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  • How do I get my blacked out ttys back?

    - by con-f-use
    Original Question: After I replaced my Ubuntu 10.10 with 11.04 all I get when I Strg+Alt+F1-6 into a tty is a black screen. Also when I boot there's a while of black screen after grub2 menu is displayed. Then until just before gnome starts it stays black. I have an Nvida Geforce Quadro FX 770M on my HP EliteBook 8530w. How do I get my ttys (aka 'virtual terminals') to work again? My effords in chronological order: So grub and gfx-payload seems to be the problem, I figured. I went along with this guide for higher tty resolution. Which led to the grub2 menu displaying in my native resolution rather than 800x600. The black screen problem remains. I googlehit some bugreports on other nvidia crads having that problem. I tried uninstalling the nvidia driver. No effect. Also tried different resolutions With an older version of the kernel it works. Though not perfectly. The ttys are usable, black screen between grub2 menu and gnome start remains. Not really a solution. Tried so much, that I lost track. Reinstalled grub2 and linux-image-2.6.38-8-generic. Then did this to my /etc/default/grub in accordance with the aforementioned guide (/etc/grub.d/00_header edited as well): GRUB_DEFAULT=0 GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT=0 #GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET=true GRUB_TIMEOUT=3 GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=`lsb_release -i -s 2> /dev/null || echo Debian` #GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash" GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="" GRUB_GFXMODE=1680x1050x32 To my surprise I can now use my ttys in native resolution. Black screen between grub2 menu and gnome login screen is still there though. That is annoying since I also use an encrypted disk thus having to enter my passphrase in total dark... Still looking for a solution but urgency is low. Downloaded and installed a later version of nvidia driver. No difference to last edit. Tried GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="vga="-parameter. No effect. nomodeset has no effect. not even in combination with vga=... Tried echo FRAMEBUFFER=y > /etc/initramfs-tools/conf.d/splash no effect (see comment) On the verge of resignation... Bounty period soon to end.

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  • Recap: Oracle at the Gartner Business Intelligence Summit

    - by kimberly.billings
    Getting to Vegas was no fun. As anyone who lives in the Bay Area knows, the SF airport shuts down one runway when it rains, causing major havoc. So rain, rain, rain on Sunday meant delay, delay, delay at the airport. Needless to say, my 6:30 pm flight didn't land in Vegas until 3:00 am! But the travel pains were worth it. There was a lot to be learned at the Gartner BI Summit this year, and the uptick in attendance was reflected in strong booth traffic and engaging conversations in the Oracle booth. Oracle customer, Dawn Conant, Director, Business Intelligence at Beckman Coulter, generated a lot of interest in her presentation about migrating from Business Objects to Oracle Business Intelligence, Enterprise Edition with Oracle Database 11g. Dawn's story was a very relatable one, as many of the attendees had plans for similar projects. One of the most interesting Gartner-led sessions compared BI/DW megavendors, IBM, Oracle, SAP and Microsoft. According to Gartner analyst Rita Sallam, these megavendors control about two-thirds of the BI market. Sallem attributes this in part to the fact that organizations are expanding their definitions of BI to also include analytics and performance management. In doing so, they require greater integration of BI applications with a broader set of applications and middleware. In a related session, a panel of Gartner analysts compared the Magic Quadrants for BI Platforms; CPM; Data Quality; Data Integration Tools; and Data Warehouses. Oracle is a leader in all of the Magic Quadrants in which it participates and has the most complete stack including hardware and software, according to Donald Feinberg. Feinberg also commented that in situations with VLDW and solid mixed workloads, Oracle Exadata is making a big difference! var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www."); document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E")); try { var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-13185312-1"); pageTracker._trackPageview(); } catch(err) {}

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  • links for 2011-03-08

    - by Bob Rhubart
    The Empowered Business "Someone needs to be the enterprise parent that asks the question, “do you really need that?” It may be a shiny new thing, but does it make a difference in the ability to accomplish the strategy and goals?" - Enterprise Architect Todd Biske (tags: enterprisearchitecture) Knowledge Workers in the British Raj "While we’ve used technology to change business, business has also evolved to the point that it’s changing how we think about and use technology." - Peter Evans Greenwood (tags: enterprisearchitecture enterprise2.0) Arun Gupta, Miles to go ...: OTN Developer Day Boston 2011 - Slides & Trip Report Arun Gupta shares slides from his Developer Day presentations. (tags: oracle otn java) Use WLST to Delete All JMS Messages From a Destination (James Bayer's Blog) James Bayer responds to a question. (tags: oracle otn weblogic jms) Triangle Circle Square: Apex in the Amazon Cloud Scott Wesley shares several links to resources covering Oracle Apex on an Amazon EC2 instance. (tags: oracle apex ec2 amazon cloud) William Vambenepe: Reading IBM's proposed standard for Cloud Architecture The always entertaining William Vambenepe gives IBM's proposed Cloud standards the full Ebert. (tags: oracle cloud ibm standards) Government Information Group Cloud Computing Research Study "The twin pressures of reduced budgets and the need for greater efficiency have led the federal government to strongly promote cloud computing as a solution whenever possible." (tags: cloudcomputing cloud) The Ron Batra Blog: Technology Whispers: Top 10 Reasons to go ExaData "Continuing my exploration of ExaData, I thought I'd take a minute to consolidate my thoughts into key reasons for which Oracle ExaData could be a good fit for your needs." - Oracle ACE Director Ron Batra (tags: oracle oracleace exadata) Oracle WebCenter: Composite Applications & Mash-Ups (Oracle Enterprise 2.0 Blog) "The new Business Mash-up editor allows business users to take any Oracle Application or 3rd party application and wire the backend data sources or APIs to a rich set of visualizations and reuse them in mashups." (tags: oracle webcenter enterprise2.0) Antonio Romero: Great Discussion of ETL and ELT Tooling in TDWI Linkedin Group Antonio says: "There’s a great discussion of ETL and ELT tooling going on in the official TDWI Linkedin group, under the heading 'How Sustainable is SQL for ETL?' It delves into a wide range of topics." (tags: oracle linkedin etl elt) YouTube - Bunny Inc. - Episode 1. Mr. CIO meets Mr. Executive Manager Yes, it's a commercial. But it's well done and it's funny. (tags: e20 enterprise2.0 webcenter) Markus Eisele: Both Weblogic and Glassfish are strategic products for Oracle Oracle ACE Director Markus Eisele shares selected quotes pulled from the recent TechCast Live interview with Oracle's Anil Gaur and Adam Leftik (tags: oracle java weblogic glassfish) How to become an Oracle SOA expert? (SOA Partner Community Blog) Jurgan Kress shares info and links for those interested in capitalizing on SOA. (tags: oracle soa)

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  • Harness MySQL's Continued Performance Tuning Improvements

    - by Antoinette O'Sullivan
    To fully harness the continued improvements in performance tuning you get with MySQL, take the MySQL Performance Tuning course. This 4 day class teaches you practical, safe, highly efficient ways to optimize performance for the MySQL Server. You will learn the skills needed to use tools for monitoring, evaluating and tuning.  You can take this course in the following three ways: Training-on-Demand: Follow this course at your own pace and from your own desk with streaming video of instructor delivery and booking time to follow hands-on exercises at your own convenience. Live-Virtual: Attend a live instructor-led event from your own desk. Choose from the numerous events on the schedule. In-Class:  Travel to an education center to follow this class. A sample of events on the schedule is shown below:  Location  Date  Delivery Language  Tokyo, Japan  19 November 2012  Japanese  Mechelen, Belgium  4 February 2013  English  London, England  19 November 2012  English  Budapest, Hungary  21 May 2013  Hungarian  Milan, Italy  14 January 2013  Italian  Rome, Italy  3 December 2012  Italian  Riga, Latvia  10 December 2012  Latvian  Amsterdam, Netherlands  7 January 2013  Dutch  Nieuwegein, Netherlands  26 November 2012  Dutch  Warsaw, Poland  3 December 2012  Polish  Lisbon, Portugal  4 February 2013  European Portugese  Porto, Portugal  4 February 2013  European Portugese  Barcelona, Spain  25 March 2013  Spanish  Madrid, Spain  17 December 2012  Spanish  Sydney, Australia  26 November 2012  English  Edmonton, Canada  10 December 2012  English  Montreal, Canada  26 November 2012  English  Ottawa, Canada  26 November 2012  English  Toronto, Canada  26 November 2012  English  Vancouver, Canada  10 December 2012  English  Sao Paolo, Brazil  26 November 2012  Brazilan Portugese For more information on this class or to know more about other courses on the authentic MySQL curriculum. see http://oracle.com/education/mysql. Note, many organizations deploy both Oracle Database and MySQL side by side to serve different needs, and as a database professional you can find training courses on both topics at Oracle University! Check out the upcoming Oracle Database training courses and MySQL training courses. Even if you're only managing Oracle Databases at this point of time, getting familiar with MySQL will broaden your career path with growing job demand.

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  • Where and how to reference composite MVP components?

    - by Lea Hayes
    I am learning about the MVP (Model-View-Presenter) Passive View flavour of MVC. I intend to expose events from view interfaces rather than using the observer pattern to remove explicit coupling with presenter. Context: Windows Forms / Client-Side JavaScript. I am led to believe that the MVP (or indeed MVC in general) pattern can be applied at various levels of a user interface ranging from the main "Window" to an embedded "Text Field". For instance, the model to the text field is probably just a string whereas the model to the "Window" contains application specific view state (like a persons name which resides within the contained text field). Given a more complex scenario: Documentation viewer which contains: TOC navigation pane Document view Search pane Since each of these 4 user interface items are complex and can be reused elsewhere it makes sense to design these using MVP. Given that each of these user interface items comprises of 3 components; which component should be nested? where? who instantiates them? Idea #1 - Embed View inside View from Parent View public class DocumentationViewer : Form, IDocumentationViewerView { public DocumentationViewer() { ... // Unclear as to how model and presenter are injected... TocPane = new TocPaneView(); } protected ITocPaneView TocPane { get; private set; } } Idea #2 - Embed Presenter inside View from Parent View public class DocumentationViewer : Form, IDocumentationViewerView { public DocumentationViewer() { ... // This doesn't seem like view logic... var tocPaneModel = new TocPaneModel(); var tocPaneView = new TocPaneView(); TocPane = new TocPanePresenter(tocPaneModel, tocPaneView); } protected TocPanePresenter TocPane { get; private set; } } Idea #3 - Embed View inside View from Parent Presenter public class DocumentationViewer : Form, IDocumentationViewerView { ... // Part of IDocumentationViewerView: public ITocPaneView TocPane { get; set; } } public class DocumentationViewerPresenter { public DocumentationViewerPresenter(DocumentationViewerModel model, IDocumentationViewerView view) { ... var tocPaneView = new TocPaneView(); var tocPaneModel = new TocPaneModel(model.Toc); var tocPanePresenter = new TocPanePresenter(tocPaneModel, tocPaneView); view.TocPane = tocPaneView; } } Some better idea...

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  • Error Using 32 vs. 64 bit SharePoint 2007 DLLs with PowerShell

    - by Brian Jackett
    Next time you fire up PowerShell to work with the SharePoint API make sure you launch the proper bit version of PowerShell.  Last week I had an interesting error that led to this blog post.  Travel back in time a little bit with me to see where this 32 vs. 64 bit debate started. History     Ever since the first pre-beta bits of Office 2010 landed in my lap I have been questioning whether it’s better to run 32 or 64 bit applications on a 64 bit host operating system.  In relation to Office 2010 I heard a number of arguments for 32 bit including this link from the Office 2010 Engineering team.  Given my typical usage scenarios 32 bit seemed the way to go since I wasn’t a “super RAM hungry” Excel user or the like. The Problem     Since I had chosen 32 bit Office 2010, I tried to stick with 32 bit version of other programs that I run assuming the same benefits and rules applied to other applications.  This is where I was wrong.  Last week I was attempting to use 32 bit PowerShell ISE (Integrated Scripting Environment) on a 64 bit WSS 3.0 server.  When trying to reference the 64 bit SharePoint DLLs I got the following errors about not being able to find the web application.     I have run into these errors when I have hosts file issues or improper permissions to the farm / site collection but these were not the case.  After taking a quick spin around the interwebs I ran across the below forum post comment and another MSDN forum reply that explained the error.  Turns out that sometimes it’s not possible to run 32 bit applications against a 64 bit OS / farm / assembly / etc. …the problem could also be because your SharePoint is 64-Bit but your app is running in 32-bit mode     I quickly exited 32 bit PowerShell ISE and ran the same code under 64 bit PowerShell ISE.  All errors were gone and the script ran successfully.   Conclusion     The rules of 32 vs. 64 bit interoperability do not always apply evenly across all applications and scenarios.  In my case I wasn’t able to run 32 bit PowerShell against 64 bit SharePoint DLLs.  I’m updating all of my links and shortcuts to use 64 bit PowerShell where appropriate.  I’m quite surprised it has taken me this long to run into this error, but sometimes blind luck is all that keeps you from running into errors.  Lesson learned and hopefully this can benefit you as well.  Happy SharePointing all!         -Frog Out   Links http://blogs.technet.com/b/office2010/archive/2010/02/23/understanding-64-bit-office.aspx http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sharepointdevelopment/thread/a732cb83-c2ef-4133-b04e-86477b72bbe3/ http://stackoverflow.com/questions/266255/filenotfoundexception-with-the-spsite-constructor-whats-the-problem

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  • Finance: Friends, not foes!

    - by red@work
    After reading Phil's blog post about his experiences of working on reception, I thought I would let everyone in on one of the other customer facing roles at Red Gate... When you think of a Credit Control team, most might imagine money-hungry (and often impolite) people, who will do nothing short of hunting people down until they pay up. Well, as with so many things, not at Red Gate! Here we do things a little bit differently.   Since joining the Licensing, Invoicing and Credit Control team at Red Gate (affectionately nicknamed LICC!), I have found it fantastic to work with people who know that often the best way to get what you want is by being friendly, reasonable and as helpful as possible. The best bit about this is that, because everyone is in a good mood, we have a great working atmosphere! We are definitely a very happy team. We laugh a lot, even when dealing with the serious matter of playing table football after lunch. The most obvious part of my job is bringing in money. There are few things quite as satisfying as receiving a big payment or one that you've been chasing for a long time. That being said, it's just as nice to encounter the companies that surprise you with a payment bang on time after little or no chasing. It's always a pleasure to find these people who are generous and easy to work with, and so they always make me smile, too. As I'm in one of the few customer facing roles here, I get to experience firsthand just how much Red Gate customers love our software and are equally impressed with our customer service. We regularly get replies from people thanking us for our help in resolving a problem or just to simply say that they think we're great. Or, as is often the case, that we 'rock and are awesome'! When those are the kinds of emails you have to deal with for most of the day, I would challenge anyone to be unhappy! The best thing about my work is that, much like Phil and his counterparts on reception, I get to talk to people from all over the world, and experience their unique (and occasionally unusual) personality traits. I deal predominantly with customers in the US, so I'll be speaking to someone from a high flying multi-national in New York one minute, and then the next phone call will be to a small office on the outskirts of Alabama. This level of customer involvement has led to a lot of interesting anecdotes and plenty of in-jokes to keep us amused! Obviously there are customers who are infuriating, like those who simply tell us that they will pay "one day", and that we should stop chasing them. Then there are the people who say that they ordered the tools because they really like them, but they just can't afford to actually pay for them at the moment. Thankfully these situations are relatively few and far between, and for every one customer that makes you want to scream, there are far, far more that make you smile!

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  • links for 2011-02-16

    - by Bob Rhubart
    On the Software Architect Trail Software architect is the #1 job, according to a 2010 CNN-Money poll. In this article in Oracle Magazine, several members of the OTN architect community talk about the career paths that led them to this lucrative role.  (tags: oracle oraclemagazine softwarearchitect) Oracle Technology Network Architect Day: Denver Registration opens soon for this event to be held in Denver on March 23, 2011.  (tags: oracle otn entarch) How the Internet Gets Inside Us : The New Yorker "It isn’t just that we’ve lived one technological revolution among many; it’s that our technological revolution is the big social revolution that we live with." - Adam Gopnik (tags: internet progress technology innovation) The Insider Threat: Understand and Mitigate Your Risks: CSO Webcast February 23, 2011 at 1:00 PM EST/ 10:00 AM PST .  Speakers: Randy Trzeciak, lead for the CERT Insider Threat research team, and  Roxana Bradescu, Director of Database Security at Oracle. (tags: oracle CERT security) The Tom Kyte Blog: An Interesting Read... Tom looks at "an internet security firm brought down by not following the most *basic* of security principals." (tags: security oracle) Jason Williamson: Oracle as a Service in the Cloud "It is not trivial to migrate large amounts of pre-relational or 'devolved' relational data. To do this, we again must revert back to a tight roadmap to migration and leverage the growing tools and services that we have." - Jason Williamson (tags: oracle cloud soa) Edwin Biemond: Java / Oracle SOA blog: Building an asynchronous web service with JAX-WS "Building an asynchronous web service can be complex especially when you are used to synchronous Web services where you can wait for the response in your favorite tool." - Oracle ACE Edwin Biemond (tags: oracle oracleace java soa) Shared Database Servers (The SaaS Report) "Outside the virtualization world, there are capabilities of Oracle Database which can be used to prevent resource contention and guarantee SLA." - Shivanshu Upadhyay (tags: oracle database cloud SaaS) White Paper: Experiencing the New Social Enterprise "Increasingly organizations recognize the mandate to create a modern user experience that transforms existing business processes and increases business efficiency and agility." (tags: e20 enterprise2.0 socialcomputing oracle) Clusterware 11gR2 - Setting up an Active/Passive failover configuration Gilles Haro illustrates the steps necessary to achieve "a fully operational 11gR2 database protected by automatic failover capabilities." (tags: oracle clusterware) Oracle ERP: How to overcome local hurdles in a global implementation "The corporate world becomes a global village as many companies expand their business and offices around different countries and even continents. And this number keeps increasing. This globalization raises interesting questions..." - Jan Verhallen (tags: oracle capgemini entarch erp) Webcast: Successful Strategies for Optimizing Your Data Warehouse. March 3. 10 a.m. PT/1 p.m. ET Thursday, March 3, 2011. 10 a.m. PT/1 p.m. ET. Speakers: Mala Narasimharajan (Senior Product Marketing Manager, Oracle Data Integration) and Denis Gray (Principal Product Manager, Oracle Data Integration) (tags: oracle dataintegration datawarehousing)

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  • Array Multiplication and Division

    - by Narfanator
    I came across a question that (eventually) landed me wondering about array arithmetic. I'm thinking specifically in Ruby, but I think the concepts are language independent. So, addition and subtraction are defined, in Ruby, as such: [1,6,8,3,6] + [5,6,7] == [1,6,8,3,6,5,6,7] # All the elements of the first, then all the elements of the second [1,6,8,3,6] - [5,6,7] == [1,8,3] # From the first, remove anything found in the second and array * scalar is defined: [1,2,3] * 2 == [1,2,3,1,2,3] But What, conceptually, should the following be? None of these are (as far as I can find) defined: Array x Array: [1,2,3] * [1,2,3] #=> ? Array / Scalar: [1,2,3,4,5] / 2 #=> ? Array / Scalar: [1,2,3,4,5] % 2 #=> ? Array / Array: [1,2,3,4,5] / [1,2] #=> ? Array / Array: [1,2,3,4,5] % [1,2] #=> ? I've found some mathematical descriptions of these operations for set theory, but I couldn't really follow them, and sets don't have duplicates (arrays do). Edit: Note, I do not mean vector (matrix) arithmetic, which is completely defined. Edit2: If this is the wrong stack exchange, tell me which is the right one and I'll move it. Edit 3: Add mod operators to the list. Edit 4: I figure array / scalar is derivable from array * scalar: a * b = c => a = b / c [1,2,3] * 3 = [1,2,3]+[1,2,3]+[1,2,3] = [1,2,3,1,2,3,1,2,3] => [1,2,3] = [1,2,3,1,2,3,1,2,3] / 3 Which, given that programmer's division ignore the remained and has modulus: [1,2,3,4,5] / 2 = [[1,2], [3,4]] [1,2,3,4,5] % 2 = [5] Except that these are pretty clearly non-reversible operations (not that modulus ever is), which is non-ideal. Edit: I asked a question over on Math that led me to Multisets. I think maybe extensible arrays are "multisets", but I'm not sure yet.

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  • Securing User Account Details with MySQL

    - by Antoinette O'Sullivan
    Keeping user account details secure is always at the forefront of a Database Administrator's mind. However, users want to get up and running as soon as possible without complex login procedures. You can learn more about this and many other topics in the MySQL for Database Administrator course. For example, MySQL 5.6.6 introduced a new utility: mysql_config_editor, which makes secure access via MySQL client applications much easier to establish, while still providing a good measure of security. The mysql_config_editor stores a user's authentication details in an encrypted login file called mylogin.cnf. This login file is readable and writable for the user who invokes the utility, and invisible to everyone else. You can use it to collect all your hard-to-remember server locations and paswords safe in the knowledge that your passwords are never invoked using clear text. The MySQL for Database Administrators course is a 5-day instructor-led course which is available as a: Training-on-Demand: Start training within 24 hours of registration, following lecture material at your own pace through streaming video and booking time on a lab environment to suit your schedule. Live-Virtual Event: Attend a live event from your own desk, choosing from a selection of events on the schedule to suit different timezones. In-Class Event: Travel to an education center to attend this course. Below is a selection of the events already on the schedule. Location  Date  Delivery Language  Brisbane, Australia  18 August 2014  English  Brussels, Belgium  25 August 2014  English  Sao Paulo, Brazil  2 June 2014  Brazilian Portuguese  Cairo, Egypt  28 September 2014  Arabic  London, England  14 July 2014  English  Belfast, Ireland  15 September 2014  English  Dublin, Ireland  29 September 2014  English  Rome, Italy  16 June 2014  Italian  Seoul, Korea  9 June 2014  Korean  Petaling Jaya, Malaysia  16 June 2014  English  Utrecht, Netherlands  25 August 2014  English  Edinburgh, Scotland  26 June 2014  English  Madrid, Spain  6 October 2014  Spanish  Tunis, Tunisia  27 October 2014  French  Istanbul, Turkey  14 July 2014  Turkish To register for an event, request an additional event or learn more about the authentic MySQL curriculum, go to http://education.oracle.com/mysql. To read more about MySQL security, consult the MySQL Reference Manual - http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.6/en/security.html.

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  • Desktop Fun: Happy New Year Icon and Font Packs

    - by Asian Angel
    With the Christmas holiday so near, New Year’s Eve and Day will not be far behind. To help you prepare those New Year’s Eve and Day celebrations we have put together a nice collection of fonts for party invitations, fliers, decorations, and more. We also have icon goodness to make your desktop all bright and shiny for the new year. Sneak Preview This is the New Year’s desktop that we put together using the Birthday Icon Set shown below. Note: The original unmodified version of this wallpaper can be found here. An up close look at the icons that we used… The Icon Packs Note: To customize the icon setup on your Windows 7 & Vista systems see our article here. Using Windows XP? We have you covered here. New Year Celebration Icon Set *.ico format only Download New Year Party Icon *.ico, .png, and .icns format Note: This icon is available for download in single file format (based on format type and/or image size). Download Celebration *.ico format only Download Birthday *.ico, .png, and .icns format Special Note: While not an official New Year’s set of icons, it will still work nicely for a New Year’s or celebration desktop setup. Download The Font Packs Note: To manage the fonts on your Windows 7, Vista, & XP systems see our article here. Cocktail Bubbly Download Fontdinerdotcom Sparkly Download Confetti Download KR Happy New Year 2002 Note: For those who are curious about this font’s shape, it is a cork popping out of a champagne bottle. Download NewYearBats *includes 52 individual characters Note: This group represents A – Z in all capital letters. Note: This group represents A – Z in all lower case letters. Download LCR Party Dings *includes 26 individual characters (A – Z), not case sensitive Special Note: This font is an all-purpose type that covers a variety of party/celebration types from New Year’s to birthdays. Download For more great ways to customize your computer be certain to look through our Desktop Fun section. Latest Features How-To Geek ETC The Complete List of iPad Tips, Tricks, and Tutorials 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 Track Weather Conditions with the Weather Underground Web App for Chrome These 8-Bit Mario Wood Magnets Put Video Games on Your Fridge Christmas Themes 4 Pack for Chrome and Iron Browser Enjoy the First Total Lunar Eclipse in 372 Years This Evening Gmail’s Free Calling Extended Through 2011 Voice Search Brings Android-Style Voice Search to Google Chrome

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  • Nagging As A Strategy For Better Linking: -z guidance

    - by user9154181
    The link-editor (ld) in Solaris 11 has a new feature that we call guidance that is intended to help you build better objects. The basic idea behind guidance is that if (and only if) you request it, the link-editor will issue messages suggesting better options and other changes you might make to your ld command to get better results. You can choose to take the advice, or you can disable specific types of guidance while acting on others. In some ways, this works like an experienced friend leaning over your shoulder and giving you advice — you're free to take it or leave it as you see fit, but you get nudged to do a better job than you might have otherwise. We use guidance to build the core Solaris OS, and it has proven to be useful, both in improving our objects, and in making sure that regressions don't creep back in later. In this article, I'm going to describe the evolution in thinking and design that led to the implementation of the -z guidance option, as well as give a brief description of how it works. The guidance feature issues non-fatal warnings. However, experience shows that once developers get used to ignoring warnings, it is inevitable that real problems will be lost in the noise and ignored or missed. This is why we have a zero tolerance policy against build noise in the core Solaris OS. In order to get maximum benefit from -z guidance while maintaining this policy, I added the -z fatal-warnings option at the same time. Much of the material presented here is adapted from the arc case: PSARC 2010/312 Link-editor guidance The History Of Unfortunate Link-Editor Defaults The Solaris link-editor is one of the oldest Unix commands. It stands to reason that this would be true — in order to write an operating system, you need the ability to compile and link code. The original link-editor (ld) had defaults that made sense at the time. As new features were needed, command line option switches were added to let the user use them, while maintaining backward compatibility for those who didn't. Backward compatibility is always a concern in system design, but is particularly important in the case of the tool chain (compilers, linker, and related tools), since it is a basic building block for the entire system. Over the years, applications have grown in size and complexity. Important concepts like dynamic linking that didn't exist in the original Unix system were invented. Object file formats changed. In the case of System V Release 4 Unix derivatives like Solaris, the ELF (Extensible Linking Format) was adopted. Since then, the ELF system has evolved to provide tools needed to manage today's larger and more complex environments. Features such as lazy loading, and direct bindings have been added. In an ideal world, many of these options would be defaults, with rarely used options that allow the user to turn them off. However, the reality is exactly the reverse: For backward compatibility, these features are all options that must be explicitly turned on by the user. This has led to a situation in which most applications do not take advantage of the many improvements that have been made in linking over the last 20 years. If their code seems to link and run without issue, what motivation does a developer have to read a complex manpage, absorb the information provided, choose the features that matter for their application, and apply them? Experience shows that only the most motivated and diligent programmers will make that effort. We know that most programs would be improved if we could just get you to use the various whizzy features that we provide, but the defaults conspire against us. We have long wanted to do something to make it easier for our users to use the linkers more effectively. There have been many conversations over the years regarding this issue, and how to address it. They always break down along the following lines: Change ld Defaults Since the world would be a better place the newer ld features were the defaults, why not change things to make it so? This idea is simple, elegant, and impossible. Doing so would break a large number of existing applications, including those of ISVs, big customers, and a plethora of existing open source packages. In each case, the owner of that code may choose to follow our lead and fix their code, or they may view it as an invitation to reconsider their commitment to our platform. Backward compatibility, and our installed base of working software, is one of our greatest assets, and not something to be lightly put at risk. Breaking backward compatibility at this level of the system is likely to do more harm than good. But, it sure is tempting. New Link-Editor One might create a new linker command, not called 'ld', leaving the old command as it is. The new one could use the same code as ld, but would offer only modern options, with the proper defaults for features such as direct binding. The resulting link-editor would be a pleasure to use. However, the approach is doomed to niche status. There is a vast pile of exiting code in the world built around the existing ld command, that reaches back to the 1970's. ld use is embedded in large and unknown numbers of makefiles, and is used by name by compilers that execute it. A Unix link-editor that is not named ld will not find a majority audience no matter how good it might be. Finally, a new linker command will eventually cease to be new, and will accumulate its own burden of backward compatibility issues. An Option To Make ld Do The Right Things Automatically This line of reasoning is best summarized by a CR filed in 2005, entitled 6239804 make it easier for ld(1) to do what's best The idea is to have a '-z best' option that unchains ld from its backward compatibility commitment, and allows it to turn on the "best" set of features, as determined by the authors of ld. The specific set of features enabled by -z best would be subject to change over time, as requirements change. This idea is more realistic than the other two, but was never implemented because it has some important issues that we could never answer to our satisfaction: The -z best proposal assumes that the user can turn it on, and trust it to select good options without the user needing to be aware of the options being applied. This is a fallacy. Features such as direct bindings require the user to do some analysis to ensure that the resulting program will still operate properly. A user who is willing to do the work to verify that what -z best does will be OK for their application is capable of turning on those features directly, and therefore gains little added benefit from -z best. The intent is that when a user opts into -z best, that they understand that z best is subject to sometimes incompatible evolution. Experience teaches us that this won't work. People will use this feature, the meaning of -z best will change, code that used to build will fail, and then there will be complaints and demands to retract the change. When (not if) this occurs, we will of course defend our actions, and point at the disclaimer. We'll win some of those debates, and lose others. Ultimately, we'll end up with -z best2 (-z better), or other compromises, and our goal of simplifying the world will have failed. The -z best idea rolls up a set of features that may or may not be related to each other into a unit that must be taken wholesale, or not at all. It could be that only a subset of what it does is compatible with a given application, in which case the user is expected to abandon -z best and instead set the options that apply to their application directly. In doing so, they lose one of the benefits of -z best, that if you use it, future versions of ld may choose a different set of options, and automatically improve the object through the act of rebuilding it. I drew two conclusions from the above history: For a link-editor, backward compatibility is vital. If a given command line linked your application 10 years ago, you have every reason to expect that it will link today, assuming that the libraries you're linking against are still available and compatible with their previous interfaces. For an application of any size or complexity, there is no substitute for the work involved in examining the code and determining which linker options apply and which do not. These options are largely orthogonal to each other, and it can be reasonable not to use any or all of them, depending on the situation, even in modern applications. It is a mistake to tie them together. The idea for -z guidance came from consideration of these points. By decoupling the advice from the act of taking the advice, we can retain the good aspects of -z best while avoiding its pitfalls: -z guidance gives advice, but the decision to take that advice remains with the user who must evaluate its merit and make a decision to take it or not. As such, we are free to change the specific guidance given in future releases of ld, without breaking existing applications. The only fallout from this will be some new warnings in the build output, which can be ignored or dealt with at the user's convenience. It does not couple the various features given into a single "take it or leave it" option, meaning that there will never be a need to offer "-zguidance2", or other such variants as things change over time. Guidance has the potential to be our final word on this subject. The user is given the flexibility to disable specific categories of guidance without losing the benefit of others, including those that might be added to future versions of the system. Although -z fatal-warnings stands on its own as a useful feature, it is of particular interest in combination with -z guidance. Used together, the guidance turns from advice to hard requirement: The user must either make the suggested change, or explicitly reject the advice by specifying a guidance exception token, in order to get a build. This is valuable in environments with high coding standards. ld Command Line Options The guidance effort resulted in new link-editor options for guidance and for turning warnings into fatal errors. Before I reproduce that text here, I'd like to highlight the strategic decisions embedded in the guidance feature: In order to get guidance, you have to opt in. We hope you will opt in, and believe you'll get better objects if you do, but our default mode of operation will continue as it always has, with full backward compatibility, and without judgement. Guidance suggestions always offers specific advice, and not vague generalizations. You can disable some guidance without turning off the entire feature. When you get guidance warnings, you can choose to take the advice, or you can specify a keyword to disable guidance for just that category. This allows you to get guidance for things that are useful to you, without being bothered about things that you've already considered and dismissed. As the world changes, we will add new guidance to steer you in the right direction. All such new guidance will come with a keyword that let's you turn it off. In order to facilitate building your code on different versions of Solaris, we quietly ignore any guidance keywords we don't recognize, assuming that they are intended for newer versions of the link-editor. If you want to see what guidance tokens ld does and does not recognize on your system, you can use the ld debugging feature as follows: % ld -Dargs -z guidance=foo,nodefs debug: debug: Solaris Linkers: 5.11-1.2275 debug: debug: arg[1] option=-D: option-argument: args debug: arg[2] option=-z: option-argument: guidance=foo,nodefs debug: warning: unrecognized -z guidance item: foo The -z fatal-warning option is straightforward, and generally useful in environments with strict coding standards. Note that the GNU ld already had this feature, and we accept their option names as synonyms: -z fatal-warnings | nofatal-warnings --fatal-warnings | --no-fatal-warnings The -z fatal-warnings and the --fatal-warnings option cause the link-editor to treat warnings as fatal errors. The -z nofatal-warnings and the --no-fatal-warnings option cause the link-editor to treat warnings as non-fatal. This is the default behavior. The -z guidance option is defined as follows: -z guidance[=item1,item2,...] Provide guidance messages to suggest ld options that can improve the quality of the resulting object, or which are otherwise considered to be beneficial. The specific guidance offered is subject to change over time as the system evolves. Obsolete guidance offered by older versions of ld may be dropped in new versions. Similarly, new guidance may be added to new versions of ld. Guidance therefore always represents current best practices. It is possible to enable guidance, while preventing specific guidance messages, by providing a list of item tokens, representing the class of guidance to be suppressed. In this way, unwanted advice can be suppressed without losing the benefit of other guidance. Unrecognized item tokens are quietly ignored by ld, allowing a given ld command line to be executed on a variety of older or newer versions of Solaris. The guidance offered by the current version of ld, and the item tokens used to disable these messages, are as follows. Specify Required Dependencies Dynamic executables and shared objects should explicitly define all of the dependencies they require. Guidance recommends the use of the -z defs option, should any symbol references remain unsatisfied when building dynamic objects. This guidance can be disabled with -z guidance=nodefs. Do Not Specify Non-Required Dependencies Dynamic executables and shared objects should not define any dependencies that do not satisfy the symbol references made by the dynamic object. Guidance recommends that unused dependencies be removed. This guidance can be disabled with -z guidance=nounused. Lazy Loading Dependencies should be identified for lazy loading. Guidance recommends the use of the -z lazyload option should any dependency be processed before either a -z lazyload or -z nolazyload option is encountered. This guidance can be disabled with -z guidance=nolazyload. Direct Bindings Dependencies should be referenced with direct bindings. Guidance recommends the use of the -B direct, or -z direct options should any dependency be processed before either of these options, or the -z nodirect option is encountered. This guidance can be disabled with -z guidance=nodirect. Pure Text Segment Dynamic objects should not contain relocations to non-writable, allocable sections. Guidance recommends compiling objects with Position Independent Code (PIC) should any relocations against the text segment remain, and neither the -z textwarn or -z textoff options are encountered. This guidance can be disabled with -z guidance=notext. Mapfile Syntax All mapfiles should use the version 2 mapfile syntax. Guidance recommends the use of the version 2 syntax should any mapfiles be encountered that use the version 1 syntax. This guidance can be disabled with -z guidance=nomapfile. Library Search Path Inappropriate dependencies that are encountered by ld are quietly ignored. For example, a 32-bit dependency that is encountered when generating a 64-bit object is ignored. These dependencies can result from incorrect search path settings, such as supplying an incorrect -L option. Although benign, this dependency processing is wasteful, and might hide a build problem that should be solved. Guidance recommends the removal of any inappropriate dependencies. This guidance can be disabled with -z guidance=nolibpath. In addition, -z guidance=noall can be used to entirely disable the guidance feature. See Chapter 7, Link-Editor Quick Reference, in the Linker and Libraries Guide for more information on guidance and advice for building better objects. Example The following example demonstrates how the guidance feature is intended to work. We will build a shared object that has a variety of shortcomings: Does not specify all it's dependencies Specifies dependencies it does not use Does not use direct bindings Uses a version 1 mapfile Contains relocations to the readonly allocable text (not PIC) This scenario is sadly very common — many shared objects have one or more of these issues. % cat hello.c #include <stdio.h> #include <unistd.h> void hello(void) { printf("hello user %d\n", getpid()); } % cat mapfile.v1 # This version 1 mapfile will trigger a guidance message % cc hello.c -o hello.so -G -M mapfile.v1 -lelf As you can see, the operation completes without error, resulting in a usable object. However, turning on guidance reveals a number of things that could be better: % cc hello.c -o hello.so -G -M mapfile.v1 -lelf -zguidance ld: guidance: version 2 mapfile syntax recommended: mapfile.v1 ld: guidance: -z lazyload option recommended before first dependency ld: guidance: -B direct or -z direct option recommended before first dependency Undefined first referenced symbol in file getpid hello.o (symbol belongs to implicit dependency /lib/libc.so.1) printf hello.o (symbol belongs to implicit dependency /lib/libc.so.1) ld: warning: symbol referencing errors ld: guidance: -z defs option recommended for shared objects ld: guidance: removal of unused dependency recommended: libelf.so.1 warning: Text relocation remains referenced against symbol offset in file .rodata1 (section) 0xa hello.o getpid 0x4 hello.o printf 0xf hello.o ld: guidance: position independent (PIC) code recommended for shared objects ld: guidance: see ld(1) -z guidance for more information Given the explicit advice in the above guidance messages, it is relatively easy to modify the example to do the right things: % cat mapfile.v2 # This version 2 mapfile will not trigger a guidance message $mapfile_version 2 % cc hello.c -o hello.so -Kpic -G -Bdirect -M mapfile.v2 -lc -zguidance There are situations in which the guidance does not fit the object being built. For instance, you want to build an object without direct bindings: % cc -Kpic hello.c -o hello.so -G -M mapfile.v2 -lc -zguidance ld: guidance: -B direct or -z direct option recommended before first dependency ld: guidance: see ld(1) -z guidance for more information It is easy to disable that specific guidance warning without losing the overall benefit from allowing the remainder of the guidance feature to operate: % cc -Kpic hello.c -o hello.so -G -M mapfile.v2 -lc -zguidance=nodirect Conclusions The linking guidelines enforced by the ld guidance feature correspond rather directly to our standards for building the core Solaris OS. I'm sure that comes as no surprise. It only makes sense that we would want to build our own product as well as we know how. Solaris is usually the first significant test for any new linker feature. We now enable guidance by default for all builds, and the effect has been very positive. Guidance helps us find suboptimal objects more quickly. Programmers get concrete advice for what to change instead of vague generalities. Even in the cases where we override the guidance, the makefile rules to do so serve as documentation of the fact. Deciding to use guidance is likely to cause some up front work for most code, as it forces you to consider using new features such as direct bindings. Such investigation is worthwhile, but does not come for free. However, the guidance suggestions offer a structured and straightforward way to tackle modernizing your objects, and once that work is done, for keeping them that way. The investment is often worth it, and will replay you in terms of better performance and fewer problems. I hope that you find guidance to be as useful as we have.

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  • A Slice of Raspberry Pi

    - by Phil Factor
    Guest editorial for the ITPro/SysAdmin newsletter The Raspberry Pi Foundation has done a superb design job on their new $35 network-enabled Linux computer. This tiny machine, incorporating an ARM processor on a Broadcom BCM2835 multimedia chip, aims to put the fun back into learning computing. The public response has been overwhelmingly positive.Note that aim: "…to put the fun back". Education in Information Technology is in dire straits. It always has been, but seems to have deteriorated further still, even in the face of improved provision of equipment.In many countries, the government controls the curriculum. It predicted a shortage in office-based IT skills, and so geared the ICT curriculum toward mind-numbing training in word-processing and spreadsheet skills. Instead, the shortage has turned out to be in people with an engineering-mindset, who can solve problems with whatever technologies are available and learn new techniques quickly, in a rapidly-changing field.In retrospect, the assumption that specific training was required rather than an education was an idiotic response to the arrival of mainstream information technology. As a result, ICT became a disaster area, which discouraged a generation of youngsters from a career in IT, and thereby led directly to the shortage of people with the skills that are required to exploit the potential of Information Technology..Raspberry Pi aims to reverse the trend. This is a rig that is geared to fast graphics in high resolution. It is no toy. It should be a superb games machine. However, the use of Fedora, Debian, or Arch Linux ARM shows the more serious educational intent behind the Foundation's work. It looks like it will even do some office work too!So, get hold of any power supply that provides a 5VDC source at the required 700mA; an old Blackberry charger will do or, alternatively, it will run off four AA cells. You'll need a USB hub to support the mouse and keyboard, and maybe a hard drive. You'll want a DVI monitor (with audio out) or TV (sound and video). You'll also need to be able to cope with wired Ethernet 10/100, if you want networking.With this lot assembled, stick the paraphernalia on the back of the HDTV with Blu Tack, get a nice keyboard, and you have a classy Linux-based home computer. The major cost is in the T.V and the keyboard. If you're not already writing software for this platform, then maybe, at a time when some countries are talking of orders in the millions, you should consider it.

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  • Tap into MySQL's Amazing Performance Results with the Performance Tuning Course

    - by Antoinette O'Sullivan
    Want to leverage the high-speed load utilities, distinctive memory caches, full text indexes, and other performance-enhancing mechanisms that MySQL offers to fuel today's critical business systems. The authentic MySQL Performance Tuning course, in 4 days, teaches you to evaluate the MySQL architecture, learn to use the tools, configure the database for performance, tune application and SQL code, tune the server, examine the storage engines, assess the application architecture, and learn general tuning concepts. You can take this course in one the following three ways: Training-on-Demand: Access the streaming video, instructor delivery of this course from your own desk, at your own pace. Book time for hands-on practice when it suits you. Live-Virtual Class: Take this instructor-led class live from your own desk. With 700 events on the schedule you are sure to find a time and date to suit you! In-Class: Travel to a classroom to take this class. A sample of events on the schedule are as follows.  Location  Date  Delivery Language  Hamburg, Germany  22 October 2012  German  Prague, Czech Republic  1 October 2012  Czech  Warsaw, Poland  3 December 2012  Polish  London, England  19 November 2012  English  Rome, Italy  23 October 2012  Italian Lisbon, Portugal  6 November 2012  European Portugese  Aix en Provence, France  4 September 2012   French  Strasbourg, France 16 October 2012   French  Nieuwegein, Netherlands 26 November 2012   Dutch  Madrid, Spain 17 December 2012   Spanish  Mechelen, Belgium  1 October 2012  English  Riga, Latvia  10 December 2012  Latvian  Petaling Jaya, Malaysia  10 September 2012 English   Edmonton, Canada 10 December 2012   English  Vancouver, Canada 10 December 2012   English  Ottawa, Canada 26 November 2012   English  Toronto, Canada 26 November 2012   English  Montreal, Canada 26 November 2012   English  Mexico City, Mexico 10 September 2012   Spanish  Sao Paolo, Brazil 26 November 2012  Brazilian Portugese   Tokyo, Japan 19 November 2012   Japanese  Tokyo, Japan  19 November 2012  Japanese For further information on this class, or to register your interest in additional events, go to the Oracle University Portal: http://oracle.com/education/mysql

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  • New hidden parameters in Oracle 11.2

    - by Mike Dietrich
    We really welcome every external review of our slides. And also recommendations from customers visiting our workshops. So it happened to me more than a week ago that Marco Patzwahl, the owner of MuniqSoft GmbH, had a very lengthy train ride in Germany (as the engine drivers go on strike this week it could have become even worse) and nothing better to do then reviewing our slide set. And he had plenty of recommendations. Besides that he pointed us to something at least I was not aware of and added it to the slides: In patch set 11.2.0.2 a new behaviour for datafile write errors has been implemented. With this release ANY write error to a datafile will cause the instance to abort. Before 11.2.0.2 those errors usually led to an offline datafile if the database operates in archivelog mode (your production database do, don’t they?!) and the datafile does not belong to the SYSTEM tablespace. Internal discussion found this behaviour not up-to-date and alligned with RAC systems and modern storages. Therefore it has been changed and a new underscore parameter got introduced. _DATAFILE_WRITE_ERRORS_CRASH_INSTANCE=TRUE This is the default setting´and the new behaviour beginning with Oracle 11.2.0.2 If you would like to revert to the pre-11.2.0.2 behaviour you’ll have to set in your init.ora/spfile this parameter to false. But keep in mind that there’s a reason why this has been changed. You’ll find more info in MOS Note: 7691270.8 and this topic in the current version of the slides on slide 255. Thanks to Marco for the review!!   And then I received an email from Kurt Van Meerbeeck today. Kurt is pretty well known in the Oracle community. And he’s the owner of jDUL/DUDE, a database unloading tool which bypasses the Oracle database engine and access data direclty from the blocks. Kurt visited the upgrade workshop two weeks ago in Belgium and did highlight to me that since Oracle 11.2.0.1 even though you haven’t set neither SGA_TARGET nor MEMORY_TARGET the database might still do resize operations. Reason why this behaviour has been changed: Prevention of ORA-4031 errors. But on databases with extremly high loads this can cause trouble. Further information can be found in MOS Note:1269139.1 . And the parameter set to TRUE by default is called _MEMORY_IMM_MODE_WITHOUT_AUTOSGA=TRUE This can be found now in the slide set as well on slide number 240. And thanks to Kurt for this information!!

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  • Build Dependencies and Silverlight 4

    - by Kyle Burns
    At my current position, I’ve been doing quite a bit of Silverlight development and have also been working with TFS2010 build services to enable continuous integration.  One of the critical pieces of a successful continuous build setup (and also one of the benefits of having one) is that the build system should be able to “get latest” against the source repository and immediately build with no errors.  This can break down both in an automated build scenario and a “new guy” scenario when the solution has external dependencies that may not be present in the build environment. The method that I use to address the dependency issue is to store all of the binaries upon which my solution depends in a folder under the solution root called “Reference Items”.  I keep this folder as part of the solution and check all of the binaries into source control so when I get the latest version of the solution from source control all of the binaries are downloaded to my machine as well and gets me closer to the ideal where a new developer installs the development IDE, get latest and can immediately build and run unit tests before jumping into coding the feature of the day. This all sounds pretty good (and it is), but a little while back I ran into one of those little hiccups that requires a little manual intervention.  The issue that I ran into is that with Silverlight (at least version 4), the behavior of the “Add Reference” command when adding reference to a DLL that is present in the GAC is to omit the HintPath element that it includes with regular .Net projects, so even if the DLL is setting in the Reference Items folder and downloaded to the build machine it cannot be found at compile time and the build will fail. To work around this behavior, you need to be comfortable editing the XML project files generated by Visual Studio (in my case this is typically a .csproj file).  Simply open the project file in your favorite text editor, find the Reference element that refers to the component, and modify the XML to include the HintPath.  Here’s a before and after example of the component that ultimately led me to the investigation behind this post: Before: <Reference Include="Telerik.Windows.Controls, Version=2011.2.920.1040, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=5803cfa389c90ce7, processorArchitecture=MSIL" /> After: <Reference Include="Telerik.Windows.Controls, Version=2011.2.920.1040, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=5803cfa389c90ce7, processorArchitecture=MSIL">       <HintPath>..\Reference Items\Telerik.Windows.Controls.dll</HintPath>     </Reference>

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  • How do I calculate the boundary of the game window after transforming the view?

    - by Cypher
    My Camera class handles zoom, rotation, and of course panning. It's invoked through SpriteBatch.Begin, like so many other XNA 2D camera classes. It calculates the view Matrix like so: public Matrix GetViewMatrix() { return Matrix.Identity * Matrix.CreateTranslation(new Vector3(-this.Spatial.Position, 0.0f)) * Matrix.CreateTranslation(-( this.viewport.Width / 2 ), -( this.viewport.Height / 2 ), 0.0f) * Matrix.CreateRotationZ(this.Rotation) * Matrix.CreateScale(this.Scale, this.Scale, 1.0f) * Matrix.CreateTranslation(this.viewport.Width * 0.5f, this.viewport.Height * 0.5f, 0.0f); } I was having a minor issue with performance, which after doing some profiling, led me to apply a culling feature to my rendering system. It used to, before I implemented the camera's zoom feature, simply grab the camera's boundaries and cull any game objects that did not intersect with the camera. However, after giving the camera the ability to zoom, that no longer works. The reason why is visible in the screenshot below. The navy blue rectangle represents the camera's boundaries when zoomed out all the way (Camera.Scale = 0.5f). So, when zoomed out, game objects are culled before they reach the boundaries of the window. The camera's width and height are determined by the Viewport properties of the same name (maybe this is my mistake? I wasn't expecting the camera to "resize" like this). What I'm trying to calculate is a Rectangle that defines the boundaries of the screen, as indicated by my awesome blue arrows, even after the camera is rotated, scaled, or panned. Here is how I've more recently found out how not to do it: public Rectangle CullingRegion { get { Rectangle region = Rectangle.Empty; Vector2 size = this.Spatial.Size; size *= 1 / this.Scale; Vector2 position = this.Spatial.Position; position = Vector2.Transform(position, this.Inverse); region.X = (int)position.X; region.Y = (int)position.Y; region.Width = (int)size.X; region.Height = (int)size.Y; return region; } } It seems to calculate the right size, but when I render this region, it moves around which will obviously cause problems. It needs to be "static", so to speak. It's also obscenely slow, which causes more of a problem than it solves. What am I missing?

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  • 25 reasons to attend JavaOne 2012

    - by arungupta
    17th JavaOne is just around the corner, less than 3 weeks away! If you are still thinking about registering for the conference, here are my top 25 reasons to attend the conference: Biggest gathering of Java geeks in the world Latest and greatest content with 475 technical sessions/Birds of Feathers/Hands-on labs sessions (about 20% more from last year) Reduced number of keynotes to accommodate room for more technical content No product pitches, exclusive focus on technology (I can tell you that from my experience as a track lead) Sessions are divided in different in-depth technical tracks to focus on Java technology that most interests you Reruns of several popular sessions Experts and Practitioners-led HOLs and tutorials Rock star speakers, panelists, faculties, and instructors. Meet several Java Champions and JUG leaders from all around the world Engage with speakers and discuss with fellow developers in a casual setting with lots of networking space A complete conference dedicated for Java Embedded Extensive and fast-paced hands-on University Sessions on Sunday, learn while you are at the conference. You can register for Java University only or attend with the conference. Dukes Choice Awards recognize and celebrate the most innovative usage of the Java platform DEMOgrounds and Exhibition Hall provide extensive opportunities for networking and engagement with the biggest names in Java (dedicated hours on each day as well) Dedicated day for Java User Groups and Communities (GlassFish Community Event and NetBeans Community Day) Multiple registration packages to meet your needs Pay for 4 full conference passes and get a fifth one free Students and Bloggers get a free pass Geek Bike Ride with fellow speakers and attendees in a casual setting Greenest conference on the plane Enjoy different cuisines in the San Francisco city, take a trip to Alcatraz or Napa Valley or go running on the crooked street ;-) There are tons of tourist opportunities in/around San Francisco. Tons of parties during the conference, in the evening, late night, and early mornings. Don't forget Thirsty Bear Party! Pearl Jam and Kings of Leon at Appreciation Party Oracle Music Festival at Yerba Buena Gardens Grab the bragging rights "I have attended JavaOne"! Learn a new skill, build new connections, conceive a new idea and push the boundaries of Java in the most important educational and networking event of the year for Java developers and enthusiasts. With so much geekgasm going on during the 5 days of JavaOne, is there a reason for you to wait ? Register for the conference now! Grab your buttons, banners, and other collateral at JavaOne Toolkit. You can also send an email to [email protected]. And reach out to us using different social media channels ... As a 13 year veteran of the conference, I can tell this is some thing every Java developer must experience! I will be there, will you ?

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  • Credentials Not Passed From SharePoint WebPart to WCF Service

    - by Jacob L. Adams
    I have spent several hours trying to resolve this problem, so I wanted to share my findings in case someone else might have the same problem. I had a web part which was calling out to a WCF service on another server to get some data. The code I had was essentially using System.ServiceModel; using System.ServiceModel.Channels; ... var binding = new CustomBinding( new HttpTransportBindingElement { AuthenticationScheme = System.Net.AuthenticationSchemes.Negotiate } ); var endpoint = new EndpointAddress(new Uri("http://someotherserver/someotherservice.svc")); var someOtherService = new SomeOtherServiceClient(binding, endpoint); string result = someOtherService.SomeServiceMethod(); This code would run fine on my local instance of SharePoint 2010 (Windows 7 64-bit). However, when I would deploy it to the testing environment, I would get a yellow screen of death  with the following message: The HTTP request is unauthorized with client authentication scheme 'Negotiate'. The authentication header received from the server was 'Negotiate,NTLM'. I then went through the usual checklist of Windows Authentication problems: Check WCF bindings to make sure authentication is set correctly Check IIS to make sure Windows Authentication is enabled and anonymous authentication was disabled. Check to make sure the SharePoint server trusted the server hosting the WCF service Verify that the account that the IIS application pool is running under has access to the other server I then spend lot of time digging into really obscure IIS, machine.config, and trust settings (as well of lots of time on Google and StackOverflow). Eventually I stumbled upon a blog post by Todd Bleeker describing how to run code under the application pool identity. Wait, what? The code is not already running under application pool identity? Another quick Google search led me to an MSDN page that imply that SharePoint indeed does not run under the app pool credentials by default. Instead SPSecurity.RunWithElevatedPrivileges is needed to run code under the app pool identity. Therefore, changing my code to the following worked seamlessly using System.ServiceModel; using System.ServiceModel.Channels; using Microsoft.SharePoint; ... var binding = new CustomBinding( new HttpTransportBindingElement { AuthenticationScheme = System.Net.AuthenticationSchemes.Negotiate } ); var endpoint = new EndpointAddress(new Uri("http://someotherserver/someotherservice.svc")); var someOtherService = new SomeOtherServiceClient(binding, endpoint); string result; SPSecurity.RunWithElevatedPrivileges(()=> { result = someOtherService.SomeServiceMethod(); });

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  • How to remap Fn key combinations (Lenovo G500)

    - by Anatoli
    I am running Kubuntu 13.10 on a Lenovo G500 laptop. My question is similar to this one: How can I remap my F keys on my HP laptop? That is to say, my F1-F12 keys are mapped to certain special functions, and only holding down the Fn key restores access to the standard F1-F12 keys. How do I remap certain keys? I would like to know if there is a way to remap Fx to Fn+Fx and vice-versa. As per the instructions of #87043 I checked my BIOS and there is no option to switch the Fx/Fn key functionality. Googling through Leonovo's support forums indicates a BIOS update enabling this is in the works, but there's no indication of when it will be complete. Using xev I was able to see what X sees when F1-F12 are pressed. Some send separate keycodes, but some are somehow mapped to key combinations or other unknown things: F1 - XF86AudioMute F2 - XF86AudioVolumeLower F3 - XF86AudioVolumeRaise F4 - Alt_L + F4 F5 - F5 F6 - Disables touchapd, cannot quite understand what xev tells me is happening, reenables if disabled (Kernel log reveals these have well-defined scancodes not assigned to any keycodes) F7 - XF86WLAN F8 - Alt_L + Ctrl_L + Tab F9 - Turns off LCD backlight, xev sees nothing F10 - Super_L + p F11 - XF86MonBrightnessLower F12 - XF86MonBrightnessRaise Following the instrusctions on this page: How do I remap certain keys? I remapped all the keys that have definite keycodes (F1, F2, F3, F5, F7, F11, F12) This still leaves the F4, F6, F8, F9, F10 keys not functioning properly. This is especially frustarting since F4, F6, F9 now kill the current window, the touchpad and screen, respectively. Any help on remapping these keys to their proper functions would be much appreciated! -Anatoli xev output for these 5 keys: F4 KeyPress event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4800001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3674037, (228,298), root:(911,321), state 0x0, keycode 64 (keysym 0xffe9, Alt_L), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 0 bytes: XmbLookupString gives 0 bytes: XFilterEvent returns: False FocusOut event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4800001, mode NotifyGrab, detail NotifyAncestor FocusIn event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4800001, mode NotifyUngrab, detail NotifyAncestor KeymapNotify event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x0, keys: 4294967197 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 65 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 KeyRelease event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4800001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3674040, (228,298), root:(911,321), state 0x8, keycode 70 (keysym 0xffc1, F4), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 0 bytes: XFilterEvent returns: False KeyRelease event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4800001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3674042, (228,298), root:(911,321), state 0x8, keycode 64 (keysym 0xffe9, Alt_L), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 0 bytes: XFilterEvent returns: False ClientMessage event, serial 40, synthetic YES, window 0x4800001, message_type 0x12a (WM_PROTOCOLS), format 32, message 0x12b (WM_DELETE_WINDOW) F6 disabling touchpad MappingNotify event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x0, request MappingKeyboard, first_keycode 8, count 248 FocusOut event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, mode NotifyGrab, detail NotifyAncestor FocusIn event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, mode NotifyUngrab, detail NotifyAncestor KeymapNotify event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x0, keys: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 MappingNotify event, serial 41, synthetic NO, window 0x0, request MappingKeyboard, first_keycode 8, count 248 F6 enabling touchpad MappingNotify event, serial 42, synthetic NO, window 0x0, request MappingKeyboard, first_keycode 8, count 248 FocusOut event, serial 42, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, mode NotifyGrab, detail NotifyAncestor FocusIn event, serial 42, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, mode NotifyUngrab, detail NotifyAncestor KeymapNotify event, serial 42, synthetic NO, window 0x0, keys: 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 MappingNotify event, serial 43, synthetic NO, window 0x0, request MappingPointer, first_keycode 0, count 0 F8 doing whatever it is F8 does KeyPress event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3508985, (13,-12), root:(696,11), state 0x0, keycode 64 (keysym 0xffe9, Alt_L), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 0 bytes: XmbLookupString gives 0 bytes: XFilterEvent returns: False KeyPress event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3508986, (13,-12), root:(696,11), state 0x8, keycode 37 (keysym 0xffe3, Control_L), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 0 bytes: XmbLookupString gives 0 bytes: XFilterEvent returns: False KeyPress event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3508988, (13,-12), root:(696,11), state 0xc, keycode 23 (keysym 0xff09, Tab), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (09) " " XmbLookupString gives 1 bytes: (09) " " XFilterEvent returns: False KeyRelease event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3508989, (13,-12), root:(696,11), state 0xc, keycode 64 (keysym 0xffe9, Alt_L), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 0 bytes: XFilterEvent returns: False KeyRelease event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3508991, (13,-12), root:(696,11), state 0x4, keycode 37 (keysym 0xffe3, Control_L), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 0 bytes: XFilterEvent returns: False KeyRelease event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3508994, (13,-12), root:(696,11), state 0x0, keycode 23 (keysym 0xff09, Tab), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (09) " " XFilterEvent returns: False F9 gives no output to xev F10 doing whatever it is F10 does KeyRelease event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3586076, (9,-14), root:(692,9), state 0x0, keycode 10 (keysym 0x31, 1), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (31) "1" XFilterEvent returns: False KeyPress event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3586552, (9,-14), root:(692,9), state 0x0, keycode 133 (keysym 0xffeb, Super_L), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 0 bytes: XmbLookupString gives 0 bytes: XFilterEvent returns: False KeyPress event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3586554, (9,-14), root:(692,9), state 0x40, keycode 33 (keysym 0x70, p), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (70) "p" XmbLookupString gives 1 bytes: (70) "p" XFilterEvent returns: False KeyRelease event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3586557, (9,-14), root:(692,9), state 0x40, keycode 33 (keysym 0x70, p), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (70) "p" XFilterEvent returns: False KeyRelease event, serial 40, synthetic NO, window 0x4600001, root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 3586560, (9,-14), root:(692,9), state 0x40, keycode 133 (keysym 0xffeb, Super_L), same_screen YES, XLookupString gives 0 bytes: XFilterEvent returns: False

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  • New Slides - and a discussion about Dictionary Statistics

    - by Mike Dietrich
    First of all we have just upoaded a new version of the Upgrade and Migration Workshop slides with some added information. So please feel free to download them from here.The slides have one new interesting information which lead to a discussion I've had in the past days with a very large customer regarding their upgrades - and internally on the mailing list targeting an EBS database upgrade from Oracle 10.2 to Oracle 11.2. Why are we creating dictionary statistics during upgrade? I'd believe this forced dictionary statistics creation got introduced with the desupport of the Rule Based Optimizer in Oracle 10g. The goal: as RBO is not supported anymore we have to make sure that the data dictionary has fresh and non-stale statistics. Actually that would have led in Oracle 9i to strange behaviour in some databases - so in Oracle 9i this was strongly disrecommended. The upgrade scripts got hardcoded to create these stats. But during tests we had the following findings: It's important to create dictionary statistics the night before the upgrade. Not two weeks before, not 60 minutes before your downtime begins. But very close to the upgrade. From Oracle 10g onwards you'd just say: $ execute DBMS_STATS.GATHER_DICTIONARY_STATS; This is important to make sure you have fresh dictionary statistics during upgrade for performance reasons. Tests have shown that running an upgrade without valid dictionary statistics might slow down the whole upgrade by factors of 2x-3x. And it would be also a great idea post upgrade to create again fresh dictionary statistics when you've did suppress the stats creation during the upgrade process. Suppress? Yes, you could set this underscore parameter in the init.ora: _optim_dict_stats_at_db_cr_upg=FALSE to suppress the forced dictionary statistics collection during an upgrade. We believe strongly that (a) people using the default statistics creation process which will create dictionary statistics by default and (b) create fresh stats before upgrade on the dictionary. Therefore we find it save once you have followed our advice to use the underscore during upgrade. And we've taken out that forced statistics collection during upgrade in the next release of the database. Please note: If you are using the DBUA for the upgrade it will remove underscore parameters for the upgrade run to improve performance - which is generally a good idea. So you'll have to start the DBUA with that call: $ dbua -initParam "_optim_dict_stats_at_cb_cr_upg"=FALSE -Mike

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  • How to get wireless (Alfa) operate in full power and speed up wireless Internet?

    - by MahboobeAlam
    I am using Wireless to connect to the internet (router). My laptop has Atheros wireless (AR 242x/542x) adapter but the router is a little bit far-away from my room so I have to use an external wireless adapter i.e. Alfa (Realtek 8187) for connectivity. However, since I have started using Ubuntu I noticed that Alfa is not working in full power, internet speed in Ubuntu is much slower than in Windows on my laptop. When I am using Windows 7 the LED (bulb) on Alfa blinks as it should, but when in Ubuntu, it doesn't blink rather it is on but very dim. Connection using Atheros adapter is also the same (slow)... I have tried 4 methods (I found on the Internet) to troubleshoot this matter but no success. It seems to me that Ubuntu/Linux is not letting these wireless adapters to operate in full strength. iwconfig shows that power management is off for both. So what's the problem? Details: ifconfig eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:1f:16:1e:36:ec UP BROADCAST MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 RX bytes:0 (0.0 B) TX bytes:0 (0.0 B) Interrupt:45 Base address:0x6000 lo Link encap:Local Loopback inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0 inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1 RX packets:1657 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:1657 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:0 RX bytes:241697 (241.6 KB) TX bytes:241697 (241.6 KB) wlan0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:22:5f:9b:24:b5 inet6 addr: fe80::222:5fff:fe9b:24b5/64 Scope:Link UP BROADCAST MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:715460 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:694246 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 RX bytes:493539292 (493.5 MB) TX bytes:235159393 (235.1 MB) wlan1 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:c0:ca:42:14:62 inet addr:192.168.100.102 Bcast:192.168.100.255 Mask:255.255.255.0 inet6 addr: fe80::2c0:caff:fe42:1462/64 Scope:Link UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:171053 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:181363 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 RX bytes:74094659 (74.0 MB) TX bytes:59474204 (59.4 MB) iwconfig lo no wireless extensions. eth0 no wireless extensions. wlan0 IEEE 802.11bg ESSID:off/any Mode:Managed Access Point: Not-Associated Tx-Power=20 dBm Retry long limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off Power Management:off wlan1 IEEE 802.11bg ESSID:"Zia" Mode:Managed Frequency:2.412 GHz Access Point: 00:0D:F0:9C:A6:18 Bit Rate=54 Mb/s Tx-Power=20 dBm Retry long limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off Power Management:off Link Quality=70/70 Signal level=-31 dBm Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0 Tx excessive retries:204 Invalid misc:6610 Missed beacon:0

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  • WebCenter Customer Spotlight: Hitachi Data Systems

    - by me
    Author: Peter Reiser - Social Business Evangelist, Oracle WebCenter Watch this Webcast to see a live demo on how HDS creates multilingual content for their 35+ regional websites  Solution SummaryHitachi Data Systems (HDS) provides mid-range and high-end storage systems, software and services. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Hitachi Ltd. HDS is based in Santa Clara, California, and has over 5,300 employees in more then 100 countries and regions. HDS's main objectives were to provide a consistent message across all their sites, to maintain a tight governance structure across their messages and related content, expand the use of the existing content management systems and implement a centralized translation management system. HDS implemented a global web content management system based on Oracle WebCenter Content and integrated the Lingotek translation management system to manage their multilingual content. The implemented solution provides each Geo with the ability to expand their web offering to meet local market needs, while staying aligned with the Corporate Web Guidelines Company OverviewHitachi Data Systems (HDS) provides mid-range and high-end storage systems, software and services. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Hitachi Ltd. and part of the Hitachi Information Systems & Telecommunications Division. The company sells through direct and indirect channels in more than 170 countries and regions. Its customers include of 50 percent of the Fortune 100 companies. HDS is based in Santa Clara California and has over 5,300 employees in more than 100 countries and regions. Business ChallengesHDS has over 35 global websites and the lack of global web capabilities led to inconsistency of messaging, slower time to market and failed to address local language needs. There was an extensive operational overhead due to manual and redundant processes. Translation efforts where superficial, inconsistent and wasteful and the lack of translation automation tools discouraged localization.  HDS's main objectives were to provide a consistent message across all their sites, to maintain a tight governance structure across their messages and related content, expand the use of the existing content management systems and implement a centralized translation management system. Solution DeployedHDS implemented a global web content management system based on Oracle WebCenter Content. The solution supports decentralized publishing for their 35+ global sites to address local market needs while ensuring editorial and brand review trough embedded review processes. They integrated the Lingotek translation management system into Oracle WebCenter Content to manage their multilingual content. Business Results Provides each Geo with the ability to expand their web offering to meet local market needs, while staying aligned with the Corporate Web Guidelines Enables end-to-end content lifecycle management across multiple languages Leverage translation memory for reuse and consistency Reduce time to market with central repository of translated content Additional Information HDS Webcast Oracle WebCenter Content Lingotek website

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  • What can I do to make sure my code gets maintained in a developer light environment?

    - by asjohnson
    I am a contract data analyst, so I bounce between jobs every 3-6 months, which I find to be a good fit for me, but it leads to some problems when it comes to coding. I mostly do statistics (I've asked a similar question on cross validated, but the answers there are not relevant here), but I have also found out that the business world loves excel and loves copying and pasting the same thing over and over again even more. This led me to learn how to write VBA scripts and then VB.NET programs to automate as many of these reports as I can. I am certain my programs are not the most elegant, but I put a good bit of effort into making sure they work under as many cases as I can test, I add in exceptions and try to code so the program can handle changes in the files that it processes, but there is a limit, if you remove a huge portion of the data, there is a good chance my program is going to trip up, which I accept will inevitably happen. Usually a pretty minor change in the code fixes the problem and I do try and comment my code and make it readable under the assumption that some other person will have to read it some day. My problem is that I generally get put on teams of folks with essentially no experience with programming (like VBA would be a huge stretch for anyone I work directly with). I am wondering what I should be doing as the person that wrote the code to do my best to keep it maintained. I have two approaches in mind (outlined next), but would be very happy to get any advice. Solution 1: Find the more tech savvy coworkers and run them through the programs and what basic changes can be made. Honestly automating excel is about as easy as it can get when it comes to programming, so I feel like I could teach someone the basics of maintaining it pretty quick. Solution 2: Get in touch with the IT department and show them what is going on and maybe they will be able to help. The problem here is that the IT department is constantly swamped (as I'm sure many of you know) and I feel like kind of a jerk for dumping more things on them. I do leave my personal email address with places and am willing to answer quick questions via email, but I view the need for more exhaustive maintenance as something of an inevitability and would like to make sure I do my due diligence to make sure it gets done. I imagine some combination of the two approaches outlined there, but is there any kind of heads up I should give IT? I feel like I would be annoyed if I started getting requests to fix a program that I had never seen from some random guy that is no longer there.

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  • How Big Data and Social Won the Election

    - by Mike Stiles
    The story of big data’s influence on the outcome of the US Presidential election is worth a good look, because a) it’s a harbinger of things to come, and b) it’s an example of similar successes available to any enterprise seriously resourcing integrated big data, modeling, and data-driven execution on all assets, including social. Obama campaign manager Jim Messina fielded a data and analytics brain trust 5 times larger than 2008. At that time, there were numerous databases from various sources, few of them talking to each other. This time, the mission was to be metrics-centered and measure everything measurable, and in context with all the other data. Big data showed them exactly what they needed to know and told them what to do about it. It showed them women 40-49 on the west coast would donate big money if they got to eat with George Clooney. Women on the east coast would pony up to hang out with Sarah Jessica Parker. Extensive daily modeling showed them what kinds of email appeals, from who, and to whom, would prove most successful in raising cash, recruiting volunteers, and getting out the vote. Swing state voters were profiled and approached with more customized targeting that at any time in history. Ads were purchased on specific shows watched by the targets, increasing efficiency 14% over traditional media buys. For all the criticism of the candidate’s focus on appearing on comedy and entertainment shows, and local radio morning shows, that’s where the data sent them to reach the voters most likely to turn out for them. And then there was social. Again, more than in any other election, Facebook was used for virtual, highly efficient door-to-door canvasing. Facebook fans got pictures of friends in swing states and were asked to encourage them to act. Using that approach, 1 in 5 peer-to-peer appeals led to the desired action. Assumptions, gut, intuition, campaign experience, all took a backseat to strategy shifts solidly backed up by data. Zeroing in on demographics likely to back the President and tracking their mood daily literally changed the voter landscape. The Romney team watched Obama voters appear seemingly out of thin air. One Obama campaign aide said, “We ran the election 66,000 times every night.” Which brings us to your organization. If you’re starting to feel like the battle-cry of “but this is the way we’ve always done it” is starting to put you in an extremely vulnerable position, you’re right. Social has become a key communication tool of the 21st century. Failing to use it, or failing to invest in a deep understanding of who your customers and prospects are so the content you post there will achieve desired actions and results, will leave you waking up one morning wondering, “What happened?”@mikestilesPhoto stock.xchng

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