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  • SSH X11 not working

    - by azat
    I have a home and work computer, the home computer has a static IP address. If I ssh from my work computer to my home computer, the ssh connection works but X11 applications are not displayed. In my /etc/ssh/sshd_config at home: X11Forwarding yes X11DisplayOffset 10 X11UseLocalhost yes At work I have tried the following commands: xhost + home HOME_IP ssh -X home ssh -X HOME_IP ssh -Y home ssh -Y HOME_IP My /etc/ssh/ssh_config at work: Host * ForwardX11 yes ForwardX11Trusted yes My ~/.ssh/config at work: Host home HostName HOME_IP User azat PreferredAuthentications password ForwardX11 yes My ~/.Xauthority at work: -rw------- 1 azat azat 269 Jun 7 11:25 .Xauthority My ~/.Xauthority at home: -rw------- 1 azat azat 246 Jun 7 19:03 .Xauthority But it doesn't work After I make an ssh connection to home: $ echo $DISPLAY localhost:10.0 $ kate X11 connection rejected because of wrong authentication. X11 connection rejected because of wrong authentication. X11 connection rejected because of wrong authentication. X11 connection rejected because of wrong authentication. X11 connection rejected because of wrong authentication. X11 connection rejected because of wrong authentication. X11 connection rejected because of wrong authentication. X11 connection rejected because of wrong authentication. kate: cannot connect to X server localhost:10.0 I use iptables at home, but I've allowed port 22. According to what I've read that's all I need. UPD. With -vvv ... debug2: callback start debug2: x11_get_proto: /usr/bin/xauth list :0 2/dev/null debug1: Requesting X11 forwarding with authentication spoofing. debug2: channel 1: request x11-req confirm 1 debug2: client_session2_setup: id 1 debug2: fd 3 setting TCP_NODELAY debug2: channel 1: request pty-req confirm 1 ... When try to launch kate: debug1: client_input_channel_open: ctype x11 rchan 2 win 65536 max 16384 debug1: client_request_x11: request from 127.0.0.1 55486 debug2: fd 8 setting O_NONBLOCK debug3: fd 8 is O_NONBLOCK debug1: channel 2: new [x11] debug1: confirm x11 debug2: X11 connection uses different authentication protocol. X11 connection rejected because of wrong authentication. debug2: X11 rejected 2 i0/o0 debug2: channel 2: read failed debug2: channel 2: close_read debug2: channel 2: input open - drain debug2: channel 2: ibuf empty debug2: channel 2: send eof debug2: channel 2: input drain - closed debug2: channel 2: write failed debug2: channel 2: close_write debug2: channel 2: output open - closed debug2: X11 closed 2 i3/o3 debug2: channel 2: send close debug2: channel 2: rcvd close debug2: channel 2: is dead debug2: channel 2: garbage collecting debug1: channel 2: free: x11, nchannels 3 debug3: channel 2: status: The following connections are open: #1 client-session (t4 r0 i0/0 o0/0 fd 5/6 cc -1) #2 x11 (t7 r2 i3/0 o3/0 fd 8/8 cc -1) # The same as above repeate about 7 times kate: cannot connect to X server localhost:10.0 UPD2 Please provide your Linux distribution & version number. Are you using a default GNOME or KDE environment for X or something else you customized yourself? azat:~$ kded4 -version Qt: 4.7.4 KDE Development Platform: 4.6.5 (4.6.5) KDE Daemon: $Id$ Are you invoking ssh directly on a command line from a terminal window? What terminal are you using? xterm, gnome-terminal, or? How did you start the terminal running in the X environment? From a menu? Hotkey? or ? From terminal emulator `yakuake` Manualy press `Ctrl + N` and write commands Can you run xeyes from the same terminal window where the ssh -X fails? `xeyes` - is not installed But `kate` or another kde app is running Are you invoking the ssh command as the same user that you're logged into the X session as? From the same user UPD3 I also download ssh sources, and using debug2() write why it's report that version is different It see some cookies, and one of them is empty, another is MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1

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  • Adobe Photoshop Vs Lightroom Vs Aperture

    - by Aditi
    Adobe Photoshop is the standard choice for photographers, graphic artists and Web designers. Adobe Photoshop Lightroom  & Apple’s Aperture are also in the same league but the usage is vastly different. Although Photoshop is most popular & widely used by photographers, but in many ways it’s less relevant to photographers than ever before. As Lightroom & Aperture is aimed squarely at photographers for photo-processing. With this write up we are going to help you choose what is right for you and why. Adobe Photoshop Adobe Photoshop is the most liked tool for the detailed photo editing & designing work. Photoshop provides great features for rollover and Image slicing. Adobe Photoshop includes comprehensive optimization features for producing the highest quality Web graphics with the smallest possible file sizes. You can also create startling animations with it. Designers & Editors know how important precise masking is, PhotoShop lets you do that with various detailing tools. Art history brush, contact sheets, and history palette are some of the smart features, which add to its viability. Download Whether you’re producing printed pages or moving images, you can work more efficiently and produce better results because of its smooth integration across other adobe applications. Buy supporting layer effects, it allows you to quickly add drop shadows, inner and outer glows, bevels, and embossing to layers. It also provides Seamless Web Graphics Workflow. Photoshop is hands-down the BEST for editing. Photoshop Cons: • Slower, less precise editing features in Bridge • Processing lots of images requires actions and can be slower than exporting images from Lightroom • Much slower with editing and processing a large number of images Aperture Apple Aperture is aimed at the professional photographer who shoots predominantly raw files. It helps them to manage their workflow and perform their initial Raw conversion in a better way. Aperture provides adjustment tools such as Histogram to modify color and white balance, but most of the editing of photos is left for Photoshop. It gives users the option of seeing their photographs laid out like slides or negatives on a light table. It boasts of – stars, color-coding and easy techniques for filtering and picking images. Aperture has moved forward few steps than Photoshop, but most of the editing work has been left for Photoshop as it features seamless Photoshop integration. Aperture Pros: Aperture is a step up from the iPhoto software that comes with every Mac, and fairly easy to learn. Adjustments are made in a logical order from top to bottom of the menu. You can store the images in a library or any folder you choose. Aperture also works really well with direct Canon files. It is just $79 if you buy it through Apple’s App Store Moving forward, it will run on the iPad, and possibly the iPhone – Adobe products like Lightroom and Photoshop may never offer these options It is much nicer and simpler user interface. Lightroom Lightroom does a smashing job of basic fixing and editing. It is more advanced tool for photographers. They can use it to have a startling photography effect. Light room has many advanced features, which makes it one of the best tools for photographers and far ahead of the other two. They are Nondestructive editing. Nothing is actually changed in an image until the photo is exported. Better controls over organizing your photos. Lightroom helps to gather a group of photos to use in a slideshow. Lightroom has larger Compare and Survey views of images. Quickly customizable interface. Simple keystrokes allow you to perform different All Lightroom controls are kept available in panels right next to the photos. Always-available History palette, it doesn’t go when you close lightroom. You gain more colors to work with compared to Photoshop and with more precise control. Local control, or adjusting small parts of a photo without affecting anything else, has long been an important part of photography. In Lightroom 2, you can darken, lighten, and affect color and change sharpness and other aspects of specific areas in the photo simply by brushing your cursor across the areas. Photoshop has far more power in its Cloning and Healing Brush tools than Lightroom, but Lightroom offers simple cloning and healing that’s nondestructive. Lightroom supports the RAW formats of more cameras than Aperture. Lightroom provides the option of storing images outside the application in the file system. It costs less than photoshop. Download Why PhotoShop is advanced than Lightroom? There are countless image processing plug-ins on the market for doing specialized processing in Photoshop. For example, if your image needs sophisticated noise reduction, you can use the Noiseware plug-in with Photoshop to do a much better job or noise removal than Lightroom can do. Lightroom’s advantages over Aperture 3 Will always have better integration with Photoshop. Lightroom is backed by bigger and more active user community (So abundant availability for tutorials, etc.) Better noise reduction tool. Especially for photographers the Lens-distortion correction tool  is perfect Lightroom Cons: • Have to Import images to work on them • Slows down with over 10,000 images in the catalog • For processing just one or two images this is a slower workflow Photoshop Pros: • ACR has the same RAW processing controls as Lightroom • ACR Histogram is specialized to the chosen color space (Lightroom is locked into ProPhoto RGB color space with an sRGB tone curve) • Don’t have to Import images to open in Bridge or ACR • Ability to customize processing of RAW images with Photoshop Actions Pricing and Availability Get LightRoomGet PhotoShop Latest version Of Photoshop can be purchased from Adobe store and Adobe authorized reseller and it costs US$999. Latest version of Aperture can be bought for US$199 from Apple Online store or Mac App Store. You can buy latest version of LightRoom from Adobe Store or Adobe Authorized reseller for US$299. Related posts:Adobe Photoshop CS5 vs Photoshop CS5 extended Web based Alternatives to Photoshop 10 Free Alternatives for Adobe Photoshop Software

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  • Best WordPress Video Themes for a Video Blog

    - by Matt
    WordPress has made blogging so easy & fun, there are plenty of video blog themes that you can pick from. However there is always rarity in quality. We at JustSkins have gathered some high quality, tested, tried video themes list. We tried to find some WordPress themes for vloggers, we knew all along that there are very few yet some of them are just brilliant premium wordpress themes. More on that later, let’s find out some themes which you can install on your vlog right now. On Demand 2.0 A fully featured video WordPress premium theme from Press75. Includes  theme options panel for personal customization and content management options, post thumbnails, drop down navigation menu, custom widgets and lots more. Demo | Price: $75 | DOWNLOAD VideoZoom An outstanding premium WordPress video theme from WPZoom featuring standard video integration plus additionally it lets you play any video from all the popular video websites. VideoZoom theme also includes a featured video slider on the homepage, multiple post layout options, theme options panel, WordPress 3.0 menus, backgrounds etc. Demo | Price Single: $69, Developer: $149 | DOWNLOAD Vidley Press75′s easy to use premium WordPress video theme. This theme is full of great features, it can be a perfect choice if you intend to make it a portal someday..it is scalable to shape like a news portal or portfolios. The Theme is widget ready. It has ability to place Featured Content and Featured Category section on homepage. The drop down menus on this theme are nifty! Demo | Price $75 |  DOWNLOAD Live A video premium WordPress theme designed for streaming video, and live event broadcasting. You can embed live video broadcasts from third party services like Ustream etc, and features a prominent timer counting down to the next broadcast, rotating bumper images, Facebook and twitter integration for viewer interaction, theme admin options panel and more make this theme one of its kind. Demo | Price: $99, Support License: $149| DOWNLOAD Groovy Video Woo Themes is pioneer in making beautiful wordpress themes,  One such theme that is built by keeping the video blogger in mind. The Groovy Theme is very colourful video blog premium WordPress theme. Creating video posts is quick and easy with just a copy / paste of the video’s embed code. The theme enables automatic video resizing, plenty of widgets. Also allows you to pick color of your choice. Price: Single Use $70, Developer Price : $150 | DOWNLOAD Video Flick Another exciting Video blogging theme by Press75 is the Video Flick theme. Video Flick is compatible with any video service that provides embed code, or if you want to host your own videos, Video Flick is also compatible with FLV (Flash Video) and Quicktime formats. This theme allows you to either keep standard Blog and/or have Video posts. You can pick a light or dark color option. Demo | Price : $75 | DOWNLOAD Woo Tube An excellent video premium WordPress theme from Woothemes, the WooTube theme is a very easy video blog platform, as it comes with  automatic video resizing, a completely widgetised sidebar and 7 different colour schemes to choose from. The theme  has the ability to be used as a normal blog or a gallery. A very wise choice! Price: Single Use $70, Developer Price : $150 | DOWNLOAD eVid Theme One of the nicest WordPress theme designed specifically for the video bloggers. Simple to integrate videos from video hosts such as Youtube, Vimeo, Veoh, MetaCafe etc. Demo | Price: $19 | DOWNLOAD Tubular A video premium WordPress theme from StudioPress which can also be used as a used a simple website or a blog. The theme is also available in a light color version. Demo | Price: $59.95 | DOWNLOAD Video Elements 2.0 Another beautiful video premium WordPress theme from Press75. Video Elements 2.0 has been re-designed to include the features you need to easily run and maintain a video blog on WordPress. Demo | Price: $75 | DOWNLOAD TV Elements 3.0 The theme includes a featured video carousel on the homepage which can display any number of videos, a featured category section which displays up to 12 channels, creates automatic thumbnails and a lots more… Demo | Price: $75 | DOWNLOAD Wave A beautiful premium video wordpress theme, Flexible & Super cool looking. The Design has very earthy feel to it. The theme has featured video area & latest listing on the homepage. All in all a simple design no fancy features. Demo | Price: $35 | Download

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  • Trying to update debian not working

    - by Sean
    As root i type this command apt-get update and get these error messages. > Err http://security.debian.org lenny/updates Release.gpg Could not resolve 'security.debian.org' Err http://security.debian.org lenny/updates/main Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'security.debian.org' Err http://security.debian.org lenny/updates/contrib Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'security.debian.org' Err http://security.debian.org lenny/updates/non-free Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'security.debian.org' Err http://www.backports.org lenny-backports Release.gpg Could not resolve 'www.backports.org' Err http://www.backports.org lenny-backports/main Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'www.backports.org' Err http://www.backports.org lenny-backports/contrib Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'www.backports.org' Err http://www.backports.org lenny-backports/non-free Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'www.backports.org' Err http://ftp.us.debian.org lenny Release.gpg Could not resolve 'ftp.us.debian.org' Err http://ftp.us.debian.org lenny/main Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'ftp.us.debian.org' Err http://ftp.us.debian.org lenny/contrib Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'ftp.us.debian.org' Err http://ftp.us.debian.org lenny/non-free Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'ftp.us.debian.org' Err http://http.us.debian.org stable Release.gpg Could not resolve 'http.us.debian.org' Err http://http.us.debian.org stable/main Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'http.us.debian.org' Err http://http.us.debian.org stable/contrib Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'http.us.debian.org' Err http://http.us.debian.org stable/non-free Translation-en_US Could not resolve 'http.us.debian.org' Reading package lists... Done W: Failed to fetch http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/dists/lenny/Release.gpg Could not resolve 'ftp.us.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/dists/lenny/main/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'ftp.us.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/dists/lenny/contrib/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'ftp.us.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/dists/lenny/non-free/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'ftp.us.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://http.us.debian.org/debian/dists/stable/Release.gpg Could not resolve 'http.us.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://http.us.debian.org/debian/dists/stable/main/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'http.us.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://http.us.debian.org/debian/dists/stable/contrib/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'http.us.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://http.us.debian.org/debian/dists/stable/non-free/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'http.us.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://security.debian.org/dists/lenny/updates/Release.gpg Could not resolve 'security.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://security.debian.org/dists/lenny/updates/main/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'security.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://security.debian.org/dists/lenny/updates/contrib/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'security.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://security.debian.org/dists/lenny/updates/non-free/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'security.debian.org' W: Failed to fetch http://www.backports.org/debian/dists/lenny-backports/Release.gpg Could not resolve 'www.backports.org' W: Failed to fetch http://www.backports.org/debian/dists/lenny-backports/main/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'www.backports.org' W: Failed to fetch http://www.backports.org/debian/dists/lenny-backports/contrib/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'www.backports.org' W: Failed to fetch http://www.backports.org/debian/dists/lenny-backports/non-free/i18n/Translation-en_US.gz Could not resolve 'www.backports.org' W: Some index files failed to download, they have been ignored, or old ones used instead. W: You may want to run apt-get update to correct these problems This is on a dreamplug linux server. Configured so that my network starts on 192.168.1.2 and my router is port forwarding ssh to 192.168.1.6 to the server.

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  • Convert Excel File 'xls' to CSV, CAUTION: Bumps Ahead

    - by faizanahmad
    The task was to provide users with an interface where they can upload the 'csv' files, these files were to be processed and loaded to Database by a Console application. The code in Console application could not handle the 'xls' files so we thought, OK, lets convert 'xls' to 'csv' in the code, Seemed like fun. The idea was to convert it right after uploading within 'csv' file. As Microsoft does not recommend using the  Excel objects in ASP.NET, we decided to use the Jet engine to open xls. (Ace driver is used for xlsx) The code was pretty straight, can be found on following links: http://www.c-sharpcorner.com/uploadfile/yuanwang200409/102242008174401pm/1.aspx http://www.devasp.net/net/articles/display/141.html FIRST BUMP 'OleDbException (0x80004005): Unspecified error' ( Impersonation ): The ablove code ran fine in my test web site and test console application, but it gave an 'OleDbException (0x80004005): Unspecified error' in main web site, turns out imperonation was set to True and as soon as I changed it to False, it did work. on My XP box, web site was running under user                   'ASPNET'  with imperosnation set to FALSE                   'IUSR_*' i.e IIS guest user with impersonation set to TRUE The weired part was that both users had same rights on the folders I was saving files to and on Excel app in DCOM Config.  We decided to give it a try on Windows Server 2003 with web site set to windows authentication ( impersonation = true ) and yes it did work. SECOND BUMP 'External table not in correct format': I got this error with some files and it appeared that the file from client has some metadata issues  ( when I opened the file in Excel and try to save it ,excel  would give me this error saying File can not be saved in current format ) and the error was caused by that. Some people were able to reslove the error by using "Extended Properties=HTML Import;" in connection string. But it did not work for me. We decided to detour from here and use Excel object :( as we had no control on client setting the meta deta of Excel files. Before third bump there were a ouple of small thingies like 'Retrieving the COM class factory for component with CLSID {00024500-0000-0000-C000-000000000046} failed due to the following error: 80070005' Fix can be found at http://blog.crowe.co.nz/archive/2006/03/02/589.aspx THIRD BUMP ( Could not get rid of the EXCEL process  ):  I has all the code in place to 'Quiet' the excel, but, it just did not work. work around was done to Kill the process as we knew no other application on server was using EXCEL.  The normal steps to quite the excel application worked just fine in console application though.   FOURTH BUMP: Code worked with one file 1 on my machine and with the other file 2 code will break. and the same code will work perfectly fine with file 2 on some other machine . We moved it to QA  ( Windows Server 2003 )and worked with every file just perfect. But , then there was another problem: one user can upload it and second cant, permissions on folder and DCOM Conifg checked. Another Detour: Uplooad the xls as it is and convert in Console application.   Lesson Learnt:  If its 'xlsx' use 'ACE Driver' or read xml within excel as recommneded by MS. If xls and you know its always going to be properly formatted  'jet Engine'  Code: Imports Microsoft.Office.Interop Private Function ConvertFile(ByVal SourceFolder As String, ByVal FileName As String, ByVal FileExtension As String)As Boolean     Dim appExcel As New Excel.Application     Dim workBooks As Excel.Workbooks = appExcel.Workbooks     Dim objWorkbook As Excel.Workbook      Try                   objWorkbook = workBooks.Open(CompleteFilePath )                            objWorkbook.SaveAs(Filename:=CObj(SourceFolder & FileName & ".csv"), FileFormat:=Excel.XlFileFormat.xlCSV)       Catch ex As Exception         GenerateAlert(ex.Message().Replace("'", "") & " Error Converting File to CSV.")         LogError(ex )         Return False      Finally                      If Not(objWorkbook is Nothing) then               objWorkbook.Close(SaveChanges:=CObj(False))           End If           ReleaseObj(objWorkbook)                                      ReleaseObj(workBooks)           appExcel.Quit()           ReleaseObj(appExcel)                                 Dim proc As System.Diagnostics.Process           For Each proc In System.Diagnostics.Process.GetProcessesByName("EXCEL")               proc.Kill()           Next         DeleteSourceFile(SourceFolder & FileName & FileExtension)     End Try  Return True  End Function   Private Sub ReleaseObj(ByVal o As Object)     Try      System.Runtime.InteropServices.Marshal.ReleaseComObject(o)   Catch ex As Exception           LogError(ex )   Finally      o = Nothing    End Try End Sub     Protected Sub DeleteSourceFile(Byval CompleteFilePath As string)         Try             Dim MyFile As FileInfo = New FileInfo(CompleteFilePath)             If  MyFile.Exists Then                 File.Delete(CompleteFilePath)             Else              Throw New FileNotFoundException()             End If         Catch ex As Exception             GenerateAlert( " Source File could not be deleted.")              LogError(ex)         End Try     End Sub  The code to kill the process ( Avoid it if you can ): Dim proc As System.Diagnostics.Process For Each proc In System.Diagnostics.Process.GetProcessesByName("EXCEL")     proc.Kill() Next

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  • How to Collect Debug Info for Oracle SQL Developer

    - by thatjeffsmith
    In a perfect world, there would be no software bugs. Developers would always test their code. QA would find any scenarios and bugs the developers hadn’t already thought of. Regression tests would be complete and flawless. But alas, we can only afford to pay mere humans here, so we will have bugs from time to time. Or sometimes you are trying to do something the software wasn’t designed for, or perhaps your machine has exhausted it’s resources trying to build the un-buildable. When you run into problems, you will need help. Developers need your help so they can help you. Surprisingly enough, feedback like this isn’t very helpful: Your program isn’t working. How can I make it work? When you are ready to work with us on the SQL Developer OTN forum, you will most likely be asked to run SQL Developer and capture the output from the command console. In case you need help with this, ere’s a step-by-step process you can follow in Windows 7 (should work in XP too.) Open a windows command window Start – Run – CMD Once it’s open, click on the window icon and select ‘Defaults.’ Change the default buffer size to be something bigger, much bigger. Set the CMD window default buffer size HIGHER Note: you only need to do this once. Navigate to your SQL Developer Installation Folder Instead of running the ‘sqldeveloper.exe’ file in the root directory, we are going to go several sub-directories down. Find the ‘bin’ sub-directory and run the ‘sqldeveloper.exe’ there. When you do this, a CMD window will open, and then you’ll see the SQL Developer application load. The SQL Developer bin directory - run the tool from here and get a logging window Use SQL Developer as normal, until it ‘breaks’ or ‘hangs’ Now, you are ready to grab the nitty-gritty information that MIGHT tell the developer what is going wrong or happening in your scenario. Click back into the CMD window Send a Ctrl+Break or a Ctrl+Pause. If you on a newer laptop that doesn’t have this key, be sure to check the ‘Fn’ subset of keys. If you need to map the BREAK or PAUSE buttons, this article might help. You can also try the on-screen keyboard in windows – just type ‘OSK’ in your START – RUN prompt. Copy the logging information from the command window – all of it We need this information, help us get it! Open a case with Oracle Support or Start a Thread on the Forums Or email me. If you’re on my blog reading this, it’s the least I can do to help Now, before you hit ‘Send’ or ‘Post’ or ‘Submit’ – be sure to add a brief description of what you were doing in the application when you ran into the problem. Even if you were doing ‘nothing,’ let us know how many connections you had open, what windows were active, etc. The more you can tell us, the higher your odds go up to getting a quick fix or at least an answer as to what is happening. Also include the following information: The version of SQL Developer you are running The version of the JDK you are using The OS you are using The version of Oracle you are connected to Now, don’t be surprised if you get asked to upgrade to a supported configuration, say ‘version 3.1 and the 1.6 JDK.’ Supporting older versions of software is fun, and while we enjoy a challenge, it may be easier for you to upgrade your way out of the problem at hand.

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  • Updating the managed debugging API for .NET v4

    - by Brian Donahue
    In any successful investigation, the right tools play a big part in collecting evidence about the state of the "crime scene" as it was before the detectives arrived. Unfortunately for the Crash Scene Investigator, we don't have the budget to fly out to the customer's site, chalk the outline, and eat their doughnuts. We have to rely on the end-user to collect the evidence for us, which means giving them the fingerprint dust and the evidence baggies and leaving them to it. With that in mind, the Red Gate support team have been writing tools that can collect vital clues with a minimum of fuss. Years ago we would have asked for a memory dump, where we used to get the customer to run CDB.exe and produce dumps that we could analyze in-house, but those dumps were pretty unwieldy (500MB files) and the debugger often didn't dump exactly where we wanted, or made five or more dumps. What we wanted was just the minimum state information from the program at the time of failure, so we produced a managed debugger that captured every first and second-chance exception and logged the stack and a minimal amount of variables from the memory of the application, which could all be exported as XML. This caused less inconvenience to the end-user because it is much easier to send a 65KB XML file in an email than a 500MB file containing all of the application's memory. We don't need to have the entire victim shipped out to us when we just want to know what was under the fingernails. The thing that made creating a managed debugging tool possible was the MDbg Engine example written by Microsoft as part of the Debugging Tools for Windows distribution. Since the ICorDebug interface is a bit difficult to understand, they had kindly created some wrappers that provided an event-driven debugging model that was perfect for our needs, but .NET 4 applications under debugging started complaining that "The debugger's protocol is incompatible with the debuggee". The introduction of .NET Framework v4 had changed the managed debugging API significantly, however, without an update for the MDbg Engine code! After a few hours of research, I had finally worked out that most of the version 4 ICorDebug interface still works much the same way in "legacy" v2 mode and there was a relatively easy fix for the problem in that you can still get a reference to legacy ICorDebug by changing the way the interface is created. In .NET v2, the interface was acquired using the CreateDebuggingInterfaceFromVersion method in mscoree.dll. In v4, you must first create IClrMetaHost, enumerate the runtimes, get an ICLRRuntimeInfo interface to the .NET 4 runtime from that, and use the GetInterface method in mscoree.dll to return a "legacy" ICorDebug interface. The rest of the MDbg Engine will continue working the old way. Here is how I had changed the MDbg Engine code to support .NET v4: private void InitFromVersion(string debuggerVersion){if( debuggerVersion.StartsWith("v1") ){throw new ArgumentException( "Can't debug a version 1 CLR process (\"" + debuggerVersion + "\"). Run application in a version 2 CLR, or use a version 1 debugger instead." );} ICorDebug rawDebuggingAPI=null;if (debuggerVersion.StartsWith("v4")){Guid CLSID_MetaHost = new Guid("9280188D-0E8E-4867-B30C-7FA83884E8DE"); Guid IID_MetaHost = new Guid("D332DB9E-B9B3-4125-8207-A14884F53216"); ICLRMetaHost metahost = (ICLRMetaHost)NativeMethods.ClrCreateInterface(CLSID_MetaHost, IID_MetaHost); IEnumUnknown runtimes = metahost.EnumerateInstalledRuntimes(); ICLRRuntimeInfo runtime = GetRuntime(runtimes, debuggerVersion); //Defined in metahost.hGuid CLSID_CLRDebuggingLegacy = new Guid(0xDF8395B5, 0xA4BA, 0x450b, 0xA7, 0x7C, 0xA9, 0xA4, 0x77, 0x62, 0xC5, 0x20);Guid IID_ICorDebug = new Guid("3D6F5F61-7538-11D3-8D5B-00104B35E7EF"); Object res;runtime.GetInterface(ref CLSID_CLRDebuggingLegacy, ref IID_ICorDebug, out res); rawDebuggingAPI = (ICorDebug)res; }elserawDebuggingAPI = NativeMethods.CreateDebuggingInterfaceFromVersion((int)CorDebuggerVersion.Whidbey,debuggerVersion);if (rawDebuggingAPI != null)InitFromICorDebug(rawDebuggingAPI);elsethrow new ArgumentException("Support for debugging version " + debuggerVersion + " is not yet implemented");} The changes above will ensure that the debugger can support .NET Framework v2 and v4 applications with the same codebase, but we do compile two different applications: one targeting v2 and the other v4. As a footnote I need to add that some missing native methods and wrappers, along with the EnumerateRuntimes method code, came from the Mindbg project on Codeplex. Another change is that when using the MDbgEngine.CreateProcess to launch a process in the debugger, do not supply a null as the final argument. This does not work any more because GetCORVersion always returns "v2.0.50727" as the function has been deprecated in .NET v4. What's worse is that on a system with only .NET 4, the user will be prompted to download and install .NET v2! Not nice! This works much better: proc = m_Debugger.CreateProcess(ProcessName, ProcessArgs, DebugModeFlag.Default,String.Format("v{0}.{1}.{2}",System.Environment.Version.Major,System.Environment.Version.Minor,System.Environment.Version.Build)); Microsoft "unofficially" plan on updating the MDbg samples soon, but if you have an MDbg-based application, you can get it working right now by changing one method a bit and adding a few new interfaces (ICLRMetaHost, IEnumUnknown, and ICLRRuntimeInfo). The new, non-legacy implementation of MDbg Engine will add new, interesting features like dump-file support and by association I assume garbage-collection/managed object stats, so it will be well worth looking into if you want to extend the functionality of a managed debugger going forward.

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  • Big Data – Buzz Words: Importance of Relational Database in Big Data World – Day 9 of 21

    - by Pinal Dave
    In yesterday’s blog post we learned what is HDFS. In this article we will take a quick look at the importance of the Relational Database in Big Data world. A Big Question? Here are a few questions I often received since the beginning of the Big Data Series - Does the relational database have no space in the story of the Big Data? Does relational database is no longer relevant as Big Data is evolving? Is relational database not capable to handle Big Data? Is it true that one no longer has to learn about relational data if Big Data is the final destination? Well, every single time when I hear that one person wants to learn about Big Data and is no longer interested in learning about relational database, I find it as a bit far stretched. I am not here to give ambiguous answers of It Depends. I am personally very clear that one who is aspiring to become Big Data Scientist or Big Data Expert they should learn about relational database. NoSQL Movement The reason for the NoSQL Movement in recent time was because of the two important advantages of the NoSQL databases. Performance Flexible Schema In personal experience I have found that when I use NoSQL I have found both of the above listed advantages when I use NoSQL database. There are instances when I found relational database too much restrictive when my data is unstructured as well as they have in the datatype which my Relational Database does not support. It is the same case when I have found that NoSQL solution performing much better than relational databases. I must say that I am a big fan of NoSQL solutions in the recent times but I have also seen occasions and situations where relational database is still perfect fit even though the database is growing increasingly as well have all the symptoms of the big data. Situations in Relational Database Outperforms Adhoc reporting is the one of the most common scenarios where NoSQL is does not have optimal solution. For example reporting queries often needs to aggregate based on the columns which are not indexed as well are built while the report is running, in this kind of scenario NoSQL databases (document database stores, distributed key value stores) database often does not perform well. In the case of the ad-hoc reporting I have often found it is much easier to work with relational databases. SQL is the most popular computer language of all the time. I have been using it for almost over 10 years and I feel that I will be using it for a long time in future. There are plenty of the tools, connectors and awareness of the SQL language in the industry. Pretty much every programming language has a written drivers for the SQL language and most of the developers have learned this language during their school/college time. In many cases, writing query based on SQL is much easier than writing queries in NoSQL supported languages. I believe this is the current situation but in the future this situation can reverse when No SQL query languages are equally popular. ACID (Atomicity Consistency Isolation Durability) – Not all the NoSQL solutions offers ACID compliant language. There are always situations (for example banking transactions, eCommerce shopping carts etc.) where if there is no ACID the operations can be invalid as well database integrity can be at risk. Even though the data volume indeed qualify as a Big Data there are always operations in the application which absolutely needs ACID compliance matured language. The Mixed Bag I have often heard argument that all the big social media sites now a days have moved away from Relational Database. Actually this is not entirely true. While researching about Big Data and Relational Database, I have found that many of the popular social media sites uses Big Data solutions along with Relational Database. Many are using relational databases to deliver the results to end user on the run time and many still uses a relational database as their major backbone. Here are a few examples: Facebook uses MySQL to display the timeline. (Reference Link) Twitter uses MySQL. (Reference Link) Tumblr uses Sharded MySQL (Reference Link) Wikipedia uses MySQL for data storage. (Reference Link) There are many for prominent organizations which are running large scale applications uses relational database along with various Big Data frameworks to satisfy their various business needs. Summary I believe that RDBMS is like a vanilla ice cream. Everybody loves it and everybody has it. NoSQL and other solutions are like chocolate ice cream or custom ice cream – there is a huge base which loves them and wants them but not every ice cream maker can make it just right  for everyone’s taste. No matter how fancy an ice cream store is there is always plain vanilla ice cream available there. Just like the same, there are always cases and situations in the Big Data’s story where traditional relational database is the part of the whole story. In the real world scenarios there will be always the case when there will be need of the relational database concepts and its ideology. It is extremely important to accept relational database as one of the key components of the Big Data instead of treating it as a substandard technology. Ray of Hope – NewSQL In this module we discussed that there are places where we need ACID compliance from our Big Data application and NoSQL will not support that out of box. There is a new termed coined for the application/tool which supports most of the properties of the traditional RDBMS and supports Big Data infrastructure – NewSQL. Tomorrow In tomorrow’s blog post we will discuss about NewSQL. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: Big Data, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL

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  • Hack Extension Files to Make Them Version-Compatible for Firefox

    - by Asian Angel
    A well known drawback in using Firefox is the problem with extension compatibility when a new major version is released. Whether it is for a new extension that you are trying for the first time or an old favorite we have a way to get those extensions working for you again. There are multiple reasons why you might want to choose this method to fix a non-compatible extension: You are uncomfortable with tweaking the “about:config” settings You prefer to maintain the original “about:config” settings in a pristine state and like having compatibility checking active You are looking to gain some “geek cred” Keep in mind that most extensions will work perfectly well with a new version of Firefox and simply have the “version compatibility number” problem. But once in a while there may be one that needs to have some work done on it by the extension’s author. The Problem Here is a perfect example of everyone’s least favorite “extension message”. This is the last thing that you need when all that you want is for your favorite extension (or a new one) to work on a fresh clean install. Note: This works nicely to “replace” non-compatible extensions already present in your browser if you are simply upgrading. Hacking the XPI File For this procedure you will need to manually download the extension to your hard-drive (right click on the extension’s “Install Button” and select “Save As”). Once you have done that you are ready to start hacking the extension. For our example we chose the “GCal Popup Extension”. The best thing to do is place the extension in a new folder (i.e. the Desktop or other convenient location) then unzip it just the same way that you would with any regular zip file. Once it is unzipped you will see the various folders and files that were in the “xpi file” (we had four files here but depending on the extension the number may vary). There is only one file that you need to focus on…the “install.rdf” file. Note: At this point you should move the original extension file to a different location (i.e. outside of the folder) so that it is no longer present. Open the file in “Notepad” so that you can change the number for the “maxVersion”. Here the number is listed as “3.5.*” but we needed to make it higher… Replacing the “5” with a “7” is all that we needed to do. Once you have entered your new “maxVersion” number save the file. At this point you will need to re-zip all of the files back into a single file. Make certain that you “create” a file with the “.zip file extension” otherwise this will not work. Once you have the new zip file created you will need to rename the entire file including the “file extension”. For our example we copied and pasted the original extension name. Once you have changed the name click outside of the “text area”. You will see a small message window like this asking for confirmation…click “Yes” to finish the process. Now your modified/updated extension is ready to install. Drag the extension into your browser to install it and watch that wonderful “Restart to complete the installation.” message appear. As soon as your browser starts you can check the “Add-ons Manager Window” and see the version compatibility numbers for the extension. Looking very very nice! And just like that your extension should be up and running without any problems. Conclusion If you are looking to try something new, gain some geek cred, or just want to keep your Firefox install as close to the original condition as possible this method should get those extensions working nicely for you again. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Make Firefox Extensions Compatible After Firefox Update Breaks Them For No Good ReasonCheck Extension Compatibility for Upcoming Firefox ReleasesFirefox 3.6 Release Candidate Available, Here’s How to Fix Your Incompatible ExtensionsHow To Force Extension Compatibility with Firefox 3.6+Test and Report Add-on Compatibility in Firefox TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional 15 Great Illustrations by Chow Hon Lam Easily Sync Files & Folders with Friends & Family Amazon Free Kindle for PC Download Stretch popurls.com with a Stylish Script (Firefox) OldTvShows.org – Find episodes of Hitchcock, Soaps, Game Shows and more Download Microsoft Office Help tab

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  • TS-7800 Hangs on bootup

    - by Reid
    I have a TS-7800, and it typically boots from the SD card inserted in it. When I tried to boot it up today, it hung on the syslog line. I am now having "Read only file system" problems. What has gone wrong? Bootup console: >> Copyright (c) 2008, Technologic Systems >> Booting from SD card... . . . . >> Booting to SD Card... INIT: version 2.86 booting Starting the hotplug events dispatcher: udevd. Synthesizing the initial hotplug events...done. Waiting for /dev to be fully populated...done. mount: can't find / in /etc/fstab or /etc/mtab Cleaning up ifupdown...rm: cannot remove `/etc/network/run/ifstate': Read-only file system Loading kernel modules...done. Checking all file systems... fsck 1.37 (21-Mar-2005) ... done. none on /dev/pts type devpts (rw,gid=5,mode=620) /etc/init.d/rcS: line 39: /tmp/.clean: Read-only file system Setting up networking...done. Setting up IP spoofing protection: rp_filter. Enabling packet forwarding...done. Configuring network interfaces...ifup: failed to open statefile /etc/network/run/ifstate: Read-only file system done. Starting portmap daemon: portmap. /etc/init.d/rcS: line 39: /tmp/.clean: Read-only file system /etc/init.d/rcS: line 24: /var/run/utmp: Read-only file system rm: cannot remove `/var/lib/urandom/random-seed': Read-only file system urandom start: failed. Recovering nvi editor sessions... done. INIT: Entering runlevel: 3 Starting system log daemon: syslogd . Starting kernel log daemon: klogd. Starting MTA: open: Read-only file system touch: cannot touch `/var/lib/exim4/config.autogenerated.tmp': Read-only file system chown: cannot access `/var/lib/exim4/config.autogenerated.tmp': No such file or directory chmod: cannot access `/var/lib/exim4/config.autogenerated.tmp': No such file or directory chmod: changing permissions of `/var/lib/exim4/config.autogenerated': Read-only file system /usr/sbin/update-exim4.conf: line 260: cannot create temp file for here document: Read-only file system /usr/sbin/update-exim4.conf: line 387: /var/lib/exim4/config.autogenerated.tmp: Read-only file system 2002-01-01 01:31:36 Cannot open main log file "/var/log/exim4/mainlog": Read-only file system: euid=0 egid=0 2002-01-01 01:31:36 non-existent configuration file(s): /var/lib/exim4/config.autogenerated.tmp 2002-01-01 01:31:36 Cannot open main log file "/var/log/exim4/mainlog": Read-only file system: euid=0 egid=0 exim: could not open panic log - aborting: see message(s) above Invalid new configfile /var/lib/exim4/config.autogenerated.tmp not installing /var/lib/exim4/config.autogenerated.tmp to /var/lib/exim4/config.autogenerated Starting internet superserver: inetd. Starting OpenBSD Secure Shell server: sshd. Starting NFS common utilities: statdStarting periodic command scheduler: cron/usr/sbin/cron: can't open or create /var/run/crond.pid: Read-only file system . Starting web server (apache2)...(30)Read-only file system: apache2: could not open error log file /var/log/apache2/error.log. Unable to open logs failed! Debian GNU/Linux 3.1 ts7800 ttyS0 ts7800 login:

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  • OpenSwan IPSec phase #2 complications

    - by XXL
    Phase #1 (IKE) succeeds without any problems (verified at the target host). Phase #2 (IPSec), however, is erroneous at some point (apparently due to misconfiguration on localhost). This should be an IPSec-only connection. I am using OpenSwan on Debian. The error log reads the following (the actual IP-addr. of the remote endpoint has been modified): pluto[30868]: "x" #2: initiating Quick Mode PSK+ENCRYPT+PFS+UP+IKEv2ALLOW+SAREFTRACK {using isakmp#1 msgid:5ece82ee proposal=AES(12)_256-SHA1(2)_160 pfsgroup=OAKLEY_GROUP_DH22} pluto[30868]: "x" #1: ignoring informational payload, type NO_PROPOSAL_CHOSEN msgid=00000000 pluto[30868]: "x" #1: received and ignored informational message pluto[30868]: "x" #1: the peer proposed: 0.0.0.0/0:0/0 - 0.0.0.0/0:0/0 pluto[30868]: "x" #3: responding to Quick Mode proposal {msgid:a4f5a81c} pluto[30868]: "x" #3: us: 192.168.1.76<192.168.1.76[+S=C] pluto[30868]: "x" #3: them: 222.222.222.222<222.222.222.222[+S=C]===10.196.0.0/17 pluto[30868]: "x" #3: transition from state STATE_QUICK_R0 to state STATE_QUICK_R1 pluto[30868]: "x" #3: STATE_QUICK_R1: sent QR1, inbound IPsec SA installed, expecting QI2 pluto[30868]: "x" #1: ignoring informational payload, type NO_PROPOSAL_CHOSEN msgid=00000000 pluto[30868]: "x" #1: received and ignored informational message pluto[30868]: "x" #3: next payload type of ISAKMP Hash Payload has an unknown value: 97 X pluto[30868]: "x" #3: malformed payload in packet pluto[30868]: | payload malformed after IV I am behind NAT and this is all coming from wlan2. Here are the details: default via 192.168.1.254 dev wlan2 proto static 169.254.0.0/16 dev wlan2 scope link metric 1000 192.168.1.0/24 dev wlan2 proto kernel scope link src 192.168.1.76 metric 2 Output of ipsec verify: Checking your system to see if IPsec got installed and started correctly: Version check and ipsec on-path [OK] Linux Openswan U2.6.37/K3.2.0-24-generic (netkey) Checking for IPsec support in kernel [OK] SAref kernel support [N/A] NETKEY: Testing XFRM related proc values [OK] [OK] [OK] Checking that pluto is running [OK] Pluto listening for IKE on udp 500 [OK] Pluto listening for NAT-T on udp 4500 [OK] Two or more interfaces found, checking IP forwarding [OK] Checking NAT and MASQUERADEing [OK] Checking for 'ip' command [OK] Checking /bin/sh is not /bin/dash [WARNING] Checking for 'iptables' command [OK] Opportunistic Encryption Support [DISABLED] This is what happens when I run ipsec auto --up x: 104 "x" #1: STATE_MAIN_I1: initiate 003 "x" #1: received Vendor ID payload [RFC 3947] method set to=109 106 "x" #1: STATE_MAIN_I2: sent MI2, expecting MR2 003 "x" #1: received Vendor ID payload [Cisco-Unity] 003 "x" #1: received Vendor ID payload [Dead Peer Detection] 003 "x" #1: ignoring unknown Vendor ID payload [502099ff84bd4373039074cf56649aad] 003 "x" #1: received Vendor ID payload [XAUTH] 003 "x" #1: NAT-Traversal: Result using RFC 3947 (NAT-Traversal): i am NATed 108 "x" #1: STATE_MAIN_I3: sent MI3, expecting MR3 004 "x" #1: STATE_MAIN_I4: ISAKMP SA established {auth=OAKLEY_PRESHARED_KEY cipher=aes_128 prf=oakley_sha group=modp1024} 117 "x" #2: STATE_QUICK_I1: initiate 010 "x" #2: STATE_QUICK_I1: retransmission; will wait 20s for response 010 "x" #2: STATE_QUICK_I1: retransmission; will wait 40s for response 031 "x" #2: max number of retransmissions (2) reached STATE_QUICK_I1. No acceptable response to our first Quick Mode message: perhaps peer likes no proposal 000 "x" #2: starting keying attempt 2 of at most 3, but releasing whack I have enabled NAT traversal in ipsec.conf accordingly. Here are the settings relative to the connection in question: version 2.0 config setup plutoopts="--perpeerlog" plutoopts="--interface=wlan2" dumpdir=/var/run/pluto/ nat_traversal=yes virtual_private=%v4:10.0.0.0/8,%v4:192.168.0.0/16,%v4:172.16.0.0/12 oe=off protostack=netkey conn x authby=secret pfs=yes auto=add phase2alg=aes256-sha1;dh22 keyingtries=3 ikelifetime=8h type=transport left=192.168.1.76 leftsubnet=192.168.1.0/24 leftprotoport=0/0 right=222.222.222.222 rightsubnet=10.196.0.0/17 rightprotoport=0/0 Here are the specs provided by the other end that must be met for Phase #2: encryption algorithm: AES (128 or 256 bit) hash algorithm: SHA local ident1 (addr/mask/prot/port): (10.196.0.0/255.255.128.0/0/0) local ident2 (addr/mask/prot/port): (10.241.0.0/255.255.0.0/0/0) remote ident (addr/mask/prot/port): (x.x.x.x/x.x.x.x/0/0) (internal network or localhost) Security association lifetime: 4608000 kilobytes/3600 seconds PFS: DH group2 So, finally, what might be the cause of the issue that I am experiencing? Thank you.

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  • SQL SERVER – Weekly Series – Memory Lane – #005

    - by pinaldave
    Here is the list of curetted articles of SQLAuthority.com across all these years. Instead of just listing all the articles I have selected a few of my most favorite articles and have listed them here with additional notes below it. Let me know which one of the following is your favorite article from memory lane. 2006 SQL SERVER – Cursor to Kill All Process in Database I indeed wrote this cursor and when I often look back, I wonder how naive I was to write this. The reason for writing this cursor was to free up my database from any existing connection so I can do database operation. This worked fine but there can be a potentially big issue if there was any important transaction was killed by this process. There is another way to to achieve the same thing where we can use ALTER syntax to take database in single user mode. Read more about that over here and here. 2007 Rules of Third Normal Form and Normalization Advantage – 3NF The rules of 3NF are mentioned here Make a separate table for each set of related attributes, and give each table a primary key. If an attribute depends on only part of a multi-valued key, remove it to a separate table If attributes do not contribute to a description of the key, remove them to a separate table. Correct Syntax for Stored Procedure SP Sometime a simple question is the most important question. I often see in industry incorrectly written Stored Procedure. Few writes code after the most outer BEGIN…END and few writes code after the GO Statement. In this brief blog post, I have attempted to explain the same. 2008 Switch Between Result Pan and Query Pan – SQL Shortcut Many times when I am writing query I have to scroll the result displayed in the result set. Most of the developer uses the mouse to switch between and Query Pane and Result Pane. There are few developers who are crazy about Keyboard shortcuts. F6 is the keyword which can be used to switch between query pane and tabs of the result pane. Interesting Observation – Use of Index and Execution Plan Query Optimization is a complex game and it has its own rules. From the example in the article we have discovered that Query Optimizer does not use clustered index to retrieve data, sometime non clustered index provides optimal performance for retrieving Primary Key. When all the rows and columns are selected Primary Key should be used to select data as it provides optimal performance. 2009 Interesting Observation – TOP 100 PERCENT and ORDER BY If you pull up any application or system where there are more than 100 SQL Server Views are created – I am very confident that at one or two places you will notice the scenario wherein View the ORDER BY clause is used with TOP 100 PERCENT. SQL Server 2008 VIEW with ORDER BY clause does not throw an error; moreover, it does not acknowledge the presence of it as well. In this article we have taken three perfect examples and demonstrated which clause we should use when. Comma Separated Values (CSV) from Table Column A Very common question – How to create comma separated values from a table in the database? The answer is also very common if we use XML. Check out this article for quick learning on the same subject. Azure Start Guide – Step by Step Installation Guide Though Azure portal has changed a quite bit since I wrote this article, the concept used in this article are not old. They are still valid and many of the functions are still working as mentioned in the article. I believe this one article will put you on the track to use Azure! Size of Index Table for Each Index – Solution Earlier I have posted a small question on this blog and requested help from readers to participate here and provide a solution. The puzzle was to write a query that will return the size for each index that is on any particular table. We need a query that will return an additional column in the above listed query and it should contain the size of the index. This article presents two of the best solutions from the puzzle. 2010 Well, this week in 2010 was the week of puzzles as I posted three interesting puzzles. Till today I am noticing pretty good interesting in the puzzles. They are tricky but for sure brings a great value if you are a database developer for a long time. I suggest you go over this puzzles and their answers. Did you really know all of the answers? I am confident that reading following three blog post will for sure help you enhance the experience with T-SQL. SQL SERVER – Challenge – Puzzle – Usage of FAST Hint SQL SERVER – Puzzle – Challenge – Error While Converting Money to Decimal SQL SERVER – Challenge – Puzzle – Why does RIGHT JOIN Exists 2011 DVM sys.dm_os_sys_info Column Name Changed in SQL Server 2012 Have you ever faced a situation where something does not work? When you try to fix it - you enjoy fixing it and started to appreciate the breaking changes. Well, this was exactly I felt yesterday. Before I begin my story, I want to candidly state that I do not encourage anybody to use * in the SELECT statement. Now the disclaimer is over – I suggest you read the original story – you will love it! Get Directory Structure using Extended Stored Procedure xp_dirtree Here is the question to you – why would you do something in SQL Server where you can do the same task in command prompt much easily. Well, the answer is sometime there are real use cases when we have to do such thing. This is a similar example where I have demonstrated how in SQL Server 2012 we can use extended stored procedure to retrieve directory structure. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: Memory Lane, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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  • Weekend With #iPad

    - by andrewbrust
    Saturday morning, I got up, got dressed and took a 7-minute walk up to the Apple Store in New York’s Meatpacking District to pick up my reserved iPad.  This precinct, which borders Greenwich Village (where I live and grew up) was, when I was a kid, a very industrial and smelly neighborhood during the day  and a rough neighborhood at night.  So imagine my sense of irony as I walked up Hudson Street towards 14th Street, to go wait in line with a bunch of hipsters to buy an iPad on launch day. Numerous blue T-shirt-clad Apple store workers were on hand to check people in to the line specifically identified for people who had reserved an iPad.  Others workers passed out water and all of them, I kid you not, applauded people as they got their chance to go into the store and buy their devices.  They also cheered people and yelled “congratulations” as they left.  The event had all the charm of a mass wedding officiated by Reverend Sung Myung Moon.  Once inside, a nice dude named Trey, with lots of tattoos on his calves, helped me and I acquired my device in short order.  Another guy helped me activate the device, which was comical, because that has to be done through iTunes, which I hadn’t logged into in a while. Turns out my user id was my email address from the company I sold 5 1/2 years ago.  Who knew?  Regardless, I go the device working, packed up and left the store, shuddering as I was cheered and congratulated.  By this time (about 10:30am) the line for reserved units and even walk-ins, was gone.  The iPhone launch this was not. As much as I detested the Apple Store experience, I must say the device is really nice.  the screen is bright, the colors are bold, and the experience is ultra-smooth.  I quickly tested Safari, YouTube, Google Maps, and then installed a few apps, including the New York Times Editors’ Choice and a couple of Twitter clients. Some initial raves: Google Maps and Street View on the iPad is just amazing.  The screen is full-size like a PC or Mac, but it’s right in front of you and responding to taps and flicks and pinches and it’s really engulfing.  Video and photos are really nice on this device, despite the fact that 16:9 and anamorphic aspect ration content is letter boxed.  It still looks amazing.  And apps that are designed especially for the iPad, including The Weather Channel and Gilt and Kayak just look stunning.  The richness, the friendly layout, the finger-friendly UIs, and the satisfaction of not having a keyboard between you and the information you’re managing, while you sit on a couch or an easy chair, is just really a beautiful thing.  The mere experience of seeing these apps’ splash screens causes a shiver and Goosebumps.  Truly.  The iPad is not a desktop machine, and it’s not pocket device.  That doesn’t mean it’s useless though.  It’s the perfect “couchtop” computer. Now some downsides: the WiFi radio seems a bit flakey.  More than a few times, I have had to toggle the WiFi off and back on to get it to connect properly.  Worse yet, the iPad is totally bamboozled by the fact that I have four WiFi access points in my house, each with the same SSID.  My laptops are smart enough to roam from one to the other, but the iPad seems to maintain an affinity for the downstairs access point, even if I’m turning it on two flights up.  Telling the iPad to “forget” my WiFi network and then re-associate with it doesn’t help. More downers: as you might expect, there are far more applications developed for the iPhone than the iPad.  And although iPhone apps run on the iPad, that provides about the same experience as watching standard def on a big HD flat panel, complete with the lousy choice of thick black borders or zooming the picture in to fill the screen.  And speaking of iPhone Apps, I can’t get the Sonos one to work.  Ideally, they’d have a dedicated iPad app and it would work on the first try.  And the iPad is just as bad as any netbook when it comes to being a magnet for fingerprints.  The lack of multi-tasking is quite painful too – truly, I don’t mind if only one app can be active at once, but the lack of ability to switch between apps, and the requirement to return to the home screen and re-launch a previous app to switch back, is already old and I’ve had the thing less than 48 hours. These are just initial impressions.  I’ll have a fuller analysis soon, after I’ve had some more break-in time with my new toy.  I’ll be thinking not just about the iPad and iPhone but also about Android, the 2.1 update for which was pushed to my Droid today, and Windows Phone 7, whose “hub” concept I now understand the value of.  This has been a great year for alternative computing devices, and I see no net downside for Apple, Google or Microsoft.  Exciting times.

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  • Oracle Fusion Middleware Innovation Award Winners 2012: ADF & Fusion Development

    - by Dana Singleterry
    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:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} Oracle Fusion Middleware Innovation Awards honor customers for their cutting-edge solutions using Oracle Fusion Middleware. Winners are selected based on the uniqueness of their business case, business benefits, level of impact relative to the size of the organization, complexity and magnitude of implementation, and the originality of architecture. The awards were presented during Oracle OpenWorld 2012 and following winners are for the category of ADF & Fusion Development. Micros – an OPN Platinum partner – has been working closely with Oracle product management teams in applying industry best practices in the development of their solutions. Their current application suite for the hospitality industry was built on Oracle Forms and the Oracle database running on MS Windows. The next generation of this suite is being developed and released in modules that are now based on Oracle FMW (including ADF) 11g technologies and Oracle Database 11g all running on Oracle Linux. The primary driver was that of modernization and hence the reason Oracle ADF was selected to provide a rich UI for business processes that could be served up through traditional methods or through mobile devices globally. SOA Suite & ADF allowed for loosely-coupled services that could evolve with the needs of the business. Micros's application innovations includes the use of business application portlets that have been published from ADF Faces Task Flows generated using WebCenter portlet libraries  & Oracle Metadata Services (MDS) with multi-layered customizations using Oracle WebCenter Composer. PCS (Marfin Egnatia Bank of Greece) – PCS Wealth Management is a WM Software Solution, which captures and automates the WM business processes allowing Service Providers to allocate enough time and effort into Customer Service and Investment Strategies, under Advisory or Execution-Only Services. The Product is built upon the latest Web Technologies and ensures Best Practices covering all functional expectations, meeting local regulatory requirements and discovering successful opportunities for the WM Customers' Portfolios. The new unified Wealth Management system offers an unparalleled User Interface taking full advantage of the user friendly ADF Faces Components to a great extent, all serving Private Banking purposes. The application offers a true Account Officer Cockpit with shallow navigation, one-click access to informed decisions and a perfect customer service. ADF Grids and Pivots, the Data Visualization Components, as well as the Calendar and Map Components are cleverly used to help the user eliminate the usage of Excel, Outlook and other systems. PCS's application is unique in the way it leverages the ADF Faces data visualization components to create a truly attractive and insightful dashboard for their application. PCS Wealth Management Demo Qualcomm – Qualcomm, a $17B per year company, designs and sells semiconductor products for wireless telecommunications, mobile and computing markets. In addition, Qualcomm companies provide various hardware and software products to facilitate the design, development and deployment of phones and the applications that run on them. Qualcomm’s challenge has been to not only develop and deploy new business system functions to keep pace with customer demand, but also to provide a customer collaboration capability that is sufficiently robust, easy to use, and flexible to meet emerging and future needs. Qualcomm has taken successful steps in building and deploying the customer engagement platform Ieveraging various Oracle technologies including Fusion Middleware (ADF, SOA, OBIEE) and their proven ERP foundation of EBS and 11g databases. The new platform delivers a more unified and “seamless” business solution with a consistent, modern “look and feel” all based on standard business processes which facilitate efficient collaboration with Qualcomm and its customers. The look and feel leverages ADF in innovative ways and includes hover over navigation, custom pagination components, and skinning. Qualcomm has exposed a services layer that provides significant functionality including order-to-ship, quote-to-order, customer on-boarding and contract validation. Qualcomm's creative designs leverage Oracle's SOA Suite to integrate with Oracle EBS and desperate applications to provide a rich user interface through the use use of Oracle ADF Faces Rich Client Components providing a self-service solution to their customers.

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  • Geocaching - World wide treasure hunt

    I'm not quite sure how I came across this topic but actually I find it absolutely interesting, challenging and most of all a great fun for the family and friends. The interesting part is for sure that you can follow other peoples treasures and their preferred locations where a cache might be hidden. Of course, it wont be easy to find a cache after all. Sometimes there are even 'mystery caches' which have either riddles, further instructions or little brain games for you in order to find the actual cache - that's the challenge. And last but not least, those caches are hidden outdoor. A great experience to explore nature either on your own, or your family especially with children, or as a treasure hunting pack with a couple of friends. What is geocaching? It's a high-tech outdoor treasure hunting game that's a great way to explore the world with friends, family or on your own. Participants use GPS-enabled devices to locate hidden containers called geocaches. There are over one million geocaches hidden around the world today, waiting for you to find them. Visit Geocaching.com to search for geocaches near you.(Source: Referral Email of geocaching.com) Checkout the Geocaching 101 for further details and information. They also provide a video channel on YouTube. Which equipment do I need? Any GPS-enabled device is sufficient to go onto the hunt. I'm going to start our geocaching experience equipped with my Samsung Galaxy Tab. Additionally, I installed a geocaching.com client called c:geo that hopefully assists me soon. Combined with a map app like Google Maps and a nice Compass app you should be fully equipped and ready to go. I guess, that even a car navigation system is perfect for that task. Later on, with more experience and demand for technology (or precision) it might be interesting to opt-in for a pure GPS device, like a Garmin or any other brand on the market. {loadposition content_adsense} What is a geocache and what does it contain? In its simplest form, a cache always contains a logbook or logsheet for you to log your find. Larger caches may contain a logbook and any number of items. These items turn the adventure into a true treasure hunt. You never know what the cache owner or visitors to the cache may have left for you to enjoy. Remember, if you take something, leave something of equal or greater value in return. It is recommended that items in a cache be individually packaged in a clear, zipped plastic bag to protect them from the elements. Finding your first geocache Well, first you have to have interest to pick up the challenge. Then you have to check out the Geocache directory on geocaching.com. They have recommendations for beginner's caches but you are free to choose any. Actually, we have a Mystery Cache very close to our base, and I guess that we are going for that one on our first trip. Anyway, there is a very informative guide on the website which should answer all your questions about starting your new outdoor adventure. For sure, it's going to be rewarding. Team up with friends and family Especially as a beginner there might be misunderstandings in handling the GPS coordinates, the compass, or the map, and even finding the container at the documented position isn't easy in the first place. Luckily, there are logbook reports online from other hunters, and most of the time there are even 'spoiler' images available. But also bear in mind, that a geocache might have been removed or is lost due to unconscious people or whatever other reasons. Don't be disappointed in case that you can't find anything... There be nothing anymore. A general recommendation in this case would be to replace the missing container with a new one, and give feedback to the original owner about the state of that particular location. After all, it's about fun and active participation in a world-wide community. Geocaches in Mauritius? Yes, there are currently about 45 geocaches spread all over the island, and even a single in Rodriguez - that's gonna be a tough one. Hopefully, we will get increasing numbers as Geocaching.com allows, no better, even encourages you to hide new containers at your locations of choice. I think this is going to be real fun for us during the upcoming weeks and months. Especially, when we are travelling to other countries and transfer so-called trackable items between geocaches. On my first impression, Geocaching.com seems to be very mature, open and community-oriented. There are literally hundreds of thousands geocache 'hunters' all over the world. And usually finding a container remote from your home is very rewarding. I'll keep you updated in these matters during the next months to come...

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  • How to restore your production database without needing additional storage

    - by David Atkinson
    Production databases can get very large. This in itself is to be expected, but when a copy of the database is needed the database must be restored, requiring additional and costly storage.  For example, if you want to give each developer a full copy of your production server, you'll need n times the storage cost for your n-developer team. The same is true for any test databases that are created during the course of your project lifecycle. If you've read my previous blog posts, you'll be aware that I've been focusing on the database continuous integration theme. In my CI setup I create a "production"-equivalent database directly from its source control representation, and use this to test my upgrade scripts. Despite this being a perfectly valid and practical thing to do as part of a CI setup, it's not the exact equivalent to running the upgrade script on a copy of the actual production database. So why shouldn't I instead simply restore the most recent production backup as part of my CI process? There are two reasons why this would be impractical. 1. My CI environment isn't an exact copy of my production environment. Indeed, this would be the case in a perfect world, and it is strongly recommended as a good practice if you follow Jez Humble and David Farley's "Continuous Delivery" teachings, but in practical terms this might not always be possible, especially where storage is concerned. It may just not be possible to restore a huge production database on the environment you've been allotted. 2. It's not just about the storage requirements, it's also the time it takes to do the restore. The whole point of continuous integration is that you are alerted as early as possible whether the build (yes, the database upgrade script counts!) is broken. If I have to run an hour-long restore each time I commit a change to source control I'm just not going to get the feedback quickly enough to react. So what's the solution? Red Gate has a technology, SQL Virtual Restore, that is able to restore a database without using up additional storage. Although this sounds too good to be true, the explanation is quite simple (although I'm sure the technical implementation details under the hood are quite complex!) Instead of restoring the backup in the conventional sense, SQL Virtual Restore will effectively mount the backup using its HyperBac technology. It creates a data and log file, .vmdf, and .vldf, that becomes the delta between the .bak file and the virtual database. This means that both read and write operations are permitted on a virtual database as from SQL Server's point of view it is no different from a conventional database. Instead of doubling the storage requirements upon a restore, there is no 'duplicate' storage requirements, other than the trivially small virtual log and data files (see illustration below). The benefit is magnified the more databases you mount to the same backup file. This technique could be used to provide a large development team a full development instance of a large production database. It is also incredibly easy to set up. Once SQL Virtual Restore is installed, you simply run a conventional RESTORE command to create the virtual database. This is what I have running as part of a nightly "release test" process triggered by my CI tool. RESTORE DATABASE WidgetProduction_virtual FROM DISK=N'C:\WidgetWF\ProdBackup\WidgetProduction.bak' WITH MOVE N'WidgetProduction' TO N'C:\WidgetWF\ProdBackup\WidgetProduction_WidgetProduction_Virtual.vmdf', MOVE N'WidgetProduction_log' TO N'C:\WidgetWF\ProdBackup\WidgetProduction_log_WidgetProduction_Virtual.vldf', NORECOVERY, STATS=1, REPLACE GO RESTORE DATABASE mydatabase WITH RECOVERY   Note the only change from what you would do normally is the naming of the .vmdf and .vldf files. SQL Virtual Restore intercepts this by monitoring the extension and applies its magic, ensuring the 'virtual' restore happens rather than the conventional storage-heavy restore. My automated release test then applies the upgrade scripts to the virtual production database and runs some validation tests, giving me confidence that were I to run this on production for real, all would go smoothly. For illustration, here is my 8Gb production database: And its corresponding backup file: Here are the .vldf and .vmdf files, which represent the only additional used storage for the new database following the virtual restore.   The beauty of this product is its simplicity. Once it is installed, the interaction with the backup and virtual database is exactly the same as before, as the clever stuff is being done at a lower level. SQL Virtual Restore can be downloaded as a fully functional 14-day trial. Technorati Tags: SQL Server

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  • How to restore your production database without needing additional storage

    - by David Atkinson
    Production databases can get very large. This in itself is to be expected, but when a copy of the database is needed the database must be restored, requiring additional and costly storage.  For example, if you want to give each developer a full copy of your production server, you’ll need n times the storage cost for your n-developer team. The same is true for any test databases that are created during the course of your project lifecycle. If you’ve read my previous blog posts, you’ll be aware that I’ve been focusing on the database continuous integration theme. In my CI setup I create a “production”-equivalent database directly from its source control representation, and use this to test my upgrade scripts. Despite this being a perfectly valid and practical thing to do as part of a CI setup, it’s not the exact equivalent to running the upgrade script on a copy of the actual production database. So why shouldn’t I instead simply restore the most recent production backup as part of my CI process? There are two reasons why this would be impractical. 1. My CI environment isn’t an exact copy of my production environment. Indeed, this would be the case in a perfect world, and it is strongly recommended as a good practice if you follow Jez Humble and David Farley’s “Continuous Delivery” teachings, but in practical terms this might not always be possible, especially where storage is concerned. It may just not be possible to restore a huge production database on the environment you’ve been allotted. 2. It’s not just about the storage requirements, it’s also the time it takes to do the restore. The whole point of continuous integration is that you are alerted as early as possible whether the build (yes, the database upgrade script counts!) is broken. If I have to run an hour-long restore each time I commit a change to source control I’m just not going to get the feedback quickly enough to react. So what’s the solution? Red Gate has a technology, SQL Virtual Restore, that is able to restore a database without using up additional storage. Although this sounds too good to be true, the explanation is quite simple (although I’m sure the technical implementation details under the hood are quite complex!) Instead of restoring the backup in the conventional sense, SQL Virtual Restore will effectively mount the backup using its HyperBac technology. It creates a data and log file, .vmdf, and .vldf, that becomes the delta between the .bak file and the virtual database. This means that both read and write operations are permitted on a virtual database as from SQL Server’s point of view it is no different from a conventional database. Instead of doubling the storage requirements upon a restore, there is no ‘duplicate’ storage requirements, other than the trivially small virtual log and data files (see illustration below). The benefit is magnified the more databases you mount to the same backup file. This technique could be used to provide a large development team a full development instance of a large production database. It is also incredibly easy to set up. Once SQL Virtual Restore is installed, you simply run a conventional RESTORE command to create the virtual database. This is what I have running as part of a nightly “release test” process triggered by my CI tool. RESTORE DATABASE WidgetProduction_Virtual FROM DISK=N'D:\VirtualDatabase\WidgetProduction.bak' WITH MOVE N'WidgetProduction' TO N'C:\WidgetWF\ProdBackup\WidgetProduction_WidgetProduction_Virtual.vmdf', MOVE N'WidgetProduction_log' TO N'C:\WidgetWF\ProdBackup\WidgetProduction_log_WidgetProduction_Virtual.vldf', NORECOVERY, STATS=1, REPLACE GO RESTORE DATABASE WidgetProduction_Virtual WITH RECOVERY   Note the only change from what you would do normally is the naming of the .vmdf and .vldf files. SQL Virtual Restore intercepts this by monitoring the extension and applies its magic, ensuring the ‘virtual’ restore happens rather than the conventional storage-heavy restore. My automated release test then applies the upgrade scripts to the virtual production database and runs some validation tests, giving me confidence that were I to run this on production for real, all would go smoothly. For illustration, here is my 8Gb production database: And its corresponding backup file: Here are the .vldf and .vmdf files, which represent the only additional used storage for the new database following the virtual restore.   The beauty of this product is its simplicity. Once it is installed, the interaction with the backup and virtual database is exactly the same as before, as the clever stuff is being done at a lower level. SQL Virtual Restore can be downloaded as a fully functional 14-day trial. Technorati Tags: SQL Server

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  • What's going on with INETA and the Regional Speakers Bureau?

    - by Chris Williams
    For those of you that have been waiting patiently (and not so patiently) I'm happy to say that we're very near completion on some changes/enhancements/improvements that will allow us to finally go live with the INETA Regional Speakers Bureau. I know quite a few of you have already registered, which is great (though some of you may need to come back and update your info) and we've had a few folks submit requests, mostly in a test capacity, but soon we'll be up and live. Here's how it breaks down. Be sure to read this, because things have changed a bit from when we initially announced it. 1. The majority of our speaker/event funding is going into the Regional Speakers Bureau.  The National Bureau still exists, but it's a good bit smaller than it was before, and it's not an "every group" benefit anymore. We'll be using the National Bureau as more of a strategic task force, targeting high impact events and areas that need some community building love from INETA. These will be identified and handled on a case by case basis, and may include more than just user group events. 2. You're going to get more events per group, per year than you did before. Not only are we focusing more resources on this program, but we're also making a lot of efforts to use it more effectively. With the INETA Regional Speakers Bureau, you should be able to get 2-3 INETA speakers per year, on average. Not every geographical area will have exactly the same experience, but we're doing the best we can. 3. It's not a farm team program for the National Bureau. Unsurprisingly, I managed to offend a number of people when I previously made the comment that the Regional Speakers Bureau program was a farm team or stepping stone to the National Bureau. It was a poor choice of words.  Anyone can participate in the Regional Speakers Bureau, and I look forward to working with all of you. 4. There is assistance for your efforts. The exact final details are still being hammered out, but expect it to look something like this: (all distances listed are based on a round trip) Distances < 120 miles = $0 121 miles - 240 miles = $50 (effectively 1 to 2 hours, each way) 241 miles - 360 miles = $100 (effectively 2 to 3 hours, each way) 361 miles - 480 miles = $200 (effectively 3 to 4 hours, each way) For those of you who travel a lot, we're working on a solution to handle group visits when you're away from home. These will (for now) be handled on a case by case basis. 5. We're going to make it as easy as possible to work with the program. In order to do this, we need a few things from you. For speakers, that means your home address. It also means (maybe) filling out a simple 1 line expense report via the INETA website. For user groups, it means making sure your meeting address is up to date as well. 6. Distances will be automatically calculated from your home of record to the user group event and back. We realize that this is not a perfect solution to every instance, but we're not paying you to speak at an event, and you won't be taxed on this money. It's simply some assistance to make your community efforts easier. Our way of saying thanks for everything you do. 7. Sounds good so far, what's the catch? There's always a catch, right? In this case there are two of them: 1) At this time, Microsoft employees are welcome to use the website to line up speaking engagements with user groups, but are not eligible for financial assistance. 2) Anyone can register and use the website to line up speaking engagements with user groups, however you must receive and maintain a net score of 3+ positive ratings (we're implementing a thumbs up / thumbs down system) in order to receive financial assistance. These ratings are provided by the User Group leaders after the meeting has taken place. 8. Involvement by the User Group leaders is a key factor in the success of this program. Your job isn't done once you request a speaker. After you've had your meeting, it's critical that you go back to the website and take a very small survey. Doing this ensures that the speaker gets rated (and compensated if eligible) and also ensures that you can make another request, since you won't be able to make a new request if you have an old one outstanding. 9. What about Canada? We're definitely working on that. Unfortunately nothing new to report on that front, other than to say that we're trying. So... this is where things stand currently. We're working very quickly to get this in place and get speakers and groups together. If you have any questions, please leave a comment below and I'll answer them as quickly as possible. If I've forgotten anything, or if things change, I'll update it here. Thanks, Chris G. Williams INETA Board of Directors

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  • Dual Boot Oracle Solaris 11/11 and Linux (Ubuntu 11.10/grub2)

    - by HartmutStreppel
    After having worked with Open Solaris on my laptop first, then with an upgrade to Oracle Solaris 11 Express, I finally did a fresh install of Oracle Solaris 11/11, when it became available. I am not a big fan of upgrades as I know that I am not the perfect administrator and my system gets spoiled with unclean configurations, outdated packages and wrong settings that cannot be reversed. So I prefer to start from scratch. Especially with Oracle Solaris 11 I wanted to have a system just like a customer would have it in production. The installation was smooth - more or less, if I had only read the documentation a bit better in advance. For a number of reasons I prefer a dual boot system. The most important one is, that especially with mobile devices you often run into network problems. And you have a hard time figuring out where the problem is: in your laptop hardware, in the OS you are running, or really within the network. If you have an alternate OS to boot, you can exclude the OS and your hardware. This makes you feel better. The second OS should be a Linux variant - and for some not so obvious reason I decided to go with the latest Ubuntu release (11.10). It replaced a very old Open Suse installation that had not been booted for a while. I knew that it was probably best to install Ubuntu first and then Oracle Solaris 11, as this would put the right boot information for Oracle Solaris  into the MBR and onto the root partition. But then, how to enable dual boot with the 2 OSes. Searching the web one mainly finds information about dual boot of: Linux and Linux Linux and Windows I do not want to explain which wrong configurations I worked through, but I prefer to explain the final setup, which is extremely simple, and I am wondering why this is not covered as the easiest solution for most dual boot setups. I use chainloader from and to both OS'es, with the only disadvantage that I have to confirm two grub menus each time I want to boot the "other" OS. Still there were some hurdles to jump over: Ubuntu did not like getting its boot blocks being placed on the partition instead of the disk; I must admit that I do not fully understand why. But using the --force option you could get that done Ubuntu needs an active partition; that was easy to achieve grub2 uses a different numbering scheme for the partitions. That is in the docs, if you read them. BTW: The usual disclaimer is valid. There is  no guarantee that what I describe works or works well. Please back up your data carefully before trying any of this. So, Oracle Solaris 11 is installed on the first partition and Ubuntu on the third. With Ubtuntu things initially were a bit more complicated, as I did not know how to boot it. And the live CD did not offer the capability to boot the on-disk image (at least I did not find it). So I booted the live CD, mounted the Ubuntu installation at /mnt and wrote the boot blocks into the partition. This is something that does not seem to be recommended, at least grub-install refrained from doing what I intended. After a bit more research I was bold enough to use the --force option and wrote the boot blocks to /dev/sda3 using grub-install --boot-directory=/mnt/boot --force --no-floppy /dev/sda3 So, I now had a system with the Solaris boot loader in the MBR, Solaris specific boot blocks on the Solaris root partition and Ubuntu specific boot blocks in the Ubuntu partition. I just had to chain them together and I was done. Oracle Solaris 11: I have added the following lines to /rpool/boot/grub/menu.lst (be aware of the /rpool!!!!) title Ubuntu 11.10root (hd0,2)makeactivechainloader +1boot The Ubuntu root file system sits on the third partition (/dev/sda3). Ubuntu: I have added the following lines to /etc/grub.d/40_custom: menuentry "Solaris 11/11" {      set root=(hd0,1)      chainloader +1} Two things need to be mentioned: a) grub2 starts numbering partitions with 1; so my /dev/sda1 is partition 1. b) Oracle Solaris boots without the partition being made active (btw: the command to make a partition active with grub2 is "parttool (hd0,1) boot+", which currently does not work for me). As debugging grub is a bit complicated, I used the grub CLI to perform some tests and also used a tool, that I found on sourceforge.net that was able to prepare a list of all boot loaders on all partitions. This told me that the basic setup was correct. Unfortunately I lost it in the live CD environment. I hope this is helpful for some of the readers.Hartmut

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  • SQL SERVER – SmallDateTime and Precision – A Continuous Confusion

    - by pinaldave
    Some kinds of confusion never go away. Here is one of the ancient confusing things in SQL. The precision of the SmallDateTime is one concept that confuses a lot of people, proven by the many messages I receive everyday relating to this subject. Let me start with the question: What is the precision of the SMALLDATETIME datatypes? What is your answer? Write it down on your notepad. Now if you do not want to continue reading the blog post, head to my previous blog post over here: SQL SERVER – Precision of SMALLDATETIME. A Social Media Question Since the increase of social media conversations, I noticed that the amount of the comments I receive on this blog is a bit staggering. I receive lots of questions on facebook, twitter or Google+. One of the very interesting questions yesterday was asked on Facebook by Raghavendra. I am re-organizing his script and asking all of the questions he has asked me. Let us see if we could help him with his question: CREATE TABLE #temp (name VARCHAR(100),registered smalldatetime) GO DECLARE @test smalldatetime SET @test=GETDATE() INSERT INTO #temp VALUES ('Value1',@test) INSERT INTO #temp VALUES ('Value2',@test) GO SELECT * FROM #temp ORDER BY registered DESC GO DROP TABLE #temp GO Now when the above script is ran, we will get the following result: Well, the expectation of the query was to have the following result. The row which was inserted last was expected to return as first row in result set as the ORDER BY descending. Side note: Because the requirement is to get the latest data, we can’t use any  column other than smalldatetime column in order by. If we use name column in the order by, we will get an incorrect result as it can be any name. My Initial Reaction My initial reaction was as follows: 1) DataType DateTime2: If file precision of the column is expected from the column which store date and time, it should not be smalldatetime. The precision of the column smalldatetime is One Minute (Read Here) for finer precision use DateTime or DateTime2 data type. Here is the code which includes above suggestion: CREATE TABLE #temp (name VARCHAR(100), registered datetime2) GO DECLARE @test datetime2 SET @test=GETDATE() INSERT INTO #temp VALUES ('Value1',@test) INSERT INTO #temp VALUES ('Value2',@test) GO SELECT * FROM #temp ORDER BY registered DESC GO DROP TABLE #temp GO 2) Tie Breaker Identity: There are always possibilities that two rows were inserted at the same time. In that case, you may need a tie breaker. If you have an increasing identity column, you can use that as a tie breaker as well. CREATE TABLE #temp (ID INT IDENTITY(1,1), name VARCHAR(100),registered datetime2) GO DECLARE @test datetime2 SET @test=GETDATE() INSERT INTO #temp VALUES ('Value1',@test) INSERT INTO #temp VALUES ('Value2',@test) GO SELECT * FROM #temp ORDER BY ID DESC GO DROP TABLE #temp GO Those two were the quick suggestions I provided. It is not necessary that you should use both advices. It is possible that one can use only DATETIME datatype or Identity column can have datatype of BIGINT or have another tie breaker. An Alternate NO Solution In the facebook thread this was also discussed as one of the solutions: CREATE TABLE #temp (name VARCHAR(100),registered smalldatetime) GO DECLARE @test smalldatetime SET @test=GETDATE() INSERT INTO #temp VALUES ('Value1',@test) INSERT INTO #temp VALUES ('Value2',@test) GO SELECT name, registered, ROW_NUMBER() OVER(ORDER BY registered DESC) AS "Row Number" FROM #temp ORDER BY 3 DESC GO DROP TABLE #temp GO However, I believe it is not the solution and can be further misleading if used in a production server. Here is the example of why it is not a good solution: CREATE TABLE #temp (name VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,registered smalldatetime) GO DECLARE @test smalldatetime SET @test=GETDATE() INSERT INTO #temp VALUES ('Value1',@test) INSERT INTO #temp VALUES ('Value2',@test) GO -- Before Index SELECT name, registered, ROW_NUMBER() OVER(ORDER BY registered DESC) AS "Row Number" FROM #temp ORDER BY 3 DESC GO -- Create Index ALTER TABLE #temp ADD CONSTRAINT [PK_#temp] PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED (name DESC) GO -- After Index SELECT name, registered, ROW_NUMBER() OVER(ORDER BY registered DESC) AS "Row Number" FROM #temp ORDER BY 3 DESC GO DROP TABLE #temp GO Now let us examine the resultset. You will notice that an index which is created on the base table which is (indeed) schema change the table but can affect the resultset. As you can see, an index can change the resultset, so this method is not yet perfect to get the latest inserted resultset. No Schema Change Requirement After giving these two suggestions, I was waiting for the feedback of the asker. However, the requirement of the asker was there can’t be any schema change because the application was used by many other applications. I validated again, and of course, the requirement is no schema change at all. No addition of the column of change of datatypes of any other columns. There is no further help as well. This is indeed an interesting question. I personally can’t think of any solution which I could provide him given the requirement of no schema change. Can you think of any other solution to this? Need of Database Designer This question once again brings up another ancient question:  “Do we need a database designer?” I often come across databases which are facing major performance problems or have redundant data. Normalization is often ignored when a database is built fast under a very tight deadline. Often I come across a database which has table with unnecessary columns and performance problems. While working as Developer Lead in my earlier jobs, I have seen developers adding columns to tables without anybody’s consent and retrieving them as SELECT *.  There is a lot to discuss on this subject in detail, but for now, let’s discuss the question first. Do you have any suggestions for the above question? Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: CodeProject, Developer Training, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL DateTime, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology

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  • ASP.NET WebAPI Security 2: Identity Architecture

    - by Your DisplayName here!
    Pedro has beaten me to the punch with a detailed post (and diagram) about the WebAPI hosting architecture. So go read his post first, then come back so we can have a closer look at what that means for security. The first important takeaway is that WebAPI is hosting independent-  currently it ships with two host integration implementations – one for ASP.NET (aka web host) and WCF (aka self host). Pedro nicely shows the integration into the web host. Self hosting is not done yet so we will mainly focus on the web hosting case and I will point out security related differences when they exist. The interesting part for security (amongst other things of course) is the HttpControllerHandler (see Pedro’s diagram) – this is where the host specific representation of an HTTP request gets converted to the WebAPI abstraction (called HttpRequestMessage). The ConvertRequest method does the following: Create a new HttpRequestMessage. Copy URI, method and headers from the HttpContext. Copies HttpContext.User to the Properties<string, object> dictionary on the HttpRequestMessage. The key used for that can be found on HttpPropertyKeys.UserPrincipalKey (which resolves to “MS_UserPrincipal”). So the consequence is that WebAPI receives whatever IPrincipal has been set by the ASP.NET pipeline (in the web hosting case). Common questions are: Are there situations where is property does not get set? Not in ASP.NET – the DefaultAuthenticationModule in the HTTP pipeline makes sure HttpContext.User (and Thread.CurrentPrincipal – more on that later) are always set. Either to some authenticated user – or to an anonymous principal. This may be different in other hosting environments (again more on that later). Why so generic? Keep in mind that WebAPI is hosting independent and may run on a host that materializes identity completely different compared to ASP.NET (or .NET in general). This gives them a way to evolve the system in the future. How does WebAPI code retrieve the current client identity? HttpRequestMessage has an extension method called GetUserPrincipal() which returns the property as an IPrincipal. A quick look at self hosting shows that the moral equivalent of HttpControllerHandler.ConvertRequest() is HttpSelfHostServer.ProcessRequestContext(). Here the principal property gets only set when the host is configured for Windows authentication (inconsisteny). Do I like that? Well – yes and no. Here are my thoughts: I like that it is very straightforward to let WebAPI inherit the client identity context of the host. This might not always be what you want – think of an ASP.NET app that consists of UI and APIs – the UI might use Forms authentication, the APIs token based authentication. So it would be good if the two parts would live in a separate security world. It makes total sense to have this generic hand off point for identity between the host and WebAPI. It also makes total sense for WebAPI plumbing code (especially handlers) to use the WebAPI specific identity abstraction. But – c’mon we are running on .NET. And the way .NET represents identity is via IPrincipal/IIdentity. That’s what every .NET developer on this planet is used to. So I would like to see a User property of type IPrincipal on ApiController. I don’t like the fact that Thread.CurrentPrincipal is not populated. T.CP is a well established pattern as a one stop shop to retrieve client identity on .NET.  That makes a lot of sense – even if the name is misleading at best. There might be existing library code you want to call from WebAPI that makes use of T.CP (e.g. PrincipalPermission, or a simple .Name or .IsInRole()). Having the client identity as an ambient property is useful for code that does not have access to the current HTTP request (for calling GetUserPrincipal()). I don’t like the fact that that the client identity conversion from host to WebAPI is inconsistent. This makes writing security plumbing code harder. I think the logic should always be: If the host has a client identity representation, copy it. If not, set an anonymous principal on the request message. Btw – please don’t annoy me with the “but T.CP is static, and static is bad for testing” chant. T.CP is a getter/setter and, in fact I find it beneficial to be able to set different security contexts in unit tests before calling in some logic. And, in case you have wondered – T.CP is indeed thread static (and the name comes from a time where a logical operation was bound to a thread – which is not true anymore). But all thread creation APIs in .NET actually copy T.CP to the new thread they create. This is the case since .NET 2.0 and is certainly an improvement compared to how Win32 does things. So to sum it up: The host plumbing copies the host client identity to WebAPI (this is not perfect yet, but will surely be improved). or in other words: The current WebAPI bits don’t ship with any authentication plumbing, but solely use whatever authentication (and thus client identity) is set up by the host. WebAPI developers can retrieve the client identity from the HttpRequestMessage. Hopefully my proposed changes around T.CP and the User property on ApiController will be added. In the next post, I will detail how to add WebAPI specific authentication support, e.g. for Basic Authentication and tokens. This includes integrating the notion of claims based identity. After that we will look at the built-in authorization bits and how to improve them as well. Stay tuned.

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  • SSH-forwarded X11 display from Linux to Mac lost after some time

    - by mklein9
    I have a new and vexing problem with ssh forwarding my X11 connection when logging in from a Mac (10.7.2) to Linux (Ubuntu 8.04). I have no trouble using ssh -X to log in to the remote machine and starting an X11-based application from that shell. What has recently started happening is that additional invocations of X11 applications from that same shell, after a while (on the order of hours), are unable to start because the forwarded display is being blocked (I presume). When attempting to start xterm, for example, I get the usual message about a bad DISPLAY setting, such as: xterm Xt error: Can't open display: localhost:10.0 But the X11 application I started right when I logged in is still running along just fine, using that exact same display (localhost:10.0), just that it was started earlier. I turned on verbose logging in sshd_config and I see this in the /var/log/auth.log file in response to the failed xterm startup attempt: sshd[22104]: channel 8: open failed: administratively prohibited: open failed If I ssh -X to the server again, starting a new shell and getting assigned a new display (localhost:11.0), the same process repeats: the X11 applications started early on run just fine for as long as I keep them open (days), but after a few hours I cannot start any new ones from that shell. Particulars: OpenSSH sshd server running on Ubuntu 8.04, display forwarded to a Mac running Lion (10.7.2) with the default Apple X server. The systems are connected on an Ethernet LAN with a single switch between them. Neither machine is running a firewall. Until recently (a few days ago) this setup worked perfectly so I am mystified as to where to look next. I am by no means an X11 or SSH expert but have good UNIX/Linux experience. Nothing obvious has changed in either client or server configuration although I have tried changing a few options to try to debug this, like setting sshd_config's TCPKeepAlive to no, and setting "host +localhost" (you can tell I've been Googling). When logging in from a Linux 11.10 laptop to the same remote host over the same network and switch, this problem does not occur -- an xterm can be invoked successfully hours later from the same ssh login shell while the same experiment from the Mac fails (tested this morning to be sure), so it would appear to be a Mac-specific issue. With "LogLevel DEBUG3" set on the remote machine (sshd server), and no change made in the client connections by me, /var/log/auth.log shows one slight change in connection status reports overnight, which is the port number used by the one successful ssh session from the Linux machine (I think), connection #7 below: sshd[20173]: debug3: channel 7: status: The following connections are open:\r\n #0 server-session (t4 r0 i0/0 o0/0 fd 14/13 cfd -1)\r\n #3 X11 connection from 127.0.0.1 port 57564 (t4 r1 i0/0 o0/0 fd 16/16 cfd -1)\r\n #4 X11 connection from 127.0.0.1 port 57565 (t4 r2 i0/0 o0/0 fd 17/17 cfd -1)\r\n #5 X11 connection from 127.0.0.1 port 57566 (t4 r3 i0/0 o0/0 fd 18/18 cfd -1)\r\n #6 X11 connection from 127.0.0.1 port 57567 (t4 r4 i0/0 o0/0 fd 19/19 cfd -1)\r\n #7 X11 connection from 127.0.0.1 port 59007 In this report, everything is the same between status reports except the port number used by connection #7 which I believe is the Linux client -- the only one still maintaining a display connection. It continues to increment over time, judging by a sequence of these reports overnight. Thanks for any help, -Mike

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  • Center Pictures and Other Objects in Office 2007 & 2010

    - by Matthew Guay
    Sometimes it can be difficult to center a picture in a document just by dragging it dragging it around. Today we show you how to center pictures, images, and other objects perfectly in Word and PowerPoint. Note: For this tutorial we’re using Office 2010, but the steps are nearly identical in 2007. Centering a Picture in Word First let’s insert a picture into our document.  Click the Insert tab, and then click Picture. Once you select the picture you want, it will be added to your document.  Usually, pictures are added wherever your curser was in the document, so in a blank document it will be added at the top left. Also notice Picture Tools show up in the Ribbon after inserting an image. Note: The following menu items are available in Picture Tools Format tab which is displayed when you select the object or image you’re working with. How do we align the picture just like we want?  Click Position to get some quick placement options, including centered in the middle of the document or on the top.    However, for more advanced placement, we can use the Align tool.  If Word isn’t maximized, you may only see the icon without the “Align” label. Notice the tools were grayed out in the menu by default.  To be able to change the Alignment, we need to first change the text wrap settings. Click the Wrap Text button, and any option other than “In Line with Text”.  Your choice will depend on the document you’re writing, just choose the option that works best in the document.   Now, select the Align tools again.  You can now position your image precisely with these options. Align Center will position your picture in the center of the page widthwise. Align Middle will put the picture in the middle of the page height-wise. This works the same with textboxes.  Simply click the Align button in the Format tab, and you can center it in the page. And if you’d like to align several objects together, simply select them all, click Group, and then select Group from the menu.   Now, in the align tools, you can center the whole group on your page for a heading, or whatever you want to use the pictures for. These steps also work the same with Office 2007. Center objects in PowerPoint This works similar in PowerPoint, except that pictures are automatically set for square wrapping automatically, so you don’t have to change anything.  Simply insert the picture or other object of your choice, click Align, and choose the option you want. Additionally, if one object is already aligned like you want, drag another object near it and you will see a Smart Guide to help you align or center the second object with the first.  This only works with shapes in PowerPoint 2010 beta, but will work with pictures, textboxes, and media in the final release this summer. Conclusion These are good methods for centering images and objects in Word and PowerPoint.  From designing perfect headers to emphasizing your message in a PowerPoint presentation, this is something we’ve found useful and hope you will too. Since we’re talking about Office here, it’s worth mentioning that Microsoft has announced the Technology Guarantee Program for Office 2010. Essentially what this means is, if you purchase a version of Office 2007 between March 5th and September 30th of this year, when Office 2010 is released you’ll be able to upgrade to it for free! Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Add or Remove Apps from the Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010 SuiteAdd More Functions To Office 2007 By Installing Add-InsCustomize Your Welcome Picture Choices in Windows VistaEasily Rotate Pictures In Word 2007Add Effects To Your Pictures in Word 2007 TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Discover New Bundled Feeds in Google Reader Play Music in Chrome by Simply Dragging a File 15 Great Illustrations by Chow Hon Lam Easily Sync Files & Folders with Friends & Family Amazon Free Kindle for PC Download Stretch popurls.com with a Stylish Script (Firefox)

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  • How to restore your production database without needing additional storage

    - by David Atkinson
    Production databases can get very large. This in itself is to be expected, but when a copy of the database is needed the database must be restored, requiring additional and costly storage.  For example, if you want to give each developer a full copy of your production server, you'll need n times the storage cost for your n-developer team. The same is true for any test databases that are created during the course of your project lifecycle. If you've read my previous blog posts, you'll be aware that I've been focusing on the database continuous integration theme. In my CI setup I create a "production"-equivalent database directly from its source control representation, and use this to test my upgrade scripts. Despite this being a perfectly valid and practical thing to do as part of a CI setup, it's not the exact equivalent to running the upgrade script on a copy of the actual production database. So why shouldn't I instead simply restore the most recent production backup as part of my CI process? There are two reasons why this would be impractical. 1. My CI environment isn't an exact copy of my production environment. Indeed, this would be the case in a perfect world, and it is strongly recommended as a good practice if you follow Jez Humble and David Farley's "Continuous Delivery" teachings, but in practical terms this might not always be possible, especially where storage is concerned. It may just not be possible to restore a huge production database on the environment you've been allotted. 2. It's not just about the storage requirements, it's also the time it takes to do the restore. The whole point of continuous integration is that you are alerted as early as possible whether the build (yes, the database upgrade script counts!) is broken. If I have to run an hour-long restore each time I commit a change to source control I'm just not going to get the feedback quickly enough to react. So what's the solution? Red Gate has a technology, SQL Virtual Restore, that is able to restore a database without using up additional storage. Although this sounds too good to be true, the explanation is quite simple (although I'm sure the technical implementation details under the hood are quite complex!) Instead of restoring the backup in the conventional sense, SQL Virtual Restore will effectively mount the backup using its HyperBac technology. It creates a data and log file, .vmdf, and .vldf, that becomes the delta between the .bak file and the virtual database. This means that both read and write operations are permitted on a virtual database as from SQL Server's point of view it is no different from a conventional database. Instead of doubling the storage requirements upon a restore, there is no 'duplicate' storage requirements, other than the trivially small virtual log and data files (see illustration below). The benefit is magnified the more databases you mount to the same backup file. This technique could be used to provide a large development team a full development instance of a large production database. It is also incredibly easy to set up. Once SQL Virtual Restore is installed, you simply run a conventional RESTORE command to create the virtual database. This is what I have running as part of a nightly "release test" process triggered by my CI tool. RESTORE DATABASE WidgetProduction_virtual FROM DISK=N'C:\WidgetWF\ProdBackup\WidgetProduction.bak' WITH MOVE N'WidgetProduction' TO N'C:\WidgetWF\ProdBackup\WidgetProduction_WidgetProduction_Virtual.vmdf', MOVE N'WidgetProduction_log' TO N'C:\WidgetWF\ProdBackup\WidgetProduction_log_WidgetProduction_Virtual.vldf', NORECOVERY, STATS=1, REPLACE GO RESTORE DATABASE mydatabase WITH RECOVERY   Note the only change from what you would do normally is the naming of the .vmdf and .vldf files. SQL Virtual Restore intercepts this by monitoring the extension and applies its magic, ensuring the 'virtual' restore happens rather than the conventional storage-heavy restore. My automated release test then applies the upgrade scripts to the virtual production database and runs some validation tests, giving me confidence that were I to run this on production for real, all would go smoothly. For illustration, here is my 8Gb production database: And its corresponding backup file: Here are the .vldf and .vmdf files, which represent the only additional used storage for the new database following the virtual restore.   The beauty of this product is its simplicity. Once it is installed, the interaction with the backup and virtual database is exactly the same as before, as the clever stuff is being done at a lower level. SQL Virtual Restore can be downloaded as a fully functional 14-day trial. Technorati Tags: SQL Server

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  • Is RTD Stateless or Stateful?

    - by [email protected]
    Yes.   A stateless service is one where each request is an independent transaction that can be processed by any of the servers in a cluster.  A stateful service is one where state is kept in a server's memory from transaction to transaction, thus necessitating the proper routing of requests to the right server. The main advantage of stateless systems is simplicity of design. The main advantage of stateful systems is performance. I'm often asked whether RTD is a stateless or stateful service, so I wanted to clarify this issue in depth so that RTD's architecture will be properly understood. The short answer is: "RTD can be configured as a stateless or stateful service." The performance difference between stateless and stateful systems can be very significant, and while in a call center implementation it may be reasonable to use a pure stateless configuration, a web implementation that produces thousands of requests per second is practically impossible with a stateless configuration. RTD's performance is orders of magnitude better than most competing systems. RTD was architected from the ground up to achieve this performance. Features like automatic and dynamic compression of prediction models, automatic translation of metadata to machine code, lack of interpreted languages, and separation of model building from decisioning contribute to achieving this performance level. Because  of this focus on performance we decided to have RTD's default configuration work in a stateful manner. By being stateful RTD requests are typically handled in a few milliseconds when repeated requests come to the same session. Now, those readers that have participated in implementations of RTD know that RTD's architecture is also focused on reducing Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) with features like automatic model building, automatic time windows, automatic maintenance of database tables, automatic evaluation of data mining models, automatic management of models partitioned by channel, geography, etcetera, and hot swapping of configurations. How do you reconcile the need for a low TCO and the need for performance? How do you get the performance of a stateful system with the simplicity of a stateless system? The answer is that you make the system behave like a stateless system to the exterior, but you let it automatically take advantage of situations where being stateful is better. For example, one of the advantages of stateless systems is that you can route a message to any server in a cluster, without worrying about sending it to the same server that was handling the session in previous messages. With an RTD stateful configuration you can still route the message to any server in the cluster, so from the point of view of the configuration of other systems, it is the same as a stateless service. The difference though comes in performance, because if the message arrives to the right server, RTD can serve it without any external access to the session's state, thus tremendously reducing processing time. In typical implementations it is not rare to have high percentages of messages routed directly to the right server, while those that are not, are easily handled by forwarding the messages to the right server. This architecture usually provides the best of both worlds with performance and simplicity of configuration.   Configuring RTD as a pure stateless service A pure stateless configuration requires session data to be persisted at the end of handling each and every message and reloading that data at the beginning of handling any new message. This is of course, the root of the inefficiency of these configurations. This is also the reason why many "stateless" implementations actually do keep state to take advantage of a request coming back to the same server. Nevertheless, if the implementation requires a pure stateless decision service, this is easy to configure in RTD. The way to do it is: Mark every Integration Point to Close the session at the end of processing the message In the Session entity persist the session data on closing the session In the session entity check if a persisted version exists and load it An excellent solution for persisting the session data is Oracle Coherence, which provides a high performance, distributed cache that minimizes the performance impact of persisting and reloading the session. Alternatively, the session can be persisted to a local database. An interesting feature of the RTD stateless configuration is that it can cope with serializing concurrent requests for the same session. For example, if a web page produces two requests to the decision service, these requests could come concurrently to the decision services and be handled by different servers. Most stateless implementation would have the two requests step onto each other when saving the state, or fail one of the messages. When properly configured, RTD will make one message wait for the other before processing.   A Word on Context Using the context of a customer interaction typically significantly increases lift. For example, offer success in a call center could double if the context of the call is taken into account. For this reason, it is important to utilize the contextual information in decision making. To make the contextual information available throughout a session it needs to be persisted. When there is a well defined owner for the information then there is no problem because in case of a session restart, the information can be easily retrieved. If there is no official owner of the information, then RTD can be configured to persist this information.   Once again, RTD provides flexibility to ensure high performance when it is adequate to allow for some loss of state in the rare cases of server failure. For example, in a heavy use web site that serves 1000 pages per second the navigation history may be stored in the in memory session. In such sites it is typical that there is no OLTP that stores all the navigation events, therefore if an RTD server were to fail, it would be possible for the navigation to that point to be lost (note that a new session would be immediately established in one of the other servers). In most cases the loss of this navigation information would be acceptable as it would happen rarely. If it is desired to save this information, RTD would persist it every time the visitor navigates to a new page. Note that this practice is preferred whether RTD is configured in a stateless or stateful manner.  

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