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  • How to Save Hundreds or Thousands of Dollars on Cell Phone Service

    - by Chris Hoffman
    Cell phone contracts are bad. You get a seemingly cheap phone up front, but you more than pay for the cost of the phone over two years. Prepaid phone plans are surging in North America for a reason. Prepaid phone plans will be cheaper and more flexible than traditional contracts with big carriers for many people. However much you use your phone, there’s a good chance you can save money with a prepaid service. No More Contracts Here’s how cell phone service typically works in North America: You get a subsidized phone for “free”, $99, or $199. You sign up for a two-year contract and more than pay back the cost of that phone over the length of the contract. This is similar to leasing something or purchasing it on a credit card and paying it back over two years — you spend less up front, but you’re paying more in the long run. But this isn’t the only option. You could opt for a cheaper prepaid service that doesn’t lock you into a contract. If you don’t use your phone much, you could just pay for what you use and avoid the hefty cell phone bills. If you use your phone a lot, you could get a cheaper plan, too. Now, this certainly isn’t for everyone. If you want the latest iPhone or Galaxy smartphone every two years and require a 4G data connection, prepaid services may not be for you. On the other hand, if you don’t need the latest phone, you can save money here. You can also save a huge amount of money if you don’t use your phone much. Phone Options When you choose your prepaid or contract-free service, you’ll often be able to purchase a phone from them. You’ll generally be able to find dirt-cheap dumbphones and the cheapest, slowest Android phones for not very much money. If you are able to buy a top-of-the-line smartphone, you’ll have to pay the full, unsubsidized price. That’s $649 for either an iPhone 5S or Samsung Galaxy S4. Whatever phones the service provider offers, you could always buy a phone elsewhere — for example, you could buy an unsubsidized iPhone direct from Apple and then take it to your cell phone service of choice. Most services will allow you to get a SIM card and pop it into your existing phone rather than purchasing a phone. If you can get a hand-me-down smartphone, you can often save quite a bit of money. For example, you may have a family member upgrading from an iPhone 4S to an iPhone 5S. You could take their phone to a prepaid carrier and have a nicer phone on a cheap cell phone plan. If you brought an old smartphone to a big carrier like AT&T or Verizon, they wouldn’t give you a discount on your monthly plan. You’d have to pay the same amount of money every month as if you had gotten a subsidized phone. Google’s Nexus phones are also great options for people looking to buy smartphones and pay up-front. Google’s Nexus 4 offered a modern, almost top-of-the-line Android smartphone experience at $299 or $349 when it came out last year. Google will soon be releasing the Nexus 5 and it’s expected to be priced at $349. That’s certainly a lot more than a cheap phone, but it’s a fairly high-end smartphone at almost half the price of an iPhone 5S or Galaxy S4. Nexus phones can be purchased online from Google’s Play Store. Service Options When choosing a service, you need to consider what you actually use. If you’re someone who only uses your phone rarely, you can get plans that will allow you to pay as little as a few dollars per month. If you’re someone who’s usually in range of Wi-Fi, you may not need much data at all. If you want a plan with unlimited talk, texting, and data usage, you can get it for much cheaper than you’d pay on a major carrier like AT&T. The options here range from pay-as-you-go plans, like the ones offered by T-Mobile, which allow you to put a certain amount of money in and only drain that balance when you actually use minutes, texts, or data. If you only make a few calls and send a few texts per month, you’d only pay a few bucks. On the other end, Walmart’s Straight Talk service is a popular option that offers unlimited talk, texting, and data at $45 per month. Which service is right for you depends on a lot of things, including your usage and what each network’s coverage is like in your area. You’ll want to do some research of your own before choosing a service. Prepaid services also offer you even more flexibility after you choose one. If you’re not happy or a better deal comes along, you can switch — you’re not locked into your service for two years and you won’t pay an early termination fee. Image Credit: Intel Free Press on Flickr, Jon Fingas on Flickr, John Karakatsanis on Flickr, kendalkinggroup on Flickr     

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  • BUILD 2013 day 1 Keynote recap for devs

    - by pluginbaby
    Only 7 months after the previous BUILD event, Microsoft is hosting a new BUILD conference in San Francisco (June 26-28, 2013).   Notable announcements of day 1: The Windows 8.1 preview is available today Preview of Internet Explorer 11 Visual Studio 2013 Preview and .NET Framework 4.5.1 Preview are both available The Windows Store has been redesigned and is now much more interesting, both for users and developers Windows Phone 8 annual Dev Center registration is reduced to $19 for the next 60 days! (normally $99 for individuals and companies)     Also to check out: Windows 8.1 Preview Product Guide for Developers http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/apps/bg184615 F12 Tools in Internet Explorer 11 Preview has been rebuilt from the ground up: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ie/bg182632   Watch the entire keynote online: http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Build/2013/1-001 Read the full transcript: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/Speeches/2013/06-26Build2013.aspx

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  • What You Said: Your Favorite Windows Customization Tricks

    - by Jason Fitzpatrick
    Earlier this week we asked you to share your favorite Windows customization tricks and now we’re back to highlight some of the tips, tricks, and tweaks you shared. Your customization tips ranged from cosmetic to behind the scenes tweaks and offered a wide variety of ways to customize the Windows experience. Ted Lilley’s favorite must-have tweak involves Windows Explorer: The most fundamental change I make to Windows 7 is to immediately add tabs to Explorer via the QTTabbar add-on. I also add the good old cut/copy/paste/delete/new folder buttons alongside the tabs by installing Classic Shell (I skip Classic Start). Robin sets up virtual desktops: How to Use an Xbox 360 Controller On Your Windows PC Download the Official How-To Geek Trivia App for Windows 8 How to Banish Duplicate Photos with VisiPic

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  • Best Web Site Copying Software

    - by GregH
    I just wanted to get some opinions on the best "web site copying" software out there (free or commercial is fine). I have a site that I've recently become responsible for managing, and the previous consultant has not provided operating system access. As such, the plan is to re-host the web site. I realize there are a lot of different issues to consider in doing this. However, I don't have much choice in the matter now. The plan is to use web site copying software (ala HTTrack) to "rip" the web site, and then modify what is downloaded back in to a maintainable site. This, of course, involves HTML, css, javascript, etc on the front-end. I'd like to recover as much of the site as possible to make re-creating it as easy as possible.

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  • Coherence 3.7.1 Released

    - by JuergenKress
    Oracle Coherence 3.7.1 introduces REST API, exalogic infiniband integration, improved data access performance due to more efficient in-memory and disk-based storage, and query explain plan support and much more, download now! View the webcast: Unbeatable Performance for your Cloud Application Foundation. To download Coherence 3.7.1 please visit OTN. Coherence Screencasts: Coherence 3.7.1 – Extend Only Keys Coherence 3.7.1 – REST Support Coherence 3.7.1 – POF Object Identities and References Coherence 3.7.1 – POF Annotation Support Coherence 3.7.1 – Query Explain Plan For more information please visit the Oracle Coherence Knowledge Base For regular Coherence information become a member in the WebLogic Partner Community please first login at http://partner.oracle.com and then visit: http://www.oracle.com/partners/goto/wls-emea Blog Twitter LinkedIn Mix Forum Wiki Technorati Tags: Coherence,Coherence 3.7.1,Oracle,WebLogic,J2EE caching,OPN,Jürgen Kress

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  • Windows Azure Tools for Microsoft Visual Studio 1.2 (June 2010)

    - by Jim Duffy
    I have good news! Microsoft has released the June 2010 Windows Azure Tools + SDK. These new tools extend Visual Studio (both VS 2010 & VS 2008) for Windows Azure development. With these tools you can create, configure, debug, build, run, and deploy scalable web apps on Windows Azure. At first glance what I see as some of the most interesting points of interest are the fact that Visual Studio 2010 RTM is fully supported as well as .NET 4 support. You can choose to build your apps with the .NET 3.5 or .NET 4 frameworks. Another area of interest that I’ll be digging into is the cloud storage explorer. It provides a read-only view of your Windows Azure tables and blob containers from within Visual Studio via the Server Explorer. I’m sure I’ll have more to say about the Windows Azure Tools as I dig deeper… Have a day. :-|

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  • CloudFlare DNS: Downtime failover host

    - by Dr. McKay
    My company uses CloudFlare for its DNS, but as our site is HTTPS-secured and we're on the free plan, we can't utilize CloudFlare's CDN services. Our host has fairly rare but not insignificant downtime. We can't migrate servers just yet, and I'd like to be able to either have the main domain redirect to the status domain, or simply resolve to the alternative status host in the event of downtime so users will stop bugging me asking if the site is down. Is this possible to do automatically using the free CloudFlare plan, or will I have to manually edit my DNS every time the site goes down?

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  • Software installed on root partition or on home partition

    - by Tim
    I am planning to install some big softwares such as Matlab (4GB), Mathematica (4GB) on my Ubuntu partitions. I was wondering if I installed them on my home partition, when I reinstall Ubuntu without touching the home partition, will the softwares still be runnable after reinstallation? what are the advantage and disadvantages of installing softwares on root partition and of on home partition? with your answer to the previous questions, what are some reasonable plans for the sizes of root partition and of home partition? Note that I would like to learn programming in C, C++, Java, Python, Lisp, databases under both Ubuntu and Windows, and no games. My laptop has around 230 GB, where I plan to install both Windows and Ubuntu, and reserve 40 GB for Ubuntu (three partitions: swap, root and home), 110 GB for NTFS partition shared between the two OSes, 70 GB for Windows OS partition, and 10 GB that can be added to any of the above partitions. I will change my plan according to your suggestions. Thanks and regards!

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  • How to Search File Contents in Windows Server 2008 R2

    - by ybbest
    By default, windows search only search by File name. To configure windows search to search by contents you need configure the following: You need to make sure Windows Search Services feature is activated.(Check this article for details) Then, configure Windows Search by Open file explorer: Press Alt button –> go to tools –> Folder options –> search tab –> Here select, “Always search file names and content(this might take several minutes)” Press okay. Now your searches will work for file content like the good old days of XP. Another way to search the contents in file without Search configuration is to Type “contents:” in the Windows Explorer search box followed by the word, searches text files. This is a search filter which seems to be undocumented?

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  • Is MediaTemple's (gs) really worth the hassle? [closed]

    - by Andrew
    I have been hosting my sites with Dreamhost for a while, and although none of them are high-trafic atm, I am going to a launch a Rails app this summer and a couple of other stuff, so I need a serious host. Since my plan ends in a couple of days, I have been looking at alternatives, and because MT has such a good reputation in the webdesign world, I have been seriously considering paying the ridiculous 20$/month for its shared hosting services. That was until I actually read some reviews of it, most of which indicated it is slow and overpriced. So now I'm wondering whether switching over to (gs) would really be a good idea, or if I would be better off paying less money for something like a Site5 or Hostgator shared hosting plan. What is your experience with MT, and particularly their Grid Service? Do you think I should even switch to (gs) in the first place, or should I choose something else from its competitors?

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  • SQL SERVER – Template Browser – A Very Important and Useful Feature of SSMS

    - by pinaldave
    Let me start today’s blog post with a direction question. How many of you have ever used Template Browser? Template Browser is a very important and useful feature of SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS). Every time when I am talking about SQL Server there is always someone comes up with the question, why there is no step by step procedure included in SSMS for features. Honestly every time I get this question, the question I ask back is How many of you have ever used Template Browser? I think the answer to this question is most of the time either no or we have not heard of the feature. One of the people asked me back – have you ever written about it on your blog? I have not yet written about it. Basically there is nothing much to write about it. It is pretty straight forward feature, like any other feature and it is indeed difficult to elaborate. However, I will try to give a quick introduction to this feature. Templates are like a quick cheat sheet or quick reference. Templates are available to create objects like databases, tables, views, indexes, stored procedures, triggers, statistics, and functions. Templates are also available for Analysis Services as well. The template scripts contain parameters to help you customize the code. You can Replace Template Parameters dialog box to insert values into the script. Additionally users can create new custom templates as well with folder structure. To open a template from Template Explorer Go to View menu >> Template Explorer or type CTRL+ALT+L. You will find a list of categories click on any category and expand the folder structure. For our sample example let us expand Index Folder. In this folder you will notice the various T-SQL Scripts. These scripts can be opened by double click or can be dragged to editor area and modified as needed. Sample template is now available in the query editor area with all the necessary parameter place folder. You can replace the same parameter by typing either CTRL+SHIFT+M or by going to Query Menu >> Specify Values for Template Parameters. In this screen it will show  Specify Values for Template Parameters dialog box, accept the value or replace it with a new value. This will now get your script ready to go. Check it one more time and change the script to fit your requirement. I personally use template explorer for two things. First one is obviously for templates but the hidden one and an important one is for learning new features and T-SQL commands. There is so much to learn and so little time. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Server Management Studio, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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  • systems/software engineering design process

    - by adam kim
    I just developed my first non-trivial android app. It was a complete nightmare. I came up with an idea, build the app, changed my idea, and implemented a lot of input from others on new features. All in all my app took 10 times longer than I think that it should have, it is almost impossible to look the source code and tell what's going on with the classes, and may or may not have unused methods that I'll never be able to find... So I would like an opinion from those of you with experience on how to plan out my designs for the future. I created a flow chart (pencil drawn) of a plan: I would like constructive criticism.

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  • WebCenter Customer Spotlight: Fundação Petrobras de Seguridade Social

    - by me
    Author: Peter Reiser - Social Business Evangelist, Oracle WebCenter Solution Summary Fundação Petrobras de Seguridade Social (PetroS) is a Brazilian nonprofit organization pension fund serving 152 private companies with more then 145,000 plan participants and  managing a portfolio of  US$35.9 billion in equity. PetroS business objective was to implement a robust and flexible online solution to enable the foundation to successfully compete in the pension marketplace. PetroS implemented a robust, flexible and highly available database solution based on Oracle Database 11g, Enterprise Edition and modernized the company’s Web portal using Oracle WebCenter Suite.  The solution enables PetroS to make an average of 5,000 online loans per month to its 110,000 qualifying participants and supports 2,000 online consultations daily. Company ProfileFundação Petrobras de Seguridade Social (Petrobras Social Security Foundation)—better known as PetroS—is a pension fund founded in the 1970s to pay supplementary retirement benefits to Petrobras employees. Later, the foundation expanded its market to include 152 private companies, including Sanasa, Repsol YPF and Alesat. The Foundation, a nonprofit organization, has more than 145,000 plan participants, US$35.9 billion in equity, and a loan portfolio of US$730 million. Business ChallengesPetroS business objectives were to implement a robust and flexible solution to enable the foundation to successfully compete in the pension marketplace without affecting its monthly payments to 60,000 beneficiaries and to extend service delivery through the Web to better serve the fund’s more than 145,000 participants. Solution DeployedPetroS worked with Oracle Consulting to implement a robust, flexible and high available database solution based on Oracle Database 11g, Enterprise Edition and modernized the company’s Web portal using Oracle WebCenter Suite, enabling PetroS to deliver more flexible services to pension plan participants. Business ResultsThe solution enables PetroS to make an average of 5,000 online loans per month to its 110,000 qualifying participants and supports 2,000 online consultations daily. “The combination of Oracle Database 11g and Oracle WebCenter Suite has helped us deliver faster and better service for over 130,000 clients who participate in the 96 supplementary pension plans we currently offer. It has certainly helped to fuel our growth.” Newton Carneiro da Cunha, Diretor Administrativo, Fundação Petrobrás de Seguridade Social           Additional Information PetroS Customer Snapshot Oracle WebCenter Suite Oracle Database 11g, Enterprise Edition Oracle Real Application Clusters Oracle Diagnostics Pack Oracle Tuning Pack Oracle Consulting

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  • How can I convert an image from raw data in Android without any munging?

    - by stephelton
    I have raw image data (may be png, jpg, ...) and I want it converted in Android without changing its pixel depth (bpp). In particular, when I load a grayscale (8 bpp) image that I want to use as alpha (glTexImage() with GL_ALPHA), it converts it to 16 bpp (presumably 5_6_5). While I do have a plan b (actually, I'm probably on plan 'e' by now, this is really becoming annoying) I would really like to discover an easy way to do this using what is readily available in the api. So far, I'm using BitmapFactory.decodeByteArray(). While I'm at it. I'm doing this from a native environment via jni (passing the buffer in from C, and a new buffer back to C from Java). Any portable solution in C/C++ would be preferable, but I don't want to introduce anything that might break in future versions of Android, etc.

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  • Partner Blog Series: PwC Perspectives - The Gotchas, The Do's and Don'ts for IDM Implementations

    - by Tanu Sood
    Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:12.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:12.0pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Arial; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Arial; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6 {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:1; mso-tstyle-colband-size:1; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; border-top:solid #E0301E 1.0pt; mso-border-top-themecolor:accent6; border-left:none; border-bottom:solid #E0301E 1.0pt; mso-border-bottom-themecolor:accent6; border-right:none; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Georgia","serif"; color:black; mso-themecolor:text1; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6FirstRow {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:first-row; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-tstyle-border-top:cell-none; mso-tstyle-border-bottom:1.0pt solid #E0301E; mso-tstyle-border-bottom-themecolor:accent6; font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Georgia; mso-ascii-theme-font:major-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:major-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Georgia; mso-hansi-theme-font:major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:major-bidi;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6LastRow {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:last-row; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-tstyle-border-top:1.0pt solid #E0301E; mso-tstyle-border-top-themecolor:accent6; mso-tstyle-border-bottom:1.0pt solid #E0301E; mso-tstyle-border-bottom-themecolor:accent6; color:#968C6D; mso-themecolor:text2; mso-ansi-font-weight:bold; mso-bidi-font-weight:bold;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6FirstCol {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:first-column; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-ansi-font-weight:bold; mso-bidi-font-weight:bold;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6LastCol {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:last-column; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-tstyle-border-top:1.0pt solid #E0301E; mso-tstyle-border-top-themecolor:accent6; mso-tstyle-border-bottom:1.0pt solid #E0301E; mso-tstyle-border-bottom-themecolor:accent6; mso-ansi-font-weight:bold; mso-bidi-font-weight:bold;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6OddColumn {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:odd-column; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-tstyle-shading:#F7CBC7; mso-tstyle-shading-themecolor:accent6; mso-tstyle-shading-themetint:63;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6OddRow {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:odd-row; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-tstyle-shading:#F7CBC7; mso-tstyle-shading-themecolor:accent6; mso-tstyle-shading-themetint:63;} Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:12.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:12.0pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Arial; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Arial; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6 {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:1; mso-tstyle-colband-size:1; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; border-top:solid #E0301E 1.0pt; mso-border-top-themecolor:accent6; border-left:none; border-bottom:solid #E0301E 1.0pt; mso-border-bottom-themecolor:accent6; border-right:none; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Georgia","serif"; color:black; mso-themecolor:text1; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6FirstRow {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:first-row; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-tstyle-border-top:cell-none; mso-tstyle-border-bottom:1.0pt solid #E0301E; mso-tstyle-border-bottom-themecolor:accent6; font-family:"Arial Narrow","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Georgia; mso-ascii-theme-font:major-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:major-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Georgia; mso-hansi-theme-font:major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:major-bidi;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6LastRow {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:last-row; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-tstyle-border-top:1.0pt solid #E0301E; mso-tstyle-border-top-themecolor:accent6; mso-tstyle-border-bottom:1.0pt solid #E0301E; mso-tstyle-border-bottom-themecolor:accent6; color:#968C6D; mso-themecolor:text2; mso-ansi-font-weight:bold; mso-bidi-font-weight:bold;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6FirstCol {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:first-column; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-ansi-font-weight:bold; mso-bidi-font-weight:bold;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6LastCol {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:last-column; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-tstyle-border-top:1.0pt solid #E0301E; mso-tstyle-border-top-themecolor:accent6; mso-tstyle-border-bottom:1.0pt solid #E0301E; mso-tstyle-border-bottom-themecolor:accent6; mso-ansi-font-weight:bold; mso-bidi-font-weight:bold;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6OddColumn {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:odd-column; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-tstyle-shading:#F7CBC7; mso-tstyle-shading-themecolor:accent6; mso-tstyle-shading-themetint:63;} table.MsoTableMediumList1Accent6OddRow {mso-style-name:"Medium List 1 - Accent 6"; mso-table-condition:odd-row; mso-style-priority:65; mso-style-unhide:no; mso-tstyle-shading:#F7CBC7; mso-tstyle-shading-themecolor:accent6; mso-tstyle-shading-themetint:63;} It is generally accepted among business communities that technology by itself is not a silver bullet to all problems, but when it is combined with leading practices, strategy, careful planning and execution, it can create a recipe for success. This post attempts to highlight some of the best practices along with dos & don’ts that our practice has accumulated over the years in the identity & access management space in general, and also in the context of R2, in particular. Best Practices The following section illustrates the leading practices in “How” to plan, implement and sustain a successful OIM deployment, based on our collective experience. Planning is critical, but often overlooked A common approach to planning an IAM program that we identify with our clients is the three step process involving a current state assessment, a future state roadmap and an executable strategy to get there. It is extremely beneficial for clients to assess their current IAM state, perform gap analysis, document the recommended controls to address the gaps, align future state roadmap to business initiatives and get buy in from all stakeholders involved to improve the chances of success. When designing an enterprise-wide solution, the scalability of the technology must accommodate the future growth of the enterprise and the projected identity transactions over several years. Aligning the implementation schedule of OIM to related information technology projects increases the chances of success. As a baseline, it is recommended to match hardware specifications to the sizing guide for R2 published by Oracle. Adherence to this will help ensure that the hardware used to support OIM will not become a bottleneck as the adoption of new services increases. If your Organization has numerous connected applications that rely on reconciliation to synchronize the access data into OIM, consider hosting dedicated instances to handle reconciliation. Finally, ensure the use of clustered environment for development and have at least three total environments to help facilitate a controlled migration to production. If your Organization is planning to implement role based access control, we recommend performing a role mining exercise and consolidate your enterprise roles to keep them manageable. In addition, many Organizations have multiple approval flows to control access to critical roles, applications and entitlements. If your Organization falls into this category, we highly recommend that you limit the number of approval workflows to a small set. Most Organizations have operations managed across data centers with backend database synchronization, if your Organization falls into this category, ensure that the overall latency between the datacenters when replicating the databases is less than ten milliseconds to ensure that there are no front office performance impacts. Ingredients for a successful implementation During the development phase of your project, there are a number of guidelines that can be followed to help increase the chances for success. Most implementations cannot be completed without the use of customizations. If your implementation requires this, it’s a good practice to perform code reviews to help ensure quality and reduce code bottlenecks related to performance. We have observed at our clients that the development process works best when team members adhere to coding leading practices. Plan for time to correct coding defects and ensure developers are empowered to report their own bugs for maximum transparency. Many organizations struggle with defining a consistent approach to managing logs. This is particularly important due to the amount of information that can be logged by OIM. We recommend Oracle Diagnostics Logging (ODL) as an alternative to be used for logging. ODL allows log files to be formatted in XML for easy parsing and does not require a server restart when the log levels are changed during troubleshooting. Testing is a vital part of any large project, and an OIM R2 implementation is no exception. We suggest that at least one lower environment should use production-like data and connectors. Configurations should match as closely as possible. For example, use secure channels between OIM and target platforms in pre-production environments to test the configurations, the migration processes of certificates, and the additional overhead that encryption could impose. Finally, we ask our clients to perform database backups regularly and before any major change event, such as a patch or migration between environments. In the lowest environments, we recommend to have at least a weekly backup in order to prevent significant loss of time and effort. Similarly, if your organization is using virtual machines for one or more of the environments, it is recommended to take frequent snapshots so that rollbacks can occur in the event of improper configuration. Operate & sustain the solution to derive maximum benefits When migrating OIM R2 to production, it is important to perform certain activities that will help achieve a smoother transition. At our clients, we have seen that splitting the OIM tables into their own tablespaces by categories (physical tables, indexes, etc.) can help manage database growth effectively. If we notice that a client hasn’t enabled the Oracle-recommended indexing in the applicable database, we strongly suggest doing so to improve performance. Additionally, we work with our clients to make sure that the audit level is set to fit the organization’s auditing needs and sometimes even allocate UPA tables and indexes into their own table-space for better maintenance. Finally, many of our clients have set up schedules for reconciliation tables to be archived at regular intervals in order to keep the size of the database(s) reasonable and result in optimal database performance. For our clients that anticipate availability issues with target applications, we strongly encourage the use of the offline provisioning capabilities of OIM R2. This reduces the provisioning process for a given target application dependency on target availability and help avoid broken workflows. To account for this and other abnormalities, we also advocate that OIM’s monitoring controls be configured to alert administrators on any abnormal situations. Within OIM R2, we have begun advising our clients to utilize the ‘profile’ feature to encapsulate multiple commonly requested accounts, roles, and/or entitlements into a single item. By setting up a number of profiles that can be searched for and used, users will spend less time performing the same exact steps for common tasks. We advise our clients to follow the Oracle recommended guides for database and application server tuning which provides a good baseline configuration. It offers guidance on database connection pools, connection timeouts, user interface threads and proper handling of adapters/plug-ins. All of these can be important configurations that will allow faster provisioning and web page response times. Many of our clients have begun to recognize the value of data mining and a remediation process during the initial phases of an implementation (to help ensure high quality data gets loaded) and beyond (to support ongoing maintenance and business-as-usual processes). A successful program always begins with identifying the data elements and assigning a classification level based on criticality, risk, and availability. It should finish by following through with a remediation process. Dos & Don’ts Here are the most common dos and don'ts that we socialize with our clients, derived from our experience implementing the solution. Dos Don’ts Scope the project into phases with realistic goals. Look for quick wins to show success and value to the stake holders. Avoid “boiling the ocean” and trying to integrate all enterprise applications in the first phase. Establish an enterprise ID (universal unique ID across the enterprise) earlier in the program. Avoid major UI customizations that require code changes. Have a plan in place to patch during the project, which helps alleviate any major issues or roadblocks (product and database). Avoid publishing all the target entitlements if you don't anticipate their usage during access request. Assess your current state and prepare a roadmap to address your operations, tactical and strategic goals, align it with your business priorities. Avoid integrating non-production environments with your production target systems. Defer complex integrations to the later phases and take advantage of lessons learned from previous phases Avoid creating multiple accounts for the same user on the same system, if there is an opportunity to do so. Have an identity and access data quality initiative built into your plan to identify and remediate data related issues early on. Avoid creating complex approval workflows that would negative impact productivity and SLAs. Identify the owner of the identity systems with fair IdM knowledge and empower them with authority to make product related decisions. This will help ensure overcome any design hurdles. Avoid creating complex designs that are not sustainable long term and would need major overhaul during upgrades. Shadow your internal or external consulting resources during the implementation to build the necessary product skills needed to operate and sustain the solution. Avoid treating IAM as a point solution and have appropriate level of communication and training plan for the IT and business users alike. Conclusion In our experience, Identity programs will struggle with scope, proper resourcing, and more. We suggest that companies consider the suggestions discussed in this post and leverage them to help enable their identity and access program. This concludes PwC blog series on R2 for the month and we sincerely hope that the information we have shared thus far has been beneficial. For more information or if you have questions, you can reach out to Rex Thexton, Senior Managing Director, PwC and or Dharma Padala, Director, PwC. We look forward to hearing from you. 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Praveen Krishna is a Manager in the Advisory Security practice within PwC.  Over the last decade Praveen has helped clients plan, architect and implement Oracle identity solutions across diverse industries.  His experience includes delivering security across diverse topics like network, infrastructure, application and data where he brings a holistic point of view to problem solving. Scott MacDonald is a Director in the Advisory Security practice within PwC.  He has consulted for several clients across multiple industries including financial services, health care, automotive and retail.   Scott has 10 years of experience in delivering Identity Management solutions. John Misczak is a member of the Advisory Security practice within PwC.  He has experience implementing multiple Identity and Access Management solutions, specializing in Oracle Identity Manager and Business Process Engineering Language (BPEL).

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  • What C++ libraries can be used in game development [closed]

    - by RedShft
    I'm currently in the planning stage for my next game, and since I've been away from C++ for a while I have some questions about helpful libraries. I plan on making a 2D game with SDL, constructing my own simple 2D engine. I plan on making this game for the PC. What libraries would you recommend to make this process easier? What about unittests? What about an enforce operator to throw exceptions? int a = 1; enforce(a == 2); //Throws an exception, Specifically, i'm looking for general purpose libraries, that implement that make my life easier (like boost). Also, a helpful library for physics/collision, AI, XML file parsing (specifically working with the Tiled map editor), and any others that you guys have used that are useful in a 2D game.

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  • Statements of direction for EPM 11.1.1.x series products

    - by THE
    Some of the older parts of EPM that have been replaced with newer software will phase out after January 2013. For most of these the 11.1.1.x Series will be the last release. They will then only be supported via sustaining support (see policy). We have notes about: the Essbase Excel Add In (replaced by SmartView which nearly achieved functionality parity with release 11.1.2.1.102) Oracle Essbase Spreadsheet Add-in Statement of Direction (Doc ID 1466700.1) Hyperion Data Integration Management (replaced by Oracle Data Integrator ( ODI )) Hyperion Data Integration Management Statement of Direction (Doc ID 1267051.1) Hyperion Enterprise and Enterprise Reporting (replaced by HFM) Hyperion Enterprise and Hyperion Enterprise Reporting Statement of Direction (Doc ID 1396504.1) Hyperion Business Rules (replaced by Calculation Manager) Hyperion Business Rules Statement of Direction (Doc ID 1448421.1) Oracle Visual Explorer (this one phased out in June 11 already - just in case anyone missed it) Oracle Essbase Visual Explorer Statement of Direction (Doc ID 1327945.1) For a complete list of the Supported Lifetimes, please review the "Oracle Lifetime Support Policy for Applications"

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  • Emaroo 1.4.0 Released

    - by WeigeltRo
    Emaroo is a free utility for browsing most recently used (MRU) lists of various applications. Quickly open files, jump to their folder in Windows Explorer, copy their path - all with just a few keystrokes or mouse clicks. tl;dr: Emaroo 1.4.0 is out, go download it on www.roland-weigelt.de/emaroo   Why Emaroo? Let me give you a few examples. Let’s assume you have pinned Emaroo to the first spot on the task bar so you can start it by hitting Win+1. To start one of the most recently used Visual Studio solutions you type Win+1, [maybe arrow key down a few times], Enter This means that you can start the most recent solution simply by Win+1, Enter What else? If you want to open an Explorer window at the file location of the solution, you type Ctrl+E instead of Enter.   If you know that the solution contains “foo” in its name, you can type “foo” to filter the list. Because this is not a general purpose search like e.g. the Search charm, but instead operates only on the MRU list of a single application, you usually have to type only a few characters until you can press Enter or Ctrl+E.   Ctrl+C copies the file path of the selected MRU item, Ctrl+Shift+C copies the directory If you have several versions of Visual Studio installed, the context menu lets you open a solution in a higher version.   Using the context menu, you can open a Visual Studio solution in Blend. So far I have only mentioned Visual Studio, but Emaroo knows about other applications, too. It remembers the last application you used, you can change between applications with the left/right arrow or accelerator keys. Press F1 or click the Emaroo icon (the tab to the right) for a quick reference. Which applications does Emaroo know about? Emaroo knows the MRU lists of Visual Studio 2008/2010/2012/2013 Expression Blend 4, Blend for Visual Studio 2012, Blend for Visual Studio 2013 Microsoft Word 2007/2010/2013 Microsoft Excel 2007/2010/2013 Microsoft PowerPoint 2007/2010/2013 Photoshop CS6 IrfanView (most recently used directories) Windows Explorer (directories most recently typed into the address bar) Applications that are not installed aren’t shown, of course. Where can I download it? On the Emaroo website: www.roland-weigelt.de/emaroo Have fun!

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