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• Experience the iPad UI On Your PC

  - by Matthew Guay

  Want to test drive iPad without heading over to an Apple store?  Here’s a way you can experience some of the iPad UI straight from your browser! The iPad is the latest gadget from Apple to wow the tech world, and people even waited in line all night to be one of the first to get their hands on one.  Thanks to a simple JavaScript trick, however, you can get a feel for some of its new features without leaving your computer.  This won’t let you try out everything on the iPad, but it will let you see how the new lists and pop-over menus work just like they do in the new apps. Test drive the iPad’s UI from your browser Normally, the Apple iPhone developer library online looks like a standard webpage. But, on the iPad, it looks and feels like a full-blown native iPad app.  With a nifty JavaScript trick from boredzo.org you can use this same interface on your PC.  Since the iPad uses the Safari browser, we ran this test in Safari for Windows.  If you don’t already have it installed, you can download it from Apple (link below) and setup as normal. Now, open Safari and browse to Apple’s developer page at: http://www.developer.apple.com   Now, enter the following in the address bar, and press Enter. javascript:localStorage.setItem('debugSawtooth', 'true')   Finally, click this link to go to the iPhone OS documentation. http://developer.apple.com/iphone/library/iPad/ After a short delay, it should open in full iPad style! The left menu works just like the menus on the iPad, complete with transitions.  It feels entirely like a native application, instead of a webpage.  To scroll through text, click and pull up or down similar to the way you would use it on a touch screen. Some pages even include a pop-over menu like many of the new iPad apps use. Note that the page will be rendered for the size of your browser, and if you resize your window the page will not resize with it.  Simply press F5 to reload the page, and it will resize to fit the new window size.  If you resize your window to be tall and narrow, like the iPad in horizontal mode, the webpage will change and the left menu will disappear in lieu of a drop-down menu just like it would if you rotated the iPad. This works in Chrome as well, since it, like Safari, is based on Webkit.  However, it didn’t seem to work in our test on Firefox or other browsers. We’ve previously covered how you can experience some of the iPhone’s UI with the online iPhone user guide.  Check it out if you haven’t yet: View Mobile Websites in Windows with Safari 4 Developer Tools Conclusion Although this doesn’t let you really try out all of the iPad’s interface, it at least gives you a taste of how it works.  It’s exciting to see how much functionality can be packed into webapps today.  And don’t forget, How-to Geek is giving away an iPad to a random fan!  Head over to our Facebook page and fan How-to Geek if you haven’t already done so. Win an iPad on the How-To Geek Facebook Fan Page Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Want an iPad? How-To Geek is Giving One Away!Why Wait? Amazing New Add-on Turns Your iPhone into an iPad! [Comic]The Complete List of iPad Tips, Tricks, and TutorialsShare Your Windows Vista Experience Index ScoreAnother Blog You Should Subscribe To TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Awesome Lyrics Finder for Winamp & Windows Media Player Download Videos from Hulu Pixels invade Manhattan Convert PDF files to ePub to read on your iPad Hide Your Confidential Files Inside Images Get Wildlife Photography Tips at BBC’s PhotoMasterClasses

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• October 2012 Critical Patch Update and Critical Patch Update for Java SE Released

  - by Eric P. Maurice

  Hi, this is Eric Maurice. Oracle has just released the October 2012 Critical Patch Update and the October 2012 Critical Patch Update for Java SE.  As a reminder, the release of security patches for Java SE continues to be on a different schedule than for other Oracle products due to commitments made to customers prior to the Oracle acquisition of Sun Microsystems.  We do however expect to ultimately bring Java SE in line with the regular Critical Patch Update schedule, thus increasing the frequency of scheduled security releases for Java SE to 4 times a year (as opposed to the current 3 yearly releases).  The schedules for the “normal” Critical Patch Update and the Critical Patch Update for Java SE are posted online on the Critical Patch Updates and Security Alerts page. The October 2012 Critical Patch Update provides a total of 109 new security fixes across a number of product families including: Oracle Database Server, Oracle Fusion Middleware, Oracle E-Business Suite, Supply Chain Products Suite, Oracle PeopleSoft Enterprise, Oracle Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Oracle Industry Applications, Oracle FLEXCUBE, Oracle Sun products suite, Oracle Linux and Virtualization, and Oracle MySQL. Out of these 109 new vulnerabilities, 5 affect Oracle Database Server.  The most severe of these Database vulnerabilities has received a CVSS Base Score of 10.0 on Windows platforms and 7.5 on Linux and Unix platforms.  This vulnerability (CVE-2012-3137) is related to the “Cryptographic flaws in Oracle Database authentication protocol” disclosed at the Ekoparty Conference.  Because of timing considerations (proximity to the release date of the October 2012 Critical Patch Update) and the need to extensively test the fixes for this vulnerability to ensure compatibility across the products stack, the fixes for this vulnerability were not released through a Security Alert, but instead mitigation instructions were provided prior to the release of the fixes in this Critical Patch Update in My Oracle Support Note 1492721.1.  Because of the severity of these vulnerabilities, Oracle recommends that this Critical Patch Update be installed as soon as possible. Another 26 vulnerabilities fixed in this Critical Patch Update affect Oracle Fusion Middleware.  The most severe of these Fusion Middleware vulnerabilities has received a CVSS Base Score of 10.0; it affects Oracle JRockit and is related to Java vulnerabilities fixed in the Critical Patch Update for Java SE.  The Oracle Sun products suite gets 18 new security fixes with this Critical Patch Update.  Note also that Oracle MySQL has received 14 new security fixes; the most severe of these MySQL vulnerabilities has received a CVSS Base Score of 9.0. Today’s Critical Patch Update for Java SE provides 30 new security fixes.  The most severe CVSS Base Score for these Java SE vulnerabilities is 10.0 and this score affects 10 vulnerabilities.  As usual, Oracle reports the most severe CVSS Base Score, and these CVSS 10.0s assume that the user running a Java Applet or Java Web Start application has administrator privileges (as is typical on Windows XP). However, when the user does not run with administrator privileges (as is typical on Solaris and Linux), the corresponding CVSS impact scores for Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability are "Partial" instead of "Complete", typically lowering the CVSS Base Score to 7.5 denoting that the compromise does not extend to the underlying Operating System.  Also, as is typical in the Critical Patch Update for Java SE, most of the vulnerabilities affect Java and Java FX client deployments only.  Only 2 of the Java SE vulnerabilities fixed in this Critical Patch Update affect client and server deployments of Java SE, and only one affects server deployments of JSSE.  This reflects the fact that Java running on servers operate in a more secure and controlled environment.  As discussed during a number of sessions at JavaOne, Oracle is considering security enhancements for Java in desktop and browser environments.  Finally, note that the Critical Patch Update for Java SE is cumulative, in other words it includes all previously released security fixes, including the fix provided through Security Alert CVE-2012-4681, which was released on August 30, 2012. For More Information: The October 2012 Critical Patch Update advisory is located at http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/security/cpuoct2012-1515893.html The October 2012 Critical Patch Update for Java SE advisory is located at http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/security/javacpuoct2012-1515924.html.  An online video about the importance of keeping up with Java releases and the use of the Java auto update is located at http://medianetwork.oracle.com/video/player/1218969104001 More information about Oracle Software Security Assurance is located at http://www.oracle.com/us/support/assurance/index.html  

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• Playing HTML5 Video with fall back for IE8/IE7 and earlier versions of other browsers using Silverlight

  - by Harish Ranganathan

  One of the popular HTML5 tags is the video tag.  The ability to play videos without depending on a plugin is something that excites web developers to a great extent and no wonder you end up seeing video demos in all HTML5 conferences. Now, coming to HTML5 Video, the tag itself is simply <video id=”ID” src=”FILENAME.mp4/ogv/webm” > in the simplest form.  This also means that the video needs to be H.256 encoded MP4 format or some of the other formats as mentioned above.  For a detailed specification on this, check this Wikipedia article HTML5 video is supported by all the modern browsers such as IE9 (currently in RC stage), Mozilla Firefox 4 and Chrome latest versions.  Here below is a simple example of a HTML5 video tag and the screen shot of how it looks like in IE9 RC <!DOCTYPE html> <head></head> <body> <h1>This is a sample of an HTML5 Video</h1> <video src="video.mp4" id="myvideo">Your browser doesn’t support this currently</video> </body> </html> You can add attributes to the video tag such as “autoplay” which will automatically start playing the video.  Also, you can specify “poster” to display an initial picture before the video starts playing etc., but I am not going into those for now. This would play well in the modern browsers as mentioned above.  However, if the end users are viewing this page from an earlier version of browsers such as IE8/IE7 or IE6, this video wouldn’t play.  Whatever text that is specified between the video tags, would just show up. Note: for demo purposes, I went to the IE9 developer toolbar and chose IE8 as Browser Mode to exhibit this legacy behaviour.  However, in the interest of serving the larger community of users who visit the site, we would like to have a fall back mechanism for playing videos on older version of browsers. Now, Silverlight is supported in IE6/7 & 8 and other browsers too.  If we can have the same video encoded for Silverlight, we can put the fall-back code, as follows:- <video src="videos/video.mp4" id="myvideo">     <object height="252" type="application/x-silverlight-2" width="448">         <param name="source" value="resources/player.xap">         <param name="initParams" value="deferredLoad=true, duration=0, m=http://localhost/DemoSite/videos/video.mp4, autostart=false, autohide=true, showembed=true, postid=0" />         <param name="background" value="#00FFFFFF" />     </object> </video>   Note, this sample uses a Silverlight XAP file with the same video and uses the object tag to embed it instead of the HTML5 video tag. So, when I now run this sample and switch to IE8 (using the IE9 Developer toolbar’s Browser Mode), I get and when clicking on the “Play” icon, Note, there are multiple ways to play videos in Silverlight and this is one of the ways.  For a complete list of Silverlight samples, visit http://www.silverlight.net/learn/  Also, we can use Flash to play video in the fall-back mechanism as well. Thus, we can create a fall-back mechanism for playing HTML5 videos for the older browsers and hence ensure that the end users get to experience the same. Cheers !!!

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• Pondering New Technology

  - by MOSSLover

  So I have been standing at the end of a fork for a year peering down a corner looking at this way and that way trying to figure out where I fit in.  I was so enthusiastic and excited about Silverlight when it came out.  It was this amazing awesome technology that had this really cool animation and webcam/multimedia piece.  I thought if I put my money on Silverlight it’s going somewhere, then HTML 5 came out and the wind shifted.  I realized times were changing. I have been working with web technologies since I was 15 years old.  Playing with html and javascript and even css back when it first came out.  In tech years 15 years is forever.  Things change so quickly and so often.  So I guess the question is where am I heading?  The answer is mobile technology.  For some reason I was resisting change and I have no idea why.  I guess I really wanted to see more than one player.  I didn’t quite feel that Microsoft was ready with Windows Phone 7.  It was a great start, but it just didn’t feel like they went all the way.  Now with Windows 8 it feels like they are at version 2.0.  It’s like hitting Silverlight 2.0 where they finally added the .Net bits.  The path is paved, but we don’t know where it’s leading.  Then we had 3.0, 4.0, and 5.0 to mature the technology into what it is today (man I’m hoping they are going to roll some of the cool bits into other tech if they don’t exist). Anyway, I’m on board, but I’m not buying a Windows Tablet just yet.  I was hoping for a 7 inch screen from Apple around $300 or just above and a 7 inch screen from the MS side around the same price.  What I got was the Apple side, but nothing from Microsoft.  I was pretty disappointed with the $500 market price on the RT version.  I realized Microsoft is close, but not quite where Apple is today.  Yes the devices have Office that they are offering, but the sticker is just too much for a first generation device.  If you guys remember correctly the first generation iPad was quite expensive.  I guess for a 1st generation device $500 is pretty good. So I guess what I’m trying to say is that I am shifting my focus entirely away from Silverlight and more towards mobile.  I will be doing a lot of postings on iOS, Windows 8, and Windows Phone 8 with SharePoint 2013.  Since I don’t have a tablet and don’t foresee myself buying one just yet it might be mostly on the phones for right now.  I want to do a bunch of testing on various devices on what needs to be done in apps on each device.  I might add a bit on porting code from one to the other.  I think it’s going to be a lot of fun and make things flow a little better for me.  In a way it’s kind of like Star Trek 6 where they talk about the Undiscovered Country.  I’m going to jump forward completely and see where I land. Technorati Tags: SharePoint 2013,Mobile,Windows 8,iOS

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• Change the Way Google Search Results Display in Firefox

  - by Asian Angel

  Are you tired of the default look for search results at Google? If you want a different and customized pleasing look for them, then join us as we look at the GoogleMonkeyR User Script. Note: User Style Scripts & User Scripts can be added to most browsers but we are using Firefox & the Greasemonkey extension for our example here. Before Here is the standard look for search results at Google…not bad but it really does not stand out that well either. Installing the User Script You may be asking yourself what makes this particular user script different from others. Take a look at the list of goodies that you get access to and you will understand: Multiple columns of results Removes “Sponsored Links” Add numbers to the results Auto-load more results Removes web search dialogues Open links in a new tab Favicons GooglePreview Self updating Can be configured from a simple user dialogue To get started click on the Webpage Install Button. Once you click on the Webpage Install Button you will see the following window asking for confirmation to add the user script to Firefox. Click Install to complete the process. GoogleMonkeyR in Action Refreshing the same search page shown above shows a noticeable difference already. The light blue background makes the search results stand out a bit better. This is an improvement from before but you will definitely want to have a look to see just how far you can go… Right click on the Greasemonkey Status Bar Icon, go to User Script Commands, and select GoogleMonkeyR Preferences. Once you have clicked on GoogleMonkeyR Preferences the search page will be shaded out and you will have access to the user script’s preferences. This is where you can really make your search results unique looking! Here are the changes that we started out with… After refreshing our search results things looked even better. A look at the entire page of results with our browser maximized and set for two columns. If you have the Auto load more results Option enabled new results will be added very quickly as you scroll down. Our set of search results after adding Favicons & GooglePreview Images. Conclusion If you have been wanting a more dramatic and pleasing look for the search results at Google then you can not go wrong with the GoogleMonkeyR User Script. Change as little or as much as you want to get that perfect look in your browser. Link Install the GoogleMonkeyR User Script Download the Greasemonkey extension for Firefox (Mozilla Add-ons) Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Make Firefox Quick Search Use Google’s Beta Search KeysMake Firefox Built-In Search Box Use Google’s Experimental Search KeysMake Firefox Show Google Results for Default Address Bar SearchesCombine Wolfram Alpha & Google Search Results in FirefoxHow To Run 4 Different Google Searches at Once In the Same Tab TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips VMware Workstation 7 Acronis Online Backup DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Explorer++ is a Worthy Windows Explorer Alternative Error Goblin Explains Windows Error Codes Twelve must-have Google Chrome plugins Cool Looking Skins for Windows Media Player 12 Move the Mouse Pointer With Your Face Movement Using eViacam Boot Windows Faster With Boot Performance Diagnostics

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• Combine the Address & Search Bars in Firefox

  - by Asian Angel

  The Search Bar in Firefox is very useful for finding additional information or images while browsing but the UI space it takes up can be frustrating at times. Now you can reclaim that UI space and still have access to all that searching goodness with the Foobar extension. Note: This is about the Foobar Firefox extension and not to be confused with Foobar2000 the open source music player. Before If you have the “Search Bar” displayed there is no doubt that it is taking up valuable space in your browser’s UI. What you need is the ability to reclaim that UI space and still have the same access to your search capability as before…no more sacrificing one for a gain with the other. After As soon as you have installed the extension you can see that the top part of your browser will look much sleeker without the “Search Bar” to clutter it up. The “Search Engine Icon” will now be visible inside of your “Address Bar” as seen here. You will be able to access the same “Search Engine Menu” as before by clicking on the “Search Engine Icon”. There are two display modes for search results (setting available in the “Options”). The first one shown here is “Simple Mode” where all results are in a condensed format. Notice that not only are there search suggestions but also “Bookmarks & History” listings as well. You can literally get the best of both when conducting a search. Note: The number of entries for search suggestions and bookmark/history listings can be adjusted higher or lower in the “Options”. The second one is “Rich Mode” where the results are shown with more details. Choose the “mode” that best suits your personal style. For our first example you can see the results when we conducted a quick search on “Windows 7” (using the first of the three offerings shown from Bing). Our second example was a search for “Flowers” using our Photobucket search engine. Once again nice results opened in a new tab for us. Options The options are easy to go through. It is really nice to be able to choose the number of results that you want displayed and the format that you want them shown in. Note: Changing the “Suggestion popup style” will require a browser restart to take effect. Conclusion If you love using the “Search Bar” in Firefox but want to reclaim the UI space then you will definitely want to add this extension to your browser. The ability to customize the number of results and choose the formatting make this extension even better. Links Download the Foobar extension (Mozilla Add-ons) Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Combine the Address Bar and Progress Bar Together in FirefoxHide Some or All of the GUI Bars in FirefoxEnable Partial Match AutoComplete in the Firefox Address BarQuick Firefox UI TweaksAdd Search Forms to the Firefox Search Bar TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Scan your PC for nasties with Panda ActiveScan CleanMem – Memory Cleaner AceStock – The Personal Stock Monitor Add Multiple Tabs to Office Programs The Wearing of the Green – St. Patrick’s Day Theme (Firefox) Perform a Background Check on Yourself

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• Access Music from Amie Street in Boxee

  - by Mysticgeek

  One of our favorite sites for discovering new music is Amie Street. Today we take a look at the Amie Street app for Boxee that allows you to access your favorite tunes from the Boxee interface. Amie Street is a cool site that allows you to discover a lot of cool music from independent artists. What makes Amie Street unique is that most of the music starts out free, then the price goes up incrementally as its popularity grows. The Amie Street App for Boxee let’s you access music and playlists you’ve created on the site, with more features are on the way. For this example we’re using the mouse and keyboard, but of course you can also get to each section using your remote if you have one. Or you can turn your iPod touch into a Boxee remote too. Amie Street in Boxee To access the Amie Street app, launch Boxee and click on Apps from the main menu. Under the Search Sidebar type in Amie Street and select it from the results field.   Then you can add it to the My Apps section…and double-click on the icon. Click on Start to begin using it. You’ll be be presented with a Welcome screen where you can sign into your account. If you don’t have an account yet, there is also an option to go to the Amie Street site and create one. Enter in your account credentials… Now you’ll be able to access your Library, Playlists, Search for new tunes, and check out your Recommended bands and artists. Hover the pointer over an album to get a bit more info about it such as the music genre. You’ll be able to play the songs from the playlists you created on the Amie Street site. You can browse through the history of the music you’ve played as well. Not all the features of this app seem to work as you’d expect them to, and some of the features are not yet available like the Browse feature.   Conclusion At the time of this writing we weren’t able to purchase music or get additional information about the artists. As development continues on Boxee and this app, you can expect more of a full user experience and the ability to purchase music. Even though some of the features are a bit buggy or not available, if you’re a Boxee user and a fan of Amie Street, this is cool app to add to your collection. Download Boxee for Windows, Mac, and Ubuntu Learn more about Amie Street on Boxee Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Amie Street Downloader Makes Purchasing Music EasierFind Free or Cheap Indie Music at Amie StreetIntegrate Boxee with Media Center in Windows 7Using Pandora in BoxeeGetting Started with Boxee TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips HippoRemote Pro 2.2 Xobni Plus for Outlook All My Movies 5.9 CloudBerry Online Backup 1.5 for Windows Home Server Watch World Cup Online On These Sites Speed Up Windows With ReadyBoost Awesome World Cup Soccer Calendar Nice Websites To Watch TV Shows Online 24 Million Sites Windows Media Player Glass Icons (icons we like)

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• Implementing features in an Entity System

  - by Bane

  After asking two questions on Entity Systems (1, 2), and reading some articles on them, I think that I understand them much better than before. But, I still have some uncertainties, and mainly they are about building a Particle Emitter, an Input system, and a Camera. I obviously still have some problems understanding Entity Systems, and they might apply to a whole other range of objects, but I chose these three because they are very different concepts and should cover a pretty big ground, and help me understand Entity Systems and how to handle problems like these myself, as they come along. I am building an engine in Javascript, and I've implemented most of the core features, which include: input handling, flexible animation system, particle emitter, math classes and functions, scene handling, a camera and a render, and a whole bunch of other things that engines usually support. Then, I read Byte56's answer that got me interested into making the engine into an Entity System one. It would still remain an HTML5 game engine with the basic Scene philosophy, but it should support dynamic creation of entities from components. These are some of the definitions from the previous questions, updated: An Entity is an identifier. It doesn't have any data, it's not an object, it's a simple id that represents an index in the Scene's list of all entities (which I actually plan to implement as a component matrix). A Component is a data holder, but with methods that can operate on that data. The best example is a Vector2D, or a "Position" component. It has data: x and y, but also some methods that make operating on the data a bit easier: add(), normalize(), and so on. A System is something that can operate on a set of entities that meet the certain requirements, usually they (the entities) need to have a specified (by the system itself) set of components to be operated upon. The system is the "logic" part, the "algorithm" part, all the functionality supplied by components is purely for easier data management. The problem that I have now is fitting my old engine concept into this new programming paradigm. Lets start with the simplest one, a Camera. The camera has a position property (Vector2D), a rotation property and some methods for centering it around a point. Each frame, it is fed to a renderer, along with a scene, and all the objects are translated according to it's position. Then the scene is rendered. How could I represent this kind of an object in an Entity System? Would the camera be an entity or simply a component? A combination (see my answer)? Another issues that is bothering me is implementing a Particle Emitter. For what exactly I mean by that, you can check out my video of it: http://youtu.be/BObargIMQsE. The problem I have with this is, again, what should be what. I'm pretty sure that particles themselves shouldn't be entities, as I want to support 10k+ of them, and creating that much entities would be a heavy blow on my performance, I believe. Or maybe not? Depends on the implementation, but anyone with experience: please, do answer. The last bit I wan't to talk about, which is also bugging me the most, is how input should be handled. In my current version of the engine, there is a class called Input. It's a handler that subscribes to browser's events, such as keypresses, and mouse position changes, and also it maintains an internal state. Then, the player class has a react() method, which accepts an input object as an argument. The advantage of this is that the input object could be serialized into JSON and then shared over the network, allowing for smooth multiplayer simulations. But how does this translate into an Entity System?

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• Recover Lost Form Data in Firefox

  - by Asian Angel

  Have you ever filled in a text area or form in a webpage and something happens before you can finish it? If you like the idea of recovering that lost data then you will want to have a look at the Lazarus: Form Recovery extension for Firefox. Lazarus: Form Recovery in Action For our first example we chose the comment text box area for one of the articles here at the website. As you can see we were not finished typing in the whole comment yet… Notice the “Lazarus Icon” in the lower right corner. Note: We simulated accidental tab closures for our two examples. After getting our webpage opened up again all of our text was gone. Right clicking within the text area showed two options available…”Recover Text & Recover Form”. Notice that our lost text was listed as a “sub menu”…this could be extremely useful in matching up the appropriate text to the correct webpage if you had multiple tabs open before something happened. Click on the correct text listing to insert it. So easy to finish writing our comment without having to start from zero again. In our second example we chose the sign-up form page for the website. As before we were not finished filling in the form… Getting the webpage opened back up showed the same problem as before…all the entered text was lost. This time we right clicked in the browser window area and there was that wonderful “Recover Form Command” waiting to be used. One click and… All of our lost form data was back and we were able to finish filling in the form. For those who may be interested you can disable Lazarus: Form Recovery on individual websites using the “Context Menu” for the “Status Bar Icon” Options There are three sections in the options and you should take a quick look through them to make any desired modifications in how Lazarus: Form Recovery functions. The first “Options Area” focuses on display/access for the extension. The second “Options Area” allows you to expand the type of data retained, enable removal of data within a given time frame, set up a password, disable search indexing, and enable form data retention while in “Private Browsing Mode”. The third “Options Area” focuses on the Lazarus database itself. Conclusion If you have ever lost text area or form data before then you know how much time could be lost in starting over. Lazarus: Form Recovery helps provide a nice backup solution to get you up and running once again with a minimum of effort. Links Download the Lazarus: Form Recovery extension (Mozilla Add-ons) Download the Lazarus: Form Recovery extension (Extension Homepage) Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Quick Tip: Resize Any Textbox or Textarea in FirefoxWhy Doesn’t AutoComplete Always Work in Firefox?Pass Variables between Windows Forms Windows without ShowDialog()Using Secure Login in FirefoxAdd Search Forms to the Firefox Search Bar TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Looking for Good Windows Media Player 12 Plug-ins? Find Out the Celebrity You Resemble With FaceDouble Whoa ! Use Printflush to Solve Printing Problems Icelandic Volcano Webcams Open Multiple Links At One Go

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• ArchBeat Link-o-Rama Top 10 for August 2012

  - by Bob Rhubart

  The Top 10 most popular items shared via the OTN ArchBeat Facebook page for the month of August 2012. Now Available: Oracle SQL Developer 3.2 (3.2.09.23) New features include APEX listener, UI enhancements, and 12c database support. The Role of Oracle VM Server for SPARC in a Virtualization Strategy In this article, Matthias Pfutzner discusses hardware, desktop, and operating system virtualization, along with various Oracle virtualization technologies, including Oracle VM Server for SPARC. How to Manually Install Flash Player Plugin to see the Oracle Enterprise Manager Performance Page | Kai Yu So, you're a DBA and you want to check the Performance page in Oracle Enterprise Manager (11g or 12c). So you click the Performance tab and… nothing. Zip. Nada. The Flash plugin is a no-show. Relax! Oracle ACE Director Kai Yu shows you what you need to do to see all the pretty colors instead of that dull grey screen. Relationally Challenged (CX - CRM - EQ/RQ/CRQ) | Chris Warticki Self-proclaimed Oracle Support "spokesmodel" Chris Chris Warticki has some advice for those interested in Customer Relationship Management: "How about we just dumb it down, strip it to the core, keep it simple and LISTEN?! No more focus groups, no more surveys, and no need to gather more data. We have plenty of that. Why not just provide the customer what they are asking for?" Free WebLogic Server Course | Middleware Magic So you want to sharpen your Oracle WebLogic Server skills, but you prefer to skip the whole classroom bit and don't want to be bothered with dealing with an instructor? No problem! Oracle ACE Rene van Wijk, a prolific Middleware Magic blogger, has information on an Oracle WebLogic course you can take on your own time, at your own pace. Oracle VM VirtualBox 4.1.20 released Oracle VM VirtualBox 4.1.20 was just released at the community and Oracle download sites, reports the Fat Bloke. This is a maintenance release containing bug fixes and stability improvements. Optimizing OLTP Oracle Database Performance using Dell Express Flash PCIe SSDs | Kai Yu Oracle ACE Director Kai Yu shares resources based on "several extensive performance studies on a single node Oracle 11g R2 database as well as a two node 11gR2 Oracle Real Application clusters (RAC) database running on Dell PowerEdge R720 servers with Dell Express Flash PCIe SSDs on Oracle Enterprise Linux 6.2 platform." Oracle ACE sessions at Oracle OpenWorld With so many great sessions at this year's event, building your Oracle OpenWorld schedule can involve making a lot of tough choices. But you'll find that the sessions led by Oracle ACEs just might be the icing on the cake for your OpenWorld experience. MySQL Update: The Cleveland MySQL Meetup (Independence, OH) Oracle MySQL team member Benjamin Wood, a MySQL engineer and five year veteran of the MySQL organization, will speak at the Cleveland MySQL Meetup event on September 12. The presentation will include a MySQL 5.5 Overview, Oracle's Roadmap for MySQL, including specifics on MySQL 5.6, best practices and how to overcome development and operational MySQL challenges, and the new MySQL commercial extensions. Click the link for time and location information. Parsing XML in Oracle Database | Martijn van der Kamp Martijn van der Kamp's post deals with processing XML in PL/SQL code and processing the data into the database. Thought for the Day "Walking on water and developing software from a specification are easy if both are frozen." — Edward V. Berard Source: SoftwareQuotes.com

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• What Counts For a DBA: Ego

  - by Louis Davidson

  Leaving aside, for a second, Freud’s psychoanalytical definitions, the term “ego” generally refers to a person’s sense of self, and their self-esteem. In casual usage, however, it usually appears in the adjectival form, “egotistical” (most often followed by “jerk”). You don’t need to be a jerk to be a DBA; humility is important. However, ego is important too. A good DBA needs a certain degree of self-esteem…a belief and pride in what he or she can do better than anyone else can. The ideal DBA needs to be humble enough to admit when they are wrong but egotistical enough to know when they are right, and to stand up for that knowledge and make their voice heard. In most organizations, the DBA team is seriously outnumbered by headstrong developers and clock driven managers, and “great” DBAs will often be outnumbered by…well…the not so great. In order to be heard in this environment, a DBA will not only need to be very skilled, but will also need a healthy dose of ego. As Freud might have put it, the unconscious desire of the DBA (the id) is for iron-fist control over their databases, and code that runs in them. However, the ego moderates this desire, seeking to “satisfy the id in realistic ways that, in the long term, bring benefit rather than grief“. In other words, the ego understands the need to exert a measure of control and self-belief, but also to tolerate and play nicely with developers and other DBAs. The trick, naturally, is learning how to be heard when it is important, but also to make everyone around you welcome that input, even when you have to be bold to make the “I know what I am talking about, and you…well…not so much” decisions. Consider a baseball team, bottom of the ninth inning of the championship game, man on first and down one run. Almost anyone on that team will have the ability to hit a home run, but only one or two will have the iron belief that they can pull it off in this critical, end-game situation. The player you need in this situation is the one who has passionately gone the extra mile preparing for just this moment, is bursting at the seams with self-confidence, and can look the coach in the eye and state, boldly, “Put me in, I am your best bet“. Likewise, on those occasions when high customer demand coincides with copious system errors, and panic is bubbling just beneath the surface, you don’t need the minimally qualified support person, armed with the “reboot and hope” technique (though that sometimes works!). You need the DBA who steps up and says, “Put me in” and has the skill and tenacity to back up those words and to fix the pinpoint and fix the problem, whatever it takes, while keeping customers and managers happy. Of course, the egotistical DBA will happily spend hours telling you how great they are at their job, and how brilliantly they put out a previous fire, and this is no guarantee that they can deliver. However, if an otherwise-humble DBA looks you in the eye and says, “I can do it”, then hear them out. Sometimes, this burst of ego will be exactly what’s required.

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• Ubuntu 12.04 - No sound - HELP!

  - by Bruno Tacca

  I'm panicking... my sound stopped working after I tried to set-up my notebook speakers, plus two headphone jacks... My idea was to multichannel the sound to 3 channels, built-in speakers, and sound-card 2 headphone jacks. After a couple efforts I did it with 2 channels, speakers and 1 headphone jack, but the other wasn't working. After more tries and tries, sound stop working. I just want my sound back... crying like a baby on the floor. And, if possible, but not necessary, a simple guide to active the 3 channels. xD I will post the diagnosis according to https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SoundTroubleshootingProcedure STEP 1 Did it, still no sound. STEP 2 Did it, still no sound. STEP 3 and #STEP 4 (I removed the log cause there is a limit of characters to be posted.) The log can be found here: https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/alsa-driver/+question/238653 STEP 5 Rebooted, still no sound. STEP 6 Did it. In the Output Devices tab, nothing is muted. I play a music with the Rhythmbox Music Player, I don't hear anything but in the pavucontrol I can see in the Built-in Audio Analog Stereo a sound bar shaking... but, no sound. STEP 7 In alsamixer, AlsaMixer v1.0.25 Card: HDA Intel PCH Chip: Creative CA0132 information View: F3:[Playback] F4: Capture F5: All Item: Headphone [dB gain: 25.00, 25.00] Then, I have 5 columns Headphone, Speaker, PCM, S/PDIF, S/PDIF Default PCM A little weird when I try to mute the Headphone and the Speaker, here what happens: Starting both unmutted, mutting headphone cause speaker being mutted automaticaly. Starting both unmutted, mutting speaker cause headphone being mutted automaticaly. Starting both mutted, possible to unmute both separately. STEP 8 I cannot hear sound on both (headphone and/or speaker). STEP 9 Dual boot... Restarted, windows was with sound at max volume. Restarted again, still no sound at ubuntu. I heard something when ubuntu started, a little noise, then silence again. The sound icon always start mutted, after unmutting, I have no sound. STEP 10 I dont have this command in my ubuntu. STEP 11 Tried at STEP 8, no sound. There are no problem with jumpers or hardware, cause I have sound working on windows. STEP 12 No way to open my alienware and loss the warranty x.X" STEP 13 I think it's loaded, judging my the logs STEP 14 Alienware M17xR4, the hardware is listed in the logs above, at STEP 4. There are two headphone hacks, one with just an headphone printed above, and the other with an headset (with mic) printed, there is a mic jack too, and a spdif (optical) too. STEP 15 I dont want to enable S/PDIF STEP 16 I never used the HDMI output, yet... Thanks in advance. I hope I listed all the information you need.

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• Extract Audio from a Video File with Pazera Free Audio Extractor

  - by DigitalGeekery

  Have you ever wanted to extract some or all of the audio from a video file?  Today we’ll take a look at Pazera Free Audio Extractor. A simple audio converter that specializes in that very task. Download the Pazera Free Audio Extractor. (See download link below) You’ll need to unzip the download folder, but there is no need to install the application. Simply double-click the AudioExtractor.exe file to run the application. To add your video files to the queue to be converted, click on the Add files  button at the top left. You can add multiple files to the queue and convert them all at one time. Browse for your video file, and click Open.   Your video will be added to the Queue for processing.   Under Output directory you can choose to output to a folder of your choice. Outputting to the same folder as the input folder is the default.   Pazera Free Audio Extractor includes pre-configured profiles that will simplify the process of choosing conversion settings. To load a profile, choose one from the Profile drop down list and then click the Load button. You can choose to output to MP3, AAC, AC3, WMA, FLAC, OGG or WAV file format.   You will see the profile update the Audio settings in the panels at the lower left of the application. If you wish, you may also select your own custom settings. Advanced Settings The Advanced settings can be used if you want to extract only a portion of the the audio, such as a clip of dialog or a song from a movie. To extract only a portion of the audio, set the start time by selecting the Start time offset check box, then entering the time in the video clip where the audio begins. To set the end time, begin by selecting the Duration check box. Now, you can either select the Duration radio button and enter the amount of time for which you would like to extract the audio, or you can select the End time offset radio button and enter the time in the video clip where the audio ends. When you are ready to convert, click the CONVERT button on the menu at the top of the screen.   An output box will open and display the conversion progress. When finished, click Close.   Now you are ready to enjoy your audio clip. Pazera Free Audio Extractor is a basic audio tool that is easy enough for everyone to use. It runs on Windows only and supports most common video formats including AVI, FLV, MP4, MPG, MOV, 3GP, and WMV. Download Free Audio Extractor 1.3 Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Eufony Free Audio Player – Resource Gentle Audio PlayerConvert .3GP and .3G2 Files to AVI / MPEG for FreeTurn Off Auto-Play of Audio and Video CDs and DVDs in UbuntuHow to Make/Edit a movie with Windows Movie Maker in Windows VistaEasily Change Audio File Formats with XRECODE TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Use Printflush to Solve Printing Problems Icelandic Volcano Webcams Open Multiple Links At One Go NachoFoto Searches Images in Real-time Office 2010 Product Guides Google Maps Place marks – Pizza, Guns or Strip Clubs

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• Uninstall, Disable, or Remove Windows 7 Media Center

  - by Mysticgeek

  Although Windows 7 Media Center has improved a lot over previous versions of Windows, but you might want to disable it for different reasons. Here we take a look at a couple of methods to get rid of it. There are a variety of reasons you might want to disable Windows 7 Media Center. Maybe you own a business and don’t want it to run on the machines. Or perhaps you don’t use it at all and just don’t want it around. Turn Off WMC Using Programs and Features Probably the easiest way to get rid of it on all versions of Windows 7 is to open Control Panel and select Programs and Features. This method is similar to disabling Internet Explorer 8 in Windows 7. On the left hand panel click on Turn Windows Features on or off. Scroll down to Media Features and expand the folder. Then Uncheck Windows Media Center… You’ll get a verification message making sure you want to disable it, click Yes. Then the box next to Windows Media Center will be empty…click OK. Wait while WMC is disabled… To complete the process a reboot is required. After getting back from the restart, the WMC icon will be gone and there won’t be any way to launch it. Re-enable WMC If you want to re-enable it, just go back in and recheck it. Again you’ll need to wait while it’s configured, but when it’s done, a restart is not required.   Disable Media Center Using Group Policy Note: This process uses Group Policy Editor which is not available in Home versions of Windows 7. Click on the Start menu and type gpedit.msc into the Search box and hit Enter. Now navigate to User Configuration \ Administrative Templates \ Windows Components \ Windows Media Center. Double-click on Do not allow Windows Media Center to run. Then select the radio button next to Enabled, click OK and close out of Group Policy Editor. Now if a user tries to launch WMC they will get the following message. Conclusion If you’re not a fan of Windows Media Center or want to disable it for whatever reason, the process is simple and there are a couple of ways you can do it. WMC is not included in Starter or Home Basic versions of Windows 7. If you’re new to Windows 7 Media Center, you might want to check out our guide on getting started and setting up live TV. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Using Netflix Watchnow in Windows Vista Media Center (Gmedia)Disable Windows Mobility Center in Windows 7 or VistaMake Outlook Faster by Disabling Unnecessary Add-InsSchedule Updates for Windows Media CenterRemove "Map Network Drive" Menu Item from Windows Vista or XP TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Find Downloads and Add-ins for Outlook Recycle ! Find That Elusive Icon with FindIcons Looking for Good Windows Media Player 12 Plug-ins? Find Out the Celebrity You Resemble With FaceDouble Whoa !

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• Bose USB audio: crackling popping sound, eventually die

  - by Richard Barrett

  I've been trying to troubleshoot this issue for a while now. Any help would be much appreciated. I'm having trouble getting my Bose "Companion 5 multimedia speakers" working with my installation of Ubuntu 12.04 (link to Bose product here: http://www.bose.com/controller?url=/shop_online/digital_music_systems/computer_speakers/companion_5/index.jsp ). The issue seems to be low level (not just Ubuntu). What happens: When I boot into Ubuntu, I can get Rhythm box to play ok. However, if I try anything else (an .avi file, a webpage, or Clementine player with mp3 files) I get crackling, popping, or choppy sounds. If I move the mouse around, especially if it seems graphic intensive, the problem gets worse (more crackling noises). The more taxing it appears to be, the more likely it is that the sound will just die altogether until I reboot. For some reason the videos at www.bloomberg.com seem especially bad for it (my sound normally goes dead in under 45 seconds and won't work until reboot). Both my desktop running Ubuntu 12.04 and my laptop (running the same) have the same crackling problem. Troubleshooting so far: A friend of mine who knows linux well tried to solve it for me without any luck. He took pulseaudio out of the equation, but still had the problem just using AlSA. Among the many things he tried was adjusting the latency, but that didn't help either. I've also tried things like adjusting the USB device settings in the config file from -2 to -1 so that it will use my USB sound and I also commented out the lines that would stop that. These don't do anything. (That really seems like it's for someone who is getting no sound at all, so it's not surprising this won't work.) My friend's laptop running his Archlinux could play my Bose USB speakers without any problems. I also tried setting my daemon.conf file to use 6 channels (based on this http://lotphelp.com/lotp/configure-ubuntu-51-surround-sound ) but that didn't work either. I recently used a DVD to boot into Ubuntu Studio 12.04 (because it uses a live audio kernel) and this happened: I got perfect sound for a minute or two When I started moving windows around while sound was playing, the sound died again. Perhaps more interesting: There is a headphone out jack on the Bose system. When I use it, the audio is perfect for all applications (even the deadly bloomberg.com videos with .avi playing at the same time and moving around windows). Also, there is an audio-in jack on the Bose system. I can use a male-to-male mini jack to go from my soundcard's output to the Bose input and then all sound works perfectly. -However, it still requires the Bose to be plugged in to USB, otherwise I lose all sound. Any thoughts? Any suggestions for trouble shooting? (Or any suggestions for somewhere else to post to solve this?) Any logs or other files I can provide to help someone help me work this out? Your help is much appreciated! Rick BTW: I sometimes get people posting responses like "My Bose USB system works great with Ubuntu 12.04," without any more details. Is there anything I should ask such people to narrow down my problem? (It's kind of annoying to hear such a response because it doesn't help solve my problem.)

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• Slick2D, Nifty GUI listeners problem

  - by Patokun

  I'm trying to get Nifty GUI to work with Slick2D. So far everything is going great, except that I can't seem to figure out how to properly interact with the GUI. I'm trying the example in the nifty manual http://sourceforge.n....0.pdf/download but it doesn't seem to entirely work. The Element controller is being called for bind(...), init(...) and onStartScreen() as it should, as I can see their println output, but the next() method isn't being called when I click on the GUI element that I assigned the controller to, nor the screen controller as no output from println is shown. What's weird is, that the player is moving, so the mouse input is working. It's supposed to be called when I click the mouse button on it from the in the XML. Here is my code: My Element controller: public class ElementController implements Controller { private Element element; @Override public void bind(Nifty nifty, Screen screen, Element element, Properties parameter, Attributes controlDefinitionAttributes) { this.element = element; System.out.println("bind() called for element: " + element); } @Override public void init(Properties parameter, Attributes controlDefinitionAttributes) { System.out.println("init() called for element: " + element); } @Override public void onStartScreen() { System.out.println("onStartScreen() alled for element: " + element); } @Override public void onFocus(boolean getFocus) { System.out.println("onFocus() called for element: " + element + ", with: " + getFocus); } @Override public boolean inputEvent(NiftyInputEvent inputEvent) { return false; } public void next() { System.out.println("next() clicked for element: " + element); } } MyScreenController: class MyScreenController implements ScreenController { public void bind(Nifty nifty, Screen screen) {} public void onEndScreen() {} public void onStartScreen() {} public void next() { System.out.println("next() called from MyScreenController"); } } And my XML file: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <nifty xmlns="http://nifty-gui.sourceforge.net/nifty-1.3.xsd" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"xsi:schemaLocation="http://niftygui.sourceforge.net/nifty-1.3.xsd http://nifty-gui.sourceforge.net/nifty-1.3.xsd"> <screen id="start" controller="predaN00b.theThing.V0004.MyScreenController"> <layer childLayout="center" controller="predaN00b.theThing.V0004.ElementController"> <panel width="100px" height="100px" childLayout="vertical" backgroundColor="#ff0f"> <text font="aurulent-sans-16.fnt" color="#ffff" text="Hello World!"> <interact onClick="next()" /> </text> </panel> </layer> </screen> </nifty> My main class, in case it's needed: public class MainGameState extends BasicGame { public Nifty nifty; public MainGame() { super("Test"); } public void init(GameContainer container, StateBasedGame game) throws SlickException { nifty = new Nifty(new SlickRenderDevice(container), new NullSoundDevice(), new PlainSlickInputSystem(), new AccurateTimeProvider()); nifty.addXml("/xml/MainState.xml"); nifty.gotoScreen("start"); } public void update(GameContainer container, StateBasedGame game, int delta) throws SlickException { nifty.update(); } public void render(GameContainer container, StateBasedGame game, Graphics graphics) throws SlickException { nifty.render(false); } public static void main(String[] args) throws SlickException { AppGameContainer app = new AppGameContainer(new MainGame()); app.setAlwaysRender(true); app.setDisplayMode( 1260 , 720, false); //window size app.start(); } }

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• How to Get Windows 7 Theme Wallpapers Without Installing Them

  - by Mysticgeek

  Are you using an older version of Windows but like the Windows 7 theme wallpapers? What if you have Windows 7 but you don’t want to install the themes just to get the wallpapers? Here is how to get them without having to install themes. This guest article was written by Ryan Dozier from the Doztech tech blog. Getting the Wallpaper on XP, Vista, or Windows 7 First download and install 7-zip on your machine (link below). After you’ve installed 7-zip, download a Windows 7 theme (link below) and right-click on the theme, select 7-Zip, and Extract to “Theme Name”… A new folder will appear with the theme name on it. When you open it, there will be a folder called DesktopBackground or something similar.   Open the folder to get the wallpapers to view the wallpapers for the theme. You can delete the extra files and just keep the wallpapers!   Getting the Wallpaper on Ubuntu Extracting the wallpaper on Ubuntu can be a little tricky. Just follow these steps and you will be able to do it. First go to the Ubuntu Software Center under the Applications menu. Search for 7zip and click on the arrow to go to the applications menu. Find the Install button and click it. It will take a couple of minutes for 7zip to install. After 7zip installs, close the Ubuntu Software Center and download a Windows 7 theme. Store it somewhere you can access it quickly. Right-click on the theme and select Rename and get rid of the themepack extension and replace it with zip. The file should be “Theme Name.zip” after you rename it. Right-click on the theme and click Extract Here. After  the extracting you will have a new folder with the theme name. Open it and go into the DesktopBackground folder to get the wallpapers. You can delete the extra files and just keep the wallpapers. If you want to get the new Windows 7 Themes Wallpapers, but don’t want to search and install them separately, this is a nice workaround. Links Get 7 zip for Windows  here Get Windows 7 Themes here Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Windows 7 Welcome Screen Taking Forever? Here’s the Fix (Maybe)Desktop Fun: Starship Theme WallpapersDesktop Fun: Underwater Theme WallpapersDesktop Fun: Forest Theme WallpapersDesktop Fun: Fantasy Theme Wallpapers TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips VMware Workstation 7 Acronis Online Backup DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Cool Looking Skins for Windows Media Player 12 Move the Mouse Pointer With Your Face Movement Using eViacam Boot Windows Faster With Boot Performance Diagnostics Create Ringtones For Your Android Phone With RingDroid Enhance Your Laptop’s Battery Life With These Tips Easily Search Food Recipes With Recipe Chimp

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• Tweaking Remote Control (In-Kernel LIRC)

  - by Geoff

  I've recently rebuilt my MythTV box using Mythbuntu 12.04, to take advantage of newer hardware (Ivy Bridge). On my previous build I used lirc to manage the remote, i.e. the mapping of key codes - keypresses - application keys; it was quite a journey to learn it all, and I ended up fairly comfortable with how it all worked. What I have: I have a cheap Chinavasion remote and USB dongle, which I've found several articles on; these largely revolve around working with XBMC (interesting, but I don't think directly applicable) and also around getting a Harmony remote to work (it's a Chinavasion CVSB-983 - very useful, since I needed this to get my Harmony 900 working). Mythbuntu 12.04 64-bit MythTV 0.25 (likely irrelevant) How it is right now When I plug this in, it 'just works'. Which is great, except that Ubuntu uses it natively, and prevents some of the button presses from getting through to Myth. For example, I can send a button from the remote that equates to Ctrl-Alt-A (which I assume Ubuntu isn't interested in), and then trap that in Mythfrontend, but the remote's Play button is caught by Ubuntu (which displays a large circle with a line though it, as there's no media player loaded). I understand that this is because lirc is merged into the kernel now, and I like that. What I've done so far: Found the device using lsusb: $ lsusb Bus 001 Device 004: ID 073a:2230 Chaplet Systems, Inc. infrared dongle for remote Found the event device number: $ cat /proc/bus/input/devices I: Bus=0003 Vendor=073a Product=2230 Version=0110 N: Name="HID 073a:2230" P: Phys=usb-0000:00:1a.0-1.2/input0 S: Sysfs=/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1a.0/usb1/1-1/1-1.2/1-1.2:1.0/input/input5 U: Uniq= H: Handlers=sysrq kbd mouse1 event5 js0 B: PROP=0 B: EV=10001f B: KEY=4c37fff072ff32d bf54445600000000 ffffffffff 30c100b17c007 ffa67bfad951dfff febeffdfffefffff fffffffffffffffe B: REL=343 B: ABS=100030000 B: MSC=10 Tested the input with evtest (I pressed Play): $ sudo evtest /dev/input/event5 Input driver version is 1.0.1 Input device ID: bus 0x3 vendor 0x73a product 0x2230 version 0x110 Input device name: "HID 073a:2230" Supported events: Event type 0 (EV_SYN) Event type 1 (EV_KEY) Event code 1 (KEY_ESC) Event code 2 (KEY_1) Event code 3 (KEY_2) Event code 4 (KEY_3) Event code 5 (KEY_4) Event code 6 (KEY_5) Event code 7 (KEY_6) <------------snipped lots of 'Event code' lines------------> Testing ... (interrupt to exit) Event: time 1336435683.230656, -------------- SYN_REPORT ------------ Event: time 1336435683.246648, type 4 (EV_MSC), code 4 (MSC_SCAN), value c00cd Event: time 1336435683.246652, type 1 (EV_KEY), code 164 (KEY_PLAYPAUSE), value 0 Event: time 1336435683.246655, -------------- SYN_REPORT ------------ Tested showkey, again for the Play key: $ sudo showkey -s kb mode was RAW [ if you are trying this under X, it might not work since the X server is also reading /dev/console ] press any key (program terminates 10s after last keypress)... 0xe0 0x22 0xe0 0xa2 What I want: I'd like a way to scan the incoming button presses, if the above method isn't correct. I'd like to either remap each button press to something that Ubuntu/Unity will ignore, or even better pass the keypress directly to Myth (I suspect this later is only possible with lirc, but I could be wrong). I would really like to do this with the in-kernel drivers, i.e. without explicitly loading lirc; if that's the way the world is going, I'd rather find a way to map the current behaviour to what I want, rather than forcing the 'old' arrangement of loading lirc outside the kernel. Learning something new is also worthwhile! My guess: I'm assuming that this will require using setkeycodes, but have had trouble finding enough information to configure this. Any help greatly appreciated!

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• Visual Studio 2010 Best Practices

  - by Etienne Tremblay

  I’d like to thank Packt for providing me with a review version of Visual Studio 2010 Best Practices eBook. In fairness I also know the author Peter having seen him speak at DevTeach on many occasions.  I started by looking at the table of content to see what this book was about, knowing that “best practices” is a real misnomer I wanted to see what they were.  I really like the fact that he starts the book by really saying they are not really best practices but actually recommend practices.  As a Team Foundation Server user I found that chapter 2 was more for the open source crowd and I really skimmed it.  The portion on Branching was well documented, although I’m not a fan of the testing branch myself, but the rest was right on. The section on merge remote changes (bring the outside to you) paradigm is really important and was touched on. Chapter 3 has good solid practices on low level constructs like generics and exceptions. Chapter 4 dives into architectural practices like decoupling, distributed architecture and data based architecture.  DTOs and ORMs are touched on briefly as is NoSQL. Chapter 5 is about deployment and is really a great primer on all the “packaging” technologies like Visual Studio Setup and Deployment (depreciated in 2012), Click Once and WIX the major player outside of commercial solutions.  This is a nice section on how to move from VSSD to WIX this is going to be important in the coming years due to the fact that VS 2012 doesn’t support VSSD. In chapter 6 we dive into automated testing practices, including test coverage, mocking, TDD, SpecDD and Continuous Testing.  Peter covers all those concepts really nicely albeit succinctly. Being a book on recommended practices I find this is really good. I really enjoyed chapter 7 that gave me a lot of great tips to enhance my Visual Studio “experience”.  Tips on organizing projects where good.  Also even though I knew about configurations I like that he put that in there so you can move all your settings to another machine, a lot of people don’t know about that. Quick find and Resharper are also briefly covered.  He touches on macros (depreciated in 2012).  Finally he touches on Continuous Integration a very important concept in today’s ALM landscape. Chapter 8 is all about Parallelization, threads, Async, division of labor, reactive extensions.  All those concepts are touched on and again generalized approaches to those modern problems are giving.       Chapter 9 goes into distributed apps, the most used and accepted practice in the industry for .NET projects the chapter tackles concepts like Scalability, Messaging and Cloud (the flavor of the month of distributed apps, although I think this will stick ;-)).  He also looks a protocols TCP/UDP and how to debug distributed apps.  He touches on logging and health monitoring. Chapter 10 tackles recommended practices for web services starting with implementing WCF services, which goes into all sort of goodness like how to host in IIS or self-host.  How to manual test WCF services, also a section on authentication and authorization.  ASP.NET Web services are also touched on in that chapter All in all a good read, nice tips and accepted practices.  I like the conciseness of the subjects and Peter touches on a lot of things in this book and uses a lot of the current technologies flavors to explain the concepts.   Cheers, ET

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• Top 5 Mobile Apps To Keep Track Of Cricket Scores [ICC World Cup]

  - by Gopinath

  The ICC World Cup 2011 has started with a bang today and the first match between India vs Bangladesh was a cracker. India trashed Bangladesh with a huge margin, thanks to Sehwag for scoring an entertaining 175 runs in 140 runs. At the moment it’s very clear that whole India is gripped with cricket fever and so the rest of fans across the globe. Couple of days ago we blogged about how to watch live streaming of ICC cricket world cup online for free as well as top 10 websites to keep track live scores on your computers. What about tracking live cricket scores on mobiles phones? Here is our guide to top mobile apps available for Symbian(Nokia), Android, iOS and Windows mobiles. By the way, we are covering free apps alone in this post. Why to waste money when free apps are available? SnapTu – Symbian Mobile App SnapTu is a multi feature application that lets you to track live cricket scores, read latest news and check stats published on cric info. SnapTu has tie up with Cric Info and accessing all of CricInfo website on your mobile is very easy. Along with live scores, SnapTu also lets you access your Facebook, Twitter and Picassa on your mobile. This is my favourite application to track cricket on Symbian mobiles. Download SnapTu for your mobiles here Yahoo! Cricket – Symbian & iOS App Yahoo! Cricket Scores is another dedicated application to catch up with live scores and news on your Nokia mobiles and iPhones. This application is developed by Yahoo!, the web giant as well as the official partner of ICC. Features of the app at a glance Cricket: Get a summary page with latest scores, upcoming matches and details of the recent matches News: View sections devoted to the latest news, interviews and photos Statistics: Find the latest team and player stats Download Yahoo! Cricket For Symbian Phones   Download Yahoo! Cricket For iOS ESPN CricInfo – Android and iOS App Is there any site that is better than CricInfo to catch up with latest cricket news and live scores? I say No. ESPN CricInfo is the best website available on the web to get up to the minute  cricket information with in-depth analysis from cricket experts. The live commentary provided by CricInfo site is equally enjoyable as watching live cricket on TV. CricInfo guys have their official applications for Android mobiles and iOS devices and you accessing ball by ball updates on these application is joy. Download ESPN Crick Info App: Android Version, iPhone Version NDTV Cricket – Android, iOS and Blackberry App NDTV Cricket App is developed by NDTV, the most popular English TV news channel in India. This application provides live coverage of international and domestic cricket (Test, ODI & T20) along with latest News, Photos, Videos and Stats. This application is available for iOS devices(iPhones, iPads, iPod Touch), Android mobiles and Blackberry devices. Download NDTV Cricket for iOS here & here    Download NDTV Apps For Rest of OSs ECB Cricket – Symbian, iOS & Android App If you are an UK citizen then  this may be the right application to download for getting live cricket score updates as well as latest news about England Cricket Board. ECB Cricket is an official application of England Cricket Board Download ECB Cricket : Android Version, iPhone Version, Symbian Version Are there any better apps that we missed to feature in this list? This article titled,Top 5 Mobile Apps To Keep Track Of Cricket Scores [ICC World Cup], was originally published at Tech Dreams. Grab our rss feed or fan us on Facebook to get updates from us.

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• SQL analytical mash-ups deliver real-time WOW! for big data

  - by KLaker

  One of the overlooked capabilities of SQL as an analysis engine, because we all just take it for granted, is that you can mix and match analytical features to create some amazing mash-ups. As we move into the exciting world of big data these mash-ups can really deliver those "wow, I never knew that" moments. While Java is an incredibly flexible and powerful framework for managing big data there are some significant challenges in using Java and MapReduce to drive your analysis to create these "wow" discoveries. One of these "wow" moments was demonstrated at this year's OpenWorld during Andy Mendelsohn's general keynote session.  Here is the scenario - we are looking for fraudulent activities in our big data stream and in this case we identifying potentially fraudulent activities by looking for specific patterns. We using geospatial tagging of each transaction so we can create a real-time fraud-map for our business users. Where we start to move towards a "wow" moment is to extend this basic use of spatial and pattern matching, as shown in the above dashboard screen, to incorporate spatial analytics within the SQL pattern matching clause. This will allow us to compute the distance between transactions. Apologies for the quality of this screenshot….hopefully below you see where we have extended our SQL pattern matching clause to use location of each transaction and to calculate the distance between each transaction: This allows us to compare the time of the last transaction with the time of the current transaction and see if the distance between the two points is possible given the time frame. Obviously if I buy something in Florida from my favourite bike store (may be a new carbon saddle for my Trek) and then 5 minutes later the system sees my credit card details being used in Arizona there is high probability that this transaction in Arizona is actually fraudulent (I am fast on my Trek but not that fast!) and we can flag this up in real-time on our dashboard: In this post I have used the term "real-time" a couple of times and this is an important point and one of the key reasons why SQL really is the only language to use if you want to analyse  big data. One of the most important questions that comes up in every big data project is: how do we do analysis? Many enlightened customers are now realising that using Java-MapReduce to deliver analysis does not result in "wow" moments. These "wow" moments only come with SQL because it is offers a much richer environment, it is simpler to use and it is faster - which makes it possible to deliver real-time "Wow!". Below is a slide from Andy's session showing the results of a comparison of Java-MapReduce vs. SQL pattern matching to deliver our "wow" moment during our live demo.  You can watch our analytical mash-up "Wow" demo that compares the power of 12c SQL pattern matching + spatial analytics vs. Java-MapReduce  here: You can get more information about SQL Pattern Matching on our SQL Analytics home page on OTN, see here http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database/bi-datawarehousing/sql-analytics-index-1984365.html.  You can get more information about our spatial analytics here: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database-options/spatialandgraph/overview/index.html If you would like to watch the full Database 12c OOW presentation see here: http://medianetwork.oracle.com/video/player/2686974264001

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• JCP Awards 10 Year Retrospective

  - by Heather VanCura

  As we celebrate 10 years of JCP Program Award recognition in 2012,  take a look back in the Retrospective article covering the history of the JCP awards.  Most recently, the JCP awards were  celebrated at JavaOne Latin America in Brazil, where SouJava was presented the JCP Member of the Year Award for 2012 (won jointly with the London Java Community) for their contributions and launch of the Global Adopt-a-JSR Program. This is also a good time to honor the JCP Award Nominees and Winners who have been designated as Star Spec Leads.  Spec Leads are key to the Java Community Process (JCP) program. Without them, none of the Java Specification Requests (JSRs) would have begun, much less completed and become implemented in shipping products.  Nominations for 2012 Start Spec Leads are now open until 31 December. The Star Spec Lead program recognizes Spec Leads who have repeatedly proven their merit by producing high quality specifications, establishing best practices, and mentoring others. The point of such honor is to endorse the good work that they do, showcase their methods for other Spec Leads to emulate, and motivate other JCP program members and participants to get involved in the JCP program. Ed Burns – A Star Spec Lead for 2009, Ed first got involved with the JCP program when he became co-Spec Lead of JSR 127, JavaServer Faces (JSF), a role he has continued through JSF 1.2 and now JSF 2.0, which is JSR 314. Linda DeMichiel – Linda thus involved in the JCP program from its very early days. She has been the Spec Lead on at least three JSRs and an EC member for another three. She holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Stanford University. Gavin King – Nominated as a JCP Outstanding Spec Lead for 2010, for his work with JSR 299. His endorsement said, “He was not only able to work through disputes and objections to the evolving programming model, but he resolved them into solutions that were more technically sound, and which gained support of its pundits.” Mike Milikich –  Nominated for his work on Java Micro Edition (ME) standards, implementations, tools, and Technology Compatibility Kits (TCKs), Mike was a 2009 Star Spec Lead for JSR 271, Mobile Information Device Profile 3. David Nuescheler – Serving as the CTO for Day Software, acquired by Adobe Systems, David has been a key player in the growth of the company’s global content management solution. In 2002, he became Spec Lead for JSR 170, Content Repository for Java Technology API, continuing for the subsequent version, JSR 283. Bill Shannon – A well-respected name in the Java community, Bill came to Oracle from Sun as a Distinguished Engineer and is still performing at full speed as Spec Lead for JSR 342, Java EE 7,  as an alternate EC member, and hands-on problem solver for the Java community as a whole. Jim Van Peursem – Jim holds a PhD in Computer Engineering. He was part of the Motorola team that worked with Sun labs on the Spotless VM that became the KVM. From within Motorola, Jim has been responsible for many aspects of Java technology deployment, from an independent Connected Limited Device Configuration (CLDC) and Mobile Information Device Profile (MIDP) implementations, to handset development, to working with the industry in defining many related standards. Participation in the JCP Program goes well beyond technical proficiency. The JCP Awards Program is an attempt to say “Thank You” to all of the JCP members, Expert Group Members, Spec Leads, and EC members who give their time to contribute to the evolution of Java technology.

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• What is the best Broadphase Interface for moving spheres?

  - by Molmasepic

  As of now I am working on optimizing the performance of the physics and collision, and as of now I am having some slowdowns on my other computers from my main. I have well over 3000 btSphereShape Rigidbodies and 2/3 of them do not move at all, but I am noticing(by the profile below) that collision is taking a bit of time to maneuver. Each sample counts as 0.01 seconds. % cumulative self self total time seconds seconds calls ms/call ms/call name 10.09 0.65 0.65 SphereTriangleDetector::collide(btVector3 const&, btVector3&, btVector3&, float&, float&, float) 7.61 1.14 0.49 btSphereTriangleCollisionAlgorithm::processCollision(btCollisionObject*, btCollisionObject*, btDispatcherInfo const&, btManifoldResult*) 5.59 1.50 0.36 btConvexTriangleCallback::processTriangle(btVector3*, int, int) 5.43 1.85 0.35 btQuantizedBvh::reportAabbOverlappingNodex(btNodeOverlapCallback*, btVector3 const&, btVector3 const&) const 4.97 2.17 0.32 btBvhTriangleMeshShape::processAllTriangles(btTriangleCallback*, btVector3 const&, btVector3 const&) const::MyNodeOverlapCallback::processNode(int, int) 4.19 2.44 0.27 btSequentialImpulseConstraintSolver::resolveSingleConstraintRowGeneric(btRigidBody&, btRigidBody&, btSolverConstraint const&) 4.04 2.70 0.26 btSequentialImpulseConstraintSolver::resolveSingleConstraintRowLowerLimit(btRigidBody&, btRigidBody&, btSolverConstraint const&) 3.73 2.94 0.24 Ogre::OctreeSceneManager::walkOctree(Ogre::OctreeCamera*, Ogre::RenderQueue*, Ogre::Octree*, Ogre::VisibleObjectsBoundsInfo*, bool, bool) 3.42 3.16 0.22 btTriangleShape::getVertex(int, btVector3&) const 2.48 3.32 0.16 Ogre::Frustum::isVisible(Ogre::AxisAlignedBox const&, Ogre::FrustumPlane*) const 2.33 3.47 0.15 1246357 0.00 0.00 Gorilla::Layer::setVisible(bool) 2.33 3.62 0.15 SphereTriangleDetector::getClosestPoints(btDiscreteCollisionDetectorInterface::ClosestPointInput const&, btDiscreteCollisionDetectorInterface::Result&, btIDebugDraw*, bool) 1.86 3.74 0.12 btCollisionDispatcher::findAlgorithm(btCollisionObject*, btCollisionObject*, btPersistentManifold*) 1.86 3.86 0.12 btSequentialImpulseConstraintSolver::setupContactConstraint(btSolverConstraint&, btCollisionObject*, btCollisionObject*, btManifoldPoint&, btContactSolverInfo const&, btVector3&, float&, float&, btVector3&, btVector3&) 1.71 3.97 0.11 btTriangleShape::getEdge(int, btVector3&, btVector3&) const 1.55 4.07 0.10 _Unwind_SjLj_Register 1.55 4.17 0.10 _Unwind_SjLj_Unregister 1.55 4.27 0.10 Ogre::D3D9HardwareVertexBuffer::updateBufferResources(char const*, Ogre::D3D9HardwareVertexBuffer::BufferResources*) 1.40 4.36 0.09 btManifoldResult::addContactPoint(btVector3 const&, btVector3 const&, float) 1.40 4.45 0.09 btSequentialImpulseConstraintSolver::setupFrictionConstraint(btSolverConstraint&, btVector3 const&, btRigidBody*, btRigidBody*, btManifoldPoint&, btVector3 const&, btVector3 const&, btCollisionObject*, btCollisionObject*, float, float, float) 1.24 4.53 0.08 btSequentialImpulseConstraintSolver::convertContact(btPersistentManifold*, btContactSolverInfo const&) 1.09 4.60 0.07 408760 0.00 0.00 Living::MapHide() 1.09 4.67 0.07 btSphereTriangleCollisionAlgorithm::~btSphereTriangleCollisionAlgorithm() 1.09 4.74 0.07 inflate_fast EDIT: Updated to show current Profile. I have only listed the functions using over 1% time from the many functions that are being used. Another thing is that each monster has a certain area that they stay in and are only active when a player is in said area. I was wondering if maybe there is a way to deactivate the non-active monsters from bullet(reactivating once in the area again) or maybe theres a different broadphase interface that I should use. The current BPI is btDbvtBroadphase. EDIT: Here is the Profile on the other computer(the top one is my main) Each sample counts as 0.01 seconds. % cumulative self self total time seconds seconds calls ms/call ms/call name 12.18 1.19 1.19 SphereTriangleDetector::collide(btVector3 const&, btVector3&, btVector3&, float&, float&, float) 6.76 1.85 0.66 btSphereTriangleCollisionAlgorithm::processCollision(btCollisionObject*, btCollisionObject*, btDispatcherInfo const&, btManifoldResult*) 5.83 2.42 0.57 btQuantizedBvh::reportAabbOverlappingNodex(btNodeOverlapCallback*, btVector3 const&, btVector3 const&) const 5.12 2.92 0.50 btConvexTriangleCallback::processTriangle(btVector3*, int, int) 4.61 3.37 0.45 btTriangleShape::getVertex(int, btVector3&) const 4.09 3.77 0.40 _Unwind_SjLj_Register 3.48 4.11 0.34 btBvhTriangleMeshShape::processAllTriangles(btTriangleCallback*, btVector3 const&, btVector3 const&) const::MyNodeOverlapCallback::processNode(int, int) 2.46 4.35 0.24 btSequentialImpulseConstraintSolver::resolveSingleConstraintRowLowerLimit(btRigidBody&, btRigidBody&, btSolverConstraint const&) 2.15 4.56 0.21 _Unwind_SjLj_Unregister 2.15 4.77 0.21 SphereTriangleDetector::getClosestPoints(btDiscreteCollisionDetectorInterface::ClosestPointInput const&, btDiscreteCollisionDetectorInterface::Result&, btIDebugDraw*, bool) 1.84 4.95 0.18 btTriangleShape::getEdge(int, btVector3&, btVector3&) const 1.64 5.11 0.16 btSequentialImpulseConstraintSolver::resolveSingleConstraintRowGeneric(btRigidBody&, btRigidBody&, btSolverConstraint const&) 1.54 5.26 0.15 btSequentialImpulseConstraintSolver::setupContactConstraint(btSolverConstraint&, btCollisionObject*, btCollisionObject*, btManifoldPoint&, btContactSolverInfo const&, btVector3&, float&, float&, btVector3&, btVector3&) 1.43 5.40 0.14 Ogre::D3D9HardwareVertexBuffer::updateBufferResources(char const*, Ogre::D3D9HardwareVertexBuffer::BufferResources*) 1.33 5.53 0.13 btManifoldResult::addContactPoint(btVector3 const&, btVector3 const&, float) 1.13 5.64 0.11 btRigidBody::predictIntegratedTransform(float, btTransform&) 1.13 5.75 0.11 btTriangleIndexVertexArray::getLockedReadOnlyVertexIndexBase(unsigned char const**, int&, PHY_ScalarType&, int&, unsigned char const**, int&, int&, PHY_ScalarType&, int) const 1.02 5.85 0.10 btSphereTriangleCollisionAlgorithm::CreateFunc::CreateCollisionAlgorithm(btCollisionAlgorithmConstructionInfo&, btCollisionObject*, btCollisionObject*) 1.02 5.95 0.10 btSphereTriangleCollisionAlgorithm::btSphereTriangleCollisionAlgorithm(btPersistentManifold*, btCollisionAlgorithmConstructionInfo const&, btCollisionObject*, btCollisionObject*, bool) Edited same as other Profile.

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• Best depth sorting method for a Top Down 2D game using a 3D physics engine

  - by Alic44

  I've spent many days googling this and still have issues with my game engine I'd like to ask about, which I haven't seen addressed before. I think the problem is that my game is an unusual combination of a completely 2D graphical approach using XNA's SpriteBatch, and a completely 3D engine (the amazing BEPU physics engine) with rotation mostly disabled. In essence, my question is similar to this one (the part about "faux 3D"), but the difference is that in my game, the player as well as every other creature is represented by 3D objects, and they can all jump, pick up other objects, and throw them around. What this means is that sorting by one value, such as a Z position (how far north/south a character is on the screen) won't work, because as soon as a smaller creature jumps on top of a larger creature, or a box, and walks backwards, the moment its z value is less than that other creature, it will appear to be behind the object it is actually standing on. I actually originally solved this problem by splitting every object in the game into physics boxes which MUST have a Y height equal to their Z depth. I then based the depth sorting value on the object's y position (how high it is off the ground) PLUS its z position (how far north or south it is on the screen). The problem with this approach is that it requires all moving objects in the game to be split graphically into chunks which match up with a physical box which has its y dimension equal to its z dimension. Which is stupid. So, I got inspired last night to rewrite with a fresh approach. My new method is a little more complex, but I think a little more sane: every object which needs to be sorted by depth in the game exposes the interface IDepthDrawable and is added to a list owned by the DepthDrawer object. IDepthDrawable contains: public interface IDepthDrawable { Rectangle Bounds { get; } //possibly change this to a class if struct copying of the xna Rectangle type becomes an issue DepthDrawShape DepthShape { get; } void Draw(SpriteBatch spriteBatch); } The Bounds Rectangle of each IDepthDrawable object represents the 2D Axis-Aligned Bounding Box it will take up when drawn to the screen. Anything that doesn't intersect the screen will be culled at this stage and the remaining on-screen IDepthDrawables will be Bounds tested for intersections with each other. This is where I get a little less sure of what I'm doing. Each group of collisions will be added to a list or other collection, and each list will sort itself based on its DepthShape property, which will have access to the object-to-be-drawn's physics information. For starting out, lets assume everything in the game is an axis aligned 3D Box shape. Boxes are pretty easy to sort. Something like: if (depthShape1.Back > depthShape2.Front) //if depthShape1 is in front of depthShape2. //depthShape1 goes on top. else if (depthShape1.Bottom > depthShape2.Top) //if depthShape1 is above depthShape2. //depthShape1 goes on top. //if neither of these are true, depthShape2 must be in front or above. So, by sorting draw order by several different factors from the physics engine, I believe I can get a really correct draw order. My question is, is this a good way of going about this, or is there some tried and true, tested way which is completely different and has somehow completely eluded me on the internets? And, if this does seem like a good way to remake my draw order sorting, what's the right sorting algorithm for reordering the Bounds Rectangle collision lists, and how do you deal with a Bounds Rectangle colliding with two different object which don't collide with eachother. I know these are solved problems, but I've only been programming for a year so any specific input here will be greatly appreciated. Thanks for reading this far, ye who made it -- sorry it was so long!

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• Physics like asteroides

  - by user2933016

  I try to make a ship that has the physic properties like asteroides. I have this for now(All in Java): Ship.class public class Ship { public static final float sMaxHealth = 0.1F; public static final float sMaxMoveVelocity = 5.0F; public static final float sMaxAngleVelocity = 20.0F; public static final float sRadius = 1.0F; public static final float sMoveDeceleration = 10.0F; public static final float sMoveAcceleration = 2.0F; public static final float sAngleDeceleration = 15.0F; public static final float sAngleAcceleration = 20.0F; private float mHealth; private float mXVelocity; private float mYVelocity; private float mAngleVelocity; private float mX; private float mY; private float mAngle; } (I let the getter and setter away for now) Controller code // Player input if(Gdx.input.isKeyPressed(Keys.UP)) { mPlayer.setXVelocity(mPlayer.getXVelocity() + (float) Math.cos(mPlayer.getAngle()) * Ship.sMoveAcceleration); mPlayer.setYVelocity(mPlayer.getYVelocity() + (float) Math.sin(mPlayer.getAngle()) * Ship.sMoveAcceleration); } if(Gdx.input.isKeyPressed(Keys.LEFT)) { mPlayer.setAngleVelocity(mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() + Ship.sAngleAcceleration * pDeltaTime); } if(Gdx.input.isKeyPressed(Keys.RIGHT)) { mPlayer.setAngleVelocity(mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() - Ship.sAngleAcceleration * pDeltaTime); } // X velocity if(mPlayer.getXVelocity() < 0) { if(-mPlayer.getXVelocity() > Ship.sMaxMoveVelocity) { mPlayer.setXVelocity(-Ship.sMaxMoveVelocity); } mPlayer.setXVelocity(mPlayer.getXVelocity() + Ship.sMoveDeceleration * pDeltaTime); if(mPlayer.getXVelocity() > 0) { mPlayer.setXVelocity(0); } } else if(mPlayer.getXVelocity() > 0) { if(mPlayer.getXVelocity() > Ship.sMaxMoveVelocity) { mPlayer.setXVelocity(Ship.sMaxMoveVelocity); } mPlayer.setXVelocity(mPlayer.getXVelocity() - Ship.sMoveDeceleration * pDeltaTime); if(mPlayer.getXVelocity() < 0) { mPlayer.setXVelocity(0); } } // Y velocity if(mPlayer.getYVelocity() < 0) { if(-mPlayer.getYVelocity() > Ship.sMaxMoveVelocity) { mPlayer.setYVelocity(-Ship.sMaxMoveVelocity); } mPlayer.setYVelocity(mPlayer.getYVelocity() + Ship.sMoveDeceleration * pDeltaTime); if(mPlayer.getYVelocity() > 0) { mPlayer.setYVelocity(0); } } else if(mPlayer.getYVelocity() > 0) { if(mPlayer.getYVelocity() > Ship.sMaxMoveVelocity) { mPlayer.setYVelocity(Ship.sMaxMoveVelocity); } mPlayer.setYVelocity(mPlayer.getYVelocity() - Ship.sMoveDeceleration * pDeltaTime); if(mPlayer.getYVelocity() < 0) { mPlayer.setYVelocity(0); } } // Angle velocity if(mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() < 0) { if(-mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() > Ship.sMaxAngleVelocity) { mPlayer.setAngleVelocity(-Ship.sMaxAngleVelocity); } mPlayer.setAngleVelocity(mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() + Ship.sAngleDeceleration * pDeltaTime); if(mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() > 0) { mPlayer.setAngleVelocity(0); } } else if(mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() > 0) { if(mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() > Ship.sMaxAngleVelocity) { mPlayer.setAngleVelocity(Ship.sMaxAngleVelocity); } mPlayer.setAngleVelocity(mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() - Ship.sAngleDeceleration * pDeltaTime); if(mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() < 0) { mPlayer.setAngleVelocity(0); } } mPlayer.setX(mPlayer.getX() + mPlayer.getXVelocity() * pDeltaTime); mPlayer.setY(mPlayer.getY() + mPlayer.getYVelocity() * pDeltaTime); mPlayer.setAngle(mPlayer.getAngle() + mPlayer.getAngleVelocity() * pDeltaTime); Why the ship does not behave like in asteroides ? What do I wrong?

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