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• Windows 7 is stuck at "Starting Windows" when I attempt to boot computer

  - by Eli

  Basically, whenever I turn on my computer, it gets to the Starting Windows phase and just stays there. The startup animation still plays, yet it gets nowhere. I have tried booting into safe mode, however it gets stuck at loading CLASSPNP.SYS. It then freezes there and doesn't continue booting. I have tried booting into recovery mode from the hard drive, and it freezes after displaying the background image. I have tried booting from a recovery CD, which works, and I was able to use system restore. However, using system restore did not fix it, and it still is stuck at the Starting Windows screen. I have tried booting a Windows CD (Windows 8 Retail Installer) to see if I could upgrade it to fix this issue, however that froze at a blank screen after it got past the boot logo. I have tried changing around the BIOS settings (including resetting), to no avail. I have tried re-plugging the internal PSU cables (this is a custom-built desktop), yet this has changed nothing. I can boot into a loopback Ubuntu install on the same drive, which works fine, other than the fact that it has issues with some of the USB ports and the network card. This system has worked fine for the past few months, completely stable, and nothing in the configuration has changed before this error started happening. Startup Repair on the Windows recovery CD doesn't find any issues. Unplugging my secondary hard drive or swapping around memory doesn't change anything. The hard drive itself is fine, it hasn't shown any signs of failure and once again, boots my other OS fine. If anyone could help with this, that would be great. I can't seem to find any possible solution to this. If it makes any difference, my system specs are as follows: AMD FX-8320 Gigabyte GA-970A-D3 4GB of DDR3 Radeon HD 6870 550w PSU I'd like to not have to reinstall Windows, for I have more than a terabyte of data that I would have to back up if that becomes the only option. EDIT: I have since tried the following: Tried the solution involving restoring files from RegBackup, which changed nothing. Tried testing everything with Hiren's boot CD, everything comes back as fine. Tried disabling everything unnecessary in the BIOS and unplugging everything unneeded, it still hangs. Tried swapping out every possible combination of RAM, it still has the same result. The RAM is not at fault it seems Tried every GPU I own (which is many!) and it still hangs at the exact same place. Tried minimizing the power consumption as much as possible, even using an old PCI graphics card. It still hangs at the same place in the same way, signifying that it's not the PSU at fault. Tried resetting the BIOS again, still nothing. Tried every possible combination of BIOS options, even downclocking everything, it still hangs in the same spot. Tried upgrading the BIOS from version FB to FD, which changed nothing. Based on this, I would conclude the motherboard to be at fault. Are there any other possibilities? I don't want to spend $150 for a new motherboard. EDIT 2: This is what it gets stuck at when I try to boot into safe mode: Note the slight graphical corruption at the top of the screen. No matter how I set up the system, this seems to be there. In addition, either it has stopped booting into safe mode now, or it takes upwards of 2+ hours, and I haven't left it running for that long.

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• Lockdown users on Windows Server 2012

  - by el.severo

  I set up a Active Directory on a server machine with Windows Server 2012 and I'd like to create some users with limitations like Windows Steady State does in Windows XP (locally). Seen already the Windows SteadyState Handbook (with Windows Server 2008), but I'd like to know if anyone has tried this before, the limitations are the following: 1. Prevent locked or roaming user profiles that cannot be found on the computer from logging on 2. Do not cache copies of locked or roaming user profiles for users who have previously logged on to this computer 3. Do not allow Windows to compute and store passwords using LAN Manager Hash values 4. Do not store usernames or passwords used to log on to the Windows Live ID or the domain 5. Prevent users from creating folders and files on drive C:\ 6. Lock profile to prevent the user from making permanent changes 7. Remove the Control Panel, Printer and Network Settings from the Classic Start menu 8. Remove the Favorites icon 9. Remove the My Network Places icon 10. Remove the Frequently Used Program list 11. Remove the Shared documents folder from My Computer 12. Remove control Panel icon 13. Remove the Set Program Access and Defaults icon 14. Remove the Network Connection(Connect To)icon 15. Remove the Printers and Faxes icon 16. Remove the Run icon 17. Prevent access to Windows Explorer features: Folder Options, Customize Toolbar, and the Notification Area 18. Prevent access to the taskbar 19. Prevent access to the command prompt 20. Prevent access to the registry editor 21. Prevent access to the Task Manager 22. Prevent access to Microsoft Management Console utilities 23. Prevent users from adding or removing printers 24. Prevent users from locking the computer 25. Prevent password changes (also requires the Control Panel icon to be removed) 26. Disable System Tools and other management programs 27. Prevent users from saving files to the desktop 28. Hide A Drive 29. Hide B Drive 30. Hide C Drive 31. Prevent changes to Internet Explorer registry settings 32. Empty the Temporary Internet Files folder when Internet Explorer is closed 33. Remove Internet Options 34. Remove General tab in Internet Options 35. Remove Security tab in Internet Options 36. Remove Privacy tab in Internet Options 37. Remove Content tab in Internet Options 38. Remove Connections tab in Internet Options 39. Remove Programs tab in Internet Options 40. Remove Advanced tab in Internet Options 41. Set a home page (Internet Explorer) 42. Restrict the possibility to change desktop image 43. Restrict the possibility to change wallpaper 44. Restrict usb flash drives Any suggestions for this? UPDATE: As @Dan suggested me I'd like to specify that would be applied to a educational scenario where students can login from a computer and want to add some restrictions to them.

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• Most secure way to access my home Linux server while I am on the road? Specialized solution wanted

  - by Ace Paus

  I think many people may be in my situation. I travel on business with a laptop. And I need secure access to files from the office (which in my case is my home). The short version of my question: How can I make SSH/SFTP really secure when only one person needs to connect to the server from one laptop? In this situation, what special steps would make it almost impossible for anyone else to get online access to the server? A lot more details: I use Ubuntu Linux on both my laptop (KDE) and my home/office server. Connectivity is not a problem. I can tether to my phone's connection if needed. I need access to a large number of files (around 300 GB). I don't need all of them at once, but I don't know in advance which files I might need. These files contain confidential client info and personal info such as credit card numbers, so they must be secure. Given this, I don't want store all these files on Dropbox or Amazon AWS, or similar. I couldn't justify that cost anyway (Dropbox don't even publish prices for plans above 100 GB, and security is a concern). However, I am willing to spend some money on a proper solution. A VPN service, for example, might be part of the solution? Or other commercial services? I've heard about PogoPlug, but I don't know if there is a similar service that might address my security concerns? I could copy all my files to my laptop because it has the space. But then I have to sync between my home computer and my laptop and I found in the past that I'm not very good about doing this. And if my laptop is lost or stolen, my data would be on it. The laptop drive is an SSD and encryption solutions for SSD drives are not good. Therefore, it seems best to keep all my data on my Linux file server (which is safe at home). Is that a reasonable conclusion, or is anything connected to the Internet such a risk that I should just copy the data to the laptop (and maybe replace the SSD with an HDD, which reduces battery life and performance)? I view the risks of losing a laptop to be higher. I am not an obvious hacking target online. My home broadband is cable Internet, and it seems very reliable. So I want to know the best (reasonable) way to securely access my data (from my laptop) while on the road. I only need to access it from this one computer, although I may connect from either my phone's 3G/4G or via WiFi or some client's broadband, etc. So I won't know in advance which IP address I'll have. I am leaning toward a solution based on SSH and SFTP (or similar). SSH/SFTP would provided about all the functionality I anticipate needing. I would like to use SFTP and Dolphin to browse and download files. I'll use SSH and the terminal for anything else. My Linux file server is set up with OpenSSH. I think I have SSH relatively secured. I'm using Denyhosts too. But I want to go several steps further. I want to get the chances that anyone can get into my server as close to zero as possible while still allowing me to get access from the road. I'm not a sysadmin or programmer or real "superuser". I have to spend most of my time doing other things. I've heard about "port knocking" but I have never used it and I don't know how to implement it (although I'm willing to learn). I have already read a number of articles with titles such as: Top 20 OpenSSH Server Best Security Practices 20 Linux Server Hardening Security Tips Debian Linux Stop SSH User Hacking / Cracking Attacks with DenyHosts Software more... I have not implemented every single thing I've read about. I probably can't do that. But maybe there is something even better I can do in my situation because I only need access from a single laptop. I'm just one user. My server does not need to be accessible to the general public. Given all these facts, I'm hoping I can get some suggestions here that are within my capability to implement and that leverage these facts to create a great deal better security than general purpose suggestions in the articles above.

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• Android Mediaplayer: setDataSource issue for downloaded media file

  - by Erik

  I have an application that will record and play audio files. Some of the audio files are downloaded using simple standard http downloads using httpclient. It worked like a charm for a long time. Now all of a sudden I cannot play the files I download. It fails with this stack. I store the files on the SDCard and I experience the problem both on a handset and a USB connected device. I have checked that the downloaded file is cool on the server, and I can play it without any issues. These are the code snippets I use ( I know that recordingFile is a valid path for the file). // inside the activity class private void playRecording() throws IOException{ File recordingFile = new File(recordingFileName); FileInputStream recordingInputStream = new FileInputStream(recordingFile); audioMediaPlayer.playAudio(recordingInputStream); } Here is the media player code: // inside my media player class which handles the recordings public void playAudio(FileInputStream audioInputStream) throws IOException { mediaPlayer.reset(); mediaPlayer.setDataSource(audioInputStream.getFD()); mediaPlayer.prepare(); mediaPlayer.start(); } Here is the exception: E/MediaPlayerService( 555): offset error E/MediaPlayer( 786): Unable to to create media player W/System.err( 786): java.io.IOException: setDataSourceFD failed.: status=0x80000000 W/System.err( 786): at android.media.MediaPlayer.setDataSource(Native Method) W/System.err( 786): at android.media.MediaPlayer.setDataSource(MediaPlayer.java:632) W/System.err( 786): at net.xxx.xxx.AudioMediaPlayer.playAudio(AudioMediaPlayer.java:69) W/System.err( 786): at net.xxx.xxx.Downloads.playRecording(Downloads.java:299) W/System.err( 786): at net.xxx.xxx.Downloads.access$0(Downloads.java:294) W/System.err( 786): at net.xxx.xxx.Downloads$1.onClick(Downloads.java:135) I have tried seeking some answer of the offset error, but not really clear what this issue might be. PS I download the file with this code: public FileOutputStream executeHttpGet(FileOutputStream fileOutputStream) throws ClientProtocolException, IOException{ try { // Execute HTTP Post Request httpResponse = httpClient.execute(httpPost, localContext); int status = httpResponse.getStatusLine().getStatusCode(); // we assume that the response body contains the error message if (status != HttpStatus.SC_OK) { ByteArrayOutputStream ostream = new ByteArrayOutputStream(); httpResponse.getEntity().writeTo(ostream); fileOutputStream = null; } else { InputStream content = httpResponse.getEntity().getContent(); byte[] buffer = new byte[1024]; int len = 0; while ( (len = content.read(buffer)) > 0 ) { fileOutputStream.write(buffer,0, len); } fileOutputStream.close(); content.close(); // this will also close the connection } } catch (ClientProtocolException e1) { // TODO Auto-generated catch block e1.printStackTrace(); fileOutputStream = null; } catch (IOException e2) { // TODO Auto-generated catch block e2.printStackTrace(); fileOutputStream = null; } return fileOutputStream; }

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• Windows CE Programming Serial Port - Getting Garbled Output

  - by user576639

  I am programming a Windows CE 6 device (Motorola MC3100 scanner Terminal). Using Lazarus FPC to compile it. After 3 weeks work I reluctantly post here in the hope someone can suggest why I am getting garbled output from the serial port. The code I am using is posted below. This is the standard code I have found from several places. The OpenPort works OK. When I send the string using SendString('ABCDEF') I get garbled input to the PC Serial port such as: 4[#131][#26][#0][#0][#0][#0] (the bracketed data indicates that it is a non-printable character ASCII Code) Obviously it is connecting to the port OK AND it is sending the correct no of characters (7). I have tried all combinations of Baud Rate, Data Bits, Parity and Stop Bits without any joy. Also tried changing cable, on a different PC etc. Could it be I need to set something else in the DCB? Any help or suggestions would be GREATLY appreciated. unit Unit1; {$mode objfpc}{$H+} interface uses Classes, SysUtils, FileUtil, Forms, Controls, Graphics, Dialogs, StdCtrls, ExtCtrls, Windows, LResources; type { TForm1 } TForm1 = class(TForm) Button1: TButton; Button2: TButton; Label1: TLabel; procedure Button1Click(Sender: TObject); procedure Button2Click(Sender: TObject); function OpenPort(ComPort:String;BaudRate,ByteSize,Parity,StopBits:integer):String; procedure SendString(str:String); private { private declarations } public { public declarations } end; var Form1: TForm1; cc:TCOMMCONFIG; Connected:Boolean; implementation {$R *.lfm} var F: TextFile; var hComm: THandle; str: String; lrc: LongWord; { TForm1 } function OpenPort(ComPort:String;BaudRate,ByteSize,Parity,StopBits:integer):String; var cc:TCOMMCONFIG; SWide:WideString; Port:LPCWSTR; begin SWide:=ComPort; Port:=PWideChar(SWide); result:=''; if (1=1) then begin Connected:=False; hComm:=CreateFile(Port, GENERIC_READ or GENERIC_WRITE,0, nil,OPEN_EXISTING,0,0); if (hComm = INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE) then begin ShowMessage('Fail to Open'); exit; end; GetCommState(hComm,cc.dcb); cc.dcb.BaudRate:=BaudRate; cc.dcb.ByteSize:=ByteSize; cc.dcb.Parity:=Parity; cc.dcb.StopBits:=StopBits; if not SetCommState(hComm, cc.dcb) then begin result:='SetCommState Error!'; CloseHandle(hComm); exit; end; Connected:=True; end; end; procedure TForm1.Button1Click(Sender: TObject); begin OpenPort('COM1:',9600,8,0,0); end; procedure TForm1.Button2Click(Sender: TObject); begin SendString('ABCDEFG'); end; procedure TForm1.SendString(str:String); var lrc:LongWord; begin if (hComm=0) then exit; try if not PurgeComm(hComm, PURGE_TXABORT or PURGE_TXCLEAR) then raise Exception.Create('Unable to purge com: '); except Exit; end; WriteFile(hComm,str,Length(str), lrc, nil); end; end.

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• Strategy and AI for the game 'Proximity'

  - by smci

  'Proximity' is a strategy game of territorial domination similar to Othello, Go and Risk. Two players, uses a 10x12 hex grid. Game invented by Brian Cable in 2007. Seems to be a worthy game for discussing a) optimal strategy then b) how to build an AI Strategies are going to be probabilistic or heuristic-based, due to the randomness factor, and the high branching factor (starts out at 120). So it will be kind of hard to compare objectively. A compute time limit of 5s per turn seems reasonable. Game: Flash version here and many copies elsewhere on the web Rules: here Object: to have control of the most armies after all tiles have been placed. Each turn you received a randomly numbered tile (value between 1 and 20 armies) to place on any vacant board space. If this tile is adjacent to any ally tiles, it will strengthen each tile's defenses +1 (up to a max value of 20). If it is adjacent to any enemy tiles, it will take control over them if its number is higher than the number on the enemy tile. Thoughts on strategy: Here are some initial thoughts; setting the computer AI to Expert will probably teach a lot: minimizing your perimeter seems to be a good strategy, to prevent flips and minimize worst-case damage like in Go, leaving holes inside your formation is lethal, only more so with the hex grid because you can lose armies on up to 6 squares in one move low-numbered tiles are a liability, so place them away from your main territory, near the board edges and scattered. You can also use low-numbered tiles to plug holes in your formation, or make small gains along the perimeter which the opponent will not tend to bother attacking. a triangle formation of three pieces is strong since they mutually reinforce, and also reduce the perimeter Each tile can be flipped at most 6 times, i.e. when its neighbor tiles are occupied. Control of a formation can flow back and forth. Sometimes you lose part of a formation and plug any holes to render that part of the board 'dead' and lock in your territory/ prevent further losses. Low-numbered tiles are obvious-but-low-valued liabilities, but high-numbered tiles can be bigger liabilities if they get flipped (which is harder). One lucky play with a 20-army tile can cause a swing of 200 (from +100 to -100 armies). So tile placement will have both offensive and defensive considerations. Comment 1,2,4 seem to resemble a minimax strategy where we minimize the maximum expected possible loss (modified by some probabilistic consideration of the value ß the opponent can get from 1..20 i.e. a structure which can only be flipped by a ß=20 tile is 'nearly impregnable'.) I'm not clear what the implications of comments 3,5,6 are for optimal strategy. Interested in comments from Go, Chess or Othello players. (The sequel ProximityHD for XBox Live, allows 4-player -cooperative or -competitive local multiplayer increases the branching factor since you now have 5 tiles in your hand at any given time, of which you can only play one. Reinforcement of ally tiles is increased to +2 per ally.)

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• Asp.net MVC and MOSS 2010 integration

  - by Robert Koritnik

  Just a sidenote: I'm not sure whether I should post this to serverfault as well, because some MOSS admin may have some info for me as well? A bit of explanation first (without Asp.net MVC) Is it possible to integrate the two? Is it possible to write an application that would share at least credential information with MOSS? I have to write a MOSS application that has to do with these technologies: MOSS 2010 Personal client certificates authentication (most probably on USB keys) Active Directory Federation Services Separate SQL DB that would serve application specific data (separate as not being part of MOSS DB) How should it work? Users should authenticate using personal certificates into MOSS 2010 There would be a certain part of MOSS that would be related to my custom application This application should only authorize certain users via AD FS - I guess these users should have a certain security claim attached to them This application should manage users (that have access to this app) with additional (app specific) security claims related to this application (as additional application level authorization rights for individual application parts) This application should use custom SQL 2008 DB heavily with its own data This application should have the possibility to integrate with external systems as well (Exchange for instance to inject calendar entries, ERP systems etc) This application should be able to export its data (from its DB) to files. I don't know if it's possible, but it would be nice if the app could add these files to MOSS and attach authorization info to them so only users with sufficient rights would be able to view/open these files. Why Asp.net MVC then? I'm very well versed in Asp.net MVC (also with the latest version) and I haven't done anything on Sharepoint since version 2003 (which doesn't do me no good or prepare me for the latest version in any way shape or form). This project will most probably be a death march project so I would rather write my application as a UI rich Asp.net MVC application and somehow integrate it into MOSS. But not only via a link, because I would like to at least share credentials, so users wouldn't need to re-login when accessing my app. Using Asp.net MVC I would at least have the possibility to finish on time or be less death marching. Is this at all possible? Questions Is it possible to integrate Asp.net MVC into MOSS as described above? If integration is not possible, would it be possible to create a completely MOSS based application that would work as described? Which parts of MOSS 2010 should I use to accomplish what I need?

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• problem with two .NET threads and hardware access

  - by mack369

  I'm creating an application which communicates with the device via FT2232H USB/RS232 converter. For communication I'm using FTD2XX_NET.dll library from FTDI website. I'm using two threads: first thread continuously reads data from the device the second thread is the main thread of the Windows Form Application I've got a problem when I'm trying to write any data to the device while the receiver's thread is running. The main thread simply hangs up on ftdiDevice.Write function. I tried to synchronize both threads so that only one thread can use Read/Write function at the same time, but it didn't help. Below code responsible for the communication. Note that following functions are methods of FtdiPort class. Receiver's thread private void receiverLoop() { if (this.DataReceivedHandler == null) { throw new BackendException("dataReceived delegate is not set"); } FTDI.FT_STATUS ftStatus = FTDI.FT_STATUS.FT_OK; byte[] readBytes = new byte[this.ReadBufferSize]; while (true) { lock (FtdiPort.threadLocker) { UInt32 numBytesRead = 0; ftStatus = ftdiDevice.Read(readBytes, this.ReadBufferSize, ref numBytesRead); if (ftStatus == FTDI.FT_STATUS.FT_OK) { this.DataReceivedHandler(readBytes, numBytesRead); } else { Trace.WriteLine(String.Format("Couldn't read data from ftdi: status {0}", ftStatus)); Thread.Sleep(10); } } Thread.Sleep(this.RXThreadDelay); } } Write function called from main thread public void Write(byte[] data, int length) { if (this.IsOpened) { uint i = 0; lock (FtdiPort.threadLocker) { this.ftdiDevice.Write(data, length, ref i); } Thread.Sleep(1); if (i != (int)length) { throw new BackendException("Couldnt send all data"); } } else { throw new BackendException("Port is closed"); } } Object used to synchronize two threads static Object threadLocker = new Object(); Method that starts the receiver's thread private void startReceiver() { if (this.DataReceivedHandler == null) { return; } if (this.IsOpened == false) { throw new BackendException("Trying to start listening for raw data while disconnected"); } this.receiverThread = new Thread(this.receiverLoop); //this.receiverThread.Name = "protocolListener"; this.receiverThread.IsBackground = true; this.receiverThread.Start(); } The ftdiDevice.Write function doesn't hang up if I comment following line: ftStatus = ftdiDevice.Read(readBytes, this.ReadBufferSize, ref numBytesRead);

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• Find optimal strategy and AI for the game 'Proximity'?

  - by smci

  'Proximity' is a strategy game of territorial domination similar to Othello, Go and Risk. Two players, uses a 10x12 hex grid. Game invented by Brian Cable in 2007. Seems to be a worthy game for discussing a) optimal algorithm then b) how to build an AI. Strategies are going to be probabilistic or heuristic-based, due to the randomness factor, and the insane branching factor (20^120). So it will be kind of hard to compare objectively. A compute time limit of 5s per turn seems reasonable. Game: Flash version here and many copies elsewhere on the web Rules: here Object: to have control of the most armies after all tiles have been placed. Each turn you received a randomly numbered tile (value between 1 and 20 armies) to place on any vacant board space. If this tile is adjacent to any ally tiles, it will strengthen each tile's defenses +1 (up to a max value of 20). If it is adjacent to any enemy tiles, it will take control over them if its number is higher than the number on the enemy tile. Thoughts on strategy: Here are some initial thoughts; setting the computer AI to Expert will probably teach a lot: minimizing your perimeter seems to be a good strategy, to prevent flips and minimize worst-case damage like in Go, leaving holes inside your formation is lethal, only more so with the hex grid because you can lose armies on up to 6 squares in one move low-numbered tiles are a liability, so place them away from your main territory, near the board edges and scattered. You can also use low-numbered tiles to plug holes in your formation, or make small gains along the perimeter which the opponent will not tend to bother attacking. a triangle formation of three pieces is strong since they mutually reinforce, and also reduce the perimeter Each tile can be flipped at most 6 times, i.e. when its neighbor tiles are occupied. Control of a formation can flow back and forth. Sometimes you lose part of a formation and plug any holes to render that part of the board 'dead' and lock in your territory/ prevent further losses. Low-numbered tiles are obvious-but-low-valued liabilities, but high-numbered tiles can be bigger liabilities if they get flipped (which is harder). One lucky play with a 20-army tile can cause a swing of 200 (from +100 to -100 armies). So tile placement will have both offensive and defensive considerations. Comment 1,2,4 seem to resemble a minimax strategy where we minimize the maximum expected possible loss (modified by some probabilistic consideration of the value ß the opponent can get from 1..20 i.e. a structure which can only be flipped by a ß=20 tile is 'nearly impregnable'.) I'm not clear what the implications of comments 3,5,6 are for optimal strategy. Interested in comments from Go, Chess or Othello players. (The sequel ProximityHD for XBox Live, allows 4-player -cooperative or -competitive local multiplayer increases the branching factor since you now have 5 tiles in your hand at any given time, of which you can only play one. Reinforcement of ally tiles is increased to +2 per ally.)

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• jQuery JSON encode set of input values

  - by gurun8

  I need tp serialize a group of input elements but I can't for the life of me figure out this simple task. I can successfully iterate through the targeted inputs using: $("#tr_Features :input").each(function() { ... } Here's my code, that doesn't work: var features = new Array(); $("#tr_Features :input").each(function() { features += {$(this).attr("name"): $(this).val()}; } Serializing the entire form won't give me what I need. The form has much more than this subset of inputs. This seems like it should be a pretty straightforward task but apparently programming late into a Friday afternoon isn't a good thing. If it's helpful, here's the form inputs I'm targeting: <table cellspacing="0" border="0" id="TblGrid_list" class="EditTable" cellpading="0"> <tbody><tr id="tr_Features" class="FormData" rowpos="1"> <td class="CaptionTD ui-widget-content">Cable Family</td> <td id="td_Features" class="DataTD ui-widget-content" style="white-space: pre;">&nbsp;<input type="text" value="" id="feature_id:8" name="feature_id:8"></td> </tr> <tr id="tr_Features" class="FormData" rowpos="1"> <td class="CaptionTD ui-widget-content">Material</td> <td id="td_Features" class="DataTD ui-widget-content" style="white-space: pre;">&nbsp;<input type="text" value="" id="feature_id:9" name="feature_id:9"></td> </tr> <tr id="tr_Features" class="FormData" rowpos="1"> <td class="CaptionTD ui-widget-content">Thread Size</td> <td id="td_Features" class="DataTD ui-widget-content" style="white-space: pre;">&nbsp;<input type="text" value="" id="feature_id:10" name="feature_id:10"></td> </tr> <tr id="tr_Features" class="FormData" rowpos="1"> <td class="CaptionTD ui-widget-content">Attachment Style</td> <td id="td_Features" class="DataTD ui-widget-content" style="white-space: pre;">&nbsp;<input type="text" value="" id="feature_id:11" name="feature_id:11"></td> </tr> <tr id="tr_Features" class="FormData" rowpos="1"> <td class="CaptionTD ui-widget-content">Feature</td> <td id="td_Features" class="DataTD ui-widget-content" style="white-space: pre;">&nbsp;<input type="text" value="" id="feature_id:12" name="feature_id:12"></td> </tr> <tr id="tr_Features" class="FormData" rowpos="1"> <td class="CaptionTD ui-widget-content">Comments</td> <td id="td_Features" class="DataTD ui-widget-content" style="white-space: pre;">&nbsp;<input type="text" value="" id="feature_id:13" name="feature_id:13"></td> </tr> </tbody></table>

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• Find optimal/good-enough strategy and AI for the game 'Proximity'?

  - by smci

  'Proximity' is a strategy game of territorial domination similar to Othello, Go and Risk. Two players, uses a 10x12 hex grid. Game invented by Brian Cable in 2007. Seems to be a worthy game for discussing a) optimal algorithm then b) how to build an AI. Strategies are going to be probabilistic or heuristic-based, due to the randomness factor, and the insane branching factor (20^120). So it will be kind of hard to compare objectively. A compute time limit of 5s per turn seems reasonable. Game: Flash version here and many copies elsewhere on the web Rules: here Object: to have control of the most armies after all tiles have been placed. Each turn you received a randomly numbered tile (value between 1 and 20 armies) to place on any vacant board space. If this tile is adjacent to any ally tiles, it will strengthen each tile's defenses +1 (up to a max value of 20). If it is adjacent to any enemy tiles, it will take control over them if its number is higher than the number on the enemy tile. Thoughts on strategy: Here are some initial thoughts; setting the computer AI to Expert will probably teach a lot: minimizing your perimeter seems to be a good strategy, to prevent flips and minimize worst-case damage like in Go, leaving holes inside your formation is lethal, only more so with the hex grid because you can lose armies on up to 6 squares in one move low-numbered tiles are a liability, so place them away from your main territory, near the board edges and scattered. You can also use low-numbered tiles to plug holes in your formation, or make small gains along the perimeter which the opponent will not tend to bother attacking. a triangle formation of three pieces is strong since they mutually reinforce, and also reduce the perimeter Each tile can be flipped at most 6 times, i.e. when its neighbor tiles are occupied. Control of a formation can flow back and forth. Sometimes you lose part of a formation and plug any holes to render that part of the board 'dead' and lock in your territory/ prevent further losses. Low-numbered tiles are obvious-but-low-valued liabilities, but high-numbered tiles can be bigger liabilities if they get flipped (which is harder). One lucky play with a 20-army tile can cause a swing of 200 (from +100 to -100 armies). So tile placement will have both offensive and defensive considerations. Comment 1,2,4 seem to resemble a minimax strategy where we minimize the maximum expected possible loss (modified by some probabilistic consideration of the value ß the opponent can get from 1..20 i.e. a structure which can only be flipped by a ß=20 tile is 'nearly impregnable'.) I'm not clear what the implications of comments 3,5,6 are for optimal strategy. Interested in comments from Go, Chess or Othello players. (The sequel ProximityHD for XBox Live, allows 4-player -cooperative or -competitive local multiplayer increases the branching factor since you now have 5 tiles in your hand at any given time, of which you can only play one. Reinforcement of ally tiles is increased to +2 per ally.)

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• Why is cell phone software still so primitive?

  - by Tomislav Nakic-Alfirevic

  I don't do mobile development, but it strikes me as odd that features like this aren't available by default on most phones: full text search: searches all address book contents, messages, anything else being a plus better call management: e.g. a rotating audio call log, meaning you always have the last N calls recorded for your listening pleasure later (your little girl just said her first "da-da" while you were on a business trip, you had a telephone job interview, you received complex instructions to do something etc.) bluetooth remote control (like e.g. anyRemote, but available by default on a bluetooth phone) no multitasking capabilities worth mentioning and in general no e.g. weekly software updates, making the phone much more usable (even if it had to be done over USB, rather than over the network). I'm sure I was dumbfounded by the lack or design of other features as well, but they don't come to mind right now. To clarify, I'm not talking about smartphones here: my plain, 2-year old phone has a CPU an order of magnitude faster than my first PC, about as much storage space and it's ridiculous how bad (slow, unwieldy) the software is and it's not one phone or one manufacturer. What keeps the (to me) obvious software functionality vacuum on a capable hardware platform from being filled up? Edit: I believe a clarification on the multitasking point might be beneficial. I'll use my phone as an example, although the point is much more general. The phone can multitask and in fact does: you can listen to music and do something else at the same time. On the other hand, the way the software has been designed makes multitasking next to useless. (Ditto with the external touch screen: it can take touch commands, but only one application makes use of it, and only with 3 commands.) To take the multitasking example to the extreme, if I plug my phone into my laptop and it registers as an external disk, it doesn't allow any kind of operation: messages, calling, calendar, everything out of reach, although I can receive a call. No "battery life" issue there: it's charging while connected. BTW, another example of design below the current state of the art: I don't see a phone on the horizon which will remember where in an audio or video file you were when you stopped listening/watching it last time (podcasts are a good use case). Simplistic rewind/fast forward functionality only aggravates the problem.

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• C# problem with two threads and hardware access

  - by mack369

  I'm creating an application which communicates with the device via FT2232H USB/RS232 converter. For communication I'm using FTD2XX_NET.dll library from FTDI website. I'm using two threads: first thread continuously reads data from the device the second thread is the main thread of the Windows Form Application I've got a problem when I'm trying to write any data to the device while the receiver's thread is running. The main thread simply hangs up on ftdiDevice.Write function. I tried to synchronize both threads so that only one thread can use Read/Write function at the same time, but it didn't help. Below code responsible for the communication. Note that following functions are methods of FtdiPort class. Receiver's thread private void receiverLoop() { if (this.DataReceivedHandler == null) { throw new BackendException("dataReceived delegate is not set"); } FTDI.FT_STATUS ftStatus = FTDI.FT_STATUS.FT_OK; byte[] readBytes = new byte[this.ReadBufferSize]; while (true) { lock (FtdiPort.threadLocker) { UInt32 numBytesRead = 0; ftStatus = ftdiDevice.Read(readBytes, this.ReadBufferSize, ref numBytesRead); if (ftStatus == FTDI.FT_STATUS.FT_OK) { this.DataReceivedHandler(readBytes, numBytesRead); } else { Trace.WriteLine(String.Format("Couldn't read data from ftdi: status {0}", ftStatus)); Thread.Sleep(10); } } Thread.Sleep(this.RXThreadDelay); } } Write function called from main thread public void Write(byte[] data, int length) { if (this.IsOpened) { uint i = 0; lock (FtdiPort.threadLocker) { this.ftdiDevice.Write(data, length, ref i); } Thread.Sleep(1); if (i != (int)length) { throw new BackendException("Couldnt send all data"); } } else { throw new BackendException("Port is closed"); } } Object used to synchronize two threads static Object threadLocker = new Object(); Method that starts the receiver's thread private void startReceiver() { if (this.DataReceivedHandler == null) { return; } if (this.IsOpened == false) { throw new BackendException("Trying to start listening for raw data while disconnected"); } this.receiverThread = new Thread(this.receiverLoop); //this.receiverThread.Name = "protocolListener"; this.receiverThread.IsBackground = true; this.receiverThread.Start(); } The ftdiDevice.Write function doesn't hang up if I comment following line: ftStatus = ftdiDevice.Read(readBytes, this.ReadBufferSize, ref numBytesRead);

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• How to listen for file system changes MAC - kFSEventStreamCreateFlagWatchRoot

  - by Cocoa Newbie

  Hi All, I am listening for Directory and disk changes in a COCOA project using FSEvents. I need to get events when a root folder is renamed or deleted. So, I passed kFSEventStreamCreateFlagWatchRoot while creating the FSEventStream.But even if I delete or rename the root folder I am not getting corresponding FSEventStreamEventFlags. Any idea what could possibly be the issue. I am listening for changes in a USB mounted device. I used both FSEventStreamCreate and FSEventStreamCreateRelativeToDevice. One thing I notices is when I try with FSEventStreamCreate I get the following error message while creating FSEventStream: (CarbonCore.framework) FSEventStreamCreate: watch_all_parents: error trying to add kqueue for fd 7 (/Volumes/NO NAME; Operation not supported) But with FSEventStreamCreateRelativeToDevice there are no errors but still not getting kFSEventStreamEventFlagRootChanged in event flags. Also, while creation using FSEventStreamCreateRelativeToDevice apple say's if I want to listen to root path changes pass emty string "". But I am not able to listen to root path changes by passing empty string. But when I pass "/" it works. But even for "/" I do not get any proper FSEventStreamEventFlags. I am pasting the code here: -(void) subscribeFileSystemChanges:(NSString*) path { PRINT_FUNCTION_BEGIN; // if already subscribed then unsubscribe if (stream) { FSEventStreamStop(stream); FSEventStreamInvalidate(stream); /* will remove from runloop */ FSEventStreamRelease(stream); } FSEventStreamContext cntxt = {0}; cntxt.info = self; CFArrayRef pathsToWatch = CFArrayCreate(NULL, (const void**)&path, 1, NULL); stream = FSEventStreamCreate(NULL, &feCallback, &cntxt, pathsToWatch, kFSEventStreamEventIdSinceNow, 1, kFSEventStreamCreateFlagWatchRoot ); FSEventStreamScheduleWithRunLoop(stream, CFRunLoopGetCurrent(), kCFRunLoopDefaultMode); FSEventStreamStart(stream); } call back function: static void feCallback(ConstFSEventStreamRef streamRef, void* pClientCallBackInfo, size_t numEvents, void* pEventPaths, const FSEventStreamEventFlags eventFlags[], const FSEventStreamEventId eventIds[]) {? char** ppPaths = (char**)pEventPaths; int i; for (i = 0; i < numEvents; i++) { NSLog(@"Event Flags %lu Event Id %llu", eventFlags[i], eventIds[i]); NSLog(@"Path changed: %@", [NSString stringWithUTF8String:ppPaths[i]]); } } Thanks a lot in advance.

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• MBR status confusion

  - by Ahmed Ghoneim

  EB 58 90 6D 6B 64 6F 73 66 73 00 00 02 08 20 00 02 00 00 00 00 F8 00 00 3E 00 83 00 00 00 00 00 94 88 7E 00 98 1F 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 01 00 06 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 29 A9 38 B1 34 57 61 76 65 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 46 41 54 33 32 20 20 20 0E 1F BE 77 7C AC 22 C0 74 0B 56 B4 0E BB 07 00 CD 10 5E EB F0 32 E4 CD 16 CD 19 EB FE 54 68 69 73 20 69 73 20 6E 6F 74 20 61 20 62 6F 6F 74 61 62 6C 65 20 64 69 73 6B 2E 20 20 50 6C 65 61 73 65 20 69 6E 73 65 72 74 20 61 20 62 6F 6F 74 61 62 6C 65 20 66 6C 6F 70 70 79 20 61 6E 64 0D 0A 70 72 65 73 73 20 61 6E 79 20 6B 65 79 20 74 6F 20 74 72 79 20 61 67 61 69 6E 20 2E 2E 2E 20 0D 0A 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 55 AA Learning disk records, this is my USB MBR record viewed by bless on ubuntu formatted with disk utility as MBR table and FAT partition, referring to this Wiki of first record status (0x80 = bootable (active), 0x00 = non-bootable, other = invalid ) but my MBR shows first offset as EB. What's this record stands for ? also, can you provide me with good tables/images tutorials for MBR and other disks' records :)

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• Strategies for "Always-Connected" Windows Client Data Architecture

  - by magz2010

  Hi. Let me start by saying: this is my 1st post here, this is a bit lenghty, and I havent done Windows Forms development in years....with that in mind please excuse me if this isn't directly a programming question and please bear with me as I really need the help!! I have been asked to develop a Windows Forms app for our company that talks to a central (local area network) Linux Server hosting a PostgreSQL database. The app is to allow users to authenticate themselves into the system and thereafter conduct the usual transactions with the PG database. Ordinarily, I would propose writing a webforms app against Mono, but the clients need to utilise local resources such as USB peripheral devices, so that is out of the question. While it might not seem clear, my questions are italised below: Dilemma #1: The application is meant to be always connected. How should I structure my DAL/BLL - Should this reside on the server or with the client? Dilemma #2: I have been reading up on Client Application Services (CAS), and it seems like a great fit for authentication, as everything is exposed via URIs. I know that a .NET Data Provider exists for PostgreSQL, but not too sure if CAS will all work on a Linux (Debian) server? Believe me, I would get my hands dirty and try myself, but I need to come up with a logical design first before resources are allocated to me for "trial purposes"! Dilemma #3: If the DAL/BLL is to reside on the server, is there any way I can create data services, and expose only these services to authenticated clients. There is a (security) requirement whereby a connection string with username and password to the database cannot be present on any client machines...even if security on the database side is quite rigid. I'm guessing that the only way for this to work would be to create the various CRUD data service methods that are exposed by an ASP.NET app, and have the WindowsForms make a request for data or persist data to the ASP.NET app (thru a URI) and have that return a resultset or value. Would I be correct in assuming this? Should I be looking into WCF Data Services? and will WCF work with a non-SQL Server database? Thank you for taking the time out to read this, but know that I am desperately seeking any advice on this! THANKS A MILLION!!!!

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• Receiving Multicast Messages on a Multihomed Windows PC

  - by Basti

  I'm developing a diagnostic tool on a PC with several Network Interfaces based on multicast/udp. The user can select a NIC, the application creates sockets, binds them to this NIC and adds them to the specific multicast group. The sending of multicast messages works fine. However receiving of messages only succeeds if I bind the sockets to a specific NIC of my PC. It almost looks like as there is a 'default' NIC for receiving multicast messages in Windows which is always the first NIC returned by the GetAdapterInfo function. I monitored the network with Wireshark and discovered that the "IGMP Join Group" message isn't sent from the NIC I bound the socket at, but by this 'default' NIC. If I disable this NIC (or remove the network cable), the next NIC of the list returned by GetAdapterInfo is used for receiving multicast messages. I was successful to change this 'default' NIC by adding an additional entry to the routing table of my PC, but I don't think this is a good solution of the problem. The problem also occurs with the code appended below. The join group messages isn't sent via 192.168.52 but via a different NIC. // socket_tst.cpp : Defines the entry point for the console application. // #include tchar.h #include winsock2.h #include ws2ipdef.h #include IpHlpApi.h #include IpTypes.h #include stdio.h int _tmain(int argc, _TCHAR* argv[]) { WSADATA m_wsaData; SOCKET m_socket; sockaddr_in m_sockAdr; UINT16 m_port = 319; u_long m_interfaceAdr = inet_addr("192.168.1.52"); u_long m_multicastAdr = inet_addr("224.0.0.107"); int returnValue = WSAStartup(MAKEWORD(2,2), &m_wsaData); if (returnValue != S_OK) { return returnValue; } // Create sockets if (INVALID_SOCKET == (m_socket = socket(AF_INET, SOCK_DGRAM, IPPROTO_UDP)) ) { return WSAGetLastError(); } int doreuseaddress = TRUE; if (setsockopt(m_socket,SOL_SOCKET,SO_REUSEADDR,(char*) &doreuseaddress,sizeof(doreuseaddress)) == SOCKET_ERROR) { return WSAGetLastError(); } // Configure socket addresses memset(&m_sockAdr,0,sizeof(m_sockAdr)); m_sockAdr.sin_family = AF_INET; m_sockAdr.sin_port = htons(m_port); m_sockAdr.sin_addr.s_addr = m_interfaceAdr; //bind sockets if ( bind( m_socket, (SOCKADDR*) &m_sockAdr, sizeof(m_sockAdr) ) == SOCKET_ERROR ) { return WSAGetLastError(); } // join multicast struct ip_mreq_source imr; memset(&imr,0,sizeof(imr)); imr.imr_multiaddr.s_addr = m_multicastAdr; // address of multicastgroup imr.imr_sourceaddr.s_addr = 0; // sourceaddress (not used) imr.imr_interface.s_addr = m_interfaceAdr; // interface address /* first join multicast group, then registerer selected interface as * multicast sending interface */ if( setsockopt( m_socket ,IPPROTO_IP ,IP_ADD_MEMBERSHIP ,(char*) &imr , sizeof(imr)) == SOCKET_ERROR) { return SOCKET_ERROR; } else { if( setsockopt(m_socket ,IPPROTO_IP ,IP_MULTICAST_IF ,(CHAR*)&imr.imr_interface.s_addr ,sizeof(&imr.imr_interface.s_addr)) == SOCKET_ERROR ) { return SOCKET_ERROR; } } printf("receiving msgs...\n"); while(1) { // get inputbuffer from socket int sock_return = SOCKET_ERROR; sockaddr_in socketAddress; char buffer[1500]; int addressLength = sizeof(socketAddress); sock_return = recvfrom(m_socket, (char*) &buffer, 1500, 0, (SOCKADDR*)&socketAddress, &addressLength ); if( sock_return == SOCKET_ERROR) { int wsa_error = WSAGetLastError(); return wsa_error; } else { printf("got message!\n"); } } return 0; } Thanks four your help!

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• Determining if Memory Pointer is Valid - C++

  - by Jim Fell

  It has been my observation that if free( ptr ) is called where ptr is not a valid pointer to system-allocated memory, an access violation occurs. Let's say that I call free like this: LPVOID ptr = (LPVOID)0x12345678; free( ptr ); This will most definitely cause an access violation. Is there a way to test that the memory location pointed to by ptr is valid system-allocated memory? It seems to me that the the memory management part of the Windows OS kernel must know what memory has been allocated and what memory remains for allocation. Otherwise, how could it know if enough memory remains to satisfy a given request? (rhetorical) That said, it seems reasonable to conclude that there must be a function (or set of functions) that would allow a user to determine if a pointer is valid system-allocated memory. Perhaps Microsoft has not made these functions public. If Microsoft has not provided such an API, I can only presume that it was for an intentional and specific reason. Would providing such a hook into the system prose a significant threat to system security? Situation Report Although knowing whether a memory pointer is valid could be useful in many scenarios, this is my particular situation: I am writing a driver for a new piece of hardware that is to replace an existing piece of hardware that connects to the PC via USB. My mandate is to write the new driver such that calls to the existing API for the current driver will continue to work in the PC applications in which it is used. Thus the only required changes to existing applications is to load the appropriate driver DLL(s) at startup. The problem here is that the existing driver uses a callback to send received serial messages to the application; a pointer to allocated memory containing the message is passed from the driver to the application via the callback. It is then the responsibility of the application to call another driver API to free the memory by passing back the same pointer from the application to the driver. In this scenario the second API has no way to determine if the application has actually passed back a pointer to valid memory.

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• C# - periodic data reading and Thread.Sleep()

  - by CaldonCZE

  Hello, my C# application reads data from special USB device. The data are read as so-called "messages", each of them having 24 bytes. The amount of messages that must be read per second may differ (maximal frequency is quite high, about 700 messages per second), but the application must read them all. The only way to read the messages is by calling function "ReadMessage", that returns one message read from the device. The function is from external DLL and I cannot modify it. My solution: I've got a seperate thread, that is running all the time during the program run and it's only job is to read the messages in cycle. The received messages are then processed in main application thread. The function executed in the "reading thread" is the following: private void ReadingThreadFunction() { int cycleCount; try { while (this.keepReceivingMessages) { cycleCount++; TRxMsg receivedMessage; ReadMessage(devHandle, out receivedMessage); //...do something with the message... } } catch { //... catch exception if reading failed... } } This solution works fine and all messages are correctly received. However, the application consumes too much resources, the CPU of my computer runs at more than 80%. Therefore I'd like to reduce it. Thanks to the "cycleCount" variable I know that the "cycling speed" of the thread is about 40 000 cycles per second. This is unnecessarily too much, since I need to receive maximum 700 messagges/sec. (and the device has buffer for about 100 messages, so the cycle speed can be even a little lower) I tried to reduce the cycle speed by suspending the thread for 1 ms by Thread.Sleep(1); command. Of course, this didn't work and the cycle speed became about 70 cycles/second which was not enough to read all messages. I know that this attempt was silly, that putting the thread to sleep and then waking him up takes much longer than 1 ms. However, I don't know what else to do: Is there some other way how to slow the thread execution down (to reduce CPU consumption) other than Thread.Sleep? Or am I completely wrong and should I use something different for this task instead of Thread, maybe Threading.Timer or ThreadPool? Thanks a lot in advance for all suggestions. This is my first question here and I'm a beginner at using threads, so please excuse me if it's not clear enough.

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• No warning from gcc when function definition in linked source different from function prototype in h

  - by c_c

  Hi, I had a problem with a part of my code, which after some iterations seemed to read NaN as value of a int of a struct. I think I found the error, but am still wondering why gcc (version 3.2.3 on a embedded Linux with busybox) did not warn me. Here are the important parts of the code: A c file and its header for functions to acquire data over USB: // usb_control.h typedef struct{ double mean; short *values; } DATA_POINTS; typedef struct{ int size; DATA_POINTS *channel1; //....7 more channels } DATA_STRUCT; DATA_STRUCT *create_data_struct(int N); // N values per channel int free_data_struct(DATA_STRUCT *data); int aqcu_data(DATA_STRUCT *data, int N); A c and header file with helper function (math, bitshift,etc...): // helper.h int mean(DATA_STRUCT *data); // helper.c (this is where the error is obviously) double mean(DATA_STRUCT *data) { // sum in for loop data->channel1->mean = sum/data->N; // ...7 more channels // a printf here displayed the mean values corretly } The main file // main.c #include "helper.h" #include "usb_control.h" // Allocate space for data struct DATA_STRUCT *data = create_data_struct(N); // get data for different delays for (delay = 0; delay < 500; delay += pw){ acqu_data(data, N); mean(data); // printf of the mean values first is correct. Than after 5 iterations // it is always NaN for channel1. The other channels are displayed correctly; } There were no segfaults nor any other missbehavior, just the NaN for channel1 in the main file. After finding the error, which was not easy, it was of course east to fix. The return type of mean(){} was wrong in the definition. Instead of double mean() it has to be int mean() as the prototype defines. When all the functions are put into one file, gcc warns me that there is a redefinition of the function mean(). But as I compile each c file seperately and link them afterwards gcc seems to miss that. So my questions would be. Why didn't I get any warnings, even non with gcc -Wall? Or is there still another error hidden which is just not causing problems now? Regards, christian

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• Week in Geek: USDA Chooses Microsoft for Cloud Services Edition

  - by Asian Angel

  This week we learned how to create geeky LED holiday lights with old bottles, dig deeper in Windows Defrag via the command prompt, use Google Chrome’s drag/drop feature to upload files easier, find great gift recommendations by looking through the How-To Geek holiday gift guide, and have fun adding Merry Christmas fonts to our computers. Photo by ntr23. Random Geek Links It has been a busy week, so we have extra news link goodness with information that is good for you to know. USDA making the move to Microsoft The U.S. Department of Agriculture has announced that it has chosen Microsoft to host things like e-mail, instant messaging, and collaboration through the software giant’s Business Productivity Online Suite. Google says it was cut off from USDA project bid Google is claiming that it was not given a chance to bid on a cloud-computing project for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, for which the contract was awarded to rival Microsoft. Apache is being forced into a Java Fork When Oracle rolled over Apache and Google’s objections to its Java plans in December, the scene was set for Apache to leave and, eventually, force a Java code fork. Tumblr explains daylong outage After experiencing an outage that started on Sunday afternoon and stretched through most of the day yesterday, Tumblr has explained what happened. Google demos Chrome OS, launches pilot program During a press briefing this week in San Francisco, Google launched the Chrome application store and demonstrated Chrome OS, its browser-centric netbook operating system. Don’t expect Spotify in U.S. this holiday season As of last week, Spotify had yet to sign a single licensing deal with a major label, after spending more than a year negotiating, multiple music sources told CNET. December 2010 Patch Tuesday will come with most bulletins ever According to the Microsoft Security Response Center, Microsoft will issue 17 Security Bulletins addressing 40 vulnerabilities on Tuesday, December 14. It will also host a webcast to address customer questions the following day. Hacker plants back door in Symbian firmware Indian hacker Atul Alex has had a look at the firmware for Symbian S60 smartphones and come up with a back door for it. PC quarantines raise tough complexities The concept of quarantining PCs to prevent widespread infection is “interesting, but difficult to implement, with far too many problems”, said security experts. Symantec: DDoS attacks hard to defend It has surfaced that the distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks on Visa and MasterCard Web sites on Wednesday were carried out by a toolkit known as low orbit ion cannon (LOIC). Web Sockets and the risks of unfinished standards Enthusiasm for a promising new standard called Web Sockets has quickly cooled in some quarters as a potential security problem led some browser makers to hastily postpone support. Internet Explorer 9 to get tracking protection Microsoft is making changes to Internet Explorer 9’s security features that will better enable users to keep sites from tracking their activity across browsing sessions. NASA sold PCs with sensitive data NASA failed to remove sensitive data from computers that it sold, according to an audit report released this week. Cybercrooks create fake Amazon receipts The bad guys have created yet another online scam, this one involving fake Amazon receipts. World of Warcraft character move fees waived Until December 22, Blizzard will allow free realm transfers from 25 highly populated servers to alleviate log-in queues or performance issues. (The free transfers are one-way and one-time only.) SpaceX Dragon reaches orbit atop a Falcon with a fiery tail The Space Exploration Technologies corporation has become the first nongovernmental entity to put a vehicle into low Earth orbit. Geek Video of the Week If birds have wings, then why are the Angry Birds using slingshots? Photo by Dorkly Bits. Wait… Birds have Wings, Why are the Angry Ones Using Slingshots? Sysadmin Geek Tips How To Setup Email Alerts on Linux Using Gmail or SMTP Linux machines may require administrative intervention in countless ways, but without manually logging into them how would you know about it? Here’s how to setup emails to get notified when your machines want some tender love and attention. Random TinyHacker Links Red Panda Webcam Support Firefox and the Knoxville Zoo’s Red Panda program. Christmas Icons (Icons we like) Superb set of holiday icons by lgp85 at deviantArt. Download the .zip and use as .png or convert to .ico at Convertico.com or with tiny app Imagicon. Super User Questions Enjoy reading the great answers to this week’s popular questions from Super User Useful USB boot disks? DVD/CD burning .zip: is it more reliable, faster, longer lasting to burn a zip of files rather than the files as a folder? What are other ways to backup my files if I do not have an external drive? Anti virus what is the difference between these all? How can I block all Facebook elements/content? How-To Geek Weekly Article Recap Have you had a busy week between work and preparing for the holidays? Get caught up on your HTG reading with our hottest articles of the week. 20 Windows Keyboard Shortcuts You Might Not Know The 50 Best Registry Hacks that Make Windows Better LCD? LED? Plasma? The How-To Geek Guide to HDTV Technology HTG Explains: Which Linux File System Should You Choose? How to Use and Customize Google Chrome Web Apps One Year Ago on How-To Geek This week’s batch of retro geeky goodness is all about customizing Windows 7. ClassicShell Adds Classic Start Menu and Explorer Features to Windows 7 Get an Aero-Styled Classic Start Menu in Windows 7 Customize the Windows 7 Logon Screen Get the Classic Style Network Activity Indicator Back in Windows 7 How To Enable Check Boxes for Items In Windows 7 The Geek Note We would like you to join us in welcoming Jason Fitzpatrick to the writing staff here at How-To Geek. He started with us this past week, so take some time to read through his articles about the Wii, Kindle, & PlayStation 2 Peripherals and leave a friendly comment to say “Hi”! Got a great tip to share? Make sure to send it in to us at [email protected]. Photo by real00. Latest Features How-To Geek ETC The 50 Best Registry Hacks that Make Windows Better The How-To Geek Holiday Gift Guide (Geeky Stuff We Like) LCD? LED? Plasma? The How-To Geek Guide to HDTV Technology The How-To Geek Guide to Learning Photoshop, Part 8: Filters Improve Digital Photography by Calibrating Your Monitor Our Favorite Tech: What We’re Thankful For at How-To Geek Settle into Orbit with the Voyage Theme for Chrome and Iron Awesome Safari Compass Icons Set Escape from the Exploding Planet Wallpaper Move Your Tumblr Blog to WordPress Pytask is an Easy to Use To-Do List Manager for Your Ubuntu System Snowy Christmas House Personas Theme for Firefox

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• Our Look at Opera 10.50 Web Browser

  - by Asian Angel

  Everyone has been talking about the newest version of Opera recently but perhaps you have not looked at it too closely yet. Today we will take a look at 10.50 and let you see what this “new browser” is all about. The New Engines Carakan JavaScript Engine: Runs web applications up to 7 times faster than its predecessor Futhark Vega Graphics Library: Enables super fast and smooth graphics on everything from tab switching to webpage animation Presto 2.5: Provides support for HTML5, CSS2.1 and the latest CSS3 standards A Look at the Features Available If you have installed or used older versions of Opera before then the default look after a clean install will probably seem rather different. The main differences in appearance are mainly located within the “glass border” areas of the browser. The “Speed Dial” setup looks and works just as well as in previous versions. You can set a favorite wallpaper or image as your background and choose the number of “dials” using the “Configure Speed Dial Command”. One of the “standout” differences is the “O Button”. All of the menus have been condensed into this single access point but it only takes a few moments to find what you are looking for. If you have used the style before in earlier versions of Opera some of the items have been moved around. For those who prefer the “Menu Bar” that can be easily restored using the “Show Menu Bar Command”. If desired you can actually “extend” the “Tab Bar” downwards to display thumbnails of your open tabs. Just use your mouse to grab the bottom of the “Tab Bar” and adjust it to suit your personal needs. The only problem with this feature is that it will quickly use up a good sized portion of your available UI and browser window space. The “Password Manager” is ready to access when needed…the background for the button will turn a shiny metallic blue when you open a webpage that you have “Login Information” saved for. One of the new features is a small “Recycle Bin Button” in the upper right corner. Clicking on this will display a list of recently closed tabs letting you have easy access to any tabs that you may have accidentally closed. This is definitely a great feature to have as an easy access button. For those who were used to how the “Zoom Feature” looked before it has a new “look” to it. Instead of the pop-up menu-type listing of “view sizes” present before you now have a slider button that you can use to adjust the zooming level. For our default setup here the “Sidebar Panels” available were: “Bookmarks, Widgets, Unite, Notes, Downloads, History, & Panels”. Additional panels such as “Links, Windows, Search, Info, etc.” are available if you want and/or need them (accessible using the “Panels Plus Sign Button”). The “Opera Link Button” makes it easy for you to synchronize your “Speed Dial, Bookmarks, Personal Bar, Custom Searches, History & Notes”. Note: “Opera Link” requires an account and can be signed up for using the link provided below. Want to share files with your family and friends? “Unite” allows you to do that and more. With “Unite” you can: “Stream Music, Show Photo Galleries, Share Files and/or Folders, & host webpages directly from your browser”. We have a more in-depth look at “Unite” in our article here. Note: Use of “Unite” requires an Opera account. Got a slow internet connection? “Opera Turbo” can help with that by running the web traffic through their “compression servers” to speed up your web browsing. Keep in mind that “Opera Turbo” will not engage if you are accessing a secure website (i.e. your bank’s website) thus preserving your security. Note: “Opera Turbo” can be set up to automatically detect slow internet connections (i.e. crowded Wi-Fi in a cafe). Opera has a built-in “Private Browsing Mode” now for those who prefer anonymous browsing and want to keep the “history records clean” on their computer. To access it go to “Tabs and windows” and select “New private tab” or “New private window” as desired. When you open your new “Private Tab or Window” you will see the following message with details on how Opera will handle browsing information and a large “door hanger symbol”. Notice that the one tab is locked into “Private Browsing Mode” while the others are still working in “Regular Browsing Mode”. Very nice! A miniature version of the “door hanger symbol” will be present on any tab that is locked into “Private Browsing Mode”. If you are using Windows 7 then you will love how things look from your “Taskbar”. Here you can see four very nice looking thumbnails for the tabs that we had open. All that you have to do is click on the desired thumbnail… The “Context Menu” looks just as lovely as the thumbnails and definitely has some terrific functionality built into it. Add Enhanced Aero Capability If you love “Aero” and want more for your new Opera install then we have the perfect theme for you. The theme’s name is Z1-AV69 and once you have downloaded it you will need to place it in the “Skins Subfolder” in Opera’s “Program Files Folder”. Note: For our example we used version 1.10 but version 2.00 is now available (link provided below). Once you have restarted Opera, go to the “O Menu” and select “Appearance”. When the “Appearance Window” opens click on “Z1-Glass Skin” and then click “OK”. All of a sudden you will have more “Aero Goodness” to enjoy. Compare this screenshot with the one at the top of this article…the only part that is not transparent now is the browser window area itself. Want even more “Aero Goodness”? Right click on the “Tab Bar” and set “Tab Bar Placement” to “Left”. Note: You can achieve the same effect by setting the “Tab Bar Placement” to “Right”. With the “Speed Dial” visible you will be able to see your wallpaper with ease. While this is obviously not for everyone it does make for a great visual trick. Portable Versions Perhaps you need this wonderful new version of Opera to go with you wherever you do during the day. Not a problem…just visit the Opera USB website to choose a version that works best for you. You can select from “Zip or Exe” setup files and if needed update an older portable version using a “Zipped Update Files Package”. If you are updating an older version keep in mind that you will need to delete the old “OperaUSB.exe. File” due to changes with the new setup files. During our tests updating older portable versions went well for the most part but we did experience a few “odd UI quirks” here and there…so we recommend setting up a clean install if possible. Conclusion The new 10.50 release is a pleasure to use and is a recommended install for your system. Whether you are considering trying Opera for the first time or have been using it for a bit we think that you will pleased with everything that the 10.50 release has to offer. For those who would like to add User Scripts to Opera be certain to look at our how-to article here. Links Download Opera 10.50 for your location (Windows) Get the latest Snapshot versions for Linux & Mac Sign up for an Opera Link account View In-Depth detail on Opera 10.50’s features Download the Z1-AV69 Aero Theme Download Portable Opera 10.50 Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Set the Speed Dial as the Opera Startup PageSet Up User Scripts in Opera BrowserScan Files for Viruses Before You Download With Dr.WebTurn Your Computer into a File, Music, and Web Server with Opera UniteSet the Default Browser on Ubuntu From the Command Line TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Make your Joomla & Drupal Sites Mobile with OSMOBI Integrate Twitter and Delicious and Make Life Easier Design Your Web Pages Using the Golden Ratio Worldwide Growth of the Internet How to Find Your Mac Address Use My TextTools to Edit and Organize Text

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• Week in Geek: 4chan Falls Victim to DDoS Attack Edition

  - by Asian Angel

  This week we learned how to tweak the low battery action on a Windows 7 laptop, access an eBook collection anywhere in the world, “extend iPad battery life, batch resize photos, & sync massive music collections”, went on a reign of destruction with Snow Crusher, and had fun decorating our desktops with abstract icon collections. Photo by pasukaru76. Random Geek Links We have included extra news article goodness to help you catch up on any developments that you may have missed during the holiday break this past week. Note: The three 27C3 articles listed here represent three different presentations at the 27th Chaos Communication Congress hacker conference. 4chan victim of DDoS as FBI investigates role in PayPal attack Users of 4chan may have gotten a taste of their own medicine after the site was knocked offline by a DDoS attack from an unknown origin early Thursday morning. Report: FBI seizes server in probe of WikiLeaks attacks The FBI has seized a server in Texas as part of its hunt for the groups behind the pro-WikiLeaks denial-of-service attacks launched in December against PayPal, Visa, MasterCard, and others. Mozilla exposes older user-account database Mozilla has disabled 44,000 older user accounts for its Firefox add-ons site after a security researcher found part of a database of the account information on a publicly available server. Data breach affects 4.9 million Honda customers Japanese automaker Honda has put some 2.2 million customers in the United States on a security breach alert after a database containing information on the owners and their cars was hacked. Chinese Trojan discovered in Android games An Android-based Trojan called “Geinimi” has been discovered in the wild and the Trojan is capable of sending personal information to remote servers and exhibits botnet-like behavior. 27C3 presentation claims many mobiles vulnerable to SMS attacks According to security experts, an ‘SMS of death’ threatens to disable many current Sony Ericsson, Samsung, Motorola, Micromax and LG mobiles. 27C3: GSM cell phones even easier to tap Security researchers have demonstrated how open source software on a number of revamped, entry-level cell phones can decrypt and record mobile phone calls in the GSM network. 27C3: danger lurks in PDF documents Security researcher Julia Wolf has pointed out numerous, previously hardly known, security problems in connection with Adobe’s PDF standard. Critical update for WordPress A critical update has been made available for WordPress in the form of version 3.0.4. The update fixes a security bug in WordPress’s KSES library. McAfee Labs Predicts Geolocation, Mobile Devices and Apple Will Top the List of Targets for Emerging Threats in 2011 The list comprises 2010’s most buzzed about platforms and services, including Google’s Android, Apple’s iPhone, foursquare, Google TV and the Mac OS X platform, which are all expected to become major targets for cybercriminals. McAfee Labs also predicts that politically motivated attacks will be on the rise. Windows Phone 7 piracy materializes with FreeMarketplace A proof-of-concept application, FreeMarketplace, that allows any Windows Phone 7 application to be downloaded and installed free of charge has been developed. Empty email accounts, and some bad buzz for Hotmail In the past few days, a number of Hotmail users have been complaining about a rather disconcerting issue: their Hotmail accounts, some up to 10 years old, appear completely empty.  No emails, no folders, nothing, just what appears to be a new account. Reports: Nintendo warns of 3DS risk for kids Nintendo has reportedly issued a warning that the 3DS, its eagerly awaited glasses-free 3D portable gaming device, should not be used by children under 6 when the gadget is in 3D-viewing mode. Google eyes ‘cloaking’ as next antispam target Google plans to take a closer look at the practice of “cloaking,” or presenting one look to a Googlebot crawling one’s site while presenting another look to users. Facebook, Twitter stock trading drawing SEC eye? The high degree of investor interest in shares of hot Silicon Valley companies that aren’t yet publicly traded–like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Zynga–may be leading to scrutiny from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Random TinyHacker Links Photo by jcraveiro. Exciting Software Set for Release in 2011 A few bloggers from great websites such as How-To Geek, Guiding Tech and 7 Tutorials took the time to sit down and talk about their software wishes for 2011. Take the time to read it and share… Wikileaks Infopr0n An infographic detailing the quest to plug WikiLeaks. The New York Times Guide to Mobile Apps A growing collection of all mobile app coverage by the New York Times as well as lists of favorite apps from Times writers. 7,000,000,000 (Video) A fascinating look at the world’s population via National Geographic Magazine. Super User Questions Check out the great answers to these hot questions from Super User. How to use a Personal computer as a Linux web server for development purposes? How to link processing power of old computers together? Free virtualization tool for testing suspicious files? Why do some actions not work with Remote Desktop? What is the simplest way to send a large batch of pictures to a distant friend or colleague? How-To Geek Weekly Article Recap Had a busy week and need to get caught up on your HTG reading? Then sit back and relax while enjoying these hot posts full of how-to roundup goodness. The 50 Best How-To Geek Windows Articles of 2010 The 20 Best How-To Geek Explainer Topics for 2010 The 20 Best How-To Geek Linux Articles of 2010 How to Search Just the Site You’re Viewing Using Google Search Ask the Readers: Backing Your Files Up – Local Storage versus the Cloud One Year Ago on How-To Geek Need more how-to geekiness for your weekend? Then look through this great batch of articles from one year ago that focus on dual-booting and O.S. installation goodness. Dual Boot Your Pre-Installed Windows 7 Computer with Vista Dual Boot Your Pre-Installed Windows 7 Computer with XP How To Setup a USB Flash Drive to Install Windows 7 Dual Boot Your Pre-Installed Windows 7 Computer with Ubuntu Easily Install Ubuntu Linux with Windows Using the Wubi Installer The Geek Note We hope that you and your families have had a terrific holiday break as everyone prepares to return to work and school this week. Remember to keep those great tips coming in to us at [email protected]! Photo by pjbeardsley. Latest Features How-To Geek ETC The 20 Best How-To Geek Linux Articles of 2010 The 50 Best How-To Geek Windows Articles of 2010 The 20 Best How-To Geek Explainer Topics for 2010 How to Disable Caps Lock Key in Windows 7 or Vista How to Use the Avira Rescue CD to Clean Your Infected PC The Complete List of iPad Tips, Tricks, and Tutorials Tune Pop Enhances Android Music Notifications Another Busy Night in Gotham City Wallpaper Classic Super Mario Brothers Theme for Chrome and Iron Experimental Firefox Builds Put Tabs on the Title Bar (Available for Download) Android Trojan Found in the Wild Chaos, Panic, and Disorder Wallpaper

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• Tips on installing Visual Studio 2010 SP1

  - by Jon Galloway

  Visual Studio SP1 went up on MSDN downloads (here) on March 8, and will be released publicly on March 10 here. Release announcements: Soma: Visual Studio 2010 enhancements Jason Zander: Announcing Visual Studio 2010 Service Pack 1 I started on this post with tips on installing VS2010 SP1 when I realized I’ve been writing these up for Visual Studio and .NET framework SP releases for a while (e.g. VS2008 / .NET 3.5 SP1 post, VS2005 SP1 post). Looking back the years of Visual Studio SP installs (and remembering when we’d get up to SP6 for a Visual Studio release), I’m happy to see that it just keeps getting easier. Service Packs are a lot less finicky about requiring beta software to be uninstalled, install more quickly, and are just generally a lot less scary. If I can’t have a jetpack, at least my future provided me faster, easier service packs. Disclaimer: These tips are just general things I've picked up over the years. I don't have any inside knowledge here. If you see anything wrong, be sure to let me know in the comments. You may want to check the readme file before installing - it's short, and it's in that new-fangled HTML format. On with the tips! Before starting, uninstall Visual Studio features you don't use Visual Studio service packs (and other Microsoft service packs as well) install patches for the specific features you’ve got installed. This is a big reason to always do a custom install when you first install Visual Studio, but it’s not difficult to update your existing installation. Here’s the quick way to do that: Tap the windows key and type “add or remove programs” and press enter (or click on the “Add or remove programs” link if you must).   Type “Visual Studio 2010” in the search box in the upper right corner, click on the Visual Studio program (the one with the VS infinity looking logo) and click on Uninstall/Change. Click on Add or Remove Features The next part’s up to you – what features do you actually use? I’ve been doing primarily ASP.NET MVC development in C# lately, so I selected Visual C# and Visual Web Developer. Remember that you can install features later if needed, and can also install the express versions if you want. Selecting everything just because it’s there - or you paid for it – means that you install updates for everything, every time. When you’ve made your changes, click on the Update button to uninstall unused features. Shut down all instances of Visual Studio It probably goes without saying that you should close a program down before installing it, partly to avoid the file-in-use-reboot-after-install horror. Additional "hunch / works on my machine" quality tip: On one computer I saw a note in the setup log about Visual Studio a prompt for user input to close Visual Studio, although I never saw the prompt. Just to  be sure, I'd personally open up Task Manager and kill any devenv.exe processes I saw running, as it couldn't hurt. Use the web installer I use the Web Installers whenever possible. There’s no point in downloading the DVD unless you’re doing multiple installs or won’t have internet access. The DVD IS is 1.5GB, since it needs to be able to service every possible supported installation option on both x86 and x64. The web installer is 776 KB (smaller than calc.exe), so you can start the installation right away. Like other web installers, the real benefit is that it only installs the updates you need (hence the reason for step 1 – uninstalling unused components). Instead of 1.5GB, my download was roughly 530MB. If you’re installing from MSDN (this link takes you right to the Visual Studio installs), select the first one on the list: The first step in the installation process is to analyze the machine configuration and tell you what needs to be installed. Since I've trimmed down my features, that's a pretty short list. The time's not far off where I may not install SQL Server on my dev machines, just using SQL Server Compact - that would shorten the list further. When I hit next, you can see that the download size has shrunk considerably. When I start the install, note that the installation begins while other components are downloading - another benefit of the web install. On my mid-range desktop machine, the install took 25 minutes. What if it takes longer? According to Heath Stewart (Visual Studio installer guru), average SP1 installs take roughly 45 minutes. An installation which takes hours to complete may be a sign of a problem: see his post Visual Studio 2010 Service Pack 1 installing for over 2 hours could be a sign of a problem. Why so long? Yes, even 25 minutes is a while. Heath's got another blog post explaining why the update can take longer than the initial install (see: A patch may take as long or longer to install than the target product) which explains all the additional steps and complexities a patch needs to deal with, as well as some mitigation steps that deployment authors can take to mitigate the impact. Other things to know about Visual Studio 2010 SP1 Installs over Visual Studio 2010 SP1 Beta That's nice. Previous Visual Studio versions did a number of annoying things when you installed SP's over beta's - fail with weird errors, get part way through and tell you needed to cancel and uninstall first, etc. I've installed this on two machines that had random beta stuff installed without tears. That Readme file you didn't read I mentioned the readme file earlier (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=210711 ). Some interesting things I picked up in there: 2.1.3. Visual Studio 2010 Service Pack 1 installation may fail when a USB drive or other removeable drive is connected 2.1.4. Visual Studio must be restarted after Visual Studio 2010 SP1 tooling for SQL Server Compact (Compact) 4.0 is installed 2.2.1. If Visual Studio 2010 Service Pack 1 is uninstalled, Visual Studio 2010 must be reinstalled to restore certain components 2.2.2. If Visual Studio 2010 Service Pack 1 is uninstalled, Visual Studio 2010 must be reinstalled before SP1 can be installed again 2.4.3.1. Async CTP If you installed the pre-SP1 version of Async CTP but did not uninstall it before you installed Visual Studio 2010 SP1, then your computer will be in a state in which the version of the C# compiler in the .NET Framework does not match the C# compiler in Visual Studio. To resolve this issue: After you install Visual Studio 2010 SP1, reinstall the SP1 version of the Async CTP from here. Hardware acceleration for Visual Studio is disabled on Windows XP Visual Studio 2010 SP1 disables hardware acceleration when running on Windows XP (only on XP). You can turn it back on in the Visual Studio options, under Environment / General, as shown below. See Jason Zander's post titled Performance Troubleshooting Article and VS2010 SP1 Change.

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• Install Ubuntu Netbook Edition with Wubi Installer

  - by Matthew Guay

  Ubuntu is one of the most popular versions of Linux, and their Netbook Remix edition is especially attractive for netbook owners.  Here we’ll look at how you can easily try out Ubuntu on your netbook without a CD/DVD drive. Netbooks, along with the growing number of thin, full powered laptops, lack a CD/DVD drive.  Installing software isn’t much of a problem since most programs, whether free or for-pay, are available for download.  Operating systems, however, are usually installed from a disk.  You can easily install Windows 7 from a flash drive with our tutorial, but installing Ubuntu from a USB flash drive is more complicated.  However, using Wubi, a Windows installer for Ubuntu, you can easily install it directly on your netbook and even uninstall it with only a few clicks. Getting Started Download and run the Wubi installer for Ubuntu (link below).  In the installer, select the drive you where you wish to install Ubuntu, the size of the installation (this is the amount dedicated to Ubuntu; under 20Gb should be fine), language, username, and desired password.  Also, from the Desktop environment menu, select Ubuntu Netbook to install the netbook edition.  Click Install when your settings are correct. Wubi will automatically download the selected version of Ubuntu and install it on your computer. Windows Firewall may ask if you want to unblock Wubi; select your network and click Allow access. The download will take around an hour on broadband, depending on your internet connection speed.  Once the download is completed, it will automatically install to your computer.  If you’d prefer to have everything downloaded before you start the install, download the ISO of Ubuntu Netbook edition (link below) and save it in the same folder as Wubi. Then, when you run Wubi, select the netbook edition as before and click Install.  Wubi will verify that your download is valid, and will then proceed to install from the downloaded ISO.  This install will only take about 10 minutes. Once the install is finished you will be asked to reboot your computer.  Save anything else you’re working on, and then reboot to finish setting up Ubuntu on your netbook. When your computer reboots, select Ubuntu at the boot screen.  Wubi leaves the default OS as Windows 7, so if you don’t select anything it will boot into Windows 7 after a few seconds. Ubuntu will automatically finish the install when you boot into it the first time.  This took about 12 minutes in our test. When the setup is finished, your netbook will reboot one more time.  Remember again to select Ubuntu at the boot screen.  You’ll then see a second boot screen; press your Enter key to select the default.   Ubuntu only took less than a minute to boot in our test.  When you see the login screen, select your name and enter your password you setup in Wubi.  Now you’re ready to start exploring Ubuntu Netbook Remix. Using Ubuntu Netbook Remix Ubuntu Netbook Remix offers a simple, full-screen interface to take the best advantage of netbooks’ small screens.  Pre-installed applications are displayed in the application launcher, and are organized by category.  Click once to open an application. The first screen on the application launcher shows your favorite programs.  If you’d like to add another application to the favorites pane, click the plus sign beside its icon. Your files from Windows are still accessible from Ubuntu Netbook Remix.  From the home screen, select Files & Folders on the left menu, and then click the icon that says something like 100GB Filesystem under the Volumes section. Now you’ll be able to see all of your files from Windows.  Your user files such as documents, music, and pictures should be located in Documents and Settings in a folder with your user name. You can also easily install a variety of free applications via the Software Installer. Connecting to the internet is also easy, as Ubuntu Netbook Remix automatically recognized the WiFi adaptor on our test netbook, a Samsung N150.  To connect to a wireless network, click the wireless icon on the top right of the screen and select the network’s name from the list. And, if you’d like to customize your screen, right-click on the application launcher and select Change desktop background. Choose a background picture you’d like. Now you’ll see it through your application launcher.  Nice! Most applications are opened full-screen.  You can close them by clicking the x on the right of the program’s name. You can also switch to other applications from their icons on the top left.  Open the home screen by clicking the Ubuntu logo in the far left. Changing Boot Options By default, Wubi will leave Windows as the default operating system, and will give you 10 seconds at boot to choose to boot into Ubuntu.  To change this, boot into Windows and enter Advanced system settings in your start menu search. In this dialog, click Settings under Startup and Recovery. From this dialog, you can select the default operating system and the time to display list of operating systems.  You can enter a lower number to make the boot screen appear for less time. And if you’d rather make Ubuntu the default operating system, select it from the drop-down list.   Uninstalling Ubuntu Netbook Remix If you decide you don’t want to keep Ubuntu Netbook Remix on your computer, you can uninstall it just like you uninstall any normal application.  Boot your computer into Windows, open Control Panel, click Uninstall a Program, and enter ubuntu in the search box.  Select it, and click Uninstall. Click Uninstall at the prompt.  Ubuntu uninstalls very quickly, and removes the entry from the bootloader as well, so your computer is just like it was before you installed it.   Conclusion Ubuntu Netbook Remix offers an attractive Linux interface for netbooks.  We enjoyed trying it out, and found it much more user-friendly than most Linux distros.  And with the Wubi installer, you can install it risk-free and try it out on your netbook.  Or, if you’d like to try out another alternate netbook operating system, check out our article on Jolicloud, another new OS for netbooks. Links Download Wubi Installer for Windows Download Ubuntu Netbook Edition Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Easily Install Ubuntu Linux with Windows Using the Wubi InstallerInstall VMware Tools on Ubuntu Edgy EftHow to install Spotify in Ubuntu 9.10 using WineInstalling PHP5 and Apache on UbuntuInstalling PHP4 and Apache on Ubuntu TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips VMware Workstation 7 Acronis Online Backup DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Explorer++ is a Worthy Windows Explorer Alternative Error Goblin Explains Windows Error Codes Twelve must-have Google Chrome plugins Cool Looking Skins for Windows Media Player 12 Move the Mouse Pointer With Your Face Movement Using eViacam Boot Windows Faster With Boot Performance Diagnostics

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