 16-17, 2012 – Amsterdam, Netherlands Apr 26-27, 2012 – Copenhagen, Denmark May 7-8, 2012 – Online for America’s time zone May 14-15, 2012 – Brussels, Belgium May 21-22, 2012 – Oslo, Norway May 24-25, 2012 – Stockholm, Sweden May 28-29, 2012 – London, United Kingdom May 31-Jun 1, 2012 – Milan, Italy (Italian language) Also Chris Webb will join us in this workshop and in every date you can find who is the speaker on the web site. The course is based on our upcoming book, almost 600 pages (!) about SSAS Tabular, an incredible effort that will be available very soon in a preview (rough cuts from O’Reilly) and will be on the shelf in May. I will provide a link to order it as soon as we have one! And if you think that this is not enough… you’re right! Do you know what is the only thing you can do to optimize your Tabular model? Optimize your DAX code. Learning DAX is easy, mastering DAX requires some knowledge… and our DAX Advanced Workshop will provide exactly the required content. Public classes will be available later this year, by now we just deliver it on demand.

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  • SUPINFO International University in Mauritius

    Since a while I'm considering to pick up my activities as a student and I'd like to get a degree in Computer Science. Personal motivation I mean after all this years as a professional software (and database) developer I have the personal urge to complete this part of my education. Having various certifications by Microsoft and being awarded as an Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) twice looks pretty awesome on a resume but having a "proper" degree would just complete my package. During the last couple of years I already got in touch with C-SAC (local business school with degree courses), the University of Mauritius and BCS, the Chartered Institute for IT to check the options to enroll as an experienced software developer. Quite frankly, it was kind of alienating to receive that feedback: Start from scratch! No seriously? Spending x amount of years to sit for courses that might be outdated and form part of your daily routine? Probably being in an awkward situation in which your professional expertise might exceed the lecturers knowledge? I don't know... but if that's path to walk... Well, then I might have to go for it. SUPINFO International University Some weeks ago I was contacted by the General Manager, Education Recruitment and Development of Medine Education Village, Yamal Matabudul, to have a chat on how the local IT scene, namely the Mauritius Software Craftsmanship Community (MSCC), could assist in their plans to promote their upcoming campus. Medine went into partnership with the French-based SUPINFO International University and Mauritius will be the 36th location world-wide for SUPINFO. Actually, the concept of SUPINFO is very likely to the common understanding of an apprenticeship in Germany. Not only does a student enroll into the programme but will also be placed into various internships as part of the curriculum. It's a big advantage in my opinion as the person stays in touch with the daily procedures and workflows in the real world of IT. Statements like "We just received a 'crash course' of information and learned new technology which is equivalent to 1.5 months of lectures at the university" wouldn't form part of the experience of such an education. Open Day at the Medine Education Village Last Saturday, Medine organised their Open Day and it was the official inauguration of the SUPINFO campus in Mauritius. It's now listed on their website, too - but be warned, the site is mainly in French language although the courses are all done in English. Not only was it a big opportunity to "hang out" on the campus of Medine but it was great to see the first professional partners for their internship programme, too. Oh, just for the records, IOS Indian Ocean Software Ltd. will also be among the future employers for SUPINFO students. More about that in an upcoming blog entry. Open Day at Medine Education Village - SUPINFO International University in Mauritius Mr Alick Mouriesse, President of SUPINFO, arrived the previous day and he gave all attendees a great overview of the roots of SUPINFO, the general development of the educational syllabus and their high emphasis on their partnerships with local IT companies in order to assist their students to get future jobs but also feel the heartbeat of technology live. Something which is completely missing in classic institutions of tertiary education in Computer Science. And since I was on tour with my children, as usual during weekends, he also talked about the outlook of having a SUPINFO campus in Mauritius. Apart from the close connection to IT companies and providing internships to students, SUPINFO clearly works on an international level. Meaning students of SUPINFO can move around the globe and can continue their studies seamlessly. For example, you might enroll for your first year in France, then continue to do 2nd and 3rd year in Canada or any other country with a SUPINFO campus to earn your bachelor degree, and then live and study in Mauritius for the next 2 years to achieve a Master degree. Having a chat with Dale Smith, Expand Technologies, after his interesting session on Technological Entrepreneurship - TechPreneur More questions by other craftsmen of the Mauritius Software Craftsmanship Community And of course, this concept works in any direction, giving Mauritian students a huge (!) opportunity to live, study and work abroad. And thanks to this, Medine already announced that there will be new facilities near Cascavelle to provide dormitories and other facilities to international students coming to our island. Awesome! Okay, but why SUPINFO? Well, coming back to my original statement - I'd like to get a degree in Computer Science - SUPINFO has a process called Validation of Acquired Experience (VAE) which is tailor-made for employees in the field of IT, and allows you to enroll in their course programme. I already got in touch with their online support chat but was only redirected to some FAQs on their website, unfortunately. So, during the Open Day I seized the opportunity to have an one-on-one conversation with Alick Mouriesse, and he clearly encouraged me to gather my certifications and working experience. SUPINFO does an individual evaluation prior to their assignment regarding course level, and hopefully my chances of getting some modules ahead of studies are looking better than compared to the other institutes. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to go down the easy route but why should someone sit for "Database 101" or "Principles of OOP" when applying and preaching database normalisation and practicing Clean Code Developer are like flesh and blood? Anyway, I'll be off to get my transcripts of certificates together with my course assignments from the old days at the university. Yes, I studied Applied Chemistry for a couple of years before intersecting into IT and software development particularly... ;-)

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  • The standards that fail us and the intellectual bubble

    - by Jeff
    There has been a great deal of noise in the techie community about standards, and a sudden and unexplainable hate for Flash. This noise isn't coming from consumers... the countless soccer moms, teens and your weird uncle Bob, it's coming from the people who build (or at least claim to build) the stuff those consumers consume. If you could survey the position of consumers on the topic, they'd likely tell you that they just want stuff on the Web to work.The noise goes something like this: Web standards are the correct and right thing to use across the Intertubes, and anything not a part of those standards (Flash) is bad. Furthermore, the more recent noise is centered around the idea that HTML 5, along with Javascript, is the right thing to use. The arguments against Flash are, well, the truth is I haven't seen a good argument. I see anecdotal nonsense about high CPU usage and things I'd never think to check when I'm watching Piano Cat on YouTube, but these aren't arguments to me. Sure, I've seen it crash a browser a few times, but it's totally rare.But let's go back to standards. Yes, standards have played an important role in establishing the ubiquity of the Web. The protocols themselves, TCP/IP and HTTP, have been critical. HTML, which has served us well for a very long time, established an incredible foundation. Javascript did an OK job, and thanks to clever programmers writing great frameworks like JQuery, is becoming more and more useful. CSS is awful (there, I said it, I feel SO much better), and I'll never understand why it's so disconnected and different from anything else. It doesn't help that it's so widely misinterpreted by different browsers. Still, there's no question that standards are a good thing, and they've been good for the Web, consumers and publishers alike.HTML 4 has been with us for more than a decade. In Web years, that might as well be 80. HTML 5, contrary to popular belief, is not a standard, and likely won't be for many years to come. In fact, the Web hasn't really evolved at all in terms of its standards. The tools that generate the standard markup and script have, but at the end of the day, we're still living with standards that are more than ten years old. The "official" standards process has failed us.The Web evolved anyway, and did not wait for standards bodies to decide what to do next. It evolved in part because Macromedia, then Adobe, kept evolving Flash. In the earlier days, it mostly just did obnoxious splash pages, but then it started doing animation, and then rich apps as they added form input. Eventually it found its killer app: video. Now more than 95% of browsers have Flash installed. Consumers are better for it.But I'll do it one better... I'll go out on a limb and say that Flash is a standard. If it's that pervasive, I don't care what you tell me, it's a standard. Just because a company owns it doesn't mean that it's evil or not a standard. And hey, it pains me to say that as a developer, because I think the dev tools are the suck (more on that in a minute). But again, consumers don't care. They don't even pay for Flash. The bottom line is that if I put something Flash based on the Internet, it's likely that my audience will see it.And what about the speed of standards owned by a company? Look no further than Silverlight. Silverlight 2 (which I consider the "real" start to the story) came out about a year and a half ago. Now version 4 is out, and it has come a very long way in its capabilities. If you believe Riastats.com, more than half of browsers have it now. It didn't have to wait for standards bodies and nerds drafting documents, it's out today. At this rate, Silverlight will be on version 6 or 7 by the time HTML 5 is a ratified standard.Back to the noise, one of the things that has continually disappointed me about this profession is the number of people who get stuck in an intellectual bubble, color it with dogmatic principles, and completely ignore the actual marketplace where this stuff all has to live. We aren't machines; Binary thinking that forces us to choose between "open standards" and "proprietary lock-in" (the most loaded b.s. FUD term evar) isn't smart at all. The truth is that the <object> tag has allowed us to build incredible stuff on top of the old standards, and consumers have benefitted greatly. Consumer desire, capitalism, and yes, standards ratified by nerds who think about this stuff for years have all played a role in the broad adoption of the Interwebs.We could all do without the noise. At the end of the day, I'm going to build stuff for the Web that's good for my users, and I'm not going to base my decisions on a techie bubble religion. Imagine what the brilliant minds behind the noise could do for the Web if they joined me in that pursuit.

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  • Trigger Happy

    - by Tim Dexter
    Its been a while, I know, we’ll say no more OK? I’ll just write …In the latest BIP 11.1.1.6 release and if I’m really honest; the release before this (we'll call it dot 5 for brevity.) The boys and gals in the engine room have been real busy enhancing BIP with some new functionality. Those of you that use the scheduling engine in OBIEE may already know and use the ‘conditional scheduling’ feature. This allows you to be more intelligent about what reports get run and sent to folks on a scheduled basis. You create a ‘trigger’ analysis (answer) that is executed at schedule time prior to the main report. When the schedule rolls around, the trigger is run, if it returns rows, then the main report is run and delivered. If there are no rows returned, then the main report is not run. Useful right? Your users are not bombarded with 20 reports in their inbox every week that they need to wade throu. They get a handful that they know they need to look at. If you ensure you use conditional formatting in the report then they can find the anomalous data in the reports very quickly and move on to the rest of their day more quickly. You could even think of OBIEE as a virtual team member, scouring the data on your behalf 24/7 and letting you know when its found an issue.BI Publisher, wanting the team t-shirt and the khaki pants, has followed suit. You can now set up ‘triggers’ for it to execute before it runs the main report. Just like its big brother, if the scheduled report trigger returns rows of data; it then executes the main report. Otherwise, the report is skipped until the next schedule time rolls around. Sound familiar?BIP differs a little, in that you only need to construct a query to act as the trigger rather than a complete report. Let assume we have a monthly wage by department report on a schedule. We only want to send the report to managers if their departmental wages reach and/or exceed a certain amount. The toughest part about this is coming up with the SQL to test the business rule you want to implement. For my example, its not that tough: select d.department_name, sum(e.salary) as wage_total from employees e, departments d where d.department_id = e.department_id group by d.department_name having sum(e.salary) > 230000 We're looking for departments where the wage cost is greater than 230,000 Dexter Dollars! With a bit of messing I found out you can parametrize the query. Users can then set a value at schedule time if they need to. To create the trigger is straightforward enough. You can create multiple triggers for users to select at schedule time. Notice I also used a parameter in the query, :wamount. Note the matching parameter in the tree on the left. You also dont need to return multiple columns, one is fine, the key is if there are rows returned. You can build the rest of your report as usual. At scheduling time the Schedule tab has a bit more on it. If your users want to set the trigger, they check the Use Trigger box. The page will then pop fields to pick the appropriate trigger they want to use, even a trigger on another data model if needed. Note it will also ask for the parameter value associated with the trigger. At this point you should note that the data model does not make a distinction between trigger and data model (extract) parameters. So users will see the parameters on the General and Schedule tabs. If per chance you do need to just have a trigger parameters. You can just hide them from the report using the Parameters popup in the report designer, just un-check the 'Show' box I have tested the opposite case where you do not want main report parameters seen in the trigger section. BIP handles that for you! Once the report hits its allotted schedule time, the trigger is executed. Based on the results the report will either run or be 'skipped.' Now, you have a smarter scheduler that will only deliver reports when folks need to see them and take action on the contents. More official info here for developers and here for users.

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  • IndyTechFest Recap

    - by Johnm
    The sun had yet to raise above the horizon on Saturday, May 22nd and I was traveling toward the location of the 2010 IndyTechFest. In my freshly awaken, and pre-coffee, state I reflected on the months that preceded this day and how quickly they slipped away. The big day had finally come and the morning dew glistened with a unique brightness that morning. What is this all about? For those who are unfamiliar with IndyTechFest, it is a regional conference held in Indianapolis and hosted by the Indianapolis .NET Developers Association (IndyNDA) and the Indianapolis Professional Association for SQL Server (IndyPASS).  The event presents multiple tracks and sessions covering subjects such as Business Intelligence,  Database Administration, .NET Development, SharePoint Development, Windows Mobile Development as well as non-Microsoft topics such as Lean and MongoDB. This year's event was the third hosting of IndyTechFest. No man is an island No event such as IndyTechFest is executed by a single person. My fellow co-founders, with their highly complementary skill sets and philanthropy make the process very enjoyable. Our amazing volunteers and their aid were indispensible. The generous financial support of our sponsors that made the event and fabulous prizes possible. The spectacular line up of speakers who came from near and far to donate their time and knowledge. Our beloved attendees who sacrificed the first sunny Saturday in weeks to expand their skill sets and network with their peers. We are deeply appreciative. Challenges in preparation With the preparation of any event comes challenges. It is these challenges that makes the process of planning an event so interesting. This year's largest challenge was the location of the event. In the past two years IndyTechFest was held at the Gene B. Glick Junior Achievement Center in Indianapolis. This facility has been the hub of the Indy technical community for many years. As the big day drew near, the facility's availability came into question due to some recent changes that had occurred with those who operated the facility. We began our search for an alternative option. Thankfully, the Marriott Indianapolis East was available, was very spacious and willing to work within the range of our budget. Within days of our event, the decision to move proved to be wise since the prior location had begun renovations to the interior. Whew! Always trust your gut. Every day it's getting better At the ending of each year, we huddle together, review the evaluations and identify an area in which the event could improve. This year's big opportunity for improvement resided in the prize give-away portion at the end of the day. In the 2008 event, admittedly, this portion was rather chaotic, rushed and disorganized. This year, we broke the drawing into two sections, of which each attendee received two tickets. The first ticket was a drawing for the mountain of books that were given away. The second ticket was a drawing for the big prizes, the 2 Xboxes, 3 laptops and iPad. We peppered the ticket drawings with gift card raffles and tossing t-shirts into the audience. If at first you don't succeed, try and try again Each year of IndyTechFest, we have offered a means for ad-hoc sessions or discussion groups to pop-up. To our disappointment it was something that never quite took off. We have always believed that this unique type of session was valuable and wanted to figure out a way to make it work for this year. A special thanks to Alan Stevens, who took on and facilitated the "open space" track and made it an official success. Share with your tweety When the attendee badges were designed we decided to place an emphasis on the attendee's Twitter account as well as the events hash-tag (#IndyTechFest) to encourage some real-time buzz during the day. At the host table we displayed a Twitter feed for all to enjoy. It was quite successful and encouraging use of social media. My badge was missing my Twitter account since it was recently changed. For those who care to follow my rather sparse tweets, my address is @johnnydata. Man, this is one long blog post! All in all it was a very successful event. It is always great to see new faces and meet old friends. The planning for the 2011 IndyTechFest will kick off very soon. We have more capacity for future growth and a truck full of great ideas. Stay tuned!

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  • Configure IPv6 on your Linux system (Ubuntu)

    After the presentation on IPv6 at the first event of the Emtel Knowledge Series and some recent discussion on social media networks with other geeks and Linux interested IT people here in Mauritius, I thought that I should give it a try (finally) and tweak my local network infrastructure. Honestly, I have been to busy with contractual project work and it never really occurred to me to set up IPv6 in my LAN. Well, the following paragraphs are going to shed some light on those aspects of modern computer and network technology. This is the first article in a series on IPv6 configuration: Configure IPv6 on your Linux system DHCPv6: Provide IPv6 information in your local network Enabling DNS for IPv6 infrastructure Accessing your web server via IPv6 Piece of advice: This is based on my findings on the internet while reading other people's helpful articles and going through a couple of man-pages on my local system. Let's embrace IPv6 The basic configuration on Linux is actually very simple as the kernel, operating system, and user-space programs support that protocol natively. If your system is ready to go for IP (aka: IPv4), then you are good to go for anything else. At least, I didn't have to install any additional packages on my system(s). We are going to assign a static IPv6 address to the system. Hence, we have to modify the definition of interfaces and check whether we have an inet6 entry specified. Open your favourite text editor and check the following entries (it should be at least similar to this): $ sudo nano /etc/network/interfaces auto eth0# IPv4 configurationiface eth0 inet static  address 192.168.1.2  network 192.168.1.0  netmask 255.255.255.0  broadcast 192.168.1.255# IPv6 configurationiface eth0 inet6 static  pre-up modprobe ipv6  address 2001:db8:bad:a55::2  netmask 64 Of course, you might have to adjust your interface device (eth0) or you might be interested to have multiple directives for additional devices (eth1, eth2, etc.). The auto instruction takes care that your device is enabled and configured during the booting phase. The use of the pre-up directive depends on your kernel configuration but in most scenarios this might be an optional line. Anyways, it doesn't hurt to have it enabled after all - just to be on the safe side. Next, either restart your network subsystem like so: $ sudo service networking restart Or you might prefer to do it manually with identical parameters, like so: $ sudo ifconfig eth0 inet6 add 2001:db8:bad:a55::2/64 In case that you're logged in remotely into your PC (ie. via ssh), it is highly advised to opt for the second choice and add the device manually. You can check your configuration afterwards with one of the following commands (depends on whether it is installed): $ sudo ifconfig eth0eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:21:5a:50:d7:94            inet addr:192.168.160.2  Bcast:192.168.160.255  Mask:255.255.255.0          inet6 addr: fe80::221:5aff:fe50:d794/64 Scope:Link          inet6 addr: 2001:db8:bad:a55::2/64 Scope:Global          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1 $ sudo ip -6 address show eth03: eth0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qlen 1000    inet6 2001:db8:bad:a55::2/64 scope global        valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever    inet6 fe80::221:5aff:fe50:d794/64 scope link        valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever In both cases, it confirms that our network device has been assigned a valid IPv6 address. That's it in general for your setup on one system. But of course, you might be interested to enable more services for IPv6, especially if you're already running a couple of them in your IP network. More details are available on the official Ubuntu Wiki. Continue to configure your network to provide IPv6 address information automatically in your local infrastructure.

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  • I, Android

    - by andrewbrust
    I’m just back from the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show (CES).  I go to CES to get a sense of what Microsoft is doing in the consumer space, and how people are reacting to it.  When I first went to CES 2 years ago, Steve Ballmer announced the beta of Windows 7 at his keynote address, and the crowd went wild.  When I went again last year, everyone was hoping for a Windows tablet announcement at the Ballmer keynote.  Although they didn’t get one (unless you count the unreleased HP Slate running Windows 7), people continued to show anticipation around Project Natal (which became Xbox 360 Kinect) and around Windows Phone 7.  On the show floor last year, there were machines everywhere running Windows 7, including lots of netbooks.  Microsoft had a serious influence at the show both years. But this year, one brand, one product, one operating system evidenced itself over and over again: Android.  Whether in the multitude of tablet devices that were shown across the show, or the burgeoning number of smartphones shown (including all four forthcoming 4G-LTE handsets at Verizon Wireless’ booth) or the Google TV set top box from Logitech and the embedded implementation in new Sony TV models, Android was was there. There was excitement in the ubiquity of Android 2.2 (Froyo) and the emergence of Android 2.3 (Gingerbread).  There was anticipation around the tablet-optimized Android 3.0 (Honeycomb).  There were highly customized skins.  There was even an official CES Android app for navigating the exhibit halls and planning events.  Android was so ubiquitous, in fact, that it became surprising to find a device that was running anything else.  It was as if Android had become the de facto Original Equipment Manufacturing (OEM) operating system. Motorola’s booth was nothing less than an Android showcase.  And it was large, and it was packed.  Clearly Moto’s fortunes have improved dramatically in the last year and change.  The fact that the company morphed from being a core Windows Mobile OEM to an Android poster child seems non-coincidental to their improved fortunes. Even erstwhile WinMo OEMs who now do produce Windows Phone 7 devices were not pushing them.  Perhaps I missed them, but I couldn’t find WP7 handsets at Samsung’s booth, nor at LG’s.  And since the only carrier exhibiting at the show was Verizon Wireless, which doesn’t yet have WP7 devices, this left Microsoft’s booth as the only place to see the phones. Why is Android so popular with consumer electronics manufacturers in Japan, South Korea, China and Taiwan?  Yes, it’s free, but there’s more to it than that.  Android seems to have succeeded as an OEM OS because it’s directed at OEMs who are permitted to personalize it and extend it, and it provides enough base usability and touch-friendliness that OEMs want it.  In the process, it has become a de facto standard (which makes OEMs want it even more), and has done so in a remarkably short time: the OS was launched on a single phone in the US just 2 1/4 years ago. Despite its success and popularity, Apple’s iOS would never be used by OEMs, because it’s not meant to be embedded and customized, but rather to provide a fully finished experience.  Ironically, Windows Phone 7 is likewise disqualified from such embedded use.  Windows Mobile (6.x and earlier) may have been a candidate had it not atrophied so much in its final 5 years of life. What can Microsoft do?  It could start by developing a true touch-centric OS for tablets, whether that be within Windows 8, or derived from Windows Phone 7.  It would then need to deconstruct that finished product into components, via a new or altered version of Windows Embedded or Windows Embedded Compact.  And if Microsoft went that far, it would only make sense to work with its OEMs and mobile carriers to make certain they showcase their products using the OS at CES, and other consumer electronics venues, prominently. Mostly though, Microsoft would need to decide if it were really committed to putting sustained time, effort and money into a commodity product, especially given the far greater financial return that it now derives from its core Windows and Office franchises. Microsoft would need to see an OEM OS for what it is: a loss leader that helps build brand and platform momentum for up-level products.  Is that enough to make the investment worthwhile?  One thing is certain: if that question is not acknowledged and answered honestly, then any investment will be squandered.

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  • Christmas in the Clouds

    - by andrewbrust
    I have been spending the last 2 weeks immersing myself in a number of Windows Azure and SQL Azure technologies.  And in setting up a new business (I’ll speak more about that in the future), I have also become a customer of Microsoft’s BPOS (Business Productivity Online Services).  In short, it has been a fortnight of Microsoft cloud computing. On the Azure side, I’ve looked, of course, at Web Roles and Worker Roles.  But I’ve also looked at Azure Storage’s REST API (including coding to it directly), I’ve looked at Azure Drive and the new VM Role; I’ve looked quite a bit at SQL Azure (including the project “Houston” Silverlight UI) and I’ve looked at SQL Azure labs’ OData service too. I’ve also looked at DataMarket and its integration with both PowerPivot and native Excel.  Then there’s AppFabric Caching, SQL Azure Reporting (what I could learn of it) and the Visual Studio tooling for Azure, including the storage of certificate-based credentials.  And to round it out with some user stuff, on the BPOS side, I’ve been working with Exchange Online, SharePoint Online and LiveMeeting. I have to say I like a lot of what I’ve been seeing.  Azure’s not perfect, and BPOS certainly isn’t either.  But there’s good stuff in all these products, and there’s a lot of value. Azure Goes Deep Most people know that Web and Worker roles put the platform in charge of spinning virtual machines up and down, and keeping them up to date. But you can go way beyond that now.  The still-in-beta VM Role gives you the power to craft the machine (much as does Amazon’s EC2), though it takes away the platform’s self-managing attributes.  It still spins instances up and down, making drive storage non-durable, but Azure Drive gives you the ability to store VHD files as blobs and mount them as virtual hard drives that are readable and writeable.  Whether with Azure Storage or SQL Azure, Azure does data.  And OData is everywhere.  Azure Table Storage supports an OData Interface.  So does SQL Azure and so does DataMarket (the former project “Dallas”).  That means that Azure data repositories aren’t just straightforward to provision and configure…they’re also easy to program against, from just about any programming environment, in a RESTful manner.  And for more .NET-centric implementations, Azure AppFabric caching takes the technology formerly known as “Velocity” and throws it up into the cloud, speeding data access even more. Snapping in Place Once you get the hang of it, this stuff just starts to work in a way that becomes natural to understand.  I wasn’t expecting that, and I was really happy to discover it. In retrospect, I am not surprised, because I think the various Azure teams are the center of gravity for Redmond’s innovation right now.  The products belie this and so do my observations of the product teams’ motivation and high morale.  It is really good to see this; Microsoft needs to lead somewhere, and they need to be seen as the underdog while doing so.  With Azure, both requirements are in place.   BPOS: Bad Acronym, Easy Setup BPOS is about products you already know; Exchange, SharePoint, Live Meeting and Office Communications Server.  As such, it’s hard not to be underwhelmed by BPOS.  Until you realize how easy it makes it to get all that stuff set up.  I would say that from sign-up to productive use took me about 45 minutes…and that included the time necessary to wrestle with my DNS provider, set up Outlook and my SmartPhone up to talk to the Exchange account, create my SharePoint site collection, and configure the Outlook Conferencing add-in to talk to the provisioned Live Meeting account. Never before did I think setting up my own Exchange mail could come anywhere close to the simplicity of setting up an SMTP/POP account, and yet BPOS actually made it faster.   What I want from my Azure Christmas Next Year Not everything about Microsoft’s cloud is good.  I close this post with a list of things I’d like to see addressed: BPOS offerings are still based on the 2007 Wave of Microsoft server technologies.  We need to get to 2010, and fast.  Arguably, the 2010 products should have been released to the off-premises channel before the on-premise sone.  Office 365 can’t come fast enough. Azure’s Internet tooling and domain naming, is scattered and confusing.  Deployed ASP.NET applications go to cloudapp.net; SQL Azure and Azure storage work off windows.net.  The Azure portal and Project Houston are at azure.com.  Then there’s appfabriclabs.com and sqlazurelabs.com.  There is a new Silverlight portal that replaces most, but not all of the HTML ones.  And Project Houston is Silvelright-based too, though separate from the Silverlight portal tooling. Microsoft is the king off tooling.  They should not make me keep an entire OneNote notebook full of portal links, account names, access keys, assemblies and namespaces and do so much CTRL-C/CTRL-V work.  I’d like to see more project templates, have them automatically reference the appropriate assemblies, generate the right using/Imports statements and prime my config files with the right markup.  Then I want a UI that lets me log in with my Live ID and pick the appropriate project, database, namespace and key string to get set up fast. Beta programs, if they’re open, should onboard me quickly.  I know the process is difficult and everyone’s going as fast as they can.  But I don’t know why it’s so difficult or why it takes so long.  Getting developers up to speed on new features quickly helps popularize the platform.  Make this a priority. Make Azure accessible from the simplicity platforms, i.e. ASP.NET Web Pages (Razor) and LightSwitch.  Support .NET 4 now.  Make WebMatrix, IIS Express and SQL Compact work with the Azure development fabric. Have HTML helpers make Azure programming easier.  Have LightSwitch work with SQL Azure and not require SQL Express.  LightSwitch has some promising Azure integration now.  But we need more.  WebMatrix has none and that’s just silly, now that the Extra Small Instance is being introduced. The Windows Azure Platform Training Kit is great.  But I want Microsoft to make it even better and I want them to evangelize it much more aggressively.  There’s a lot of good material on Azure development out there, but it’s scattered in the same way that the platform is.   The Training Kit ties a lot of disparate stuff together nicely.  Make it known. Should Old Acquaintance Be Forgot All in all, diving deep into Azure was a good way to end the year.  Diving deeper into Azure should a great way to spend next year, not just for me, but for Microsoft too.

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  • Real World Nuget

    - by JoshReuben
    Why Nuget A higher level of granularity for managing references When you have solutions of many projects that depend on solutions of many projects etc à escape from Solution Hell. Links · Using A GUI (Package Explorer) to build packages - http://docs.nuget.org/docs/creating-packages/using-a-gui-to-build-packages · Creating a Nuspec File - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vs2010trainingcourse_aspnetmvcnuget_topic2.aspx · consuming a Nuget Package - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vs2010trainingcourse_aspnetmvcnuget_topic3 · Nuspec reference - http://docs.nuget.org/docs/reference/nuspec-reference · updating packages - http://nuget.codeplex.com/wikipage?title=Updating%20All%20Packages · versioning - http://docs.nuget.org/docs/reference/versioning POC Folder Structure POC Setup Steps · Install package explorer · Source o Create a source solution – configure output directory for projects (Project > Properties > Build > Output Path) · Package o Add assemblies to package from output directory (D&D)- add net folder o File > Export – save .nuspec files and lib contents <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?> <package > <metadata> <id>MyPackage</id> <version>1.0.0.3</version> <title /> <authors>josh-r</authors> <owners /> <requireLicenseAcceptance>false</requireLicenseAcceptance> <description>My package description.</description> <summary /> </metadata> </package> o File > Save – saves .nupkg file · Create Target Solution o In Tools > Options: Configure package source & Add package Select projects: Output from package manager (powershell console) ------- Installing...MyPackage 1.0.0 ------- Added file 'NugetSource.AssemblyA.dll' to folder 'MyPackage.1.0.0\lib'. Added file 'NugetSource.AssemblyA.pdb' to folder 'MyPackage.1.0.0\lib'. Added file 'NugetSource.AssemblyB.dll' to folder 'MyPackage.1.0.0\lib'. Added file 'NugetSource.AssemblyB.pdb' to folder 'MyPackage.1.0.0\lib'. Added file 'MyPackage.1.0.0.nupkg' to folder 'MyPackage.1.0.0'. Successfully installed 'MyPackage 1.0.0'. Added reference 'NugetSource.AssemblyA' to project 'AssemblyX' Added reference 'NugetSource.AssemblyB' to project 'AssemblyX' Added file 'packages.config'. Added file 'packages.config' to project 'AssemblyX' Added file 'repositories.config'. Successfully added 'MyPackage 1.0.0' to AssemblyX. ============================== o Packages folder created at solution level o Packages.config file generated in each project: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <packages>   <package id="MyPackage" version="1.0.0" targetFramework="net40" /> </packages> A local Packages folder is created for package versions installed: Each folder contains the downloaded .nupkg file and its unpacked contents – eg of dlls that the project references Note: this folder is not checked in UpdatePackages o Configure Package Manager to automatically check for updates o Browse packages - It automatically picked up the updates Update Procedure · Modify source · Change source version in assembly info · Build source · Open last package in package explorer · Increment package version number and re-add assemblies · Save package with new version number and export its definition · In target solution – Tools > Manage Nuget Packages – click on All to trigger refresh , then click on recent packages to see updates · If problematic, delete packages folder Versioning uninstall-package mypackage install-package mypackage –version 1.0.0.3 uninstall-package mypackage install-package mypackage –version 1.0.0.4 Dependencies · <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?> <package xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/packaging/2012/06/nuspec.xsd"> <metadata> <id>MyDependentPackage</id> <version>1.0.0</version> <title /> <authors>josh-r</authors> <owners /> <requireLicenseAcceptance>false</requireLicenseAcceptance> <description>My package description.</description> <dependencies> <group targetFramework=".NETFramework4.0"> <dependency id="MyPackage" version="1.0.0.4" /> </group> </dependencies> </metadata> </package> Using NuGet without committing packages to source control http://docs.nuget.org/docs/workflows/using-nuget-without-committing-packages Right click on the Solution node in Solution Explorer and select Enable NuGet Package Restore. — Recall that packages folder is not part of solution If you get downloading package ‘Nuget.build’ failed, config proxy to support certificate for https://nuget.org/api/v2/ & allow unrestricted access to packages.nuget.org To test connectivity: get-package –listavailable To test Nuget Package Restore – delete packages folder and open vs as admin. In nugget msbuild: <Import Project="$(SolutionDir)\.nuget\nuget.targets" /> TFSBuild Integration Modify Nuget.Targets file <RestorePackages Condition="  '$(RestorePackages)' == '' "> True </RestorePackages> … <PackageSource Include="\\IL-CV-004-W7D\Packages" /> Add System Environment variable EnableNuGetPackageRestore=true & restart the “visual studio team foundation build service host” service. Important: Ensure Network Service has access to Packages folder Nugetter TFS Build integration Add Nugetter build process templates to TFS source control For Build Controller - Specify location of custom assemblies Generate .nuspec file from Package Explorer: File > Export Edit the file elements – remove path info from src and target attributes <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?> <package xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/packaging/2012/06/nuspec.xsd">     <metadata>         <id>Common</id>         <version>1.0.0</version>         <title />         <authors>josh-r</authors>         <owners />         <requireLicenseAcceptance>false</requireLicenseAcceptance>         <description>My package description.</description>         <dependencies>             <group targetFramework=".NETFramework3.5" />         </dependencies>     </metadata>     <files>         <file src="CommonTypes.dll" target="CommonTypes.dll" />         <file src="CommonTypes.pdb" target="CommonTypes.pdb" /> … Add .nuspec file to solution so that it is available for build: Dev\NovaNuget\Common\NuSpec\common.1.0.0.nuspec Add a Build Process Definition based on the Nugetter build process template: Configure the build process – specify: · .sln to build · Base path (output directory) · Nuget.exe file path · .nuspec file path Copy DLLs to a binary folder 1) Set copy local for an assembly reference to false 2)  MSBuild Copy Task – modify .csproj file: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/3e54c37h.aspx <ItemGroup>     <MySourceFiles Include="$(MSBuildProjectDirectory)\..\SourceAssemblies\**\*.*" />   </ItemGroup>     <Target Name="BeforeBuild">     <Copy SourceFiles="@(MySourceFiles)" DestinationFolder="bin\debug\SourceAssemblies" />   </Target> 3) Set Probing assembly search path from app.config - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/823z9h8w(v=vs.80).aspx -                 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <configuration>   <runtime>     <assemblyBinding xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1">       <probing privatePath="SourceAssemblies"/>     </assemblyBinding>   </runtime> </configuration> Forcing 'copy local = false' The following generic powershell script was added to the packages install.ps1: param($installPath, $toolsPath, $package, $project) if( $project.Object.Project.Name -ne "CopyPackages") { $asms = $package.AssemblyReferences | %{$_.Name} foreach ($reference in $project.Object.References) { if ($asms -contains $reference.Name + ".dll") { $reference.CopyLocal = $false; } } } An empty project named "CopyPackages" was added to the solution - it references all the packages and is the only one set to CopyLocal="true". No MSBuild knowledge required.

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