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• High Availability for IaaS, PaaS and SaaS in the Cloud

  - by BuckWoody

  Outages, natural disasters and unforeseen events have proved that even in a distributed architecture, you need to plan for High Availability (HA). In this entry I'll explain a few considerations for HA within Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS). In a separate post I'll talk more about Disaster Recovery (DR), since each paradigm has a different way to handle that. Planning for HA in IaaS IaaS involves Virtual Machines - so in effect, an HA strategy here takes on many of the same characteristics as it would on-premises. The primary difference is that the vendor controls the hardware, so you need to verify what they do for things like local redundancy and so on from the hardware perspective. As far as what you can control and plan for, the primary factors fall into three areas: multiple instances, geographical dispersion and task-switching. In almost every cloud vendor I've studied, to ensure your application will be protected by any level of HA, you need to have at least two of the Instances (VM's) running. This makes sense, but you might assume that the vendor just takes care of that for you - they don't. If a single VM goes down (for whatever reason) then the access to it is lost. Depending on multiple factors, you might be able to recover the data, but you should assume that you can't. You should keep a sync to another location (perhaps the vendor's storage system in another geographic datacenter or to a local location) to ensure you can continue to serve your clients. You'll also need to host the same VM's in another geographical location. Everything from a vendor outage to a network path problem could prevent your users from reaching the system, so you need to have multiple locations to handle this. This means that you'll have to figure out how to manage state between the geo's. If the system goes down in the middle of a transaction, you need to figure out what part of the process the system was in, and then re-create or transfer that state to the second set of systems. If you didn't write the software yourself, this is non-trivial. You'll also need a manual or automatic process to detect the failure and re-route the traffic to your secondary location. You could flip a DNS entry (if your application can tolerate that) or invoke another process to alias the first system to the second, such as load-balancing and so on. There are many options, but all of them involve coding the state into the application layer. If you've simply moved a state-ful application to VM's, you may not be able to easily implement an HA solution. Planning for HA in PaaS Implementing HA in PaaS is a bit simpler, since it's built on the concept of stateless applications deployment. Once again, you need at least two copies of each element in the solution (web roles, worker roles, etc.) to remain available in a single datacenter. Also, you need to deploy the application again in a separate geo, but the advantage here is that you could work out a "shared storage" model such that state is auto-balanced across the world. In fact, you don't have to maintain a "DR" site, the alternate location can be live and serving clients, and only take on extra load if the other site is not available. In Windows Azure, you can use the Traffic Manager service top route the requests as a type of auto balancer. Even with these benefits, I recommend a second backup of storage in another geographic location. Storage is inexpensive; and that second copy can be used for not only HA but DR. Planning for HA in SaaS In Software-as-a-Service (such as Office 365, or Hadoop in Windows Azure) You have far less control over the HA solution, although you still maintain the responsibility to ensure you have it. Since each SaaS is different, check with the vendor on the solution for HA - and make sure you understand what they do and what you are responsible for. They may have no HA for that solution, or pin it to a particular geo, or perhaps they have a massive HA built in with automatic load balancing (which is often the case).   All of these options (with the exception of SaaS) involve higher costs for the design. Do not sacrifice reliability for cost - that will always cost you more in the end. Build in the redundancy and HA at the very outset of the project - if you try to tack it on later in the process the business will push back and potentially not implement HA. References: http://www.bing.com/search?q=windows+azure+High+Availability  (each type of implementation is different, so I'm routing you to a search on the topic - look for the "Patterns and Practices" results for the area in Azure you're interested in)

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• Speakers, Please Check Your Time

  - by AjarnMark

  Woodrow Wilson was once asked how long it would take him to prepare for a 10 minute speech. He replied "Two weeks". He was then asked how long it would take for a 1 hour speech. "One week", he replied. 2 hour speech? "I'm ready right now," he replied.  Whether that is a true story or an urban legend, I don’t really know, but either way, it is a poignant reminder for all speakers, and particularly apropos this week leading up to the PASS Community Summit. (Cross-posted to the PASS Professional Development Virtual Chapter blog #PASSProfDev.) What’s the point of that story?  Simply this…if you have plenty of time to do your presentation, you don’t need to prepare much because it is easy to throw in more and more material to stretch out to your allotted time.  But if you are on a tight time constraint, then it will take significant preparation to distill your talk down to only the essential points. I have attended seven of the last eight North American Summit events, and every one of them has been fantastic.  The speakers are great, the material is timely and relevant, and the networking opportunities are awesome.  And every year, there is one little thing that just bugs me…speakers going over their allotted time.  Why does it bother me so?  Well, if you look at a typical schedule for a Summit, you’ll see that there are six or more sessions going on at the same time, and only 15 minutes to move from one to another.  If you’re trying to maximize your training dollar by attending something during every session time slot, and you don’t want to be the last guy trying to squeeze into the middle of the row, then those 15 minutes can be critical.  All the more so if you need to stop and use the bathroom or if you have to hike to the opposite end of the convention center.  It is really a bad position to find yourself having to choose between learning the last key points of Speaker A who is going over time, and getting over to Speaker B on time so you don’t miss her key opening remarks. And frankly, I think it is just rude.  Yes, the speakers are the function, after all they are bringing the content that the rest of us are paying to learn.  But it is also an honor to be given the opportunity to speak at a conference like this, and no one speaker is so important that the conference would be a disaster without him.  Speakers know when they submit their abstract, long before the conference, how much time they will have.  It has been the same pattern at the Summit for at least the last eight years.  Program Sessions are 75 minutes long.  Some speakers who have a good track record, and meet other qualifying criteria, are extended an invitation to present a Spotlight Session which is 90 minutes (a 20% increase).  So there really is no excuse.  It’s not like you were promised a 2-hour segment and then discovered when you got here that it was only 75 minutes.  In fact, it’s not like PASS advertised 90-minute sessions for everyone and then a select few were cut back to only 75.  As a speaker, you know well before you get here which type of session you are doing and how long it is, so as a professional, you should plan accordingly. Now you might think that this only happens to rookies, but I’ll tell you that some of the worst offenders are big-name veterans who draw huge attendance numbers for their sessions.  Some attendees blow this off as, “Hey, it’s so-and-so, and I’d stay here for hours and listen to him/her talk.”  To which I would reply, “Then they should have submitted for a pre- or post-conference day-long seminar instead, but don’t try to squeeze your day-long talk into a 90-minute session.”  Now I don’t really believe that these speakers are being malicious or just selfishly trying to extend their time in the spotlight.  I think that most of them are merely being undisciplined and did not trim their presentation sufficiently, or allowed themselves to get off-track (often in a generous attempt to help someone in the audience with a question or problem that really should have been noted for further discussion after the session). So here is my recommendation…my plea, even.  TRIM THE FAT!  Now.  Before it’s too late.  Before you even get on the airplane, take a long, hard look at your presentation and eliminate some of the points that you originally thought you had to make, but in reality are not truly crucial to your main topic.  Delete a few slides.  Test your demos and have them already scripted rather than typing them during your talk.  It is better to cut out too much and end up with plenty of time at the end for Questions & Answers.  And you can always keep some notes on the stuff that you cut out so that you could fill it back in at the end as bonus material if you really do end up with a whole bunch of time on your hands.  But I don’t think you will.  And if you do, that will look even better to the audience as it will look like you’re giving them something extra that not every audience gets.  And they will thank you for that.

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• Social Engagement: One Size Doesn't Fit Anyone

  - by Mike Stiles

  The key to achieving meaningful social engagement is to know who you’re talking to, know what they like, and consistently deliver that kind of material to them. Every magazine for women knows this. When you read the article titles promoted on their covers, there’s no mistaking for whom that magazine is intended. And yet, confusion still reigns at many brands as to exactly whom they want to talk to, what those people want to hear, and what kind of content they should be creating for them. In most instances, the root problem is brands want to be all things to all people. Their target audience…the world! Good luck with that. It’s 2012, the age of aggregation and custom content delivery. To cope with the modern day barrage of information, people have constructed technological filters so that content they regard as being “for them” is mostly what gets through. Even if your brand is for men and women, young and old, you may want to consider social properties that divide men from women, and young from old. Yes, a man might find something in a women’s magazine that interests him. But that doesn’t mean he’s going to subscribe to it, or buy even one issue. In fact he’ll probably never see the article he’d otherwise be interested in, because in his mind, “This isn’t for me.” It wasn’t packaged for him. News Flash: men and women are different. So it’s a tall order to craft your Facebook Page or Twitter handle to simultaneously exude the motivators for both. The Harris Interactive study “2012 Connecting and Communicating Online: State of Social Media” sheds light on the differing social behaviors and drivers. -65% of women (vs. 59% of men) stay glued to social because they don’t want to miss anything. -25% of women check social when they wake up, before they check email. Only 18% of men check social before e-mail. -95% of women surveyed belong to Facebook vs. 86% of men. -67% of women log in to Facebook once a day or more vs. 54% of men. -Conventional wisdom is Pinterest is mostly a woman-thing, right? That may be true for viewing, but not true for sharing. Men are actually more likely to share on Pinterest than women, 23% to 10%. -The sharing divide extends to YouTube. 68% of women use it mainly for consumption, as opposed to 52% of men. -Women are as likely to have a Twitter account as men, but they’re much less likely to check it often. 54% of women check it once a week compared to 2/3 of men. Obviously, there are some takeaways from this depending on your target. Women don’t want to miss out on anything, so serialized content might be a good idea, right? Promotional posts that lead to a big payoff could keep them hooked. Posts for women might be better served first thing in the morning. If sharing is your goal, maybe male-targeted content is more likely to get those desired shares. And maybe Twitter is a better place to aim your male-targeted content than Facebook. Some grocery stores started experimenting with male-only aisles. The results have been impressive. Why? Because while it’s true men were finding those same items in the store just fine before, now something has been created just for them. They have a place in the store where they belong. Each brand’s strategy and targets are going to differ. The point is…know who you’re talking to, know how they behave, know what they like, and deliver content using any number of social relationship management targeting tools that meets their expectations. If, however, you’re committed to a one-size-fits-all, “our content is for everybody” strategy (or even worse, a “this is what we want to put out and we expect everybody to love it” strategy), your content will miss the mark for more often than it hits. @mikestilesPhoto via stock.schng

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• Application Composer Series: Where and When to use Groovy

  - by Richard Bingham

  This brief post is really intended as more of a reference than an article. The table below highlights two things, firstly where you can add you own custom logic via groovy code (end column), and secondly (middle column) when you might use each particular feature. Obviously this applies only where Application Composer exists, namely Fusion CRM and Oracle Sales Cloud, and is based on current (release 8) functionality. Feature Most Common Use Case Groovy Field Triggers React to run-time data changes. Only fired when the field is changed and upon submit. Y Object Triggers To extend the standard processing logic for an object, based on record creation, updates and deletes. There is a split between these firing events, with some related to UI/ADF actions and others originating in the database. UI Trigger Points: After Create - fires when a new object record is created. Commonly used to set default values for fields. Before Modify - Fires when the end-user tries to modify a field value. Could be used for generic warnings or extra security logic. Before Invalidate - Fires on the parent object when one of its child object records is created, updated, or deleted. For building in relationship logic. Before Remove - Fires when an attempt is made to delete an object record. Can be used to create conditions that prevent deletes. Database Trigger Points: Before Insert in Database - Fires before a new object is inserted into the database. Can be used to ensure a dependent record exists or check for duplicates. After Insert in Database - Fires after a new object is inserted into the database. Could be used to create a complementary record. Before Update in Database -Fires before an existing object is modified in the database. Could be used to check dependent record values. After Update in Database - Fires after an existing object is modified in the database. Could be used to update a complementary record. Before Delete in Database - Fires before an existing object is deleted from the database. Could be used to check dependent record values. After Delete in Database - Fires after an existing object is deleted from the database. Could be used to remove dependent records. After Commit in Database - Fires after the change pending for the current object (insert, update, delete) is made permanent in the current transaction. Could be used when committed data that has passed all validation is required. After Changes Posted to Database - Fires after all changes have been posted to the database, but before they are permanently committed. Could be used to make additional changes that will be saved as part of the current transaction. Y Field Validation Displays a user entered error message based groovy logic validating the field value. The message is shown only when the validation logic returns false, and the logic is triggered only when tabbing out of the field on the user interface. Y Object Validation Commonly used where validation is needed across multiple related fields on the object. Triggered on the submit UI action. Y Object Workflows All Object Workflows are fired upon either record creation or update, along with the option of adding a custom groovy firing condition. Y Field Updates - change another field when a specified one changes. Intended as an easy way to set different run-time values (e.g. pick values for LOV's) plus the value field permits groovy logic entry. Y E-Mail Notification - sends an email notification to specified users/roles. Templates support using run-time value tokens and rich text. N Task Creation - for adding standard tasks for use in the worklist functionality. N Outbound Message - will create and send an XML payload of the related object SDO to a specified endpoint. N Business Process Flow - intended for approval using the seeded process, however can also trigger custom BPMN flows. N Global Functions Utility functions that can be called from any groovy code in Application Composer (across applications). Y Object Functions Utility functions that are local to the parent object. Usually triggered from within 'Buttons and Actions' definitions in Application Composer, although can be called from other code for that object (e.g. from a trigger). Y Add Custom Fields When adding custom fields there are a few places you can include groovy logic. Y Default Value - to add logic within setting the default value when new records are entered. Y Conditionally Updateable - to add logic to set the field to read-only or not. Y Conditionally Required - to add logic to set the field to required or not. Y Formula Field - Used to provide a new aggregate field that is entirely based on groovy logic and other field values. Y Simplified UI Layouts - Advanced Expressions Used for creating dynamic layouts for simplified UI pages where fields and regions show/hide based on run-time context values and logic. Also includes support for the depends-on feature as a trigger. Y Related References This Blog: Application Composer Series Extending Sales Guide: Using Groovy Scripts Groovy Scripting Reference Guide

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• Documentation Changes in Solaris 11.1

  - by alanc

  One of the first places you can see Solaris 11.1 changes are in the docs, which have now been posted in the Solaris 11.1 Library on docs.oracle.com. I spent a good deal of time reviewing documentation for this release, and thought some would be interesting to blog about, but didn't review all the changes (not by a long shot), and am not going to cover all the changes here, so there's plenty left for you to discover on your own. Just comparing the Solaris 11.1 Library list of docs against the Solaris 11 list will show a lot of reorganization and refactoring of the doc set, especially in the system administration guides. Hopefully the new break down will make it easier to get straight to the sections you need when a task is at hand. Packaging System Unfortunately, the excellent in-depth guide for how to build packages for the new Image Packaging System (IPS) in Solaris 11 wasn't done in time to make the initial Solaris 11 doc set. An interim version was published shortly after release, in PDF form on the OTN IPS page. For Solaris 11.1 it was included in the doc set, as Packaging and Delivering Software With the Image Packaging System in Oracle Solaris 11.1, so should be easier to find, and easier to share links to specific pages the HTML version. Beyond just how to build a package, it includes details on how Solaris is packaged, and how package updates work, which may be useful to all system administrators who deal with Solaris 11 upgrades & installations. The Adding and Updating Oracle Solaris 11.1 Software Packages was also extended, including new sections on Relaxing Version Constraints Specified by Incorporations and Locking Packages to a Specified Version that may be of interest to those who want to keep the Solaris 11 versions of certain packages when they upgrade, such as the couple of packages that had functionality removed by an (unusual for an update release) End of Feature process in the 11.1 release. Also added in this release is a document containing the lists of all the packages in each of the major package groups in Solaris 11.1 (solaris-desktop, solaris-large-server, and solaris-small-server). While you can simply get the contents of those groups from the package repository, either via the web interface or the pkg command line, the documentation puts them in handy tables for easier side-by-side comparison, or viewing the lists before you've installed the system to pick which one you want to initially install. X Window System We've not had good X11 coverage in the online Solaris docs in a while, mostly relying on the man pages, and upstream X.Org docs. In this release, we've integrated some X coverage into the Solaris 11.1 Desktop Adminstrator's Guide, including sections on installing fonts for fontconfig or legacy X11 clients, X server configuration, and setting up remote access via X11 or VNC. Of course we continue to work on improving the docs, including a lot of contributions to the upstream docs all OS'es share (more about that another time). Security One of the things Oracle likes to do for its products is to publish security guides for administrators & developers to know how to build systems that meet their security needs. For Solaris, we started this with Solaris 11, providing a guide for sysadmins to find where the security relevant configuration options were documented. The Solaris 11.1 Security Guidelines extend this to cover new security features, such as Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) and Read-Only Zones, as well as adding additional guidelines for existing features, such as how to limit the size of tmpfs filesystems, to avoid users driving the system into swap thrashing situations. For developers, the corresponding document is the Developer's Guide to Oracle Solaris 11 Security, which has been the source for years for documentation of security-relevant Solaris API's such as PAM, GSS-API, and the Solaris Cryptographic Framework. For Solaris 11.1, a new appendix was added to start providing Secure Coding Guidelines for Developers, leveraging the CERT Secure Coding Standards and OWASP guidelines to provide the base recommendations for common programming languages and their standard API's. Solaris specific secure programming guidance was added via links to other documentation in the product doc set. In parallel, we updated the Solaris C Libary Functions security considerations list with details of Solaris 11 enhancements such as FD_CLOEXEC flags, additional *at() functions, and new stdio functions such as asprintf() and getline(). A number of code examples throughout the Solaris 11.1 doc set were updated to follow these recommendations, changing unbounded strcpy() calls to strlcpy(), sprintf() to snprintf(), etc. so that developers following our examples start out with safer code. The Writing Device Drivers guide even had the appendix updated to list which of these utility functions, like snprintf() and strlcpy(), are now available via the Kernel DDI. Little Things Of course all the big new features got documented, and some major efforts were put into refactoring and renovation, but there were also a lot of smaller things that got fixed as well in the nearly a year between the Solaris 11 and 11.1 doc releases - again too many to list here, but a random sampling of the ones I know about & found interesting or useful: The Privileges section of the DTrace Guide now gives users a pointer to find out how to set up DTrace privileges for non-global zones and what limitations are in place there. A new section on Recommended iSCSI Configuration Practices was added to the iSCSI configuration section when it moved into the SAN Configuration and Multipathing administration guide. The Managing System Power Services section contains an expanded explanation of the various tunables for power management in Solaris 11.1. The sample dcmd sources in /usr/demo/mdb were updated to include ::help output, so that developers like myself who follow the examples don't forget to include it (until a helpful code reviewer pointed it out while reviewing the mdb module changes for Xorg 1.12). The README file in that directory was updated to show the correct paths for installing both kernel & userspace modules, including the 64-bit variants.

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• Why bother writing an Windows 8 app?

  - by Dennis Vroegop

  So you want to know more about development for Window 8. Great! There are lots of reasons you should be excited about this. Since I don’t know why YOU are interested in this, I’ll make a list of reasons people can choose from. (as a side note: whenever I talk about Win8 development I am referring to the Metro Style / WinRt side of things. Apps for the ‘classic’ desktop side of Win8 on Intel are business as usual…) So… Why would you care about making an app for Windows 8? 1. It’s cool. Let’s not beat around the bush: if you like development for a hobby then you’ll love to work on this new platform. You can create apps in a relative short time (short time as in compared to writing a new CRM system) and that makes it great for a hobby product. 2. You’ll stand out. Hey, we all need an ego boost every now and then. We all need to feel special. So if you can manage to be one of the first to have you app in the Store then you’ll likely to be noticed. Just close your eyes for a moment and image you standing in a bar. It’s crowded, and then you casually say “Oh yeah, I just had my app certified and it’s in the Win8 store now”. People will stop talking, will offer you drinks and beautiful women / gorgeous man / furry creatures from Alpha Centauri (whatever your preferences are) will propose. Or maybe not. Anyway…. 3. Make some cash! IDC predicts there will be about 350,000,000 Windows 8 licenses sold in the next year. Think about that number. 350,000,000. And they all have access to the Store. Where you’re app will be. With one little click they can select it, download and somehow magically $1.00 or $2.00 from their bank account is transferred to yours. Now, I am not saying that all of those people will download and buy your app but what if only 1% of them did? Remember: there aren’t that many apps available yet….. 4. Learn. Creating new small apps is a great way to learn new stuff. Yes, you could read about it (on this blog for instance) but the only way to learn something is to do it. So be prepared for the future and learn something new by doing it.Write an app! Now! 5. The biggie (for me at least): it’s fun. Even if you remove the points above it’s still fun to write for these devices and this platform. Now some of you will say : “But why not write a great app for IOS or Android?” I think this is a valid question. Of course the novelty of the platform wears out and points 2 and 3 from above list will not be as relevant as it is today. But still 1 4 and 5 remain. And don’t forget: if you already work on the Microsoft platform it’s not that hard to learn this new Win8 stuff. If you have done some XAML development (be it WPF or Silverlight) you are almost there in becoming a good Win8 developer. So you’ll be more productive much sooner than when you have to learn Objective C or Java. Even if you’re a HTML / Javascript developer (I say developer here, not designer) you’ll be up to speed on Win8 development pretty soon. Yes, you, that funky Web Developer who lives and breathes HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript / Node.Js / JQuery: you too can be a Win8 developer. A first class Win8 developer! So.. Download the stuff you need from http://dev.windows.com install Windows 8 and Visual Studio 12 and by the time you’re ready I’ll be working on the next article: how to do all this? Happy coding!

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• Rules for Naming

  - by PointsToShare

  © 2011 By: Dov Trietsch. All rights reserved Naming Documents (or is it “Document, Naming”?) Tis but thy name that is my enemy; Thou art thyself, though not a Montague. What's Montague? It is nor hand, nor foot, Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part Belonging to a man. O, be some other name! What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet; So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call'd, Retain that dear perfection which he owes Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name And for that name which is no part of thee Take all myself.  Shakespeare – Romeo and Juliet Act II, Scene 2 We normally only use the bold portion of the famous Shakespearean quote above, but it is really out of context. As the play unfolds, we learn that a name is all too powerful. Indeed it is because of their names that the doomed lovers die. There might be life and death in a name (BTW, when I wrote this monogram, I was in Hatfield, PA. Remember the Hatfields and the McCoys?) This is a bit extreme, but in the field of Knowledge Management (KM) names are of the utmost importance as well. When I write an article about managing SharePoint sites, how should I name it? “Managing a site” or “Site, managing”? Nine times out of ten I’d opt for the latter. Almost everything we do is “Managing” so to make life easier for a person looking for meaningful content, we title our articles starting with the differentiator rather than the common factor. As a rule of thumb, we start the name with the noun rather than the verb. It is not what we do that is the primary key; it is what we do it to. So, answer this – is it a “rule of thumb” or a “thumb rule?” This is tough. A lot of what we do when naming is a judgment call. Both thumb and rule are nouns, albeit concrete and abstract (more about this later), but to most people “thumb rule” is meaningless while “rule of thumb” is an idiom. The difference between knowledge and information is that knowledge is meaningful information placed in context. Thus I elect the “rule of thumb”. It is the more meaningful title. Abstract and Concrete are relative terms. Many nouns (and verbs) that are abstract to a commoner, are concrete to a practitioner of one profession or another and may even have different concrete meanings in different professional jargons. Think about “running”. To an executive it means running a business, to a marathoner its meaning is much more literal. Generally speaking, we store and disseminate knowledge within a practice more than we do it in general. Even dictionaries encyclopedias define terms as they apply to different audiences. The rule of thumb is to put the more concrete first, but within the audience’s jargon. Even the title of this monogram is a question. Do I name it “Naming Documents” or “Documents, Naming”? Well, my own rule of thumb (“Here he goes again!?”) states that the latter is better because it starts with a noun, but this is a document about naming more than it about documents. The rules of naming also apply to graphs and charts, excel spreadsheets, and so on. Thus, I vote for the former.  A better title could have been “Naming Objects” only the word “Object” is a bit too abstract. How about just “Naming” or “Naming, rules of”? You get the drift. One of the ways to resolve all of this is to store the documents in Knowledge-Bases, which may become the subjects of a future punditry. Knowledge bases use keywords to describe their content.  Use a Metadata store for the keywords to at least attempt some common grounds. Here is another general rule (rule of thumb?!!) – put at least the one keyword in the title. Use subtitles. Here is an example: Migrating documents – Screening, cleaning, and organizing our knowledge. The main keyword is “documents”, next is “migrating”, other keywords also appear in the subtitle. They are “screening”, “cleaning”, and “organizing”. Any questions? Send me an amply named document by email: [email protected]

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• How to break out of if statement

  - by TheBroodian

  I'm not sure if the title is exactly an accurate representation of what I'm actually trying to ask, but that was the best I could think of. I am experiencing an issue with my character class. I have developed a system so that he can perform chain attacks, and something that was important to me was that 1)button presses during the process of an attack wouldn't interrupt the character, and 2) at the same time, button presses should be stored so that the player can smoothly queue up chain attacks in the middle of one so that gameplay doesn't feel rigid or unresponsive. This all begins when the player presses the punch button. Upon pressing the punch button, the game checks the state of the dpad at the moment of the button press, and then translates the resulting combined buttons into an int which I use as an enumerator relating to a punch method for the character. The enumerator is placed into a List so that the next time the character's Update() method is called, it will execute the next punch in the list. It only executes the next punch if my character is flagged with acceptInput as true. All attacks flag acceptInput as false, to prevent the interruption of attacks, and then at the end of an attack, acceptInput is set back to true. While accepting input, all other actions are polled for, i.e. jumping, running, etc. In runtime, if I attack, and then queue up another attack behind it (by pressing forward+punch) I can see the second attack visibly execute, which should flag acceptInput as false, yet it gets interrupted and my character will stop punching and start running if I am still holding down the dpad. Included is some code for context. This is the input region for my character. //Placed this outside the if (acceptInput) tree because I want it //to be taken into account whether we are accepting input or not. //This will queue up attacks, which will only be executed if we are accepting input. //This creates a desired effect that helps control the character in a // smoother fashion for the player. if (Input.justPressed(buttonManager.Punch)) { int dpadPressed = Input.DpadState(0); if (attackBuffer.Count() < 1) { attackBuffer.Add(CheckPunch(dpadPressed)); } else { attackBuffer.Clear(); attackBuffer.Add(CheckPunch(dpadPressed)); } } if (acceptInput) { if (attackBuffer.Count() > 0) { ExecutePunch(attackBuffer[0]); attackBuffer.RemoveAt(0); } //If D-Pad left is being held down. if (Input.DpadDirectionHeld(0, buttonManager.Left)) { flipped = false; if (onGround) { newAnimation = "run"; } velocity = new Vector2(velocity.X - acceleration, velocity.Y); if (walking == true && velocity.X <= -walkSpeed) { velocity.X = -walkSpeed; } else if (walking == false && velocity.X <= -maxSpeed) { velocity.X = -maxSpeed; } } //If D-Pad right is being held down. if (Input.DpadDirectionHeld(0, buttonManager.Right)) { flipped = true; if (onGround) { newAnimation = "run"; } velocity = new Vector2(velocity.X + acceleration, velocity.Y); if (walking == true && velocity.X >= walkSpeed) { velocity.X = walkSpeed; } else if (walking == false && velocity.X >= maxSpeed) { velocity.X = maxSpeed; } } //If jump/accept button is pressed. if (Input.justPressed(buttonManager.JumpAccept)) { if (onGround) { Jump(); } } //If toggle element next button is pressed. if (Input.justPressed(buttonManager.ToggleElementNext)) { if (elements.Count != 0) { elementInUse++; if (elementInUse >= elements.Count) { elementInUse = 0; } } } //If toggle element last button is pressed. if (Input.justPressed(buttonManager.ToggleElementLast)) { if (elements.Count != 0) { elementInUse--; if (elementInUse < 0) { elementInUse = Convert.ToSByte(elements.Count() - 1); } } } //If character is in the process of jumping. if (jumping == true) { if (Input.heldDown(buttonManager.JumpAccept)) { velocity.Y -= fallSpeed.Y; maxJumpTime -= elapsed; } if (Input.justReleased(buttonManager.JumpAccept) || maxJumpTime <= 0) { jumping = false; maxJumpTime = 0; } } //Won't execute abilities if input isn't being accepted. foreach (PlayerAbility ability in playerAbilities) { if (buffer.Matches(ability)) { if (onGround) { ability.Activate(); } if (!onGround && ability.UsableInAir) { ability.Activate(); } else if (!onGround && !ability.UsableInAir) { buffer.Clear(); } } } } When the attackBuffer calls ExecutePunch(int) method, ExecutePunch() will call one of the following methods: private void NeutralPunch1() //0 { acceptInput = false; busy = true; newAnimation = "punch1"; numberOfAttacks++; timeSinceLastAttack = 0; } private void ForwardPunch2(bool toLeft) //true == 7, false == 4 { forwardPunch2Timer = 0f; acceptInput = false; busy = true; newAnimation = "punch2begin"; numberOfAttacks++; timeSinceLastAttack = 0; if (toLeft) { velocity.X -= 800; } if (!toLeft) { velocity.X += 800; } } I assume the attack is being interrupted due to the fact that ExecutePunch() is in the same if statement as running, but I haven't been able to find a suitable way to stop this happening. Thank you ahead of time for reading this, I apologize for it having become so long winded.

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• Some Early Considerations

  - by Chris Massey

  Following on from my previous post, I want to say "thank you" to everyone who has got in touch and got involved – you are pioneers! An update on where we are right now: paper prototypes v1 To be more specific, we’ve picked two of the ideas that seem to have more pros than cons, turned them into Balsamiq mockups, and are getting them fleshed out with realistic content. We’ll initially make these available to the aforementioned pioneers (thank you again), roll in the feedback, and then open up to get more data on what works and what doesn’t. If you’ve got any questions about this (or what we’re working on right now), feel free to ask me in the comments below. I’ve had a few people express an interest in the process we’re going through, and I’m more than happy to share details more frequently as we go along – not least because you, dear reader, will help us stay on target and create something Good. To start with, here’s a quick flashback to bring you all up to speed. A Brief Retrospective As you may already know, we’re creating a new publishing asset specifically focused on providing great content for web developers. We don’t yet know exactly what this thing will look like, or exactly how it will work, but we know we want to create something that is useful different. For my part, I’m seriously excited at the prospect of building a genuinely digital publishing system (as opposed to what most publishing is these days, which is print-style publishing which just happens to be on the web). The main challenge at this point is working out our build-measure-assess loop to speed up our experimental turn-around, and that’ll get better as we run more trials. Of course, there are a few things we’ve been pondering at this early conceptual stage: Do we publishing about heterogeneous technology stacks from day 1, or do we start with ASP.NET (which we’re familiar with) & branch out later? There are challenges with either approach. What publishing "modes" are already being well-handled? For example, the likes of Pluralsight, TekPub, and Treehouse have pretty much nailed video training (debate about price, if you like), and unless we think we can do it faster / better / cheaper (unlikely, for the record), we should leave them to it. Where should we base whatever we create? Should we create a completely new asset under a new name, graft something onto Simple-Talk (like the labs), or just build something directly into Simple-Talk? It sounds trivial, but it does have at least some impact on infrastructure and what how we manage the different types of content we (will) have. Are there any obvious problems or niches that we think could address really well, or should we just throw ideas out and see what readers respond to? What kind of users do we want to provide for? This actually deserves a little bit of unpacking… Why are you here? We currently divide readers into (broadly) the categories: Category 1: I know nothing about X, and I’d like to learn about it. Category 2: I know something about X, but I’d like to learn how to do something specific with it. Category 3: Ah man, I have a problem with X, and I need to fix it now. Now that I think about it, I might also include a 4th class of reader: Category 4: I’m looking for something interesting to engage my brain. These are clearly task-based categorizations, and depending on which task you’re performing when you arrive here, you’re going to need different types of content, or will have specific discovery needs. One of the questions that’s at the back of my mind whenever I consider a new idea is “How many of the categories will this satisfy?” As an example, typical video training is very well suited to categories 1, 2, and 4. StackOverflow is very well suited to category 3, and serves as a sign-posting system to the rest. Clearly it’s not necessary to satisfy every category need to be useful and popular, but being aware of what behavior readers might be exhibiting when they arrive will help us tune our ideas appropriately. < / Flashback > We don’t have clean answers to most of these considerations – they’re things we’re aware of, and each idea we look at is going to be best suited to a different mix of the options I’ve described. Our first experimental loop will be coming full circle in the next few days, so we should start to see how the different possibilities vary between ideas. Free to chime in with questions and suggestions about anything I’ve just brain-dumped, or at any stage as we go along. If you see anything that intrigued or enrages you, or just have an idea you’d like to share, I’d love to hear from you.

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• How do I dig myself out of this DEEP hole? [closed]

  - by user74847

  I may be a bit bias in the way i word this but any opinions and suggestions are welcome. I should start by saying i have a MSc in CS and a degree in new media +6 years expereince and im probably around a middleweight developer. I started a web development company with my friend from uni a year ago, there was a 4 month gap in the middle where i went miles away work on a big project. Ive since returned and picked up where we left off. A year on though i find im still staying up til 5am and getting up at 9 sometimes 2-3 days without sleep. While i was away i was working 9-5 and struggling to keep up with doing stuff for my clients 8 hours ahead, after work, so things stagnated. We currently have about 12 active projects, with one other part time developer and a full time freelancer who is dealing with one of our major projects. I am solely responsible for concurrently developing 2 big sites similar to gumtree in functionality, at the same time as about 5-6+ small WordPress based 5-10page sites. a lot of the content isnt in yet or the client is delaying so i chop and change project every other day which does my head in. Is it reasonable to expect myself to remember the intricate details of each project when i come back to it a week later? and remember the details of a task which hasnt been written down? my business partner seems to think so. or am i just forgetful? Im particularly bad at estimating timescales which doesnt help, added to that a lot of the technologies im am using are new to me (a magento site took weeks to theme rather than days and was full of bugs, even after 1000's of google searches and hours reading forums) im still trying to learn and find the best CMS for us to use and getting my head around the likes of Bootstrap and jquery, Cpanel / Linux (we just got a blank vps for me to set up with no experience) even installing an SSL certificate caused everyone's mail clients to go down which was more stress for me to sort out. I find the pressure of the workload and timescales and trying to learn this stuff so fast is beginning to turn me against my career path. The fact that i never seem to get anything done really winds up my business partner and iv come to associate him with the stress and pain of the whole situation especially when I get berated or a look that says "oh you retard" when I forget something. Even today i spent hours learning how a particular themeforest theme worked with wordpress and how i could twist it to work for our partiuclar needs, on the surface had done no work, that triggered a 30 minute tirade of anger and stress and questioning what i had done from my business partner. had i taken too long to work on that? shoudl i have done it in 2 hours instead of 6? i told him i would take 2 hours. i was wrong. I feel like im running myself into the ground. My sleeping pattern has got so bad that when im working im half asleep and making mistakes, my eyes are constantly purple underneath, i literally fall asleep at my desk, its affecting my social life too, ive not slept more than lightly for the last year and grind through impossible code puzzles in my half sleep wich keeps me awake, when im already exhausted. plus the work is rushed and buggy when it does get done so drags on into the next project. I also procrastinate quite badly, pacing the livingroom, looking out the window when Im alone for three days straight in the flat and start to get cabin fever which means i do even less work and the negative feedback loop continues. I get told im the only one with the problem when i say that i cant work from home any more, and examples of other freelancers get brought up. an office wouldnt bring any extra cash in to the company but im convinced having that moving more than 2 meters away from my bed to go to "work" would get me working, at the moment i feel guilty like i should be working 24-7. It is important that we do all this work to raise enough cash to get our business to the next level but every month still feels like a struggle to pay the rent (there is about £20K coming in by Jan) and i have to borrow money from friends often to buy food or get a taxi to a meeting, so it is vital the money keeps coming in. (im also 20 mins late for nearly all meetings but thats a different issue) have you experienced anything similar? how can i deal with the issues ive raised? is it realistic to develop 10 sites at once? how can i improve my relationship with my business partner? do you struggle to work at home? how do you deal with that? i think if i dont get my life on track by feb i will seriously consider giving it all up, but that seems like such a waste. any ideas!!? i need help! Thanks.

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• Data Source Security Part 2

  - by Steve Felts

  In Part 1, I introduced the default security behavior and listed the various options available to change that behavior.  One of the key topics to understand is the difference between directly using database user and password values versus mapping from WLS user and password to the associated database values.   The direct use of database credentials is relatively new to WLS, based on customer feedback.  Some of the trade-offs are covered in this article. Credential Mapping vs. Database Credentials Each WLS data source has a credential map that is a mechanism used to map a key, in this case a WLS user, to security credentials (user and password).  By default, when a user and password are specified when getting a connection, they are treated as credentials for a WLS user, validated, and are converted to a database user and password using a credential map associated with the data source.  If a matching entry is not found in the credential map for the data source, then the user and password associated with the data source definition are used.  Because of this defaulting mechanism, you should be careful what permissions are granted to the default user.  Alternatively, you can define an invalid default user to ensure that no one can accidentally get through (in this case, you would need to set the initial capacity for the pool to zero so that the pool is populated only by valid users). To create an entry in the credential map: 1) First create a WLS user.  In the administration console, go to Security realms, select your realm (e.g., myrealm), select Users, and select New.  2) Second, create the mapping.  In the administration console, go to Services, select Data sources, select your data source name, select Security, select Credentials, and select New.  See http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E24329_01/apirefs.1211/e24401/taskhelp/jdbc/jdbc_datasources/ConfigureCredentialMappingForADataSource.html for more information. The advantages of using the credential mapping are that: 1) You don’t hard-code the database user/password into a program or need to prompt for it in addition to the WLS user/password and 2) It provides a layer of abstraction between WLS security and database settings such that many WLS identities can be mapped to a smaller set of DB identities, thereby only requiring middle-tier configuration updates when WLS users are added/removed. You can cut down the number of users that have access to a data source to reduce the user maintenance overhead.  For example, suppose that a servlet has the one pre-defined, special WLS user/password for data source access, hard-wired in its code in a getConnection(user, password) call.  Every WebLogic user can reap the specific DBMS access coded into the servlet, but none has to have general access to the data source.  For instance, there may be a ‘Sales’ DBMS which needs to be protected from unauthorized eyes, but it contains some day-to-day data that everyone needs. The Sales data source is configured with restricted access and a servlet is built that hard-wires the specific data source access credentials in its connection request.  It uses that connection to deliver only the generally needed day-to-day information to any caller. The servlet cannot reveal any other data, and no WebLogic user can get any other access to the data source.  This is the approach that many large applications take and is the reasoning behind the default mapping behavior in WLS. The disadvantages of using the credential map are that: 1) It is difficult to manage (create, update, delete) with a large number of users; it is possible to use WLST scripts or a custom JMX client utility to manage credential map entries. 2) You can’t share a credential map between data sources so they must be duplicated. Some applications prefer not to use the credential map.  Instead, the credentials passed to getConnection(user, password) should be treated as database credentials and used to authenticate with the database for the connection, avoiding going through the credential map.  This is enabled by setting the “use-database-credentials” to true.  See http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E24329_01/apirefs.1211/e24401/taskhelp/jdbc/jdbc_datasources/ConfigureOracleParameters.html "Configure Oracle parameters" in Oracle WebLogic Server Administration Console Help. Use Database Credentials is not currently supported for Multi Data Source configurations.  When enabled, it turns off credential mapping on Generic and Active GridLink data sources for the following attributes: 1. identity-based-connection-pooling-enabled (this interaction is available by patch in 10.3.6.0). 2. oracle-proxy-session (this interaction is first available in 10.3.6.0). 3. set client identifier (this interaction is available by patch in 10.3.6.0).  Note that in the data source schema, the set client identifier feature is poorly named “credential-mapping-enabled”.  The documentation and the console refer to it as Set Client Identifier. To review the behavior of credential mapping and using database credentials: - If using the credential map, there needs to be a mapping for each WLS user to database user for those users that will have access to the database; otherwise the default user for the data source will be used.  If you always specify a user/password when getting a connection, you only need credential map entries for those specific users. - If using database credentials without specifying a user/password, the default user and password in the data source descriptor are always used.  If you specify a user/password when getting a connection, that user will be used for the credentials.  WLS users are not involved at all in the data source connection process.

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• Computer science undergraduate project ideas

  - by Mehrdad Afshari

  Hopefully, I'm going to finish my undergraduate studies next semester and I'm thinking about the topic of my final project. And yes, I've read the questions with duplicate title. I'm asking this from a bit different viewpoint, so it's not an exact dupe. I've spent at least half of my life coding stuff in different languages and frameworks so I'm not looking at this project as a way to learn much about coding and preparing for real world apps or such. I've done lots of those already. But since I have to do it to complete my degree, I felt I should spend my time doing something useful instead of throwing the whole thing out. I'm planning to make it an open source project or a hosted Web app (depending on the type) if I can make a high quality thing out of it, so I decided to ask StackOverflow what could make a useful project. Situation I've plenty of freedom about the topic. They also require 30-40 pages of text describing the project. I have the following points in mind (the more satisfied, the better): Something useful for software development Something that benefits the community Having academic value is great Shouldn't take more than a month of development (I know I'm lazy). Shouldn't be related to advanced theoretical stuff (soft computing, fuzzy logic, neural networks, ...). I've been a business-oriented software developer. It should be software oriented. While I love hacking microcontrollers and other fun embedded electronic things, I'm not really good at soldering and things like that. I'm leaning toward a Web application (think StackOverflow, PasteBin, NerdDinner, things like those). Technology It's probably going to be done in .NET (C#, F#) and Windows platform. If I really like the project (cool low level hacking), I might actually slip to C/C++. But really, C# is what I'm efficient at. Ideas Programming language, parsing and compiler related stuff: Designing a domain specific programming language and compiler Templating language compiled to C# or IL Database tools and related code generation stuff Web related technologies: ASP.NET MVC View engine doing something cool (don't know what exactly...) Specific-purpose, small, fast ASP.NET-based Web framework Applications: Visual Studio plugin to integrate with Bazaar (it's too much work, I think). ASP.NET based, jQuery-powered issue tracker (and possibly, project lifecycle management as a whole - poor man's TFS) Others: Something related to GPGPU Looking forward for great ideas! Unfortunately, I can't help on a currently existing project. I need to start my own to prevent further problems (as it's an undergrad project, nevertheless).

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• Qt vs .NET - plz no n00bs who don't know wtf they're talking about [closed]

  - by Pirate for Profit

  Man in all these Qt vs. .NET discussions 90% these people don't know WTF they're talking about. Trying to get a real comparison chart going before we embark on a major fucking project. And yes I'm drunk, and yes I use cocaine. Event Handling In Qt the event handling system you just emit signals when something cool happens and then catch them in slots, for instance emit valueChanged(int percent, bool something); and void MyCatcherObj::valueChanged(int p, bool ok){} blocking them and disconnecting them when needed, doing it across threads... once you get the hang of it, it just seems a lot more natural and intuitive than the way the .NET event handling is set up (you know, object sender, CustomEventArgs e). And I'm not just talking about syntax, because in the end the .NET delegate crap is the bomb. I'm also talking about in more than just reflection (because, yes, .NET obviously has much stronger reflection capabilities). I'm talking about in the way the system feels to a human being. Qt wins hands down i m o. Basically, the footprints make more sense and you can visualize the project easier without the clunky event handling system. I wish I could it explain it better. The only thing is, I do love some of the ease of C# compared to C++ and .NET's assembly architecture. That is a big bonus for modular projects, which are a PITA to do in C++. Database Ease of Doing Crap Also what about datasets and database manipulations. I think .net wins here but I'm not sure. Threading/Conccurency How do you guys think of the threading? In .NET, all I've ever done is make like a list of master worker threads with locks. I like QConcurrentFramework, you don't worry about locks or anything, and with the ease of the signal slot system across threads it's nice to get notified about the progress of things. Memory Usage Also what do you think of the overall memory usage comparison. Is the .NET garbage collector pretty on the ball and quick compared to the instantaneous nature of native memory management? Or does it just let programs leak up a storm and lag the computer then clean it up when it's about to really lag? However, I am a n00b who doesn't know what I'm talking about, please school me on the subject.

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• Existing web-site CSS replacement (re-skinning) best-practices without changing the HTML

  - by Enigmativity

  I can see a number of other good answers to questions relating to CSS best-practices on stack overflow: How to Manage CSS Explosion CSS Conventions / Code Layout Models Are there any CSS standards that I should follow while writing my first stylesheet? What is the best method for tidying CSS? Best Practices - CSS Stylesheet Formatting But I think I have a different problem. I'm trying to "re-skin" an existing site that has been nicely built using div's and ul's, etc, and it has a good existing CSS file, but when I start making changes to the CSS I quickly find that I break the layout. My feeling is that it is very hard to get a feel for how all the CSS will work together and indeed what CSS is affecting parent and sibling elements in the HTML. So, my question is "what are the best-practices around re-skinning an existing web-site by replacing the CSS only and not modifying the existing HTML?" I can't change the classes, ids, node hierarchy, etc. An example of the particular site that I am trying to re-skin is http://demo.nopcommerce.com/. The existing CSS can be as complicated/detailed as this extract from the main CSS file: .header-selectors-wrapper { text-align: right; float: right; width: 500px; } .header-currencyselector { float: right; } .header-languageselector { float: left; } .header-taxDisplayTypeSelector { float: right; } .header-links-wrapper { float: right; text-align: right; width: 570px; } .header-links { border: solid 1px #9a9a9a; padding: 5px 5px 5px 5px; margin-bottom: 5px; display: inline-table; } .order-summary-content .cart .cart-item-row td, .wishlist-content .cart .cart-item-row td { border-bottom: 1px solid #c5c5c5; vertical-align: middle; line-height: 30px; } .order-summary-content .cart .cart-item-row td.product, .wishlist-content .cart .cart-item-row td.product { text-align: left; padding: 0px 10px 0px 10px; } .order-summary-content .cart .cart-item-row td.product a, .wishlist-content .cart .cart-item-row td.product a { font-weight: bold; } Any help would be appreciated.

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• Best programming aids for a quadriplegic programmer

  - by Peter Rowell

  Before you jump to conclusions, yes, this is programming related. It covers a situation that comes under the heading of, "There, but for the grace of God, go you or I." This is brand new territory for me so I'm asking for some serious help here. A young man, Honza Ripa, in a nearby town did the classic Dumb Thing two weeks after graduating from High School -- he dove into shallow water in the Russian River and had a C-4/C-5 break, sometimes called a Swimming Pool break. In a matter of seconds he went from an exceptional golfer and wrestler to a quadriplegic. (Read the story ... all of us should have been so lucky as to have a girlfriend like Brianna.) That was 10 months ago and he has regained only tiny amounts of control of his right index finger and a couple of other hand/foot motions, none of them fine-grained. His total control of his computer (currently running Win7, but we can change that as needed) is via voice command. Honza's not dumb. He had a 3.7 GPA with AP math and physics. The Problems: Since all of his input is via voice command, he is concerned that the predominance of special characters in programming will require vast amount of verbose commands. Does anyone know of any well done voice input system specifically designed for programmers? I'm thinking about something that might be modal--e.g. you say "Python input" and it goes into a macro mode for doing class definitions, etc. Given all of the RSI in programmer-land there's got to be something out there. What OS(es) does it run on? I am planning on teaching him Python, which is my preferred language for programming and teaching. Are there any applications / whatevers that are written in Python and would be a particularly good match for engaging him mentally while supporting his disability? One of his expressed interests is in stock investing, but that not might be a good starting point for a brand-new programmer. There are a lot of environments (Flash, JavaScript, etc) that are not particularly friendly to people with accessibility challenges. I vaguely remember (but cannot find) a research project that basically created an overlay system on top of a screen environment and then allowed macro command construction on top of the screen image. If we can get/train this system, we may be able to remove many hurdles to using the net. I am particularly interested in finding open source Python-based robotics and robotic prostheses projects so that he can simultaneously learn advanced programming concepts while learning to solve some of his own immediate problems. I've done a ton of googling on this, but I know there things I'm missing. I'm asking the SO community to step up to the plate here. I know this group has the answers, so let me hear them! Overwhelm me with the opportunities that any of us might have/need to still program after such a life-changing event.

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• WMI/VBS/HTML System Information Script

  - by Methical

  Hey guys; havin' a problem with this code here; can't seem to work out whats goin' wrong with it. All other variables seem to print fine in the HTML ouput; but I get an error that relates to the cputype variable. I get the following error C:\Users\Methical\Desktop\sysinfo.vbs(235,1) Microsoft VBScript runtime error: Invalid procedure call or argument I think it has somethin' to do with this line here fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>CPU</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & cputype & "</i></td></tr>" If i delete this line; the script compiles and outputs with no errors. Here is the full code below Dim strComputer, objWMIService, propValue, objItem Dim strUserName, strPassword, colItems, SWBemlocator ' This section querries for the workstation to be scanned. UserName = "" Password = "" strComputer = "127.1.1.1" ImgDir = "C:\Scripts\images\" 'Sets up the connections and opjects to be used throughout the script. Set SWBemlocator = CreateObject("WbemScripting.SWbemLocator") Set objWMIService = SWBemlocator.ConnectServer(,"root\CIMV2",strUserName,strPassword) 'This determines the current date and time of the PC being scanned. Set colItems = objWMIService.ExecQuery("SELECT * FROM Win32_LocalTime", "WQL", wbemFlagReturnImmediately + wbemFlagForwardOnly) For Each objItem in colItems If objItem.Minute < 10 Then theMinutes = "0" & objItem.Minute Else theMinutes = objItem.Minute End If If objItem.Second < 10 Then theSeconds = "0" & objItem.Second Else theSeconds = objItem.Second End If DateTime = objItem.Month & "/" & objItem.Day & "/" & objItem.Year & " - " & objItem.Hour & ":" & theMinutes & ":" & theSeconds Next 'Gets some ingomation about the Operating System including Service Pack level. Set colItems = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_OperatingSystem",,48) For Each objItem in colItems WKID = objItem.CSName WKOS = objItem.Caption CSD = objItem.CSDVersion Architecture = objItem.OSArchitecture SysDir = objItem.SystemDirectory SysDrive = objItem.SystemDrive WinDir = objItem.WindowsDirectory ServicePack = objItem.ServicePackMajorVersion & "." & objItem.ServicePackMinorVersion Next 'This section returns the Time Zone Set colItems = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_TimeZone") For Each objItem in colItems Zone = objItem.Description Next 'This section displays the Shadow Storage information Set colItems = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_ShadowStorage") For Each objItem in colItems Allocated = int((objItem.AllocatedSpace/1024)/1024+1) UsedSpace = int((objItem.UsedSpace/1024)/1024+1) MaxSpace = int((objItem.MaxSpace/1024)/1024+1) Next 'This section returns the InstallDate of the OS Set objSWbemDateTime = _ CreateObject("WbemScripting.SWbemDateTime") Set colOperatingSystems = _ objWMIService.ExecQuery _ ("Select * from Win32_OperatingSystem") For Each objOperatingSystem _ in colOperatingSystems objSWbemDateTime.Value = _ objOperatingSystem.InstallDate InstallDate = _ objSWbemDateTime.GetVarDate(False) Next 'This section returns the Video card and current resolution. Set colItems = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_DisplayConfiguration",,48) For Each objItem in colItems VideoCard = objItem.DeviceName Resolution = objItem.PelsWidth & " x " & objItem.PelsHeight & " x " & objItem.BitsPerPel & " bits" Next 'This section returns the Video card memory. Set objWMIService = GetObject("winmgmts:root\cimv2") Set colItems = objWMIService.ExecQuery ("Select * from Win32_VideoController") For Each objItem in colItems VideoMemory = objItem.AdapterRAM/1024/1024 Next 'This returns various system information including current logged on user, domain, memory, manufacture and model. Set colItems = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_ComputerSystem",,48) For Each objItem in colItems UserName = objItem.UserName Domain = objItem.Domain TotalMemory = int((objItem.TotalPhysicalMemory/1024)/1024+1) Manufacturer = objItem.Manufacturer Model = objItem.Model SysType = objItem.SystemType Next 'This determines the total hard drive space and free hard drive space. Set colItems = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_LogicalDisk Where Name='C:'",,48) For Each objItem in colItems FreeHDSpace = Fix(((objItem.FreeSpace/1024)/1024)/1024) TotalHDSpace = Fix(((objItem.Size/1024)/1024)/1024) Next 'This section returns the default printer and printer port. Set colItems = objWMIService.ExecQuery("SELECT * FROM Win32_Printer where Default=True", "WQL", wbemFlagReturnImmediately + wbemFlagForwardOnly) For Each objItem in colItems Printer = objItem.Name PortName = objItem.PortName Next 'This returns the CPU information. Set colItems = objWMIService.ExecQuery("SELECT * FROM Win32_Processor", "WQL", wbemFlagReturnImmediately + wbemFlagForwardOnly) For Each objItem in colItems CPUDesc = LTrim(objItem.Name) Next '// CPU Info For each objCPU in GetObject("winmgmts:{impersonationLevel=impersonate}\\" & strComputer & "\root\cimv2").InstancesOf("Win32_Processor") Select Case objCPU.Family Case 2 cputype = "Unknown" Case 11 cputype = "Pentium brand" Case 12 cputype = "Pentium Pro" Case 13 cputype = "Pentium II" Case 14 cputype = "Pentium processor with MMX technology" Case 15 cputype = "Celeron " Case 16 cputype = "Pentium II Xeon" Case 17 cputype = "Pentium III" Case 28 cputype = "AMD Athlon Processor Family" Case 29 cputype = "AMD Duron Processor" Case 30 cputype = "AMD2900 Family" Case 31 cputype = "K6-2+" Case 130 cputype = "Itanium Processor" Case 176 cputype = "Pentium III Xeon" Case 177 cputype = "Pentium III Processor with Intel SpeedStep Technology" Case 178 cputype = "Pentium 4" Case 179 cputype = "Intel Xeon" Case 181 cputype = "Intel Xeon processor MP" Case 182 cputype = "AMD AthlonXP Family" Case 183 cputype = "AMD AthlonMP Family" Case 184 cputype = "Intel Itanium 2" Case 185 cputype = "AMD Opteron? Family" End Select Next 'This returns the current uptime (time since last reboot) of the system. Set colOperatingSystems = objWMIService.ExecQuery ("Select * from Win32_OperatingSystem") For Each objOS in colOperatingSystems dtmBootup = objOS.LastBootUpTime dtmLastBootupTime = WMIDateStringToDate(dtmBootup) dtmSystemUptime = DateDiff("h", dtmLastBootUpTime, Now) Uptime = dtmSystemUptime Next Function WMIDateStringToDate(dtmBootup) WMIDateStringToDate = CDate(Mid(dtmBootup, 5, 2) & "/" & Mid(dtmBootup, 7, 2) & "/" & Left(dtmBootup, 4) & " " & Mid (dtmBootup, 9, 2) & ":" & Mid(dtmBootup, 11, 2) & ":" & Mid(dtmBootup,13, 2)) End Function dim objFSO Set objFSO = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject") ' -- The heart of the create file script ----------------------- ' -- Creates the file using the value of strFile on Line 11 ' -------------------------------------------------------------- Set fileOutput = objFSO.CreateTextFile( "x.html", true ) 'Set fileOutput = objExplorer.Document 'This is the code for the web page to be displayed. fileOutput.WriteLine "<html>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <head>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <title>System Information for '" & WKID & "' </title>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </head>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <body bgcolor='#FFFFFF' text='#000000' link='#0000FF' vlink='000099' alink='#00FF00'>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <center>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <h1>System Information for " & WKID & "</h1>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <table border='0' cellspacing='1' cellpadding='1' width='95%'>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <tr><td background='" & ImgDir & "blue_spacer.gif'>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <table border='0' cellspacing='0' cellpadding='0' width='100%'>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <tr><td>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <table border='0' cellspacing='0' cellpadding='0' width='100%'>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <td width='5%' align='left' valign='middle' background='" & ImgDir & "blue_spacer.gif'><img src='" & ImgDir & "write.gif'></td>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <td width='95%' align='left' valign='middle' background='" & ImgDir & "blue_spacer.gif'> <font color='#FFFFFF' size='5'>WKInfo - </font><font color='#FFFFFF' size='3'>General information on the Workstation.</font></td>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <tr><td colspan='2' bgcolor='#FFFFFF'>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TABLE width='100%' cellspacing='0' cellpadding='2' border='1' bordercolor='#c0c0c0' bordercolordark='#ffffff' bordercolorlight='#c0c0c0'>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr height=2><td height=10 align=center bgcolor=midnightblue colspan=3></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD align='center' bgcolor='#d0d0d0' colspan='2'><b><h3>Date and Time</h3></b></TD></TR>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr height=2><td height=10 align=center bgcolor=midnightblue colspan=3></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Date/Time</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & DateTime & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>System Uptime</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & Uptime & " hours</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Time Zone</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & Zone & " </i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr height=2><td height=10 align=center bgcolor=midnightblue colspan=3></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD align='center' bgcolor='#d0d0d0' colspan='2'><b><h3>General Computer Information</h3></b></TD></TR>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr height=2><td height=10 align=center bgcolor=midnightblue colspan=3></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Manufacturer</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & Manufacturer & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Model</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & Model & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>System Based</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & SysType & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Operating System</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & WKOS & " " & CSD & " " & Architecture & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Operating System Install Date</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & InstallDate & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>UserName</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & UserName & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Workstation Name</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & WKID & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Domain</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & Domain & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>System Drive</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & SysDrive & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>System Directory</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & SysDir & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Windows Directory</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & WinDir & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>ShadowStorage Allocated Space</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & Allocated & " MB</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>ShadowStorage Used Space</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & UsedSpace & " MB</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>ShadowStorage Max Space</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & MaxSpace & " MB</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr height=2><td height=10 align=center bgcolor=midnightblue colspan=3></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD align='center' bgcolor='#d0d0d0' colspan='2'><b><h3>General Hardware Information</h3></b></TD></TR>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr height=2><td height=10 align=center bgcolor=midnightblue colspan=3></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>CPU</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & cputype & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Memory</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & TotalMemory & " MB</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Total HDD Space</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & TotalHDSpace & " GB</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Free HDD Space</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & FreeHDSpace & " GB</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr height=2><td height=10 align=center bgcolor=midnightblue colspan=3></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD align='center' bgcolor='#d0d0d0' colspan='2'><b><h3>General Video Card Information</h3></b></TD></TR>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr height=2><td height=10 align=center bgcolor=midnightblue colspan=3></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Video Card</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & VideoCard & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Resolution</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & Resolution & "</i></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='30%' align='left' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'>Memory</TD><td width='70%' bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=left><i>" & VideoMemory & " MB</i></td></tr>" 'This section lists all the current services and their status. fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD align='center' bgcolor='#d0d0d0' colspan='2'><b><h3>Current Service Information</h3></b></TD></TR>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <tr><td colspan='2' bgcolor='#f0f0f0'>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TABLE width='100%' cellspacing='0' cellpadding='2' border='1' bordercolor='#c0c0c0' bordercolordark='#ffffff' bordercolorlight='#c0c0c0'>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='70%' align='center' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'><b>Service Name</b></td><TD width='30%' align='center' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'><b>Service State</b></td><tr>" Set colRunningServices = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_Service") For Each objService in colRunningServices fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD align='left' bgcolor='#f0f0f0'>" & objService.DisplayName & "</TD><td bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=center><i>" & objService.State & "</i></td></tr>" wscript.echo " <TR><TD align='left' bgcolor='#f0f0f0'>" & objService.DisplayName & "</TD><td bgcolor=#f0f0f0 align=center><i>" & objService.State & "</i></td></tr>" Next fileOutput.WriteLine " </table>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </td></tr>" 'This section lists all the current running processes and some information. fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD align='center' bgcolor='#d0d0d0' colspan='2'><b><h3>Current Process Information</h3></b></TD></TR>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <tr><td colspan='2' bgcolor='#f0f0f0'>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TABLE width='100%' cellspacing='0' cellpadding='2' border='1' bordercolor='#c0c0c0' bordercolordark='#ffffff' bordercolorlight='#c0c0c0'>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD width='10%' align='center' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'><b>PID</b></td><TD width='35%' align='center' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'><b>Process Name</b></td><TD width='40%' align='center' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'><b>Owner</b></td><TD width='15%' align='center' bgcolor='#e0e0e0'><b>Memory</b></td></tr>" Set colProcessList = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_Process") For Each objProcess in colProcessList colProperties = objProcess.GetOwner(strNameOfUser,strUserDomain) fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD align='center' bgcolor='#f0f0f0'>" & objProcess.Handle & "</td><TD align='center' bgcolor='#f0f0f0'>" & objProcess.Name & "</td><TD align='center' bgcolor='#f0f0f0'>" & strUserDomain & "\" & strNameOfUser & "</td><TD align='center' bgcolor='#f0f0f0'>" & objProcess.WorkingSetSize/1024 & " kb</td><tr>" Next fileOutput.WriteLine " </table>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </td></tr>" 'This section lists all the currently installed software on the machine. fileOutput.WriteLine " <TR><TD align='center' bgcolor='#d0d0d0' colspan='2'><b><i>Installed Software</i></b></TD></TR>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <tr><td colspan='2' bgcolor='#f0f0f0'>" Set colSoftware = objWMIService.ExecQuery ("Select * from Win32_Product") For Each objSoftware in colSoftware fileOutput.WriteLine" <TABLE width='100%' cellspacing='0' cellpadding='2' border='1' bordercolor='#c0c0c0' bordercolordark='#ffffff' bordercolorlight='#c0c0c0'>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr><td width=30% align=center bgcolor='#e0e0e0'><b>Name</b></td><td width=30% align=center bgcolor='#e0e0e0'><b>Vendor</b></td><td width=30% align=center bgcolor='#e0e0e0'><b>Version</b></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr><td align=center bgcolor=#f0f0f0>" & objSoftware.Name & "</td><td align=center bgcolor=#f0f0f0>" & objSoftware.Vendor & "</td><td align=center bgcolor=#f0f0f0>" & objSoftware.Version & "</td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine" <tr height=2><td height=10 align=center bgcolor=midnightblue colspan=3></td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine" </table>" Next fileOutput.WriteLine " </td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </table>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </table>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </table>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </td></tr>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </table>" fileOutput.WriteLine " <p><small></small></p>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </center>" fileOutput.WriteLine " </body>" fileOutput.WriteLine "<html>" fileOutput.close WScript.Quit

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• pyQt4: QWidget subclass not responding to new setStyleSheet() background colour

  - by Ronny

  I am having an issue with PyQt4. I want to create a new widget within a window, and I want this widget to have a custom color. When i create a subclass of the QWidget class, and instantiate it, I am not able to change its background color through the setStyleSheet() function. When I instantiate a new QWidget object, I have no problems in changing its background color. But i dont want an ordinary QWidget object.I want to create my own subclass of QWidget. When i create a subclass of a QPushButton, I am also able to change its background color using the setStyleSheet() function. There are no error messages or warnings in the console window, it just refuses to work properly without any indication as to why. So what i would like to know is why is it that i can change the background color of a widget if i simply create a QWidget object, or a subclass of QPushButton, but not when i create a subclass of QWidget. And how can i therefore change the background color of an object that is a subclass of QWidget? Is it maybe something specific to the version of python or PyQt that i am using? Is it a bug in the library? or some flaw in the way that i am writing my code? I am using python 2.6.4 and PyQt4 Below is an example of the code that leads me to trouble. There are three widgets within the window one below the other. The parent widget is set with background color of green. The top widget is set to red, the middle one, is the subclass of QWidget, which should be blue, but it appears invisible because it takes on the color of the parent window for some reason. and the bottom widget is a subclass of QPushButton and is white. import sys from PyQt4 import QtGui, QtCore ################################################################################ #--------------------------------------------------------- CUSTOM WIDGET CLASS 1 class CustomWidget(QtGui.QWidget): def __init__(self, parent): QtGui.QWidget.__init__(self, parent) # some custom properties and functions will follow ################################################################################ #--------------------------------------------------------- CUSTOM WIDGET CLASS 2 class CustomWidget2(QtGui.QPushButton): def __init__(self, parent): QtGui.QPushButton.__init__(self, parent) # some custom properties and functions will follow ################################################################################ #----------------------------------------------------------- PARENT WIDGET CLASS class Parent(QtGui.QWidget): def __init__(self, parent=None): #---------------------------------------------------------- SETUP WINDOW QtGui.QWidget.__init__(self, parent) self.resize(500, 340) self.setStyleSheet("QWidget {background-color: #00FF00}") #-------------------------------------------------- SETUP DEFAULT WIDGET wid1 = QtGui.QWidget(self) wid1.setGeometry(10, 10, 480, 100) wid1.setStyleSheet("QWidget {background-color: #FF0000 }") #------------------------------------------------- SETUP CUSTOM WIDGET 1 wid2 = CustomWidget(self) wid2.setGeometry(10, 120, 480, 100) wid2.setStyleSheet("QWidget {background-color: #0000FF }") for i in dir(wid2): print i #------------------------------------------------- SETUP CUSTOM WIDGET 2 wid3 = CustomWidget2(self) wid3.setGeometry(10, 230, 480, 100) wid3.setStyleSheet("QWidget {background-color: #FFFFFF }") ################################################################################ #-------------------------------------------------------------------------- MAIN app = QtGui.QApplication(sys.argv) win = Parent() win.show() app.exec_()

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• An existing connection was forcibly closed by the remote host

  - by George

  I have a fat VB.NET Winform client that is using the an old asmx style web service. Very often, when I perform query that takes a while, I get the subject error. The error happenes The error seems to occur in < 1 min, which is far less that the web service timeout value that I have set or the timeout value on the ADO Command object that is performing the query within the web server. It seems to occur whenever I am performing a large query that expects to return a lot of rows or when I am sending up a large amount of data to the web service. For example, it just occurred when I was passing a large dataset to the web server: System.Net.WebException: The underlying connection was closed: An unexpected error occurred on a receive. ---> System.IO.IOException: Unable to read data from the transport connection: An existing connection was forcibly closed by the remote host. ---> System.Net.Sockets.SocketException: An existing connection was forcibly closed by the remote host at System.Net.Sockets.Socket.Receive(Byte[] buffer, Int32 offset, Int32 size, SocketFlags socketFlags) at System.Net.Sockets.NetworkStream.Read(Byte[] buffer, Int32 offset, Int32 size) --- End of inner exception stack trace --- at System.Net.Sockets.NetworkStream.Read(Byte[] buffer, Int32 offset, Int32 size) at System.Net.PooledStream.Read(Byte[] buffer, Int32 offset, Int32 size) at System.Net.Connection.SyncRead(HttpWebRequest request, Boolean userRetrievedStream, Boolean probeRead) --- End of inner exception stack trace --- at System.Web.Services.Protocols.WebClientProtocol.GetWebResponse(WebRequest request) at System.Web.Services.Protocols.HttpWebClientProtocol.GetWebResponse(WebRequest request) at System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapHttpClientProtocol.Invoke(String methodName, Object[] parameters) at Smit.Pipeline.Bo.localhost.WsSR.SaveOptions(String emailId, DataSet dsNeighborhood, DataSet dsOption, DataSet dsTaskApplications, DataSet dsCcUsers, DataSet dsDistinctUsers, DataSet dsReferencedApplications) in C:\My\Code\Pipeline2\Smit.Pipeline.Bo\Web References\localhost\Reference.vb:line 944 at Smit.Pipeline.Bo.Options.Save(TaskApplications updatedTaskApplications) in I've been looking a tons of postings on this error and it is surprising at how varied the circumstances which cause this error are. I've tried messing with Wireshark, but I am clueless how to use it. This application only has about 20 users at any one time and I am able to reproduce this error in the middle of the night when probably no one is using the app, so I don't think that the number of requests to the web server or to the database is high. It's probably one right now when I just got the error now. It seems to have to do everything with the amt of data being passed in either direction. This error is really chronic and killing me. Please help.

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• Collapse span when input button is hidden

  - by Evan

  I have a style that wraps around an input button, so the button can be styled very creatively. When the button is hidden in .Net, i would like the style to collapse so it renders like its hidden as well. What the style does, as a result of no value in the button or its hidden, is it keeps a small shape. Click to see a demo: http://media.apus.edu/it/evan-testing/button.htm <style> .button { cursor:pointer; text-decoration:none; background:url(button_bg.gif) no-repeat right top; padding-right:10px; display:inline-block; line-height:29px; height:29px; font-size:12px; color:#FFFFFF; font-weight:bold; } span.button { vertical-align: middle; } .button span { background:url(button_bg.gif) no-repeat left top; padding-left:10px; line-height:20px; height:29px; display:inline-block; } .button span span { background:transparent; padding:0; font-size:12px; } .button span input { cursor:pointer; font-weight:bold; background:transparent; border:0; padding-top:.4em; font-size:12px; font-family:verdana; color:#FFFFFF; } .button:hover { background-position:right -39px; } .button:hover span { background-position:left -39px; } .button:active { background-position:right -78px; } .button:active span { background-position:left -78px; } </style> Input button wrapped in a span with no value: <span class="button"><span><input type="button" value=""></span></span> <P> Input button wrapped in a span with a value: <span class="button"><span><input type="button" value="test"></span></span> <P> Span with no data value: <span class="button"><span></span>

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• Best practices concerning view model and model updates with a subset of the fields

  - by Martin

  By picking MVC for developing our new site, I find myself in the midst of "best practices" being developed around me in apparent real time. Two weeks ago, NerdDinner was my guide but with the development of MVC 2, even it seems outdated. It's an thrilling experience and I feel privileged to be in close contact with intelligent programmers daily. Right now I've stumbled upon an issue I can't seem to get a straight answer on - from all the blogs anyway - and I'd like to get some insight from the community. It's about Editing (read: Edit action). The bulk of material out there, tutorials and blogs, deal with creating and view the model. So while this question may not spell out a question, I hope to get some discussion going, contributing to my decision about the path of development I'm to take. My model represents a user with several fields like name, address and email. All the names, in fact, on field each for first name, last name and middle name. The Details view displays all these fields but you can change only one set of fields at a time, for instance, your names. The user expands a form while the other fields are still visible above and below. So the form that is posted back contains a subset of the fields representing the model. While this is appealing to us and our layout concerns, for various reasons, it is to be shunned by serious MVC-developers. I've been reading about some patterns and best practices and it seems that this is not in key with the paradigm of viewmodel == view. Or have I got it wrong? Anyway, NerdDinner dictates using FormCollection och UpdateModel. All the null fields are happily ignored. Since then, the MVC-community has abandoned this approach to such a degree that a bug in MVC 2 was not discovered. UpdateModel does not work without a complete model in your formcollection. The view model pattern receiving most praise seems to be Dedicated view model that contains a custom view model entity and is the only one that my design issue could be made compatible with. It entails a tedious amount of mapping, albeit lightened by the use of AutoMapper and the ideas of Jimmy Bogard, that may or may not be worthwhile. He also proposes a 1:1 relationship between view and view model. In keeping with these design paradigms, I am to create a view and associated view for each of my expanding sets of fields. The view models would each be nearly identical, differing only in the fields which are read-only, the views also containing much repeated markup. This seems absurd to me. In future I may want to be able to display two, more or all sets of fields open simultaneously. I will most attentively read the discussion I hope to spark. Many thanks in advance.

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• Scheme Formatting Help

  - by Logan

  I've been working on a project for school that takes functions from a class file and turns them into object/classes. The assignment is all about object oriented programming in scheme. My problem however is that my code doesn't format right. The output it gives me whenever I give it a file to pass in wraps the methods of the class in a list, making it so that the class never really gets declared. I can't for the life of me figure out how to get the parenthesis wrapping the method list to remove. I would really appreciate any help. Below is the code and the class file. ;;;; PART1 --- A super-easy set of classes. Just models points and lines. Tests all of the ;; basics of class behavior without touching on anything particularly complex. (class pointInstance (parent:) (constructor_args:) (ivars: (myx 1) (myy 2)) (methods: (getx () myx) (gety () myy) (setx (x) (set! myx x)) (show () (begin (display "[") (display myx) (display ",") (display myy) (display "]"))) )) (require (lib "trace.ss")) ;; Continue reading until you hit the end of the file, all the while ;; building a list with the contents (define load-file (lambda (port) (let ((rec (read port))) (if (eof-object? rec) '() (cons rec (load-file port)))))) ;; Open a port based on a file name using open-input-file (define (load fname) (let ((fport (open-input-file fname))) (load-file fport))) ;(define lis (load "C:\\Users\\Logan\\Desktop\\simpletest.txt")) ;(define lis (load "C:\\Users\\Logan\\Desktop\\complextest.txt")) (define lis (load "C:\\Users\\Logan\\Desktop\\pointinstance.txt")) ;(display (cdaddr (cdddar lis))) (define makeMethodList (lambda (listToMake retList) ;(display listToMake) (cond [(null? listToMake) retList ;(display "The list passed in to parse was null") ] [else (makeMethodList (cdr listToMake) (append retList (list (getMethodLine listToMake)))) ] ) )) ;(trace makeMethodList) ;this works provided you just pass in the function line (define getMethodLine (lambda (functionList) `((eq? (car msg) ,(caar functionList)) ,(caddar functionList)))) (define load-classes (lambda paramList (cond [(null? paramList) (display "Your parameters are null, man.")] [(null? (car paramList))(display "Done creating class definitions.")] [(not (null? (car paramList))) (begin (let* ((className (cadaar paramList)) (classInstanceVars (cdaddr (cddaar paramList))) (classMethodList (cdr (cadddr (cddaar paramList)))) (desiredMethodList (makeMethodList classMethodList '())) ) ;(display "Classname: ") ;(display className) ;(newline)(newline) ;(display "Class Instance Vars: ") ;(display classInstanceVars) ;(newline)(newline) ;(display "Class Method List: ") ;(display classMethodList) ;(newline) ;(display "Desired Method List: ") ;(display desiredMethodList)) ;(newline)(newline) ;---------------------------------------------------- ;do not delete the below code!` `(define ,className (let ,classInstanceVars (lambda msg ;return the function list here (cond ,(makeMethodList classMethodList '()))) )) ;--------------------------------------------------- ))] ) )) (load-classes lis) ;(load-classes lis) ;(load-classes-helper lis) ;(load-classes "simpletest.txt") ;(load-classes "complextest.txt") ;method list ;(display (cdr (cadddr (cddaar <class>))))

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• Classic ASP vs. ASP.NET encryption options

  - by harrije

  I'm working on a web site where the new pages are ASP.NET and the legacy pages are Classic ASP. Being new to development in the Windows env, I've been studying the latest technology, i.e. .NET and I become like a deer in headlights when ever legacy issues come up regarding COM objects. Security on the website is an abomination, but I've easily encrypted the connectionStrings in the web.config file per http://www.4guysfromrolla.com/articles/021506-1.aspx based on DPAPI machine mode. I understand this approach is not the most secure, but it's better than nothing which is what it was for the ASP.NET pages. Now, I question how to do similar encryption for the connection strings used by the Classic ASP pages. A complicating factor is that the web sited is hosted where I do not have admin permissions or even command line access, just FTP. Moreover I want to avoid managing the key. My research has found: DPAPI with COM interop. Seems like this should already be available, but the only thing I could find discussing this is CyptoUtility (see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/cc163884.aspx) which is not installed on the hosting server. There are plenty of other third party COM objects, e.g. Crypto from Dalun Software http://www.dalun.com, but these aren't on the hosted server either, and they look to me to require you to do some kind of key management. There is CAPICOM on the hosted server, but M$ has deprecated it and many report it is not the easiest to use. It is not clear to me whether I can avoid key management with CAPICOM similar to using DPAPI for ASP.NET. If anyone happens to know, please clue me in. I could write an web service in ASP.NET and have the classic ASP pages use it to get the decrypted connection strings and then store those in an application variable. I would not need to use SSL since I could use localhost and nothing would be sent over the internet. In the simpliest form I could implement what someone termed a poor man's version based on a simple XML stream, however, I really was looking to avoid any development since I find it hard to believe there is not a simple solution for Classic ASP like there is for ASP.NET. Maybe I'm missing some options... Recommendations are requested...

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• Using commit monitors as a form of code review

  - by Jeff Dege

  I'm working in a small company - four developers, working on a variety of projects. We've been looking at what we can do as cost-effective methods of process improvement, and an idea came up. Given what we do, we often have single developers working on parts of a system, independently of the other developers. This can have a number of negative affects: A developer might not be fully aware of the context in which a change is being implemented, and make the change in a way that will meet the current customer's needs, but will break functionality that other customers depend on. A developer might make a change that breaks the current architectural design, introducing a dependency that will cause problems in future development. Other developers might not be aware of how the system has changed, in areas that they have not worked on. We've talked about doing code reviews, as a way of dealing with these issues. But we've not had much success when we tried. It takes a lot of time to prepare a change for a code review, and it takes everybody out of production while the review is being performed. And the benefits of any review we've tried has been minimal. We're using Subversion (with TortioseSVN) as our VCS. I've been looking at the SubVersion CommitMonitor tool, and wondering whether it might work as a sort of poor-man's code review. It lists every commit made on the repository, allowing someone to see the changes that have been made, the log messages made for that change, the files that were included in the change, and the specific lines in each file that were changed. Rather than scheduling a meeting, trying to get everybody together to review every change, we could just have every developer review every other developer's commits, at whatever time was convenient. This would keep every developer abreast of what changes were being made elsewhere in the system, and would have every change reviewed for customer conflicts and design consistency, at a fairly low cost. If someone saw a problem with the code that was being checked in, he could discuss it with the developer who did the commit, or more likely, schedule a meeting to discuss how the new feature could be implemented in a way that would not impact other users or screw up the architecture. Anyone else doing anything like this, using commit monitors for such a purpose?

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• Unable to cast lists with Reflection in C#

  - by DrLazer

  I am having a lot of trouble with Reflection in C# at the moment. The app I am writing allows the user to modify the attributes of certain objects using a config file. I want to be able to save the object model (users project) to XML. The function below is called in the middle of a foreach loop, looping through a list of objects that contain all the other objects in the project within them. The idea is, that it works recursively to translate the object model into XML. Dont worry about the call to "Unreal" that just modifes the name of the objects slightly if they contain certain words. private void ReflectToXML(object anObject, XmlElement parentElement) { Type aType = anObject.GetType(); XmlElement anXmlElement = m_xml.CreateElement(Unreal(aType.Name)); parentElement.AppendChild(anXmlElement); PropertyInfo[] pinfos = aType.GetProperties(); //loop through this objects public attributes foreach (PropertyInfo aInfo in pinfos) { //if the attribute is a list Type propertyType = aInfo.PropertyType; if ((propertyType.IsGenericType)&&(propertyType.GetGenericTypeDefinition() == typeof(List<>))) { List<object> listObjects = (aInfo.GetValue(anObject,null) as List<object>); foreach (object aListObject in listObjects) { ReflectToXML(aListObject, anXmlElement); } } //attribute is not a list else anXmlElement.SetAttribute(aInfo.Name, ""); } } If an object attributes are just strings then it should be writing them out as string attributes in the XML. If an objects attributes are lists, then it should recursively call "ReflectToXML" passing itself in as a parameter, thereby creating the nested structure I require that nicely reflect the object model in memory. The problem I have is with the line List<object> listObjects = (aInfo.GetValue(anObject,null) as List<object>); The cast doesn't work and it just returns null. While debugging I changed the line to object temp = aInfo.GetValue(anObject,null); slapped a breakpoint on it to see what "GetValue" was returning. It returns a "Generic list of objects" Surely I should be able to cast that? The annoying thing is that temp becomes a generic list of objects but because i declared temp as a singular object, I can't loop through it because it has no Enumerator. How can I loop through a list of objects when I only have it as a propertyInfo of a class? I know at this point I will only be saving a list of empty strings out anyway, but thats fine. I would be happy to see the structure save out for now. Thanks in advance

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• Global Entity Framework Context in WPF Application

  - by OffApps Cory

  Good day, I am in the middle of development of a WPF application that is using Entity Framework (.NET 3.5). It accesses the entities in several places throughout. I am worried about consistency throughout the application in regard to the entities. Should I be instancing separate contexts in my different views, or should I (and is a a good way to do this) instance a single context that can be accessed globally? For instance, my entity model has three sections, Shipments (with child packages and further child contents), Companies/Contacts (with child addresses and telephones), and disk specs. The Shipments and EditShipment views access the DiskSpecs, and the OptionsView manages the DiskSpecs (Create, Edit, Delete). If I edit a DiskSpec, I have to have something in the ShipmentsView to retrieve the latest specs if I have separate contexts right? If it is safe to have one overall context from which the rest of the app retrieves it's objects, then I imagine that is the way to go. If so, where would that instance be put? I am using VB.NET, but I can translate from C# pretty good. Any help would be appreciated. I just don't want one of those applications where the user has to hit reload a dozen times in different parts of the app to get the new data. Update: OK so I have changed my app as follows: All contexts are created in Using Blocks to dispose of them after they are no longer needed. When loaded, all entities are detatched from context before it is disposed. A new property in the MainViewModel (ContextUpdated) raises an event that all of the other ViewModels subscribe to which runs that ViewModels RefreshEntities method. After implementing this, I started getting errors saying that an entity can only be referenced by one ChangeTracker at a time. Since I could not figure out which context was still referencing the entity (shouldn't be any context right?) I cast the object as IEntityWithChangeTracker, and set SetChangeTracker to nothing (Null). This has let to the current problem: When I Null the changeTracker on the Entity, and then attach it to a context, it loses it's changed state and does not get updated to the database. However if I do not null the change tracker, I can't attach. I have my own change tracking code, so that is not a problem. My new question is, how are you supposed to do this. A good example Entity query and entity save code snipped would go a long way, cause I am beating my head in trying to get what I once thought was a simple transaction to work. Any help would elevate you to near god-hood.

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