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• MS Excel automation without macros in the generated reports. Any thoughts?

  - by ezeki77

  Hello! I know that the web is full of questions like this one, but I still haven't been able to apply the answers I can find to my situation. I realize there is VBA, but I always disliked having the program/macro living inside the Excel file, with the resulting bloat, security warnings, etc. I'm thinking along the lines of a VBScript that works on a set of Excel files while leaving them macro-free. Now, I've been able to "paint the first column blue" for all files in a directory following this approach, but I need to do more complex operations (charts, pivot tables, etc.), which would be much harder (impossible?) with VBScript than with VBA. For this specific example knowing how to remove all macros from all files after processing would be enough, but all suggestions are welcome. Any good references? Any advice on how to best approach external batch processing of Excel files will be appreciated. Thanks! PS: I eagerly tried Mark Hammond's great PyWin32 package, but the lack of documentation and interpreter feedback discouraged me.

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• Circle to move when mouse clicked Java

  - by Myt

  So I am really new to Java and I need a circle to move around JFrame when it's clicked, but the circle has to get random cordinates. So far this code generates a new circle every time it's clicked, but all the other circles stay there aswell, but I only need one circle to move around the frame. So maybe someone can help me a little :) public class test2 extends JFrame implements MouseListener { int height, width; public test2() { this.setTitle("Click"); this.setSize(400,400); this.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE); this.setVisible(true); addMouseListener(this); width = getSize().width; height = getSize().height; } public void paint (Graphics g) { setBackground (Color.red); g.setColor(Color.yellow); int a, b; a = -50 + (int)(Math.random()*(width+40)); b = (int)(Math.random()*(height+20)); g.fillOval(a, b, 130, 110); } public void mouseClicked(MouseEvent e) { int a, b; a = -50 + (int)(Math.random()*(width+40)); b = (int)(Math.random()*(height+20)); repaint(); } public void mouseReleased(MouseEvent e){} public void mouseEntered(MouseEvent e){} public void mouseExited(MouseEvent e){} public void mousePressed(MouseEvent e){} public static void main(String arg[]){ new test2(); } }

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• Pythagoras tree with g2d

  - by owca

  I'm trying to build my first fractal (Pythagoras Tree): in Java using Graphics2D. Here's what I have now : import java.awt.*; import java.awt.geom.*; import javax.swing.*; import java.util.Scanner; public class Main { public static void main(String[] args) { int i=0; Scanner scanner = new Scanner(System.in); System.out.println("Give amount of steps: "); i = scanner.nextInt(); new Pitagoras(i); } } class Pitagoras extends JFrame { private int powt, counter; public Pitagoras(int i) { super("Pythagoras Tree."); setSize(1000, 1000); setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE); setVisible(true); powt = i; } private void paintIt(Graphics2D g) { double p1=450, p2=800, size=200; for (int i = 0; i < powt; i++) { if (i == 0) { g.drawRect((int)p1, (int)p2, (int)size, (int)size); counter++; } else{ if( i%2 == 0){ //here I must draw two squares } else{ //here I must draw right triangle } } } } @Override public void paint(Graphics graph) { Graphics2D g = (Graphics2D)graph; paintIt(g); } So basically I set number of steps, and then draw first square (p1, p2 and size). Then if step is odd I need to build right triangle on the top of square. If step is even I need to build two squares on free sides of the triangle. What method should I choose now for drawing both triangle and squares ? I was thinking about drawing triangle with simple lines transforming them with AffineTransform but I'm not sure if it's doable and it doesn't solve drawing squares.

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• How can I make hundreds of simultaneously running processes communicate with a database through one

  - by Olfan

  Long speech short: How can I make hundreds of simultaneously running processes communicate with a database through one or few permanent sessions? The whole story: I once built a number crunching engine that handles vast amounts of large data files by forking off one child after another giving each a small number of files to work on. File locking, progress monitoring and result propagation happen in an Oracle database which all (sub-)processes access at various times using an application-specific module which encapsulates DBI. This worked well at first, but now with higher volumes of input data, the number of database sessions (one per child, and they can be very short-lived) constantly being opened and closed is becoming an issue. I now want to centralise database access so that there are only one or few fixed database sessions which handle all database access for all the (sub-)processes. The presence of the database abstraction module should make the changes easy because the function calls in the worker instances can stay the same. My problem is that I cannot think of a suitable way to enhance said module in order to establish communication between all the processes and the database connector(s). I thought of message queueing, but couldn't come up with a way of connecting a large herd of requestors with one or few database connectors in a way so that bidirectional communication is possible (for collecting the query result). An asynchronous approach could help here in that all requests are written to the same queue and the database connector servicing the request will "call back" to submit the result. But my mind fails me in generating an image clear enough so that I can paint into code. Threading instead of forking might have given me an easier start, but this would now require massive changes to the code base that I'm not prepared to do to a live system. The more I think of it, the more the base idea looks like a pre-forked web server to me only that it doesn't serve web pages but database queries. Any ideas on what to dig into, and where? Sample (pseudo) code to inspire me, links to possibly related articles, ready solutions on CPAN maybe?

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• CustomButton Field not aligning in the center

  - by rupesh

  Hi all I have created a custom button and i am placing the bunch of Custombuttons in a verticalfieldManager , I have aligned the verticalField Manager in the center. when i am creating a default buttonField then verticalfield Manager is able to align the buttonfield in the center. but when i am assigning custombuttonfield in the verticalField Manager it's not aligning in the center. here is my custombuttoncode enter code herepublic CustomButtonField(String label,long style) { super(style); this.label = label; onPicture = Bitmap.getBitmapResource(onPicturePath); font = getFont(); this.setPadding(5,5, 5, 5); } public String getLabel() { return label; } public int getPreferredHeight() { return onPicture.getHeight(); } public int getPreferredWidth() { return onPicture.getWidth(); } protected void layout(int width , int height) { setExtent(Math.min(width, Display.getWidth()), Math.min(height,getPreferredHeight())); } protected void paint(Graphics graphics) { int texty =(getHeight()-getFont().getHeight())/2; if (isFocus()) { graphics.setColor(Color.BLACK); graphics.drawBitmap(0, 0, getWidth(), getHeight(),onPicture , 0, 0); graphics.setColor(Color.WHITE); graphics.setFont(font); graphics.drawText(label,0,texty,DrawStyle.ELLIPSIS,getWidth()); } else { graphics.drawBitmap(0, 0, getWidth(), getHeight(),onPicture , 0, 0); graphics.setColor(Color.WHITE); graphics.setFont(font); graphics.drawText(label,0,texty,DrawStyle.ELLIPSIS,getWidth()); } } public boolean isFocusable() { return true; } protected void onFocus(int direction) { super.onFocus(direction); invalidate(); } protected void onUnfocus() { super.onUnfocus(); invalidate(); } protected boolean navigationClick(int status, int time) { fieldChangeNotify(0); return true; } protected boolean keyChar(char character, int status, int time) { if (character == Keypad.KEY_ENTER) { fieldChangeNotify(0); return true; } return super.keyChar(character, status, time); } }

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• How to Develop Dynamic Plug-In Based Functionality in C#

  - by Matthew

  Hello: I've been looking around for different methods of providing plug-in support for my application. Ideally, I will be creating a core functionality and based on different customers developing different plug-ins/addons such as importing, exporting data etc... What are the some methods available for making a C# application extensible via a plug-in architecture? Lets make up an example. If we have a program that consists of a main menu ( File, Edit, View, et al. ) along with a TreeView that displays different brands of cars grouped by manufacturer ( Ford, GM, for now). Right clicking on a car displays a context menu with the only option being 'delete car'. How could you develop the application so that plug-ins could be deployed so that you could allow one customer to see a new brand in the TreeView, let's say Honda, and also extent the car context menu so that they may now 'paint a car'? In Eclipse/RCP development this is easily handled by extension points and plug-ins. How does C# handle it? I've been looking into developing my own plug-in architecture and reading up on MEF.

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• Using Visual Studio 2010 Express to create a surface I can draw to

  - by Joel

  I'm coming from a Java background and trying to port a simple version of Conway's Game of Life that I wrote to C# in order to learn the language. In Java, I drew my output by inheriting from JComponent and overriding paint(). My new canvas class then had an instance of the simulation's backend which it could read/manipulate. I was then able to get the WYSIWYG GUI editor (Matisse, from NetBeans) to allow me to visually place the canvas. In C#, I've gathered that I need to override OnPaint() to draw things, which (as far as I know) requires me to inherit from something (I chose Panel). I can't figure out how to get the Windows forms editor to let me place my custom class. I'm also uncertain about where in the generated code I need to place my class. How can I do this, and is putting all my drawing code into a subclass really how I should be going about this? The lack of easy answers on Google suggests I'm missing something important here. If anyone wants to suggest a method for doing this in WPF as well, I'm curious to hear it. Thanks

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• SQL Database Schema Design For Large 3 Billion Relationship Database.

  - by K-Bell

  Get your geek on. Can you solve this? I am designing a products database for SQL Server 2008 R2 Ed. (not Enterprise Ed.) that will be used to store custom product configurations for over 30,000 distinct products. The database will have up to 500 users at a time. Here is the design problem… Each Product has a collection of Parts (up to 50 parts per product). So if I have 30,000 Products and each of them can have up to 50 Parts, that’s 1.5 million distinct Product-to-Part relationships …or as an equation… 30,000 (Products) X 50 (Parts) = 1.5 million Product-to-Parts records. …and If… Each Part can have up to 2000 finish options (A finish is a paint color). NOTE: Only one finish will be selected by a user at run-time. The 2000 finish options I need to store are the allowed options for a specific part on a specific product. So if I have 1.5 million distinct product-to-part relationships/records and each of those parts can have up to 2,000 finishes that is 3 billion allowable product-to-part-to finish relationships/records …or as an equation… 1.5 million (Parts) x 2,000 (Finishes) = 3 Billion Product-to-Part-to-Finishes records. How can I design this database so that I can execute fast and efficient queries for a specific product and return its list of Parts and all the allowable Finishes for each part without 3 Billion Product-to-Part-to-Finish records? Read time is more important then write time. Please post your thoughts/suggestions if you have experience with large databases. Thanks!

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• How do I detect the colillison of components?

  - by Coupon22

  How do I detect the collision of components, specifically JLabels (or ImageIcons?)?I have tried this: add(test1); test1.setLocation(x, y); add(test2); test1.setLocation(x1, y1); validate(); if(intersects(test1, test2)) { ehealth-=50; } public boolean intersects(JLabel testa, JLabel testb) { boolean b3 = false; if(testa.contains(testb.getX(), testb.getY())) { b3 = true; } return b3; } When I run this, it does nothing! I used to use rectangle, but it didn't go well with me. I was thinking about an image with a border (using paint.net) and moving an imageicon, but I don't know how to get the x of an imageicon or detect collision. I don't know how to detect collision of a label or increase the location either. I have searched for collision detection with components/ImageIcons, but nothing has came up. I have also searched for getting the x of ImageIcons.

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• In Xlib, How can I animate until an event occurs?

  - by Animateur

  Hi, I've been trying to animate in a C program using Xlib and I wanna do something when an event occurs, otherwise I wanna keep animating. Here's an example code snippet of what I am doing currently: while( 1 ) { // If an event occurs, stop and do whatever is needed. // If no event occurs, skip this if statement. if ( XEventsQueued( display, QueuedAlready ) > 0 ) { XNextEvent( display, &event ) switch ( event.type ) { // Don't do anything case Expose: while ( event.xexpose.count != 0 ) break; // Do something, when a button is pressed case ButtonPress: ... break; // Do something, when a key is pressed case KeyPress: ... break; } } animate(); // Do animation step i.e. change any drawings... repaint(); // Paint again with the new changes from animation... } So basically, I wanna keep looping if the user hasn't clicked the mouse OR pressed a key in the keyboard yet. When the user presses a key OR clicks the mouse, I wanna stop and do a specific action. The problem in my above code is that, it doesnt stop whenever I do an action. If I remove the if statement, the animation blocks until an event occurs, however I do not want this. It's a simple problem, but I'm kinda new to Xlib/animations so any help would be highly appreciated. Thanks.

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• Painting on GtkScrolledWindow or GtkEventBox

  - by ptomato

  Using GTK, I'm trying to overlay a "More" prompt (but it could just as well be any drawing object) in the corner of a GtkTextView contained within a GtkScrolledWindow. I draw the prompt in the handler for the expose signal of the text view. It works, but when I scroll the window I get artifacts: the prompt is moved along with the contents of the text view and not erased. In order to get rid of the artifacts I trigger a redraw after each scroll. This mostly works, but you can still see the prompt jumping up and down when you scroll quickly. Is there any way to prevent this? It would be nice if the prompt just "floated" on top of the text view. I tried enclosing the scrolled window in a GtkEventBox and painting the prompt on top of that, but that didn't work either; the scrollbars and text view always paint over the prompt, even when you set the event box's window to go in front of its children's windows. UPDATE If I connect the GtkEventBox's expose callback with g_signal_connect_after(), then it is called after the expose callbacks of the GtkScrolledWindow and GtkTextView. The text view still draws over the event box though. I think this is because the scrolling happens asynchronously. Anybody got any idea how I can prevent my drawing from being overwritten?

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• OpenCV compare two images and get different pixels

  - by Richard Knop

  For some reason the code bellow is not working. I have two 640*480 images which are very similar but not the same (at least few hundred/thousand pixels should be different). This is how I am comparing them and counting different pixels: unsigned char* row; unsigned char* row2; int count = 0; // this happens in a loop // fIplImageHeader is current image // lastFIplImageHeader is image from previous iteration if ( NULL != lastFIplImageHeader->imageData ) { for( int y = 0; y < fIplImageHeader->height; y++ ) { row = &CV_IMAGE_ELEM( fIplImageHeader, unsigned char, y, 0 ); row2 = &CV_IMAGE_ELEM( lastFIplImageHeader, unsigned char, y, 0 ); for( int x = 0; x < fIplImageHeader->width*fIplImageHeader->nChannels; x += fIplImageHeader->nChannels ) { if (row[x] == row2[x]) // the pixel in the first channel (usually G) { count++; } if (row[x+1] == row2[x+1]) // ... second channel (usually B) { count++; } if (row[x+2] == row2[x+2]) // ... third channel (usually R) { count++; } } } } Now at the end I get number 3626 which would seem alright. But, I tried opening one of the images in MS Paint and drawing thick red lines all over it which should increase the number of different pixels substantially. I got the same number again: 3626. Obviously I am doing something wrong here. I am comparing these images in a loop. This line is before the loop: IplImage* lastFIplImageHeader = cvCreateImageHeader(cvSize(640, 480), 8, 3); Then inside the loop I load images like this: IplImage* fIplImageHeader = cvLoadImage( filePath.c_str() ); // here I compare the pixels (the first code snippet) lastFIplImageHeader->imageData = fIplImageHeader->imageData; So lastFIplImageHeader is storing the image from the previous iteration and fIplImageHeader is storing the current image.

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• Java applet wont run

  - by Courtney

  I am trying to get a Java applet to run properly when linked to an HTML page in Dreamweaver CC. I'm new to all this so please bear with me here. First I saved this code to a .java file //Triangle.java import java.awt.*; import java.applet.Applet; public class Triangle extends Applet { public void paint (Graphics g){ int bottomX=80; int bottomY=200; int base=100; int height=100; g.drawLine(bottomX,bottomY,bottomX+base,bottomY); g.drawLine(bottomX+base,bottomY,bottomX+base/2,bottomY-height); g.drawLine(bottomX+base/2,bottomY-height, bottomX,bottomY); } } I then compiled it entering javac Triangle.java After that, I inserted it into a Dreamwever page using: <html> <applet code=Triangle.class width=400 height=400 > </applet> </html> Now when I try and open the page in Chrome I get an error reading: UnsupportedClassVersionError Triangle: Unsupported major.minor version 52.0 This, as I have read, is an issue with using two incompatible Java versions? In my Java Control Panel it says I am using version 1.8.0_20 and my JDK is jdk1.8.0_20. Does anyone see anything super obvious that I am doing wrong here?

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• "Find all tiles connected to this one" project

  - by Omega

  Remember MS Paint? The bucket tool? If you used it and clicked on a pixel, all pixels connected to this pixel that are the same are affected. The theory is, I suppose, to check if there is any pixel adjacent to the selected one. If such pixel is the same type as the selected one, check for more adjacent pixels in this one, and so on. I want to implement something similar in VB.NET. Basically I have a 2D array map which represents the map. Let's assume there are only two types of tile: 0 and 1. Now, I got pretty much everything ready: I got my 2d map and I can tell which tile is clicked and tell what array indexes are the ones that represent such tile. Now for the "painting" process. Whenever I think about it, I can't figure a convenient way to execute such iteration. Can someone help me choosing a correct design/way/tip to achieve this?

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• What is the optimal way to animate a drawable within a view using the animator classes?

  - by littleFluffyKitty

  I have read about Property Animation and Hardware Acceleration but I am still uncertain what is the most efficient way to use the animator classes. (For the sake of this question I don't need to support devices before Honeycomb. So I want to use the animator classes.) For example, say I have a View. In this view I have a BitmapDrawable that I want to fade in. There are also many other elements within the view that won't change. What property or object would be best to use with the animator? The drawable? A paint that I am drawing the bitmap with in onDraw? Something else? How can this be done to be most efficient with hardware acceleration? Will this require calling invalidate for each step of the animation or is there a way to animate just the drawable and not cause the rest of the view to be redrawn completely for each step of the animation? I guess I imagine an optimal case would be the rest of the view not having to be completely redrawn in software, but rather hardware acceleration efficiently fading the drawable. Any suggestions or pointers to recommended approaches? Thanks!

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• Picture Box and Form Transparency

  - by Qu1nncunxIV

  Maybe I am missing something, but is it the case that when you set a pictureboxes background to transparent, all it really does is set it to the same color as the forms background? What I am trying to do is draw an animation for the benefit of this, a bouncing ball - which I paint on the form, then overlay that with a picture frame. End result should be a bouncing ball in a picture frame, I should mention that the picture frame does not have a straight edge, so it is not possible to arrange 4 picture boxes in a frame. The ball needs to vanish behind the frame to change color and then magically bounce back out. I have tried: 1.Setting the picture box background to pink and then key out the same pink, this basically cuts away everything, including that which is behind the picture box 2.Setting the picture box to transparent, this just displays the picture box background as the same color as the forms background. 3.I have tried painting the image in a rectangle, this had the same effect as drawing it in a picture box. I am not sure what I am doing wrong, I am wondering if there is any other ways I could try or if someone has made a custom control or library that supports transparency?

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• How can I avoid garbage collection delays in Java games? (Best Practices)

  - by Brian

  I'm performance tuning interactive games in Java for the Android platform. Once in a while there is a hiccup in drawing and interaction for garbage collection. Usually it's less than one tenth of a second, but sometimes it can be as large as 200ms on very slow devices. I am using the ddms profiler (part of the Android SDK) to search out where my memory allocations come from and excise them from my inner drawing and logic loops. The worst offender had been short loops done like, for(GameObject gob : interactiveObjects) gob.onDraw(canvas); where every single time the loop was executed there was an iterator allocated. I'm using arrays (ArrayList) for my objects now. If I ever want trees or hashes in an inner loop I know that I need to be careful or even reimplement them instead of using the Java Collections framework since I can't afford the extra garbage collection. That may come up when I'm looking at priority queues. I also have trouble where I want to display scores and progress using Canvas.drawText. This is bad, canvas.drawText("Your score is: " + Score.points, x, y, paint); because Strings, char arrays and StringBuffers will be allocated all over to make it work. If you have a few text display items and run the frame 60 times a second that begins to add up and will increase your garbage collection hiccups. I think the best choice here is to keep char[] arrays and decode your int or double manually into it and concatenate strings onto the beginning and end. I'd like to hear if there's something cleaner. I know there must be others out there dealing with this. How do you handle it and what are the pitfalls and best practices you've discovered to run interactively on Java or Android? These gc issues are enough to make me miss manual memory management, but not very much.

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• How to move image in Applet?

  - by user1609804

  I want to move the character left, right up, and down in applet, but it is not moving at all. here is my code, help please import javax.swing.JPanel; import java.awt.image.BufferedImage; import java.io.*; import javax.imageio.ImageIO; import java.applet.*; import java.awt.event.*; import java.awt.*; public class drawCenter extends Applet { private int x,y;// the x and y of the position of the player private BufferedImage image, pos; public void init( ) { try { image = ImageIO.read(new File("pokemonCenter.png")); pos = ImageIO.read(new File("player/maleInGame.png")); } catch (IOException ex) { } x = 150; y = 171; } public void keyPressed(KeyEvent e) { int keyCode = e.getKeyCode(); switch( keyCode ) { case KeyEvent.VK_UP: if( y>0 ) { y=y-19; repaint(); } break; case KeyEvent.VK_DOWN: if( y<171 ) { y=y+19; repaint(); } break; case KeyEvent.VK_LEFT:if( x>0 ) { x=x-15; repaint(); } break; case KeyEvent.VK_RIGHT:if( x<285 ) { x=x+15; repaint(); } break; } e.consume(); } public void keyReleased(){ } public void paint( Graphics g ) { g.drawImage(image, 0, 0, null); g.drawImage(pos, x, y, null); } }

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• Inspire Geek Love with These Hilarious Geek Valentines

  - by Eric Z Goodnight

  Want to send some Geek Love to that special someone? Why not do it with these elementary school throwback valentines, and win their heart this upcoming Valentine’s day—the geek way! Read on to see the simple method to make your own custom Valentines, as well as download a set of eleven ready-made ones any geek guy or gal should be delighted get. It’s amore! How to Make Custom Valentines A size we’ve used for all of our Valentines is a 3” x 4” at 150 dpi. This is fairly low resolution for print, but makes a great graphic to email. With your new image open, Navigate to Edit > Fill and fill your background layer with a rich, red color (or whatever appeals to you.) By setting “Use” to “Foreground color as shown above, you’ll paint whatever foreground color you have in your color picker. Press to select the text tool. Set a few text objects, using whatever fonts appeal to you. Pixel fonts, like this one, are freely downloadable, and we’ve already shared a great list of Valentines fonts. Copy an image from the internet if you’re confident your sweetie won’t mind a bit of fair use of copyrighted imagery. If they do mind, find yourself some great Creative Commons images. to do a free transform on your image, sizing it to whatever dimensions work best for your design. Right click your newly added image layer in your panel and Choose “Blending Effects” to pick a Layer Style. “Stroke” with this setting adds a black line around your image. Also turning on “Outer Glow” with this setting puts a dark black shadow around the top and bottom (and sides, although they are hidden). Add some more text. Double entendre is recommended. Click and hold down on the “Rectangle Tool” to get the “Custom Shape Tool.” The custom shape tool has useful vector shapes built into it. Find the “Shape” dropdown in the menu to find the heart image. Click and drag to create a vector heart shape in your image. Your layers panel is where you can change the color, if it happens to use the wrong one at first. Click the color swatch in your panel, highlighted in blue above. will transform your vector heart. You can also use it to rotate, if you like. Add some details, like this Power or Standby symbol, which can be found in symbol fonts, taken from images online, or drawn by hand. Your Valentine is now ready to be saved as a JPG or PNG and sent to the object of your affection! Keep reading to see a list of 11 downloadable How-To Geek Valentines, including this one and the three from the header image. Download The HTG Set of Valentines Download the HTG Geek Valentines (ZIP) Download the HTG Geek Valentines (ZIP) When he’s not wooing ladies with Valentines cards, you can email the author at [email protected] with your Photoshop and Graphics questions. Your questions may be featured in a future How-To Geek article! Latest Features How-To Geek ETC Inspire Geek Love with These Hilarious Geek Valentines How to Integrate Dropbox with Pages, Keynote, and Numbers on iPad RGB? CMYK? Alpha? What Are Image Channels and What Do They Mean? How to Recover that Photo, Picture or File You Deleted Accidentally How To Colorize Black and White Vintage Photographs in Photoshop How To Get SSH Command-Line Access to Windows 7 Using Cygwin How to Kid Proof Your Computer’s Power and Reset Buttons Microsoft’s Windows Media Player Extension Adds H.264 Support Back to Google Chrome Android Notifier Pushes Android Notices to Your Desktop Dead Space 2 Theme for Chrome and Iron Carl Sagan and Halo Reach Mashup – We Humans are Capable of Greatness [Video] Battle the Necromorphs Once Again on Your Desktop with the Dead Space 2 Theme for Windows 7

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• Reconciling the Boy Scout Rule and Opportunistic Refactoring with code reviews

  - by t0x1n

  I am a great believer in the Boy Scout Rule: Always check a module in cleaner than when you checked it out." No matter who the original author was, what if we always made some effort, no matter how small, to improve the module. What would be the result? I think if we all followed that simple rule, we'd see the end of the relentless deterioration of our software systems. Instead, our systems would gradually get better and better as they evolved. We'd also see teams caring for the system as a whole, rather than just individuals caring for their own small little part. I am also a great believer in the related idea of Opportunistic Refactoring: Although there are places for some scheduled refactoring efforts, I prefer to encourage refactoring as an opportunistic activity, done whenever and wherever code needs to cleaned up - by whoever. What this means is that at any time someone sees some code that isn't as clear as it should be, they should take the opportunity to fix it right there and then - or at least within a few minutes Particularly note the following excerpt from the refactoring article: I'm wary of any development practices that cause friction for opportunistic refactoring ... My sense is that most teams don't do enough refactoring, so it's important to pay attention to anything that is discouraging people from doing it. To help flush this out be aware of any time you feel discouraged from doing a small refactoring, one that you're sure will only take a minute or two. Any such barrier is a smell that should prompt a conversation. So make a note of the discouragement and bring it up with the team. At the very least it should be discussed during your next retrospective. Where I work, there is one development practice that causes heavy friction - Code Review (CR). Whenever I change anything that's not in the scope of my "assignment" I'm being rebuked by my reviewers that I'm making the change harder to review. This is especially true when refactoring is involved, since it makes "line by line" diff comparison difficult. This approach is the standard here, which means opportunistic refactoring is seldom done, and only "planned" refactoring (which is usually too little, too late) takes place, if at all. I claim that the benefits are worth it, and that 3 reviewers will work a little harder (to actually understand the code before and after, rather than look at the narrow scope of which lines changed - the review itself would be better due to that alone) so that the next 100 developers reading and maintaining the code will benefit. When I present this argument my reviewers, they say they have no problem with my refactoring, as long as it's not in the same CR. However I claim this is a myth: (1) Most of the times you only realize what and how you want to refactor when you're in the midst of your assignment. As Martin Fowler puts it: As you add the functionality, you realize that some code you're adding contains some duplication with some existing code, so you need to refactor the existing code to clean things up... You may get something working, but realize that it would be better if the interaction with existing classes was changed. Take that opportunity to do that before you consider yourself done. (2) Nobody is going to look favorably at you releasing "refactoring" CRs you were not supposed to do. A CR has a certain overhead and your manager doesn't want you to "waste your time" on refactoring. When it's bundled with the change you're supposed to do, this issue is minimized. The issue is exacerbated by Resharper, as each new file I add to the change (and I can't know in advance exactly which files would end up changed) is usually littered with errors and suggestions - most of which are spot on and totally deserve fixing. The end result is that I see horrible code, and I just leave it there. Ironically, I feel that fixing such code not only will not improve my standings, but actually lower them and paint me as the "unfocused" guy who wastes time fixing things nobody cares about instead of doing his job. I feel bad about it because I truly despise bad code and can't stand watching it, let alone call it from my methods! Any thoughts on how I can remedy this situation ?

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• Make Text and Images Easier to Read with the Windows 7 Magnifier

  - by DigitalGeekery

  Do you have impaired vision or find it difficult to read small print on your computer screen? Today, we’ll take a closer look at how to magnify that hard to read content with the Magnifier in Windows 7. Magnifier was available in previous versions of Windows, but the Windows 7 version comes with some notable improvements. There are now three screen modes in Magnifier. Full Screen and Lens mode, however, require Windows Aero to be enabled. If your computer doesn’t support Aero, or if you’re not using am Aero theme, Magnifier will only work in Docked mode. Using Magnifier in Windows 7 You can find the Magnifier by going to Start > All Programs > Accessories > Ease of Access > Magnifier.   Alternately, you can type magnifier into the Search box in the Start Menu and hit Enter. On the Magnifier toolbar, choose your View mode by clicking Views and choosing from the available options. Clicking the plus (+) and minus (-) buttons will zoom in or zoom out. You can change the zoom in/out percentage by adjusting the slider bar. You can also enable color inversion and select tracking options. Click OK when finished to save your settings.   After a brief period, the Magnifier Toolbar will switch to a magnifying glass icon. Simply click the magnifying glass to display the Magnifier Toolbar again.   Docked Mode In Docked mode, a portion of the screen is magnified and docked at the top of the screen. The rest of your desktop will remain in it’s normal state. You can then control which area of the screen is magnified by moving your mouse.   Full Screen Mode This magnifies your entire screen and follows your mouse as you move it around. If you loose track of where you are on the screen, use the Ctrl + Alt + Spacebar shortcut to preview where your mouse pointer is on the screen.   Lens Mode The Lens screen mode is similar to holding a magnifying glass up to your screen. Full screen mode magnifies the area around the mouse. The magnified area moves around the screen with your mouse.    Shortcut Keys Windows key + (+) to zoom in Windows key + (-) to zoom out Windows key + ESC to exit Ctrl + Alt + F – Full screen mode Ctrl + Alt + L – Lens mode Ctrl + Alt + D – Dock mode Ctrl + Alt + R – Resize the lens Ctrl + Alt + Spacebar – Preview full screen Conclusion Windows Magnifier is a nice little tool if you have impaired vision or just need to make items on the screen easier to read. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips New Features in WordPad and Paint in Windows 7How-To Geek on Lifehacker: How to Make Windows Vista Less AnnoyingUsing Comments in Word 2007 DocumentsMake Your PC Look Like Windows Phone 7Use Image Placeholders to Display Documents Faster in Word TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips HippoRemote Pro 2.2 Xobni Plus for Outlook All My Movies 5.9 CloudBerry Online Backup 1.5 for Windows Home Server Windows Media Player Plus! – Cool WMP Enhancer Get Your Team’s World Cup Schedule In Google Calendar Backup Drivers With Driver Magician TubeSort: YouTube Playlist Organizer XPS file format & XPS Viewer Explained Microsoft Office Web Apps Guide

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• How to Set Up Your Enterprise Social Organization

  - by Mike Stiles

  The rush for business organizations to establish, grow, and adopt social was driven out of necessity and inevitability. The result, however, was a sudden, booming social presence creating touch points with customers, partners and influencers, but without any corporate social organization or structure in place to effectively manage it. Even today, many business leaders remain uncertain as to how to corral this social media thing so that it makes sense for their enterprise. Imagine their panic when they hear one of the most beneficial approaches to corporate use of social involves giving up at least some hierarchical control and empowering employees to publicly engage customers. And beyond that, they should also be empowered, regardless of their corporate status, to engage and collaborate internally, spurring “off the grid” innovation. An HBR blog points out that traditionally, enterprise organizations function from the top down, and employees work end-to-end, structured around business processes. But the social enterprise opens up structures that up to now have not exactly been embraced by turf-protecting executives and managers. The blog asks, “What if leaders could create a future where customers, associates and suppliers are no longer seen as objects in the system but as valued sources of innovation, ideas and energy?” What if indeed? The social enterprise activates internal resources without the usual obsession with position. It is the dawn of mass collaboration. That does not, however, mean this mass collaboration has to lead to uncontrolled chaos. In an extended interview with Oracle, Altimeter Group analyst Jeremiah Owyang and Oracle SVP Reggie Bradford paint a complete picture of today’s social enterprise, including internal organizational structures Altimeter Group has seen emerge. One sign of a mature social enterprise is the establishing of a social Center of Excellence (CoE), which serves as a hub for high-level social strategy, training and education, research, measurement and accountability, and vendor selection. This CoE is led by a corporate Social Strategist, most likely from a Marketing or Corporate Communications background. Reporting to them are the Community Managers, the front lines of customer interaction and engagement; business unit liaisons that coordinate the enterprise; and social media campaign/product managers, social analysts, and developers. With content rising as the defining factor for social success, Altimeter also sees a Content Strategist position emerging. Across the enterprise, Altimeter has seen 5 organizational patterns. Watching the video will give you the pros and cons of each. Decentralized - Anyone can do anything at any time on any social channel. Centralized – One central groups controls all social communication for the company. Hub and Spoke – A centralized group, but business units can operate their own social under the hub’s guidance and execution. Most enterprises are using this model. Dandelion – Each business unit develops their own social strategy & staff, has its own ability to deploy, and its own ability to engage under the central policies of the CoE. Honeycomb – Every employee can do social, but as opposed to the decentralized model, it’s coordinated and monitored on one platform. The average enterprise has a whopping 178 social accounts, nearly ¼ of which are usually semi-idle and need to be scrapped. The last thing any C-suite needs is to cope with fragmented technologies, solutions and platforms. It’s neither scalable nor strategic. The prepared, effective social enterprise has a technology partner that can quickly and holistically integrate emerging platforms and technologies, such that whatever internal social command structure you’ve set up can continue efficiently executing strategy without skipping a beat. @mikestiles

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• How to Set Up Your Enterprise Social Organization?

  - by Richard Lefebvre

  By Mike Stiles on Dec 04, 2012 The rush for business organizations to establish, grow, and adopt social was driven out of necessity and inevitability. The result, however, was a sudden, booming social presence creating touch points with customers, partners and influencers, but without any corporate social organization or structure in place to effectively manage it. Even today, many business leaders remain uncertain as to how to corral this social media thing so that it makes sense for their enterprise. Imagine their panic when they hear one of the most beneficial approaches to corporate use of social involves giving up at least some hierarchical control and empowering employees to publicly engage customers. And beyond that, they should also be empowered, regardless of their corporate status, to engage and collaborate internally, spurring “off the grid” innovation. An HBR blog points out that traditionally, enterprise organizations function from the top down, and employees work end-to-end, structured around business processes. But the social enterprise opens up structures that up to now have not exactly been embraced by turf-protecting executives and managers. The blog asks, “What if leaders could create a future where customers, associates and suppliers are no longer seen as objects in the system but as valued sources of innovation, ideas and energy?” What if indeed? The social enterprise activates internal resources without the usual obsession with position. It is the dawn of mass collaboration. That does not, however, mean this mass collaboration has to lead to uncontrolled chaos. In an extended interview with Oracle, Altimeter Group analyst Jeremiah Owyang and Oracle SVP Reggie Bradford paint a complete picture of today’s social enterprise, including internal organizational structures Altimeter Group has seen emerge. One sign of a mature social enterprise is the establishing of a social Center of Excellence (CoE), which serves as a hub for high-level social strategy, training and education, research, measurement and accountability, and vendor selection. This CoE is led by a corporate Social Strategist, most likely from a Marketing or Corporate Communications background. Reporting to them are the Community Managers, the front lines of customer interaction and engagement; business unit liaisons that coordinate the enterprise; and social media campaign/product managers, social analysts, and developers. With content rising as the defining factor for social success, Altimeter also sees a Content Strategist position emerging. Across the enterprise, Altimeter has seen 5 organizational patterns. Watching the video will give you the pros and cons of each. Decentralized - Anyone can do anything at any time on any social channel. Centralized – One central groups controls all social communication for the company. Hub and Spoke – A centralized group, but business units can operate their own social under the hub’s guidance and execution. Most enterprises are using this model. Dandelion – Each business unit develops their own social strategy & staff, has its own ability to deploy, and its own ability to engage under the central policies of the CoE. Honeycomb – Every employee can do social, but as opposed to the decentralized model, it’s coordinated and monitored on one platform. The average enterprise has a whopping 178 social accounts, nearly ¼ of which are usually semi-idle and need to be scrapped. The last thing any C-suite needs is to cope with fragmented technologies, solutions and platforms. It’s neither scalable nor strategic. The prepared, effective social enterprise has a technology partner that can quickly and holistically integrate emerging platforms and technologies, such that whatever internal social command structure you’ve set up can continue efficiently executing strategy without skipping a beat. @mikestiles

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• Thread safe double buffering

  - by kdavis8

  I am trying to implement a draw map method that will draw the tiled image across the surface of the component. I'm having issue with this code. The double buffering does not seem to be working, because the sprite flickers like crazy; my source code: package myPackage; import java.awt.Color; import java.awt.Graphics; import java.awt.Graphics2D; import java.awt.Image; import java.awt.Toolkit; import java.awt.image.BufferStrategy; import java.awt.image.BufferedImage; import javax.swing.JFrame; public class GameView extends JFrame implements Runnable { public BufferedImage backbuffer; public Graphics2D g2d; public Image img; Thread gameloop; Scene scene; public GameView() { super("Game View"); setSize(600, 600); setVisible(true); setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE); backbuffer = new BufferedImage(getWidth(), getHeight(), BufferedImage.TYPE_INT_RGB); g2d = backbuffer.createGraphics(); Toolkit tk = Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit(); img = tk.getImage(this.getClass().getResource("cage.png")); scene = new Scene(g2d, this); gameloop = new Thread(this); gameloop.start(); } public static void main(String args[]) { new GameView(); } public void paint(Graphics g) { g.drawImage(backbuffer, 0, 0, this); repaint(); } @Override public void run() { // TODO Auto-generated method stub Thread t = Thread.currentThread(); while (t == gameloop) { scene.getScene("dirtmap"); g2d.drawImage(img, 80, 80,this![enter image description here][1]); } } private void drawScene(String string) { // TODO Auto-generated method stub // g2d.setColor(Color.white); // g2d.fillRect(0, 0, getWidth(), getHeight()); scene.getScene(string); } } package myPackage; import java.awt.Color; import java.awt.Component; import java.awt.Graphics; import java.awt.Graphics2D; import java.awt.Image; import java.awt.Toolkit; public class Scene { Graphics g2d; Component c; boolean loaded = false; public Scene(Graphics2D gr, Component co) { g2d = gr; c = co; } public void getScene(String mapName) { Toolkit tk = Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit(); Image tile = tk.getImage(this.getClass().getResource("dirt.png")); // g2d.setColor(Color.red); for (int y = 0; y <= 18; y++) { for (int x = 0; x <= 18; x += 1) { g2d.drawImage(tile, x * 32, y * 32, c); } } loaded = true; } }

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• SQL SERVER – Why Do We Need Master Data Management – Importance and Significance of Master Data Management (MDM)

  - by pinaldave

  Let me paint a picture of everyday life for you.  Let’s say you and your wife both have address books for your groups of friends.  There is definitely overlap between them, so that you both have the addresses for your mutual friends, and there are addresses that only you know, and some only she knows.  They also might be organized differently.  You might list your friend under “J” for “Joe” or even under “W” for “Work,” while she might list him under “S” for “Joe Smith” or under your name because he is your friend.  If you happened to trade, neither of you would be able to find anything! This is where data management would be very important.  If you were to consolidate into one address book, you would have to set rules about how to organize the book, and both of you would have to follow them.  You would also make sure that poor Joe doesn’t get entered twice under “J” and under “S.” This might be a familiar situation to you, whether you are thinking about address books, record collections, books, or even shopping lists.  Wherever there is a lot of data to consolidate, you are going to run into problems unless everyone is following the same rules. I’m sure that my readers can figure out where I am going with this.  What is SQL Server but a computerized way to organize data?  And Microsoft is making it easier and easier to get all your “addresses” into one place.  In the  2008 version of SQL they introduced a new tool called Master Data Services (MDS) for Master Data Management, and they have improved it for the new 2012 version. MDM was hailed as a major improvement for business intelligence.  You might not think that an organizational system is terribly exciting, but think about the kind of “address books” a company might have.  Many companies have lots of important information, like addresses, credit card numbers, purchase history, and so much more.  To organize all this efficiently so that customers are well cared for and properly billed (only once, not never or multiple times!) is a major part of business intelligence. MDM comes into play because it will comb through these mountains of data and make sure that all the information is consistent, accurate, and all placed in one database so that employees don’t have to search high and low and waste their time. MDM also has operational MDM functions.  This is not a redundancy.  Operational MDM means that when one employee updates one bit of information in the database, for example – updating a new address for a customer, operational MDM ensures that this address is updated throughout the system so that all departments will have the correct information. Another cool thing about MDM is that it features Master Data Services Configuration Manager, which is exactly what it sounds like.  It has a built-in “helper” that lets you set up your database quickly, easily, and with the correct configurations.  While talking about cool features, I can’t skip over the add-in for Excel.  This allows you to link certain data to Excel files for easier sharing and uploading. In summary, I want to emphasize that the scariest part of the database is slowly disappearing.  Everyone knows that a database – one consolidated area for all your data – is a good idea, but the idea of setting one up is daunting.  But SQL Server is making data management easier and easier with features like Master Data Services (MDS). Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Master Data Services, MDM

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