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• Problems with mounting .ISO files

  - by user89599

  I'm using Precise, with GNOME. I've attempted to install some retro, multi-cd games (KOTOR1) via .ISO images and WINE, but I can't get the ISO's to mount correctly. First I tried GMountISO, which showed a read-only warning but worked - until I went to unmount. When the installation program asked for CD 2 I couldn't unmount from the /cdrom folder because neither GMountISO or umount from terminal could detect the mount. After a reboot, I changed to GISOMount (different somehow, I guess?), but when I attempt to mount the ISO I get an error window explaining the syntax of the mount command and, which is also what I get when I attempt to use mount from terminal. After checking /media from terminal on a lark I see the disc mounted there twice over, but umount won't recognize it, even when I specify the full path sudo umount /media/KOTOR_1.iso. It cleared up upon reboot. Can someone please assist? UPDATE :: Thanks for the quick response. What's weird, is the images are like stuck in limbo... I'll show you: sc@sc-HP-110-3700:/media$ ls cdrom KOTOR_1(0)(vcd) KOTOR_1(vcd) sc@sc-HP-110-3700:/media$ cd cdrom sc@sc-HP-110-3700:/media/cdrom$ ls sc@sc-HP-110-3700:/media/cdrom$ cd .. sc@sc-HP-110-3700:/media$ umount KOTOR_1(vcd) bash: syntax error near unexpected token `(' sc@sc-HP-110-3700:/media$ umount KOTOR_1.ISO umount: KOTOR_1.ISO is not mounted (according to mtab) sc@sc-HP-110-3700:/media$ sudo umount -a umount: /run/shm: device is busy. (In some cases useful info about processes that use the device is found by lsof(8) or fuser(1)) umount: /run: device is busy. (In some cases useful info about processes that use the device is found by lsof(8) or fuser(1)) umount: /dev: device is busy. (In some cases useful info about processes that use the device is found by lsof(8) or fuser(1)) umount: /: device is busy. (In some cases useful info about processes that use the device is found by lsof(8) or fuser(1)) sc@sc-HP-110-3700:/media$

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• When does a Project Manager start in a project?

  - by johndoucette

  From a colleague of mine… “As a project manager, when do you typically like to get initially involved in the project? Is it better for the PM to be rolled on during the project kick-off, the first week, or is it better to roll-on the second week when things settle down?” My textbook answer is “the Project Manager is responsible for the successful completion and delivery of the expected outcome of the project through the following major tasks;” 1.    Identifying requirements 2.    Establishing clear and achievable objectives 3.    Balancing the competing demands for quality, scope, time, and cost 4.    Adapting the specifications, plans, and approach to the different concerns and expectations of the various stakeholders However; My colleague is often a lead technical consultant coming into a project alone to help a client solve a complex problem. As Magenic consultants, we all possess many of the “project managing” skills I talked about above and tend to be responsible for item #1 and #2 as well as the actual architecture/design tasks early in a project. When the real development begins and there is no PM involved, the project will quickly get harder to execute unless items #3 & #4 are assigned to a Project Manager. In software development, the concept of context switching between coding and other administrative activities is the hardest skill perfect. In my experience, I have rarely been introduced to someone who has mastered this skill. This is the limbo I was in when I was asked to become a PM -- while still developing. “Put down the code” was not only a profound statement, but looking back – a necessary one. Unless you are lucky to have found that one developer who is a superman, asking your developers (internal corporate or consultant) to perform #3 and #4 tasks, will surely take more time, allow opportunity for more scope, and eventually cost more. Project Managers are crucial to the overall success of a project, and I prefer them to start by taking ownership of delivery on day one.

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• What is the difference between apt-get and dpkg?

  - by William F. Hammond

  Both apt-get and dpkg can be used to install and remove packages. When to use which? Context: I'm in stuck in package limbo between 10.04.4 LTS and 12.04.1 LTS after an attempted upgrade via the package manager. For example, to fix things I wanted to remove "skype" so that things it depends on could be freed up. But "aptitude" (my normal package management tool) refused to remove it. The advice at http://administratosphere.wordpress.com/2011/11/02/rescuing-an-interrupted-ubuntu-upgrade/ seems helpful but not adequate to resolve my package conflicts. Also there's a strange thing where the grub menu seems not to be properly interpreted, but eventually I get the splash screen with "/ is not ready yet or not present. Continue to wait; or press S to skip or M to recover manually." Manual recovery puts me in a single user shell where I can easily remount / as rw and bring up the network. If I become myself, the command line seems quite robust, but, there seems to be no way to get X11 going.

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• What kinds of issues can one expect when changing a domain names registar? (3 questions)

  - by anonymous-one

  Assuming that there are no 'unusual' items that come up, what kind of disruptions can one expect when moving a domain between registrars? I understand some of the below may vary over registrars. But assuming both ends are large proficient registrars: a) Will the NS settings be mirrored? We use a dedicated dns service provider so we are not using the originating registrars name servers. All that we are concerned about is that the existing NS values are mirrored at the target registrar. b) Are incoming domain transfers automated on the target registrar end? Eg: If we begin the transfer process during business hours at the source registrar, will someone have to manually approve the inbound transfer (most likely during their business hours) at the target registrar? c) Is the domain ever 'in limbo'? At any time in the process is there ever a time when the NS values for the domain are not populated (as they were prior to initiating the transfer) OR one does not have access to populate them (at the target registrar)? Thank you kindly for the help.

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• Why was the arguments.callee.caller property deprecated in JavaScript?

  - by pcorcoran

  Why was the arguments.callee.caller property deprecated in JavaScript? It was added and then deprecated in JavaScript, but it was omitted altogether by ECMAScript. Some browser (Mozilla, IE) have always supported it and don't have any plans on the map to remove support. Others (Safari, Opera) have adopted support for it, but support on older browsers is unreliable. Is there a good reason to put this valuable functionality in limbo? (Or alternately, is there a better way to grab a handle on the calling function?)

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• How Serializable works with insert in SQL Server 2005

  - by Spence

  G'day I think I have a misunderstanding of serializable. I have two tables (data, transaction) which I insert information into in a serializable transaction (either they are both in, or both out, but not in limbo). SET TRANSACTION ISOLATION LEVEL SERIALIZABLE BEGIN TRANSACTION INSERT INTO dbo.data (ID, data) VALUES (@Id, data) INSERT INTO dbo.transactions(ID, info) VALUES (@ID, @info) COMMIT TRANSACTION I have a reconcile query which checks the data table for entries where there is no transaction at read committed isolation level. INSERT INTO reconciles (ReconcileID, DataID) SELECT Reconcile = @ReconcileID, ID FROM Data WHERE NOT EXISTS (SELECT 1 FROM TRANSACTIONS WHERE data.id = transactions.id) Note that the ID is actually a composite (2 column) key, so I can't use a NOT IN operator My understanding was that the second query would exclude any values written into data without their transaction as this insert was happening at serializable and the read was occurring at read committed. I have evidence that reconcile is picking up entries

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• how to insert page view of a node in another page in drupal

  - by sprugman

  I have a list of node ids and I want to display the 'page' view of each one. For various reasons, I don't want to do this with views, and don't think I should need a module. Just an API call to theme('node'). Something like: $nids = array(3,4,5); foreach ($nids as $nid) { $node = node_load($nid); $result .= theme('node', $node); } but I'm not getting back the full page view of the node. I added this to my node-[type].tpl.php file: if ($page) print "PAGE MODE "; else print "NOT PAGE "; if ($teaser) print "TEASER MODE "; else print "NOT TEASER "; and got: NOT PAGE NOT TEASER I seem to be in some kind of limbo. I suspect there's an argument that I add to the theme function, but the terms are all so general (theme, teaser, page, node), I'm having trouble with my google-fu.

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• What is wrong with my JPGEncoder

  - by hitek

  Here is my code if (event.target.content is Bitmap) { infotext.text = "got something"; var image:Bitmap = Bitmap(event.target.content); var bitmapData:BitmapData = image.bitmapData; this.addChild(image); var j:JPGEncoder = new JPGEncoder(100); var bytes:ByteArray = new ByteArray(); bytes=j.encode(bitmapData); } else { throw new Error("What the heck bob?"); } When I run a debug session everything works fine till it reaches to the line bytes=j.encode(bitmapData); after that nothing happens and my program just goes into limbo Please help

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• Level designing with Cocos2d and Box2d

  - by Majster

  I want to learn how to make levels using cocos2d and box2d (for iOS). I am talking about a 2d platformer such as Limbo or Braid or something like that. How can I design and build levels like this? I have seen Level Helper for cocos2d but its not free and I don't think it makes physic objects for box2d. How is this accomplished in real games? How to make camera move with character and so on. Any starting points would be much appreciated.

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• Is it appropriate to try to control the order of finalization?

  - by Strilanc

  I'm writing a class which is roughly analogous to a CancellationToken, except it has a third state for "never going to be cancelled". At the moment I'm trying to decide what to do if the 'source' of the token is garbage collected without ever being set. It seems that, intuitively, the source should transition the associated token to the 'never cancelled' state when it is about to be collected. However, this could trigger callbacks who were only kept alive by their linkage from the token. That means what those callbacks reference might now in the process of finalization. Calling them would be bad. In order to "fix" this, I wrote this class: public sealed class GCRoot { private static readonly GCRoot MainRoot = new GCRoot(); private GCRoot _next; private GCRoot _prev; private object _value; private GCRoot() { this._next = this._prev = this; } private GCRoot(GCRoot prev, object value) { this._value = value; this._prev = prev; this._next = prev._next; _prev._next = this; _next._prev = this; } public static GCRoot Root(object value) { return new GCRoot(MainRoot, value); } public void Unroot() { lock (MainRoot) { _next._prev = _prev; _prev._next = _next; this._next = this._prev = this; } } } intending to use it like this: Source() { ... _root = GCRoot.Root(callbacks); } void TransitionToNeverCancelled() { _root.Unlink(); ... } ~Source() { TransitionToNeverCancelled(); } but now I'm troubled. This seems to open the possibility for memory leaks, without actually fixing all cases of sources in limbo. Like, if a source is closed over in one of its own callbacks, then it is rooted by the callback root and so can never be collected. Presumably I should just let my sources be collected without a peep. Or maybe not? Is it ever appropriate to try to control the order of finalization, or is it a giant warning sign?

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• Firebird 2.1: gfix -online returns "database shutdown"

  - by darvids0n

  Hey all. Googling this one hasn't made a bit of difference, unfortunately, as most results specify the syntax for onlining a database after using gfix -shut -force 30 (or any other number of seconds) as gfix -online dbname, and I have run gfix -online dbname with and without login credentials for the DB in question. The message that I get is: database dbname shutdown Which is fine, except that I want to bring it online now. It's out of the question to close fbserver.exe (running on a Windows box, afaik it's Classic Server 2.1.1 but it may be Super) since we have other databases running off of that which need almost 24/7 uptime. The message from doing another gfix -shut -force or -attach or -tran is invalid shutdown mode for dbname which appears to match with the documentation of what happens if the database is already fully shut down. Ideas and input greatly appreciated, especially since at the moment time is a factor for me. Thanks! EDIT: The whole reason I shut down the DB is to clear out "active" transactions which were linked to a specific IP address, and that computer is my dev terminal (actually a virtual machine where I develop frontends for the database software) but I had no processes connecting to the database at the time. They looked like orphaned transactions to me, and they weren't in limbo afaik. Running a manual sweep didn't clear them out, deleting the rows from MON$STATEMENTS didn't work even though Firebird 2.1 supposedly supports cancelling queries that way. My last resort was to "restart" the database, hence the above issue.

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• Office 365 domain federation conversion failed

  - by Matt Bear

  We're doing things backwards, we have an established o365 domain, with 400+ users, and are just now deploying local AD, and ADFS for SSO. Last night, after configuring my servers, I ran the powershell command convert-MSOLdomaintofederated to convert the xxx.com vanity domain to federated, it errored out with an unspecified error(Microsoft ADFS support said the error has to do with the default password settings being changed.) And when I run convert-MSOLdomaintostandard, it comes back with the domain is already standard. Also in the o365 portal it shows the domain as standard, however it is trying to process login attempts as if it were a federated domain. I've spent 5 hours total on the phone with Microsoft, and it has been escalated to their engineering department for resolution, sometime within the next few days... I need it yesterday. From what we can gather, the conversion process started, error out, changed some of the internal configurations to federated, but left the description as standard.(if that makes since). So its in a weird limbo, where its in both modes but neither at the same time. Currently, the only way to fix it is to remove the vanity domain, and re-add it. I need a way to dissociate the user accounts from xxx.com domain to allow its removal. Removal of all the users themselves is not an option.

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• Ubuntu-one syncs single files, but not directories [closed]

  - by Luiz Cláudio Duarte

  I'm using Ubuntu 10.10, fully updated. I have tried to sync my ~/Documents and ~/Pictures folders; U1 replicates the directory structure, but no files are uploaded. Next I tried to sync a single file inside ~/Ubuntu One and it was synced. Then I tried to put a directory inside ~/Ubuntu One and, again, the directory structure was replicated, but no files were synced. All the files have the "syncing" icon, however. The latest syncdaemon.log is below: 2011-03-30 07:41:50,752 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.fsm - INFO - loading updated metadata 2011-03-30 07:41:55,081 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.fsm - INFO - initialized: idx_path: 266, idx_node_id: 266, shares: 1 2011-03-30 07:41:55,082 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.GeneralINotProc - INFO - Ignoring files: ['\\A#.*\\Z', '\\A.*~\\Z', '\\A.*\\.py[oc]\\Z', '\\A.*\\.sw[nopx]\\Z', '\\A.*\\.swpx\\Z', '\\A\\..*\\.tmp\\Z'] 2011-03-30 07:41:55,083 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.HQ - INFO - HashQueue: _hasher started 2011-03-30 07:41:55,902 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.DBus - INFO - DBusInterface initialized. 2011-03-30 07:41:55,903 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - INFO - Using '/home/l_claudius/Ubuntu One' as root dir 2011-03-30 07:41:55,903 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - INFO - Using '/home/l_claudius/.local/share/ubuntuone/syncdaemon' as data dir 2011-03-30 07:41:55,903 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - INFO - Using '/home/l_claudius/.local/share/ubuntuone/shares' as shares root dir 2011-03-30 07:41:55,903 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - NOTE - ---- MARK (state: <State: 'INIT' (queues IDLE connection 'Not User Not Network')>; queues: metadata: 0; content: 0; hash: 0, fsm-cache: hit=1 miss=266) ---- 2011-03-30 07:41:55,904 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - NOTE - Local rescan starting... 2011-03-30 07:41:55,904 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.local_rescan - INFO - start scan all volumes 2011-03-30 07:41:55,906 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.local_rescan - INFO - processing trash 2011-03-30 07:41:56,044 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.local_rescan - INFO - processing move limbo 2011-03-30 07:41:56,491 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - NOTE - Local rescan finished! 2011-03-30 07:41:56,492 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - INFO - hash queue empty. We are ready! 2011-03-30 07:42:15,583 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.DBus - INFO - u'CredentialsFound': callbacking with credentials (token_name: None). 2011-03-30 07:42:15,584 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.DBus - INFO - connect: credential request was successful, pushing SYS_USER_CONNECT. 2011-03-30 07:42:15,617 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.ActionQueue - INFO - Connection started to host fs-1.one.ubuntu.com, port 443. 2011-03-30 07:42:15,977 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.ActionQueue - INFO - Connection made. 2011-03-30 07:42:15,978 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.StorageClient - INFO - Connection made. 2011-03-30 07:42:16,581 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.ActionQueue - INFO - The request 'protocol_version' finished OK. 2011-03-30 07:42:16,774 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.ActionQueue - INFO - The request 'caps_raising_if_not_accepted' finished OK. 2011-03-30 07:42:16,966 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.ActionQueue - INFO - The request 'caps_raising_if_not_accepted' finished OK. 2011-03-30 07:42:17,722 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.ActionQueue - INFO - The request 'oauth_authenticate' finished OK. 2011-03-30 07:42:17,723 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.ActionQueue - NOTE - Session ID: '563bc960-35fa-4f44-b9b6-125819656dc3' 2011-03-30 07:42:19,258 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.ActionQueue - INFO - The request 'list_volumes' finished OK. 2011-03-30 07:43:55,903 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - NOTE - ---- MARK (state: <State: 'QUEUE_MANAGER' (queues IDLE connection 'With User With Network')>; queues: metadata: 0; content: 0; hash: 0, fsm-cache: hit=1059 miss=266) ---- 2011-03-30 07:45:55,903 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - NOTE - ---- MARK (state: <State: 'QUEUE_MANAGER' (queues IDLE connection 'With User With Network')>; queues: metadata: 0; content: 0; hash: 0, fsm-cache: hit=1059 miss=266) ---- 2011-03-30 07:47:55,903 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - NOTE - ---- MARK (state: <State: 'QUEUE_MANAGER' (queues IDLE connection 'With User With Network')>; queues: metadata: 0; content: 0; hash: 0, fsm-cache: hit=1059 miss=266) ---- 2011-03-30 07:49:55,903 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - NOTE - ---- MARK (state: <State: 'QUEUE_MANAGER' (queues IDLE connection 'With User With Network')>; queues: metadata: 0; content: 0; hash: 0, fsm-cache: hit=1059 miss=266) ---- 2011-03-30 07:51:55,903 - ubuntuone.SyncDaemon.Main - NOTE - ---- MARK (state: <State: 'QUEUE_MANAGER' (queues IDLE connection 'With User With Network')>; queues: metadata: 0; content: 0; hash: 0, fsm-cache: hit=1059 miss=266) ----

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• User Friendly Video Review with Locking

  - by James Cori

  We have a jquery/php/mysql system that allows a user to log in and review videos built by a system for online viewing. When a user begins reviewing a video, the video is marked as such. But now we've cornered ourselves into the classic browser-based application problem of the user navigating away or closing the browser without completing review. That video would then enter a state of limbo of constantly being reviewed, but never completed, and never re-entering the queue. Options we have are: Build a service (which we already have others) to find review sessions that are outside a duration boundary and reset them back into the queue. Reset review sessions outside a duration boundary when that user logs in. Essentially, if a user locks out a video for review, it'll be unlocked the next time they log in. A suggestion made to me was to use the php/apache session length and on expiration, reset any pending review jobs. I don't even know where to look to implement this as this is one project on a shared server, so it shouldn't be an apache config, but the reset mechanism would need to know the database credentials to be able to reset it... The worst solution everyone hates is preventing the user from navigating away with javascript, asking "Are you sure?!" This system is used by a few hired reviewers, so I'm not exactly dealing with the public here, but I can't prevent users from sharing logins for speedier review, which would knock out the 2nd option above because it would unlock a video being reviewed by someone else using the same login.

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• How to hide the console of batch scripts without losing std err/out streams

  - by cooper.thompson

  My question is similar to Running a CMD or BAT in silent mode, but with one additional constraint. If you use WshScript.Run in vbscript, you lose access to the standard in/error/out streams of the process. WshScript.Exec gives you access to the standard streams, but you can't hide your windows. How can you have your cake (hide the windows) and eat it too (have direct access to the console streams)? I'm currently thinking about a C++ executable which creates a new Windows Station and Desktop, (see MSDN) and runs a specified script within that new Desktop (I'm not yet an expert on Window Stations and Desktops, so this idea may be retarded). This idea is based loosely on Condor's USE_VISIBLE_DESKTOP feature, which, if disabled, runs Condor jobs in a non-visible Desktop. I haven't quite figured out if this requires elevated priveledge. The tradeoff of this approach is that your script can disappear into limbo if it blocks on user input. Does anyone have any additional ideas? Or feedback on the approach outlined above? Edit: Also, the purpose of our script is to set up the user environment, so running as another user, or as a system scheduled task isn't really an option (unless there are clever tricks I don't know about).

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• fix needed for bug in TextField/Text

  - by Mark

  Sort of a complicated scenario - just curious if anyone else could come up with something: I have a Text control and when I scroll it and stop the scroll with the cursor over some text that has a url, the cursor doesn't revert to a hand, and also flash player starts acting as if a selection is being made from the last cursor position. So IOW a bonafide bug in flash as far as I can determine. The above probably wasn't completely clear so let me elaborate. If you grab a scrollbar thumb and start moving it up and down, you don't actually have to keep the mouse pointer on the thumb while doing so. When you stop the scroll, the mouse pointer could be outside the browser window, inside your flash application, but not currently on the scroll bar thumb, or wherever. The previously mentioned bug occurs when you stop the scroll with the mouse pointer positioned over text with an html anchor (a hyperlink). At that point the cursor enters into some state of limbo, and doesn't show the url hand pointer, and furthermore acts as if some text selection is taking place from the last cursor position prior to the scroll. So the question would be, what sort of event could I simulate in code to jolt flash out of this erroneous state it is in. And furthermore in what event could I perform this simulated event (given that for example there is no AS3 event to signal the end of a scroll.) To be clear, the Text control in question is on a canvas, and that canvas (call it A) is on another canvas which actually owns the scrollbar, and scrolling takes place by changing the scrollRect of canvas A.

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• Need help with transferring data between MySQL db's using PHP

  - by JM4

  In one of the sites I manage, the client has decided to take on ACH/Bank Account administration where it was previously outsourced. As a result, the information submitted in our online form which used to simply store in a single database for processing now must sit in 'limbo' until the funds used for payment have been verified. My original plan is as follows: At the end of an enrollment, all form data is collected and stored in a single MySQL database. Our internal administrator will receive an email notification reminding him enrollments have taken place. He will process the ACH information collected and wait the 3-4 business days needed for payment to clear. Once the payment information has been returned as Good (haven't considered what I will do with the 'bad' yet), the administrator can log into a secure portal which allows him to click a button to 'process' the full information once compared and verified. the process is simplified as: Enrollment complete: data stored in DB 'A' Funds verified and link clicked: data from 'A' is copied to DB 'B' and 'A' is deleted. I have run similar processes with CSV output before and simply used //transfers old data to archive $transfer = mysql_query('INSERT INTO '.$archive.' SELECT * FROM '.$table) or die(mysql_error()); //empties existing table $query = mysql_query('TRUNCATE TABLE '.$table) or die(mysql_error()); but in those cases, ALL data returned was copied and deleted. I only want to copy and delete a single record. Any idea how to accomplish this?

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• Ruby on Rails check box not updating on form submission

  - by user284194

  I have an entries controller that allows users to add contact information the website. The user-submitted information isn't visible to users until the administrator checks a check box and submits the form. So basically my problem is that if I check the check box as an administrator while initially creating an entry (entries#new) the entry will be publicly visible as expected, but if a non-admin user creates an entry (the normal user view doesn't include the 'live' check box, only the admin one does) then that entry is stuck in limbo because the entries#edit view for some reason doesn't update the boolean check box value when logged in as an admin. entries#new view: <% form_for(@entry) do |f| %> <%= f.error_messages %> Name<br /> <%= f.text_field :name %> Mailing Address<br /> <%= f.text_field :address %> #... <%- if current_user -%> <%= f.label :live %><br /> <%= f.check_box :live %> <%- end -%> <%= f.submit 'Create' %> <% end %> entries#edit (only accessible by admin) view: <% form_for(@entry) do |f| %> <%= f.error_messages %> <%= f.label :name %><br /> <%= f.text_field :name %> Mailing Address<br /> <%= f.text_field :address %> <%= f.label :live %><br /> <%= f.check_box :live %> <%= f.submit 'Update' %> <% end %> Any ideas as to why an administrator can't update the :live check box from the edit view? I would greatly appreciate any suggestions. I'm new to rails. I can post more code if it's needed. Thanks for reading my question.

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• Setting up and using Bing Translate API Service for Machine Translation

  - by Rick Strahl

  Last week I spent quite a bit of time trying to set up the Bing Translate API service. I can honestly say this was one of the most screwed up developer experiences I've had in a long while - specifically related to the byzantine sign up process that Microsoft has in place. Not only is it nearly impossible to find decent documentation on the required signup process, some of the links in the docs are just plain wrong, and some of the account pages you need to access the actual account information once signed up are not linked anywhere from the administration UI. To make things even harder is the fact that the APIs changed a while back, with a completely new authentication scheme that's described and not directly linked documentation topic also made for a very frustrating search experience. It's a bummer that this is the case too, because the actual API itself is easy to use and works very well - fast and reasonably accurate (as accurate as you can expect machine translation to be). But the sign up process is a pain in the ass doubtlessly leaving many people giving up in frustration. In this post I'll try to hit all the points needed to set up to use the Bing Translate API in one place since such a document seems to be missing from Microsoft. Hopefully the API folks at Microsoft will get their shit together and actually provide this sort of info on their site… Signing Up The first step required is to create a Windows Azure MarketPlace account. Go to: https://datamarket.azure.com/ Sign in with your Windows Live Id If you don't have an account you will be taken to a registration page which you have to fill out. Follow the links and complete the registration. Once you're signed in you can start adding services. Click on the Data Link on the main page Select Microsoft Translator from the list This adds the Microsoft Bing Translator to your services. Pricing The page shows the pricing matrix and the free service which provides 2 megabytes for translations a month for free. Prices go up steeply from there. Pricing is determined by actual bytes of the result translations used. Max translations are 1000 characters so at minimum this means you get around 2000 translations a month for free. However most translations are probable much less so you can expect larger number of translations to go through. For testing or low volume translations this should be just fine. Once signed up there are no further instructions and you're left in limbo on the MS site. Register your Application Once you've created the Data association with Translator the next step is registering your application. To do this you need to access your developer account. Go to https://datamarket.azure.com/developer/applications/register Provide a ClientId, which is effectively the unique string identifier for your application (not your customer id!) Provide your name The client secret was auto-created and this becomes your 'password' For the redirect url provide any https url: https://microsoft.com works Give this application a description of your choice so you can identify it in the list of apps Now, once you've registered your application, keep track of the ClientId and ClientSecret - those are the two keys you need to authenticate before you can call the Translate API. Oddly the applications page is hidden from the Azure Portal UI. I couldn't find a direct link from anywhere on the site back to this page where I can examine my developer application keys. To find them you can go to: https://datamarket.azure.com/developer/applications You can come back here to look at your registered applications and pick up the ClientID and ClientSecret. Fun eh? But we're now ready to actually call the API and do some translating. Using the Bing Translate API The good news is that after this signup hell, using the API is pretty straightforward. To use the translation API you'll need to actually use two services: You need to call an authentication API service first, before you can call the actual translator API. These two APIs live on different domains, and the authentication API returns JSON data while the translator service returns XML. So much for consistency. Authentication The first step is authentication. The service uses oAuth authentication with a  bearer token that has to be passed to the translator API. The authentication call retrieves the oAuth token that you can then use with the translate API call. The bearer token has a short 10 minute life time, so while you can cache it for successive calls, the token can't be cached for long periods. This means for Web backend requests you typically will have to authenticate each time unless you build a more elaborate caching scheme that takes the timeout into account (perhaps using the ASP.NET Cache object). For low volume operations you can probably get away with simply calling the auth API for every translation you do. To call the Authentication API use code like this:/// /// Retrieves an oAuth authentication token to be used on the translate /// API request. The result string needs to be passed as a bearer token /// to the translate API. /// /// You can find client ID and Secret (or register a new one) at: /// https://datamarket.azure.com/developer/applications/ /// /// The client ID of your application /// The client secret or password /// public string GetBingAuthToken(string clientId = null, string clientSecret = null) { string authBaseUrl = https://datamarket.accesscontrol.windows.net/v2/OAuth2-13; if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(clientId) || string.IsNullOrEmpty(clientSecret)) { ErrorMessage = Resources.Resources.Client_Id_and_Client_Secret_must_be_provided; return null; } var postData = string.Format("grant_type=client_credentials&client_id={0}" + "&client_secret={1}" + "&scope=http://api.microsofttranslator.com", HttpUtility.UrlEncode(clientId), HttpUtility.UrlEncode(clientSecret)); // POST Auth data to the oauth API string res, token; try { var web = new WebClient(); web.Encoding = Encoding.UTF8; res = web.UploadString(authBaseUrl, postData); } catch (Exception ex) { ErrorMessage = ex.GetBaseException().Message; return null; } var ser = new JavaScriptSerializer(); var auth = ser.Deserialize<BingAuth>(res); if (auth == null) return null; token = auth.access_token; return token; } private class BingAuth { public string token_type { get; set; } public string access_token { get; set; } } This code basically takes the client id and secret and posts it at the oAuth endpoint which returns a JSON string. Here I use the JavaScript serializer to deserialize the JSON into a custom object I created just for deserialization. You can also use JSON.NET and dynamic deserialization if you are already using JSON.NET in your app in which case you don't need the extra type. In my library that houses this component I don't, so I just rely on the built in serializer. The auth method returns a long base64 encoded string which can be used as a bearer token in the translate API call. Translation Once you have the authentication token you can use it to pass to the translate API. The auth token is passed as an Authorization header and the value is prefixed with a 'Bearer ' prefix for the string. Here's what the simple Translate API call looks like:/// /// Uses the Bing API service to perform translation /// Bing can translate up to 1000 characters. /// /// Requires that you provide a CLientId and ClientSecret /// or set the configuration values for these two. /// /// More info on setup: /// http://www.west-wind.com/weblog/ /// /// Text to translate /// Two letter culture name /// Two letter culture name /// Pass an access token retrieved with GetBingAuthToken. /// If not passed the default keys from .config file are used if any /// public string TranslateBing(string text, string fromCulture, string toCulture, string accessToken = null) { string serviceUrl = "http://api.microsofttranslator.com/V2/Http.svc/Translate"; if (accessToken == null) { accessToken = GetBingAuthToken(); if (accessToken == null) return null; } string res; try { var web = new WebClient(); web.Headers.Add("Authorization", "Bearer " + accessToken); string ct = "text/plain"; string postData = string.Format("?text={0}&from={1}&to={2}&contentType={3}", HttpUtility.UrlEncode(text), fromCulture, toCulture, HttpUtility.UrlEncode(ct)); web.Encoding = Encoding.UTF8; res = web.DownloadString(serviceUrl + postData); } catch (Exception e) { ErrorMessage = e.GetBaseException().Message; return null; } // result is a single XML Element fragment var doc = new XmlDocument(); doc.LoadXml(res); return doc.DocumentElement.InnerText; } The first of this code deals with ensuring the auth token exists. You can either pass the token into the method manually or let the method automatically retrieve the auth code on its own. In my case I'm using this inside of a Web application and in that situation I simply need to re-authenticate every time as there's no convenient way to manage the lifetime of the auth cookie. The auth token is added as an Authorization HTTP header prefixed with 'Bearer ' and attached to the request. The text to translate, the from and to language codes and a result format are passed on the query string of this HTTP GET request against the Translate API. The translate API returns an XML string which contains a single element with the translated string. Using the Wrapper Methods It should be pretty obvious how to use these two methods but here are a couple of test methods that demonstrate the two usage scenarios:[TestMethod] public void TranslateBingWithAuthTest() { var translate = new TranslationServices(); string clientId = DbResourceConfiguration.Current.BingClientId; string clientSecret = DbResourceConfiguration.Current.BingClientSecret; string auth = translate.GetBingAuthToken(clientId, clientSecret); Assert.IsNotNull(auth); string text = translate.TranslateBing("Hello World we're back home!", "en", "de",auth); Assert.IsNotNull(text, translate.ErrorMessage); Console.WriteLine(text); } [TestMethod] public void TranslateBingIntegratedTest() { var translate = new TranslationServices(); string text = translate.TranslateBing("Hello World we're back home!","en","de"); Assert.IsNotNull(text, translate.ErrorMessage); Console.WriteLine(text); } Other API Methods The Translate API has a number of methods available and this one is the simplest one but probably also the most common one that translates a single string. You can find additional methods for this API here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff512419.aspx Soap and AJAX APIs are also available and documented on MSDN: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd576287.aspx These links will be your starting points for calling other methods in this API. Dual Interface I've talked about my database driven localization provider here in the past, and it's for this tool that I added the Bing localization support. Basically I have a localization administration form that allows me to translate individual strings right out of the UI, using both Google and Bing APIs: As you can see in this example, the results from Google and Bing can vary quite a bit - in this case Google is stumped while Bing actually generated a valid translation. At other times it's the other way around - it's pretty useful to see multiple translations at the same time. Here I can choose from one of the values and driectly embed them into the translated text field. Lost in Translation There you have it. As I mentioned using the API once you have all the bureaucratic crap out of the way calling the APIs is fairly straight forward and reasonably fast, even if you have to call the Auth API for every call. Hopefully this post will help out a few of you trying to navigate the Microsoft bureaucracy, at least until next time Microsoft upends everything and introduces new ways to sign up again. Until then - happy translating… Related Posts Translation method Source on Github Translating with Google Translate without Google API Keys Creating a data-driven ASP.NET Resource Provider© Rick Strahl, West Wind Technologies, 2005-2013Posted in Localization  ASP.NET  .NET   Tweet !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js";fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); (function() { var po = document.createElement('script'); po.type = 'text/javascript'; po.async = true; po.src = 'https://apis.google.com/js/plusone.js'; var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(po, s); })();

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