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  • Need some help on how to replay the last game of a java maze game

    - by Marty
    Hello, I am working on creating a Java maze game for a project. The maze is displayed on the console as standard output not in an applet. I have created most of hte code I need, however I am stuck at one problem and that is I need a user to be able to replay the last game i.e redraw the maze with the users moves but without any input from the user. I am not sure on what course of action to take, i was thinking about copying each users move or the position of each move into another array, as you can see i have 2 variables which hold the position of the player, plyrX and plyrY do you think copying these values into a new array after each move would solve my problem and how would i go about this? I have updated my code, apologies about the textIO.java class not being present, not sure how to resolve that exept post a link to TextIO.java [TextIO.java][1] My code below is updated with a new array of type char to hold values from the original maze (read in from text file and displayed using unicode characters) and also to new variables c_plyrX and c_plyrY which I am thinking should hold the values of plyrX and plyrY and copy them into the new array. When I try to call the replayGame(); method from the menu the maze loads for a second then the console exits so im not sure what I am doing wrong Thanks public class MazeGame { //unicode characters that will define the maze walls, //pathways, and in game characters. final static char WALL = '\u2588'; //wall final static char PATH = '\u2591'; //pathway final static char PLAYER = '\u25EF'; //player final static char ENTRANCE = 'E'; //entrance final static char EXIT = '\u2716'; //exit //declaring member variables which will hold the maze co-ordinates //X = rows, Y = columns static int entX = 0; //entrance X co-ordinate static int entY = 1; //entrance y co-ordinate static int plyrX = 0; static int plyrY = 1; static int exitX = 24; //exit X co-ordinate static int exitY = 37; //exit Y co-ordinate //static member variables which hold maze values //used so values can be accessed from different methods static int rows; //rows variable static int cols; //columns variable static char[][] maze; //defines 2 dimensional array to hold the maze //variables that hold player movement values static char dir; //direction static int spaces; //amount of spaces user can travel //variable to hold amount of moves the user has taken; static int movesTaken = 0; //new array to hold player moves for replaying game static char[][] mazeCopy; static int c_plyrX; static int c_plyrY; /** userMenu method for displaying the user menu which will provide various options for * the user to choose such as play a maze game, get instructions, etc. */ public static void userMenu(){ TextIO.putln("Maze Game"); TextIO.putln("*********"); TextIO.putln("Choose an option."); TextIO.putln(""); TextIO.putln("1. Play the Maze Game."); TextIO.putln("2. View Instructions."); TextIO.putln("3. Replay the last game."); TextIO.putln("4. Exit the Maze Game."); TextIO.putln(""); int option; //variable for holding users option TextIO.put("Type your choice: "); option = TextIO.getlnInt(); //gets users option //switch statement for processing menu options switch(option){ case 1: playMazeGame(); case 2: instructions(); case 3: if (c_plyrX == plyrX && c_plyrY == plyrY)replayGame(); else { TextIO.putln("Option not available yet, you need to play a game first."); TextIO.putln(); userMenu(); } case 4: System.exit(0); //exits the user out of the console default: TextIO.put("Option must be 1, 2, 3 or 4"); } } //end of userMenu /**main method, will call the userMenu and get the users choice and call * the relevant method to execute the users choice. */ public static void main(String[]args){ userMenu(); //calls the userMenu method } //end of main method /**instructions method, displays instructions on how to play * the game to the user/ */ public static void instructions(){ TextIO.putln("To beat the Maze Game you have to move your character"); TextIO.putln("through the maze and reach the exit in as few moves as possible."); TextIO.putln(""); TextIO.putln("Your characer is displayed as a " + PLAYER); TextIO.putln("The maze exit is displayed as a " + EXIT); TextIO.putln("Reach the exit and you have won escaped the maze."); TextIO.putln("To control your character type the direction you want to go"); TextIO.putln("and how many spaces you want to move"); TextIO.putln("for example 'D3' will move your character"); TextIO.putln("down 3 spaces."); TextIO.putln("Remember you can't walk through walls!"); boolean insOption; //boolean variable TextIO.putln(""); TextIO.put("Do you want to play the Maze Game now? (Y or N) "); insOption = TextIO.getlnBoolean(); if (insOption == true)playMazeGame(); else userMenu(); } //end of instructions method /**playMazeGame method, calls the loadMaze method and the charMove method * to start playing the Maze Game. */ public static void playMazeGame(){ loadMaze(); plyrMoves(); } //end of playMazeGame method /**loadMaze method, loads the 39x25 maze from the MazeGame.txt text file * and inserts values from the text file into the maze array and * displays the maze on screen using the unicode block characters. * plyrX and plyrY variables are set at their staring co ordinates so that when * a game is completed and the user selects to play a new game * the player character will always be at position 01. */ public static void loadMaze(){ plyrX = 0; plyrY = 1; TextIO.readFile("MazeGame.txt"); //now reads from the external MazeGame.txt file rows = TextIO.getInt(); //gets the number of rows from text file to create X dimensions cols = TextIO.getlnInt(); //gets number of columns from text file to create Y dimensions maze = new char[rows][cols]; //creates maze array of base type char with specified dimnensions //loop to process the array and read in values from the text file. for (int i = 0; i<rows; i++){ for (int j = 0; j<cols; j++){ maze[i][j] = TextIO.getChar(); } TextIO.getln(); } //end for loop TextIO.readStandardInput(); //closes MazeGame.txt file and reads from //standard input. //loop to process the array values and display as unicode characters for (int i = 0; i<rows; i++){ for (int j = 0; j<cols; j++){ if (i == plyrX && j == plyrY){ plyrX = i; plyrY = j; TextIO.put(PLAYER); //puts the player character at player co-ords } else{ if (maze[i][j] == '0') TextIO.putf("%c",WALL); //puts wall block if (maze[i][j] == '1') TextIO.putf("%c",PATH); //puts path block if (maze[i][j] == '2') { entX = i; entY = j; TextIO.putf("%c",ENTRANCE); //puts entrance character } if (maze[i][j] == '3') { exitX = i; //holds value of exit exitY = j; //co-ordinates TextIO.putf("%c",EXIT); //puts exit character } } } TextIO.putln(); } //end for loop } //end of loadMaze method /**redrawMaze method, method for redrawing the maze after each move. * */ public static void redrawMaze(){ TextIO.readFile("MazeGame.txt"); //now reads from the external MazeGame.txt file rows = TextIO.getInt(); //gets the number of rows from text file to create X dimensions cols = TextIO.getlnInt(); //gets number of columns from text file to create Y dimensions maze = new char[rows][cols]; //creates maze array of base type char with specified dimnensions //loop to process the array and read in values from the text file. for (int i = 0; i<rows; i++){ for (int j = 0; j<cols; j++){ maze[i][j] = TextIO.getChar(); } TextIO.getln(); } //end for loop TextIO.readStandardInput(); //closes MazeGame.txt file and reads from //standard input. //loop to process the array values and display as unicode characters for (int i = 0; i<rows; i++){ for (int j = 0; j<cols; j++){ if (i == plyrX && j == plyrY){ plyrX = i; plyrY = j; TextIO.put(PLAYER); //puts the player character at player co-ords } else{ if (maze[i][j] == '0') TextIO.putf("%c",WALL); //puts wall block if (maze[i][j] == '1') TextIO.putf("%c",PATH); //puts path block if (maze[i][j] == '2') { entX = i; entY = j; TextIO.putf("%c",ENTRANCE); //puts entrance character } if (maze[i][j] == '3') { exitX = i; //holds value of exit exitY = j; //co-ordinates TextIO.putf("%c",EXIT); //puts exit character } } } TextIO.putln(); } //end for loop } //end redrawMaze method /**replay game method * */ public static void replayGame(){ c_plyrX = plyrX; c_plyrY = plyrY; TextIO.readFile("MazeGame.txt"); //now reads from the external MazeGame.txt file rows = TextIO.getInt(); //gets the number of rows from text file to create X dimensions cols = TextIO.getlnInt(); //gets number of columns from text file to create Y dimensions mazeCopy = new char[rows][cols]; //creates maze array of base type char with specified dimnensions //loop to process the array and read in values from the text file. for (int i = 0; i<rows; i++){ for (int j = 0; j<cols; j++){ mazeCopy[i][j] = TextIO.getChar(); } TextIO.getln(); } //end for loop TextIO.readStandardInput(); //closes MazeGame.txt file and reads from //standard input. //loop to process the array values and display as unicode characters for (int i = 0; i<rows; i++){ for (int j = 0; j<cols; j++){ if (i == c_plyrX && j == c_plyrY){ c_plyrX = i; c_plyrY = j; TextIO.put(PLAYER); //puts the player character at player co-ords } else{ if (mazeCopy[i][j] == '0') TextIO.putf("%c",WALL); //puts wall block if (mazeCopy[i][j] == '1') TextIO.putf("%c",PATH); //puts path block if (mazeCopy[i][j] == '2') { entX = i; entY = j; TextIO.putf("%c",ENTRANCE); //puts entrance character } if (mazeCopy[i][j] == '3') { exitX = i; //holds value of exit exitY = j; //co-ordinates TextIO.putf("%c",EXIT); //puts exit character } } } TextIO.putln(); } //end for loop } //end replayGame method /**plyrMoves method, method for moving the players character * around the maze. */ public static void plyrMoves(){ int nplyrX = plyrX; int nplyrY = plyrY; int pMoves; direction(); //UP if (dir == 'U' || dir == 'u'){ nplyrX = plyrX; nplyrY = plyrY; for(pMoves = 0; pMoves <= spaces; pMoves++){ if (maze[nplyrX][nplyrY] == '0'){ TextIO.putln("Invalid move, try again."); } else if (pMoves != spaces){ nplyrX =plyrX + 1; } else { plyrX = plyrX-spaces; c_plyrX = plyrX; movesTaken++; } } }//end UP if //DOWN if (dir == 'D' || dir == 'd'){ nplyrX = plyrX; nplyrY = plyrY; for (pMoves = 0; pMoves <= spaces; pMoves ++){ if (maze[nplyrX][nplyrY] == '0'){ TextIO.putln("Invalid move, try again"); } else if (pMoves != spaces){ nplyrX = plyrX+1; } else{ plyrX = plyrX+spaces; c_plyrX = plyrX; movesTaken++; } } } //end DOWN if //LEFT if (dir == 'L' || dir =='l'){ nplyrX = plyrX; nplyrY = plyrY; for (pMoves = 0; pMoves <= spaces; pMoves++){ if (maze[nplyrX][nplyrY] == '0'){ TextIO.putln("Invalid move, try again"); } else if (pMoves != spaces){ nplyrY = plyrY + 1; } else{ plyrY = plyrY-spaces; c_plyrY = plyrY; movesTaken++; } } } //end LEFT if //RIGHT if (dir == 'R' || dir == 'r'){ nplyrX = plyrX; nplyrY = plyrY; for (pMoves = 0; pMoves <= spaces; pMoves++){ if (maze[nplyrX][nplyrY] == '0'){ TextIO.putln("Invalid move, try again."); } else if (pMoves != spaces){ nplyrY += 1; } else{ plyrY = plyrY+spaces; c_plyrY = plyrY; movesTaken++; } } } //end RIGHT if //prints message if player escapes from the maze. if (maze[plyrX][plyrY] == '3'){ TextIO.putln("****Congratulations****"); TextIO.putln(); TextIO.putln("You have escaped from the maze."); TextIO.putln(); userMenu(); } else{ movesTaken++; redrawMaze(); plyrMoves(); } } //end of plyrMoves method /**direction, method * */ public static char direction(){ TextIO.putln("Enter the direction you wish to move in and the distance"); TextIO.putln("i.e D3 = move down 3 spaces"); TextIO.putln("U - Up, D - Down, L - Left, R - Right: "); dir = TextIO.getChar(); if (dir =='U' || dir == 'D' || dir == 'L' || dir == 'R' || dir == 'u' || dir == 'd' || dir == 'l' || dir == 'r'){ spacesMoved(); } else{ loadMaze(); TextIO.putln("Invalid direction!"); TextIO.put("Direction must be one of U, D, L or R"); direction(); } return dir; //returns the value of dir (direction) } //end direction method /**spaces method, gets the amount of spaces the user wants to move * */ public static int spacesMoved(){ TextIO.putln(" "); spaces = TextIO.getlnInt(); if (spaces <= 0){ loadMaze(); TextIO.put("Invalid amount of spaces, try again"); spacesMoved(); } return spaces; } //end spacesMoved method } //end of MazeGame class

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  • Complete Guide to Networking Windows 7 with XP and Vista

    - by Mysticgeek
    Since there are three versions of Windows out in the field these days, chances are you need to share data between them. Today we show how to get each version to be share files and printers with one another. In a perfect world, getting your computers with different Microsoft operating systems to network would be as easy as clicking a button. With the Windows 7 Homegroup feature, it’s almost that easy. However, getting all three of them to communicate with each other can be a bit of a challenge. Today we’ve put together a guide that will help you share files and printers in whatever scenario of the three versions you might encounter on your home network. Sharing Between Windows 7 and XP The most common scenario you’re probably going to run into is sharing between Windows 7 and XP.  Essentially you’ll want to make sure both machines are part of the same workgroup, set up the correct sharing settings, and making sure network discovery is enabled on Windows 7. The biggest problem you may run into is finding the correct printer drivers for both versions of Windows. Share Files and Printers Between Windows 7 & XP  Map a Network Drive Another method of sharing data between XP and Windows 7 is mapping a network drive. If you don’t need to share a printer and only want to share a drive, then you can just map an XP drive to Windows 7. Although it might sound complicated, the process is not bad. The trickiest part is making sure you add the appropriate local user. This will allow you to share the contents of an XP drive to your Windows 7 computer. Map a Network Drive from XP to Windows 7 Sharing between Vista and Windows 7 Another scenario you might run into is having to share files and printers between a Vista and Windows 7 machine. The process is a bit easier than sharing between XP and Windows 7, but takes a bit of work. The Homegroup feature isn’t compatible with Vista, so we need to go through a few different steps. Depending on what your printer is, sharing it should be easier as Vista and Windows 7 do a much better job of automatically locating the drivers. How to Share Files and Printers Between Windows 7 and Vista Sharing between Vista and XP When Windows Vista came out, hardware requirements were intensive, drivers weren’t ready, and sharing between them was complicated due to the new Vista structure. The sharing process is pretty straight-forward if you’re not using password protection…as you just need to drop what you want to share into the Vista Public folder. On the other hand, sharing with password protection becomes a bit more difficult. Basically you need to add a user and set up sharing on the XP machine. But once again, we have a complete tutorial for that situation. Share Files and Folders Between Vista and XP Machines Sharing Between Windows 7 with Homegroup If you have one or more Windows 7 machine, sharing files and devices becomes extremely easy with the Homegroup feature. It’s as simple as creating a Homegroup on on machine then joining the other to it. It allows you to stream media, control what data is shared, and can also be password protected. If you don’t want to make your Windows 7 machines part of the same Homegroup, you can still share files through the Public Folder, and setup a printer to be shared as well.   Use the Homegroup Feature in Windows 7 to Share Printers and Files Create a Homegroup & Join a New Computer To It Change which Files are Shared in a Homegroup Windows Home Server If you want an ultimate setup that creates a centralized location to share files between all systems on your home network, regardless of the operating system, then set up a Windows Home Server. It allows you to centralize your important documents and digital media files on one box and provides easy access to data and the ability to stream media to other machines on your network. Not only that, but it provides easy backup of all your machines to the server, in case disaster strikes. How to Install and Setup Windows Home Server How to Manage Shared Folders on Windows Home Server Conclusion The biggest annoyance is dealing with printers that have a different set of drivers for each OS. There is no real easy way to solve this problem. Our best advice is to try to connect it to one machine, and if the drivers won’t work, hook it up to the other computer and see if that works. Each printer manufacturer is different, and Windows doesn’t always automatically install the correct drivers for the device. We hope this guide helps you share your data between whichever Microsoft OS scenario you might run into! Here are some other articles that will help you accomplish your home networking needs: Share a Printer on a Home Network from Vista or XP to Windows 7 How to Share a Folder the XP Way in Windows Vista Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Delete Wrong AutoComplete Entries in Windows Vista MailSvchost Viewer Shows Exactly What Each svchost.exe Instance is DoingFixing "BOOTMGR is missing" Error While Trying to Boot Windows VistaShow Hidden Files and Folders in Windows 7 or VistaAdd Color Coding to Windows 7 Media Center Program Guide TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Icelandic Volcano Webcams Open Multiple Links At One Go NachoFoto Searches Images in Real-time Office 2010 Product Guides Google Maps Place marks – Pizza, Guns or Strip Clubs Monitor Applications With Kiwi

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  • Remove Office 2010 Beta and Reinstall Office 2007

    - by Matthew Guay
    Have you tried out the Office 2010 beta, but want to go back to Office 2007?  Here’s a step-by-step tutorial on how to remove your Office 2010 beta and reinstall your Office 2007. The Office 2010 beta will expire on October 31, 2010, at which time you may see a dialog like the one below.  At that time, you will need to either upgrade to the final release of Office 2010, or reinstall your previous version of Office. Our computer was running the Office 2010 Home and Business Click to Run beta, and after uninstalling it we reinstalled Office 2007 Home and Student.  This was a Windows Vista computer, but the process will be exactly the same on Windows XP, Vista, or Windows 7.  Additionally, the process to reinstall Office 2007 will be exactly the same regardless of the edition of Office 2007 you’re using. However, please note that if you are running a different edition of Office 2010, especially the 64 bit version, the process may be slightly different.  We will cover this scenario in another article. Remove Office 2010 Click to Run Beta: To remove Office 2010 Click to Run Beta, open Control Panel and select Uninstall a Program. If your computer is running Windows 7, enter “Uninstall a program” in your Start menu search. Scroll down, select “Microsoft Office Click-to-Run 2010 (Beta)”, and click the Uninstall button on the toolbar.  Note that there will be two entries for Office, so make sure to select the “Click-to-Run” entry. This will automatically remove all of Office 2010 and its components.  Click Yes to confirm you want to remove it. Office 2010 beta uninstalled fairly quickly, and a reboot will be required.  Once your computer is rebooted, Office 2010 will be entirely removed. Reinstall Office 2007 Now, you’re to the easy part.  Simply insert your Office 2007 CD, and it should automatically startup the setup.  If not, open Computer and double-click on your CD drive.   Now, double-click on setup.exe to start the installation. Enter your product key, and click Continue…   Click Install Now, or click Customize if you want to change the default installation settings. Wait while Office 2007 installs…it takes around 15 to 20 minutes in our experience.  Once it’s finished  close the installer. Now, open one of the Office applications.  A popup will open asking you to activate Office.  Make sure you’re connected to the internet, and click next; otherwise, you can select to activate over the phone if you do not have internet access. This should only take a minute, and Office 2007 will be activated and ready to run. Everything should work just as it did before you installed Office 2010.  Enjoy! Office Updates Make sure to install the latest updates for Office 2007, as these are not included in your disk.  Check Windows Update (search for Windows Update in the Start menu search), and install all of the available updates for Office 2007, including Service Pack 2. Conclusion This is a great way to keep using Office even if you don’t decide to purchase Office 2010 after it is released.  Additionally, if you’re were using another version of Office, such as Office 2003, then reinstall it as normal after following the steps to remove Office 2010. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Add or Remove Apps from the Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010 SuiteDetect and Repair Applications In Microsoft Office 2007Save and Restore Your Microsoft Office SettingsDisable Office 2010 Beta Send-a-Smile from StartupHow to See the About Dialog and Version Information in Office 2007 TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 If Web Browsers Were Modes of Transportation Google Translate (for animals) Out of 100 Tweeters Roadkill’s Scan Port scans for open ports Out of band Security Update for Internet Explorer 7 Cool Looking Screensavers for Windows

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  • Connecting to DB2 from SSIS

    - by Christopher House
    The project I'm currently working on involves moving various pieces of data from a legacy DB2 environment to some SQL Server and flat file locations.  Most of the data flows are real time, so they were a natural fit for the client's MQSeries on their iSeries servers and BizTalk to handle the messaging.  Some of the data flows, however, are daily batch type transmissions.  For the daily batch transmissions, it was decided that we'd use SSIS to pull the data direct from DB2 to either a SQL Server or flat file.  I'm not at all an SSIS guy, I've done a bit here and there, but mainly for situations were we needed to move data from a dev environment to QA, mostly informal stuff like that.  And, as much as I'm not an SSIS guy, I'm even less a DB2/iSeries guy.  Prior to this engagement, my knowledge of DB2 was limited to the fact that it's an IBM product and that it was probably a DBMS flatform (that's what the DB in DB2 means, right?).   One of my first goals when I came onto this project was to develop of POC SSIS package to pull some data from DB2 and dump it to a flat file.  It sounded like a pretty straight forward task.  As always, the devil is in the details.  Configuring the DB2 connection manager took a bit of trial and error.  As such, I thought I'd post my experiences here in hopes that they might save someone the efforts I went through.  That being said, please keep in mind, as I pointed out, I'm not at all a DB2 guy, so my terminology and explanations may not be 100% spot on. Before you get started, you need to figure out how you're going to connect to DB2.  From the research I did, it looks like there are a few options.  IBM has both an OLE DB and .Net data provider which can be found here.  I installed their client access tools and tried to use both the .Net and OLE DB providers but I received an error message from both when attempting to connect to the iSeries that indicated I needed a license for a product called DB2 Connect.  I inquired with one of my client's iSeries resources about a license for this product and it appears they didn't have one, so that meant the IBM drivers were out.  The other option that I found quite a bit of discussion around was Microsoft's OLE DB Provider for DB2.  This driver is part of the feature pack for SQL Server 2008 Enterprise Edition and can be downloaded here. As it turns out, I already had Microsoft's driver installed on my dev VM, which stuck me as odd since I hadn't installed it.  I discovered that the driver is installed with the BizTalk adapter pack for host systems, which was also installed on my VM.  However, it looks like the version used by the adapter pack is newer than the version provided in the SQL Server feature pack.   Once you get the driver installed, create a connection manager in your package just like you normally would and select the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 from the list of available drivers. After you select the driver, you'll need to enter in your host name, login credentials and initial catalog. A couple of things to note here.  First, the Initial catalog needs to be the same as your host name.  Not sure why that is, but trust me, it just does.  Second, for credentials, in my environment, we're using what the client's iSeries people refer to as "profiles".  I guess this is similar to SQL auth in the SQL Server world.  In other words, they've given me a username and password for connecting to DB, so I've entered it here. Next, click the Data Links button.  On the Data Links screen, enter your package collection on the first tab. Package collection is one of those DB2 concepts I'm still trying to figure out.  From the little bit I've read, packages are used to control SQL compilation and each DB2 connection needs one.  The package collection, I believe, controls where your package is created.  One of the iSeries folks I've been working with told me that I should always use QGPL for my package collection, as QGPL is "general purpose" and doesn't require any additional authority. Next click the ellipsis next to the Network drop-down.  Here you'll want to enter your host name again. Again, not sure why you need to do this, but trust me, my connection wouldn't work until I entered my hostname here. Finally, go to the Advanced tab, select your DBMS platform and check Process binary as character. My environment is DB2 on the iSeries and iSeries is the replacement for AS/400, so I selected DB2/AS400 for my platform.  Process binary as character was necessary to handle some of the DB2 data types.  I had a few columns that showed all their data as "System.Byte[]".  Checking Process binary as character resolved this. At this point, you should be good to go.  You can go back to the Connection tab on the Data Links dialog to perform a couple of tests to validate your configuration.  The Test Connection button is obvious, this just verifies you can connect to the host using the configuration data you've entered.  The Packages button will attempt to connect to the host and create the packages required to execute queries. This isn't meant to be a comprehensive look SSIS and DB2, these are just some of the notes I've come up with since I've started working with DB2 and SSIS.  I'm sure as I continue developing my packages, I'll find more quirks and will post them here.

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  • Programmatically use a server as the Build Server for multiple Project Collections

    Important: With this post you create an unsupported scenario by Microsoft. It will break your support for this server with Microsoft. So handle with care. I am the administrator an a TFS environment with a lot of Project Collections. In the supported configuration of Microsoft 2010 you need one Build Controller per Project Collection, and it is not supported to have multiple Build Controllers installed. Jim Lamb created a post how you can modify your system to change this behaviour. But since I have so many Project Collections, I automated this with the API of TFS. When you install a new build server via the UI, you do the following steps Register the build service (with this you hook the windows server into the build server environment) Add a new build controller Add a new build agent So in pseudo code, the code would look like foreach (projectCollection in GetAllProjectCollections) {       CreateNewWindowsService();       RegisterService();       AddNewController();       AddNewAgent(); } The following code fragements show you the most important parts of the method implementations. Attached is the full project. CreateNewWindowsService We create a new windows service with the SC command via the Diagnostics.Process class:             var pi = new ProcessStartInfo("sc.exe")                         {                             Arguments =                                 string.Format(                                     "create \"{0}\" start= auto binpath= \"C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Team Foundation Server 2010\\Tools\\TfsBuildServiceHost.exe              /NamedInstance:{0}\" DisplayName= \"Visual Studio Team Foundation Build Service Host ({1})\"",                                     serviceHostName, tpcName)                         };            Process.Start(pi);             pi.Arguments = string.Format("failure {0} reset= 86400 actions= restart/60000", serviceHostName);            Process.Start(pi); RegisterService The trick in this method is that we set the NamedInstance static property. This property is Internal, so we need to set it through reflection. To get information on these you need nice Microsoft friends and the .Net reflector .             // Indicate which build service host instance we are using            typeof(BuildServiceHostUtilities).Assembly.GetType("Microsoft.TeamFoundation.Build.Config.BuildServiceHostProcess").InvokeMember("NamedInstance",              System.Reflection.BindingFlags.NonPublic | System.Reflection.BindingFlags.SetProperty | System.Reflection.BindingFlags.Static, null, null, new object[] { serviceName });             // Create the build service host            serviceHost = buildServer.CreateBuildServiceHost(serviceName, endPoint);            serviceHost.Save();             // Register the build service host            BuildServiceHostUtilities.Register(serviceHost, user, password); AddNewController and AddNewAgent Once you have the BuildServerHost, the rest is pretty straightforward. There are methods on the BuildServerHost to modify the controllers and the agents                 controller = serviceHost.CreateBuildController(controllerName);                 agent = controller.ServiceHost.CreateBuildAgent(agentName, buildDirectory, controller);                controller.AddBuildAgent(agent); You have now seen the highlights of the application. If you need it and want to have sample information when you work in this area, download the app TFS2010_RegisterBuildServerToTPCs

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  • repair broken packages-"dpkg: error: conflicting actions -f (--field) and -r (--remove)"

    - by yinon
    Ubuntu 12.04 LTS. if more information will be needed, tell me and'll give. the main problem is: tzach@tzach-pc:~$ sudo apt-get install docky [sudo] password for tzach: Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done docky is already the newest version. You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these: The following packages have unmet dependencies: ca-certificates-java : Depends: openjdk-6-jre-headless (>= 6b16-1.6.1-2) but it is not going to be installed or java6-runtime-headless openjdk-7-jre-lib : Depends: openjdk-7-jre-headless (>= 7~b130~pre0) but it is not going to be installed E: Unmet dependencies. Try 'apt-get -f install' with no packages (or specify a solution). tzach@tzach-pc:~$ and also: tzach@tzach-pc:~$ sudo apt-get upgrade Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these. **The following packages have unmet dependencies: ca-certificates-java : Depends: openjdk-6-jre-headless (>= 6b16-1.6.1-2) but it is not installed or java6-runtime-headless openjdk-7-jre-lib : Depends: openjdk-7-jre-headless (>= 7~b130~pre0) but it is not installed E: Unmet dependencies. Try using ******* so we tryied the guide here in messege #9: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=947124 we run all the first 4 commands and the last one-"sudo apt-get autoremove" gave us: tzach@tzach-pc:~$ sudo apt-get autoremove Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these. The following packages have unmet dependencies: **ca-certificates-java** : Depends: openjdk-6-jre-headless (>= 6b16-1.6.1-2) but it is not installed or java6-runtime-headless **openjdk-7-jre-lib** : Depends: openjdk-7-jre-headless (>= 7~b130~pre0) but it is not installed E: Unmet dependencies. Try using -f. so we run the last command twice: sudo dpkg --remove -force --force-remove-reinstreq ca-certificates-java and sudo dpkg --remove -force --force-remove-reinstreq openjdk-7-jre-lib but both of them gives: tzach@tzach-pc:~$ sudo dpkg --remove -force --force-remove-reinstreq ca-certificates-java [sudo] password for tzach: dpkg: error: conflicting actions -f (--field) and -r (--remove) Type dpkg --help for help about installing and deinstalling packages [*]; Use `dselect' or `aptitude' for user-friendly package management; Type dpkg -Dhelp for a list of dpkg debug flag values; Type dpkg --force-help for a list of forcing options; Type dpkg-deb --help for help about manipulating *.deb files; Options marked [*] produce a lot of output - pipe it through `less' or `more' ! EDIT FOR green7-output of "sudo apt-get -f install": tzach@tzach-pc:~$ sudo apt-get -f install [sudo] password for tzach: Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done Correcting dependencies... Done The following extra packages will be installed: icedtea-7-jre-cacao icedtea-7-jre-jamvm java-common openjdk-7-jre-headless tzdata-java Suggested packages: default-jre equivs sun-java6-fonts ttf-dejavu-extra fonts-ipafont-gothic fonts-ipafont-mincho ttf-telugu-fonts ttf-oriya-fonts ttf-kannada-fonts ttf-bengali-fonts The following packages will be REMOVED: ttf-mscorefonts-installer The following NEW packages will be installed: icedtea-7-jre-cacao icedtea-7-jre-jamvm java-common openjdk-7-jre-headless tzdata-java 0 upgraded, 5 newly installed, 1 to remove and 355 not upgraded. 5 not fully installed or removed. Need to get 0 B/29.6 MB of archives. After this operation, 88.5 MB of additional disk space will be used. Do you want to continue [Y/n]? y debconf: DbDriver "config": /var/cache/debconf/config.dat is locked by another process: Resource temporarily unavailable dpkg: warning: there's no installed package matching ttf-mscorefonts-installer:amd64 Setting up tzdata (2012e-0ubuntu0.12.04) ... debconf: DbDriver "config": /var/cache/debconf/config.dat is locked by another process: Resource temporarily unavailable dpkg: error processing tzdata (--configure): subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 1 No apport report written because MaxReports is reached already Errors were encountered while processing: tzdata E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1) EDIT2 FOR green7: tzach@tzach-pc:~$ sudo apt-get remove --purge tzdata [sudo] password for tzach: Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these: The following packages have unmet dependencies: ca-certificates-java : Depends: openjdk-6-jre-headless (>= 6b16-1.6.1-2) but it is not going to be installed or java6-runtime-headless libc6 : Depends: tzdata but it is not going to be installed libc6:i386 : Depends: tzdata:i386 libical0 : Depends: tzdata but it is not going to be installed openjdk-7-jre-lib : Depends: openjdk-7-jre-headless (>= 7~b130~pre0) but it is not going to be installed python-dateutil : Depends: tzdata but it is not going to be installed ubuntu-minimal : Depends: tzdata but it is not going to be installed util-linux : Depends: tzdata (>= 2006c-2) but it is not going to be installed E: Unmet dependencies. Try 'apt-get -f install' with no packages (or specify a solution). EDIT3 FOR green7: tzach@tzach-pc:~$ sudo apt-get install openjdk-7-jre-headless [sudo] password for tzach: Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these: The following packages have unmet dependencies: openjdk-7-jre-headless : Depends: tzdata-java but it is not going to be installed Depends: java-common (>= 0.28) but it is not going to be installed Recommends: icedtea-7-jre-cacao (= 7~u3-2.1.1~pre1-1ubuntu3) but it is not going to be installed Recommends: icedtea-7-jre-jamvm (= 7~u3-2.1.1~pre1-1ubuntu3) but it is not going to be installed E: Unmet dependencies. Try 'apt-get -f install' with no packages (or specify a solution). some things in the text also supposed to be bolded. but not critic (: Thanks for the editing! Thanks a lot for your assistance.

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  • The Complementary Roles of PLM and PIM

    - by Ulf Köster
    Oracle Product Value Chain Solutions (aka Enterprise PLM Solutions) are a comprehensive set of product management solutions that work together to provide Oracle customers with a broad array of capabilities to manage all aspects of product life: innovation, design, launch, and supply chain / commercialization processes beyond the capabilities and boundaries of traditional engineering-focused Product Lifecycle Management applications. They support companies with an integrated managed view across the product value chain: From Lab to Launch, From Farm to Fork, From Concept to Product to Customer, From Product Innovation to Product Design and Product Commercialization. Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) represents a broad suite of software solutions to improve product-oriented business processes and data. PLM success stories prove that PLM helps companies improve time to market, increase product-related revenue, reduce product costs, reduce internal costs and improve product quality. As a maturing suite of enterprise solutions, PLM is still evolving to realize the promise it can provide across all facets of a business and all phases of the product lifecycle. The vision for PLM includes everything from gathering early requirements for a product through multiple stages of the product lifecycle from product design, through commercialization and eventual product retirement or replacement. In discrete or process industries, PLM is typically more focused on Product Definition as items with respect to the technical view of a material or part, including specifications, bills of material and manufacturing data. With Agile PLM, this is specifically related to capabilities addressing Product Collaboration, Governance and Compliance, Product Quality Management, Product Cost Management and Engineering Collaboration. PLM today is mainly addressing key requirements in the early product lifecycle, in engineering changes or in the “innovation cycle”, and primarily adds value related to product design, development, launch and engineering change process. In short, PLM is the master for Product Definition, wherever manufacturing takes place. Product Information Management (PIM) is a product suite that has evolved in parallel to PLM. Product Information Management (PIM) can extend the value of PLM implementations by providing complementary tools and capabilities. More relevant in the area of Product Commercialization, the vision for PIM is to manage product information throughout an enterprise and supply chain to improve product-related knowledge management, information sharing and synchronization from multiple data sources. PIM success stories have shown the ability to provide multiple benefits, with particular emphasis on reducing information complexity and information management costs. Product Information in PIM is typically treated as the commercial view of a material or part, including sales and marketing information and categorization. PIM collects information from multiple manufacturing sites and multiple suppliers into its repository, but also provides integration tools to push the information back out to the other systems, serving as an active central repository with the aim to provide a holistic view on any product sold by a company (hence the name “Product Hub”). In short, PIM is the master of commercial Product Information. So PIM is quickly becoming mandatory because of its value in optimizing multichannel selling processes and relationships with customers, as you can see from the following table: Viewpoint PLM Current State PIM Key Benefits PIM adds to PLM Product Lifecycle Primarily R&D Front end Innovation Cycle Change process Primarily commercial / transactional state of lifecycle Provides a seamless information flow from design and manufacturing through the ultimate selling and servicing of products Data Primarily focused on “item” vs. “product” data Product structures Specifications Technical information Repository for all product information. Reaches out to entire enterprise and its various silos of product information and descriptions Provides a “trusted source” of accurate product information to the internal organization and trading partners Data Lifecycle Repository for all design iterations Historical information Released, current information, with version management and time stamping Provides a single location to track and audit historical product information Communication PLM release finished product to ERP PLM is the master for Product Definition Captures information from disparate sources, including in-house data stores Recognizes the reality of today’s data “mess” across information silos Provides the ability to package product information to its audience in the desired, relevant format to meet their exacting business requirements Departmental R&D Manufacturing Quality Compliance Procurement Strategic Marketing Focus on Marketing and Sales Gathering information from other Departments, multiple sites, multiple suppliers A singular enterprise solution that leverages existing information silos and data stores Supply Chain Multi-site internal collaboration Supplier collaboration Customer collaboration Works with customers, exchanges / data pools, and trading partners to provide relevant product information packaged the way the customer desires Provides ability to provide trading partners and internal customers with information in a manner they desire, continuously Tools Data Management Collaboration Innovation Management Cleansing Synchronization Hub functions Consistent, clean and complete commercial product information The goals of both PLM and PIM, put simply, are to help companies make more profit from their products. PLM and PIM solutions can be easily added as they share some of the same goals, while coming from two different perspectives: the definition of the product and the commercialization of the product. Both can serve as a form of product “system of record”, but take different approaches to delivering value. Oracle Product Value Chain solutions offer rich new strategies for executives to collectively leverage Agile PLM, Product Data Hub, together with Enterprise Data Quality for Products, and other industry leading Oracle applications to achieve further incremental value, like Oracle Innovation Management. This is unique on the market today.

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  • Slow boot on Ubuntu 12.04

    - by Hailwood
    My Ubuntu is booting really slow (Windows is booting faster...). I am using Ubuntu a Dell Inspiron 1545 Pentium(R) Dual-Core CPU T4300 @ 2.10GHz, 4GB Ram, 500GB HDD running Ubuntu 12.04 with gnome-shell 3.4.1. After running dmesg the culprit seems to be this section, in particular the last three lines: [26.557659] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready [26.565414] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready [27.355355] Console: switching to colour frame buffer device 170x48 [27.362346] fb0: radeondrmfb frame buffer device [27.362347] drm: registered panic notifier [27.362357] [drm] Initialized radeon 2.12.0 20080528 for 0000:01:00.0 on minor 0 [27.617435] init: udev-fallback-graphics main process (1049) terminated with status 1 [30.064481] init: plymouth-stop pre-start process (1500) terminated with status 1 [51.708241] CE: hpet increased min_delta_ns to 20113 nsec [59.448029] eth2: no IPv6 routers present But I have no idea how to start debugging this. sudo lshw -C video $ sudo lshw -C video *-display description: VGA compatible controller product: RV710 [Mobility Radeon HD 4300 Series] vendor: Hynix Semiconductor (Hyundai Electronics) physical id: 0 bus info: pci@0000:01:00.0 version: 00 width: 32 bits clock: 33MHz capabilities: pm pciexpress msi vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom configuration: driver=fglrx_pci latency=0 resources: irq:48 memory:e0000000-efffffff ioport:de00(size=256) memory:f6df0000-f6dfffff memory:f6d00000-f6d1ffff After loading the propriety driver my new dmesg log is below (starting from the first major time gap): [2.983741] EXT4-fs (sda6): mounted filesystem with ordered data mode. Opts: (null) [25.094327] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready [25.119737] udevd[520]: starting version 175 [25.167086] lp: driver loaded but no devices found [25.215341] fglrx: module license 'Proprietary. (C) 2002 - ATI Technologies, Starnberg, GERMANY' taints kernel. [25.215345] Disabling lock debugging due to kernel taint [25.231924] wmi: Mapper loaded [25.318414] lib80211: common routines for IEEE802.11 drivers [25.318418] lib80211_crypt: registered algorithm 'NULL' [25.331631] [fglrx] Maximum main memory to use for locked dma buffers: 3789 MBytes. [25.332095] [fglrx] vendor: 1002 device: 9552 count: 1 [25.334206] [fglrx] ioport: bar 1, base 0xde00, size: 0x100 [25.334229] pci 0000:01:00.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ 16 [25.334235] pci 0000:01:00.0: setting latency timer to 64 [25.337109] [fglrx] Kernel PAT support is enabled [25.337140] [fglrx] module loaded - fglrx 8.96.4 [Mar 12 2012] with 1 minors [25.342803] Adding 4189180k swap on /dev/sda7. Priority:-1 extents:1 across:4189180k [25.364031] type=1400 audit(1338241723.027:2): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/sbin/dhclient" pid=606 comm="apparmor_parser" [25.364491] type=1400 audit(1338241723.031:3): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/NetworkManager/nm-dhcp-client.action" pid=606 comm="apparmor_parser" [25.364760] type=1400 audit(1338241723.031:4): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/connman/scripts/dhclient-script" pid=606 comm="apparmor_parser" [25.394328] wl 0000:0c:00.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 17 (level, low) -> IRQ 17 [25.394343] wl 0000:0c:00.0: setting latency timer to 64 [25.415531] acpi device:36: registered as cooling_device2 [25.416688] input: Video Bus as /devices/LNXSYSTM:00/device:00/PNP0A03:00/device:34/LNXVIDEO:00/input/input6 [25.416795] ACPI: Video Device [VID] (multi-head: yes rom: no post: no) [25.416865] [Firmware Bug]: Duplicate ACPI video bus devices for the same VGA controller, please try module parameter "video.allow_duplicates=1"if the current driver doesn't work. [25.425133] lib80211_crypt: registered algorithm 'TKIP' [25.448058] snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1b.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 21 (level, low) -> IRQ 21 [25.448321] snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1b.0: irq 47 for MSI/MSI-X [25.448353] snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1b.0: setting latency timer to 64 [25.738867] eth1: Broadcom BCM4315 802.11 Hybrid Wireless Controller 5.100.82.38 [25.761213] input: HDA Intel Mic as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1b.0/sound/card0/input7 [25.761406] input: HDA Intel Headphone as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1b.0/sound/card0/input8 [25.783432] dcdbas dcdbas: Dell Systems Management Base Driver (version 5.6.0-3.2) [25.908318] EXT4-fs (sda6): re-mounted. Opts: errors=remount-ro [25.928155] input: Dell WMI hotkeys as /devices/virtual/input/input9 [25.960561] udevd[543]: renamed network interface eth1 to eth2 [26.285688] init: failsafe main process (835) killed by TERM signal [26.396426] input: PS/2 Mouse as /devices/platform/i8042/serio2/input/input10 [26.423108] input: AlpsPS/2 ALPS GlidePoint as /devices/platform/i8042/serio2/input/input11 [26.511297] Bluetooth: Core ver 2.16 [26.511383] NET: Registered protocol family 31 [26.511385] Bluetooth: HCI device and connection manager initialized [26.511388] Bluetooth: HCI socket layer initialized [26.511391] Bluetooth: L2CAP socket layer initialized [26.512079] Bluetooth: SCO socket layer initialized [26.530164] Bluetooth: BNEP (Ethernet Emulation) ver 1.3 [26.530168] Bluetooth: BNEP filters: protocol multicast [26.553893] type=1400 audit(1338241724.219:5): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_replace" name="/sbin/dhclient" pid=928 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.554860] Bluetooth: RFCOMM TTY layer initialized [26.554866] Bluetooth: RFCOMM socket layer initialized [26.554868] Bluetooth: RFCOMM ver 1.11 [26.557910] type=1400 audit(1338241724.223:6): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/lightdm/lightdm/lightdm-guest-session-wrapper" pid=927 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.559166] type=1400 audit(1338241724.223:7): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_replace" name="/usr/lib/NetworkManager/nm-dhcp-client.action" pid=928 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.559574] type=1400 audit(1338241724.223:8): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_replace" name="/usr/lib/connman/scripts/dhclient-script" pid=928 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.575519] type=1400 audit(1338241724.239:9): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/telepathy/mission-control-5" pid=931 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.581100] type=1400 audit(1338241724.247:10): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/lib/telepathy/telepathy-*" pid=931 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.582794] type=1400 audit(1338241724.247:11): apparmor="STATUS" operation="profile_load" name="/usr/bin/evince" pid=929 comm="apparmor_parser" [26.605672] ppdev: user-space parallel port driver [27.592475] sky2 0000:09:00.0: eth0: enabling interface [27.604329] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready [27.606962] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready [27.852509] vesafb: mode is 1024x768x32, linelength=4096, pages=0 [27.852513] vesafb: scrolling: redraw [27.852515] vesafb: Truecolor: size=0:8:8:8, shift=0:16:8:0 [27.852523] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,400000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852527] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,200000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852531] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,100000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852534] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,80000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852538] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,40000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852541] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,20000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852544] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,10000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852548] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,8000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852551] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,4000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852554] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,2000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.852558] mtrr: type mismatch for e0000000,1000 old: write-back new: write-combining [27.853154] vesafb: framebuffer at 0xe0000000, mapped to 0xffffc90005580000, using 3072k, total 3072k [27.853405] Console: switching to colour frame buffer device 128x48 [27.853426] fb0: VESA VGA frame buffer device [28.539800] fglrx_pci 0000:01:00.0: irq 48 for MSI/MSI-X [28.540552] [fglrx] Firegl kernel thread PID: 1168 [28.540679] [fglrx] Firegl kernel thread PID: 1169 [28.540789] [fglrx] Firegl kernel thread PID: 1170 [28.540932] [fglrx] IRQ 48 Enabled [29.845620] [fglrx] Gart USWC size:1236 M. [29.845624] [fglrx] Gart cacheable size:489 M. [29.845629] [fglrx] Reserved FB block: Shared offset:0, size:1000000 [29.845632] [fglrx] Reserved FB block: Unshared offset:fc21000, size:3df000 [29.845635] [fglrx] Reserved FB block: Unshared offset:1fffb000, size:5000 [59.700023] eth2: no IPv6 routers present

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  • Part 2&ndash;Load Testing In The Cloud

    - by Tarun Arora
    Welcome to Part 2, In Part 1 we discussed the advantages of creating a Test Rig in the cloud, the Azure edge and the Test Rig Topology we want to get to. In Part 2, Let’s start by understanding the components of Azure we’ll be making use of followed by manually putting them together to create the test rig, so… let’s get down dirty start setting up the Test Rig.  What Components of Azure will I be using for building the Test Rig in the Cloud? To run the Test Agents we’ll make use of Windows Azure Compute and to enable communication between Test Controller and Test Agents we’ll make use of Windows Azure Connect.  Azure Connect The Test Controller is on premise and the Test Agents are in the cloud (How will they talk?). To enable communication between the two, we’ll make use of Windows Azure Connect. With Windows Azure Connect, you can use a simple user interface to configure IPsec protected connections between computers or virtual machines (VMs) in your organization’s network, and roles running in Windows Azure. With this you can now join Windows Azure role instances to your domain, so that you can use your existing methods for domain authentication, name resolution, or other domain-wide maintenance actions. For more details refer to an overview of Windows Azure connect. A very useful video explaining everything you wanted to know about Windows Azure connect.  Azure Compute Windows Azure compute provides developers a platform to host and manage applications in Microsoft’s data centres across the globe. A Windows Azure application is built from one or more components called ‘roles.’ Roles come in three different types: Web role, Worker role, and Virtual Machine (VM) role, we’ll be using the Worker role to set up the Test Agents. A very nice blog post discussing the difference between the 3 role types. Developers are free to use the .NET framework or other software that runs on Windows with the Worker role or Web role. Developers can also create applications using languages such as PHP and Java. More on Windows Azure Compute. Each Windows Azure compute instance represents a virtual server... Virtual Machine Size CPU Cores Memory Cost Per Hour Extra Small Shared 768 MB $0.04 Small 1 1.75 GB $0.12 Medium 2 3.50 GB $0.24 Large 4 7.00 GB $0.48 Extra Large 8 14.00 GB $0.96   You might want to review the Windows Azure Pricing FAQ. Let’s Get Started building the Test Rig… Configuration Machine Role Comments VM – 1 Domain Controller for Playpit.com On Premise VM – 2 TFS, Test Controller On Premise VM – 3 Test Agent Cloud   In this blog post I would assume that you have the domain, Team Foundation Server and Test Controller Installed and set up already. If not, please refer to the TFS 2010 Installation Guide and this walkthrough on MSDN to set up your Test Controller. You can also download a preconfigured TFS 2010 VM from Brian Keller's blog, Brian also has some great hands on Labs on TFS 2010 that you may want to explore. I. Lets start building VM – 3: The Test Agent Download the Windows Azure SDK and Tools Open Visual Studio and create a new Windows Azure Project using the Cloud Template                   Choose the Worker Role for reasons explained in the earlier post         The WorkerRole.cs implements the Run() and OnStart() methods, no code changes required. You should be able to compile the project and run it in the compute emulator (The compute emulator should have been installed as part of the Windows Azure Toolkit) on your local machine.                   We will only be making changes to WindowsAzureProject, open ServiceDefinition.csdef. Ensure that the vmsize is small (remember the cost chart above). Import the “Connect” module. I am importing the Connect module because I need to join the Worker role VM to the Playpit domain. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceDefinition name="WindowsAzureProject2" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceDefinition"> <WorkerRole name="WorkerRole1" vmsize="Small"> <Imports> <Import moduleName="Diagnostics" /> <Import moduleName="Connect"/> </Imports> </WorkerRole> </ServiceDefinition> Go to the ServiceConfiguration.Cloud.cscfg and note that settings with key ‘Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.%%%%’ have been added to the configuration file. This is because you decided to import the connect module. See the config below. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceConfiguration serviceName="WindowsAzureProject2" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceConfiguration" osFamily="1" osVersion="*"> <Role name="WorkerRole1"> <Instances count="1" /> <ConfigurationSettings> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Diagnostics.ConnectionString" value="UseDevelopmentStorage=true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.ActivationToken" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Refresh" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.WaitForConnectivity" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Upgrade" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.EnableDomainJoin" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainFQDN" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainControllerFQDN" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainAccountName" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainPassword" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainOU" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Administrators" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainSiteName" value="" /> </ConfigurationSettings> </Role> </ServiceConfiguration>             Let’s go step by step and understand all the highlighted parameters and where you can find the values for them.       osFamily – By default this is set to 1 (Windows Server 2008 SP2). Change this to 2 if you want the Windows Server 2008 R2 operating system. The Advantage of using osFamily = “2” is that you get Powershell 2.0 rather than Powershell 1.0. In Powershell 2.0 you could simply use “powershell -ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted ./myscript.ps1” and it will work while in Powershell 1.0 you will have to change the registry key by including the following in your command file “reg add HKLM\Software\Microsoft\PowerShell\1\ShellIds\Microsoft.PowerShell /v ExecutionPolicy /d Unrestricted /f” before you can execute any power shell. The other reason you might want to move to os2 is if you wanted IIS 7.5.       Activation Token – To enable communication between the on premise machine and the Windows Azure Worker role VM both need to have the same token. Log on to Windows Azure Management Portal, click on Connect, click on Get Activation Token, this should give you the activation token, copy the activation token to the clipboard and paste it in the configuration file. Note – Later in the blog I’ll be showing you how to install connect on the on premise machine.                       EnableDomainJoin – Set the value to true, ofcourse we want to join the on windows azure worker role VM to the domain.       DomainFQDN, DomainControllerFQDN, DomainAccountName, DomainPassword, DomainOU, Administrators – This information is specific to your domain. I have extracted this information from the ‘service manager’ and ‘Active Directory Users and Computers’. Also, i created a new Domain-OU namely ‘CloudInstances’ so all my cloud instances joined to my domain show up here, this is optional. You can encrypt the DomainPassword – refer to the instructions here. Or hold fire, I’ll be covering that when i come to certificates and encryption in the coming section.       Now once you have filled all this information up, the configuration file should look something like below, <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceConfiguration serviceName="WindowsAzureProject2" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceConfiguration" osFamily="2" osVersion="*"> <Role name="WorkerRole1"> <Instances count="1" /> <ConfigurationSettings> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Diagnostics.ConnectionString" value="UseDevelopmentStorage=true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.ActivationToken" value="45f55fea-f194-4fbc-b36e-25604faac784" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Refresh" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.WaitForConnectivity" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Upgrade" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.EnableDomainJoin" value="true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainFQDN" value="play.pit.com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainControllerFQDN" value="WIN-KUDQMQFGQOL.play.pit.com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainAccountName" value="playpit\Administrator" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainPassword" value="************************" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainOU" value="OU=CloudInstances, DC=Play, DC=Pit, DC=com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Administrators" value="Playpit\Administrator" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainSiteName" value="" /> </ConfigurationSettings> </Role> </ServiceConfiguration> Next we will be enabling the Remote Desktop module in to the ServiceDefinition.csdef, we could make changes manually or allow a beautiful wizard to help us make changes. I prefer the second option. So right click on the Windows Azure project and choose Publish       Now once you get the publish wizard, if you haven’t already you would be asked to import your Windows Azure subscription, this is simply the Msdn subscription activation key xml. Once you have done click Next to go to the Settings page and check ‘Enable Remote Desktop for all roles’.       As soon as you do that you get another pop up asking you the details for the user that you would be logging in with (make sure you enter a reasonable expiry date, you do not want the user account to expire today). Notice the more information tag at the bottom, click that to get access to the certificate section. See screen shot below.       From the drop down select the option to create a new certificate        In the pop up window enter the friendly name for your certificate. In my case I entered ‘WAC – Test Rig’ and click ok. This will create a new certificate for you. Click on the view button to see the certificate details. Do you see the Thumbprint, this is the value that will go in the config file (very important). Now click on the Copy to File button to copy the certificate, we will need to import the certificate to the windows Azure Management portal later. So, make sure you save it a safe location.                                Click Finish and enter details of the user you would like to create with permissions for remote desktop access, once you have entered the details on the ‘Remote desktop configuration’ screen click on Ok. From the Publish Windows Azure Wizard screen press Cancel. Cancel because we don’t want to publish the role just yet and Yes because we want to save all the changes in the config file.       Now if you go to the ServiceDefinition.csdef file you will see that the RemoteAccess and RemoteForwarder roles have been imported for you. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceDefinition name="WindowsAzureProject2" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceDefinition"> <WorkerRole name="WorkerRole1" vmsize="Small"> <Imports> <Import moduleName="Diagnostics" /> <Import moduleName="Connect" /> <Import moduleName="RemoteAccess" /> <Import moduleName="RemoteForwarder" /> </Imports> </WorkerRole> </ServiceDefinition> Now go to the ServiceConfiguration.Cloud.cscfg file and you see a whole bunch for setting “Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.%%%” values added for you. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceConfiguration serviceName="WindowsAzureProject2" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceConfiguration" osFamily="2" osVersion="*"> <Role name="WorkerRole1"> <Instances count="1" /> <ConfigurationSettings> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Diagnostics.ConnectionString" value="UseDevelopmentStorage=true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.ActivationToken" value="45f55fea-f194-4fbc-b36e-25604faac784" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Refresh" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.WaitForConnectivity" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Upgrade" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.EnableDomainJoin" value="true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainFQDN" value="play.pit.com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainControllerFQDN" value="WIN-KUDQMQFGQOL.play.pit.com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainAccountName" value="playpit\Administrator" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainPassword" value="************************" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainOU" value="OU=CloudInstances, DC=Play, DC=Pit, DC=com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Administrators" value="Playpit\Administrator" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainSiteName" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.Enabled" value="true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.AccountUsername" value="Administrator" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.AccountEncryptedPassword" value="MIIBnQYJKoZIhvcNAQcDoIIBjjCCAYoCAQAxggFOMIIBSgIBADAyMB4xHDAaBgNVBAMME1dpbmRvd 3MgQXp1cmUgVG9vbHMCEGa+B46voeO5T305N7TSG9QwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQAEggEABg4ol5Xol66Ip6QKLbAPWdmD4ae ADZ7aKj6fg4D+ATr0DXBllZHG5Umwf+84Sj2nsPeCyrg3ZDQuxrfhSbdnJwuChKV6ukXdGjX0hlowJu/4dfH4jTJC7sBWS AKaEFU7CxvqYEAL1Hf9VPL5fW6HZVmq1z+qmm4ecGKSTOJ20Fptb463wcXgR8CWGa+1w9xqJ7UmmfGeGeCHQ4QGW0IDSBU6ccg vzF2ug8/FY60K1vrWaCYOhKkxD3YBs8U9X/kOB0yQm2Git0d5tFlIPCBT2AC57bgsAYncXfHvPesI0qs7VZyghk8LVa9g5IqaM Cp6cQ7rmY/dLsKBMkDcdBHuCTAzBgkqhkiG9w0BBwEwFAYIKoZIhvcNAwcECDRVifSXbA43gBApNrp40L1VTVZ1iGag+3O1" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.AccountExpiration" value="2012-11-27T23:59:59.0000000+00:00" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteForwarder.Enabled" value="true" /> </ConfigurationSettings> <Certificates> <Certificate name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.PasswordEncryption" thumbprint="AA23016CF0BDFC344400B5B82706B608B92E4217" thumbprintAlgorithm="sha1" /> </Certificates> </Role> </ServiceConfiguration>          Okay let’s look at them one at a time,       Enabled - Yes, we would like to enable Remote Access.       AccountUserName – This is the user name you entered while you were on the publish windows azure role screen, as detailed above.       AccountEncrytedPassword – Try and decode that, the certificate is used to encrypt the password you specified for the user account. Remember earlier i said, either use the instructions or wait and i’ll be showing you encryption, now the user account i am using for rdp has the same password as my domain password, so i can simply copy the value of the AccountEncryptedPassword to the DomainPassword as well.       AccountExpiration – This is the expiration as you specified in the wizard earlier, make sure your account does not expire today.       Remote Forwarder – Check out the documentation, below is how I understand it, -- One role in an application that implements a remote desktop connection must import the RemoteForwarder module. The two modules work together to enable the remote desktop connections to role instances. -- If you have multiple roles defined in the service model, it does not matter which role you add the RemoteForwarder module to, but you must add it to only one of the role definitions.       Certificate – Remember the certificate thumbprint from the wizard, the on premise machine and windows azure role machine that need to speak to each other must have the same thumbprint. More on that when we install Windows Azure connect Endpoints on the on premise machine. As i said earlier, in this blog post, I’ll be showing you the manual process so i won’t be scripting any star up tasks to install the test agent or register the test agent with the TFS Server. I’ll be showing you all this cool stuff in the next blog post, that’s because it’s important to understand the manual side of it, it becomes easier for you to troubleshoot in case something fails. Having said that, the changes we have made are sufficient to spin up the Windows Azure Worker Role aka Test Agent VM, have it connected with the play.pit.com domain and have remote access enabled on it. Before we deploy the Test Agent VM we need to set up Windows Azure Connect on the TFS Server. II. Windows Azure Connect: Setting up Connect on VM – 2 i.e. TFS & Test Controller Glad you made it so far, now to enable communication between the on premise TFS/Test Controller and Azure-ed Test Agent we need to enable communication. We have set up the Azure connect module in the Test Agent configuration, now the connect end points need to be enabled on the on premise machines, let’s have a look at how we can do this. Log on to VM – 2 running the TFS Server and Test Controller Log on to the Windows Azure Management Portal and click on Virtual Network Click on Virtual Network, if you already have a subscription you should see the below screen shot, if not, you would be asked to complete the subscription first        Click on Install Local Endpoints from the top left on the panel and you get a url appended with a token id in it, remember the token i showed you earlier, in theory the token you get here should match the token you added to the Test Agent config file.        Copy the url to the clip board and paste it in IE explorer (important, the installation at present only works out of IE and you need to have cookies enabled in order to complete the installation). As stated in the pop up, you can NOT download and run the software later, you need to run it as is, since it contains a token. Once the installation completes you should see the Windows Azure connect icon in the system tray.                         Right click the Azure Connect icon, choose Diagnostics and refer to this link for diagnostic detail terminology. NOTE – Unfortunately I could not see the Windows Azure connect icon in the system tray, a bit of binging with Google revealed that the azure connect icon is only shown when the ‘Windows Azure Connect Endpoint’ Service is started. So go to services.msc and make sure that the service is started, if not start it, unfortunately again, the service did not start for me on a manual start and i realised that one of the dependant services was disabled, you can look at the service dependencies and start them and then start windows azure connect. Bottom line, you need to start Windows Azure connect service before you can proceed. Please refer here on MSDN for more on Troubleshooting Windows Azure connect. (Follow the next step as well)   Now go back to the Windows Azure Management Portal and from Groups and Roles create a new group, lets call it ‘Test Rig’. Make sure you add the VM – 2 (the TFS Server VM where you just installed the endpoint).       Now if you go back to the Azure Connect icon in the system tray and click ‘Refresh Policy’ you will notice that the disconnected status of the icon should change to ready for connection. III. Importing Certificate in to Windows Azure Management Portal But before that you need to import the certificate you created in Step I in to the Windows Azure Management Portal. Log on to the Windows Azure Management Portal and click on ‘Hosted Services, Storage Accounts & CDN’ and then ‘Management Certificates’ followed by Add Certificates as shown in the screen shot below        Browse to the location where you saved the certificate earlier, remember… Refer to Step I in case you forgot.        Now you should be able to see the imported certificate here, make sure the thumbprint of the certificate matches the one you inserted in the config files        IV. Publish Windows Azure Worker Role aka Test Agent Having completed I, II and III, you are ready to publish the Test Agent VM – 3 to the cloud. Go to Visual Studio and right click the Windows Azure project and select Publish. Verify the infomration in the wizard, from the advanced settings tab, you can also enabled capture of intellitrace or profiling information.         Click Next and Click Publish! From the view menu bar select the Windows Azure Activity Log window.       Now you should be able to see the deployment progress in real time.             In the Windows Azure Management Portal, you should also be able to see the progress of creation of a new Worker Role.       Once the deployment is complete you should be able to RDP (go to run prompt type mstsc and in the pop up the machine name) in to the Test Agent Worker Role VM from the Playpit network using the domain admin user account. In case you are unable to log in to the Test Agent using the domain admin user account it means the process of joining the Test Agent to the domain has failed! But the good news is, because you imported the connect module, you can connect to the Test Agent machine using Windows Azure Management Portal and troubleshoot the reason for failure, you will be able to log in with the user name and password you specified in the config file for the keys ‘RemoteAccess.AccountUsername, RemoteAccess.EncryptedPassword (just that enter the password unencrypted)’, fix it or manually join the machine to the domain. Once you have managed to Join the Test Agent VM to the Domain move to the next step.      So, log in to the Test Agent Worker Role VM with the Playpit Domain Administrator and verify that you can log in, the machine is connected to the domain and the connect service is successfully running. If yes, give your self a pat on the back, you are 80% mission accomplished!         Go to the Windows Azure Management Portal and click on Virtual Network, click on Groups and Roles and click on Test Rig, click Edit Group, the edit the Test Rig group you created earlier. In the Connect to section, click on Add to select the worker role you have just deployed. Also, check the ‘Allow connections between endpoints in the group’ with this you will enable to communication between test controller and test agents and test agents/test agents. Click Save.      Now, you are ready to deploy the Test Agent software on the Worker Role Test Agent VM and configure it to work with the Test Controller. V. Configuring VM – 3: Installing Test Agent and Associating Test Agent to Controller Log in to the Worker Role Test Agent VM that you have just successfully deployed, make sure you log in with the domain administrator account. Download the All Agents software from MSDN, ‘en_visual_studio_agents_2010_x86_x64_dvd_509679.iso’, extract the iso and navigate to where you have extracted the iso. In my case, i have extracted the iso to “C:\Resources\Temp\VsAgentSetup”. Open the Test Agent folder and double click on setup.exe. Once you have installed the Test Agent you should reach the configuration window. If you face any issues installing TFS Test Agent on the VM, refer to the walkthrough on MSDN.       Once you have successfully installed the Test Agent software you will need to configure the test agent. Right click the test agent configuration tool and run as a different user. i.e. an Administrator. This is really to run the configuration wizard with elevated privileges (you might have UAC block something's otherwise).        In the run options, you can select ‘service’ you do not need to run the agent as interactive un less you are running coded UI tests. I have specified the domain administrator to connect to the TFS Test Controller. In real life, i would never do that, i would create a separate test user service account for this purpose. But for the blog post, we are using the most powerful user so that any policies or restrictions don’t block you.        Click the Apply Settings button and you should be all green! If not, the summary usually gives helpful error messages that you can resolve and proceed. As per my experience, you may run in to either a permission or a firewall blocking communication issue.        And now the moment of truth! Go to VM –2 open up Visual Studio and from the Test Menu select Manage Test Controller       Mission Accomplished! You should be able to see the Test Agent that you have just configured here,         VI. Creating and Running Load Tests on your brand new Azure-ed Test Rig I have various blog posts on Performance Testing with Visual Studio Ultimate, you can follow the links and videos below, Blog Posts: - Part 1 – Performance Testing using Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate - Part 2 – Performance Testing using Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate - Part 3 – Performance Testing using Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate Videos: - Test Tools Configuration & Settings in Visual Studio - Why & How to Record Web Performance Tests in Visual Studio Ultimate - Goal Driven Load Testing using Visual Studio Ultimate Now that you have created your load tests, there is one last change you need to make before you can run the tests on your Azure Test Rig, create a new Test settings file, and change the Test Execution method to ‘Remote Execution’ and select the test controller you have configured the Worker Role Test Agent against in our case VM – 2 So, go on, fire off a test run and see the results of the test being executed on the Azur-ed Test Rig. Review and What’s next? A quick recap of the benefits of running the Test Rig in the cloud and what i will be covering in the next blog post AND I would love to hear your feedback! Advantages Utilizing the power of Azure compute to run a heavy virtual user load. Benefiting from the Azure flexibility, destroy Test Agents when not in use, takes < 25 minutes to spin up a new Test Agent. Most important test Network Latency, (network latency and speed of connection are two different things – usually network latency is very hard to test), by placing the Test Agents in Microsoft Data centres around the globe, one can actually test the lag in transferring the bytes not because of a slow connection but because the page has been requested from the other side of the globe. Next Steps The process of spinning up the Test Agents in windows Azure is not 100% automated. I am working on the Worker process and power shell scripts to make the role deployment, unattended install of test agent software and registration of the test agent to the test controller automated. In the next blog post I will show you how to make the complete process unattended and automated. Remember to subscribe to http://feeds.feedburner.com/TarunArora. Hope you enjoyed this post, I would love to hear your feedback! If you have any recommendations on things that I should consider or any questions or feedback, feel free to leave a comment. See you in Part III.   Share this post : CodeProject

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  • Backup Your Windows Home Server Off-Site with Asus Webstorage

    - by Mysticgeek
    Windows Home Server lets you backup machines on your network easily. But what about backing up the server data? Today we take a look at ASUS WebStorage for Windows Home Server, which provides you with secure off-site backup for WHS. To use the ASUS WebStorage service you’ll need to sign up for a free account. It offers 1GB of free storage, then you can purchase an unlimited backup package for $39.99 for a year subscription. Note: They also offer online storage for individual PCs as well. Install ASUS WebStorage for WHS Browse to your shared folders on the server and open the Add-Ins folder and copy over the WHSConnectorSetup2.2.4.088.msi file (link below) then close out of the folder. Now launch Windows Home Server Console from one of the computers on your network, click Settings, then Add-ins. Under Available Add-ins click the Available tab and you’ll see the Asus WebStorage installer file we just copied over. Click the Install button. Installation kicks off and when it’s complete, you’ll need to close out of the console and reconnect. Using ASUS WebStorage WHS Connector  When you reconnect to WHS Console, scroll over to the ASUS WebStorage icon and click on Settings. Now log into your ASUS account… Now select the folders you want to backup to the WebStorage service. Select the radio button next to Enable to initialize the backup process… The backup process begins. You can change which folders are backed up simply by disabling the backup process, uncheck the folder(s), then enable the backup again. ASUS WebStorage Site After you have files backed up to the ASUS site, log into your account, and your presented with an overview of the amount of storage you’re using. It also shows what type of files are taking certain amounts of space.   You can browse through your backed up files and folders. It allows you to share and sync backed up data as well. Navigate to the file you want and you can easily download it by clicking on it, or share it out by clicking the share link below it. If you choose to share it, you’re provided with a link to the file to send out to other users.   Conclusion Users of Windows Home Server have been looking for an inexpensive cloud backup solution for quite some time. There are services such as JungleDisk, KeepVault, Wuala…etc. These services probably do a better job, but can start getting expensive once you start uploading a GBs of data. Another disappointment of ASUS WebStorage is you can only backup your WHS shares (from what we’ve been able to determine), it’s an “all or nothing” type of thing. You cannot go in and select individual files and folders. The initial upload speeds can be a bit slow as well, although that might have something to do with limited upload speeds on the DSL connection we used to test it. Retrieving your data from the ASUS site is a breeze though, and all the data files are organized quite well. The WHS Addin is very easy to install and use. If you’re looking for an off-site solution to backup your WHS data, you can test out ASUS WebStorage for free with a 1GB limit. This is good for testing the service and it might be exactly what you’re looking for. Other users may want a more advanced solution like KeepVault or CloudBerry…which is a front end for Amazon S3 storage. Download ASUS WebStorage WHS Addin Other WHS Offsite Backup Solutions CloudBerry, JungleDisk, KeepVault, Wuala Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Restore Files from Backups on Windows Home ServerGMedia Blog: Setting Up a Windows Home ServerCreate A Windows Home Server Home Computer Restore DiscRemove a Network Computer from Windows Home ServerShare Ubuntu Home Directories using Samba TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Gadfly is a cool Twitter/Silverlight app Enable DreamScene in Windows 7 Microsoft’s “How Do I ?” Videos Home Networks – How do they look like & the problems they cause Check Your IMAP Mail Offline In Thunderbird Follow Finder Finds You Twitter Users To Follow

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  • Delving into design patterns, and what that means for the Oracle user experience

    - by Kathy.Miedema
    By Kathy Miedema, Oracle Applications User Experience George Hackman, Senior Director, Applications User Experiences The Oracle Applications User Experience team has some exciting things happening around Fusion Applications design patterns. Because we’re hoping to have some new offerings soon (stay tuned with VoX to see what’s in the pipeline around Fusion Applications design patterns), now is a good time to talk more about what design patterns can do for the individual user as well as the entire company. George Hackman, Senior Director of Operations User Experience, says the first thing to note is that user experience is not just about the user interface. It’s about understanding how people do things, observing them, and then finding the patterns that emerge. The Applications UX team develops those patterns and then builds them into Oracle applications. What emerges, Hackman says, is a consistent, efficient user experience that promotes a productive workplace. Creating design patterns What is a design pattern in the context of enterprise software? “Every day, people use technology to get things done,” Hackman says. “They navigate a virtual world that reaches from enterprise to consumer apps, and from desktop to mobile. This virtual world is constantly under construction. New areas are being developed and old areas are being redone. As this world is being built and remodeled, efficient pathways and practices emerge. “Oracle's user experience team watches users navigate this world. We measure their productivity and ask them about their satisfaction. We take the most efficient, most productive pathways from the enterprise and consumer world and turn them into Oracle's user experience patterns.” Hackman describes the process as combining all of the best practices from every part of a user’s world. Members of the user experience team observe, analyze, design, prototype, and measure each work task to find the best possible pattern for a particular work flow. As the team builds the patterns, “we make sure they are fully buildable using Oracle technology,” Hackman said. “So customers know they can use these patterns. There’s no need to make something up from scratch, not knowing whether you can even build it.” Hackman says that creating something on a computer is a good example of a user experience pattern. “People are creating things all the time,” he says. “On the consumer side, they are creating documents. On the enterprise side, they are creating expense reports. On a mobile phone, they are creating contacts. They are using different apps like iPhone or Facebook or Gmail or Oracle software, all doing this creation process.” The Applications UX team starts their process by observing how people might create something. “We observe people creating things. We see the patterns, we analyze and document, then we apply them to our products. It might be different from phone to web browser, but we have these design patterns that create a consistent experience across platforms, and across products, too. The result for customers Oracle constantly improves its part of the virtual world, Hackman said. New products are created and existing products are upgraded. Because Oracle builds user experience design patterns, Oracle's virtual world becomes both more powerful and more familiar at the same time. Because of design patterns, users can navigate with ease as they embrace the latest technology – because it behaves the way they expect it to. This means less training and faster adoption for individual users, and more productivity for the business as a whole. Hackman said Oracle gives customers and partners access to design patterns so that they can build in the virtual world using the same best practices. Customers and partners can extend applications with a user experience that is comfortable and familiar to their users. For businesses that are integrating different Oracle applications, design patterns are key. The user experience created in E-Business Suite should be similar to the user experience in Fusion Applications, Hackman said. If a user is transitioning from one application to the other, it shouldn’t be difficult for them to do their work. With design patterns, it isn’t. “Oracle user experience patterns are the building blocks for the virtual world that ensure productivity, consistency and user satisfaction,” Hackman said. “They are built for the enterprise, but incorporate the best practices from across the virtual world. They empower productivity and facilitate social interaction. When you build with patterns, you get all the end-user benefits of less training / retraining from the finished product. You also get faster / cheaper development.” What’s coming? You can already access design patterns to help you build Dashboards with OBIEE here. And we promised you at the beginning that we had something in the pipeline on Fusion Applications design patterns. Look for the announcement about when they are available here on VoX.

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  • In the Groove: PASS Board Year 1, Q3

    - by Denise McInerney
    It's nine months into my first year on the PASS Board and I feel like I've found my rhythm. I've accomplished one of the goals I set out for the year and have made progress on others. Here's a recap of the last few months. Anti-Harassment Policy & Process Completed In April I began work on a Code of Conduct for the PASS Summit. The Board had several good discussions and various PASS members provided feedback. You can read more about that in this blog post. Since the document was focused on issues of harassment we renamed it the "Anti-Harassment Policy " and it was approved by the Board in August. The next step was to refine the guideliness and process for enforcement of the AHP. A subcommittee worked on this and presented an update to the Board at the September meeting. You can read more about that in this post, and you can find the process document here. Global Growth Expanding PASS' reach and making the organization relevant to SQL Server communities around the world has been a focus of the Board's work in 2012. We took the Global Growth initiative out to the community for feedback, and everyone on the Board participated, via Twitter chats, Town Hall meetings, feedback forums and in-person discussions. This community participation helped shape and refine our plans. Implementing the vision for Global Growth goes across all portfolios. The Virtual Chapters are well-positioned to help the organization move forward in this area. One outcome of the Global Growth discussions with the community is the expansion of two of the VCs from country-specific to language-specific. Thanks to the leadership in Brazil & Mexico for taking the lead here. I look forward to continued success for the Portuguese- and Spanish-language Virtual Chapters. Together with the Global Chinese VC PASS is off to a good start in making the VC's truly global. Virtual Chapters The VCs continue to grow and expand. Volunteers recently rebooted the Azure and Virutalization VCs, and a new  Education VC will be launching soon. Every week VCs offer excellent free training on a variety of topics. It's the dedication of the VC leaders and volunteers that make all this possible and I thank them for it. Board meeting The Board had an in-person meeting in September in San Diego, CA.. As usual we covered a number of topics including governance changes to support Global Growth, the upcoming Summit, 2013 events and the (then) upcoming PASS election. Next Up Much of the last couple of months has been focused on preparing for the PASS Summit in Seattle Nov. 6-9. I'll be there all week;  feel free to stop me if you have a question or concern, or just to introduce yourself.  Here are some of the places you can find me: VC Leaders Meeting Tuesday 8:00 am the VC leaders will have a meeting. We'll review some of the year's highlights and talk about plans for the next year Welcome Reception The VCs will be at the Welcome Reception in the new VC Lounge. Come by, learn more about what the VCs have to offer and meet others who share your interests. Exceptional DBA Awards Party I'm looking forward to seeing PASS Women in Tech VC leader Meredith Ryan receive her award at this event sponsored by Red Gate Session Presentation I will be presenting a spotlight session entitled "Stop Bad Data in Its OLTP Tracks" on Wednesday at 3:00 p.m. Exhibitor Reception This reception Wednesday evening in the Expo Hall is a great opportunity to learn more about tools and solutions that can help you in your job. Women in Tech Luncheon This year marks the 10th WIT Luncheon at PASS. I'm honored to be on the panel with Stefanie Higgins, Kevin Kline, Kendra Little and Jen Stirrup. This event is on Thursday at 11:30. Community Appreciation Party Thursday evening don't miss this event thanking all of you for everthing you do for PASS and the community. This year we will be at the Experience Music Project and it promises to be a fun party. Board Q & A Friday  9:45-11:15  am the members of the Board will be available to answer your questions. If you have a question for us, or want to hear what other members are thinking about, come by room 401 Friday morning.

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  • While installing updates I get "Package operation Failed" for ubuntu 12.04

    - by user54395
    i get the following response in the details:- Please help nstallArchives() failed: perl: warning: Setting locale failed. perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings: LANGUAGE = (unset), LC_ALL = (unset), LANG = "en_IN.ISO8859-1" are supported and installed on your system. perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C"). locale: Cannot set LC_CTYPE to default locale: No such file or directory locale: Cannot set LC_MESSAGES to default locale: No such file or directory locale: Cannot set LC_ALL to default locale: No such file or directory perl: warning: Setting locale failed. perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings: LANGUAGE = (unset), LC_ALL = (unset), LANG = "en_IN.ISO8859-1" are supported and installed on your system. perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C"). locale: Cannot set LC_CTYPE to default locale: No such file or directory locale: Cannot set LC_MESSAGES to default locale: No such file or directory locale: Cannot set LC_ALL to default locale: No such file or directory perl: warning: Setting locale failed. perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings: LANGUAGE = (unset), LC_ALL = (unset), LANG = "en_IN.ISO8859-1" are supported and installed on your system. perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C"). locale: Cannot set LC_CTYPE to default locale: No such file or directory locale: Cannot set LC_MESSAGES to default locale: No such file or directory locale: Cannot set LC_ALL to default locale: No such file or directory perl: warning: Setting locale failed. perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings: LANGUAGE = (unset), LC_ALL = (unset), LANG = "en_IN.ISO8859-1" are supported and installed on your system. perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C"). locale: Cannot set LC_CTYPE to default locale: No such file or directory locale: Cannot set LC_MESSAGES to default locale: No such file or directory locale: Cannot set LC_ALL to default locale: No such file or directory (Reading database ... (Reading database ... 5%% (Reading database ... 10%% (Reading database ... 15%% (Reading database ... 20%% (Reading database ... 25%% (Reading database ... 30%% (Reading database ... 35%% (Reading database ... 40%% (Reading database ... 45%% (Reading database ... 50%% (Reading database ... 55%% (Reading database ... 60%% (Reading database ... 65%% (Reading database ... 70%% (Reading database ... 75%% (Reading database ... 80%% (Reading database ... 85%% (Reading database ... 90%% (Reading database ... 95%% (Reading database ... 100%% (Reading database ... 427340 files and directories currently installed.) Preparing to replace thunderbird-trunk-globalmenu 14.0~a1~hg20120409r9862.91177-0ubuntu1~umd1 (using .../thunderbird-trunk-globalmenu_14.0~a1~hg20120409r9866.91235-0ubuntu1~umd1_i386.deb) ... Unpacking replacement thunderbird-trunk-globalmenu ... Preparing to replace thunderbird-trunk 14.0~a1~hg20120409r9862.91177-0ubuntu1~umd1 (using .../thunderbird-trunk_14.0~a1~hg20120409r9866.91235-0ubuntu1~umd1_i386.deb) ... Unpacking replacement thunderbird-trunk ... Processing triggers for man-db ... locale: Cannot set LC_CTYPE to default locale: No such file or directory locale: Cannot set LC_MESSAGES to default locale: No such file or directory locale: Cannot set LC_ALL to default locale: No such file or directory Processing triggers for bamfdaemon ... Rebuilding /usr/share/applications/bamf.index... Processing triggers for gnome-menus ... Processing triggers for desktop-file-utils ... Setting up crossplatformui (1.0.27) ... Rather than invoking init scripts through /etc/init.d, use the service(8) utility, e.g. service acpid restart Since the script you are attempting to invoke has been converted to an Upstart job, you may also use the stop(8) and then start(8) utilities, e.g. stop acpid ; start acpid. The restart(8) utility is also available. acpid stop/waiting acpid start/running, process 5286 package libqtgui4 exist QT_VERSION = 4 make -C /lib/modules/3.2.0-22-generic/build M=/usr/local/bin/ztemtApp/zteusbserial/below2.6.27 modules make[1]: Entering directory /usr/src/linux-headers-3.2.0-22-generic' CC [M] /usr/local/bin/ztemtApp/zteusbserial/below2.6.27/usb-serial.o /usr/local/bin/ztemtApp/zteusbserial/below2.6.27/usb-serial.c:34:28: fatal error: linux/smp_lock.h: No such file or directory compilation terminated. make[2]: *** [/usr/local/bin/ztemtApp/zteusbserial/below2.6.27/usb-serial.o] Error 1 make[1]: *** [_module_/usr/local/bin/ztemtApp/zteusbserial/below2.6.27] Error 2 make[1]: Leaving directory/usr/src/linux-headers-3.2.0-22-generic' make: * [modules] Error 2 dpkg: error processing crossplatformui (--configure): subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 2 No apport report written because MaxReports is reached already Setting up thunderbird-trunk (14.0~a1~hg20120409r9866.91235-0ubuntu1~umd1) ... Setting up thunderbird-trunk-globalmenu (14.0~a1~hg20120409r9866.91235-0ubuntu1~umd1) ... Errors were encountered while processing: crossplatformui Error in function: SystemError: E:Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1) Setting up crossplatformui (1.0.27) ... Rather than invoking init scripts through /etc/init.d, use the service(8) utility, e.g. service acpid restart Since the script you are attempting to invoke has been converted to an Upstart job, you may also use the stop(8) and then start(8) utilities, e.g. stop acpid ; start acpid. The restart(8) utility is also available. acpid stop/waiting acpid start/running, process 5541 package libqtgui4 exist QT_VERSION = 4 make -C /lib/modules/3.2.0-22-generic/build M=/usr/local/bin/ztemtApp/zteusbserial/below2.6.27 modules make[1]: Entering directory /usr/src/linux-headers-3.2.0-22-generic' CC [M] /usr/local/bin/ztemtApp/zteusbserial/below2.6.27/usb-serial.o /usr/local/bin/ztemtApp/zteusbserial/below2.6.27/usb-serial.c:34:28: fatal error: linux/smp_lock.h: No such file or directory compilation terminated. make[2]: *** [/usr/local/bin/ztemtApp/zteusbserial/below2.6.27/usb-serial.o] Error 1 make[1]: *** [_module_/usr/local/bin/ztemtApp/zteusbserial/below2.6.27] Error 2 make[1]: Leaving directory/usr/src/linux-headers-3.2.0-22-generic' make: * [modules] Error 2 dpkg: error processing crossplatformui (--configure): subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 2

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  • Can't remove the libpcap0.8 package

    - by Yogesh
    I am getting error when running apt-get remove root@System:~/Downloads# sudo apt-get remove The following packages have unmet dependencies: libpcap0.8 : Breaks: libpcap0.8:i386 (!= 1.4.0-2) but 1.5.3-2 is installed libpcap0.8:i386 : Breaks: libpcap0.8 (!= 1.5.3-2) but 1.4.0-2 is installed libpcap0.8-dev : Depends: libpcap0.8 (= 1.5.3-2) but 1.4.0-2 is installed E: Unmet dependencies. Try using -f. and when I ran apt-get remove -f this is what happens: root@System:~/Downloads# sudo apt-get remove -f The following extra packages will be installed: libpcap0.8 The following packages will be upgraded: libpcap0.8 1 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 365 not upgraded. 2 not fully installed or removed. Need to get 0 B/110 kB of archives. After this operation, 13.3 kB of additional disk space will be used. Do you want to continue? [Y/n] y (Reading database ... 163539 files and directories currently installed.) Preparing to unpack .../libpcap0.8_1.5.3-2_amd64.deb ... Unpacking libpcap0.8:amd64 (1.5.3-2) over (1.4.0-2) ... dpkg: error processing archive /var/cache/apt/archives/libpcap0.8_1.5.3-2_amd64.deb (--unpack): trying to overwrite shared '/usr/share/man/man7/pcap-filter.7.gz', which is different from other instances of package libpcap0.8:amd64 dpkg-deb: error: subprocess paste was killed by signal (Broken pipe) Processing triggers for man-db (2.6.7.1-1) ... Errors were encountered while processing: /var/cache/apt/archives/libpcap0.8_1.5.3-2_amd64.deb E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1) root@System:~/Downloads# clear root@System:~/Downloads# sudo apt-get remove -f Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done Correcting dependencies... Done The following extra packages will be installed: libpcap0.8 The following packages will be upgraded: libpcap0.8 1 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 365 not upgraded. 2 not fully installed or removed. Need to get 0 B/110 kB of archives. After this operation, 13.3 kB of additional disk space will be used. Do you want to continue? [Y/n] y (Reading database ... 163539 files and directories currently installed.) Preparing to unpack .../libpcap0.8_1.5.3-2_amd64.deb ... Unpacking libpcap0.8:amd64 (1.5.3-2) over (1.4.0-2) ... dpkg: error processing archive /var/cache/apt/archives/libpcap0.8_1.5.3-2_amd64.deb (--unpack): trying to overwrite shared '/usr/share/man/man7/pcap-filter.7.gz', which is different from other instances of package libpcap0.8:amd64 dpkg-deb: error: subprocess paste was killed by signal (Broken pipe) Processing triggers for man-db (2.6.7.1-1) ... Errors were encountered while processing: /var/cache/apt/archives/libpcap0.8_1.5.3-2_amd64.deb E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1) root@System:~/Downloads# root@System:~/Downloads# sudo apt-get check Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these. The following packages have unmet dependencies: libpcap0.8 : Breaks: libpcap0.8:i386 (!= 1.4.0-2) but 1.5.3-2 is installed libpcap0.8:i386 : Breaks: libpcap0.8 (!= 1.5.3-2) but 1.4.0-2 is installed libpcap0.8-dev : Depends: libpcap0.8 (= 1.5.3-2) but 1.4.0-2 is installed E: Unmet dependencies. Try using -f. root@System:~/Downloads# apt-cache policy libpcap0.8:amd64 libpcap0.8 libpcap0.8-dev libpcap0.8: Installed: 1.4.0-2 Candidate: 1.5.3-2 Version table: 1.5.3-2 0 500 http://in.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ trusty/main amd64 Packages *** 1.4.0-2 0 100 /var/lib/dpkg/status libpcap0.8: Installed: 1.4.0-2 Candidate: 1.5.3-2 Version table: 1.5.3-2 0 500 http://in.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ trusty/main amd64 Packages *** 1.4.0-2 0 100 /var/lib/dpkg/status libpcap0.8-dev: Installed: 1.5.3-2 Candidate: 1.5.3-2 Version table: *** 1.5.3-2 0 500 http://in.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ trusty/main amd64 Packages 100 /var/lib/dpkg/status root@System:~/Downloads# root@System:~/Downloads# sudo apt-get -f remove libpcap0.8 libpcap0.8-dev libpcap0.8-dev:i386 libpcap0.8:i386 Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done Package 'libpcap0.8-dev:i386' is not installed, so not removed. Did you mean 'libpcap0.8-dev'? You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these: The following packages have unmet dependencies: libpcap-dev : Depends: libpcap0.8-dev but it is not going to be installed E: Unmet dependencies. Try 'apt-get -f install' with no packages (or specify a solution). root@System:~/Downloads# sudo apt-get -f install Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done Correcting dependencies... Done The following extra packages will be installed: libpcap0.8 The following packages will be upgraded: libpcap0.8 1 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 365 not upgraded. 2 not fully installed or removed. Need to get 0 B/110 kB of archives. After this operation, 13.3 kB of additional disk space will be used. Do you want to continue? [Y/n] y (Reading database ... 163539 files and directories currently installed.) Preparing to unpack .../libpcap0.8_1.5.3-2_amd64.deb ... Unpacking libpcap0.8:amd64 (1.5.3-2) over (1.4.0-2) ... dpkg: error processing archive /var/cache/apt/archives/libpcap0.8_1.5.3-2_amd64.deb (--unpack): trying to overwrite shared '/usr/share/man/man7/pcap-filter.7.gz', which is different from other instances of package libpcap0.8:amd64 dpkg-deb: error: subprocess paste was killed by signal (Broken pipe) Processing triggers for man-db (2.6.7.1-1) ... Errors were encountered while processing: /var/cache/apt/archives/libpcap0.8_1.5.3-2_amd64.deb E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1) root@System:~/Downloads#

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  • The Oracle Graduate Experience...A Graduates Perspective by Angelie Tierney

    - by david.talamelli
    [Note: Angelie has just recently joined Oracle in Australia in our 2011 Graduate Program. Last week I shared my thoughts on our 2011 Graduate Program, this week Angelie took some time to share her thoughts of our Graduate Program. The notes below are Angelie's overview from her experience with us starting with our first contact last year - David Talamelli] How does the 1 year program work? It consists of 3 weeks of training, followed by 2 rotations in 2 different Lines of Business (LoB's). The first rotation goes for 4 months, while your 2nd rotation goes for 7, when you are placed into your final LoB for the program. The interview process: After sorting through the many advertised graduate jobs, submitting so many resumes and studying at the same time, it can all be pretty stressful. Then there is the interview process. David called me on a Sunday afternoon and I spoke to him for about 30 minutes in a mini sort of phone interview. I was worried that working at Oracle would require extensive technical experience, but David stressed that even the less technical, and more business-minded person could, and did, work at Oracle. I was then asked if I would like to attend a group interview in the next weeks, to which I said of course! The first interview was a day long, consisting of a brief introduction, a group interview where we worked on a business plan with a group of other potential graduates and were marked by 3 Oracle employees, on our ability to work together and presentation. After lunch, we then had a short individual interview each, and that was the end of the first round. I received a call a few weeks later, and was asked to come into a second interview, at which I also jumped at the opportunity. This was an interview based purely on your individual abilities and would help to determine which Line of Business you would go to, should you land a graduate position. So how did I cope throughout the interview stages? I believe the best tool to prepare for the interview, was to research Oracle and its culture and to see if I thought I could fit into that. I personally found out about Oracle, its partners as well as competitors and along the way, even found out about their part (or Larry Ellison's specifically) in the Iron Man 2 movie. Armed with some Oracle information and lots of enthusiasm, I approached the Oracle Graduate Interview process. Why did I apply for an Oracle graduate position? I studied a Bachelor of Business/Bachelor of Science in IT, and wanted to be able to use both my degrees, while have the ability to work internationally in the future. Coming straight from university, I wasn't sure exactly what I wanted to do in terms of my career. With the program, you are rotated across various lines of business, to not only expose you to different parts of the business, but to also help you to figure out what you want to achieve out of your career. As a result, I thought Oracle was the perfect fit. So what can an Oracle ANZ Graduate expect? First things first, you can expect to line up for your visitor pass. Really. Next you enter a room full of unknown faces, graduates just like you, and then you realise you're in this with 18 other people, going through the same thing as you. 3 weeks later you leave with many memories, colleagues you can call your friends, and a video of your presentation. Vanessa, the Graduate Manager, will also take lots of photos and keep you (well) fed. Well that's not all you leave with, you are also equipped with a wealth of knowledge and contacts within Oracle, both that will help you throughout your career there. What training is involved? We started our Oracle experience with 3 weeks of training, consisting of employee orientation, extensive product training, presentations on the various lines of business (LoB's), followed by sales and presentation training. While there was potential for an information overload, maybe even death by Powerpoint, we were able to have access to the presentations for future reference, which was very helpful. This period also allowed us to start networking, not only with the graduates, but with the managers who presented to us, as well as through the monthly chinwag, HR celebrations and even with the sharing of tea facilities. We also had a team bonding day when we recorded a "commercial" within groups, and learned how to play an Irish drum. Overall, the training period helped us to learn about Oracle, as well as ourselves, and to prepare us for our transition into our rotations. Where to now? I'm now into my 2nd week of my first graduate rotation. It has been exciting to finally get out into the work environment and utilise that knowledge we gained from training. My manager has been a great mentor, extremely knowledgeable, and it has been good being able to participate in meetings, conference calls and make a contribution towards the business. And while we aren't necessarily working directly with the other graduates, they are still reachable via email, Pidgin and lunch and they are important as a resource and support, after all, they are going through a similar experience to you. While it is only the beginning, there is a lot more to learn and a lot more to experience along the way, especially because, as we learned during training, at Oracle, the only constant is change.

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  • SSIS: Building SQL databases on-the-fly using concatenated SQL scripts

    - by DrJohn
    Over the years I have developed many techniques which help automate the whole SQL Server build process. In my current process, where I need to build entire OLAP data marts on-the-fly, I make regular use of a simple but very effective mechanism to concatenate all the SQL Scripts together from my SSMS (SQL Server Management Studio) projects. This proves invaluable because in two clicks I can redeploy an entire SQL Server database with all tables, views, stored procedures etc. Indeed, I can also use the concatenated SQL scripts with SSIS to build SQL Server databases on-the-fly. You may be surprised to learn that I often redeploy the database several times per day, or even several times per hour, during the development process. This is because the deployment errors are logged and you can quickly see where SQL Scripts have object dependency errors. For example, after changing a table structure you may have forgotten to change any related views. The deployment log immediately points out all the objects which failed to build so you can fix and redeploy the database very quickly. The alternative approach (i.e. doing changes in the database directly using the SSMS UI) would require you to check all dependent objects before making changes. The chances are that you will miss something and wonder why your app returns the wrong data – a common problem caused by changing a table without re-creating dependent views. Using SQL Projects in SSMS A great many developers fail to make use of SQL Projects in SSMS (SQL Server Management Studio). To me they are invaluable way of organizing your SQL Scripts. The screenshot below shows a typical SSMS solution made up of several projects – one project for tables, another for views etc. The key point is that the projects naturally fall into the right order in file system because of the project name. The number in the folder or file name ensures that the projects the SQL scripts are concatenated together in the order that they need to be executed. Hence the script filenames start with 100, 110 etc. Concatenating SQL Scripts To concatenate the SQL Scripts together into one file, I use notepad.exe to create a simple batch file (see example screenshot) which uses the TYPE command to write the content of the SQL Script files into a combined file. As the SQL Scripts are in several folders, I simply use several TYPE command multiple times and append the output together. If you are unfamiliar with batch files, you may not know that the angled bracket (>) means write output of the program into a file. Two angled brackets (>>) means append output of this program into a file. So the command-line DIR > filelist.txt would write the content of the DIR command into a file called filelist.txt. In the example shown above, the concatenated file is called SB_DDS.sql If, like me you place the concatenated file under source code control, then the source code control system will change the file's attribute to "read-only" which in turn would cause the TYPE command to fail. The ATTRIB command can be used to remove the read-only flag. Using SQLCmd to execute the concatenated file Now that the SQL Scripts are all in one big file, we can execute the script against a database using SQLCmd using another batch file as shown below: SQLCmd has numerous options, but the script shown above simply executes the SS_DDS.sql file against the SB_DDS_DB database on the local machine and logs the errors to a file called SB_DDS.log. So after executing the batch file you can simply check the error log to see if your database built without a hitch. If you have errors, then simply fix the source files, re-create the concatenated file and re-run the SQLCmd to rebuild the database. This two click operation allows you to quickly identify and fix errors in your entire database definition.Using SSIS to execute the concatenated file To execute the concatenated SQL script using SSIS, you simply drop an Execute SQL task into your package and set the database connection as normal and then select File Connection as the SQLSourceType (as shown below). Create a file connection to your concatenated SQL script and you are ready to go.   Tips and TricksAdd a new-line at end of every fileThe most common problem encountered with this approach is that the GO statement on the last line of one file is placed on the same line as the comment at the top of the next file by the TYPE command. The easy fix to this is to ensure all your files have a new-line at the end.Remove all USE database statementsThe SQLCmd identifies which database the script should be run against.  So you should remove all USE database commands from your scripts - otherwise you may get unintentional side effects!!Do the Create Database separatelyIf you are using SSIS to create the database as well as create the objects and populate the database, then invoke the CREATE DATABASE command against the master database using a separate package before calling the package that executes the concatenated SQL script.    

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  • Agile Development Requires Agile Support

    - by Matt Watson
    Agile developmentAgile development has become the standard methodology for application development. The days of long term planning with giant Gantt waterfall charts and detailed requirements is fading away. For years the product planning process frustrated product owners and businesses because no matter the plan, nothing ever went to plan. Agile development throws the detailed planning out the window and instead focuses on giving developers some basic requirements and pointing them in the right direction. Constant collaboration via quick iterations with the end users, product owners, and the development team helps ensure the project is done correctly.  The various agile development methodologies have helped greatly with creating products faster, but not without causing new problems. Complicated application deployments now occur weekly or monthly. Most of the products are web-based and deployed as a software service model. System performance and availability of these apps becomes mission critical. This is all much different from the old process of mailing new releases of client-server apps on CD once per quarter or year.The steady stream of new products and product enhancements puts a lot of pressure on IT operations to keep up with the software deployments and adding infrastructure capacity. The problem is most operations teams still move slowly thanks to change orders, documentation, procedures, testing and other processes. Operations can slow the process down and push back on the development team in some organizations. The DevOps movement is trying to solve some of these problems by integrating the development and operations teams more together. Rapid change introduces new problemsThe rapid product change ultimately creates some application problems along the way. Higher rates of change increase the likelihood of new application defects. Delivering applications as a software service also means that scalability of applications is critical. Development teams struggle to keep up with application defects and scalability concerns in their applications. Fixing application problems is a never ending job for agile development teams. Fixing problems before your customers do and fixing them quickly is critical. Most companies really struggle with this due to the divide between the development and operations groups. Fixing application problems typically requires querying databases, looking at log files, reviewing config files, reviewing error logs and other similar tasks. It becomes difficult to work on new features when your lead developers are working on defects from the last product version. Developers need more visibilityThe problem is most developers are not given access to see server and application information in the production environments. The operations team doesn’t trust giving all the developers the keys to the kingdom to log in to production and poke around the servers. The challenge is either give them no access, or potentially too much access. Those with access can still waste time figuring out the location of the application and how to connect to it over VPN. In addition, reproducing problems in test environments takes too much time and isn't always possible. System administrators spend a lot of time helping developers track down server information. Most companies give key developers access to all of the production resources so they can help resolve application defects. The problem is only those key people have access and they become a bottleneck. They end up spending 25-50% of their time on a daily basis trying to solve application issues because they are the only ones with access. These key employees’ time is best spent on strategic new projects, not addressing application defects. This job should fall to entry level developers, provided they have access to all the information they need to troubleshoot the problems.The solution to agile application support is giving all the developers limited access to the production environment and all the server information they need to see. Some companies create their own solutions internally to collect log files, centralize errors or other things to address the problem. Some developers even have access to server monitoring or other tools. But they key is giving them access to everything they need so they can see the full picture and giving access to the whole team. Giving access to everyone scales up the application support team and creates collaboration around providing improved application support.Stackify enables agile application supportStackify has created a solution that can give all developers a secure and read only view of the entire production server environment without console or remote desktop access.They provide a web application that provides real time visibility to the important information that developers need to see. An application centric view enables them to see all of their apps across multiple datacenters and environments. They don’t need to know where the application is deployed, just the name of the application to find it and dig in to see more. All your developers can see server health, application health, log files, config files, windows event viewer, deployment history, application notes, and much more. They can receive email and text alerts when problems arise and even safely query your production databases.Stackify enables companies that do agile development to scale up their application support team by getting more team members involved. The lead developers can spend more time on new projects. Application issues can be fixed quicker than ever. Operations can spend less time helping developers collect server information. Agile application support starts with Stackify. Visit Stackify.com to learn more.

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  • Oracle NoSQL Database Exceeds 1 Million Mixed YCSB Ops/Sec

    - by Charles Lamb
    We ran a set of YCSB performance tests on Oracle NoSQL Database using SSD cards and Intel Xeon E5-2690 CPUs with the goal of achieving 1M mixed ops/sec on a 95% read / 5% update workload. We used the standard YCSB parameters: 13 byte keys and 1KB data size (1,102 bytes after serialization). The maximum database size was 2 billion records, or approximately 2 TB of data. We sized the shards to ensure that this was not an "in-memory" test (i.e. the data portion of the B-Trees did not fit into memory). All updates were durable and used the "simple majority" replica ack policy, effectively 'committing to the network'. All read operations used the Consistency.NONE_REQUIRED parameter allowing reads to be performed on any replica. In the past we have achieved 100K ops/sec using SSD cards on a single shard cluster (replication factor 3) so for this test we used 10 shards on 15 Storage Nodes with each SN carrying 2 Rep Nodes and each RN assigned to its own SSD card. After correcting a scaling problem in YCSB, we blew past the 1M ops/sec mark with 8 shards and proceeded to hit 1.2M ops/sec with 10 shards.  Hardware Configuration We used 15 servers, each configured with two 335 GB SSD cards. We did not have homogeneous CPUs across all 15 servers available to us so 12 of the 15 were Xeon E5-2690, 2.9 GHz, 2 sockets, 32 threads, 193 GB RAM, and the other 3 were Xeon E5-2680, 2.7 GHz, 2 sockets, 32 threads, 193 GB RAM.  There might have been some upside in having all 15 machines configured with the faster CPU, but since CPU was not the limiting factor we don't believe the improvement would be significant. The client machines were Xeon X5670, 2.93 GHz, 2 sockets, 24 threads, 96 GB RAM. Although the clients had 96 GB of RAM, neither the NoSQL Database or YCSB clients require anywhere near that amount of memory and the test could have just easily been run with much less. Networking was all 10GigE. YCSB Scaling Problem We made three modifications to the YCSB benchmark. The first was to allow the test to accommodate more than 2 billion records (effectively int's vs long's). To keep the key size constant, we changed the code to use base 32 for the user ids. The second change involved to the way we run the YCSB client in order to make the test itself horizontally scalable.The basic problem has to do with the way the YCSB test creates its Zipfian distribution of keys which is intended to model "real" loads by generating clusters of key collisions. Unfortunately, the percentage of collisions on the most contentious keys remains the same even as the number of keys in the database increases. As we scale up the load, the number of collisions on those keys increases as well, eventually exceeding the capacity of the single server used for a given key.This is not a workload that is realistic or amenable to horizontal scaling. YCSB does provide alternate key distribution algorithms so this is not a shortcoming of YCSB in general. We decided that a better model would be for the key collisions to be limited to a given YCSB client process. That way, as additional YCSB client processes (i.e. additional load) are added, they each maintain the same number of collisions they encounter themselves, but do not increase the number of collisions on a single key in the entire store. We added client processes proportionally to the number of records in the database (and therefore the number of shards). This change to the use of YCSB better models a use case where new groups of users are likely to access either just their own entries, or entries within their own subgroups, rather than all users showing the same interest in a single global collection of keys. If an application finds every user having the same likelihood of wanting to modify a single global key, that application has no real hope of getting horizontal scaling. Finally, we used read/modify/write (also known as "Compare And Set") style updates during the mixed phase. This uses versioned operations to make sure that no updates are lost. This mode of operation provides better application behavior than the way we have typically run YCSB in the past, and is only practical at scale because we eliminated the shared key collision hotspots.It is also a more realistic testing scenario. To reiterate, all updates used a simple majority replica ack policy making them durable. Scalability Results In the table below, the "KVS Size" column is the number of records with the number of shards and the replication factor. Hence, the first row indicates 400m total records in the NoSQL Database (KV Store), 2 shards, and a replication factor of 3. The "Clients" column indicates the number of YCSB client processes. "Threads" is the number of threads per process with the total number of threads. Hence, 90 threads per YCSB process for a total of 360 threads. The client processes were distributed across 10 client machines. Shards KVS Size Clients Mixed (records) Threads OverallThroughput(ops/sec) Read Latencyav/95%/99%(ms) Write Latencyav/95%/99%(ms) 2 400m(2x3) 4 90(360) 302,152 0.76/1/3 3.08/8/35 4 800m(4x3) 8 90(720) 558,569 0.79/1/4 3.82/16/45 8 1600m(8x3) 16 90(1440) 1,028,868 0.85/2/5 4.29/21/51 10 2000m(10x3) 20 90(1800) 1,244,550 0.88/2/6 4.47/23/53

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  • What Counts For a DBA: Fitness

    - by Louis Davidson
    If you know me, you can probably guess that physical exercise is not really my thing. There was a time in my past when it a larger part of my life, but even then never in the same sort of passionate way as a number of our SQL friends.  For me, I find that mental exercise satisfies what I believe to be the same inner need that drives people to run farther than I like to drive on most Saturday mornings, and it is certainly just as addictive. Mental fitness shares many common traits with physical fitness, especially the need to attain it through repetitive training. I only wish that mental training burned off a bacon cheeseburger in the same manner as does jogging around a dewy park on Saturday morning. In physical training, there are at least two goals, the first of which is to be physically able to do a task. The second is to train the brain to perform the task without thinking too hard about it. No matter how long it has been since you last rode a bike, you will be almost certainly be able to hop on and start riding without thinking about the process of pedaling or balancing. If you’ve never ridden a bike, you could be a physics professor /Olympic athlete and still crash the first few times you try, even though you are as strong as an ox and your knowledge of the physics of bicycle riding makes the concept child’s play. For programming tasks, the process is very similar. As a DBA, you will come to know intuitively how to backup, optimize, and secure database systems. As a data programmer, you will work to instinctively use the clauses of Transact-SQL DML so that, when you need to group data three ways (and not four), you will know to use the GROUP BY clause with GROUPING SETS without resorting to a search engine.  You have the skill. Making it naturally then requires repetition and experience is the primary requirement, not just simply learning about a topic. The hardest part of being really good at something is this difference between knowledge and skill. I have recently taken several informative training classes with Kimball University on data warehousing and ETL. Now I have a lot more knowledge about designing data warehouses than before. I have also done a good bit of data warehouse designing of late and have started to improve to some level of proficiency with the theory. Yet, for all of this head knowledge, it is still a struggle to take what I have learned and apply it to the designs I am working on.  Data warehousing is still a task that is not yet deeply ingrained in my brain muscle memory. On the other hand, relational database design is something that no matter how much or how little I may get to do it, I am comfortable doing it. I have done it as a profession now for well over a decade, I teach classes on it, and I also have done (and continue to do) a lot of mental training beyond the work day. Sometimes the training is just basic education, some reading blogs and attending sessions at PASS events.  My best training comes from spending time working on other people’s design issues in forums (though not nearly as much as I would like to lately). Working through other people’s problems is a great way to exercise your brain on problems with which you’re not immediately familiar. The final bit of exercise I find useful for cultivating mental fitness for a data professional is also probably the nerdiest thing that I will ever suggest you do.  Akin to running in place, the idea is to work through designs in your head. I have designed more than one database system that would revolutionize grocery store operations, sales at my local Target store, the ordering process at Amazon, and ways to improve Disney World operations to get me through a line faster (some of which they are starting to implement without any of my help.) Never are the designs truly fleshed out, but enough to work through structures and processes.  On “paper”, I have designed database systems to catalog things as trivial as my Lego creations, rental car companies and my audio and video collections. Once I get the database designed mentally, sometimes I will create the database, add some data (often using Red-Gate’s Data Generator), and write a few queries to see if a concept was realistic, but I will rarely fully flesh out the database since I have no desire to do any user interface programming anymore.  The mental training allows me to keep in practice for when the time comes to do the work I love the most for real…even if I have been spending most of my work time lately building data warehouses.  If you are really strong of mind and body, perhaps you can mix a mental run with a physical run; though don’t run off of a cliff while contemplating how you might design a database to catalog the trees on a mountain…that would be contradictory to the purpose of both types of exercise.

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  • Integrating a Progress Bar into a Wizard

    - by Geertjan
    Normally, when you create a wizard, as described here, and you have your own iterator, you'll have a class signature like this: public final class MyWizardWizardIterator implements WizardDescriptor.InstantiatingIterator<WizardDescriptor> { Let's now imagine that you've got some kind of long running process your wizard needs to perform. Maybe the wizard needs to connect to something, which could take some time. Start by adding a new dependency on the Progress API, which gives you the classes that access the NetBeans Platform's progress functionality. Now all we need to do is change the class signature very slightly: public final class MyWizardWizardIterator implements WizardDescriptor.ProgressInstantiatingIterator<WizardDescriptor> { Take a look at the part of the signature above that is highlighted. I.e., use WizardDescriptor.ProgressInstantiatingIterator instead of WizardDescriptor.InstantiatingIterator. Now you will need to implement a new instantiate method, one that receives a ProgressHandle. The other instantiate method, i.e., the one that already existed, should never be accessed anymore, and so you can add an assert to that effect: @Override public Set<?> instantiate() throws IOException {     throw new AssertionError("instantiate(ProgressHandle) " //NOI18N             + "should have been called"); //NOI18N } @Override public Set instantiate(ProgressHandle ph) throws IOException {     return Collections.emptySet(); } OK. Let's now add some code to make our progress bar work: @Override public Set instantiate(ProgressHandle ph) throws IOException {     ph.start();     ph.progress("Processing...");     try {         //Simulate some long process:         Thread.sleep(2500);     } catch (InterruptedException ex) {         Exceptions.printStackTrace(ex);     }     ph.finish();     return Collections.emptySet(); } And, maybe even more impressive, you can also do this: @Override public Set instantiate(ProgressHandle ph) throws IOException {     ph.start(1000);     ph.progress("Processing...");     try {         //Simulate some long process:         ph.progress("1/4 complete...", 250);         Thread.sleep(2500);         ph.progress("1/2 complete...", 500);         Thread.sleep(5000);         ph.progress("3/4 complete...", 750);         Thread.sleep(7500);         ph.progress("Complete...", 1000);         Thread.sleep(1000);     } catch (InterruptedException ex) {         Exceptions.printStackTrace(ex);     }     ph.finish();     return Collections.emptySet(); } The screenshots above show you what you should see when the Finish button is clicked in each case.

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  • A Knights Tale

    - by Phil Factor
    There are so many lessons to be learned from the story of Knight Capital losing nearly half a billion dollars as a result of a deployment gone wrong. The Knight Capital Group (KCG N) was an American global financial services firm engaging in market making, electronic execution, and institutional sales and trading. According to the recent order (File No.3.15570) against Knight Capital by U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission?, Knight had, for many years used some software which broke up incoming “parent” orders into smaller “child” orders that were then transmitted to various exchanges or trading venues for execution. A tracking ‘cumulative quantity’ function counted the number of ‘child’ orders and stopped the process once the total of child orders matched the ‘parent’ and so the parent order had been completed. Back in the mists of time, some code had been added to it  which was excuted if a particular flag was set. It was called ‘power peg’ and seems to have had a similar design and purpose, but, one guesses, would have shared the same tracking function. This code had been abandoned in 2003, but never deleted. In 2005, The tracking function was moved to an earlier point in the main process. It would seem from the account that, from that point, had that flag ever been set, the old ‘Power Peg’ would have been executed like Godzilla bursting from the ice, making child orders without limit without any tracking function. It wasn’t, presumably because the software that set the flag was removed. In 2012, nearly a decade after ‘Power Peg’ was abandoned, Knight prepared a new module to their software to cope with the imminent Retail Liquidity Program (RLP) for the New York Stock Exchange. By this time, the flag had remained unused and someone made the fateful decision to reuse it, and replace the old ‘power peg’ code with this new RLP code. Had the two actions been done together in a single automated deployment, and the new deployment tested, all would have been well. It wasn’t. To quote… “Beginning on July 27, 2012, Knight deployed the new RLP code in SMARS in stages by placing it on a limited number of servers in SMARS on successive days. During the deployment of the new code, however, one of Knight’s technicians did not copy the new code to one of the eight SMARS computer servers. Knight did not have a second technician review this deployment and no one at Knight realized that the Power Peg code had not been removed from the eighth server, nor the new RLP code added. Knight had no written procedures that required such a review.” (para 15) “On August 1, Knight received orders from broker-dealers whose customers were eligible to participate in the RLP. The seven servers that received the new code processed these orders correctly. However, orders sent with the repurposed flag to the eighth server triggered the defective Power Peg code still present on that server. As a result, this server began sending child orders to certain trading centers for execution. Because the cumulative quantity function had been moved, this server continuously sent child orders, in rapid sequence, for each incoming parent order without regard to the number of share executions Knight had already received from trading centers. Although one part of Knight’s order handling system recognized that the parent orders had been filled, this information was not communicated to SMARS.” (para 16) SMARS routed millions of orders into the market over a 45-minute period, and obtained over 4 million executions in 154 stocks for more than 397 million shares. By the time that Knight stopped sending the orders, Knight had assumed a net long position in 80 stocks of approximately $3.5 billion and a net short position in 74 stocks of approximately $3.15 billion. Knight’s shares dropped more than 20% after traders saw extreme volume spikes in a number of stocks, including preferred shares of Wells Fargo (JWF) and semiconductor company Spansion (CODE). Both stocks, which see roughly 100,000 trade per day, had changed hands more than 4 million times by late morning. Ultimately, Knight lost over $460 million from this wild 45 minutes of trading. Obviously, I’m interested in all this because, at one time, I used to write trading systems for the City of London. Obviously, the US SEC is in a far better position than any of us to work out the failings of Knight’s IT department, and the report makes for painful reading. I can’t help observing, though, that even with the breathtaking mistakes all along the way, that a robust automated deployment process that was ‘all-or-nothing’, and tested from soup to nuts would have prevented the disaster. The report reads like a Greek Tragedy. All the way along one wants to shout ‘No! not that way!’ and ‘Aargh! Don’t do it!’. As the tragedy unfolds, the audience weeps for the players, trapped by a cruel fate. All application development and deployment requires defense in depth. All IT goes wrong occasionally, but if there is a culture of defensive programming throughout, the consequences are usually containable. For financial systems, these defenses are required by statute, and ignored only by the foolish. Knight’s mistakes weren’t made by just one hapless sysadmin, but were progressive errors by an  IT culture spanning at least ten years.  One can spell these out, but I think they’re obvious. One can only hope that the industry studies what happened in detail, learns from the mistakes, and draws the right conclusions.

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  • My rhythm game runs choppy even with high frame rate

    - by felipedrl
    I'm coding a rhythm game and the game runs smoothly with uncapped fps. But when I try to cap it around 60 the game updates in little chunks, like hiccups, as if it was skipping frames or at a very low frame rate. The reason I need to cap frame rate is because in some computers I tested, the fps varies a lot (from ~80 - ~250 fps) and those drops are noticeable and degrade response time. Since this is a rhythm game this is very important. This issue is driving me crazy. I've spent a few weeks already on it and still can't figure out the problem. I hope someone more experienced than me could shed some light on it. I'll try to put here all the hints I've tried along with two pseudo codes for game loops I tried, so I apologize if this post gets too lengthy. 1st GameLoop: const uint UPDATE_SKIP = 1000 / 60; uint nextGameTick = SDL_GetTicks(); while(isNotDone) { // only false when a QUIT event is generated! if (processEvents()) { if (SDL_GetTicks() > nextGameTick) { update(UPDATE_SKIP); render(); nextGameTick += UPDATE_SKIP; } } } 2nd Game Loop: const uint UPDATE_SKIP = 1000 / 60; while (isNotDone) { LARGE_INTEGER startTime; QueryPerformanceCounter(&startTime); // process events will return false in case of a QUIT event processed if (processEvents()) { update(frameTime); render(); } LARGE_INTEGER endTime; do { QueryPerformanceCounter(&endTime); frameTime = static_cast<uint>((endTime.QuadPart - startTime.QuadPart) * 1000.0 / frequency.QuadPart); } while (frameTime < UPDATE_SKIP); } [1] At first I thought it was a timer resolution problem. I was using SDL_GetTicks, but even when I switched to QueryPerformanceCounter, supposedly less granular, I saw no difference. [2] Then I thought it could be due to a rounding error in my position computation and since game updates are smaller in high FPS that would be less noticeable. Indeed there is an small error, but from my tests I realized that it is not enough to produce the position jumps I'm getting. Also, another intriguing factor is that if I enable vsync I'll get smooth updates @60fps regardless frame cap code. So why not rely on vsync? Because some computers can force a disable on gfx card config. [3] I started printing the maximum and minimum frame time measured in 1sec span, in the hope that every a few frames one would take a long time but still not enough to drop my fps computation. It turns out that, with frame cap code I always get frame times in the range of [16, 18]ms, and still, the game "does not moves like jagger". [4] My process' priority is set to HIGH (Windows doesn't allow me to set REALTIME for some reason). As far as I know there is only one thread running along with the game (a sound callback, which I really don't have access to it). I'm using AudiereLib. I then disabled Audiere by removing it from the project and still got the issue. Maybe there are some others threads running and one of them is taking too long to come back right in between when I measured frame times, I don't know. Is there a way to know which threads are attached to my process? [5] There are some dynamic data being created during game run. But It is a little bit hard to remove it to test. Maybe I'll have to try harder this one. Well, as I told you I really don't know what to try next. Anything, I mean, anything would be of great help. What bugs me more is why at 60fps & vsync enabled I get an smooth update and at 60fps & no vsync I don't. Is there a way to implement software vsync? I mean, query display sync info? Thanks in advance. I appreciate the ones that got this far and yet again I apologize for the long post. Best Regards from a fellow coder.

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  • Application Composer: Exposing Your Customizations in BI Analytics and Reporting

    - by Richard Bingham
    Introduction This article explains in simple terms how to ensure the customizations and extensions you have made to your Fusion Applications are available for use in reporting and analytics. It also includes four embedded demo videos from our YouTube channel (if they don't appear check the browser address bar for a blocking shield icon). If you are new to Business Intelligence consider first reviewing our getting started article, and you can read more about the topic of custom subject areas in the documentation book Extending Sales. There are essentially four sections to this post. First we look at how custom fields added to standard objects are made available for reporting. Secondly we look at creating custom subject areas on the standard objects. Next we consider reporting on custom objects, starting with simple standalone objects, then child custom objects, and finally custom objects with relationships. Finally this article reviews how flexfields are exposed for reporting. Whilst this article applies to both Cloud/SaaS and on-premises deployments, if you are an on-premises developer then you can also use the BI Administration Tool to customize your BI metadata repository (the RPD) and create new subject areas. Whilst this is not covered here you can read more in Chapter 8 of the Extensibility Guide for Developers. Custom Fields on Standard Objects If you add a custom field to your standard object then it's likely you'll want to include it in your reports. This is very simple, since all new fields are instantly available in the "[objectName] Extension" folder in existing subject areas. The following two minute video demonstrates this. Custom Subject Areas for Standard Objects You can create your own subject areas for use in analytics and reporting via Application Composer. An example use-case could be to simplify the seeded subject areas, since they sometimes contain complex data fields and internal values that could confuse business users. One thing to note is that you cannot create subject areas in a sandbox, as it is not supported by BI, so once your custom object is tested and complete you'll need to publish the sandbox before moving forwards. The subject area creation processes is essentially two-fold. Once the request is submitted the ADF artifacts are generated, then secondly the related metadata is sent to the BI presentation server API's to make the updates there. One thing to note is that this second step may take up to ten minutes to complete. Once finished the status of the custom subject area request should show as 'OK' and it is then ready for use. Within the creation processes wizard-like steps there are three concepts worth highlighting: Date Flattening - this feature permits the roll up of reports at various date levels, such as data by week, month, quarter, or year. You simply check the box to enable it for that date field. Measures - these are your own functions that you can build into the custom subject area. They are related to the field data type and include min-max for dates, and sum(), avg(), and count() for  numeric fields. Implicit Facts - used to make the BI metadata join between your object fields and the calculated measure fields. The advice is to choose the most frequently used measure to ensure consistency. This video shows a simple example, where a simplified subject area is created for the customer 'Contact' standard object, picking just a few fields upon which users can then create reports. Custom Objects Custom subject areas support three types of custom objects. First is a simple standalone custom object and for which the same process mentioned above applies. The next is a custom child object created on a standard object parent, and finally a custom object that is related to a parent object - usually through a dynamic choice list. Whilst the steps in each of these last two are mostly the same, there are differences in the way you choose the objects and their fields. This is illustrated in the videos below.The first video shows the process for creating a custom subject area for a simple standalone custom object. This second video demonstrates how to create custom subject areas for custom objects that are of parent:child type, as well as those those with dynamic-choice-list relationships. &lt;span id=&quot;XinhaEditingPostion&quot;&gt;&lt;/span&gt; Flexfields Dynamic and Extensible Flexfields satisfy a similar requirement as custom fields (for Application Composer), with flexfields common across the Fusion Financials, Supply Chain and Procurement, and HCM applications. The basic principle is when you enable and configure your flexfields, in the edit page under each segment region (for both global and context segments) there is a BI Enabled check box. Once this is checked and you've completed your configuration, you run the Scheduled Process job named 'Import Oracle Fusion Data Extensions for Transactional Business Intelligence' to generate and migrate the related BI artifacts and data. This applies for dynamic, key, and extensible flexfields. Of course there is more to consider in terms of how you wish your flexfields to be implemented and exposed in your reports, and details are given in Chapter 4 of the Extending Applications guide.

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  • Pirates, Treasure Chests and Architectural Mapping

    Pirate 1: Why do pirates create treasure maps? Pirate 2: I do not know.Pirate 1: So they can find their gold. Yes, that was a bad joke, but it does illustrate a point. Pirates are known for drawing treasure maps to their most prized possession. These documents detail the decisions pirates made in order to hide and find their chests of gold. The map allows them to trace the steps they took originally to hide their treasure so that they may return. As software engineers, programmers, and architects we need to treat software implementations much like our treasure chest. Why is software like a treasure chest? It cost money, time,  and resources to develop (Usually) It can make or save money, time, and resources (Hopefully) If we operate under the assumption that software is like a treasure chest then wouldn’t make sense to document the steps, rationale, concerns, and decisions about how it was designed? Pirates are notorious for documenting where they hide their treasure.  Shouldn’t we as creators of software do the same? By documenting our design decisions and rationale behind them will help others be able to understand and maintain implemented systems. This can only be done if the design decisions are correctly mapped to its corresponding implementation. This allows for architectural decisions to be traced from the conceptual model, architectural design and finally to the implementation. Mapping gives software professional a method to trace the reason why specific areas of code were developed verses other options. Just like the pirates we need to able to trace our steps from the start of a project to its implementation,  so that we will understand why specific choices were chosen. The traceability of a software implementation that actually maps back to its originating design decisions is invaluable for ensuring that architectural drifting and erosion does not take place. The drifting and erosion is prevented by allowing others to understand the rational of why an implementation was created in a specific manor or methodology The process of mapping distinct design concerns/decisions to the location of its implemented is called traceability. In this context traceability is defined as method for connecting distinctive software artifacts. This process allows architectural design models and decisions to be directly connected with its physical implementation. The process of mapping architectural design concerns to a software implementation can be very complex. However, most design decision can be placed in  a few generalized categories. Commonly Mapped Design Decisions Design Rationale Components and Connectors Interfaces Behaviors/Properties Design rational is one of the hardest categories to map directly to an implementation. Typically this rational is mapped or document in code via comments. These comments consist of general design decisions and reasoning because they do not directly refer to a specific part of an application. They typically focus more on the higher level concerns. Components and connectors can directly be mapped to architectural concerns. Typically concerns subdivide an application in to distinct functional areas. These functional areas then can map directly back to their originating concerns.Interfaces can be mapped back to design concerns in one of two ways. Interfaces that pertain to specific function definitions can be directly mapped back to its originating concern(s). However, more complicated interfaces require additional analysis to ensure that the proper mappings are created. Depending on the complexity some Behaviors\Properties can be translated directly into a generic implementation structure that is ready for business logic. In addition, some behaviors can be translated directly in to an actual implementation depending on the complexity and architectural tools used. Mapping design concerns to an implementation is a lot of work to maintain, but is doable. In order to ensure that concerns are mapped correctly and that an implementation correctly reflects its design concerns then one of two standard approaches are usually used. All Changes Come From ArchitectureBy forcing all application changes to come through the architectural model prior to implementation then the existing mappings will be used to locate where in the implementation changes need to occur. Allow Changes From Implementation Or Architecture By allowing changes to come from the implementation and/or the architecture then the other area must be kept in sync. This methodology is more complex compared to the previous approach.  One reason to justify the added complexity for an application is due to the fact that this approach tends to detect and prevent architectural drift and erosion. Additionally, this approach is usually maintained via software because of the complexity. Reference:Taylor, R. N., Medvidovic, N., & Dashofy, E. M. (2009). Software architecture: Foundations, theory, and practice Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons  

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  • Lessons learnt in implementing Scrum in a Large Organization that has traditional values

    - by MarkPearl
    I recently had the experience of being involved in a “test” scrum implementation in a large organization that was used to a traditional project management approach. Here are some lessons that I learnt from it. Don’t let the Project Manager be the Product Owner First lesson learnt is to identify the correct product owner – in this instance the product manager assumed the role of the product owner which was a mistake. The product owner is the one who has the most to loose if the project fails. With a methodology that advocates removing the role of the project manager from the process then it is not in the interests of the person who is employed as a project manager to be the product owner – in fact they have the most to gain should the project fail. Know the time commitments of team members to the Project Second lesson learnt is to get a firm time commitment of the members on a team for the sprint and to hold them to it. In this project instance many of the issues we faced were with team members having to double up on supporting existing projects/systems and the scrum project. In many situations they just didn’t get round to doing any work on the scrum project for several days while they tried to meet other commitments. Initially this was not made transparent to the team – in stand up team members would say that had done some work but would be very vague on how much time they had actually spent using the blackhole of their other legacy projects as an excuse – putting up a time burn down chart made time allocations transparent and easy to hold the team to. In addition, how can you plan for a sprint without knowing the actual time available of the members – when I mean actual time, the exercise of getting them to go through all their appointments and lunch times and breaks and removing them from their time commitment helps get you to a realistic time that they can dedicate. Make sure you meet your minimum team sizes In a recent post I wrote about the difference between a partnership and a team. If you are going to do scrum in a large organization make sure you have a minimum team size of at least 3 developers. My experience with larger organizations is that people have a tendency to be sick more, take more leave and generally not be around – if you have a team size of two it is so easy to loose momentum on the project – the more people you have in the team (up to about 9) the more the momentum the project will have when people are not around. Swapping from one methodology to another can seem as waste to the customer It sounds bad, but most customers don’t care what methodology you use. Often they have bought into the “big plan upfront”. If you can, avoid taking a project on midstream from a traditional approach unless the customer has not bought into the process – with this particular project they had a detailed upfront planning breakaway with the customer using the traditional approach and then before the project started we moved onto a scrum implementation – this seemed as waste to the customer. We should have managed the customers expectation properly. Don’t play the role of the scrum master if you can’t be the scrum master With this particular implementation I was the “scrum master”. But all I did was go through the process of the formal meetings of scrum – I attended stand up, retrospectives and planning – but I was not hands on the ground. I was not performing the most important role of removing blockages – and by the end of the project there were a number of blockages “cropping up”. What could have been a better approach was to take someone on the team and train them to be the scrum master and be present to coach them. Alternatively actually be on the team on a fulltime basis and be the scrum master. By just going through the meetings of scrum didn’t mean we were doing scrum. So we failed with this one, if you fail look at it from an agile perspective As this particular project drew to a close and it became more and more apparent that it was not going to succeed the failure of it became depressing. Emotions were expressed by various people on the team that we not encouraging and enforced the failure. Embracing the failure and looking at it for what it is instead of taking it as the end of the world can change how you grow from the experience. Acknowledging that it failed and then focussing on learning from why and how to avoid the failure in the future can change how you feel emotionally about the team, the project and the organization.

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