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• Voxel Engine in Multiplayer?

  - by Oliver Schöning

  This is a question more out of Interest for now, because I am not even near to the point that I could create this project at the moment. I really like the progress on the Atomontage Engine. A Voxel engine that is WIP at the moment. I would like to create a Voxel SERVER eventually. First in JavaScript (That's what I am learning right now) later perhaps in C++ for speed. Remember, I am perfectly aware that this is very hard! This is a brainstorm for the next 10 years as for now. What I would like to achieve one day is a Multiplayer Game in the Browser where the voxels positions are updated by XYZ input from the server. The Browser Does only 3 things: sending player input to the server, updating Voxel positions send from the server and rendering the world. I imagine using something like the Three.js libary on the client side. So that would be my programming dream right there... Now to something simpler for the near future. Right now I am learning javascript. And I am making games with Construct2. (A really cool JavaScript "game maker") The plan is to create a 2D Voxel enviorment (Block Voxels) on the Socket.IO Server* and send the position of the Voxels and Players to the Client side which then positions the Voxel Blocks to the Server Output coordinates. I think that is a bit more manageable then the other bigger idea. And also there should be no worries about speed with this type of project in JavaScript (I hope). Extra Info: *I am using nodejs (Without really knowing what it does besides making Socket.IO work) So now some questions: Is the "dream project" doable in JavaScript? Or is C++ just the best option because it does not take as long to be interpreted at run time like JavaScript? What are the limitations? I can think of some: Need of a Powerful server depending on how much information the server has to process. Internet Speed; Sending the data of the Voxel positions to every player could add up being very high! The browser FPS might go down quickly if rendering to many objects. One way of fixing reducing the packages Could be to let the browser calculate some of the Voxel positions from Several Values. But that would slow down the Client side too. What about the more achievable project? I am almost 100% convinced that this is possible in JavaScript, and that there are several ways of doing this. This is just XY position Updating for now.. Hope this did make some sense. Please comment if you got something to say :D

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• OpenGL - Calculating camera view matrix

  - by Karle

  Problem I am calculating the model, view and projection matrices independently to be used in my shader as follows: gl_Position = projection * view * model * vec4(in_Position, 1.0); When I try to calculate my camera's view matrix the Z axis is flipped and my camera seems like it is looking backwards. My program is written in C# using the OpenTK library. Translation (Working) I've created a test scene as follows: From my understanding of the OpenGL coordinate system they are positioned correctly. The model matrix is created using: Matrix4 translation = Matrix4.CreateTranslation(modelPosition); Matrix4 model = translation; The view matrix is created using: Matrix4 translation = Matrix4.CreateTranslation(-cameraPosition); Matrix4 view = translation; Rotation (Not-Working) I now want to create the camera's rotation matrix. To do this I use the camera's right, up and forward vectors: // Hard coded example orientation: // Normally calculated from up and forward // Similar to look-at camera. Vector3 r = Vector.UnitX; Vector3 u = Vector3.UnitY; Vector3 f = -Vector3.UnitZ; Matrix4 rot = new Matrix4( r.X, r.Y, r.Z, 0, u.X, u.Y, u.Z, 0, f.X, f.Y, f.Z, 0, 0.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f, 1.0f); This results in the following matrix being created: I know that multiplying by the identity matrix would produce no rotation. This is clearly not the identity matrix and therefore will apply some rotation. I thought that because this is aligned with the OpenGL coordinate system is should produce no rotation. Is this the wrong way to calculate the rotation matrix? I then create my view matrix as: // OpenTK is row-major so the order of operations is reversed: Matrix4 view = translation * rot; Rotation almost works now but the -Z/+Z axis has been flipped, with the green cube now appearing closer to the camera. It seems like the camera is looking backwards, especially if I move it around. My goal is to store the position and orientation of all objects (including the camera) as: Vector3 position; Vector3 up; Vector3 forward; Apologies for writing such a long question and thank you in advance. I've tried following tutorials/guides from many sites but I keep ending up with something wrong. Edit: Projection Matrix Set-up Matrix4 projection = Matrix4.CreatePerspectiveFieldOfView( (float)(0.5 * Math.PI), (float)display.Width / display.Height, 0.1f, 1000.0f);

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• Impulsioned jumping

  - by Mutoh

  There's one thing that has been puzzling me, and that is how to implement a 'faux-impulsed' jump in a platformer. If you don't know what I'm talking about, then think of the jumps of Mario, Kirby, and Quote from Cave Story. What do they have in common? Well, the height of your jump is determined by how long you keep the jump button pressed. Knowing that these character's 'impulses' are built not before their jump, as in actual physics, but rather while in mid-air - that is, you can very well lift your finger midway of the max height and it will stop, even if with desacceleration between it and the full stop; which is why you can simply tap for a hop and hold it for a long jump -, I am mesmerized by how they keep their trajetories as arcs. My current implementation works as following: While the jump button is pressed, gravity is turned off and the avatar's Y coordenate is decremented by the constant value of the gravity. For example, if things fall at Z units per tick, it will rise Z units per tick. Once the button is released or the limit is reached, the avatar desaccelerates in an amount that would make it cover X units until its speed reaches 0; once it does, it accelerates up until its speed matches gravity - sticking to the example, I could say it accelerates from 0 to Z units/tick while still covering X units. This implementation, however, makes jumps too diagonal, and unless the avatar's speed is faster than the gravity, which would make it way too fast in my current project (it moves at about 4 pixels per tick and gravity is 10 pixels per tick, at a framerate of 40FPS), it also makes it more vertical than horizontal. Those familiar with platformers would notice that the character's arc'd jump almost always allows them to jump further even if they aren't as fast as the game's gravity, and when it doesn't, if not played right, would prove itself to be very counter-intuitive. I know this because I could attest that my implementation is very annoying. Has anyone ever attempted at similar mechanics, and maybe even succeeded? I'd like to know what's behind this kind of platformer jumping. If you haven't ever had any experience with this beforehand and want to give it a go, then please, don't try to correct or enhance my explained implementation, unless I was on the right way - try to make up your solution from scratch. I don't care if you use gravity, physics or whatnot, as long as it shows how these pseudo-impulses work, it does the job. Also, I'd like its presentation to avoid a language-specific coding; like, sharing us a C++ example, or Delphi... As much as I'm using the XNA framework for my project and wouldn't mind C# stuff, I don't have much patience to read other's code, and I'm certain game developers of other languages would be interested in what we achieve here, so don't mind sticking to pseudo-code. Thank you beforehand.

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• How I might think like a hacker so that I can anticipate security vulnerabilities in .NET or Java before a hacker hands me my hat [closed]

  - by Matthew Patrick Cashatt

  Premise I make a living developing web-based applications for all form-factors (mobile, tablet, laptop, etc). I make heavy use of SOA, and send and receive most data as JSON objects. Although most of my work is completed on the .NET or Java stacks, I am also recently delving into Node.js. This new stack has got me thinking that I know reasonably well how to secure applications using known facilities of .NET and Java, but I am woefully ignorant when it comes to best practices or, more importantly, the driving motivation behind the best practices. You see, as I gain more prominent clientele, I need to be able to assure them that their applications are secure and, in order to do that, I feel that I should learn to think like a malevolent hacker. What motivates a malevolent hacker: What is their prime mover? What is it that they are most after? Ultimately, the answer is money or notoriety I am sure, but I think it would be good to understand the nuanced motivators that lead to those ends: credit card numbers, damning information, corporate espionage, shutting down a highly visible site, etc. As an extension of question #1--but more specific--what are the things most likely to be seeked out by a hacker in almost any application? Passwords? Financial info? Profile data that will gain them access to other applications a user has joined? Let me be clear here. This is not judgement for or against the aforementioned motivations because that is not the goal of this post. I simply want to know what motivates a hacker regardless of our individual judgement. What are some heuristics followed to accomplish hacker goals? Ultimately specific processes would be great to know; however, in order to think like a hacker, I would really value your comments on the broader heuristics followed. For example: "A hacker always looks first for the low-hanging fruit such as http spoofing" or "In the absence of a CAPTCHA or other deterrent, a hacker will likely run a cracking script against a login prompt and then go from there." Possibly, "A hacker will try and attack a site via Foo (browser) first as it is known for Bar vulnerability. What are the most common hacks employed when following the common heuristics? Specifics here. Http spoofing, password cracking, SQL injection, etc. Disclaimer I am not a hacker, nor am I judging hackers (Heck--I even respect their ingenuity). I simply want to learn how I might think like a hacker so that I may begin to anticipate vulnerabilities before .NET or Java hands me a way to defend against them after the fact.

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• PayPal India Problems Continues

  - by Ravish

  Reserve Bank of India has been giving hard time to PayPal and its users in India. RBI had previously blocked PayPal transactions in India a few times, and they made it difficult to withdraw payments by enforcing exports and forex related compliance. Here is yet another bad news for Indian PayPal users. With effect from March 1st, Indian users cannot receive payments of more than $500 in your PayPal account. Moreover, you cannot keep or use any funds in your PayPal account. You can use your PayPal balance to make send money for any goods or services, and must withdraw it to your bank account within 7 days of the receipt. These changes have rendered PayPal almost useless for small business, webmasters and publishers. Most webmasters and publishers rely on PayPal to receive payments from advertisers and clients. It has also made it impossible to buy anything online with PayPal. Sending payments abroad via other channels is already a pain, sending a bank wire requires too many formalities, documentation and time. Moreover, you are even required to deduct TDS on payments you make for any products or services. The restrictions will take effect on March 1st, so you have 30 days to complete any pending transactions you may have. This step by RBI is yet another gimmick by corrupt Indian Government to make life difficult of entrepreneurs, kill innovation, slap more taxes and create more channels to take bribes. Following is the notification from PayPal about this issue: As part of our commitment to provide a high level of customer service, we would like to give you a 30-day advance notice on changes to our user agreement for India. With effect from 1 March 2011, you are required to comply with the requirements set out in the notification of the Reserve Bank of India governing the processing and settlement of export-related receipts facilitated by online payment gateways (“RBI Guidelines”). In order to comply with the RBI Guidelines, our user agreement in India will be amended for the following services as follows: Any balance in and all future payments into your PayPal account may not be used to buy goods or services and must be transferred to your bank account in India within 7 days from the receipt of confirmation from the buyer in respect of the goods or services; and Export-related payments for goods and services into your PayPal account may not exceed US$500 per transaction. We seek your understanding as we continue to employ our best efforts to comply with the RBI Guidelines in a timely manner. Related posts:WordCamp India Ends On a High Note Silicon WordPress Theme Accord WordPress Theme

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• Why is there nobody talking about an alternative to HTML & CSS? [closed]

  - by Nic

  HTML is such an old and cumbersome language, which was intended just to markup text. Today it's very rare to see a static HTML website, or a site with only text or a very simple layout. As a web developer I find it inconvenient to use HTML & CSS, very repetitive and cumbersome. I think that for a lot of website it could be simplified a lot. Tim Berners-Lee (W3) wrote a document named "The World Wide Web: Past, Present and Future" in August 1996 ... though HTML will be considered part of the established infrastructure (rather than an exciting new toy), there will always be new formats coming along, and it may be that a more powerful and perhaps a more consistent set of formats will eventually displace HTML. So, more than 15 years later, HTML is still here and it's here to stay. Why? Why searching for xml alternatives brings so much relevant result, but searching for html alternatives brings almost none relevant results? Answers like "it's too hard to change a standard" aren't answering the question since a lot of new standards emerged since the initiation of the web. I'm also not searching for answers that suggest using tools to simplify the process or formats that anyhow depends on HTML or CSS, technologies that currently require a plugin and not even trying to become an open standards (like Flash) aren't an answer neither. BTW, here are 2 articles written more than two years ago as food for thought, it might help with writing a better answers. "HTML, CSS, and Web Development Practices: Past, Present, and Future" describing a very related problem, by Jens O. Meiert. "A Brief History of HTML" by Scott Reynen, Here is a quote from the end: So now you can answer questions about HTML5 without even looking at the draft, which is handy, because the draft is 400+ pages long. Why is there a new tag in HTML5? Because some browser vendor (maybe the one that also owns a large video site) wanted it. Why are there so many scriptable interface elements in HTML5? Because some browser vendor (maybe the one selling phones without Flash support) wants them. Why is there no support for RDFa in HTML5? Apparently no browser vendor wanted it. Is that the future?

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• What Am I doing for my 5 months 1 week old baby for his first cold?

  - by Rekha

  With my limited friends circle with babies, I heard that babies in their fifth month usually gets affected by cold all of a sudden. This is unavoidable and I feel it is good for the babies as they start developing their immune system right on. We usually take our son for a small walk so that he is able to explore the world out there. We have been taking him for a stroll almost everyday since we was 3 months old. But only now he is getting his first cold. So things happen only now I think. Till that day I had somehow brought some routine for him for his feed and naps during day time. Night time is still sleepless ones anyway. So when he first got his cold, that night it went on as usual getting up every few hours. From the next day on, he stopped feeding at the usual time. In the night he goes for 8-10 hours between feeds but still wakes up every two hours and cries for about 10 minutes and when we lift him for sometime, he goes back to sleep. Now to the point what all to expect: * Babies starts feeding frequently * Babies spit up increases * They dislike the food they liked before (we have just started solid foods as per our pediatricians advice) * Since they cannot breathe properly, they cannot sleep for a long time *Pees and poops less frequently. What all we did for our baby to make him comfortable during this time: * Feed the baby less quantity and more frequently whenever they expect to feed (Do not follow the schedule) * When the quantity is less, spit ups is also less * If the baby does not like the food (vegetable or fruit), avoid them till they get back to normal * Try to elevate their head while sleeping ( we used the cradle – sitting position, bouncer, car seat and finally all four sides we placed firm pillows so that he does not roll and kept a pillow for his head till his hip – this one is recommended usually but we have an eye on him always) * No need for any medicines – it will take a week for them to get back to normal whether or not we gives medicines * We applied home made Cold Reliever (heat 2 teaspoons of coconut oil with a small camphor piece till the camphor disappears – then cool the mixture) on his chest, back, neck and feet and covered the feet with socks in the nights * Bathe him everyday – hot (that your baby can withstand) *  Whenever possible give him a steam bath (open the hot showers for sometime in the bathroom and close the doors. When the steam is bearable, close the shower and take the baby inside the bathroom for sometime) * Also use a bulb syringe provided in the hospital to clear the nose (use some saline water drops for ease) * Cuddle him when he cries But please do take him to his doctor if he has fever and other symptoms other than cold or the cold persists for more than 5 – 7 days. Image Credit : MiriamBJDolls

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• Designing Mobile SMS text advertising system

  - by Ramraj Edagutti

  Currently, I am working on a product where we have an SMS text advertising system, and using this, we setup advertising campaigns for clients, and later these campaigns are sent to the end users. This is very similar to Google Adwords, but targeted to Mobile users via SMS. Just to give an overview of the system Each Campaign is mapped to an advertiser Campaign has start date and end date Campaign has a filter condition(s) or query to select the target user base from our database (to whom we send Campaigns) Target user base can be fixed, for e.g send campaign to 10000 users Target user base can also be dynamic based on query condition, for e.g send campaign to users who are active and from a particular state, district, town etc. (this way user base will be keep changing on daily basis) Campaign can have multiple campaign messages Each campaign message has start date and end date Each campaign message can have multiple message texts for different locales, for e.g English,Hindi,Telugu etc After creating an advertisement campaign, we run daily night job to provision the target user base for that a particular campaign in a separate table, and another daily job runs on morning times and checks provisioned table for campaigns and targeted users and sends the campaign to users via SMS. Problem is, current UI for creating advertising campaigns is designed in a very technical manner, I mean, normal user or business owner or clients can not use the UI to create a campaign. Below are reasons why the UI is very technical in nature Filter condition(s) or query input filed, takes user ids or mobile numbers or SQL queries. Most of times or almost every time, we use big SQL queries So we end up storing SQL queries in a database for a campaign, later we use this SQL query to fetch targeted user base. For scheduling these campaigns, we have input filed on UI which takes quartz cron expression(s) ( for e.g. send campaign on "0 0 9 1-10 MAR 2012" ), again very technical in nature Normal user or business owner, can not use the UI for creating campaigns for reasons mentioned above, Currently, we ourself (developers) helping clients to setup/create campaigns. we are trying to re-design the UI to make it more user friendly so that any user can go to UI and create an advertisement campaign by himself. I am thinking of re-designing the current UI similar to Google Adwords interface, especially for selecting target users based on user geography like country, state, city etc. I also need to select users based user subscription(s), which might make system even more complex. And also, for campaign scheduling, I am thinking of using weekdays with hours. For example, I will shows Monday to Sunday on UI, and user can select the from hours, to hours etc. Any better ideas or suggestion on how to design UI in very user friendly manner and what design should be followed on server side code (we write backend code on java/jpa/spring/quartz)? And I am looking for ideas or design patterns on how to build SQL queries (using JPA/Hinernate) programmatically on server side, based on varies conditions like based on country, state, town, village, and user subscriptions.

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• Stagnating in programming

  - by Coder

  Time after time this question came up in my mind, but up until today I wasn't thinking about it much. I have been programming for maybe around 8 years now, and for the last two years it seems I'm not as keen to pick up new technologies anymore. Maybe that's a burnout or something, but I'd say it's experience and what I like, that's stopping me from running after the latest and greatest. I'm C++ developer, by this I mean, I love close to metal programming. I have no problems tracing problems through assembly, using tools like WinDbg or HexView. When I use constructs, I think about how they are realized underneath, how the bits are set and unset under the hood. I love battling with complex threading problems and doing everything hardcore way, even by hand if the regular solutions seem half baked. But I also love the C++0x stuff, and use it a lot. And all C++ code as long as it's not cumbersome compared to C counterparts, sometimes I also fall back to sort of "Super C" if the C++ way is ugly. And then there are all other developers who seem to be way more forward looking, .Net 4.0 MVC, WPF, all those Microsoft X#s, LINQ languages, XML and XSLT, mobile devices and so on. I have done a considerable amount of .NET, SQL, ASPX programming, but the further I go, the less I want to try those technologies. Is that bad? Almost every day I hear people saying that managed code is the only way forward, WPF is the way to go. I hear that C++ is godawful, and you can't code anything in it that's somewhat stable. But I don't buy it. With the experience I have, and the knowledge of how native code is compiled and executes, I can say I find it extremely rare that C++ code is unstable, or leaks, or causes crashes that takes more than 30 seconds to identify and fix. And to tell the truth, I've seen enough problems with other "cool" languages that I'd say C++ is even more stable and production proof than the safe languages, at least for me. The only thing that scares me in C++ is new frameworks, I don't trust them, and I use them extra sparingly. STL - yes, ATL - very sparingly, everything else... Well, not very keen on it. Most huge problems I've ran into, all were related to frameworks, not the language itself. Some overrided operator here, bad hierarchy there, poor class design here, mystical castings there. Other than that, C/C++ (yes, I use them together) still seems a very controlled and stable way to develop applications. Am I stagnating? Should I switch a profession, or force myself in all that marketing hype? Are there more developers who feel the same way?

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• Monitoring Your Servers

  - by Grant Fritchey

  If you are the DBA in a large scale enterprise, you’re probably already monitoring your servers for up-time and performance. But if you work for a medium-sized business, a small shop, or even a one-man operation, chances are pretty good that you’re not doing that sort of monitoring. You know that you’re supposed to be doing it, but other things, more important at-the-moment things, keep getting in the way. After all, which is more important, some monitoring or backup testing?  Backup testing, of course. Monitoring is frequently one of those things that you do when can get around to it.  Well, as you can see at the right, I have your round tuit ready to go. What if I told you that you could get monitoring on your servers for up-time, job completion, performance, all the standard stuff? And what if I told you that you wouldn’t need to install and configure another server in your environment to get it done? And what if I told you that you’d be able to set up and customize your alerts so you could know if your server was offline or a drive was full? Almost nothing for you to do, and you’ll have a full-blown monitoring process. Sounds to good to be true doesn’t it? Well, it’s coming. We’re creating an online, remote, monitoring system here at Red Gate. You’ll be able to use our SQL Monitor tool (which you can see here, monitoring SQL Server Central in real time) to keep track of your systems, but without having to set up a server and a database for storing the information collected. Instead, we’re taking advantage of services available through the internet to enable collection and storage of this information remotely, off your systems. All you have to do is install a piece of software that will communicate between our service and your servers and you’ll be off and running. It’s that easy. Before you get too excited, let me break the news that this is the near future I’m talking about. We’re setting up the program and there’s a sign-up you can use to get in on the initial tests.

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• Executing server validators first before OnClientClick Javascript confirm/alert

  - by kaushalparik27

  I got to answer a simple question over community forums. Consider this: Suppose you are developing a webpage with few input controls and a submit button. You have placed some server validator controls like RequiredFieldValidator to validate the inputs entered by the user. Once user fill-in all the details and try to submit the page via button click you want to alert/confirm the submission like "Are you sure to modify above details?". You will consider to use javascript on click of the button.Everything seems simple and you are almost done. BUT, when you run the page; you will see that Javascript alert/confirm box is executing first before server validators try to validate the input controls! Well, this is expected behaviour. BUT, this is not you want. Then? The simple answer is: Call Page_ClientValidate() in javascript where you are alerting the submission. Below is the javascript example:    <script type="text/javascript" language="javascript">        function ValidateAllValidationGroups() {            if (Page_ClientValidate()) {                return confirm("Are you sure to modify above details?");            }        }    </script>Page_ClientValidate() function tests for all server validators and return bool value depends on whether the page meets defined validation criteria or not. In above example, confirm alert will only popup up if Page_ClientValidate() returns true (if all validations satisfy). You can also specify ValidationGroup inside this function as Page_ClientValidate('ValidationGroup1') to only validate a specific group of validation in your page.        function ValidateSpecificValidationGroup() {            if (Page_ClientValidate('ValidationGroup1')) {                return confirm("Are you sure to modify above details?");            }        }I have attached a sample example with this post here demonstrating both above cases. Hope it helps./.

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• Silverlight Cream for December 08, 2010 -- #1005

  - by Dave Campbell

  In this Issue: Peter Kuhn, David Anson, Jesse Liberty, Mike Taulty(-2-, -3-), Kunal Chowdhury, Jeremy Likness, Martin Krüger, Beth Massi(-2-, -3-)/ Above the Fold: Silverlight: "Rebuilding the PDC 2010 Silverlight Application (Part 1)" Mike Taulty WP7: "WP7: Glossy text block custom control" Martin Krüger Lightswitch: "How to Create a Screen with Multiple Search Parameters in LightSwitch" Beth Massi From SilverlightCream.com: Requirements of and pitfalls in Windows Phone 7 serialization Peter Kuhn discusses Data Contract Serializer issuses on WP7 and how to work around them. Managed implementation of CRC32 and MD5 algorithms updated; new release of ComputeFileHashes for Silverlight, WPF, and the command-line! David Anson ties up some loose ends from a prior post on hash functions, and updates his CRC32 and MD5 algorithms. Windows Phone From Scratch #9 – Visual State Jesse Liberty's latest Windows Phone from Scratch tutorial up... and is on the Visual State... he extends a Button and codes up the State Transitions. Rebuilding the PDC 2010 Silverlight Application (Part 1) Mike Taulty has taken the time to rebuild the PDC2010 Silverlight App that folks wanted the source for... and he's taking multiple posts to explain the heck out of it. This first one is mostly infrastructure. Rebuilding the PDC 2010 Silverlight Application (Part 2) In the 2nd post of the series, Mike Taulty is handling the In/Out of Browser business because he eventually is going to be going OOB. Rebuilding the PDC 2010 Silverlight Application (Part 3) Part 3 finds Mike Taulty delving into WCF Data Services and getting some data on the screen. Paginating Records in Silverlight DataGrid using PagedCollectionView Kunal Chowdhury continues with his investigation of the PagedCollectionView with this post on Pagination of your data. Old School Silverlight Effects If you haven't seen Jeremy Likness' 'Old School' Effects page yet, go just for the entertainment... you'll find yourself hanging around for the code :) WP7: Glossy text block custom control Martin Krüger's latest post is a very cool custom control for WP7 that displays Glossy text... it ain't Metro, but it looks pretty nice... some of it almost like etched text. How to Create a Screen with Multiple Search Parameters in LightSwitch Looks like Beth Massi got a few Lightswitch posts in while I wasn't looking. First up is this one on a multiple-parameter search screen. Adding Static Images and Logos to LightSwitch Applications In the 2nd post, Beth Massi shows how to add your own static images and logos to Lightswitch apps... in response to reader questions. Getting the Most out of LightSwitch Summary Properties In her latest post, Beth Massi explains what Summary Properties are in Lightswitch and how to use them to get the best results for your users. Stay in the 'Light! Twitter SilverlightNews | Twitter WynApse | WynApse.com | Tagged Posts | SilverlightCream Join me @ SilverlightCream | Phoenix Silverlight User Group Technorati Tags: Silverlight    Silverlight 3    Silverlight 4    Windows Phone MIX10

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• SQL SERVER – Reseting Identity Values for All Tables

  - by pinaldave

  Sometime email requesting help generates more questions than the motivation to answer them. Let us go over one of the such examples. I have converted the complete email conversation to chat format for easy consumption. I almost got a headache after around 20 email exchange. I am sure if you can read it and feel my pain. DBA: “I deleted all of the data from my database and now it contains table structure only. However, when I tried to insert new data in my tables I noticed that my identity values starts from the same number where they actually were before I deleted the data.” Pinal: “How did you delete the data?” DBA: “Running Delete in Loop?” Pinal: “What was the need of such need?” DBA: “It was my development server and I needed to repopulate the database.” Pinal: “Oh so why did not you use TRUNCATE which would have reset the identity of your table to the original value when the data got deleted? This will work only if you want your database to reset to the original value. If you want to set any other value this may not work.” DBA: (silence for 2 days) DBA: “I did not realize it. Meanwhile I regenerated every table’s schema and dropped the table and re-created it.” Pinal: “Oh no, that would be extremely long and incorrect way. Very bad solution.” DBA: “I understand, should I just take backup of the database before I insert the data and when I need, I can use the original backup to restore the database. This way I will have identity beginning with 1.” Pinal: “This going totally downhill. It is wrong to do so on multiple levels. Did you even read my earlier email about TRUNCATE.” DBA: “Yeah. I found it in spam folder.” Pinal: (I decided to stay silent) DBA: (After 2 days) “Can you provide me script to reseed identity for all of my tables to value 1 without asking further question.” Pinal: USE DATABASE; EXEC sp_MSForEachTable ' IF OBJECTPROPERTY(object_id(''?''), ''TableHasIdentity'') = 1 DBCC CHECKIDENT (''?'', RESEED, 1)' GO Our conversation ended here. If you have directly jumped to this statement, I encourage you to read the conversation one time. There is difference between reseeding identity value to 1 and reseeding it to original value – I will write an another blog post on this subject in future. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• A big flat text file or a HTML site for language documentation?

  - by Bad Sector

  A project of mine is a small embeddable Tcl-like scripting language, LIL. While i'm mostly making it for my own use, i think it is interesting enough for others to use, so i want it to have a nice (but not very "wordy") documentation. So far i'm using a single flat readme.txt file. It explains the language's syntax, features, standard functions, how to use the C API, etc. Also it is easy to scan and read in almost every environment out there, from basic text-only terminals to full-fledged high-end graphical desktop environments. However, while i tried to keep things nicely formatted (as much as this is possible in plain text), i still think that being a big (and growing) wall of text, it isn't as easy on the eyes as it could be. Also i feel that sometimes i'm not writing as much as i want in order to avoid expanding the text too much. So i thought i could use another project of mine, QuHelp, which is basically a help site generator for sites like this one with a sidebar that provides a tree of topics/subtopics and offline full text search. With this i can use HTML to format the documentation and if i use QuHelp for some other project that uses LIL, i can import LIL's documentation as part of the other project's documentation. However converting the existing documentation to QuHelp/HTML isn't a small task, especially when it comes to functions (i'll need to put more detail on them than what currently exists in the readme.txt file). Also it loses the wide range of availability that it currently has (even if QuHelp's generated code degrades gracefully down to console-only web browsers, plain text is readable from everywhere, including from popular editors such as Vim and Emacs - i had someone once telling me that he likes LIL's documentation because it is readable without leaving his editor). So, my question is simply this: should i keep the documentation as it is now in the form of a single readme.txt file or should i convert it to something like the site i mentioned above? There is also the option to do both, but i'm not sure if i'll be able to always keep them in sync or if it is worth the effort. After asking around in IRC i've got mixed answers: some liked the wide availability of the single text file, others said that it is looks as bad as a man page (personally i don't mind that - i can read man pages just fine - but other people might have issues reading them). What do you think?

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• Separating a "wad of stuff" utility project into individual components with "optional" dependencies

  - by romkyns

  Over the years of using C#/.NET for a bunch of in-house projects, we've had one library grow organically into one huge wad of stuff. It's called "Util", and I'm sure many of you have seen one of these beasts in your careers. Many parts of this library are very much standalone, and could be split up into separate projects (which we'd like to open-source). But there is one major problem that needs to be solved before these can be released as separate libraries. Basically, there are lots and lots of cases of what I might call "optional dependencies" between these libraries. To explain this better, consider some of the modules that are good candidates to become stand-alone libraries. CommandLineParser is for parsing command lines. XmlClassify is for serializing classes to XML. PostBuildCheck performs checks on the compiled assembly and reports a compilation error if they fail. ConsoleColoredString is a library for colored string literals. Lingo is for translating user interfaces. Each of those libraries can be used completely stand-alone, but if they are used together then there are useful extra features to be had. For example, both CommandLineParser and XmlClassify expose post-build checking functionality, which requires PostBuildCheck. Similarly, the CommandLineParser allows option documentation to be provided using the colored string literals, requiring ConsoleColoredString, and it supports translatable documentation via Lingo. So the key distinction is that these are optional features. One can use a command line parser with plain, uncolored strings, without translating the documentation or performing any post-build checks. Or one could make the documentation translatable but still uncolored. Or both colored and translatable. Etc. Looking through this "Util" library, I see that almost all potentially separable libraries have such optional features that tie them to other libraries. If I were to actually require those libraries as dependencies then this wad of stuff isn't really untangled at all: you'd still basically require all the libraries if you want to use just one. Are there any established approaches to managing such optional dependencies in .NET?

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• Windows Desktop Virtualization Gets Easier

  - by andrewbrust

  This past Thursday, Microsoft announced that Windows (7) Virtual PC (WVPC) and its XP Mode feature would no longer require hardware assisted virtualization (HAV).  That means any PC running Windows 7 Pro, or higher, can now run this software.  And that’s a great thing because, as I noted in a post almost five month ago, determining whether a given PC you might be planning to buy actually offers HAV can be extremely difficult.  That meant even dedicated, sophisticated PC users, with a budget for new hardware, might be blocked from using this technology.  And that was just plain silly. One of the features offered by WVPC, and utilized heavily by XP Mode, is the concept of virtual applications: apps within a guest VM that can actually run within the host’s desktop environment.  I find this feature so powerful that my February Redmond Review column entertained the notion of a future version of Windows that runs all applications in this manner. The elimination of the HAV requirement for XP Mode and WVPC was just one of many virtualization-related announcements Microsoft made on Thursday.  And, interestingly, most of the others were also desktop-related, rather than server-related.  This is a welcome change from the multi-year period in which Microsoft enhanced its server virtualization lineup (in Hyper-V) and let the desktop platform fester.  Microsoft now seems to understand desktop virtualization is in high-demand and strengthens the Windows franchise.  As I explained in the column, even cloud computing can have a desktop spin if desktop virtualization is part of the equation. One company that knows this well is Citrix, and a closer alliance between Microsoft and Citrix was one of the many announcements from Thursday.  In fact, there’s a whole Web site dedicated to the alliance at http://www.citrixandmicrosoft.com/. I’d love to see virtual applications and entire virtual desktops offered as Azure-branded services.  This could allow me to run, for example, the full Office client on a variety of desktops I might use, and for large organizations it could easily reduce the expense, burden and duration of the deployment cycle for new versions of Office.  Business Intelligence providers, including my own firm, twentysix New York, would find great relief in enabling their customers to run the newest version of Excel, with the latest BI capabilities, instead of having to wait the requisite two to three years it takes for many Fortune 500 customers to upgrade. Microsoft should do more, and faster.  WVPC still does not support 64-bit guest images, even on 64-bit hosts.  That needs to be fixed.  File access from the guest to the host needs to be improved (right now, it’s done through Terminal Services/Remote Desktop file sharing, and it’s slow) and VM load times need to be significantly reduced before virtualized apps can become the norm.  (I suppose the advance of solid state drive technology will help there.) I do think these improvements will come, because Microsoft is focused on the virtual desktop now.  And that’s a smart focus to have.

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• links for 2011-02-10

  - by Bob Rhubart

  Manish Devgan: Extending WebCenter Spaces Using JDeveloper In addition to being able to customize WebCenter Spaces using the browser-based tools, you can now also customize and “extend” WebCenter Spaces in many ways in JDeveloper.  (tags: oracle enterprise2.0 webcenter jdeveloper) Oracle University: New Personalized Training Catalog "Searching for training classes just got easier with Oracle University's new Personalized Training Catalog. View upcoming course schedules for the topics that you select in your preferred locations. Browse courses when you need to or request your personalized catalog to be emailed to you." (tags: oracle oracleuniversity) René van Wijk: Hibernate and Coherence « Middleware Magic "A major justification for the claim that applications using an object/relational persistence layer are expected to outperform applications built using direct JDBC is the potential for caching." - René van Wijk (tags: oracle coherence middleware) Sten Vesterli on Fusion Applications: " It’s (almost) here!" Speaking of Fusion Applications, Oracle ACE Director Sten Vesterli says: "The usability revolution has finally caught up with enterprise applications; they will no longer be built based on the capabilities of the database, but on the needs of users." (tags: oracle otn oracleace fusionapplications) The Myth of Oracle Fusion | The ORACLE-BASE Blog "I can totally understand when people on the outside of our little goldfish bowl have a really bad and confused impression of anything containing the term “Fusion”, because it does have a very long and sordid history." Oracle ACE Director Tim Hall (tags: oracle otn oracleace fusionapplications) The Other Side of XBRL (Enterprise Performance Management Blog) With the United States SEC's mandate for XBRL filings entering its third year, and impacting over 7000 additional companies in 2011, there's a lot of buzz in the industry about how companies should address the new reporting requirements. (tags: oracle xbrl compliance) Database Vault integration available (The Shorten Spot) Anthony Shorten shares information on the Database Vault solution included in the Oracle Utilities Application Framework. (tags: oracle database) SOASuite 11.1.1.4 : Error Logging into BPM11g Composer? (Angelo Santagata's Blog) Angelo Santagata shares simple solutions to a few minor SOA Suite 11.1.1.4 issues. (tags: oracle soa soasuite bpm) Thierry Vergult: No electricity, but the application is up "Dakar is having more troubles then normal with electricity. Never thought that the SaaS model would be that useful when the light goes out. And the extra battery in the office dies, and the router goes down. But you still can access the application over your smartphone and finish your payroll run." (tags: oracle cloud saas)

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• Using ext4 in VMware machine

  First of all, using a journaling filesystems like NTFS, ext4, XFS, or JFS (not to name all of them) is a very good idea and nowadays unthinkable not to do. Linux offers a good variety of different option as journaling filesystem for your system. Since years I am using SGI's XFS and I am pretty confident with stability, performance and liability of the system. In earlier years I had to struggle with incompatibilities between XFS and the boot loader. Using an ext2 formatted /boot solved this issue. But, wow, that is ages ago! Lately, I had to setup a fresh Lucid Lynx (Ubuntu 10.04 LTS) system for a change of our internal groupware / messaging system. Therefore, I fired up a new virtual machine with almost standard configuration in VMware Server and run through our network-based PXE boot and installation procedure. At a certain step in this process, Ubuntu asks you about the partitioning of your hard drive(s). Honestly, I have to say that only out of curiousity I sticked to the "default" suggestion and gave my faith and trust into the Ubuntu installation routine... Resulting to have an ext4 based root mount point ( / ). The rest of the installation went on without further concerns or worries. Note:I really can't remember why I chose to go away from my favourite... Well, it should turn out to be the wrong decision after all. Ok, let's continue the story about ext4 in a VMware based virtual machine. After some hours installing additional packages and configuring the new system using LDAP for general authentication and login, I had an "out-of-the-box" usable enterprise messaging system based on Zarafa 6.40 Community Edition inclusive proper SSL-based Webaccess interface and Z-Push extension for ActiveSync with my Nokia mobile. Straightforward and pretty nice for the time spent on the setup. Having priority on other tasks I let the system just running and didn't pay any further attention at all. Until I run into an upgrade of "Mail for Exchange" on Symbian OS. My mobile did not bother me at all with the upgrade and everything went smooth, but trying to re-establish the ActiveSync connection to the Zarafa messaging system resulted in a frustating situation. So, I shifted my focus back to the Linux system and I was amazed to figure out that the root had been remounted readonly due to hard drive failures or at least ext4 reported errors. Firing up Google only confirmed my concerns and it seems that using ext4 for VMware based virtual machines does not look like a stable and reliable candidate to me. You might consider reading those external resources: ext4 fs corruption under VMWare Server 2.01Bug #389555 - ext4 filesystem corruption Well, I learned my lesson and ext{2|3|4} based filesystems are not going to be used on any of my Linux systems or customer installations in the future. Addendum: I did not try this setup in other virtualization environments like VirtualBox, qemu, kvm, Xen, etc.

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• TDD - Red-Light-Green_Light:: A critical view

  - by Renso

  Subject: The concept of red-light-green-light for TDD/BDD style testing has been around since the dawn of time (well almost). Having written thousands of tests using this approach I find myself questioning the validity of the principle The issue: False positive or a valid test strategy that can be trusted? A critical view: I agree that the red-green-light concept has some validity, but who has ever written 2000 tests for a system that goes through a ton of chnages due to the organic nature fo the application and does not have to change, delete or restructure their existing tests? If you asnwer to the latter question is" "Yes I had a situation(s) where I had to refactor my code and it caused me to have to rewrite/change/delete my existing tests", read on, else press CTRL+ALT+Del :-) Once a test has been written, failed the test (red light), and then you comlpete your code and now get the green light for the last test, the test for that functionality is now in green light mode. It can never return to red light again as long as the test exists, even if the test itself is not changed, and only the code it tests is changed to fail the test. Why you ask? because the reason for the initial red-light when you created the test is not guaranteed to have triggered the initial red-light result for the same reasons it is now failing after a code change has been made. Furthermore, when the same test is changed to compile correctly in case of a compile-breaking code change, the green-light once again has been invalidated. Why? Because there is no guarantee that the test code fix is in the same green-light state as it was when it first ran successfully. To make matters worse, if you fix a compile-breaking test without going through the red-light-green-light test process, your test fix is essentially useless and very dangerous as it now provides you with a false-positive at best. Thinking your code has passed all tests and that it works correctly is far worse than not having any tests at all, well at least for that part of the system that the test-code represents. What to do? My recommendation is to delete the tests affected, and re-create them from scratch. I have to agree. Hard to do and justify if it has a significant impact on project deadlines. What do you think?

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• Hardware and Software Working Together - What Does LJE say?

  - by Stephen Slade

   IDG News Service - Oracle CEO Larry Ellison said Oracle will continue to bet on selling high-end custom hardware for its software products, even amidst a growing trend toward roomfuls of cheap, generic servers. "You have to be in the hardware business and the software business, to get the best possible system," he said during a keynote speech at Oracle's OpenWorld conference in Tokyo. "We believe it's the right idea, we believe it's the next generation of computing, we believe all the pieces have to fit together." Ellison, as he has often done in the past, repeatedly referred to Apple as his "favorite example" of such tight integration. He was a close friend of Apple's co-founder Steve Jobs and previously served on Apple's board of directors.He said sales of Oracle's advanced servers were booming and generating around a billion dollars a year in revenue for the company, which has until recent years focused almost exclusively on its software offerings. With the explosion of popular online services and the increasing number of mobile devices that access them, demand is high for databases that can quickly respond to high numbers of relatively simple queries. While Oracle is pitching its expensive, finely-tuned machines to meet this requirement, Internet behemoths like Google, Facebook and Microsoft increasingly rely on armies of low-cost, easily replaceable servers. Ellison emphasized the high specifications of Oracle's servers, which come packed with multiple terabytes of RAM and flash-based storage for speed. Such machines are superior to large server farms, he said, because they require far less electricity and floor space, and are also cost competitive. When asked about whether purchasing such products would lock customers in to expensive hardware from Oracle, he promised that the company's software would always run on "multiple hardware sources."  Ellison, who spoke from Kyoto, Japan's ancient capital, was shown live online via webcast. The Oracle founder has a fondness for Japanese architecture and is staying in his large garden residence in the city Source: Ellison: Hardware-software integration key, Apple is best example. Oracle's founder and CEO reaffirmed his commitment to custom hardware for its software products  LINK to Computerworld article Apr 5, 2012 http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9225858/Ellison_Hardware_software_integration_key_Apple_is_best_example?source=CTWNLE_nlt_entsoft_2012-04-09&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+computerworld%2Fs%2Ffeed%2Ftopic%2F173+%28Computerworld+Databases+News%29#disqus_thread

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• June IOUG events

  - by Mandy Ho

  Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} Independent Oracle User Group (IOUG) Regional Events: June 11-12, 2012 – Broomfield, CO 2-Day Seminar- “ High Performance PL/SQL & Oracle Database 11g New Features” Steven Feuerstein, generally considered the world’s leading PL/SQL expert, will be presenting his all-new, 2-day, “Higher Performance PL/SQL and Oracle 11g PL/SQL New Features” seminar on June 11 & 12 at Level 3 Communications in Broomfield, Colorado.  This will be Steven’s first Denver seminar in almost 4  years.  Who knows when he will offer another? http://www.rmoug.org/ June 14, 2012 – Ottawa, Ontario Pythian’s Gwen Shapira puts on 3 great presentations focused on NoSQL, making OLTP run fast and Big Data. http://www.oug-ottawa.org/pls/htmldb/f?p=327:27:1317735724699447::NO June 21, 2012 – Calgary, Alberta Big Data and Extreme Analytics Summit http://coug.ab.ca/ June 22, 2012 – Westborough, MA 10 Things You Probably Did Not Know? With Tom Kyte PL/SQL turns 23 years old this year. It was first introduced in 1988 with Oracle6 Database. This session looks at five technical things about PL/SQL you probably did not know: under-the-covers features that make PL/SQL quite simply the most efficient language with which to process data in the database. http://noug.com/  June 28/29, 2012 – Plano, Texas Jonathan Lewis Oracle Performance Seminars The DOUG (DALLAS ORACLE USERS GROUP) has invited SpeakTech to return to Dallas, and they’re bringing Jonathan Lewis! Topics are Beating the Oracle Optimizer – June 28, 2012, Trouble Shooting & Tuning – June 29, 2012 http://www.eventbrite.com/event/3082448687

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• An update on using Rosetta Stone: Studio now isn't very useful and is not great value as an add-on option

  - by Greg Low

  I had a surprisingly large number of responses from my previous posting about learning Chinese. An update for those considering Rosetta Stone (www.rosettastone.com) for Chinese, Spanish or any other language that they offer:I had to renew my "Studio" subscription today and it's now a much worse deal than it was.It's now $75 for 6 months for Studio sessions. Online classes used to be 45 mins. Recently they reduced them to 20 mins. Given how often people have connection issues, etc. that 20 mins can disappear very quickly.They've also reduced the number you can attend. You used to be able to have 2 scheduled at any point in time. Now they limit you to 2 "group sessions" per month during the period. (You can pay for additional private sessions). The combination of these two changes now makes it much less useful. Two x 20 min sessions per month is an almost meaningless amount of practice. They also now automatically change you to auto-renew when you subscribe. They tell you where to remove this auto-renewal but the first 4 or 5 times that I went into that screen, no such option appeared. Later, an option did appear and I used it.Overall, things just aren't what they used to be at Rosetta Stone. It's now pretty hard to recommend the Studio option where it was a no-brainer before.FURTHER UPDATE: <sigh>Even after I renewed, I could not even connect to their "new" service. Although the system processed the renewal, it still tells me it's expired. My online chat person "Siva S" tells me that the problem is that I've purchased all 5 levels of the program. I can't wait till they explain to me how making an extra purchase from them stops me from logging on. Siva told me that they had "renewed" the program. I'd have to speak to Customer Care; they aren't available and then disconnected himself. Impressive (not).Their website is now full of issues too. It insists that my billing address is in the USA, even though it pretends to accept changes to it.Overall, it's gone from something that could be recommended (with some limitations) to now being an app to avoid. That's a pity as I liked much of it before.

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• Your Next IT Job

  - by BuckWoody

  Some data professionals have worked (and plan to work) in the same place for a long time. In organizations large and small, the turnover rate just isn’t that high. This has not been my experience. About every 3-5 years I’ve changed either roles or companies. That might be due to the IT environment or my personality (or a mix of the two), but the point is that I’ve had many roles and worked for many companies large and small throughout my 27+ years in IT. At one point this might have been a detriment – a prospective employer looks at the resume and says “it seems you’ve moved around quite a bit.” But I haven’t found that to be the case all the time –in fact, in some cases the variety of jobs I’ve held has been an asset because I’ve seen what works (and doesn’t) in other environments, which can save time and money. So if you’re in the first camp – great! Stay where you are, and continue doing the work you love. but if you’re in the second, then this post might be useful. If you are planning on making a change, or perhaps you’ve hit a wall at your current location, you might start looking around for a better paying job – and there’s nothing wrong with that. We all try to make our lives better, and for some that involves more money. Money, however, isn’t always the primary motivator. I’ve gone to another job that doesn’t have as many benefits or has the same salary as the current job I’m working to gain more experience, get a better work/life balance and so on. It’s a mix of factors that only you know about. So I thought I would lay out a few advantages and disadvantages in the shops I’ve worked at. This post isn’t aimed at a single employer, but represents a mix of what I’ve experienced, and of course the opinions here are my own. You will most certainly have a different take – if so, please post a response! I also won’t mention a specific industry – I’ve worked everywhere from medical firms, legal offices, retail, billing centers, manufacturing, government, even to NASA. I’m focusing here mostly on size and composition. And I’m making some very broad generalizations here – I am fully aware that a small company might have great benefits and a large company might allow a lot of role flexibility.  your mileage may vary – and again, post those comments! Small Company To me a “small company” means around 100 people or less – sometimes a lot less. These can be really fun, frustrating places to to work. Advantages: a great deal of flexibility, a wide range of roles (often at the same time), a large degree of responsibility, immediate feedback, close relationships with co-workers, work directly with your customer. Disadvantages: Too much responsibility, little work/life balance, immature political structure, few (if any) benefits. If the business is family-owned, they can easily violate work/life boundaries. Medium Size company In my experience the next size company I would work for involves from a few hundred people to around five thousand. Advantages: Good mobility – fairly easy to get promoted, acceptable benefits, more defined responsibilities, better work/life balance, balanced load for expertise, but still the organizational structure is fairly simple to understand. Disadvantages: Pay is not always highest, rapid changes in structure as the organization grows, transient workforce. You may not be given the opportunity to work with another technology if someone already “owns” it. Politics are painful at this level as people try to learn how to do it. Large Company When you get into the tens of thousands of folks employed around the world, you’re in a large company. Advantages: Lots of room to move around – sometimes you can work (as I have) multiple jobs through the years and yet stay at the same company, building time for benefits, very defined roles, trained managers (yes, I know some of them are still awful – trust me – I DO know that), higher-end benefits, long careers possible, discounts at retailers and other “soft” benefits, prestige. For some, a higher level of politics (done professionally) is a good thing. Disadvantages: You could become another faceless name in the crowd, might not allow a great deal of flexibility,  large organizational changes might take away any control you have of your career. I’ve also seen large layoffs happen, and good people get let go while “dead weight” is retained. For some, a higher level of politics is distasteful. So what are your experiences? Share with the group! Share this post: email it! | bookmark it! | digg it! | reddit! | kick it! | live it!

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• Silverlight Cream Monday WP7 App Review # 1

  - by Dave Campbell

  I'm going to try something here... if it seems useful, I'll continue, if it doesn't, I'll stop... so give me feedback! There are *lots* of Apps in the WP7 Marketplace, and heaven help me, but the Marketplace sucks for finding stuff. I won't rehash what's already been said in the blogs, but I agree with one and all. I went out last Saturday to find 2 apps that I knew were released, and couldn't do so on my device. Even in the Zune app, it took quite a while to find them... ok, I'll back off a bit, because I just found out I can do 'Search' now if I know the name... I didn't think that was working before. So my thought is on Monday (like today), I will post a review of 5 apps/games I either use or have played with on my device. These are strictly my opinions, you understand, but hey... it's better than a poke in the eye with an iPhone! A few disclaimers:     Feel free to write me about your app and tell me about it. While it would be very cool to receive a whole bunch of xap files to review, at this point, for technical reasons, I'm unable to side-load my device. Since I plan on only doing this one day a week, and only 5, I may never get caught up, so if you send me some info, be patient. Re: games ... remember I'm old... I'm from the era of Colossal Cave and Zork. Duke-Nukem 2D and Captain Comic were awesome. I don't own an XBOX or any other game system, so take game reviews from my perspective -- who knows, it may be refreshing :) I won't pay for an app or game just to try it. If you expect me to test-drive your app, it's going to have to have a Free Trial. In this Issue:   Jingo! is the first app I bought, just to see what the experience was like. It's very much like a game we used to play in school in the Army in 1971 on paper we passed around. Sort of a cross between hangman and Mastermind, you try to figure out the hidden word in 5 tries. You get really good at 5-letter words after a while. I like this because you have to think, and you're not pressured by a clock Jingo! is by James Furdell and is $1.99 I reviewed René Schulte's Pictures Lab a while back, and have not changed my mind. This is an excellent app for playing with any photo on your device... one you've just taken, one you've synced from your PC, or one you've saved from email. I like this because you can get some cool effects for your photos, and it just works. Pictures Lab is by Schulte Software Development and is $1.99 Since I work as a consultant, and from home, I wanted something I could track my time with. I've test-driven all the contenders I could find so far on the phone, and so far I like ONTRACK! the best. If asked, I have some suggestions, but it's probably just the way I work or think. What I do like is I can tap a project to start/stop/restart a counter, and at the end of the day it shows me how much time I've been working. If there's a way to make an adjustment in case you forget to tap the counter, I don't know how to do it, and that's my biggest complaint. I like this because you can get a daily readout which you can also email as a spreadsheet. The daily results display is very good. ONTRACK! is by Qmino and is $2.99 Remember Item 4 above... I've been playing guitar for 48 years... obviously since before the invention of 'tuners', so I'm not as dependent upon these as some folks are. I've tried some in the past and have always felt I can do just as good by ear (I have perfect relative pitch). So, I gave this app by András Velvárt a dance just to see how it works, and it is surprisingly good. If you're used to one of the stage tuners this may take a little getting used to, but it does the job. The difference with this one is there is no real 'null' point inside which you can think your guitar is in tune. The soundwave stays visible on the device, and if it's moving to the right, your string is flat, if it's moving to the left, your string is sharp. Getting it exact might be tricky, but it is exact! If you need to rely on a tuner, this is a good choice in my opinion, exactly because of the sensitivity.. tune up with this and you're dead-on. Guitar Tuner is by Kinabalu Innovation Limited and is $0.99 Popper 2 is the WP7 version of a wildly popular game by Bill Reiss named Dr. Popper. You can get a trial, or you can now get a free lite version of the game. Popper 2 is a fast-paced bubble breaker game. I find it something fun to play when I just want to buzz out, but maybe the best review is that my daughter didn't want to give my phone back when I showed it to her, and always wants to grab my phone to play 'that game'. A fun distraction with great graphics and a great price Popper 2 is by Blue Rose Systems, LLC and is $1.29 Let me know what you think of the idea of doing reviews, or the layout/whatever, and Stay in the 'Light!   Twitter SilverlightNews | Twitter WynApse | WynApse.com | Tagged Posts | SilverlightCream Join me @ SilverlightCream | Phoenix Silverlight User Group Technorati Tags: Silverlight    Silverlight 3    Silverlight 4    Windows Phone MIX10

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• Audio Stutters at gdm

  - by Allan

  Ok I have a problem every 2 times out of 3 I login (I cant be specific it fairly random) I get a Stuttering GDM warning (not the login sound just the Bell sound to wake you up) the only way to stop it is to login I have a Fujitsu Siemens Amilo 1718 with a 2gig of memory (only hardware mod) using 10.10 Maverick and I have disabled KMS as my system was freezing as per the release notes. The only time this has happened before on the same machine was when I gave Kubuntu a try when 10.04 came out then it happened at the login screen and at random times while listening to music in any program. By the way audio is fine as is almost everything else once I have logged in. I would like an answer to this as I am an advocate of Ubuntu and its kind of embarrassing when the first thing that happens is *bing*. as requested Daniel alsa-info Pulse verbose log Not sure how useful the pulse log will be as I cant replicate the bug with a terminal open but I wouldnt be asking the question if I knew the answer so..... Edit 24/12/2010 ......been living on cocktail sausages and pickled onions for five days now made a make shift splint with cocktail sticks..... oops so updated the alsa drivers but I still get the same message in the dmesg No response from codec, disabling MSI: last cmd=0x10a90000 googleing it brings up a forum post from some other distro with a green logo the only common denominator seems to be graphics ie ATI Radeon XPRESS 200M which is why I have had to turn of kms as the chip is so old that small mice try to eat the "kernel" ;) funnily enough following the bug link at the end of the post, I found a comment about "Ubuntu Black Magic" so mabey I am coming at this from the wrong angle...... Bad Joo Joo any one. I will try the second part of Daniels Fix and Update with the result. The final Edit: (Plays air guitar) In the end neither of these solved the problem as such However I have given Roland a tick for reminding me of the solution and I gave Daniel the Bounty for the effort in trying to solve the problem. The answer for future readers was the enable the correct HD Audio Model I found the answer back when using Karmic Koala 9.10 in this forum post Amilo Li1718 Skype - Can't get it working... the model is options snd-hda-intel model=3stack position_fix=1 enable=yes which can be added to the end of alsa-base.conf thanks all for helping and hope anyone with a similar problem will find the answer here.

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